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Author Topic: Mac OS 9 booting on: iMac G4 Flat-panel (Detailed Posts)  (Read 186777 times)

indibil

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Re: Mac OS 9 booting on: iMac G4 Flat-panel (Detailed Posts)
« Reply #160 on: July 09, 2025, 09:01:26 PM »

Hi, thanks for the help. I haven't actually tried booting from a CD; I haven't fallen for that. From OSx, I copy the system folder to the OS9 partition, and neither has worked.

I have two partitions: the first 50GB for OS9 with OS9 drivers, and the second up to 128GB for OSx, also with OS9 drivers.

Maybe I should use Target Disk and copy from another Mac running OS9?

The way I'm doing it, I did it with my iBook G4 1.33GHz, and it worked.

Greystash

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Re: Mac OS 9 booting on: iMac G4 Flat-panel (Detailed Posts)
« Reply #161 on: Yesterday at 05:22:52 AM »

Thanks!
If you're copying over the System folder, there's a chance it's not being "Blessed". If that's the case there's a terminal command you can run to bless the OS9 system folder from OSX.

As long as the Mac OS 9 disk drivers are installed the rest of your setup sounds good.

Can you please try these ROMs. If you place them in the OS9 System Folder it should eliminate the need to run those Open Firmware commands. I modified the iMic ROM to run the OFW command as part of the boot script.

Test ROM

Use this ROM if the above works:
Screamer ROM

If you don't get any crashes with those ROMS, then I would suspect it's something to do with the System Folder being unblessed or partitioning issues.
If your system does crash, reboot and hold the alt key and boot from OSX, then restore the original Mac OS ROM.

iMac G3s are a pain with multi-partition SSDs and I had a lot of trouble with this. The G4 may be similar. This page may also be helpful: iMac G3 Dual Bootable SSD Setup/
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indibil

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Re: Mac OS 9 booting on: iMac G4 Flat-panel (Detailed Posts)
« Reply #162 on: Yesterday at 08:11:56 AM »

Thanks!
If you're copying over the System folder, there's a chance it's not being "Blessed". If that's the case there's a terminal command you can run to bless the OS9 system folder from OSX.

As long as the Mac OS 9 disk drivers are installed the rest of your setup sounds good.

Can you please try these ROMs. If you place them in the OS9 System Folder it should eliminate the need to run those Open Firmware commands. I modified the iMic ROM to run the OFW command as part of the boot script.

Test ROM

Use this ROM if the above works:
Screamer ROM

If you don't get any crashes with those ROMS, then I would suspect it's something to do with the System Folder being unblessed or partitioning issues.
If your system does crash, reboot and hold the alt key and boot from OSX, then restore the original Mac OS ROM.

iMac G3s are a pain with multi-partition SSDs and I had a lot of trouble with this. The G4 may be similar. This page may also be helpful: iMac G3 Dual Bootable SSD Setup/

Hello!!! Thank you so much for your instructions and help.

I downloaded your two ROMs, but they weren't working, so I booted the iMac in Target Disk mode and, from the Mac Mini running OS 9, ran First Aid on the iMac disk. This fixed it and caused the OS 9 disk image with your ROMs to appear when booting with ALT.

With the first ROM, the first thing it does is open the CD tray and then enter Open Firmware. With the second ROM, the CD doesn't open, but it also enters Open Firmware. I've attached a photo.

Since you were right, and that I had the wrong system folder because I had copied it from OSX (and that it had worked for me before), I tried another ROM file, which I think is the "Unsupported" one, and which I attached below.

It booted with this ROM, but I have two issues (I'd appreciate other things I need to check). First, I have no internal sound, and second, I only had 256 colors and no 3D acceleration.

I haven't gotten anywhere with the sound, but with the graphics, changing the NVidia drivers from version 2.3 to version 3.2 or 3.5 allows me to get millions of colors, but I still don't have 3D acceleration. Since it's a more modern GF4 chip and AGPx8, there may not be drivers for OS9.

Do you know if these problems can be solved?

Greystash

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Re: Mac OS 9 booting on: iMac G4 Flat-panel (Detailed Posts)
« Reply #163 on: Yesterday at 02:09:44 PM »

Good to hear!

The sound issue is still likely due to the "screamer" fix not being present, and if that doesn't work your next best bet would be to plug something into the headphone jack and see if that fixes it.

