help me build a boot cd please, on a *cough* pc

[merlyn]

ok,

my wife recently discovered a great local auction house. in the last 3 weeks, she has brought home 3 working atari 800's, an atari 400, 4 tandy model III's that need work, but one at least works, and enough PC parts that i built a PC for trade, for a beautiful, almost pristine, quadra 650. a little dirty, but otherwise ... well it brings tears to my eyes.

I now want to replace the installed system 8.1 with netBSD. but before i can continue with the BSD install, i feel i *_MUST_* have a return path, just in case. I've downloaded 7.5.3 from Apples ftp, and using basilisk II, and the host pc have tried several methods of building a bootable cdrom. the closest ive come is using transmac and the HD image from basilisk. with that i can get basilisk to boot up to a warning about the desktop not being writable [or similar], but not the Mac.

so now, i ask you guys, who seem to be the current day experts, is it possible to compile a bootable cd, with the 7.5.3 files included, on a PC, and what must i do in order to get going? should i try burning the cd's using linux? would i be better off simply trying to eBuy a 7.5.3 or 8.1 cd?

thanx in advance,

merlyn

 

[porter]

1. Connect an external SCSI disk.

2. make sure that virtual memory is off.

3. drag the whole boot volume onto the external disk

4. confirm that you can change startup disk and boot from external drive

Bingo, you now have a disk to recover from, for example I have a ZIP disk with 8.6 on it, created in this fashion.

 

[Bunsen]

Creating a boot CD on a PC can be done; I've done it, but the steps involved have escaped my memory. I remember it involved rather a lot of Googling for instructions, and downloading one or two utilities on the PC side. From memory, you need a CD burning app that can create .iso CDs, such as Nero, and a utility to read and write Mac HFS and/or HFS+ file systems. MacDrive's 30 day free trial did that part for me.

If you have downloaded 7.5.3 from Apple, it may be easier to create a floppy install set than a CD. IIRC, what you will have downloaded is a set of floppy disk images. Searching here should reveal instructions for creating bootable floppies from the images.

I recommend, as porter suggests, backing up the entire existing install of 8.1 to an external Mac formatted SCSI drive. You can format the drive with Drive Setup or Apple HD SC Setup in the Utilities folder of the existing install, or with the tools on the first floppy image. Even then, you will need to boot from the first boot floppy to read the external drive, if the existing install is wiped.

Incidentally, if you end up with a surplus complete and empty TRS-80 Model III shell, please get in touch with me through PM on these forums.

 

[macgeek417]

Get 8.1 off of *cough* BitTorrent *cough*

 

[merlyn]

i got the 8.1 iso from bittorrent ... and as i understand it, i am allowed to have a copy right? i mean after all its already installed on my quadra.

-but-

i still need to be able to build an iso thats apple compat, on my pc because i need to use apple's hd setup to change some aprtitions to a/ux in order to install the BSD.

i know im not *DOOPID* i just cant figure out the apple cd format ...

thanx, guess im gonna have to find and buy a floppy disk, finding them around here has become a challenge.

 

[porter]

i am allowed to have a copy right? i mean after all its already installed on my quadra.

Not if the machine was not originally shipped with that OS.

i got the 8.1 iso

Then you should have an apple compatible ISO image. Why do you not think it is Apple compatible?

 

[merlyn]

what i need, now that i've found the 8.1 iso as a return path, is to be able to modify or create a bootable cdrom, one that contains the proper utilities [ apple sc hd setup for example ] to setup an a/ux partition, and copy/install NetBSD. i dont have any floppies here at home, and they've become scarce in the stores as well. im not certain if my floppy drive even works, i can't test it.

 

[porter]

What OS are you intending to use as the bootstrap for NetBSD?

I would find it far far simpler to simply set up an AFP share on another box with all the utilities. Then you can boot with the OS of your choice, set up AppleTalk, use the Chooser and bingo you have all your utilities.

 

[porter]

Have you seen this... http://www.macdisk.com/mimhyben.php3

 

[merlyn]

i think i actually found a solution ...

using basilisk emulator, i can edit the 8.1 iso directly from macos.

i then put the hd setup and the bsd install files on the 8.1 iso!

i never would have thought that i could do so, but it seems to work. i let you know if i run into any more snags!

thanx guys.

 

[porter]

Well done, neat solution.