At 12:55 AM -0500 3/25/04, Jason Sterne wrote:
>I am in the process of downloading the NetBSD/macppc ISO. I am hoping that
>OF can boot from that, from a CDROM drive as master on the sole IDE channel.
>I do recall that Linux/PPC had no problem using the master and the slave on
>that bus ca. 1999 (unlike MacOS 7.x), so I'm hoping that once NetBSD boots, I
>can install from a CDROM master to an IDE HD slave. Will this be a problem? I
>can install onto the ancient SCSI drive, although at 120MB, it may not hold
>the entire distribution (although X is very optional for this machine!) and
>then copy that over to the IDE drive, although I'm concerned that the IDE
>drive would then not be bootable, as I understand that NetBSD (like Linux)
>needs a multi-stage bootloader on OF 2.x machines, which I assume is
>installed by sysinst running from the CD.

Booting is complex.  See the install notes, which cover a lot of the 
options.  Sounds like you know OF well enough to deal with most of 
them.

>I'd also like to get Ethernet going as cheaply as possible. I have several DEC
>Tulip-compatible cards for the PC. Is there any chance they would work with
>NetBSD on PowerPC despite the obvious firmware inconsistency? ;)

Shouldn't be a problem in general.  Some drivers might not support 
both endianness, but people seem pretty good about keeping up with 
that.  Unless the cards have an OF prom you won't be able to net-boot 
with them.
-- 
The opinions expressed in this message are mine,
not those of Caltech, JPL, NASA, or the US Government.
Henry.B.Hotz@jpl.nasa.gov, or hbhotz@oxy.edu