[SOLVED] Beige G3 Tower (oldworld) Massive Fail

[themacmeister]

I am trying to install Xubuntu 7.0.4 (Feisty Fawn) PPC onto my new (second hand) G3 Beige megatower with ATI Rage Pro (6MB VRAM). I have 584MB RAM, PCI USB Card (working in OS9.21&OSX 10.2), 6GB HDD (500MB for OS9, 500MB for swap, 5GB for /).

I have reset the PRAM, I am using latest BootX (1.22), and have a slow-burnt copy of Xubuntu PPC alternate install CD. I also have the 17" AV monitor with 2 ADB ports, headphone jack etc.

Using the Kernel and the RamDisk on the Xubuntu installer CD, I am able to boot into the text install for Xubuntu. Unfortunately, that is almost as far as I get. I have free space available for the Linux partitions, but the partitioner is flakey. I can only select XFS as an option if I select manual partitioning. If I select automatic using available space, It selects ext2 for /boot (32MB), and ext3 for the rest.

Here is where my problem occurs!

Upon creation and finishing partioning, the installer fails to mount ANY type of partition - and THEREFORE CANNOT CONTINUE the install!

I have heard that some people with OldWorld Macs need a custom built kernel. I have also heard that upping the RamDisk size in BootX helps a great deal.

Can someone please help me out here, as this could be a great linux box!

Cheers

[stream303]

There might be something in here that will help:

https://help.ubuntu.com/community/In...n/OldWorldMacs

I'd love to hear about a sucessful old-world install!

[themacmeister]

That was a great read, but unfortunately no help to me. I believe I need to modprobe ide_core (as I have one of the first IDE drives) and possibly even 'mesh' and 'mace'. I will try a full install again when I find time.

I am SURE I need to UP the RAMDISK size in BootX - that seems to be a given, seeing what I've read online. I will try all these options next time...

PS. The screen is very very dark - and very very bright with OS9/X. darn software controlled AV monitor!!

This is a 1 1/2 year old distro - but should be good enough for my purposes (if I wanted to go retro, I would have kept OS9!! or even updated to Tiger). Jeez, tiger would be slow on this machine I think (300MHz).

[stream303]

Just be careful with underscores and hyphens - I've seen them listed as ide-core and ide_core before, not knowing if it was a typo or not. I guess try it both ways to be sure.

[tiresia]

Just some thoughts: I installed Ubuntu Hardy on my PowerPC 7500 and on my beige g3 and there was no problem.
I had a PCI USB card as well, but I had to remove it, otherwise I got always a kernel panic.
Have you tried with a different CD Installer? Maybe also with Debian? Did you check the .iso image after the download?

[themacmeister]

Typing this in Firefox on my freshly installed Xubuntu 7.04 PPC Beige G3 MiniTower PowerMacintosh!!!! I will document my install procedure at the end of this post - to hopefully help those struggling with oldworld macs.

RTL8139D 10/100 PCI ethernet found and working now with ADSL. (better than built-in 10BaseT).

Screamer soundcard working OOTB.

ATI video driver working with or without "load DRI" in xorg.conf
Obviously no DRI support at the moment. I might try Mach64 driver later.

Listening to Joe Cocker in Audacious at the moment - very nice!

USB PCI card (generic) working beautifully. Printers (FX Docuprint 203A & HP Deskjet F2275) working beautifully. Computer is fairly responsive, considering.

Unaware if my G3 cache is enabled - not even sure if I have an L2 cache (pretty sure I only have an L1 cache of 1MB). see http://www.everymac.com/systems/appl...g3_300_mt.html for more info.

Instructions coming REAL SOON!!!

mplayer *IS* broken btw... found out for myself!

[themacmeister]

Step 1. (longest)

I have read many (well, one) posts that state zeroing all data when you reformat a hard disk is a first step to repeated success. I used a PLAIN HFS VOLUME, as you have read/write drivers under Linux. I selected Zero All Sectors in Drive Setup under MacOS 9.2.1 (under Initialisation Options). A 6GB ATA HDD took about 30min. Bigger disks mean bigger waits.

Use a custom partition setup of 200-500MB for OS9, can be smaller if you will never use OS9. Can be excrutiatingly small if you do a minimal install, and add internet utilities custom install (Aladdin StuffIt Expander). Using my method, you will not require FTP, HTTP, SCP or anything else.

Step 2. Install MacOS 9.x.x off a FULL install CD. Do not use an updater or recovery disk. The one I used was for a G4 9.2.1 (this is the first to contain the USB PCI Card extensions as a default - and a newer more reliable version at that). Make sure you install Aladdin Stuffit Expander - it is part of Internet Access.

Step 3. Boot into MacOS 9.x.x.

Download and install http://penguinppc.org/historical/benh/BootX_1.2.2.sit
You can download it on another machine and transfer it via USB Thumb Drive - It works in OS9 exactly like windows (except OS9 thinks it is a removable cartridge, REMEMBER THOSE?!).

