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Got Mac mini G4? Then you got a 10.2 Jaguar rig

Jubadub

Jubadub

macrumors 6502
Original poster
Nov 1, 2017
352
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Heya, hope people here are doing well. I break my absence streak with a discovery that I haven't seen being documented before, and some folks here would definitely appreciate it.

So, any Mac mini G4 owner here who misses Mac OS X 10.2 Jaguar? Because although all 4 models officially support only 10.4 Tiger and 10.5 Leopard, with one half of those models also officially supporting 10.3 Panther, they ALL, in reality, support not only also 10.3 Panther and, as some of you already know, Mac OS 9.2.2 (with a modified Mac OS ROM file), but also 10.2 Jaguar. ZERO modifications required.

All you need is Mac OS X 10.2.8 Jaguar + ATI Radeon 9200 drivers.

Why would you do this? Say you want to use OS 9 apps & games, but not to the point you want to boot into OS 9 and still want an OS X experience and/or software, but you want to use a superior Classic environment than what is offered by 10.3 Panther and 10.4 Tiger, especially for games, and/or you want to use a version of OS X with the lowest memory & processing footprint.

Or you just simply can't resist its cute & "chubby" delicious user interface. Or perhaps you want to natively poke at Xcode's direct predecessor, Project Builder (& associated dev tools). Or you just perhaps are a Jaguar lover & you couldn't wait for the day it would be available on one of the most portable & versatile Macs of all history.

Hopefully this reveal brings a smile to some people.
 
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Aah, thanks for pointing that out, so it was already documented before. :) I wish I knew that in advance, though! I'd have jumped in on that bandwagon a lot sooner.

I see sound is reported as "not working", but it actually works with sound on mine! It must be because I'm using a USB audio adapter for OS 9 anyway (which allows for much higher quality sound output, as well).
 
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Jubadub said:
Aah, thanks for pointing that out, so it was already documented before. :) I wish I knew that in advance, though! I'd have jumped in on that bandwagon a lot sooner.
Click to expand...

No problem. :) It's worth noting that installing the Radeon drivers still won't give you graphics acceleration or Quartz Extreme.
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Jubadub said:
I see sound is reported as "not working"
Click to expand...
That refers to the Mini's onboard sound.
 
I started poking at Classic on Jaguar and comparing it directly to Tiger's, meticulously. Holy shiiiiiiet, you can really tell the difference in quality, specifically in smoothness (refresh rate of visual elements, even in clicking around the OS-9-stylized menus in the menu bar, which becomes even more obvious with, say, a CRT at 85 Hz, like mine) and in compatibility (i.e. even without 3D acceleration on my Jaguar mini, it still ran Hexen essentially as properly as it does in OS 9, while it's beyond visually broken and glitchy in Panther/Tiger).

Why Apple felt they had to silently ruin and piss on Classic for Panther and Tiger to phase Classic out instead of just removing it when Leopard came, I do not know. But it is what it is.

And thus! I ask: Are there documented efforts of people trying to bring Jaguar's version of Classic into Panther and/or Tiger? (I know there're lots of failed attempts of people trying to bring Tiger's Classic to Leopard, though, but that's something else.)

I figure probably replacing Panther/Tiger's Classic files with Jaguar's and then repairing permissions or something would be the first thing to try. Not that I expect it to work, but it'd be nice for me not to try to reinvent the wheel again.
 
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Jubadub said:
I figure probably replacing Panther/Tiger's Classic files with Jaguar's and then repairing permissions or something would be the first thing to try. Not that I expect it to work, but it'd be nice for me not to try to reinvent the wheel again.
Click to expand...
This. I’ve always wanted to try this. I’d love for someone to “fix” Tiger’s classic environment.
Amethyst1 said:
No problem. :) It's worth noting that installing the Radeon drivers still won't give you graphics acceleration or Quartz Extreme.
Click to expand...
This makes Jaguar useless on a G4 Mini, even if you only want it for the classic environment.
 
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Jubadub said:
Heya, hope people here are doing well. I break my absence streak with a discovery that I haven't seen being documented before, and some folks here would definitely appreciate it.

So, any Mac mini G4 owner here who misses Mac OS X 10.2 Jaguar? Because although all 4 models officially support only 10.4 Tiger and 10.5 Leopard, with one half of those models also officially supporting 10.3 Panther, they ALL, in reality, support not only also 10.3 Panther and, as some of you already know, Mac OS 9.2.2 (with a modified Mac OS ROM file), but also 10.2 Jaguar. ZERO modifications required.

All you need is Mac OS X 10.2.8 Jaguar + ATI Radeon 9200 drivers.

Why would you do this? Say you want to use OS 9 apps & games, but not to the point you want to boot into OS 9 and still want an OS X experience and/or software, but you want to use a superior Classic environment than what is offered by 10.3 Panther and 10.4 Tiger, especially for games, and/or you want to use a version of OS X with the lowest memory & processing footprint.

Or you just simply can't resist its cute & "chubby" delicious user interface. Or perhaps you want to natively poke at Xcode's direct predecessor, Project Builder (& associated dev tools). Or you just perhaps are a Jaguar lover & you couldn't wait for the day it would be available on one of the most portable & versatile Macs of all history.

Hopefully this reveal brings a smile to some people.
Click to expand...

Time to buy some CDs.
 
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Amethyst1 said:
Keep in mind you'll need to install on a supported machine and update to 10.2.8 before it will boot on a mini and there'll be no graphics acceleration.
Click to expand...

Not according to the Macintosh garden page. Quote:
“

SkyCapt's picture
by SkyCapt - 2019, November 19 - 2:05am
"
Supported computers
You can install this version of Mac OS X on any of the following computers:
- Power Mac G4
- Power Macintosh G3
- PowerBook G4
- PowerBook G3 (except the original PowerBook G3)
- iMac and eMac
- iBook
"
Power Mac G5 tested cannot install, this disc makes platform checks despite its long compatibility list.”
 
alex_free said:
Ok, I’ll just try patching the 10.2 installer to allow powermac10,1.
Click to expand...
Hey. May I ask, can you help me with trying to patch the 10.2 installer to allow it to work on a 2005 eMac? The CD I use doesn't show as a bootable device when holding down the alt key.
 
Amethyst1 said:
Try one of these 10.2.7 DVDs - they may even work without patching.

Internet Archive: Digital Library of Free & Borrowable Texts, Movies, Music & Wayback Machine

archive.org archive.org

A retail 10.2.0 disc would very probably just crash on the eMac anyway.
Click to expand...
Will those disks install the drivers for their own hardware, or do they have drivers for the eMac as well? If not, how do I go about getting the drivers for the eMac? I'm sorry I've never done this before so I'm not sure what's supposed to happen.
 
Skylexo said:
Will those disks install the drivers for their own hardware, or do they have drivers for the eMac as well?
Click to expand...
They will have drivers for all hardware that 10.2.7 supports. Since your 2005 eMac is newer than 10.2.7, you should expect some hardware to not work. If that is the case, then perhaps it can be fixed, perhaps not. That's the thing with shoving OS X onto newer hardware it wasn't designed for. :)
 
Amethyst1 said:
Keep in mind you'll need to install on a supported machine and update to 10.2.8 before it will boot on a mini and there'll be no graphics acceleration.
Click to expand...
Technically you can boot a mini with 10.2.7, too. It will "just" look near-unusably ugly. :)

Namely this:

1618394438354.png


Instead of this:

1618394466773.png


Installing 10.2.7 from the mini itself is quite a pain, though, because the text is somewhat unreadable in the installer procedure. But it's possible, because that's how I did it.

Note that 10.2.8 with ATI's drivers will still look glitched like that if you boot via the OF boot menu, instead of Jaguar being booted automatically as the blessed partition. No idea why.
 
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Jubadub said:
Technically you can boot a mini with 10.2.7, too. It will "just" look near-unusably ugly. :)
Click to expand...
Oh I get that in 10.2.8 on my mini too - when I hook up Bertha :) As for my statement, it hadn't occurred to me that the 10.2.7 installers may in fact work, so I just started with a previously-updated installation made on a supported machine.

Edit - you've got quite the bunch of OSes installed on yours. Kewl! :)
 
Last edited:
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Jubadub said:
Technically you can boot a mini with 10.2.7, too. It will "just" look near-unusably ugly. :)

Namely this:

View attachment 1757636

Instead of this:

View attachment 1757637

Installing 10.2.7 from the mini itself is quite a pain, though, because the text is somewhat unreadable in the installer procedure. But it's possible, because that's how I did it.

Note that 10.2.8 with ATI's drivers will still look glitched like that if you boot via the OF boot menu, instead of Jaguar being booted automatically as the blessed partition. No idea why.
Click to expand...
You can actually install the 10.2.8 update from any other dual booted Mac OS X by selecting the Jaguar partition.
 
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alex_free said:
You can actually install the 10.2.8 update from any other dual booted Mac OS X by selecting the Jaguar partition.
Click to expand...
Sure. But why quote my post? I only talk about how we additionally have the ability to install 10.2.7 from the mini itself, and boot from it.
 
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