A few months back, I saw that I was running out of space on my home theater Mac Mini. This was a 2007 Mac Mini with 2 GBs of RAM running 10.6.8, with a 1 TB drive that held media content and 2 TB backup drive connected via FireWire 400. I also noticed that it was struggling to play the latest HD movies from the iTunes Store.
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This Mini also acted as my Tivo2Go server and DVD player, so I couldn’t just replace the Mini with an Apple TV and call it a day. So I pitched to my wife the idea of replacing the 2007 Mac Mini with a newer Mini and upgrading the storage with a 2 TB drive to hold media content and 4 TB backup drive connected via FireWire 800. To help future-proof it against future storage needs, I also wanted to get a Mini with Thunderbolt capability.
“Fine, but it needs to be able to run Front Row.”
That was a problem. The first Mini models to come with Thunderbolt were the 2011 Mac Minis. The 2011 Mac Minis were among the first Mac models that supported only 10.7.0 and higher. Front Row is noticeably absent in 10.7.0 and higher .
In short, I needed a 2011 Mac Mini to run Mac OS X 10.6.8.
After a bit of research and head-scratching, I was able to get both what I wanted and what my wife wanted. See below the jump for the details.
I did have one lucky break, in that the early 2011 MacBook Pros and the 2011 Mac Minis are almost identical hardware-wise. The early 2011 MacBook Pros ran 10.6.8 because they were released before 10.7.0’s release in July 2011, so (theoretically) the 2011 Mac Minis could as well.
When I researched the subject, I found a lot of people online trying to run 10.6.8 on 2011 Mac Minis with varying degrees of success. The most common issues were lower performance, video that displayed a very pinkish hue on the screen and Thunderbolt not working. However, I hit pay dirt when I came across this Apple discussion forum thread because someone in the thread named newfoundglory had not only figured out the necessary driver support; they had also been nice enough to package up the drivers into one installer package: the NFG Mac Mini 2011 installer
This installer package turned out to be the key. It installed the correct drivers to make Thunderbolt work, make the video work normally and installed the correct hardware profiles to allow the Mini’s hardware performance on Snow Leopard to be on-par with Lion.
With this driver package available, here’s how to install Mac OS X 10.6.8 on a 2011 Mac Mini.
1. Start the Mini in Target Disk Mode and attach it to a Mac that can itself run 10.6.8.
2. Erase the Mini’s boot drive.
3. Install Mac OS X 10.6.x onto the Mini’s boot drive via Target Disk Mode. (For this, I used the 10.6.7 install disks that came with my early 2011 MacBook Pro.)
4. Once the installation is finished, install the 10.6.8 v1.1 Combo Update onto the Mini’s boot drive via Target Disk Mode.
5. Once 10.6.8 is on the Mini’s boot drive, disconnect the Mini from the other Mac and boot the Mini from its own boot drive.
At this point, you’ll see the pink video output, Thunderbolt not work and everything else because the Mini doesn’t have the right 10.6.8 drivers for its hardware.
6. Install the NFG Mac Mini 2011 installer package and reboot.
This installer adds the needed driver support to the Mini, so you should see the pink video and other problems go away.
7. To be on the safe side, I reinstalled the 10.6.8 v1.1 Combo Update at this point and rebooted again. I’m not certain it was necessary, but it did not hurt.
8. Ran Software Update to get all available updates for 10.6.8.
Following Software Update’s final run of updates, I started working with the Mini and everything looked like it was working, including the all-important Front Row. Front Row was able to communicate with iTunes 11.x, so it looked like I was set until I attached an Apple USB SuperDrive and tried to play a movie DVD. No go; neither Front Row nor Apple’s DVD Player application recognized it as a valid DVD drive.
Why was this? After all, the 2011 Mini never came with an internal DVD player. This should have worked; except for the fact that the 2011 Mini was never supposed to run 10.6.8 either. All of the 2011 Macs that ran 10.6.8 were laptops that came with internal optical drives.
What fixed it was some additional driver modification. Using information found here on MacOSXHints, I edited /System/Library/Frameworks/DVDPlayback.framework/Versions/A/DVDPlayback with the 0xED hex editor. What I was doing was updating DVDPlayback‘s definition of an acceptable DVD player by finding the word Internal and replacing it with External, by searching for (hex) 496E7465726E616C and replacing with (hex) 45787465726E616C.
Once this part was complete, I restarted and put a movie into the DVD drive. Front Row accepted it and started playing the movie.
It’s now been a couple of days since getting all of this set up and so far, it’s been fairly trouble-free. Hopefully, this helps the next person who wants to get a similar setup going.
Since OS-X Mavericks (10.9) Apple have been releasing their OS X upgrades for free. This means if you have any version of OS X newer than 10.9 then you can upgrade it to the latest version for free. There are three ways you can upgrade.
Download the Installer from Apple directly to the computer that you want to install the new OS X onto.
Take your computer into the nearest Apple Store and they will do the upgrade for you.
Make a USB thumb drive installer that you can plug into your computer to upgrade it.
Method 1 is Apple’s suggestion method, but if you have more than one computer it requires you to download the OS X update more than once. Method 3 gives you a thumb drive that you can use multiple times to install OSX, and you can even boot off it in an emergency if your hard drive crashes. It is very handy to have a bootable version of the latest OSX on a thumb drive lying around So I suggest option three
This article tells you how to make a USB thumb drive installer so you can upgrade any computer to the latest OS X.
