apple « stopmebeforeiblogagain

As you may already know I use Dell Netbooks with Apple OSX and I previously wrote a post about how you can too.

I recently encountered a problem with the Dell Mini (Inspiron) 9 that I found no real helpful solution to fixing on the intarnets, so I thought I’d just take a moment to share what I did to fix it. Sort of.

Whatever you do, don’t buy a new Dell battery before you’ve tried this. If it doesn’t work, you’re probably better off buying a new (used) Mini 9 on e.g. eBay instead, cost/benefit wise. You can always use the old Mini 9 Hackintosh on mains in the kitchen, on the night stand, in the bathroom, give it to someone who could need a computer or whatever.

Problem / Symptoms:

Battery not recognized on boot up (“Battery not identified, press F1 to continue”)
OSX reports that the battery is 100% charged (although you know it’s not)
White power/charging ligt and red low battery warning light blinking, disco style
Battery will not charge whatever you (even downgrading BIOS to A00) do and will eventually run out of juice
GOTO 10

Possible Causes:

BIOS upgraded to A05 or above
Something else (I have no idea. You tell me.)

Conditions / Prerequisites:

Dell Mini 9 with blinking leds, disco style
NetBookInstaller 0.8.4 RC1 “special edition”
OSX Snow Leopard updated to 10.6.5 installed on said Dell Mini 9 by way of said version of NetBookInstaller
USB stick with Dell I910 Mini/Vostro A90 USB Key Drive flashBIOS Utility installed (Don’t ask me how to get it. Search around.)
Make sure the battery is connected to said Dell Mini 9

Recipe / Fix:

Boot from said “Dell I910 Mini/Vostro A90 USB Key Drive flashBIOS Utility” on said USB stick
Select the Mini/Inspiron A04 BIOS and flash it
Wait for the flashing to complete and reboot the Netbook

Et voilà. On boot, there should be no nagging “battery not identified: press F1 to continue”, no more disco blinking of LED lights and the battery will now recharge. I hope. At least it now does for me. For good measures, let the Hackintosh recharge the recommended-from-Dell 12 hours before using it

I’ll mention here that this worked with the original Dell battery that came with the Mini 9 and with my Chinese 8 cell aftermarket battery.

Problems / Still to resolve:

If you pull the mains power plug out, the red/white disco style blinking will return
If you pull the mains power and re-insert it, OSX reports that the battery is 100% charged (although it’s not)
If you pull the mains power and re-insert it, the Hackintosh will not recharge
GOTO 10

Kludge to the Fix:

Don’t pull the mains when turned on
Re-insert mains
Reboot
Or turn off, turn on, let boot
Or keep it turned off, connected to mains, see if the white charging light is on, if the battery is actually charged
Or rinse, lathe and repeat the flashing of the BIOS if the battery won’t charge once again

Hey, at least you do not need to buy a new battery or a new Dell Mini 9. I never promised you a rose garden.

Here’s the official Dell response to Mini 9 and 10v battery problems on the Dell support forums, although it did not help me initially. I tried to flash the BIOS back to A00 through each revision up to and including A06 with no positive result. Flashing directly from A06 to A04 with the battery inserted seems to have worked for me.

This has nothing to do with the “Airplane Mode” on Linux issue or the 12 hours charge-up battery issue, mind you. Those are red herrings if you’re using OSX and have the symptoms I described above.

In other personal Hackintosh news, I recently acquired a Dell Mini 10v off of eBay and upgraded it with 2GB RAM, a 60G SSD and OSX 10.6.5. I find the size of the keys more convenient for work use than the Mini 9. My experience so far is that the Mini 10v works flawlessly with OSX 10.6.5 – including sleep. I’d recommend it instead of the Mini 9 if you’d ask for my opinion on the two.

I do have a 3G iPad and I’m really happy with it, should you be wondering, but I still find myself needing a “real” OS for work use from time to time. Maybe it’s more due to my mouse, keyboard, desktop paradigm conditioning over the years than the iPad iOS and Apps. Sure, I’d really love to get the new MacBook Air, but as a bootstrapping entrepreneur, I find the cost/benefit of a Hackintosh to be the more conscientious choice at the moment.

Do you use OSX on non-Apple hardware? Tell me about your experiences.

Bonus Material:

How to change the HD for a SSD in a Dell Mini 10v