Sonnet Encore ST G4 1400/2M in a Sawtooth / Apple CPU Plugins

[saturnu]

Hi,

this forum was a great help at getting my power mac g4 running!
A few weeks ago i bought a cheap sawtooth at ebay from a collector for about 35€.
That was pretty cheap as i found out - it has 2gb ram, ati 9800 pro, sonnet tempo 133 pata, usb2.0 card, m-audio soundcard and the sonnect cpu upgrade.
At first it had issues running os9, it constantly froze and i have read here, that this could be an incompatiblity with the 'Mac OS Rom' calling some functions unsupported by the cpu through the 'Multiprocessing/Apple CPU Plugins'-Extension.
So without the extension everything is working fine, except the functions provided by the extension, e.g. power management, sleep-mode.

I have (sonnet)-patched the extension without any improvement (the patch is only one byte).
Is there something i can do about that, e.g. compile a new 'new world rom' with some modifications?

I'm not quite sure if open firmware is patched on this machine but i have read here that the computer shouldn't boot without the firmware patch.
On the other hand it's a 7455 cpu which should be supported without a patch?

I have an ofw hex dump converted to a binary, but it doesn't quite match up with the firmware, that i have extracted of the apple firmware updater, the hex dump is a bit larger and the firmware matches up in blocks in that dump.

I'm a bit afraid to run the updater again, but it seems like the updater has a check - not to patch twice.

Can someone help me on getting the Extension running or even confirm, that i'm in bad luck?
This is my first mac so, it's possible that i have missed something importent with this computer archelology. 



By the way - this is how i dumped the firmware range in ofw - credits goes to Daniel for the actual dump-line

Option-Command-O-F
#after chime

#type in ofw
dev /packages/telnet
" enet:telnet,192.168.XXX.XXX" io

#terminal on the second machine
$ telnet 192.168.XXX.XXX | tee -a dump.txt

#in ofw - telnet session
dev /cpus/@0
100000 4 claim dup fff00000 swap 100000 10 map 100000 dump

#quit session and convert dump.txt
#delete some unwanted text at the beginning and the end of the file, than use awk
$ awk -F '[:|]' '{print $2}' dump.txt | xxd -r -p > ofw_dump.bin

The Sonnet Patcher contains two small patches and un-patches for the v4.2.8f1 open firmware and it uses the same forth-script like the apple firmware updater, i'm still not finished in figuring out how the patch format works.



The cpu is an XC7455B-RX1400PF
The datasheet said, it has a max die-junction temp. of only 65°C and os9 froze without an extra fan on the heatsink, so i watercooled it together with the 9800pro and replaced the power supply just in case. ^^

[saturnu]

Hi,

i finished comparing my actual open firmware dump with the one out of the Apple Updater.
And guess what... they match up pretty well.
So the sonnet open firmware patch was never installed on this machine.
It seems like a Sawtooth G4 can boot with this 7455B cpu out of the box, without the "Apple CPU Plugins" Extension.

So i tried my luck and installed the sonnet package ce_install_v31.sit from 2007.

If you look at the screenshot, on the left side is one sonnet unpatch and the corresponding patch resource - on the right side is the dump before and after.
dump1.bin is my first dump and it matches the unpatched original version of the firmware 4.2.8.1f1.
dump3.bin is the dump after i applied the sonnet fw patch, right next to the patch binary of the file resource.
 
OS 9 still is freezing with the patched "Apple CPU Plugins" Extension.
Maybe i should try to disable all Extensions beside the "Apple CPU Plugins".

[AtariMan]

https://macintoshgarden.org/apps/mac-os-922-universal

This image works with Sonnet Encore ST G4.
Burn the image to a CD, download and install.
Firmware is not needed. You can't boot into OS 9 because of the graphics card.
Your card will not work in OS 9. Buy or flash a PC card.

[FBz]

Problem is likely the Apple CPU Plugins file anyway.

More often than not, the Apple CPU Plugins Extension (inside the Multiprocessing folder) is intentionally disabled or removed from the active Extensions folder because it causes SO many problems. AND as you only have a single processor on your Sonnet - you need not any multiprocessing assistance / so disable or remove THAT extension and then address any resultant power management or sleep-mode problems afterwards.

ZAP the PRAM, rebuild the desktop, etc. after removal or disabling of that extension and proceed from there.

By the way, very nice score on that Sawtooth. You STOLE it, at that price.

Addendum:
For more info refer to this thread...
http://macos9lives.com/smforum/index.php/topic,3878.msg26161.html#msg26161

[saturnu]

https://macintoshgarden.org/apps/mac-os-922-universal

This image works with Sonnet Encore ST G4.
Burn the image to a CD, download and install.
Firmware is not needed. You can't boot into OS 9 because of the graphics card.
Your card will not work in OS 9. Buy or flash a PC card.

I can run os 9 in a stable condition, if i just disable the plugin.
I thought it would be nice, if i could get the sleep mode and power management working, that's all.

the gpu card is already flashed and i can run up to 1920x1080 at 24bit, i can even change it to 256 colors and go down with the resolution for older games.
3d accel isn't working, 'cause it's running in a generic mode, as expected.

Problem is likely the Apple CPU Plugins file anyway.

More often than not, the Apple CPU Plugins Extension (inside the Multiprocessing folder) is intentionally disabled or removed from the active Extensions folder because it causes SO many problems. AND as you only have a single processor on your Sonnet - you need not any multiprocessing assistance / so disable or remove THAT extension and then address any resultant power management or sleep-mode problems afterwards.

ZAP the PRAM, rebuild the desktop, etc. after removal or disabling of that extension and proceed from there.

By the way, very nice score on that Sawtooth. You STOLE it, at that price.

Addendum:
For more info refer to this thread...
http://macos9lives.com/smforum/index.php/topic,3878.msg26161.html#msg26161

i think you are right, i guess i have to live with it, with the extension disabled.
i disabled all other extensions except the cpus-plugin and the sonnet one, but it's still crashing.
it's no big deal after all. 

thanks for your answers,
at least i have learned something about old macs 

[smilesdavis]

same boat 500mhz with 1.8 sonnet, no original cpu

whats the procedure? shall i use a 2002qs single core which has a faster bus and use this from scratch instead or is there another way to recover a os9 on a 1.8 sonnet? someone share an iso?