It also tells you how to work out what is the newest version of OSX that you can run on your computer.
1. Look up what version of OS X your Macintosh can run.
Some older Macintosh computers won’t run the latest version of OS X.
For example, the 2006 Mac mini “Core Duo” 1.83 will only run up to System 10.6.8, while the the 2008 Apple MacBook Air will only run up to 10.7.5.
So before you go downloading it’s good to check which version your computer is able to run. The folks over at everyMac.com have helpfully made a list of what the newest OSX that runs on every Mac model is. You can access that list here.
2. Update to the newest update of your OSX version.
(e.g. 10.6.8)
The major OS X versions have different names and numbers.
Within these major versions there are also smaller software updates. For example 10.6.1, 10.6.2 etc. These minor updates are simple updates and you just update them by going to the Apple menu and selecting ‘Software Update’ or by going to the Apple menu, App Store and then ‘check for software update’.
Before you do a major update to a new version of OS X it is good to make sure that your current version is up to date because some installers require you to have an updated version of your current version. My laptop had Snow Leopard 10.6.5, but the ‘Mountain Lion’ Installer I wanted to use needed 10.6.8 so I ran Software Update’ and it upgraded to 10.6.8 first.
3. Download the Installer for the new version that you want
(e.g. 10.11 El Capitan)
The easiest way to get a copy of the installer for OS X is to go the Apple website or the App Store and type in the version that you want. I went to the ‘App Store’ and typed in El Capitan and this was the first result that appeared:
All you need to do is click on the download icon and it will download to your computer.
If you are looking for a version of OSX that does not appear on the App Store, you can find it in ‘Purchased’ if you have downloaded it previously. In my ‘Purchased’ tab of App Store I can see Yosemite, Mavericks, Mountain Lion, Lion ( even though I did not purchase them I simply downloaded them). Tf you have not downloaded it previously and you want an older version that is not the latest version, you may need to find a friend who has downloaded it previously and get it from there computer.
If you have a version of OS X that is older than 10.6 you will need to pay to upgrade to Mountain Lion (10.8) first because it is only versions later than 10.8 that are free. You can buy 10.7 or 10.8 at the Apple Store here.
4. Make a copy of the OS X Installer.
The installer will download to your ‘Applications’ folder. If you run it from there, it will install the latest OSX but then it will delete itself. Given that these installers are huge files – 6 or 7 GB, it makes sense to save a copy so that if you ever need to install it on another computer you don’t need to do the entire download again. This is especially the case if you have three or four different computers. You can use the same installer file on different computers. An iMac, a MacBook Air, a Mac Mini, a MacBook Pro all use the same OSX installer. So it is much faster and uses less of your Internet bandwidth to download the installer once and use it on your different computers via a thumb drive rather than downloading it four times.
To make a copy of the installer you simply need to click on it, hold the ‘option’ key and drag it to your desktop. A green plus will appear to indicate that it will make a copy of the installer.
Hold down the option key while dragging installer to your desktop and a copy will be made.
5. Use DiskMaker X to make the installer USB drive.
Now that you have made a copy of the installer, grab an 8GB thumb drive, and download this program called Disk Maker X.
You can do this manually, and I have explained how here, but DiskMaker X automates the process and makes it a lot simpler.
Run Disk Maker X and it will ask you for the location of the Installer file. It will also ask you to choose your thumb drive. Show it where the installer file is, select your USB thumb drive, and it will make a bootable version of the OS X installer.
This maker X will ask you what version of OSX you want to make an installer for. Click on the version you want and then it will ask you for the installer file that you downloaded in step 3. It does the rest!
You might notice that the latest version of DiskMaker X only works with the latest three versions of OS X
If you want to work with a version of OSX older than Mavericks (e.g. 10.8 Mountain Lion) then you can download an older version of DiskMaker X from their website which works with the older installers.
6. Install OSX from the USB
Now all you need to do is take that USB thumbdrive, stick it in the computer that you want to upgrade, and double click on the icon that appears on desktop. The installation is automatic. This installer thumb drive is identical to the thumb drive that you would have if you purchased it from Apple.
Related posts:
How to install OSX Lion on multiple computersHow to install Lion from scratch if you don’t have Snow Leopard.How to make an OS X Lion USB thumb driveHow to do a clean install of OS X Yosemite.How to make a bootable OS X El Capitan Installer on a USB driveikechukwusays:August 12, 2016 at 5:33 pm
i have been trying for ages to update my mac book from 10.7.5 can i download this update and get it to work? it is really frustrating me. if there are other means or links, please i would love to be in on the info. thanks.
ReplyDAVE WESTsays:March 19, 2017 at 9:31 am
I am on Snow Leopard and I downloaded El Capitan. Total disaster. It would not let me use scanner on Epson SX415 printer. I could not use my MacFamilyTree with 200 people on it. Iphoto went haywire plus various other problems. Fortunately I had backed up a few days previously so I deleted El Capitan and it all works OK again Only trouble is I can’t update my web browser so I have to use my ipad UGGGHHH
Replycraigsays:May 12, 2019 at 10:52 am
I have just bought football manager 2019 , but i have os x version 10.9.5 but its saying i need 10.10 or later, can this be sorted ?? any help be greatly appreciated??