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[Jubadub]

Awesome, @RossDarker! Just like with Mac OS 9.2.2, now it feels like the mini has officially stepped into Mac OS 7.6.1 territory!

Many thanks for getting this ready and set up!

[Jubadub]

OK, this came out sooner than expected... Or should I say, this was never truly expected.

I'm posting this on all 3 Mac communities I put the original post in, because it's that much of a big deal.

Many of us know System 7.1.2 was the first ever version of Mac OS to support PowerPC-based Macintoshes...

... Yet we couldn't go below System 7.5. Until a day ago:



Rairii just released not only an update to his System Enabler for System 7.5 ~ Mac OS 7.6.1, but also a separate patching effort of the same System Enabler to get System 7.1.x booting.

So this achievement alone is BEYOND newsworthy...

... But it doesn't stop there. No.

You'd think a PURE 68k OS wouldn't boot in PowerPC in bare-metal:



System 7.1.1...



... And System 7.1.

"To boldly go where no PowerMac has ever gone before."

This is precisely what we theorized earlier, and the thoughts we entertained: with Apple's 68k emulator residing in the Mac OS ROM file, we now have the LATEST version of said 68k-to-PPC CPU instruction converter, making ALL OF 68k run as if it was no different than a Java runtime, with "68k bytecode", if you will. A whole OS done that way.

And guess what? System 7.1 is so light, so fast, I cannot even SEE the "Welcome to Power Macintosh" screen or any of the Extensions loading, because they all just load INSTANTLY. If you blink for even a moment, you WILL miss all of it.

It got to the point that the OS is so light, what takes the "longest" to load is the Mac OS ROM itself! You know that finished loading after you are past the Happy Mac part.

Anyway... There some points about these achievements I'd like to clarify:

- The OSes seem to pair with the Finder as follows: System 7.1 Finder 7.1, System 7.1.1 Finder 7.1.3, System 7.1.2 (and 7.1.2P) Finder 7.1.4. Note that System 7.5 is also paired with Finder 7.1.4;

- Systems 7.1.1 ~ 7.1.2P aren't able to run their Finders (crash+reopen Finder eternal loop), but if we swap them in with Finder 7.1, it all works, which is how I took those screenshots (Rairii figured this out first, as well);

- Systems 7.1.1 comes with its various own "System Enablers". You must delete them first so they don't intervene with Rairii's Enabler, as it's all System 7.1.1 needs. If you don't, you will see this instead. If you do, and please correct me if I'm mistaken, it seems like Rairii's Enabler gets its Resource Fork updated to also error out like this even after you got rid of the other, pesky enablers (I did an MD5 check for both forks to confirm). So if that happens, unpack Rairii's Enabler anew and discard the old one;

- System 7.1.2 (7.1.2P untested) is just like 7.1.1 in that it comes with its own Enabler that you need to get rid of first, in order not to face the same issue. In this case, it's called the "PowerPC Enabler";

- I could boot all these OSes with all Extensions on. I did get this and this as warning messages, though, after boot, at least with System 7.1.2;

- Funnily enough, System 7.5 has the same Finder 7.1.4 as System 7.1.2(P), but there are no issues with it there. Likewise, System 7.1.2(P) is fine with a different Finder. The problem only materializes when both are present simultaneously, but not individually. Incidentally, Finder 7.1.3 on System 7.1.2(P) will also have the same issue, as will the Finder that came with System 7.5, hence why we settle for Finder 7.1 (there are no Finder version 7.1.1 and 7.1.2 that I could find).

I think that's about it. So to highlight one of the interesting features of e.g. System 7.1.2P, it is the latest version of the OS that is still able to format disks as MFS. Nearly all of the later System 7 versions can both read from and write to existing MFS disks, but not format one anew. (So a Mac mini G4 CD for 7.1.2P could, one day, be theoretically cool to have. It is also a relatively popular System 7 version choice by many.)

There's also one more thing: Personally, I never really coexisted much with Mac OS before the System 7.5.x era. So I can't say what should be or should not be working at this point anymore... And I could use more people exploring this together with me. But what I can say is that System 7.1.x was almost as stable as the 7.5 and later counterparts on the Mac mini G4 1.5 GHz model (this hardware is so overkill). Most apps ran, but some, such as "The Teleporting Inchworm" (my personal choice of basic System features benchmark in this project) no longer runs (and freezes the OS). But maybe it was never meant to run on System 7.1 to begin with?

Some might now be wondering, "What about System 7.0 and 7.0.1?". From what I understood, System 7.1.x used a different "format" for its System Enablers compared to 7.5.x and 7.6.x, which is why we now have 2 different Enablers, but it seems no version of Mac OS before 7.1 is even aware of System Enabler files at all! (So-called "gibblies" or "gbly" type.)

So... yeah. Only time can tell what happens or not after this!

As always, many thanks to Rairii for yet another groundbreaking update! The latest enablers can be found in his GitHub project page, as per usual, which are also mirrored here in the Garden for both archival and easier access from Mac OS itself. Make sure to check the release notes for details. This time around, the Mac OS ROMs are the same as the previous release, so nothing new there to think about.

