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Attempts to install Linux in multi-boot on a 2004 12" Alubook
- Thread starter Alubook133
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Ah... I read on the Void PPC thread here that it was still possible to install a previous version from an archive site... but maybe make no sense if there's a more current and well maintained distro.
So thanxx for the tip, I actually just downloaded latest Chimera live 32-bit ppc (file : "chimera-linux-ppc-LIVE-20250214-gnome.iso") and dd'ed on usb stick, boot picker does show a happy gnu icon with full OS name below it so clicked on it, showed a "Welcome to GRUB!" screen, took several minutes before anything else happens... then the grub menu showed up but for only a few seconds before auto going to "Booting Chimera Linux 6.13.etc", didn't have the time to pick another item in the (short) list, and... goes ahead with the install, get to the login screen, but :
the keyboard isn't very responsive, the fans get on, I sense there's some process going in the background that prevents typed keys to appear on the screen, which flashes like every 5s or so, I see that I have to wait after a "flash" in order to type the next letter, so finally able to enter "root" as the login, however since the password is hidden I don't know which keys are taken in and which are not (as if not typed in at all) and so unable to login unfortunately, always get "login incorrect"...
(note: I had posted here a previous attempt which gave same symptoms plus a garbled screen, but I realized I had an external monitor + wireless mouse + keyboard connected thru a hub, so I disconnected the whole bunch and the screen doesn't get garbled anymore - however other symptoms still effective and it's impossible to properly login)
So thanxx for the tip, I actually just downloaded latest Chimera live 32-bit ppc (file : "chimera-linux-ppc-LIVE-20250214-gnome.iso") and dd'ed on usb stick, boot picker does show a happy gnu icon with full OS name below it so clicked on it, showed a "Welcome to GRUB!" screen, took several minutes before anything else happens... then the grub menu showed up but for only a few seconds before auto going to "Booting Chimera Linux 6.13.etc", didn't have the time to pick another item in the (short) list, and... goes ahead with the install, get to the login screen, but :
the keyboard isn't very responsive, the fans get on, I sense there's some process going in the background that prevents typed keys to appear on the screen, which flashes like every 5s or so, I see that I have to wait after a "flash" in order to type the next letter, so finally able to enter "root" as the login, however since the password is hidden I don't know which keys are taken in and which are not (as if not typed in at all) and so unable to login unfortunately, always get "login incorrect"...
(note: I had posted here a previous attempt which gave same symptoms plus a garbled screen, but I realized I had an external monitor + wireless mouse + keyboard connected thru a hub, so I disconnected the whole bunch and the screen doesn't get garbled anymore - however other symptoms still effective and it's impossible to properly login)
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I wonder if you tried the “base” iso if you’d fair a bit better. It should be console only with no desktop. It might eliminate the screen flicker. If it does, you could then install a different desktop of your choice which may eliminate that issue.
Guess it's worth trying, working with usb drives is a breeze for me compared with DVDs so I'll definitely give it a shot.
In fact after a while fans get back down to "normal" spinning/noise and indeed the keys I enter evaporate less than initially right after I got the login screen. So next time I boot Chimera I'll wait until the fans have finished their mad trip while I do some work on the PC, and only then will I get back to it.
Which brings the next question : I've finally been able to login as root (blind typing the password w/o knowing if each key I typed was really entered, took me 6 trials), but now I don't know what to do, couldn't find any info on the Chimera web site, I'd love to launch the DE but how ?? (I tried some commands eg
(btw I've also asked this question in the Chimera thread)
In fact after a while fans get back down to "normal" spinning/noise and indeed the keys I enter evaporate less than initially right after I got the login screen. So next time I boot Chimera I'll wait until the fans have finished their mad trip while I do some work on the PC, and only then will I get back to it.
