Update: Due to issues with Chameleon RC4 when upgrading Snow Leopard, this guide has been reverted back to Chameleon RC3.
**Post updated with Chameleon RC4 files**
The most widely used and probably the best bootloader out for OSX86 systems, Chameleon, is out with yet another update. This latest version ditches that ugly, white text and black background junk from Chameleon 1 and upgrades to 100% sexy. But not only sexy was added to the latest version. Now, you will see a logo for the OS you select to boot from which only increases the sexy. Plus, non-bootable partitions are no longer displayed and Snow Leopard support has been added. Additionally, you have the option to hide partitions. RC4 mostly boasts behind the scenes updates, with the exception of the new hidden partition option. You can see the official release notes here. To be honest, I’m still waiting for a final release as Chameleon is in its 4th Release Candidate!!!
So now that you know about the update, go ahead and download the file and then follow the instructions below. Pay close attention as these instructions have changed from previous versions of Chameleon.
1. Make sure the untarred folder is on your desktop.
2. Open Terminal and type “diskutil list” w/o the quotes
3. Find the partition with OS X installed on it and remember its identifier ie. rdisk0s1
4. Type cd /Users/YOURUSERNAME/Desktop/Chameleon-2.0-RC3-r658-bin/i386 but replacing YOURUSERNAME with, you guessed it, your username.
5. Copy and paste the following commands into terminal but replacing DISK_IDENTIFIER with the code you were supposed to remember before (Don’t forget the r in the front of the disk identifier)
sudo fdisk -f boot0 -u -y /dev/rdisk0
sudo dd if=boot1h of=/dev/DISK_IDENTIFIER
sudo cp boot /
6. Reboot
***For those of you that had any custom settings in com.apple.boot.plist – this file will remain untouched so any boot flags or other stuff you may have added will still be used at boot***
If you found this guide useful then feel free to make a donation by clicking the link at the end of the Authors Mini-Biography. Any amount truly does help.
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January 18th, 2010 at 11:11 am
Try reinstalling Chameleon RC4 following this guide and see if it resolves your issue. Also, trying copying your com.apple.boot.plist to the Extra folder in the root of your HDD.
January 18th, 2010 at 9:45 am
Hello Thomas,
thanks for your response.
It didn’t work.
I’ve checked if the boot file was really copied to / comparing the timestamps:
sudo cp -p boot / (added -p)
The file really went to /…
cat /Library/Preferences/SystemConfiguration/com.apple.Boot.plist
Kernel
mach_kernel
Kernel Flags
Timeout
10
January 15th, 2010 at 12:44 pm
Nysos- Try copying the lines from this file to your com.apple.boot.plist (found in the Extra folder in the root of your hard drive). If the file isn’t in your Extra folder, it will be in Library/Preferences/SystemConfiguration.
January 15th, 2010 at 8:24 am
Hello Thomas,
nice tutorial… :)
I still have one problem: chameleon won’t show up at boot time…
Mac OS is directly booted.
I’m using Mac OS X 10.6 and Ubuntu 9.10.
I followed the steps you specified in this post “Booting Ubuntu With The Chameleon Bootloader!”
I am completely new to Mac and installed the chameleon boot 3 times without changes, any clues?
January 13th, 2010 at 7:00 am
Verify that OS X is the active/boot partition (Using GParted in Linux), and then reinstall Chameleon.If this doesn’t work then it may be beneficial to attempt to install Chameleon RC3. Also, which Linux distro are you using?
January 13th, 2010 at 2:55 am
Dear Thomas,
I tried it and the commands worked fine this time, but when i restarted, i got three options at chemloeon at the boot time.
1) Linux,
2) Leaopord
When i select Linux, it loads grubu correctly, but when i select Leaopord, nothing loads up, only one message says Loading Darwin and thats it, but there is no real loading CPU is halted etc. This is when i tried with RC4.
But when I install chemloan version1, it does not show any boot time options for Linux etc and loads Mac OS straight away and i get to the Login screen as desired.
Can you please point further out about RC4 setup?
January 8th, 2010 at 4:11 pm
Don’t forget the r in front of the Disk Identifier. So you should be entering “sudo fdisk -f boot0 -u -y /dev/rdisk0s4″
January 8th, 2010 at 3:00 pm
Dear Thomas,
I setup grub correctly from inside ubuntu on its own partition instead of MBR. Then i booted in OSx and fired the following command, i get the resource busy message and chameoleon RC4 could not be installed.
$ sudo fdisk -f boot0 -u -y /dev/disk0s4
Password:
fdisk: /dev/disk0s4: Resource busy
Any clue to resolve it out as grub is still the default loader in absence of chameoleon
December 15th, 2009 at 8:44 pm
Glad it fixed your issue!
December 14th, 2009 at 9:49 am
Works great on my laptop, solved my problems on how to hide partitions
Thanks
—miaxz Says:
2. August 2009 at 6:02 AM
Hi there
I am triple booting (XP, OS X, MediaDirect) in my dell 1525 with chameleon
bootloader RC2, its great but i dont want the dell utility partition to appear
in the bootloader menu, is there any way to hide this partition?
thanks a lot
November 22nd, 2009 at 12:17 pm
brilliant..solved my problem….THANKS
November 13th, 2009 at 7:32 am
Will chameleon bootloader have Google Chrome OS Support?
Because it should, Its apparently coming out very soon now and I want to be one of the first to start using it.
October 4th, 2009 at 10:06 am
Sorry but I can’t provide support for Boot-132 installs as I have never tried one myself so I wouldn’t know where to begin in troubleshooting.