Become a MacRumors Supporter for $50/year with no ads, ability to filter front page stories, and private forums.
Status
The first post of this thread is a WikiPost and can be edited by anyone with the appropiate permissions. Your edits will be public.

Which OS is Your Main/Favorite One?


  • Total voters
    421

MacMaverick855

macrumors 6502
Feb 6, 2021
266
66
Marion, IA
CRUX link broken

MM855
So, that’s pretty cool, how do you download it? There seem to be a lot of folders and such and the more I dig down the less I get to a point where I get to a downloadable file or method to do so. If it fits on a CD I’m game. IF it can drive two monitors, one of which is an Apple Studio Display from a Radeon 9600XT, I’ll reach through the internet and kiss you!!!!

I’ll research this more but I’m not sure how to get my hands on the .iso

MacMaverick855

Update: found it and downloading it now!!!! Time to do some reading.
 

dreadbit

macrumors newbie
Jan 6, 2021
21
3
Hi, did anyone tried bonnix slackware https://bonslack.org/ ? There are binaries, but its not clear how to install that (probably getting kernel from existing void linux etc -- is there a simpler way?) (both G3/G4 and G5 is interesting)

As for recent OpenSuse (trying on iMac/G5 iSight) I get "repodata/repomd.xml: Invalid signature" , while media check says its ok. My system date is fine. Tried DVD, usb, providing url as package source -- nothing helps.
 

Doq

macrumors 6502a
Dec 8, 2019
533
798
The Lab DX
I saw that too and was looking into it to put a tarball together for a Bedrock stratum but got lost and I probably shouldn't have even attempted BonSlack until I was more familiar with Slackware as a whole-- which I am getting around to I swear!

There is documentation in the PPC directory -> https://bonslack.org/bonslack_ppc-14.2/BonSlack-HOWTO that might be helpful.
 

dreadbit

macrumors newbie
Jan 6, 2021
21
3
Trying to get ArchPOWER working - really want RetroPi and Kodi working!
I'm at `pacstrap -K /mnt base linux linux-firmware`

It cannot find linux anywhere. And installing grub will be a different problem. I see now manual anywhere.

Do you have any progress?

PS. What a pity we have no Void Linux anymore. It made be fully happy!
 

im_to_hyper

macrumors 65816
Aug 25, 2004
1,383
399
Pasadena, California, USA
I'm at `pacstrap -K /mnt base linux linux-firmware`

It cannot find linux anywhere. And installing grub will be a different problem. I see now manual anywhere.

Do you have any progress?

PS. What a pity we have no Void Linux anymore. It made be fully happy!

Hmmm have you tried linux-lts or searching for linux* to see what may be there? Something should provide `linux` though, that's so odd.

Try posting on the Github? The dev seems friendly at least.

Also, try following the Debian install guide for PowerPC Macs.

There was another installer once upon a day on Reddit that I can't seem to find anymore. It was another flavor of Arch for PowerPC.
 

mortlocli

macrumors 6502a
Feb 23, 2020
729
665
Tinkered with Anitx yesterday..latest version..3.0
I find it fixes an issue I have with most distributions on my two old iMacs - a four screen display instead of the one. A preload menu allows to set xorg to safe to prevent that.

It also has a 'make USB stick' option that works on the iMac 17 inch that has a 32bit loading issue.

But with this current version, I've got the /dev stall happening at boot up..stops at that point.
But it works ok on my other later iMac..so have set up live persistence, etc, and will try the USB stick on the 17 inch today.

oops oops - just realized Im in the PPC thread..sorry guys!!
 
Last edited:
  • Haha
Reactions: Doq

dreadbit

macrumors newbie
Jan 6, 2021
21
3
Was able to install Bonslack.
Booted iMac G5 iSight with void live, mounted dest part, enabled remote ssh access.
On slackware on other machine, mounted via sshfs, then installed everything via installpkg --root
Then belled and whistled with fstab, kernel + modules (I had kernel from other source), removed root's password, ln -s es something around /lib64/ld.so.X to ld64 something (to find out what does it want, chroot from void to slackware, then ldd /bin/sh , then compare with a working slack computer), then recovered intittab that was not installed, then installed some -noarch packages from real slackware ( startup scripts and netconfig scripts ) -- the procedure is scary for non-slackwarer, but for me (as a slacker) that was quite ok.

Still boot that via yaboot.

I really liked the result. There is no firefox, so I use Sealion. XFCE + xdm.

Also I have to report I have 4.5G there -- with Hynix HYMP151F72CPD43 DIMM sold locally as "4G RAM for AMD ONLY" ;-)))
 
  • Like
Reactions: wicknix

dreadbit

macrumors newbie
Jan 6, 2021
21
3
...And people call Gentoo installation "Difficult"...:D
Yes it is! I have to compile things during installation! Its not a time for that, especially if the CPU is 233 Mhz, and there are a lot of chances that installation will have to be repeated, because the platform is -- saying, -- hppa -- and may not be well-tested (or I can be mistaken during install because that is not my native distributive).

