Re: Trouble installing on iBook G4

Hello Adrian,


Thank you for your reply.  Here is the link to the image I used: 
https://cdimage.debian.org/cdimage/ports/12.0/powerpc .  Following K's 
suggestion, I looked back through the mailing list.  I didn't find the 
solution there, but elsewhere, on Google, I found the solution to GRUB 
not installing was to have the Ethernet hooked up during installation.  
I reinstalled and I appear to have a mostly functional system, with some 
quirks.  I think perhaps my first installation didn't get wiped, 
although I was quite certain the installer said it was formatting the 
disk.  When I boot I get the GRUB menu  fine, but I have to select 
Advanced Options because otherwise the system crashes to Open Firmware 
with the following message: Error: You can't boot a kdump kernel from 
OF! Invalid memory access at %SRR0: 032c04a4 %SRR1: 00023030.


Then, in Advanced Options, I have two versions listed, 6.10.7 and 
6.1.0-9.  I have to pick 6.1.0-9 otherwise I get the above crash 
message.  But once I get past that, I have a working desktop!


When I try to run apt update && apt upgrade, I get the following: 
"Warning: Skipping acquire of configured file 'main/source/Sources' as 
repository 'http://deb.debian.org/debian-ports sid inRelease' does not 
seem to prove it (sources.list entry misspelt?)"  Perhaps this is 
related to why so many packages are broken or have unmet and 
uninstallable dependencies?  For instance, LibreOffice (preinstalled) 
can't be launched because it has a bunch of unmet dependencies which 
can't be installed.


During installation, the installer complained that I was "Missing 
firmware files b43/ucode5.fw b43-open/ucode5.fw"  I tried installing 
firmware-b43-installer, but the package doesn't exist. Most information 
I found online about this appears to be outdated, or suggested that I 
would have to compile the drivers from source.  But where even is the 
source?


lspci recognizes my graphics card (AMD/ATI Radeon Mobility 9550) but 
judging by the performance it looks like I'm stuck in software 
rendering.  All the answers online I found said that graphics drivers 
haven't been available in several years.  Is this still the case?


For reference, my iBook G4's identifier is PowerBook 6,7.  12" model, 
1.33GHz, 1.5GB RAM.


I appreciate your hard work and dedication to this old platform.

On 9/5/24 15:33, John Paul Adrian Glaubitz wrote:
> Hello Cedar,
>
> On Thu, 2024-09-05 at 14:16 -0500, Cedar Maxwell wrote:
>> I just installed the latest stable Debian iso on my iBook G4, but the
>> grub bootloader install failed during the installation.  When I boot,
>> I get the grub prompt.
> Please provide the URL of the installation image that you used to install
> this machine. Not all images work properly on Apple PowerMac.
>
> I am planning to create new installation images in the near future.
>
> Adrian
>
-- 
Sincerely,
Cedar Maxwell