boot installer from usb
not sure if anyone else has done this yet, but i thought it was
pretty cool, so I'd pass it along. I've got an original iBook and
finally decided to install debian on it.
i've also got a usb ZiO multimedia card reader and I've successfully
booted MacOS from it so I thought I'd take a stab at using it to boot
the debian installer.
A couple of hours of experimenting and here's what I found:
format the chip Mac OS Standard (HFS). not sure what formats OF
understands -- this worked, but others may too.
put the yaboot, yaboot.conf from disks-powerpc/powermac& root.bin
from images-1.44 on the chip
boot to open firmware (cmd+option+o+f)
enter: boot usb0/disk@1:yaboot
enter: install
looking at yaboot.conf (this is the first new world mac I've
installed on so I've not used the yaboot alot) it looks like it would
be really easy to add entries for other kernels being on the usb
disk. I'll probably mess with building a rescue disk with a kernel
that has more drivers next (i'd really like the airport driver on the
chip).
my iBook only has one usb port but devalias in OF lists a usb0 and
usb1, the other one may be for macs with 2 usb ports. if you try
this on a 2 port machine you may need to change the boot command.
Kevin
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