How to install OpenBSD on MacBook Air?

[Skinny]

As I read here OpenBSD works OK on MacBook Air:

The new KMS code brings up the MBA's eDP display in 1366x768 with backlight control. ACPI works as expected for battery/AC status, CPU throttling, and full suspend/resume support. The Broadcom wireless card does not work, [...]

How can I install OpenBSD on this device?

I tried:
- Installed rEFIt on MacOS X to get a boot selector
- dd'ed install53.iso to USB-Stick (sd0c) using another OBSD machine
=> reFIt doesn't recognize the USB-Stick as a bootable device

I don't really care about dual boot. Using whole wd0 for OBSD would be OK.

[daemonfowl]

Hi Skinny !

I don't really care about dual boot. Using whole wd0 for OBSD would be OK.

Then simply choose MBR instead of HFS and for customized install remove all existing partitions -if any- except i as it is needed then add new partitions the way you wish
on reboot go to openfirmware and type :

  setenv boot-device hd:,ofwboot /bsd 
  reset-all

So that you can autoboot the bsd kernel.
That has always been my case (ie. whole disk , iBook/iMac)

[Skinny]

Thanks for the answer, daemonfowl.
Unfortunately, the MacBook Air doesn't have Open Firmware.

[katokan]

If you haven't gotten the usb stick to work maybe you could try a DVD? I've done an OpenBSD install on my macbook using rEFIt with a DVD

Otherwise there is unetbootin but I can't vouch for whether that actually works.

[Skinny]

Sounds great.
Did you use the whole disk for OpenBSD or is rEFIt required every time to boot?

[katokan]

I did a whole disk install. rEFIt was used to boot into the install disc the first time. After that the OpenBSD bootloader has been able to boot just fine.

[Skinny]

That's even better. Thx for sharing!

[pttymuth]

I've got a nice new MacBook Air and while I'm not planning on uninstalling OS X anytime soon, I will certainly put OpenBSD on an Apple Laptop. The idea of it just sounds so cool. Thanks for the thread!