Install Mac OS X (El Capitan, Yosemite,...) in VirtualBox in Mac OS X [Tutorial]

#1

In this thread, we show a specific tutorial to Install and Run a Mac OS X (El Capitan, Yosemite, Maverick) inside Mac OS X using VirtualBox.

PREPARATION

  • Download Virtual Box (Free) here.
  • Mac OS X (El Capitan, Yosemite, Maverick, Lion).app from Apple store.
    We would suggest downloading Yosemite from here, El Capitan from here, and Maverick from here.
  • A tool to handle the InstallESD.dmg named Github v1.2.0.

PROCESS

1. Configure the VirtualBox machine
+, RAM: At least 2048 MB or more.
+, Enable EFI mode.
+, If you face black screen when booting into the virtual machine, we need to set the chipset from ICH9 to PIIX3.

Virtual box setting.png1202x744 60.3 KB

A, Create a new virtual machine

Setting > System.

Enable EFI.jpg752x1074 74.9 KB

2. Prepare Install Disk

  • Open Terminal, use the following command line to install iesd

gem install iesd

iESD requires to install ruby-1.9.2 or later. Use the two following command lines to install Ruby.

ruby -e "$(curl -fsSL https://raw.githubusercontent.com/Homebrew/install/master/install)"
Then
brew install rbenv ruby-build

3. Make Yosemite, Mavericks or El Capitan bootable

  • No matter the OS X 10.9, 10.10 or 10.11, the InstallESD.dmg is not bootable. We therefore need to make a bootable file by BaseSystem.dmg. Open Terminal, then use the following command line.

iesd -i /Applications/Install\ OS\ X\ Mavericks.app -o Mavericks.dmg -t BaseSystem

Be noticed that you have to change to Mavericks.app to Yosemite.App or El Capitan.app at your particular case.

  • At for Mac using Intel Haswell CPU (Macs 2013 and later), we need to fake CPU to Ivy Bridge by the following command line.

/Applications/VirtualBox.app/Contents/MacOS/VBoxManage modifyvm --cpuidset 00000001 000306a9 00020800 80000201 178bfbff

  • If you want to install Mountain Lion & Lion (10.7 and 10.8), InstallESD.dmg is a bootable disk image. But we need to take off the kext AppleIntelCPUPowerManagement.kext.

iesd -i /Applications/Install\ OS\ X\ Mountain\ Lion.app -o Mountain\ Lion.dmg --install-extension NullCPUPowerManagement.kext

4. Now we can run the virtual machine and install Mac OS X without any raised troubles.
The result:

#2

I get it done! Thanks

OS X running inside Mac OS X via Virtual Box.jpg750x596 103 KB

#3

When I start my VM, everything works fine until this message appears: ****[IOBluetoothFamily][SearchForTransportEventTimeOutHandler] – Missing Bluetooth Controller Transport!"

#4

Hi, i try but not working. This step:
iesd -i /Applications/Install\ OS\ X\ Mavericks.app -o Mavericks.dmg -t BaseSystem

i editing the text to use El Capitan, but the file downloaded from appstore have different name, so i try to replace to have:
iesd -i /Applications/Install\ OS\ X\Install OS X El Capitan.app -o El Capitan.dmg -t BaseSystem

but not working fine.
I have try different path, different name, but the 3 step of your tutorial not working.
i try to install from VirtualBox on my macbook pro 2015 the El Capitan virtual machine.

Do u have idea how can i do to fix it?

thanks

#5

Just a note–for people copy/pasting the code above, you’ll get errors at the Haswell conversion portion of step three. You need to add your VM machine name between “modifyvm” and “–cpuidset”.