Want to try Linux



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Author	Want to try Linux (Read 32547 times)
cr2032 64 MB Posts: 81	on: February 05, 2008, 16:10 I would like to install Linux in my PPC 8500 which currently have OS761. A friend told me that Mklinux and Debian seems to be quite suitable for pre-G3 PPC. But he knows nothing on old world mac... May I have some of you guys experiences which one is better for me as a newbie to Linux. i.e. to the minimal start up distribution which is also competible to OS761 ? Or do you have other suggestions besides the above 2 ? thanks.

wove 1024 MB Posts: 1363	Reply #1 on: February 05, 2008, 17:26 Old World Macs need to start into the Mac OS then switch to another OS during boot. This means that a minimal Mac OS needs to be installed on the hard drive. BootX is the most common application used to start Linux on a PPC Mac. Information on BootX is here. OpenSuse Linux which is now distributed by Novell, continues to support PPC machines in its new releases. OpenSuse 10.3 is the latest. Yellowdog Linux was perhaps the easiest Linux to install on PPC machines because PPC hardware was all that Yellowdog supported. Older version are perhaps still available and they would come with excellent documentation for installing. Much of the install process would be the same regardless of the Linux distro you choose to use. bill

Minimalist 128 MB Posts: 186	Reply #2 on: February 05, 2008, 17:58 Don't do it. If you want to try Linux get an old PC.

cr2032 64 MB Posts: 81	Reply #3 on: February 07, 2008, 17:50 Thanks suggestions. Is that means I need to run the Mac OS as well when Linux is running ? And we can not run Linux directly after installation ? I have experienced of Sheep Shaver on PC, when I run Mac OS, its speed is about 25% of my PC speed because OS translation of commands stuff. Is it something similar ? If the Linux can be run direct, may be it will be more efficient. I will try to see if it is too slow to run on PPC or it is marginally "fast" to newbie.

null1024 8 MB Posts: 8	Reply #4 on: February 09, 2008, 05:00 Once you load up Linux after MacOS boots, Linux takes over, and MacOS exits.

p-amadeus 64 MB Posts: 89	Reply #5 on: February 09, 2008, 06:20 I have BSD running on a Mac LC III. Ha sorry I have nothing to really contribute but I guess just keep googling for info on what you want to do and if it's remotely possible you'll find some info.

wall 256 MB Posts: 343	Reply #6 on: February 10, 2008, 09:54 If you have an access to any pc (in a library, at work) you should try Puppy Linux Distribution first before playing with your mac, just to see if you like a Linux OS. It will load itself into a pc's RAM from a cd or USB-stick, and it will not touch the HD at all, making the try-out very safe. The whole size of the distro is under 100MB with apps and a pc with 256MB of RAM will be sufficient to run it well. Puppy transforms an USB-stick into world's smallest portable pc! Someone made it to run in an Intel Mac too.

Minimalist 128 MB Posts: 186	Reply #7 on: February 11, 2008, 01:18 I agree in part with wall. If you have no linux experience at all you will be better off to start with linux on a pc first. There's two reasons why I say this: 1) Regardless of the distribution you choose the pc architecture is better supported and poses fewer problems, giving you a truer feel for the abilities of linux. I hate to see people get turned off linux due to the fact that their first experience with linux was on an under-supported architecture like old world powermacs, for example. 2) No current distribution of linux offers a 'live' cd or non-intrusive means of "test-driving" linux on an old world powermac. The only way to try linux on an old world powermac is to actually commit to an install. That said, linux on an old world powermac can be very impressive performance wise as compared to classic mac os and will give you the stability that classic mac os never did or could never offer.

