Trouble booting 9-STABLE memstick on PowerBook G4

[John W. O'Brien]

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On 05/28/2012 07:38 AM, Nathan Whitehorn wrote:
> On 05/28/12 05:39, John W. O'Brien wrote:
>> 
>> I am trying to install 9-STABLE (r236164, GENERIC) on a PowerBook
>> G4 (model #A1010) that has a gimpy optical drive, but I cannot
>> get the memstick to boot. I know my way around i386 and amd64
>> reasonably well, but am new to freebsd-ppc and to Open Firmware.
>> CC me off-list with replies, please.
>> 
> 
> Two suggestions: 1. It may show up in the graphical boot chooser
> that comes up if you hold down "Option" 2. dd'ing the regular CD
> image to a USB stick may also work
> 
> It's also possible that your model of powerbook can't boot from
> USB. It should, however, be able to boot from firewire -- in
> particular, if you have a second powerbook/ibook/macbook you should
> be able to boot from the other machine's optical drive if it is in
> target mode. -Nathan

Hi Nathan,

Thanks for the suggestions.

The only other FireWire-equipped Mac I have readily available is an
Intel MacBook Pro (model #A1620).

1. When I hold down "Option" only the internal hard drive is presented
as a bootable target. The options that come up when connected to the
MacBook in TDM include the remote hard drive, but not the remote CD
drive, or the remote memstick.

2. Tried this but could not detect any difference in how the memstick
was handled.

I've also tried this with the other combinations I could think of
(memstick image vs. ISO image, local memstick vs. remote memstick via
TDM, remote CD via TDM).

I verified that the memstick and the CD are readable by the OS when
each machine is booted natively. That is, each one is automounted and
can be browsed in the Finder. Further, when I started with "Option" on
the MacBook Pro, the choices included a CD-ROM icon labeled "Windows."
Obviously the MacBook wouldn't boot from the CD.

I also verified that I must not be too far off with the OFW syntax by
doing "dir hd:,\" on the PowerBook.

Since this is not a mission-critical exercise, I'll probably just let
it go for now, unless there are other ideas forthcoming from you or
the list.

Regards,
John
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