Which brings the next question : I've finally been able to login as root (blind typing the password w/o knowing if each key I typed was really entered, took me 6 trials), but now I don't know what to do, couldn't find any info on the Chimera web site, I'd love to launch the DE but how ?? (I tried some commands eg
systemctl start gdm3 but systemctl is unrecognized)(btw I've also asked this question in the Chimera thread)
doing it right now, bizarre issue with the boot picker, the gnu icon is there but I can't select it, in fact the boot picker GUI is stuck on the (pre)selected Sorbet Leopard icon/partition (and the wireless mouse can only move vertically, very weird all this, while the trackpad works Ok).
So tried to boot it from O.F., but while I know how to do it with yaboot this is a GRUB based install, dunno what's to type in O.F. to launch the boot-up. 😔
EDIT : found out tinkering with O.F. and browsing the pendrive :
boot usb1/disk@1:,\System\Library\CoreServices\grub.elfBooting right now (I think, got the Welcome to GRUB! msg), takes a while...and yes, as you thought, this is better, normal behavior no flashing screen etc... Great, next step will be to install a (light) DE and see if it's usable...
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Trying to have Chimera Linux (with XFCE4) to work on my laptop, I'm posting only in the Chimera thread to avoid double posting. Got the DE started, however mouse/kbd inactive, so can't do much for now.
i'm in total discovery mode, so probably done something wrong or missed a step or something (or that DE distro is not suited for my Alubook, just like Gnome and Plasma won't work on it), dunno.
i'm in total discovery mode, so probably done something wrong or missed a step or something (or that DE distro is not suited for my Alubook, just like Gnome and Plasma won't work on it), dunno.
So... following the slight disappointment with Chimera (but I'm hopeful it's just a matter of time before I can get a working DE on top of the successfully installed base OS, did get XFCE to launch but mouse and keyboard "dead"), I'm now going in "distro hopping" mode.
I've installed an Ubuntu MATE 16.04 distro that looks promising but missing the Broadcom wifi chip driver for now (I'll get back to it later), and right now just installed a Kubuntu 12.04 distro I found who knows how and where ^^, not quite sure what to do with it but here's a screenshot anyway :
Obviously it's not quite what KDE Plasma looks like today lol, but some interesting stuff in there, lots of potential tweaks on most system elements, wifi chip identified but same b43-pci-bridge driver installed as in MATE so no luck with that, will require some more work.
I've installed an Ubuntu MATE 16.04 distro that looks promising but missing the Broadcom wifi chip driver for now (I'll get back to it later), and right now just installed a Kubuntu 12.04 distro I found who knows how and where ^^, not quite sure what to do with it but here's a screenshot anyway :
Obviously it's not quite what KDE Plasma looks like today lol, but some interesting stuff in there, lots of potential tweaks on most system elements, wifi chip identified but same b43-pci-bridge driver installed as in MATE so no luck with that, will require some more work.
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KDE 4.... man that takes me back.
Make sure you fix the repository urls as they no longer point to valid locations.
Make sure you fix the repository urls as they no longer point to valid locations.
thanxx for the tip, I'll try and figure out how to do this.
Pretty happy right now, have successfully installed the Broadcom wifi chip driver on MATE, in fact worked quite flawlessly (actually posting this via wifi, disconnected the ethernet cable just to make sure ^^), I had previously gone thru a bunch of papers and YT videos - but in reality I just had to install the two main BCM43 packages (readily available with a basic
apt install), modprobe and then reboot, et voilà ! 😃Hopefully can replicate this with Kubuntu 12.04, but prolly not until I do what you suggested. Anyhow at this point MATE on 16.04 looks way nicer, so I'll want to focus on it for now. Really like the crisp dark theme there, visually enjoyable and efficient. A bit challenging for my poor old 1.33GHz G4, will try to get used to it and see how much I can do with the distro.
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Two months later...
After my Chimera trials ended (current status : my Pbook and I aren't up to the task for now), I read about Void and decided it looked like a "sweet spot" of CPU power requirements vs usability/fun to use, so went on to install it on my Alubook. Of course knowing that the distro has been put offline, got the ISO's from the web archive here.
First tried Void-musl+XFCE which worked fine from Live session but failed to install : SSD not detected.
