Inspiron 5523 - fine tuning of El Capitan installation

[45br]

Hey guys, 

I also got my Inspiron 5523 (i5, 6gb, hd4000) rocking the OS X El Capitan with Clover. 

So far I got these working:

- Sound - using Voodoo Audio kext (using fn+multimediaKeys to control volume doesn't work, neither does dragging the volume slider on the top bar up and down, the only way to do it is in iTunes)
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And these I need to fix:
-RT5370 chipset based wifi dongle.
-Battery Information
-Fix shutdown/restart issue where it stays on black screen with a cursor for minutes (5-10).
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I read in other forums that I should make changes to my dsdt and ssdt files for better performance. Then I found this thread. It seems to have everything I am looking for (dsdt and ssdt files), but I am not really sure it matches my bootloader (clover). Is it safe to proceed and copy these files on my EFI drive?

Thanks.

 

[Jake Lo]

IF you have the same CPU as OP, then yes, both DSDT and SSDT can be use; otherwise, just use the DSDT and generate your own SSDT.

As for audio, you could either modify the info.plist of VoodooHDA or opt to use the patched AppleHDA.

 

Try booting with the DSDT and see if performance is better, I'll assist you with the patched AppleHDA for El Capitan.

[Hervé]

Battery information should work with Rehabman's ACPIBatteryManager v1.60.4 but may require DSDT patching. Often the case with EC...

 

Shutdown/restart is also a typical issue sorted by DSDT patching. Rehabman's has a whole set of DSDT patches on his repository. Look it up.

 

For the RT5370-based wireless dongle, check the Ralink/Mediatek web site. They list drivers per chip and per OS. You'll soon see if it is supported under OS X or not. Mavericks or Yosemite drivers, if they exist, should work without issues under EL Capitan. From memory, I believe it is. Check our non-exhaustive list of supported/unsupported wireless cards here.

[45br]

@Jake Lo not really, he has a core i7 while mine is core i5. As per the Audio, I've downloaded a patch for AppleHDA from insanelymac, executed it and the sound works fine. Volume control is still not possible but it doesn't  really matter to me that much. I just need a battery indicator and this wifi dongle working
I am aware this might be a noob question, but how do I tell Clover to use the DSDT and SSDT files from the OP's post?


@Hervé

Thanks, I'll try that ACPIBatteryManager, even though that might be included in my Clover config as I'm using exactly the one recommended from RehabMan. 

Regarding the shutdown issue: I will try that also. Meanwhile, on clover boot screen, I've set"Shutdown fix" to [+] (enabled), but it doesn't seem to work. And this is what it shows when I run sudo shutdown -r now on terminal:

shutdown: / is busy updating; waiting for lock.

As per the wifi dongle, I can get it working on my other hackintosh (ML), and could get the ssid's showing when I had a fresh install on this laptop too (but couldnt connect), but after removing SIP and trying every related method from my google search, it came to my attention that the DWA-140 prefpane did not even recognize the device, whereas before it used to show details like : MAC Adress, Driver Version and EPROM version too. I think its related to the fact that my laptop only has USB 3 ports. Also the Ralink USB Device is shown in the USB 3.0 Hub on the System Information util. Here's a screenshot.

I am trying to avoid having to patch the DSDT&SSDTs as much as I can because they really do sound a little hard to comprehend for a starter like myself. But I can see that I probably will not be able to get things working without doing so. I'll be dumping my ASCI files to my EFI drive after I finish this reply, and will be trying to experiment and hopefully start understanding things.

In the meantime I would really appreciate if you guys could help me fix this wifi dongle (my priority) problem so I wouldn't have to restart and boot in Windows everytime I need to access the Internet.

Thanks!

[Jake Lo]

In that case, copy only DSDT.aml to /EFI/Clover/ACPI/Patched

You are not able to change volume even with the patched AppleHDA could be because you still have VoodooHDA and AppleHDADisabler installed. Remove both and AppleHDA should work if it's the correct one.

[45br]

That worked quite good. I removed VoodooHDA and now I have a smoother+greater volume and the ability to control it with the function keys! 
Thanks a lot Jake!

I did put the DSDT to the patched folder. I have not been able to see any significant increase in performance as I still have no way of benchmarking it without internet available. Is it safe to assume that I will now only need to generate my SSDT, and if so do you know any good read explaining the process?

[Jake Lo]

Download this. Execute ssdtprGen.sh from the terminal. It'll generate 2 files to the Desktop. Copy SSDT.aml to /EFI/Clover/ACPI/Patched.

Regarding the performance change with the DSDT added, are you able to shutdown properly or restart?

[45br]

Okay, I executed ssdtprGen.sh and this was the output. I looked up for "0x0604" in my DSDT.aml using MaciASL but couldn't find any matching string.

Nevertheless, after I got the generated ssdt.aml I renamed it to SSDT.aml and copied it at EFI/Clover/ACPI/Patched as per your instructions. After doing so, I tried restarting it and it didn't hang like it usually does. But after powering it up I thought lets just be sure its fixed, I tried shutting it down and was greeted by a black screen and my mouse cursor staying there, just chillin, like they always do. Tried 2 other times, still the same.

I don't think its related to my DSDT as I did not have this problem when my my OS X was freshly installed. It came only after I started messing up to fix this precious ralink chip wifi dongle.

In other news, my boot time has shrunk for 20 seconds (it used to be 1 minute, now is 40 seconds; HDD ofc), which is great.

Thanks.

[Jake Lo]

You could ignore that message. It's known by the author of the script.

Remove the Ralink software and kexts, see if that makes a difference.

Also check your system log for any clue as to the shutdown issue.

 

edit:

see here.  You probably could ignore the SIP part since your Hackintosh should already have it disabled.

[45br]

That was the exact tutorial I followed which led me to disabling my SIP.

I removed my Ralink software and kexts, but it did not make any difference. Then I went on and re-enabled my SIP. I tried to uncheck those boxes which I checked 2 days ago (not really sure I was 100% correct on all of them), but it seems to have fixed my shutdown issue.