Subject: Re: MOL on Umax c600
From: Quentin Mason (quentin-mason@cornell.edu)
Date: Tue Jan 23 2001 - 16:07:25 MST
Hi Jackson,
I think that it is possible that you do not quite understand how MOL
works: MacOS runs and is told that it has a certain type of processor,
and has access to some RAM, which linux handles for it. ALL the requests
for disk accesses, cd access, serial access, ethernet access, (tape,
firewire, usb printers etc) are passed TO LINUX which figures out the
answer and sends it back to MacOS in the way that it wants the data. Thus
if linux does not do something MOL will *NOT* be able to do it (see items
in brackets above). Particularly MOL will not see the G3 upgrade unless
linux does.
It is possible that % cat /proc/cpuinfo will tell you something about your
CPU, and might include the L2 cache -- this will tell you whether the
thing is working or no. It is also important to remember that the speed
of a _machine_ is measured roughly in terms of how fast it does real
calculations, and NOT how fast the screen draws, which is a measure of the
speed of the CPU-graphics card datawidth, and speed of the graphics
card. It is possible that you are confusing a "dog slow" machine with a
reasonable machine with very poor graphics card, or no graphics
acceleration enabled on the card. Do you use Xpmac or Xfree 3.3.6 or
4.0.2? Do you have graphics acceleration in linux ? what kernel arguments
do you specify etc?
I cannot help you with a quest for a prebuilt kernel for a 603e machine,
but I am pretty sure that MOL requires MacOS 8.6 ROM and MacOS 8.6 and
cannot use 8.5.*. The upgrade a is free ~30mb download from apple, the
link used to appear on the MOL site. In terms of kernel source, look at
the linuxppc-user list, archived at http://lists.linuxppc.org for various
places to get a kernel. Search on "kernel;rsync", most people rsync
their's.
In terms of your upgrade card I believe that there are people who have
used it successfully on linux, see again the archived list above. I
understand that certain versions of BootX do not work well with the older
machines, and that some people have changed the order of their extensions
booting in order to get the Sonnet Extension to load before BootX, and
this has worked for them.
Do not give up hope -- I do not believe that MOL will be the answer to
your speed problems, but I am pretty sure that the link above will help
you out.
HTH,
Q.
On Tue, 23 Jan 2001, Jackson Damien wrote:
> Hello, long time no email. I kind of fell away from working on MOL,
> mainly a simple lack of time. Currently I've gotten some free time
> available and wanted to make another go at it.
>
> I was hoping I might be able to ask a few more questions. First of
> all, I know LinuxPPC doesn't support dual monitors, so I'm assuming
> I'm still out of luck with MOL? Also, is it possible to run MOL with
> starting X?
>
> >On Sat, 25 Mar 2000, Jackson Damien wrote:
> >
> >> I tried following the instructions without success. BTW, I was able
> >> to upgrade (successfully I believe) to mol-0.9.41, which according to
> >> the website (http://www.maconlinux.com) supports the 603. I guess it
> >> is still assumed that you need to patch the kernel however.
> >
> >Yes, I think that is right.
> >
> >> I've read the documentation, specifically the patch instructions, and
> >> have tried the dry run with the
> >>
> >> cd /doc/Kernel_Patches
> >> patch --dry-run -d /usr/scr/linux - p0 < mol-kernel-2.2.10.patch
> > ^^^^^
> >"-p0" at first.
> >Second the path to go is /usr/doc/mol-0.9.41/Kernel_Patches and not /doc/
> >(at least for my system)
> >Third. If you running LinuxPPC 2000 the kernel version is
> >2.2.15preSomething. The is a patch for that kernel version included the
> >RPM.
> >
> >If you are unsure about the kernel version use "dmesg | less" to read the
> >boot messages again.
>
> I found out that the kernel is 2.2.15pre3, and their is a patch for
> 2.2.15pre4 included in the latest RPM for MOL.
>
> > > of the installation instructions that I was unsure on. Step 5 was to
> >> copy the newly compiled kernel (/usr/src/linx/vmlinux) to the MacOS
> >> and select it with BootX. How would I go about doing that?
> >
> >You need the kernel on MacOS side. Probably easiest method is to gzip it
> >copy it to floppy, reboot MacOS and read it from floppy. You will need
> >MacGzip for it. Maybe a recent version of StuffIt-expander will also work.
>
> How would I copy it to a floppy?
>
> > > How would I make a backup of my own kernel, how would I do that? I
> >
> >Just keep copy of vmlinux somewhere.
> >
> >> was just planning on patching the kernel according to the
> >> instructions and recompiling according to the instructions included:
> >>
> >> cd /usr/src/linux
> >> make clean
> >> make xconfig
> >> make clen
> >> make dep
> >> make
> >
> >I am not sure but the 2nd "make cle(a)n" is not necessary.
>
> I think the patch applied successfully, and I went through all of
> these steps. However after I was finished I could not find a vmlinux
> file.
>
> > > The only thing is I don't believe (I'm not positive) but it didn't
> >> appear that the /usr/src/linux directory had anything useful in it
> >> when I looked in it.
> >
> >Are there any obvious error messages?
>
> When I tried it again I did receive error messages and I did record
> them. I would post them except I had another question, please see
> below.
>
> > > Thanks again.
> >
> >Good luck for the next term. I also was not successful at my first attemt.
>
> Finally, I noticed that on the Mac-on-Linux page
> (http://www.turbolinux.com/~brad/mol/) under the section 'Patching
> the kernel' (http://www.turbolinux.com/~brad/mol/#patching) that it
> was possible to get precompiled kernels from Ben Herrenschmidt's test
> page (http://ppclinux.apple.com/~benh).
>
> I couldn't get that link to function but I think I did find Ben's
> page at http://penguinppc.org/~benh/. Under 'Test Kernels' on his
> page he provided a link (http://linuxcare.com.au/paulus/kernels.html)
> to yet another kernel repository.
>
> Basically what I would like to know is if it is possible to get a
> precompiled kernel that I can install on my machine so I can run MOL.
> I have installed the latest RPM version of MOL from the website
> (http://www.maconlinux.com) and since I have a 603 processer (a Umax
> c600 or APUS model in Europe I believe) I have been trying
> (unsuccessfully) to patch the kernel.
>
> I am running Mac OS 8.5.1 and have a Sonnet L2 Cache G3 upgrade in my
> machine. Since my machine seems to run dog slow while in Linux
> (since I don't believe it's taking advantage of the card) if I get
> MOL working should it theoretically take advantage of the card?
> Otherwise I'm just wasting my time because it's pretty much too slow
> to be usable.
>
> Finally, if I grab the rom image off my OS 8.5 cd as described in the
> instructions, download and place a precompiled kernel to my Linux
> kernels folder and select it in BootX, should MOL work and take
> advantage of my G3 card? If so, where could I get a precompiled
> kernel for my machine?
>
> I've been working for hours on this without success. If Linux were
> taking of the G3 card it wouldn't be so painfully slow.
>
> Thanks again.
>
This archive was generated by hypermail 2a24 : Tue Jan 23 2001 - 16:05:35 MST