Insert your Ubuntu/Xubuntu/Fedora Core/Mandrake/Mandriva CD, and copy the Kernel and ramdisk image to your Mac Desktop. The Kernel will almost always be called "vmlinux" and the ramdisk is usually called "initrd.gz" (for Initial Ramdisk).

Create a new folder in System Folder called "Linux Kernels" and move vmlinux in there.

Move initrd.gz loose in the System Folder.

Step 4. TIME TO INSTALL LINUX!!!

Launch BootXApp, it should be in your Control Panels folder if you dropped both BootX files onto your System Folder.

The vmlinux file should automagically be detected, and under the options button, select a custom ramdisk - select the initrd.gz file you copied into the System Folder earlier.

IMPORTANT: Set the ramdisk size UP from 8192. I chose 10240 - your mileage may vary depending on how much RAM you have installed.

When all this is done, you can click the "Linux" button.

The screen will go black, and you should see the typical scrolling white text of a Linux startup procedure.

To solve any non-loaded module problems, I used a second terminal (Control-Alt F3), and entered the following.

modprobe mesh
modprobe mace
modprobe ide_core
modprobe ide_disk

If you are using only SCSI, choose Force 'SCSI on' in BootX, and don't forget the above commands. FYI mesh=built-in ethernet, mace=built-in SCSI. mesh and mace may be back-to-front as well in their meanings

I got errors on mace and ide_core, but some systems may need these...

Go through the entire procedure as normal, except with the following caveats!!

a. Do a manual format, and select ext2 for the main portion of your partitioning. This was the safest way for me, as I had epic failure using ext3 previously. TAKE NOTE of the partition you formatted as / (root filesystem), as you will need to use it again in BootX. Also TAKE NOTE of the largest HFS partition, as you will need to mount that later as well.

I don't remember seeing it as an option, but I would have loved to use ReiserFS, as it performs wonderfully with many million small files, and the journal recovery process takes seconds, not MINUTES!

b. The install will seem to hang at certain points, in my case, it was at 86% of the original install, and also at 6% of the Xubuntu-Desktop install.

I believe it is timing out a lot of unnecessary wget commands, so it does take a LONG time (maybe 15-20min stall each time on a 300MHz G3).

You will get an alert at the end of the install that a bootloader could not be installed. This is FINE, as you will be using BootX to load Linux.

At the point when this warning occurs, you can go to the other terminal Cntrl-Alt-F3.

You need to mount your existing Mac and new Linux partition, just type:

mkdir /tmp/mac
mount -t hfs /dev/hda6 /tmp/mac
mkdir /tmp/lin
mount -t ext2 /dev/hda7 /tmp/lin
cp -R /tmp/lin/boot /tmp/mac/Desktop\ Folder/

This boot folder will be waiting on your OS9 desktop later, when you will need to replace vmlinux and initrd.gz you copied off the Linux CD earlier.

nano /etc/X11/xorg.conf

find the line that reads

load "dri"

and change it to:

# load "dri"

as your graphics drivers and kernel do not support DRI/DRM

hit Cntrl-X and save as the same name (press Y then enter)

Switch back to the installer (Cntrl-Alt-F1 for text, Cntrl-Alt-F7 for graphic)

and REBOOT - the CD will be ejected - this is a good time for:

STEP 5. Reboot into OS9 install CD

Yes, the hard disk is completely fried, but by simply launching the OS9 install CD (you may need to first select it from the HD boot of OS9), and run Drive Setup, and Update Drivers...

This fixes the disk to solve the flashing question mark, and now boots OS9/BootX as expected.

STEP 6. Reboot into hard disk OS9

At BootX screen, hit MacOS, and when at the desktop, open the folder called 'boot'

Rename the corresponding LONG named vmlinux and initd.gz files. Make sure you replace the VMLINUX file from before, or you will not be able to boot your newly installed Linux, the same applies for replacing the old initrd.gz.

Now launch BootXapp, and type in the Kernel Parameters field:

root=/dev/hda7

or whatever the root (/) install of Linux was installed earlier - YOU TOOK NOTE RIGHT???.

Select "Save to Prefs"

hit the Linux button.

SUCCESS!!! SUCCESS!!! SUCCESS!!!

NOTE: When BootX appears, you only have about 5 seconds to act, before it automatically continues booting OS9. If you begin typing it stalls this autostart. You may need to hit "save to prefs" the next boot, as this does not always "stick" the first time.

I would love to give you more information, but I have only just begun this myself. I have installed VLC for movies (as mplayer does not work), and Audacious for MP3s. All working wonderfully at the moment. My install of Xubuntu 7.0.4 included F11 and F12 mapped as the middle and right mouse buttons respectively. You may be lucky if this is the case for yours.

With X/K/Ubuntu there is a STAGGERING selection of PPC packages to install with apt-get (or Synaptic - the GUI frontend for apt). There are notable missing files, but certainly enough software to get started. If you want to do any building/compiling of software (almost a necessity in Linux), you will need to type:

sudo apt-get install build-essential

in a Terminal window. This will give you everything you need to configure and compile a program.

That is all for now. I am real tired. More later. Remember - GOOGLE is your friend!

