[lug] G4 LinuxPPC booting problems

[Justin Simoni]

hello all, 
I'm presently trying to get LinuxPPC up and running like a champ on my first
revision G4. I took the liberty to snap some info about my comp from the
Apple System profiler, so I don't have to type it all out (I'm pretty lazy)


.: My Sytem Profile :.
http://www.skazat.com/for_you/system_profile.gif

.: Devices and Volumes :.
http://www.skazat.com/for_you/devices_and_volumes.gif

I have the boot partition on the disk entitled 'Untitled' (its soooo avante
garde like that) 

Installation seemed to go just fine after a few muck ups, I created the 4
disk partitions on a clean new harddrive straight from comp usa. I followed
the directions to a 'T'. the boot partiton didn't create a fake system
folder, but did create these files:

first.b
second.b
System.map
System.map-2.2.18-4hpmac
vmlinux-2.2.18-4hpmac
vmlinuz-2.2.18-4hpmac
yaboot

(btw, I got the distro straight from the LinuxPPC.org site a few weeks ago
and created a CD from the disk image)

I create a System Folder from a copy of what was on the cd and copyed it to
the boot partition and my yaboot.conf file looks like this:

=======================================================

init-message = "\nWelcome to LinuxPPC\Press <TAB> for boot options.\n\n"
timeout = 100
default = linuxppc

image=hdvb11:,vmlinux-2.2.18-4hpmac
label=linuxppc
video=aty128fb

=======================================================

I'm trying to boot into LinuxPPC by selecting the startup disk in MacOS as
'Untitled' and restarting.

I'm hoping to get everything good and well and making some kind of CD boot
disk, as that would be much more convenient. Right now, If i want to get
back to MacOS, say to write an email for help, I have to boot from my
Software Restore Disk, select the regular MacOS 9.1 disk and restart again.

anyways, 

When I restart (using 'Unititled as the startup disk), I get the yaboot
screen, and I just let it time out, the screen changes from the graphical
mode to a textbased mode, but with a pic of tux on the top. About 30 lines
of startup info is shown and a blinking block ends my brief Linux
experience. It seems that it goes no farrther than this point. Like I said,
I'm to lazy to write down all of the diagnostic info, but here is the only
error I received, about 1/3 of the way down:

clgen: Driver for Cirrus Logic based graphic boards, v1.5.2


the last line went something like:

input0: Macintosh mouse button emulation

I'm booting up with just one mouse, the original 'puck' design, the one
without the dimple.

Is there something obvious that I'm overlooking? I did the install using the
Ultrasafe Video Mode, as all the other options seemed to fail for me.


The reason I'm setting Linux is to use it as a testing server from home, so
when I'm at work, my bright, shiny G4 isn't dormat. I paid quite a bit for
it (actually, I'm still paing quite a bit for it via the apple loan!) so as
much as I can get from it the better. I do CGI/Perl programming at work and
we don't even have our own staging server. Makes my life freakin dificult.
Our entire office uses Macs, and I also do graphic design, so this seemed to
be the way to go. My house is hooked up using an @home modem and DHCP, so
I'm hoping I can get around that little problem (if there is one) I'm
thinking setting up Apache and a CVS server should really help me out.

Anyways, any help would be appreciated. Please tell me if any more
information is needed. One thing I should make clear is that I am using two
monitors, I'm not sure what the support is for that in the various Xapps,
like Gnome or K


cheers, 


-- 
 justin simoni
   
        personal site           -=-       lit/art creative
      http://skazat.com                   http://prolix.nu

  +++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
 
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 -Steven Wright
 
  
http://quotes.prolix.nu/steven_wright.html