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G4 cube fully supported Linux ?

D

dr.zeissler

6502
Hi there,
is there any (older) linux that workes 100% on a stock G4 with R128pro and HK-Speakers?
Currently I am using YDL3 but R128pro is not working, only vesa mode is supported.
If this could not be fixed I have to choose another Linux.

Thx
 
What's YDL3?

I tried getting Gentoo set up on a G4 Mac mini, but I stopped because a) I couldn't get the bootloader working (though I've found some resources that should help with that since then), and b) fun as it was, the G4 mini is just too weak for a modern load. Despite all that, I learned quite a bit and would be happy to help.
 
It's been a long time since I tried running linux on a PPC Mac, but as I recall the Rage 128 Pro was never supported well under Linux. This made Linux a bad fit for the iMac DV I had with that GPU, but on a cube you can swap out the GPU. If you're intent on running Linux on it your best bet would probably be to find a GPU that both fits in the cube and is supported by Linux.
 
An Apple OEM Geforce 2 MX might be a good cheap choice to switch out for the Rage 128 - you still retain ADC and get much better Linux support
 
"Rage Mobility" comes in both Rage Pro (IE, Mach64-descended chips) and Rage 128 flavors, but digging through the rest of that doc it lists "PowerBook4,1" as a supported system... which translates to the first-gen Snow iBook G3s, which had Rage 128-based Mobility chips so.... yeah, it's pretty likely it'll work as well on a desktop Rage 128 as it does on the laptop.

It's my vague recollection that the Rage 128 worked "okay" under Linux for 3D back in the day (like, way back in the day, when if you wanted 3D you were left messing around with setting up Mesa on your own) and was somewhat less of a pain in the neck to get working than the Mach64-descended Rage chips were, but it is also true that it has some hardware limitations that prevent it from working with Linux environments that use 3D acceleration for the desktop. (Long and short of it: they worked okay with game software that used OpenGL rendering, but because they only support power-of-2 texture sizes they can't support Compiz or other OpenGL compositing.) Because of that compiz limitation it's possible modern Linux-i don't bother enabling OpenGL acceleration on anything less than a Radeon, I can't say I've looked. It's possible it may only give you framebuffer-level graphics.
 
dr.zeissler said:
no does not work on g4cube with stock config. sorry.
Click to expand...

Do what startx is telling you, show what /var/log/Xorg.0.log has to say.

A quick Google shows that some work has been done on the Rage 128 driver: https://www.phoronix.com/scan.php?page=news_item&px=ATI-RAGE-128-Linux-6.12.0. You might just need to install it, if my experiences with Arch Linux are any indication (where Xorg just needed a driver install to become perfectly functional, albeit on x86 with Intel integrated graphics). The driver might be called xf86-video-r128.
 
Ok, I only booted the live-cd of Adelie-Linux, but I have YDL3 already installed on that G4-cube and yaboot is working fine on that.
Would be much easier to install the patched r128-linux driver on that YDL3-installation, as deleting everything and start from scratch installing OS9/OSX and linux.
 
It's obviously not that simple to get r128 working in YDL3 by simply changing the config-file.
 

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Oh it's kernel 2...I thought you were running something, well, modern. I agree, there's no way to get the Rage to work with just config in your case.

Why do you want to run YDL3? Like davewongillies said, modern Linux might be an easier choice. TecnoballZ is from 2014, I bet there's a good chance it will compile on a modern system.
 
dr.zeissler said:
...currently I am using YDL3 but R128pro is not working, only vesa mode is supported.
Click to expand...
liamur said:
Oh it's kernel 2...I thought you were running something, well, modern. I agree, there's no way to get the Rage to work with just config in your case.

Why do you want to run YDL3? Like davewongillies said, modern Linux might be an easier choice. TecnoballZ is from 2014, I bet there's a good chance it will compile on a modern system.
Click to expand...

TecnoballZ 0.90 - TLK Games: Open Source Games For GNU/Linux

Linux Port of Powermanga and TecnoballZ games
web.archive.org web.archive.org

It's from 2004 not 2014.

I thought never linux might have dropped support for gfx/sound of my G4-Cube and will also perhaps be very slow, that's why I thought about an older linux. I am only interested in retro-gaming, no browser, no productivity...

I am using tripple-boot OS9/OSX so yaboot or another bootmanager that does not kill the other os is a must have.
 
Last edited:
Oh I see. I thought you wanted it to be a full Linux install.

With that, I admit that I have no idea :p. If you think you can build the (patched) driver, go for it. Do you know if TecnoballZ is known to work with the Rage 128 and/or the G4 Cube?
 
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