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Mac Pro Classic, Snow Leopard, and 64-bit kernel
- Thread starter bozz2006
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awesome discussion guys. Lot of info since last night! I see it's getting into discussion about netkas' injector. Can we keep the focus on the 2006 mac pro + snow leopard + 64-bit kernel? Thanks for all the info to you all, especially netkas. As I'm one who doesn't have much knowledge on how this stuff works, I appreciate you coming and spelling it out for me.
I don't listen to marketing "********". I listen to Apple engineers.
With that do what you want but don't come back in here later asking why your computer is acting up.
Make sure you strip out all the old PPC stuff from that driver you downloaded too because it's designed for 10.5 not 10.6
Yeah, there's a lot of stuff like that from ADC. RAM limits on 2006 MP is another one. And a whole host of silly stuff about iMac and Mini that I read about too. O-Well.
With your Mac there would likely be very little difference between 32 bit and 64 bit Kernel. 64 bit kernel is _needed_ for machines with enormous amounts of memory, like 64 GB or more (for every page of RAM, some small amount of kernel memory is used. No problem for a 32 bit kernel if you have 16 GB, but with 64 GB it is a problem). And since we are getting there, Apple _must_ produce a 64 bit kernel for future machines that will need it. But if your machine doesn't have that kind of RAM, it won't make a difference.
I hope you are wrong. I run mostly protools... mostly for video, some audio. I hoping to see huge improvements in rendering and effects once FCS has been rewritten. Most of this might actually come from openCL rather than a 64 bit kernel, but I'm betting you can't have the openCL without the new kernel. But then I've been know to be wrong before.
hyram
Hey guys - interesting if not heated discussion. ;-)
Here I am on my Pro and am looking at SL build 411 (very nice by the way, it is incredibly snappy). I'm not even using my RAID 0 volume to boot from, and apps launch in half the time or less, it's incredible.
Of course, the 64-bit kernel is NOT loaded in this release either. Did any other Pro owners (2008/2009 models) see if this was the case on your machines?
However, it's good to see every OTHER part of the OS is loading in 64-bit. ITunes and other apps aren't yet, but I would imagine that's a matter of time.
So will it even matter? According to the screenshot, just about every part of the OS is running in 64-bit, so will we even notice when the kernel goes 64?
Just wondering out loud,
JP
Here I am on my Pro and am looking at SL build 411 (very nice by the way, it is incredibly snappy). I'm not even using my RAID 0 volume to boot from, and apps launch in half the time or less, it's incredible.
Of course, the 64-bit kernel is NOT loaded in this release either. Did any other Pro owners (2008/2009 models) see if this was the case on your machines?
However, it's good to see every OTHER part of the OS is loading in 64-bit. ITunes and other apps aren't yet, but I would imagine that's a matter of time.
So will it even matter? According to the screenshot, just about every part of the OS is running in 64-bit, so will we even notice when the kernel goes 64?
Just wondering out loud,
JP
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The only things that I can tell you for sure is that it will run 64-Bit Windows and 64-Bit Linux perfectly, and those use pure 64-bit kernels.
your screenshot is pretty useless
make it to show all processes and make a screenhot where we can see process named kernel_task
well....
i have some ideas, if mac can boot from usb sticks( it can afaik), we can try to boot any mac to x64 with hackintosh bootloader
need to try the trick with lipo first.
after some tests with macbook4,1(efi32) got those conclusions:
even if u lipo kernel, snow leo usualy uses prelinked kernel from another location.
removed prelinked kernel and lipoed kernel to x86_64, booter doesnt want to boot it, ****** apple disabled such ability.
Idea - install osx86 bootlloader to usb stick, boot from usb stick (with bootcamp help), and boot your snowleopard to x64 with osx86 booter
will report later if it worked.
P.S. this doesnt applies to machines with core duo/core solo
even if u lipo kernel, snow leo usualy uses prelinked kernel from another location.
removed prelinked kernel and lipoed kernel to x86_64, booter doesnt want to boot it, ****** apple disabled such ability.
Idea - install osx86 bootlloader to usb stick, boot from usb stick (with bootcamp help), and boot your snowleopard to x64 with osx86 booter
will report later if it worked.
P.S. this doesnt applies to machines with core duo/core solo
Apple says in the web:
64-bit support
requires a Mac with a 64-bit processor.
(http://www.apple.com/macosx/specs.html)
Mac Pro Rev.A has a 64-bit processor so We will have a 64-bit kernel...
64-bit support
requires a Mac with a 64-bit processor.
(http://www.apple.com/macosx/specs.html)
Mac Pro Rev.A has a 64-bit processor so We will have a 64-bit kernel...
64-bit support by apple can mean anything that makes your 64-bit apps run. I would not be surprised if they fudge it again somehow.
I mean which self and customer respecting computer company would leave customers with known faulty or seriously defective firmware like Apple does. EFI32 is unable to boot multiple OD images like those for Vista anytime upgrade DVDs. They fixed it with EFI64 but never cared about millions of MBPs and MP which are really designed for 64-bit Windows that comes mostly in multiple image DVDs. All this Windows bragging and then you find out they cannot even boot the most interesting (64-bit) versions.
The most humble and minor garage manufacturer of graphic cards or mother bords in China would have released a BIOS update by now. It is standard policy of Apple to never make any firmware improvements unless they are pushed into it by a public blame and shame campaign.
I mean which self and customer respecting computer company would leave customers with known faulty or seriously defective firmware like Apple does. EFI32 is unable to boot multiple OD images like those for Vista anytime upgrade DVDs. They fixed it with EFI64 but never cared about millions of MBPs and MP which are really designed for 64-bit Windows that comes mostly in multiple image DVDs. All this Windows bragging and then you find out they cannot even boot the most interesting (64-bit) versions.
The most humble and minor garage manufacturer of graphic cards or mother bords in China would have released a BIOS update by now. It is standard policy of Apple to never make any firmware improvements unless they are pushed into it by a public blame and shame campaign.
I'm pretty sure this isn't true. You can load whatever bootloader you want into EFI on a Mac. rEFIt is an example.
If you're in ADC, Apple gives you directions on how to force a Mac to boot into x64. I'm not going to detail them here, for obvious reasons, but there is no need to write a boot loader, and I'd stop speculating until 10.6 is released.
Good one! I found this information a while back too. As far as I know, the first gen Mac Pro is 64-bit as you said.
You mean by starting up holding down the 6 and 4 keys at the same time?... or are you talking about a different method?
There is a firmware independent way to force it to boot 64 bit. I don't know if this means it will still work on the 32 bit EFI Mac Pro, but you can force it to boot 64 bit without modifying any EFI boot configs.
Edit: Why is this an issue anyway? You can still run 64 bit apps without the 64 bit kernel, and you can still access the full amount of memory. Seems kind of like a non issue to me...
I agree. It's really not a big deal. Does anyone even have enough RAM to make a difference?
It's kind of funny that my 3 year old Mac Pro only runs two 64bit apps so far... Chess and XCode. Hah!
I think most of the speed is going to come from Grand Central, OS optimizations and the rewritten Cocoa Finder.
If I see a speed increase in Snow Leopard like the speed increase I saw from Tiger to Leopard, I'll be happy.
You can't put enough RAM in a Rev. A Mac Pro to require the 64 bit kernel.
Most of the reason Apple is moving to a 64 bit kernel now is to get developers to do 64 bit kernel extensions before 10.8 or 10.9 shows up...