Mac OS 8.6 on machines that require OS 9.x

[MacOS Plus]

  All the excitement around here for a while has obviously surrounded the booting of OS 9.2.2 on unsupported machines.  There was a comment from a user suggesting that the technical understandings gained from this development work might later allow OS 9.x-minimum machines to boot the earlier OS 8.6 too.  This is something I'm very interested in because I've pretty much exhausted all avenues for moving past 8.6 with one particular piece of hardware that is a preferred part of one type of DAW I use.  There is much to be gained where it concerns CPU-intensive tasks, improved video speed/resolution/dual monitor support, PCI bus integrity/speed, and the general smooth UI feel of getting beyond a Graphite G4/AGP.  Now that I have a FW800 MDD with Dual 1.8GHz Sonnet upgrade booting the unsupported 9.2.2, I'd really like to know if it would be possible to have it also boot 8.6.  (Or anything else far better than a Graphite G4/AGP.)

  My situation stems from unresolved problems with Sonic Solutions systems where they chose to abandon development of their driver for Medianet.  While the core hardware of this DAW system can operate alone without issue, performance and flexibility is greatly enhanced by adding Medianet.  Medianet is a hybrid of a specialized SCSI accelerator host card with FDDI networking supporting AppleTalk.  As soon as you hit OS 9.x there are serious fundamental issues created once its extension loads, which drags down the speed of the whole computer.  I can't pin-point the exact source of the slowdown.  It sorta works, slowly, but not completely.  A faster CPU helps a little but never allows it to completely function.  Given that I'm likely the only member here who knows about the Sonic Solutions systems in-depth, and have experimented thoroughly to resolve the issue, I doubt this problem will ever be fixed within the OS 9.x environment.  I would happily back down to 8.6 if I could use later CPU hardware though.

  I'd like to know your thoughts on how far 8.6 might be taken, particularly in the video card driver department (especially where it concerns ATI cards).  Obviously I'd hope for the MDD series, but I also have a Quicksilver at my disposal with a Dual 1.8GHz upgrade of it's own. A Radeon 9000 and GeForce4 Ti4600 are available in my collection for best video performance (only concerned with best 2D and especially scrolling performance).  If anyone has an idea what exactly it is about OS 9.x that messes up the Medianet card so much, I'm all-ears.

[Mat]

Not exactly your question, but I had a few thoughts, when I read your posting.

8.6 at G4s. What was the latest G4 officially supporting 8.6? THe G4 500 AGP? Why exactly do you need a MDD or Quicksilver. Wouldn´t a earlier G4 with an Upgradecard bring you back more speed with your medianet

Sonnet dual 1,8 Upgrades. Don´t they require 9.2.2 as well? What would the fastest official Sonnetupgrade be that officially supports 8.6? I am thinking if it is possible at all to run the latest Sonnet cards with 8.6 or if this is another showstopper?

Radeon 9000 and GeForce4 Ti4600. If you only need 2D there are several really fast cards out there that work officially with 8.6. The Formac products, the 3dfx, earlier Radeons, or the still very fine Matrox cards.

[Jakl]

I'm quite sure that I have read a post here somewhere in this forum - which I cannot find at the moment - but where I think Mactron was talking about this very topic - Mactron is this possible - booting macos 8.6 on an unsupported G4?

[MacTron]

  I'd like to know your thoughts on how far 8.6 might be taken, particularly in the video card driver department (especially where it concerns ATI cards).

The video card support of Mac os 8.6 is the same than Mac Os 9.2. You just have to install the latest ATI or nVidia drivers.

I'm quite sure that I have read a post here somewhere in this forum - which I cannot find at the moment - but where I think Mactron was talking about this very topic - Mactron is this possible - booting macos 8.6 on an unsupported G4?

Yes, It is possible, I think.

http://macos9lives.com/smforum/index.php?topic=2409.msg13570#msg13570

The Only G4 CPU that Mac Os 8.6 can deal with is a 7400. So to boot Mac Os 8.6 in a Mac with the latest G4 CPUs (7450, 7455, 7447, 7448 ...) a open firmware hack is needed.

[DieHard]

We should PM iMic about this, I had been very interested in this idea for a while, but stopped perusing it.

One of my MDD single 1.33 Ghz. running 8.6 might a sight to behold

[MacTron]

One of my MDD single 1.33 Ghz. running 8.6 might a sight to behold

The MDD have a *very* different uninorth chip, probably the 8.6 can't boot on this machine anyways ...