Moved to non-musl distro, again Live session Ok, SSD detected but the installer fails toward the end.
Finally tried the base non-musl distro, which installed successfully - however kernel 5 would refuse to boot, so have to use kernel 4.4. Not sure how much of an impact this might have on the overall functioning of the distro on my Alubook 12".
Then went on installing xorg, LightDM and MATE from one of the Europe-based mirror repos, both working fine, though can't get neither the DM nor the DE to remember to default to FR keymap i/o US. In the process learnt a bunch of tips, like using
Then installed among others Firefox, Filezilla and Evolution (mail/calendar client, trying to avoid the bloated Thunderbird), then Spiderweb, all work fine, I'll probably want to try ArcticFox next see how it performs vs the others but quite happy with Spiderweb for now (kudos and thanxx again go to @wicknix). Got audio to work with the alsa packages, however right now Wifi and BT both not working, tried to install the b43 drivers but no success yet, WIP. (need to go thru the 36 pages of the Void-PPC thread, at p.4 for now). Oh yeah, and need to switch to EN as the OS language, can't deal with menus in FR ^^.
So overall quite happy with Void-PPC, looks very promising as a "daily driver" on my 2004 Alubook (not necessarily with MATE though, I'll try other DE's to see which one works best), in fact I also installed the latest Void release as a Win11 Virtualbox VM to get familiar with it (and some apps like Evolution), pretty stable so far though it freezes and I have to power it off and restart it like once a day, not too bad I guess. Might in fact become the distro I'll install on my mini-PC as the main OS (and Win11 degraded to a VM or dual-boot status, will still need it at least for a while).
After my Chimera trials ended (current status : my Pbook and I aren't up to the task for now), I read about Void and decided it looked like a "sweet spot" of CPU power requirements vs usability/fun to use, so went on to install it on my Alubook. Of course knowing that the distro has been put offline, got the ISO's from the web archive here.
First tried Void-musl+XFCE which worked fine from Live session but failed to install : SSD not detected.
Moved to non-musl distro, again Live session Ok, SSD detected but the installer fails toward the end.
Finally tried the base non-musl distro, which installed successfully - however kernel 5 would refuse to boot, so have to use kernel 4.4. Not sure how much of an impact this might have on the overall functioning of the distro on my Alubook 12".
Then went on installing xorg, LightDM and MATE from one of the Europe-based mirror repos, both working fine, though can't get neither the DM nor the DE to remember to default to FR keymap i/o US. In the process learnt a bunch of tips, like using
ntpdate time.cloudflare.com to get a valid current date/time (main and CMOS batteries both dead), how to launch a service with runit via symbolic links, pretty neat, etc...Then installed among others Firefox, Filezilla and Evolution (mail/calendar client, trying to avoid the bloated Thunderbird), then Spiderweb, all work fine, I'll probably want to try ArcticFox next see how it performs vs the others but quite happy with Spiderweb for now (kudos and thanxx again go to @wicknix). Got audio to work with the alsa packages, however right now Wifi and BT both not working, tried to install the b43 drivers but no success yet, WIP. (need to go thru the 36 pages of the Void-PPC thread, at p.4 for now). Oh yeah, and need to switch to EN as the OS language, can't deal with menus in FR ^^.
So overall quite happy with Void-PPC, looks very promising as a "daily driver" on my 2004 Alubook (not necessarily with MATE though, I'll try other DE's to see which one works best), in fact I also installed the latest Void release as a Win11 Virtualbox VM to get familiar with it (and some apps like Evolution), pretty stable so far though it freezes and I have to power it off and restart it like once a day, not too bad I guess. Might in fact become the distro I'll install on my mini-PC as the main OS (and Win11 degraded to a VM or dual-boot status, will still need it at least for a while).
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Christian is still building SeaLion for VoidPPC yet. You can get that build from here.
Ah, good to know, I'll give it a shot, next priority for me is to get the wifi to work, I've had it working in Ubuntu-MATE (and Lubuntu-remix btw) so there's hope I'll figure it out within Void-PPC.