cosmicaug

Does this page help: https://osxlatitude.com/index.php?/topic/2120-inventory-of-unsupported-and-supported-wireless-cards/

I saw references to various folk in the 'Other Research' forum running various developer's preview versions of 10.11. Would I be correct that no one has posted here about running 10.11 on the E6400?

The trackpad kext did not seem to do anything until I tried to reboot. Trying to reboot was unsuccessful. Trying to reboot in recovery mode the keyboard woudn't even work.

New buttons from Ebay appear to have fixed the issue! I verified it in Linux with xev. The mode of failure resulting in an "identity crisis" for the left button is could be as simple as cross talk between the left button line and the right button line (though I don't know how that would happen). If both are on (pressing both buttons simultaneously), X Windows (and probably OS X) interprets that as button 2. Thus, if the left button can create a signal on both lines due to the hardware failure I suppose that could be seen as input from all three buttons by the OS. Unfortunately, I did not have the foresight to do a pre-test to rule out a "spontaneous remission" elsewhere.

WARNING! For anyone who wishes to try this, I am reporting here that when I did this it rendered OSX unbootable. The fix is easy, in theory. To fix this you just delete the 'VoodooPS2Controller.kext' file or rename it to have a different extension. However, you might find, as I did, that even if you can get a USB mouse to work in recovery mode you cannot use the keyboard. Command line based fixes cease to be practical if you are lacking a functioning keyboard. I ended up attaching the drive to an OSX VMWare Player Virtual machine and deleting the file from there. You might be able to do this from a Linux install as well but getting Linux to use the HFS+ file system in read/write mode can be tricky (it was more trouble for me than it was worth so I stopped trying since I know I'd have access to my virtual machine soon). If you wish to go that route, however, the Paragon file system driver might be the way to do it. Again, I was unable to do this myself but I was operating from a live DVD so it might be easier to get to work from a real install.

So I am wondering if there's any processing in those switches or if that happens on the trackpad (and the switches are just switches). Given the strange nature of the malfunction I am experiencing, if the second, that would imply that my extra cleaning of the switches should have been accompanied by extra cleaning of the trackpad (as I don't think a switch malfunction is likely to make the electronics "think" it's dealing with a different switch). It also implies that replacing the trackpad buttons will not fix my problem.

If I go to the Console and search in system.log there are references to ApplePS2ALPSGlidepoint. I thought that switching the buttons might be a good temporary workaround but I do not know how to do that. If I go to the Trackpad section of 'System Preferences' it does not offer me a choice for button assignment. In fact, there are no settings making any references to buttons.

Does one install that by dragging it to the Kext utility? I have done that and it changes nothing. I was actually referring to the keyboard buttons (three above the touchpad) and the keyboard pointing stick (the little stick between the 'G', 'H' & 'B' keys). I have noticed very curious things, though. I am starting to get the touchpad buttons (located below it) back but the left one is wrong. I noticed this when running the Mint 17.2 live DVD. Basically, though I have no idea how this is even possible, it seems as if my left button is having an identity crisis. I ran a program called "xev" that looks at the input that X is getting and it told me that it was reading my left button as button #2 even though it should read as button #1. My laptop thinks the left button is a middle button! Now I have borrowed a mouse and am actually running OSX while typing this and I've tested the trackpad buttons a bit. It seems like the left button is sometimes acting like a middle button (remember, there is no middle button on the trackpad itself), sometimes acting like the right button (this seems like the most frequent behavior now) and rarely acting like a left button. I have ordered replacement trackball buttons but I actually hope that it resolves this identity crisis on its own so that I do not have to disassemble the laptop a third time. By the way, is there any utility on OS X like xev that will tell me when the OS is seeing?

Is there any chance that the TrackPoint (specially the buttons) could be made to work? Of course, I am not going to even know how to follow instructions until I can borrow someone's mouse.

Weird! Mine is Broadcom based. An unfortunate side effect of the maple syrup incident is that shortly after I put the laptop back together the trackpad buttons stopped working. Attempting to clean the buttons did not fix the problem. I really dislike the fact that to get to the palm rest I have to remove the heatsink. Other laptops that I have taken apart seem to work similarly, however. But I digress....

Things I have learned this week: OSX 10.10.5 does not render the Dell E6400 hardware impervious to the effects of maple syrup (so if you were hoping that hackintoshing your Dell would help you cope with a maple syrup rich environment forget about it!). Maple syrup has an ability to flow around obstacles that is only exceeded by helium (the He being cooled to a superfluid state in this comparison). OSX does not know about the wifi hardware switch on the Dell E6400 (if you boot with the wifi disabled by said switch you may have to reboot to get wifi function back --though I imagine there must be a UNIX way to get it back without a reboot) Despite being called a "syrup", maple syrup could also be considered to be a very light brine (you are concentrating the electrolytes in xylem sap 20 to 50 fold, not just the sugars) and as such it is perfectly capable of shorting out electronic components. A thorough cleaning (tap water followed by distilled water followed by 91% isopropyl alcohol --the last helps to speed up drying) can bring maple syrup afflicted electronic components (including keyboards and trackpads) back to life. YMMV. Thorough cleanings need to be thorough.

The download works fine for me. IIRC, someone mentioned that using Chrome makes a difference.

The video seems good now. The only thing different is that I enabled SpeedStep in the BIOS (I rebooted and disabled it and verified that it makes video stutter when disabled). For my future reference, specs follow (I just put them in my signature as well): Latitude E6400 with BIOS updated to A34 Intel Core Duo 2.66GHz 3GB DDR2-800 (will bump this to 4 GB but not today) 80GB Western Digital HD (model WD800BEVS-75RST0) NVIDIA Quadro NVS 160M 256 MB video memory with a 1440x900 display, Dell Wireless 1510 No Bluetooth adapter for now (maybe I'll get one sometime) Integrated webcam with model ID: UVC Camera VendorID_3141 ProductID_25585 Ricoh SDHC card reader (VendorID:0x1180 ;DeviceID:0x0822) Running Yosemite 10.10.5 Not sure what else one would need to know.

I did the update to 10.10.5 and the sound stopped working. I took all files from the 0X574R/kext/10.10 folder from the zip file that krzysztofc10 provided and dragged them unto the Kext utility. It fixed it. I assume that's what I was supposed to do? Or is there a different recommended procedure? Anyway, sound works (though I still have the choppy videos issue --but I never expected it to magically fix itself so no surprise there).

The one thing that did not work when I got this laptop (I ordered it from Ebay without a drive & used a drive that I had lying around) was wifi but I knew it was 50/50 depending on what card came with the machine. The BROADCOM BCM94322HM8L DW 1510 MINICARD I had ordered after I installed Yosemite & verified non-working status of the card I had (some kind of Intel, IIRC) arrived a little bit ago and it worked just fine. As an aside, what is the difference between the wifi cards that have three antenna connectors and those that have two? I have run into both styles but I don't know the difference.