Re: Sound problems with MOL on an OldWorld G3

On 1/25/06, Risto Suominen <[email protected]> wrote:
> I installed MOL 0.9.70 on my OldWorld PowerMac G3. It seems usable,
> but the sound doesn't work. I run Ubuntu 4.10 with kernel 2.6.8.1, and
> I compiled MOL from source.

I run MOL on an oldworld PowerBook G3 (1998 "Wallstreet II" / "PDQ")
and I am able to use the binary packages supplied with Ubuntu 5.10.
(Installing/upgrading to later versions of Ubuntu from 5.10 is a
challenge, but that's a separate issue.) Of course I DID have to
compile the MOL kernel drivers, as Ubuntu does not supply binary
versions of them. But that's not difficult -- check the Ubuntu wiki
page https://wiki.ubuntu.com/MacOnLinuxHowto

> To be able to get Mac OS 9 to boot, I had to extract the ROM from
> another machine, a PowerMac 7600. With it, and oftree.8500, it boots
> with 'startmol --oldworld'.

I did not need to extract a ROM image to run MOL on my 266 Mhz
PowerBook -- apparently the ROM image supplied in Mac OS 9 is
sufficient on mine. I could very well be wrong, but I think the
"oldworld" procedure you're describing must be for Mac OS versions
much older than Mac OS 9. I suspect that's really your problem -- the
ROM image needs to come from the OS 9 installer disk -- the Apple
installer should supply it.

> I put the Mol-audio extension to the
> Extensions folder.

I believe that is correct. It's been so long since I've done it I
don't remember.

> In both cases, I get no startboing. I tried with different versions,
> with and without OSS and ALSA,

I suggest a clean install of Mac OS 9 from the Apple installer disks.
It wouldn't hurt to check your installation of MOL too as described on
the Ubuntu Wiki. On my machine when I upgraded to 5.10 this past
October I had to apply a patch and recompile the MOL kernel module
because it runs extremely slowly on later kernels. (This is the patch
that sets the niceness to zero. I have not needed any other patches to
run the Ubuntu-supplied version of MOL.)

If others have more specific suggestions maybe you can avoid the OS reinstall.

P.S.: The start "boing" has NEVER worked on my machine, but once OS 9
has booted all the sounds work fine. So don't give up hope!