Subject: Re: netboot from system 7.1? (was: how to install on a cold
To: Tommy Smith <thsmith@online.no>
From: Henry B. Hotz <hotz@jpl.nasa.gov>
List: port-mac68k
Date: 10/06/1999 15:25:11
At 10:35 AM -0700 10/6/99, Tommy Smith wrote:
>Thanks for all good suggestions!
>
>> Starting with an NT machine?  You're asking how you deal with Apple
>> DiskCopy images on a Windoze NT machine?  Good luck!
>Yea, it is a problem, isn't it?
8-)

>> Didn't that Mac IIcx come with *any* boot disks at all?
>Probably, but where is it?  (This machine is old, and I am probably not
>the 2nd >owner, but maybe the 5th).
>
>I have a small SCSI disk (40Mb) with System 7.1 on it.
>I also have a 120Mb empty SCSI disk, but I probably wont be able to put it
>into the IIcx.
>I have no CD player.

OK, you can boot the machine at least.  And it has the floppy drive it came
with.

The IIcx can hold one 3" hard disk with a narrow SCSI interface.  The disk
can be "half high" but low profile (1") will fit too.  I'd suggest you put
the 120MB disk in and not install X if you can't connect one of the two
externally.

>I managed to mount a shared directory on the Windows NT computer, but
>still the
>downloaded 7.5.3 files doesnt help me much.  The nice mac just mark them
>as PC
>files, and thats it.  What can I do to install the system from there?

And you have some kind of network connection that works.  From your other
comments I guess you have an Ethernet card in the machine?

What you need is some kind of client that lets you acquire Mac files in
either .hqx or MacBinary format and create real native binary files in the
Mac filesystem.

The usual way to do this is to use .hqx files, which are text encoded, and
feed them to something like Stuffit Expander.  .hqx files will survive
whatever translation the NT machine interface imposes.  So first thing is
to look for a copy of Stuffit on that existing disk.  (There's a find file
command in the apple menu.)

The other way to do this is with a network client that interprets .hqx or
MacBinary directly.  Look for one of Netscape, Fetch, Anarchie, NCSA
Telnet, or BetterTelnet.  The last two have FTP servers built in.  Look at
the Ethernet HowTo that I wrote and follow it in reverse if you need help
configuring IP under MacOS.

Then get a copy of DiskCopy (4.2, or 6.something) to create floppies from
the floppy image files of the OS.  Again look to see if you have it already.

Now you should be able to download the floppy images for some version of
MacOS (7.1 is fine actually).  Expand them with Stuffit Expander if
necessary.  Create real floppies from them with DiskCopy.

Also get a floppy with the driver installer for whatever Ethernet card you
are using.

If it isn't included in your version of MacOS then get a copy of the MacTCP
Installer floppy as well.  Also save copies of the other utilities you
needed to get this far (DiskCopy, Anarchie, Stuffit, whatever).

Look at the NetBSD/Mac FAQ and create a copy of HD SC Setup which has been
patched to work on non-Apple disk drives.  You may need to download a copy
of the ResEdit utility to do this.  Put the modified copy of HD SC Setup on
the Disk Tools floppy.

Now you are set up to maintain your IIcx when you go changing the OS or
installing new disks or whatever.

>Another option is to just leave the system 7.1 intact, and netboot the mac
>from
>NetBSD/vax.  Is this possible?

I'm not sure.  The newest versions of the booter may possibly be able to do
that, but I've never looked at that capability.

You do know that NetBSD/Mac boots from MacOS, not from the bare machine
currently?  You can just use a minimum install on a 2 MB partition for the
purpose, but I tend to keep a slightly larger set of MacOS tools around for
maintenance.  Also NetBSD uses the MacOS partition map so you still need to
have a working MacOS setup even if a native boot capability is created.

If you can do what I outlined then the MacOS readme files covering
installation and the NetBSD installation guides should cover the rest of
what you need to do.

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