The remaining G4 desktops are very similar each other.


The 9.2.2, once optimized, is better than the 8.6. I have tested both on the G4 Sawtooth.

[IIO]

what application is that which does not run on 9.x but on 8.6 ?

[DieHard]

The MDD have a *very* different uninorth chip, probably the 8.6 can't boot on this machine anyways ...

The remaining G4 desktops are very similar each other.

I have some older network clients and music apps I would like to bench on a QS 933 with 8.6 to compare with 9.2.2, so even a quick OF hack to get 8.6 to load on a QS still interests me

[MacOS Plus]

To be more specific about why I would prefer a (much) later machine:

- faster bus speed.
- faster RAM support, possibly improved 'picky-ness' about RAM module types.
- resolution of built-in bugs in older hardware chipsets.
- more-advanced and more-compatible PCI bus controller.
- better ATA on-board, with three busses and large drive support, without wasting precious PCI slots with an upgrade card.
- gigabit ethernet built in, also not wasting a PCI slot.
- AGP 4x and ADC support, also with more USB ports provided by ADC connector or monitor.
- better tolerance of multiple high-bandwidth PCI cards at same time.
- not feeling like the whole motherboard is 'wasting' powerful CPU upgrades and Video cards by being a slow 'foundation'.

Every Mac model has it's own specific set of what I call 'voodoo issues'.  In one place I worked they found that Quicksilvers would quite consistently literally fry a certain Miro video capture card.  I just want the best I can do without having to deal with predictable or unpredictable 'voodoo issues'.  I've wasted countless hours on almost every machine I own trying to work around silly obscure issues, most of which can be avoided simply by using later and better machines.  Could I live with a Graphite G4/AGP?  Sure.  Can I have a much smoother and more-efficient ride with a later machine?  I certainly think so.

[DieHard]

Hey MacOS, I have a few "Aurora Capture Cards" in the back of my shop, you can have one for shipping only if you want it, don't know if it's as good, but I never heard of Aurora PCI's getting "fried"

[ELN]

Here's my AU $0.02:

Mac OS 8.6 and 9.2.2 are, for most people, the best versions of the OS for a PowerPC Mac.

OS 8.6 had a very nice System 7-style blue environment, and a new Nanokernel (v2) that improved interrupt latency, power consumption and stability. But the oddball machine-specific release for the earliest G4s had very flaky AltiVec support in the kernel (v2.11), so I would avoid that kernel version. It is a great OS.

OS 9.2.2 was the culmination of a great deal of work on the Nanokernel and the Multiprocessing Services API. It is a great OS.

OS 8.6 would need to use a newer Nanokernel and drivers on newer hardware. This would be accomplished most easily by swapping in a new Mac OS ROM file. And that should probably be combined with that machine-specific 8.6.

MacOS Plus: could you please send me a copy of the extension that is giving you grief?

And are MacOS Plus and MacTron interested in giving this a go?

[MacOS Plus]

  Thank-you very much for your offer of help with this.  Of all the possible things I've ever wanted to see made work with OS 9, this Medianet issue is #1 for me.  Alternatively, making later machines work correctly with OS 8.6 would be a decent compromise.  I'm very interested and curious to try both routes really because I can't be sure which path gives the best overall support for the best-performing hardware.  The better the performance and flexibility of the system, the more applications I can run on one machine in one environment.  I'm getting tired of, and running out of room for, maintaining specific customized machines for each application and hardware set I want to run.

  I don't know what actually changed between OS 8.6 and OS 9.x to break the Medianet support.  I'm guessing the required interaction with AppleTalk/Open Transport is the culprit but I have no proof.  The host computer seems to be of no consequence because the bad behaviour can be replicated by booting my 8600 into 9.1.  It works perfectly well if the 8600 is booting 8.6.  I seem to recall even seeing the same behaviour difference on a Nubus 9150 with the Nubus version of the hardware.  The machine was dual-boot with an 8.6 drive and 9.1 drive.

  I'd be quite happy to help with experiments for getting late-model machines booting OS 8.6.  I have a lot of hardware at my disposal for such testing.  When I was still working professionally with audio, the majority of the systems I was working with were booting OS 8.6.

  I'm not sure what I'd have to do to get the Medianet files to you.  Suggestions are welcome - PM me.  I'd have to do any testing locally because it needs the hardware present to load fully, but hopefully the content of the files and the OS development documents you've been reading will give you enough clues.  I only have one functioning PCI Medianet card.  All the others are Nubus.  I'll post some additional information and hardware photos here when I get a chance.

