Dual Boot OS X/ OS 9/ Instant DAW on 17"Alu 1Ghz PowerBook G4

[mrhappy]

So I FINALLY got around to installing the SSD (OWC) in my Aluminum 17 1Ghz PowerBook G4 on which I had planned to install ‘Unsupported OS 9.2.2’  but then decided to try a dual boot setup… as usual, I turned it into a circus!!

The plan was to make 3 partitions to install (1)  OS X Tiger (as I had a retail copy) on the 1st partition, (2)  OS 9.2.2 (Unsupported) on the 2nd, then (3) the ‘Instant DAW’ on the 3rd (I know I couldn’t boot from this partition but wanted access to all the goodies!).

The problems started right out of the gate just trying to ‘initialize’ the new drive… being a OS X only machine I couldn’t get the option of ‘installing OS 9 drivers’ from Disk Utility and my ‘OS9 Unsupported’ disc was not recognized…. So I wound up firing up a G4 DP500, started the PowerBook in ‘target disc’ mode and initialized/ partitioned the new drive from there using Drive Setup on the DP500. I CAN’T BELIEVE that I never used ‘Target Disc Mode’ before!!! It’s super handy and works great!

The Tiger installation started off smooth but then the PB kept getting errors reading the installation disc… not sure if it’s the disc or the optical drive is getting ‘flakey’ but after a number of tries it finally read the disc and I was able to get Tiger installed.

At this point I inserted the ‘Unsupported’ disc and things were looking promising… I was able to select the destination partition but when I’d hit the ‘ASR Restore’ icon it would try to open ‘Classic’ and it wouldn’t let me ‘Restore’… so after a few tries of that it was time once again for… you guessed it… ‘Target Disc Mode’!!! Haha!

Fired the DP500 back up… clicked on the Unsupported disc and it wouldn’t open … forgot that I had to ‘mount it’ using Toast! Once it was mounted and opened I just had to click through the series of ‘destinations’ until I got to the proper volume on the PowerBook. Now the ASR worked and was ‘restored’ to partition 2 on the PowerBook.

While I was having so much fun with ‘Target Disc Mode’ I went ahead and restored the ‘Instant DAW’ onto partition 3 of the PowerBook.

By this time it was getting late so I just did a quick check restarting in Tiger, OS 9 and opening a few things from the Instant DAW… I did notice that Cubase didn’t want to open, although it looked like it wanted to. Anyway, I’ll have to sort that all out when I get a chance and go through and see what works and what doesn’t.

So there you have my ‘mentally challenged’ attempt at OS X/ OS9/ Instant DAW on the Aluminum 17” 1Ghz PowerBook!!

[mrhappy]

Checked out a few more things... Cubase won't open, probably due to my system folder shenanigans. There's a bunch of audio extensions missing from the 'Unsupported' system folder that are in the 'Instant DAW' system folder (OMS etc.) so I'll probably have to reinstall Cubase/OMS or maybe just copy the extensions over??

I have a external FW 400 drive that doesn't show up on the OS 9 but DOES work on the OS X volume. Other FW 400 stuff seems to work properly.

Internal sound is goofed up in OS 9. In order to work, something has to be plugged into to the headphone jack, in which case the internal speakers work along with headphones. Any volume adjustments act on both the speakers AND headphones.