[themacmeister]

I gleaned most of this info off the web. Not a lot out there either, and most people talk of custom kernels needed to boot etc.

The short answer is - if it boots off CD, it will work with BootX. If it doesn't boot with BootX using the above - it will almost certainly be a pain in the *ss, and most probably never work on that machine!

The long answer is - don't try any modern KDE or Gnome desktops unless you have a zippy G4 and a supported accelerated graphics card (Rage 128, 3Dfx Voodoo3, Radeon). Most of these OldWorld macs have no AGP port either, so you may not have a lot of choice.

If you get glx working in Direct Rendering mode, you can use fancy compiz/beryl effects. I use OpenBox (CrunchBangLinux!) on my Core2Duo machine, and it is AWESOME!

I am using a Mac-PC VGA dongle, which lets me use PC monitors. This gives me perfect screen postion and geometry every time. If you are using a Mac monitor, remember that some resolutions are WIERD (834x624) etc. I knocked all those out of xorg.conf, leaving only 1024x768, 800x600, 640x480.

Also defaulted to 24bit, where 16bit may be a LOT faster for you.

Cheers til later.

PS. I would LOVE to try FluxbuntuPPC, but when will that ever appear - 2 years overdue already!

[Mocker]

Hi folks,

Sorry to resurrect an old thread, but I'm trying to follow these instructions and have hit a snag.

I'm trying to get a Beige G3 (300Mhz, 384MB RAM, 250 GB IDE hard disk, ATI Mach 64 video card) up and running on Xubuntu Jaunty. I followed all of the steps up to booting up Xubuntu for the first time to start the install. I found that in order to have the boot text appear, I needed check BootX's "No video driver" box (I assume this has to do with the ATI video card, which is in addition to the built-in video card). After that, things started promisingly, but then ground to a halt with these messages:

Begin: Running /scripts/init-premount ...
Done.
Begin: Mounting root file system... ...
Begin: Running /scripts/local-top ...
Done.
Begin: Waiting for root file system ...
[ 269.065418] SCSI subsystem initialized
[ 269.074919] ide-gd driver 1.18
[ 269.106646] hda: max request size: 512KiB
[ 279,112143] mesh: configured for synchronous 5 MB/s
[ 269.266719] ide-cd driver 5.00
[ 269.993279] Adding 92520k swap on /dev/ramzswap0. Priority:100 extents:1 across:92520k
[ 273.265390] eth0: BMAC at 00:05:02:d9:f5:13
[ 270.497683] mesh: performing initial bus resey...
[ 273.670750] hda: 488397168 sectors (250059 MB) w/8192KiB Cache, CHS=30401/255/63
[ 273.700018] hda: cache flushes supported 
[ 273.726199] hda: [mac] hda1 hda2 hda3 hda4 hda5 hda6 hda7 hda8
[ 273.764372] ide-cd: hdc: ATAPTI 24X CD-ROM drive, 128kB Cache
[ 273.790533] Uniform CD-ROM driver Revision: 3.20
[ 273.966247] ide-gd: hdd: No disk in drive
[ 274.038813] ide-gd: hdd: 98304kB, 32/64/96 CHS, 4096 kBps, 512 sectior size, 2941 rpm
[ 274.525627] scsi0 : MESH
Done.
Gave up while waiting for root device. Common Problems:
- Boot args (cat /proc/cmdline)
  - Check rootdelay= (did the system wait long enough?)
  - Check root= (did the system wait for the right device?)
- Missing modules (cat /proc/modules; ls /dev)
ALERT! does not exist. Dropping to a shell!

and drops me to an initramfs prompt.

I've tried several things:

• Upping the size of the ram disk in BootX, in case the initrd was too large (although I'm not sure... does initrd go into this ram disk, or is the ram disk separate?)
• Tried setting a rootdelay value of 50
• Double-checked to make sure the proper vmlinux and initrd.gz files were copied. They came from the /casper/powerpc/ directory on the Xubuntu CD.
• Tried the modprobe commands to make sure all of the necessary modules are loaded. This didn't seem to have any effect, though (i.e. no new modules appeared in /proc/modules).
• Trying to manually mount the cdrom (/dev/hdc, I think). That fails with an "Invalid Argument" error

So, I've run out of things to try. I don't know how to check for what the boot process thinks is the root device (and is this different than the root file system?) Anyone else have any ideas?

Thanks!

[eldon.t]

i've got the exact same problem here on a g3 beige i try to upgrade

did you try another distro to see if it's xubuntu's ppc boot cd's fault ?

also there's an usb adapter card on this g3 and usb seems to be properly detected showing a /dev/sda "kingston" device when my kingston usb key is plugged in at boot.
I was wondering if it would be possible to launch the install from an usb install disk ? i used ubuntu's usb disk creator to put that xubuntu ppc iso on the usb device.

finally can something actually be done from that shell or is it useless to start the install ?

hope someone can give us some hints..


-edit
debian 503 ppc netinst boots without problem from bootx (using vmlinuz and initrd.gz), is there a difference between those debian boot cds and xubuntu ones ?