On Jun 28, 2006, at 17:23, Rob Hamrick wrote:

>
>>> I haven't been able to get Linux working on either my recently
>>> purchased G3 PDQ or my G5 single (PowerMac 9.1) - except for Fedora
>>> Core PPC 5 (no sound). I would have thought that the BSDs being more
>>
>> I've had good experiences with Ubuntu on PPC hardware.  You might  
>> want
>> to give it a try.
>
> Yes.  I've also found that Debian/Ubuntu have good support for PPC
> hardware.  ...no experience with any G3 powerbooks though.
>
> I think NetBSD is a much more elegant system, but, if you're at an
> impasse with NetBSD, you may want to try either of those.  The
> installers are extremely newbie-friendly.  And you can use the Debian
> package manager at the same time as pkgsrc if you want.
>
> -Rob

Thanks for the advice. I am a huge fan of Debian and Ubuntu, but as I  
posted earlier, I have only been able to get Fedora working on my G5  
so far. (With Fedora, you are forced to dump the old and install the  
new version every time a new version number is finished (i.e. 4, 5,  
6) and I don't want to have to do that with my hardware problems from  
distro to distro and version to version. I have no idea what could  
crop up in a new version. That is why I thought I would try a BSD  
flavor. Debian Sarge (3.1r2) has a serious problem with the SATA  
driver blocking access to CD drive in installations from CD and Etch  
beta 2 has an issue not being able to detect USB keyboards. Etch also  
has bug that show up in the Ubuntu flavors with complaints about a  
'module unknown not found', then it tries to mount /dev/sdb3 on /root  
(which fails with a 'no such device'), then comes a "no such file or  
directory' and then the system defaults into BusyBox and I get the  
error "/bin/sh: can't access tty: job conrol turned off". This issue  
also exists when I try to install on my daughter's IBM PC (which is  
about as generic as you can get for Linux, seen from a hardware point  
of view).

An install with the "desktop" or "live" CD version of (Xu), (Ku) or  
(U)buntu Dapper reaches the GTK login screen and then freezes. This  
may be related to similar behavior that I have seen with sound card  
issues on the G5 in earlier versions of Ubuntu and Fedora Core 4.  
Lastly, none of the above mentioned distros have sorted out the  
thermal control issues on the G5 single, where the fans rev like a  
jet engine. I'll refrain from expressing my opinion about releasing  
new versions of a distro before they are fully sorted out.

Lastly and maybe most interesting, Darwin 602.2 (Jaguar) spins its  
wheels, but never actually loads for an install (never get past the  
Apple splash screen) and Darwin 801 (Tiger) puts out a huge amount of  
error messages about packages not being found for installation, etc.  
when I try to install it on my G5 single. Very frustrating, but again  
thanks to all for advice. It seems to be a really good bunch of  
people here :-)

Brian