This is a living document which contains my own notes on how to install Debian GNU/Linux on a Power Macintosh 8200. Please note, there might be errors and misleading text here, which may lead to problems for you. In any case I am not responsible for anything at all.
Author: Alfred E. Heggestad <aeh@db.org>
| Last update | 9. Apr 2006 |
| OS | Debian GNU/Linux sarge |
| Kernel | Linux 2.4.27 |
Machine: Powermac 8200
CPU: PowerPC 601+ 120 MHz
System Bus Speed: 40 MHz
Cache: 32 k L1, 256 k L2
Memory: 48 MB
Disk: 1.2 Gb SCSI-disk
Floppy: 1.44 MB Floppy, SWIM3 controller
CD-rom: SONY 4x or 8x CD-ROM CDU-8005
Gfx: N/A
Bus: ADB, 2 serial ports
NICs: AAUI-15, 10B-T (MACE)
Audio: 16-bit stereo Awacs/Screamer
Installation must be done from floppy disks, as booting from CD-rom is not supported. One of the main reasons for writing this HOWTO is the lack of exact information in other documentation; i.e. there is a lot of useless information about things we don't want to know about. When the doc says "...just download the boot.img and..." it does not specify WHERE to get it !!!
Get the following images and write them to a couple of floppies:
Write the files to floppy:
$ dd if=boot-floppy-hfs.img of=/dev/fd0 bs=1024 conv=sync; sync
$ dd if=root.img of=/dev/fd0 bs=1024 conv=sync; sync
Insert Disk 1 into your Powermac and press the power button.
The first floppy disk must be in HFS format (Apple) in order to boot. You can verify that the image is correct by using hexdump:
$ hexdump -C boot-floppy-hfs.img
00000000 4c 4b 60 00 00 86 44 18 00 00 06 53 79 73 74 65 |LK`...D....Syste| 00000010 6d 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 06 46 69 6e 64 65 |m..........Finde| 00000020 72 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 07 4d 61 63 73 42 |r..........MacsB| 00000030 75 67 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 0c 44 69 73 61 73 |ug.........Disas| 00000040 73 65 6d 62 6c 65 72 00 00 00 0d 53 74 61 72 74 |sembler....Start| 00000050 55 70 53 63 72 65 65 6e 00 00 06 46 69 6e 64 65 |UpScreen...Finde| 00000060 72 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 09 43 6c 69 70 62 |r..........Clipb| 00000070 6f 61 72 64 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 0a 00 14 00 00 |oard............| 00000080 43 00 00 00 80 00 00 02 00 00 4a 78 02 8e 6b 46 |C.........Jx..kF| 00000090 20 78 02 ae 32 28 00 08 7c fe 54 46 30 3b 60 3c | x..2(..|.TF0;`<| 000000a0 67 58 b2 40 66 f4 0c 01 00 76 62 10 20 78 02 a6 |gX.@f....vb. x..| 000000b0 d1 fa ff d4 a0 57 21 f8 02 a6 01 18 58 4f 2e 0f |.....W!.....XO..| 000000c0 61 38 32 3b 60 22 4a 40 67 04 32 3b 60 24 20 78 |a82;`"J@g.2;`$ x| 000000d0 02 ae 4e f0 10 00 70 62 a9 c9 00 75 02 76 01 78 |..N...pb...u.v.x| 000000e0 03 7a 06 7c 00 00 0a 44 09 0e 0f 1c 30 e6 1d 96 |.z.|...D....0...| 000000f0 0b 82 0a 52 11 ae 33 6e 20 3e 41 fa ff 0e 43 f8 |...R..3n >A...C.| 00000100 0a d8 70 10 a0 2e 41 fa ff 12 43 f8 02 e0 70 10 |..p...A...C...p.| 00000110 a0 2e 41 fa ff 56 43 f8 09 70 21 c9 09 6c 70 10 |..A..VC..p!..lp.| 00000120 a0 2e 30 3a ff 58 a0 6d 30 3a ff 50 a0 6c 20 47 |..0:.X.m0:.P.l G| 00000130 31 78 02 10 00 16 a0 0f 66 54 42 a8 00 12 42 68 |1x......fTB...Bh| 00000140 00 1c a2 07 66 40 28 68 00 5e 21 68 00 5a 00 30 |....f@(h.^!h.Z.0| 00000150 67 10 21 7c 45 52 49 4b 00 1c 70 01 a2 60 66 26 |g.!|ERIK..p..`f&| ...
If the floppy disk is ejected during boot, there is a problem with it, i.e. it might not be in HFS format, missing boot files etc. You can try the hfsutils Debian package to aid debugging.
debian:~# mac-fdisk /dev/sda
/dev/sda
Command (? for help): p
/dev/sda
# type name length base ( size ) system
/dev/sda1 Apple_partition_map Apple 63 @ 1 ( 31.5k) Partition map
/dev/sda2 Apple_UNIX_SVR2 swap 262144 @ 64 (128.0M) Linux swap
/dev/sda3 Apple_UNIX_SVR2 root 2241664 @ 262208 ( 1.1G) Linux native
Block size=512, Number of Blocks=2503872
DeviceType=0x0, DeviceId=0x0
Command (? for help):
# apt-get install kernel-image-2.4.18-powerpc
After installation I updated the quik.conf file:
image=/boot/vmlinux-2.4.18-powerpc
label=Linux
read-only
and then ran quik:
$ quik
$ quikconfig
deb http://ftp.no.debian.org/debian sarge main
and then doing:
# apt-get update && apt-get install kernel-image-2.4.27-powerpc
After installation I updated the quik.conf file:
image=/boot/vmlinux-2.4.27-powerpc
label=Linux
read-only
and then ran quik:
$ quik
$ quikconfig
NOTE initrd is not needed here.
nvi
The following new packages was *installed* after complete upgrade:
vim
less
ssh
make
gcc
ncurses-dev
apt-get install gcc libc6-dev
I managed to get the audio output working by loading the dmasound_pmac.o module. This gave the following output in syslog:
Mar 11 20:27:11 tuck kernel: i2c-core.o: i2c core module
Mar 11 20:27:11 tuck kernel: dmasound_pmac: Awacs/Screamer Codec Mfct: 2 Rev 2
Mar 11 20:27:11 tuck kernel: PowerMac AWACS rev 2 DMA sound driver rev 016 installed
Mar 11 20:27:11 tuck kernel: Core driver edition 01.06 : PowerMac Built-in Sound driver edition 00.07
Mar 11 20:27:11 tuck kernel: Write will use 4 fragments of 32768 bytes as default
Mar 11 20:27:11 tuck kernel: Read will use 4 fragments of 32768 bytes as default
Taking a look at the modules loaded:
alfredh@tuck:/boot$ /sbin/lsmod
Module Size Used by Not tainted
sound 76072 0 (unused)
dmasound_pmac 47624 0
i2c-core 14904 0 [dmasound_pmac]
dmasound_core 13768 0 [dmasound_pmac]
soundcore 5336 5 (autoclean) [sound dmasound_core]
I use the aumix program to control the volume etc.
NOTE! I did not get the microphone working, even with a microphone connected there is no audio recorded..
NFS and NIS is used to mount the home directory from a server.
apt-get install nfs-common portmap nis
My /etc/fstabcontains a line like this:
10.0.0.2:/home /home nfs defaults,nfsvers=3,tcp 0 0
/etc/yp.conf:
ypserver 10.0.0.2
There is an NFS over UDP bug in 2.4.18, so TCP must be used.
The box in my kitchen is now playing my local radio station (NRK P1) using ogg123.
Attempt to boot 2.6.15 stops here:
