What is this boot screen trying to tell me?

[m1maverick]

I decided to reinstall OS X Tiger on my PowerBook G4 5,8 DSLD laptop. I am using an OS X Tiger DVD to boot the system and I see the following screen at boot. It looks as if it's looking for a wireless Mighty Mouse. It may be that the DVD is OS X 10.4.0 and this system requires OS X 10.4.2? Odd that I would receive this display though.

What say the forum?

 

[B S Magnet]

I decided to reinstall OS X Tiger on my PowerBook G4 5,8 DSLD laptop. I am using an OS X Tiger DVD to boot the system and I see the following screen at boot. It looks as if it's looking for a wireless Mighty Mouse. It may be that the DVD is OS X 10.4.0 and this system requires OS X 10.4.2? Odd that I would receive this display though.

What say the forum?

View attachment 2189006

Maybe a long shot guess:

Owing how this PowerBook line lacks an ADB bus for human interface/HID components, 10.4.0 may be unaware of any PowerBookX,X configured without an ADB (my guess is this framework was updated to account for that for 10.4.2).

So it’s looking for another HID device in a particular order: first, the internal HID kbd/trackpad; then, absent that, a USB mouse/kbd. Seeing neither, it’s looking via Bluetooth for a wireless mouse. Seeing none, its routine is to IKEA visual instructions for getting one of those turned on and connected (which may have been what Apple’s OS X developers were thinking would be an issue for the-then brand-new Mighty Mouse.

Try plugging in a wired mouse at this prompt and see what happens. I hypothesize it’ll disappear and proceed with booting the installer. Even so, 10.4.0 may fail on pre-install or install.

 

[minik]

I think the Tiger DVD lacked the PowerBook's built-in trackpad driver. The original Apple Pro Mouse or early 2000 Apple Mouse may work.

 

[DearthnVader]

I think the Tiger DVD lacked the PowerBook's built-in trackpad driver. The original Apple Pro Mouse or early 2000 Apple Mouse may work.

Any USB mouse should work, the built-in trackpad doesn't comply with the USB HID driver from 10.4.0.

Or just use the 10.4.6 Tiger DVD image......

 

[AphoticD]

Earlier replies here are on the money. I've seen this on the DLSD PowerBook G4s and final run of iBooks when installing 10.4. Hook up a USB mouse and keyboard and you should be able to install and run the 10.4.11 update OK.

There are also cases where the display shows up fuzzy and black & white, which also resolves itself once updated - I think this was the case with the last gen iBook Radeon 9550 GPUs.

Worst case scenario, it will install, but kernel panic on boot, in which case you can try Safe Boot (hold shift at boot) and then update. Or if that doesn't get you in, drop into Firewire Target Disk Mode (hold T at boot), and use a different PowerPC Mac to install, boot (first run setup) and update, onto the PBG4's HDD over the 'wire.

 

[Diskutant]

The picture says "Put batteries in mouse, and turn mouse on"

But you can just use any wired mouse, it will move on.

 

[m1maverick]

Thanks all. I understood the image was instructing me to install batteries in the wireless mouse. My question was more of why is it asking me to do so because there was no wireless mouse present.

That said after plugging in a wired mouse the system booted to a blank screen where it just hung. Apparently the default is to display the above image when it can't find a mouse.

I grabbed a copy of 10.4.6 and it booted fine into the installer. So, as suspected, the issue was the DVD I was using (10.4.0) isn't a supported (10.4.2) version of Tiger for this system.

 

[DearthnVader]

Thanks all. I understood the image was instructing me to install batteries in the wireless mouse. My question was more of why is it asking me to do so because there was no wireless mouse present.

That said after plugging in a wired mouse the system booted to a blank screen where it just hung. Apparently the default is to display the above image when it can't find a mouse.

I grabbed a copy of 10.4.6 and it booted fine into the installer. So, as suspected, the issue was the DVD I was using (10.4.0) isn't a supported (10.4.2) version of Tiger for this system.

It's just that 10.4.0 doesn't have a driver for Apple's weird USB trackpad used on the later PowerBook G4's. So the Install Disc just assumes you are trying to use a bluetooth mouse when it can't find a mouse connected to the system.

As you have found, just use a version of OS X that actually in supported on your PowerBook. Apple doesn't include device drivers for systems it hasn't built yet.

If you want to install older version of the Mac OS on your PowerBook to run older hardware add-ons or software that's another thing.