Ubuntu on G4 PowerBook

Installed Ubuntu 8.10 PPC to Apple G4 Powerbook. The laptop's SuperDrive was broken and it does not support booting from USB, therefore the OS was installed completely over the network utilizing the open firmware's tftp boot.

requirements

  • Another PC (girlfriend's Vista laptop)
  • Internet connection
  • DHCP server (on Wi-Fi router)
  • TFTP server (tftpd32 for Windows)

booting & installing

  • Copied yaboot, yaboot.conf, initrd.gz, vmlinux, and boot.msg to tftp server's root from Ubuntu 8.10 PPC's netboot directory.
  • Booted Powerbook and held down cmd + option + o + f to reach the Open Firmware console.
  • Loaded yaboot and kernel from tftp server with "boot enet:10.1.1.10,yaboot". 10.1.1.10 is the IP of the tftp server.
  • Yaboot failed to load initrd.gz with error message: Transfer FILE: initrd.gz method 'load' failed 00000300.
  • Learned that yaboot has a 6MB limitation on G4 PowerPC, but found a patched version from here. Local copy.
  • Replaced yaboot in tftp root with this patched version.
  • Retried booting from Open Firmware. This time booting to Ubuntu installer was successful.
  • Installed Ubuntu to the hard disk overwriting all the partitions and data. Used default Ubuntu ports download location.
  • The computer boots to Ubuntu Linux 8.10.

kernel

  • "sudo make-kpgk --initrd --append_to_version MyOwnKernel --revision=1"

links

(Mac os X from HDD)