Currently I think about Bonslack not as distribution, but as a set of Slackware packages compiled for wide number of archs. Personally, except ppc*, I find armv7hf usefull (for Orange PI PC H3 and Toshiba AC100/PAZ00). The guy (and his CPUs that compile that all) behind that is doing an incredible work, so that is not a big problem that there is no ready receipt/boot media for every existing platform.

Next I'll try to install Bonslack on G3/G4s and will try to write down of what I'm doing.
 
Last edited:

Tratkazir_the_1st

macrumors 65816
Feb 11, 2020
1,019
536
Russia, Moscow region
Its not a time for that, especially if the CPU is 233 Mhz, and there are a lot of chances that installation will have to be repeated, because the platform is -- saying, -- hppa -- and may not be well-tested (or I can be mistaken during install because that is not my native distributive).
This is why I wish I could build some system for crosscompiling purposes.
 

dreadbit

macrumors newbie
Jan 6, 2021
21
3
My .config 6.6.2 -- mostly for myself if I lost it ;-) , based of the one from Gentoo forum.
Fine for my iSight, fans are silent, sound is working.
 

Attachments

  • isight.png
    isight.png
    52.4 KB · Views: 99
  • Like
Reactions: mortlocli

MacMore

Suspended
Jan 4, 2024
33
13
My last PoweMac was a G5 Xserve, which gave up the ghost when the power supply failed. All be it I have run Debian based distros including Ubuntu.

Which, while Ubuntu and Debian give you back much of the control Apple took away with the switch to Intel leaves a lot.

If you thought native app support was bad on Linux on a PC, doing it on PPC makes you feel like you have developed leprosy. Just do aptget on any Debian based OS to see what I mean.

And even then, I'm pretty sure Firefox is still broken when you compile it through apt for PPC... Which leaves you to use some other chromium based browser such as the default one for Unity, or some off brand Firefox such as Arctic Fox, which may or may not have full HTML5 compliance.
 

barracuda156

macrumors 68020
Sep 3, 2021
2,295
1,514
Has anyone installed FreeBSD 14 on G4? Is there a way to use bootable ISOs without burning physical DVDs? I got loads of FireWire and some USB drives.
 

Doq

macrumors 6502a
Dec 8, 2019
533
798
The Lab DX
I don't know about FreeBSD specifically, but I got OpenBSD to install from a USB by first copying its ramdisk and kernel to the hard drive and booting it in OF from there. This might be able to apply to FreeBSD as well, but testing may be required. I am getting around to doing a FreeBSD install myself as well (I want to take a look at the BSD Holy Trinity on PPC beyond just OpenBSD) but that's a bit out.

I have not gotten any BSD to boot natively from USB, but I wouldn't completely rule it out.
 
  • Like
Reactions: barracuda156

barracuda156

macrumors 68020
Sep 3, 2021
2,295
1,514
I don't know about FreeBSD specifically, but I got OpenBSD to install from a USB by first copying its ramdisk and kernel to the hard drive and booting it in OF from there. This might be able to apply to FreeBSD as well, but testing may be required. I am getting around to doing a FreeBSD install myself as well (I want to take a look at the BSD Holy Trinity on PPC beyond just OpenBSD) but that's a bit out.

I have not gotten any BSD to boot natively from USB, but I wouldn't completely rule it out.

Do you co-install OpenBSD along with macOS on PowerPC? If yes, could you refer to some up-to-date procedure?
I considered installing it, but I need macOS to be the primary OS. (Having a dedicated drive for BSD is doable though.)
 

Doq

macrumors 6502a
Dec 8, 2019
533
798
The Lab DX
Do you co-install OpenBSD along with macOS on PowerPC? If yes, could you refer to some up-to-date procedure?
I considered installing it, but I need macOS to be the primary OS. (Having a dedicated drive for BSD is doable though.)
The INSTALL.macppc document has a section on this.

Check the sections titled "Sharing a disk with Mac OS" and "HFS partitioning". If you plan on having separate disks for OpenBSD and Mac OS you may be able to forgo the HFS part.

There is no provision for bootpicker support though; booting OpenBSD must be done via OF (though this is the case for the entire BSD Holy Trinity AFAIK).

My setup is rather exotic (by way of not having a dual-boot but a several-boot) but the gist for a single disk is to have two volumes: one for Mac OS and the other for OpenBSD, then manually dropping the OpenBSD bootloader into the Mac OS volume.
 
Register on MacRumors! This sidebar will go away, and you'll see fewer ads.