  BTW, If anyone ever sees Sonic Solutions Medianet cards come up for sale on eBay, PLEASE LET ME KNOW!  I am still in the market for more of them, especially PCI ones.  They are extremely rare to find these days.

[ELN]

I've PM'ed you.

So if you're keen to give this a go, the procedure would be:

• Start with a working Mac OS 8.6 installation on a supported machine.
• Replace the Mac OS ROM file with one that would work on your newer machine.
• Try booting the supported machine.
• If that works, then try the unsupported machine.

[MacTron]

And are MacOS Plus and MacTron interested in giving this a go?

This isn't an important project for me .
 Any way, I think that we can learn alot from it, we have to replicate iMic and nanopico's work and learn how to add the 9.2 microkernel and some newest drivers to 8.6 ( to the Sawtoth version) .

[ELN]

I've got some code in my repo that can move around pretty much every combination of kernel, ROM image, early-boot driver and boot script (plug plug). That's stuff's pretty easy to do now.

https://github.com/elliotnunn/cdg5

[MacOS Plus]

  It took a little longer than intended to get around to the 8.6 test, but I finally tried it.  (After tons of mysterious hell trying to get drives behaving on two B&W G3s that had been in storage.  One won't even chime any longer - grrrrrr... )  I used the 8.5.1-G3 version of the install CD to make a fresh copy on a new PATA SSD drive, then updated to 8.6 and cleaned up the extensions arrangement.  I also replaced the Multiprocessing CPU Plugins extension with the one I'd been using under OS 9.2.2 Universal on the intended target G4 MDD machine.  (In fact I was booting the G3 from the 9.2.2 drive from the MDD to speed up the installation process rather than boot directly from the 8.5.1 CD.)

* Note, the Multiprocessing extension version made no difference to what happened next.

  On both the B&W G3 and the MDD G4 the end result of trying to boot 8.6 with the much later Mac OS ROM file was exactly the same - moments after the OS splash screen appears it halts with an "unimplemented trap" error.  I was hardly surprised by this.  Perhaps you guys know better than I what was changed in the later ROM file to break it working in 8.6, but this implies a fix could be difficult.  It also implies though that booting 8.6 on the MDD isn't necessarily impossible.

  Can anyone tell me what the most up-to-date ATI drivers are for Mac OS 8.6?  Are these available through an installer that will run under 8.6, or do they have to be installed under 9.x and copied over?

@ELN: I've created a Drop-box account.  When I figure out how to use it I will PM you with a download link for the Medianet files and an explanation of their usage.

[nanopico]

There are a lot of supporting resources in the ROM and any kernel swapping is highly unlikely to work or produce any reasonable result.
There is a reason it's different between ROM versions if nothing else than to support interfaces to other parts of the OS that are in the ROM resources or System file resources.

[MacOS Plus]

  Ya, I know, I only tried it because ELN wanted to know what would happen.  I fully expected a 'fail'.  I did find it interesting that it failed in completely the same way at the same point on two machines so far apart in architecture.  This implies, as you say, a fundamental incompatability between the ROM and the rest of the operating system at a software level, long before hardware itself might crash the boot.  The fact that it gets as far as the OS splash screen on the MDD leaves hope for the situation though.

[MacTron]

You should try the Mac Os ROM v2.5.2 because it's the "most advanced" Mac Os 8.6 compatible ROM. But even though that, you should realize that this ROM lack some of the drivers needed for the MDD: the U2 ( and the ATA 100 ) support, by example.

[geforceg4]

A faster CPU helps a little but never allows it to completely function.  Given that I'm likely the only member here who knows about the Sonic Solutions systems in-depth, and have experimented thoroughly to resolve the issue, I doubt this problem will ever be fixed within the OS 9.x environment.  I would happily back down to 8.6 if I could use later CPU hardware though.

sounds to me like the best thing to do for this situation is to get a Sawtooth G4 and then get a CPU Upgrade to 1ghz or higher, i beleive this would allow u to run mac os 8.6 100% properly - theres a link here on the forums for the specific installer for the sawtooth g4 8.6 original installer.

this actually is intriguing me a bit now.. as 8.6 is really snappy, with a ghz cpu it would be REALLY fast!

personally i tend to trust the original specs + i dont like to waste my time messing around with hacking + trying other mac os roms in computers they werent meant to be used with. id rather use a sawtooth that i know 100% supports mac os 8.6!