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System 7 (and OS 8) natively boots on the Mac mini G4!

MBongo

MBongo

6502
 
Based on the threads on here on CHRP and on System Enablers, there's some interesting potential to improve the current TBXI and Enabler files to make things even more stable and support more OS versions :)
 
I did this on my mini a couple days ago, some notes for 7.6.1:

- Sytem Profiler was hanging for me. Doing the update to 2.1.2 fixed it.
- I tried a few different things but could not get networking to work. Even with Open Transport 1.3, 7.6.1 doesn't seem to want to speak with the ethernet driver. Might be an enabler problem.
- I could not get graphics acceleration to work. I tried a combo of the Jan 2005 drivers, the ATI 9250 backport to 7.0, including modifying the 9250 drivers with the correct device ID. It does (mostly) work fine without though, and it's not that slow. Changing color depth is extremely unstable, avoid it.
- I pulled the FireWire extensions from the original PowerMac G4 (Sawtooth) installer, and that seemed to get FireWire working on 7.6.1. I can't find my FireWire cable to confirm, but it does boot and recognize everything.
- Weird surprising stuff works like USB thumb drives. The ROM brings enough along to make 7 happy.

So, 7.6.1 in short: everything works but ethernet, graphics acceleration, and the same stuff that's broken on 9.2.2 (airport, sound, sleep).
 
Thanks @MBongo for making the thread, I was finally able to get past the registration and login duration woes here, so now I'm finally able to participate here, as well. (Just not from native Mac OS, as the website causes the browser, and even OS, to crash on Classilla, despite Crypto Ancienne taking care of TLS. I never had such an issue with any other website I have ever visited on the browser, not even GitHub or MacRumors).

For clarification (just to be sure there's no risk of misunderstanding from any side), the sole author of the project itself is @Rairii, to whom we all owe for this phenomenal outcome. And to @elliotnunn for his Mac mini G4 compatibility patches / scripts and patching tools, plus Mac OS 9 Lives!'s various contributors like "darthnvader" (ATI driver patches), "iMic" and lots more people.

I am merely a messenger who tried to put together a summary of everything for everyone else to also follow along. :) And who applied @elliotnunn's Mac mini patches to @Rairii's ROMs to test it all on my 1.5GHz G4 mini and attached the new mini ROM on my post on "Mac OS 9 Lives!" for other mini owners to join in without having to do the patching on their own, if they prefer. Nonetheless, I'm glad everyone seems to be enjoying all of it: the project, the summary and the milestones that were reached!

My mini is currently my only PowerMac currently able of booting into Mac OS (sadly): I also have a DLSD G4, but that's the last G4 Mac that we have yet to get booting Mac OS on, somehow... (And even if we do, the GPU will have no acceleration, short of someone making/porting/patching in Mobility Radeon 9700 drivers.)

@eharmon I actually ended up booting all these systems off FireWire without any FireWire-related extensions, even System 7.5. I was and still am surprised that FireWire and USB just work like that, thanks to those ROMs!

I'm also glad to know a later version of the System Profiler fixed things! That's exactly what I was hoping for, for the various things that have yet to work right.

Did you also get sound to work, by the way? Like, at all? How were you able to do it, if so? Bringing in a later version of Apple's sound extension(s)?

Too bad about networking and graphics, though. I'm sure we can manage something to get the mini's ATI Radeon 9250 going if we keep at it, if nothing else... But I have no idea what prospects there could be of getting Ethernet working.
 
Nixontheknight said:
I wonder if this can be made possible on a G4 iMac. I have an 800MHz iMac that I want to try this on
Click to expand...
Yeah; it should work fine on a G4 iMac. The Mini's from late 2005; the last G4 iMac is from 2004. The one I think you're talking about is from 2002 and could boot natively into 9.2.2, which means you can just toss the CHRP ROM and the System Enabler into a System 7.5.0 System Folder (on an HFS partition) and you're good to go.

Oh, and on that front... for those who haven't figured it out yet: here's how I got my partitioning set up:

Step 1: Boot into Leopard and use Disk Utility to partition up your drive the way you want it. I just created 2GB partitions for each of the older OS versions.

Step 2: Boot into Mac OS 9 and run Disk First Aid. Up in the menu, you'll find a "Format Disk" option -- you can select each of those partitions and format them as HFS (instead of HFS Extended). Now they'll be visible/bootable in Mac OS 8.1 and lower.

Step 3: while in Mac OS 9, use Toast 5 to mount the installer image of your choice and run the installer. Some of the installers need you to navigate down to the actual system installer and run that, some won't work if you do that, but will run from the outermost Install app. For some, you may need to hold down option at certain points during the config process to get it to not block the install.

Step 4: copy the appropriate MacOS ROM into the System Folder, and for 7.6.1 and earlier, also copy in the System Enabler.

Step 5: reboot, holding down option, and select the appropriate OS to boot from

Step 6: Enjoy!
 
adespoton said:
Yeah; it should work fine on a G4 iMac. The Mini's from late 2005; the last G4 iMac is from 2004. The one I think you're talking about is from 2002 and could boot natively into 9.2.2, which means you can just toss the CHRP ROM and the System Enabler into a System 7.5.0 System Folder (on an HFS partition) and you're good to go.