Minimalist 128 MB Posts: 186	Reply #8 on: February 11, 2008, 01:44 Quote from: "wove" Old World Macs need to start into the Mac OS then switch to another OS during boot. This means that a minimal Mac OS needs to be installed on the hard drive. BootX is the most common application used to start Linux on a PPC Mac. That's not entirely true. There is the quik bootloader that works fairly well on most old world macs. I believe the preferred method to boot linux on old world macs is to use bootx and to have a small mac os partition, but that's not to say that bootx is your only option. You will absolutely need mac os to install linux on an old world powermac, but you can get rid of mac os after install if you elect to go with the quik bootloader. When I was used Debian on an old 7300 and 9500 I used the quik bootloader without incident. I used two hard drives for the install. One hard drive contained Mac OS and the other was the destination device for linux. Once linux was installed and booting, I simply removed the mac os drive. ie. I never used mac os to boot into linux on my old world powermacs. If you want to give NetBSD a spin on your old world machine, you don't need mac os for anything. NetBSD boots from open firmware but can be a bit of a bugger to configure.

cr2032 64 MB Posts: 81	Reply #9 on: March 07, 2008, 07:33 Thanks guys !! I just tried out Red Hat 8.0 on a Pentium PC 733MHz with 10G HDD. It works quite ok and is a good experience on Linux. Now, I am going to put Debian on one of my old PPC. If it works good and the next project is to install the Debian into one of 68K. (Coz I see they have 68K from Debian website.) Let me study more in the web. Can't wait...

dpaanlka 1024 MB Posts: 1646	Reply #10 on: March 07, 2008, 08:08 I spent the better part of last weekend trying to get Debian running on my PowerBook G3 Kanga, without success.

Minimalist 128 MB Posts: 186	Reply #11 on: March 07, 2008, 20:09 Quote from: "dpaanlka" I spent the better part of last weekend trying to get Debian running on my PowerBook G3 Kanga, without success. Debian should run fine on that machine. What problems did you encounter? It's been a while since I have installed Debian on a PowerMac, but I've done it enough times that I could do it blindfolded now. Well, maybe not blindfolded, but definitely without guidance of any sort.

Minimalist 128 MB Posts: 186	Reply #12 on: March 07, 2008, 20:23 Quote from: "cr2032" Now, I am going to put Debian on one of my old PPC. It should work fine. If you're planning to use xfree or xorg -- it's been a while since I've actually run Linux on PPC so I'm not sure if they're still using xfree or have migrated to xorg -- I would suggest getting yourself a USB card, if you don't already have one, and a mouse with a couple of buttons and a scroll wheel, again, if you don't already have one. Most of the window managers require two or more mouse buttons and the scroll wheel is a tremendous convenience. The most compelling reason for running an X environment on old world Macs is the availability of modern web browsers. Having multiple terminals open in, say, fluxbox, is nice too if you're a console junkie. Quote If it works good and the next project is to install the Debian into one of 68K. (Coz I see they have 68K from Debian website.) Installing Debian on a 68k Mac can be a very trying experience. Debian seems to use a bit more memory than most 68k Macs are capable of having. So that means that you should expect a lot of use of swap space and a tediously slow user experience. Installing Debian on a 68k Macintosh can be a very time consuming process as well. Think day or two for a basic install. Quote Let me study more in the web. My experience has been that NetBSD is a better alternative to Linux for 68k Macintosh machines. It installs faster and is a tad bit easier to install, and it runs a heck of a lot faster. The downside to running NetBSD on the 68k Mac is that you'll end up having to do a fair bit of pkgsrc compiling -- there aren't a whole lot of precompiled packages for 68k NetBSD machines.

cr2032 64 MB Posts: 81	Reply #13 on: July 20, 2008, 14:00 Quote from: "Minimalist" When I was used Debian on an old 7300 and 9500 I used the quik bootloader without incident. I used two hard drives for the install. One hard drive contained Mac OS and the other was the destination device for linux. Once linux was installed and booting, I simply removed the mac os drive. ie. I never used mac os to boot into linux on my old world powermacs. I used floppy bootloader from PPC 9600 open firmware to successfully installed NetBSD 4.0. However, I could not use open firmware to "dir" or boot ofwboot.xcf from the scsi/sd@0:0 (the HD that I installed NetBSD.) I stucked here for nearly 3 weeks and searched quite some FAQ but still can not go further i.e. to boot from that HD. Is there any way that can create a floppy with the ofwboot.xcf and to load the second boot loader ? I don't know why I can not use open firmware to boot the HD directly ? If it is successfully boot, I think it will be very similar to install the debian.

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