I would try the second ROM (with screamer fix) again, because it looks like you have an incorrect device path referenced in your NVRAM. Try the following:

1. Boot into Open Firmware
2. Type
Code: [Select]
nvedit3. You can press the up and down arrow keys to navigate any saved commands, and you should delete them all
4. Press ctrl + c
5. Run the following:
Code: [Select]
nvstore
setenv use-nvramrc? false
reset-all
6. It should reboot and hopefully boot successfully with sound with the modified ROM.

If it doesn't boot try adding the following to the NVRAM:
Code: [Select]
dev /cpus/PowerPC,G4@0
80010201 encode-int " cpu-version" property
device-end

Then:
Code: [Select]
nvstore
setenv use-nvramrc? true
reset-all

The issue is that in your NVRAM it looks like you entered
Code: [Select]
dev /cpus/PowerPC,60@1 instead of
Code: [Select]
dev /cpus/PowerPC,G4@0, although maybe that is correct? I don't have that machine to test.

The video issues are a different problem, hardware acceleration is unlikely to be possible in this machine. I've tried with a lower model and was unsuccessful.
« Last Edit: Yesterday at 04:45:34 PM by Greystash »
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indibil

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Re: Mac OS 9 booting on: iMac G4 Flat-panel (Detailed Posts)
« Reply #164 on: Yesterday at 10:05:10 PM »

Good to hear!



Okay, I'll try all that, but... with those changes, I'm not going to lose the gigabyte patcher so I can use the 7447, right? Because if the patcher is "deleted," I won't be able to boot anymore. Remember I did a CPU swap.

I have tried all the ROMs without writing anything in OpenFirmware, just placing Mac OS ROM in system folder and booting.

As for the graphics, just like what was done with the 9200 to get it to work on the Mini, can't you add the ID of the "new" GF4 to the drivers so it'll recognize it? I have no idea how to do that.

Greystash

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Re: Mac OS 9 booting on: iMac G4 Flat-panel (Detailed Posts)
« Reply #165 on: Today at 01:02:20 AM »

Ah right, I forgot about that. In that case, check the NVRAM editor to make sure there's no line containing `dev /cpus/PowerPC,60@1`. If that line isn't there, I'm not sure where it's being defined. Open Firmware is throwing an error related to it and stopping the boot process. However, you should still be able to type `mac-boot` at the prompt to continue booting.

I tried playing around with the hardware acceleration here, but was unsuccessful:
https://macos9lives.com/smforum/index.php?topic=7054.msg54720#msg54720
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indibil

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Re: Mac OS 9 booting on: iMac G4 Flat-panel (Detailed Posts)
« Reply #166 on: Today at 04:14:36 AM »

Ah right, I forgot about that. In that case, check the NVRAM editor to make sure there's no line containing `dev /cpus/PowerPC,60@1`. If that line isn't there, I'm not sure where it's being defined. Open Firmware is throwing an error related to it and stopping the boot process. However, you should still be able to type `mac-boot` at the prompt to continue booting.

I tried playing around with the hardware acceleration here, but was unsuccessful:
https://macos9lives.com/smforum/index.php?topic=7054.msg54720#msg54720

Hi, I've been doing some tests, but nothing new. Although I have discovered a few things.

It turns out I was able to boot with the "Unsupported" Mac OS ROM because I had the Gigadesigns Boot Patcher for OS9 installed. I'm attaching a photo.

Without it, NO Mac OS ROM will boot.

I removed the Gigadesigns patcher and tried all the ROMs. Some appeared when booting with ALT, but when I selected them, the screen went gray. Not even the "Unsupported" ROM works. Your two modified ROMs still have the same effect; they take me to Open Firmware, and I can't figure out the commands. I've tried several things, and none of them work.

Then I reinstalled the Gigadesigns Patcher, which is a patch that is deleted if you remove the battery or boot with Opt-Cmd-R-P. With it, I've been able to boot only with the "Unsupported" ROM, but without internal sound (yes, through the headphones) and without 3D acceleration.

Is it possible to add that Gigadesigns Patcher to the "Unsupported" ROM? Could you add the Screamer Patcher to it?

Regarding the GF4, it seems that only the v3.2 drivers allow millions of colors; the v3.5 drivers sometimes boot with 256 colors. As you may have noticed, I'm not very good with Open Firmware, and I might be going on about something crazy now, but could it be that the NVidia drivers don't have the ID for this new GF4? If I'm not mistaken, the 9200 ID was added to the 9000 drivers for the Mini, and that's how it worked. Could something similar be done? Maybe I misunderstood the GF4 thread you showed me.
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