Oh, and on that front... for those who haven't figured it out yet: here's how I got my partitioning set up:

Step 1: Boot into Leopard and use Disk Utility to partition up your drive the way you want it. I just created 2GB partitions for each of the older OS versions.

Step 2: Boot into Mac OS 9 and run Disk First Aid. Up in the menu, you'll find a "Format Disk" option -- you can select each of those partitions and format them as HFS (instead of HFS Extended). Now they'll be visible/bootable in Mac OS 8.1 and lower.

Step 3: while in Mac OS 9, use Toast 5 to mount the installer image of your choice and run the installer. Some of the installers need you to navigate down to the actual system installer and run that, some won't work if you do that, but will run from the outermost Install app. For some, you may need to hold down option at certain points during the config process to get it to not block the install.

Step 4: copy the appropriate MacOS ROM into the System Folder, and for 7.6.1 and earlier, also copy in the System Enabler.

Step 5: reboot, holding down option, and select the appropriate OS to boot from

Step 6: Enjoy!
Click to expand...
hold on, won't 8.1 boot on HFS+, or am I thinking of 8.5-9.2.2?
 
I know 8.1 can _access_ HFS+ media, but I can't recall whether it will _boot_ off of one. The two are not the same. I also seem to recall that bootability varied between the 68k and PPC versions, but I hope I'm wrong about that part.
 
gsteemso said:
I know 8.1 can _access_ HFS+ media, but I can't recall whether it will _boot_ off of one. The two are not the same. I also seem to recall that bootability varied between the 68k and PPC versions, but I hope I'm wrong about that part.
Click to expand...
Yes, 8.1 will boot off HFS+.
 
gsteemso said:
I know 8.1 can _access_ HFS+ media, but I can't recall whether it will _boot_ off of one. The two are not the same. I also seem to recall that bootability varied between the 68k and PPC versions, but I hope I'm wrong about that part.
Click to expand...
My PowerBook 1400c/166 boots off HFS+ under Mac OS 8.1. Having said that, I got there in a convoluted way on my SD card. I started with Mac OS 7.5.3 on a 750MB HD. Then cloned it to an 8GB microSD (with an adapter); then I added another 5 x 750MB, HFS partitions.

I had a retail copy of Mac OS 8.0, but no Mac OS 7.5.3 driver for the PowerCD I needed to use to install it (the only working SCSI CD-ROM drive I had), but I found a ZIP disk with a boot driver on it, then used that to find a ZIP disk with a proper ZIP disk driver extension; then used that to find a ZIP disk with a PowerCD extension, which could then use to install Mac OS 8.0 CD onto the second partition.

Then I found the British Mac OS 8.1 upgrade on the Wayback machine. I used that to upgrade from Mac OS 8.0 on the same partition. So, now I could change other partitions to HFS+; copy Mac OS 8.1 to a HFS+ partition and boot from that; then make the second partition HFS+; copy Mac OS 8.1 back and reboot into Mac OS 8.1 on HFS+. In other words, there are many viable ways to get Mac OS 8.1 booting on HFS+, in my case bootstrapping via 7.5.3 and 8.0.

I really liked Mac OS 8.1; I used it from 1997 to mid-2000 on my PowerMac 4400 and PowerBook 5300, until my Tangerine iBook replaced the PowerBook 5300.
 
adespoton said:
8.1 can handle reading/writing HFS+ partitions, but I was unable to get it to boot HFS+ on my G4 Mini.
Click to expand...

My mini boots 8.1 normally off an HFS+ partition. I did it over FireWire, but I'd expect it to be the same via the internal drive, as well. I just re-tested this to be sure.

It would be weird if it didn't! I assume something must have been amiss when you tried it?

gsteemso said:
I know 8.1 can _access_ HFS+ media, but I can't recall whether it will _boot_ off of one. The two are not the same. I also seem to recall that bootability varied between the 68k and PPC versions, but I hope I'm wrong about that part.
Click to expand...

All PowerPC Macs can boot from HFS+ partitions, whereas not a single 68k Mac is capable of doing so. (AFAIK.) This is said by Apple themselves somewhere or the other, as well. (Not that Apple was always right about things they said, to say the least.)
 
Jubadub said:
My mini boots 8.1 normally off an HFS+ partition. I did it over FireWire, but I'd expect it to be the same via the internal drive, as well. I just re-tested this to be sure.

It would be weird if it didn't! I assume something must have been amiss when you tried it?



All PowerPC Macs can boot from HFS+ partitions, whereas not a single 68k Mac is capable of doing so. (AFAIK.) This is said by Apple themselves somewhere or the other, as well. (Not that Apple was always right about things they said, to say the least.)
Click to expand...
Yeah; I think I figured it out; two system folders on the same partition, and it went and "re-blessed" the other one somehow. With a single 8.1 system folder named "System Folder" on the HFS+ partition, it works.
 
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