[robespierre]

So to highlight one of the interesting features of e.g. System 7.1.2P, it is the latest version of the OS that is still able to format disks as MFS. Nearly all of the later System 7 versions can both read from and write to existing MFS disks, but not format one anew. (So a Mac mini G4 CD for 7.1.2P could, one day, be theoretically cool to have. It is also a relatively popular System 7 version choice by many.)

MFS floppy disks are formatted with Apple's proprietary GCR encoding, which can only be written or read on Apple floppy drives connected to an IWM or SWIM controller chip. No computer since the "Gossamer" G3 desktop or "PDQ" notebook is able to use these disks, since they are unreadable in all USB floppy drives. MFS was normally only used on single-sided double density (SSDD 400KB) floppy disks, but there were ways to prepare double-sided (DSDD 800KB) disks as MFS instead of HFS. Both use GCR encoding, not industry-standard MFM.

A Mac Mini G4 cannot read, write, or format 400/800KB disks at all. It is a hardware limitation, not a missing driver or software issue.

[Jubadub]

So to highlight one of the interesting features of e.g. System 7.1.2P, it is the latest version of the OS that is still able to format disks as MFS. Nearly all of the later System 7 versions can both read from and write to existing MFS disks, but not format one anew. (So a Mac mini G4 CD for 7.1.2P could, one day, be theoretically cool to have. It is also a relatively popular System 7 version choice by many.)

MFS floppy disks are formatted with Apple's proprietary GCR encoding, which can only be written or read on Apple floppy drives connected to an IWM or SWIM controller chip. No computer since the "Gossamer" G3 desktop or "PDQ" notebook is able to use these disks, since they are unreadable in all USB floppy drives. MFS was normally only used on single-sided double density (SSDD 400KB) floppy disks, but there were ways to prepare double-sided (DSDD 800KB) disks as MFS instead of HFS. Both use GCR encoding, not industry-standard MFM.

A Mac Mini G4 cannot read, write, or format 400/800KB disks at all. It is a hardware limitation, not a missing driver or software issue.

Physical disks, yes, but there are also disk images.

[smilesdavis]

not an issue these days with ZULUScisi, BlueSCSI, AppleSauce etc

[robespierre]

Physical disks, yes, but there are also disk images.

For making MFS disk images you can use MinivMac:

Code: [Select]

% dd if=/dev/zero of=400kb.image count=800and drag that file into MinivMac, select single-sided.

[Jubadub]

Mac7News again!

Rairii figured out all that System 7.0.x needed in order to fully use and acknowledge the existence of the Enablers, more appropriately-called "Gibblies", which is to take the boot 2 (and optionally boot 3) resources from System 7.1 and put them on System 7.0.x! So I went ahead and tried exactly that, on the Mac mini G4 as always:

7.0.1 (International English):



7.0 (International English):



Well, that's it. It's completely CRAZY all of this got this far. Incidentally, this patching might also assist older 68k Macs that required an Enabler to boot System 7.1 in a way so that they also boot 7.0.x (at least in theory).

Oh yeah, and it's incredibly stable, too. Played and completed a game of Shanghai II on these. Ran Glider flawlessly (lack of sound aside), too. Things just... work. Smoother than butter, it's playing with lightning!

Anyone can replicate this with easy ResEdit copy + paste, but just in case anyone wants an ever bigger shortcut, I attached a patch for 7.0 and 7.0.1 to this post, which I created with ResCompare 2.6. You double-click it, then click on the button to patch, then select your System 7.0 or 7.0.1 file accordingly. It may or may not require the "International English" version for my patches, though, but I'm not sure. The patches do work on the International English release, though, that much I can say. Also note that the patches create an unmodified backup file called "System (original)", just in case, but make sure you don't leave the backup inside your System Folder by accident.

This was my first time actually using ResEdit OR ResCompare in all my life. But wow, they are easy and nice. (Had to increase allocated memory on Get Info to both, though, which you must if you do any of this patching by hand!)

One way or another, we got ALL versions of System 7 now covered. Insane. Rairii also intends to look into the lack of audio one day, so this might not be over yet from his side.

Just to address our next natural expectation: "WHAT ABOUT SYSTEM 6?"

This one seems like it won't be easy (not that most of this was, as extremely few people on Earth have the ability + interest to do what Rairii did up until this point). Rairii is working on this, but there can't be any guarantees. It seems that even Macsbug is not working in this case? System 6 is just too much of a departure from System 7 and later. Code only present in Old World ROMs will be needed this time around, one way or another.

Now only time can tell what will or will not happen!

[ssp3]

Holy mackerel! 

This was my first time actually using ResEdit OR ResCompare in all my life. But wow, they are easy and nice.

WHAAT? And you call yourself a Mac user?
Kiddin', just kiddin' 

Anyway, your ResCompare patch on System might work or it might not. For it to work, somebody else's System file (before applying a patch) should be bit for bit identical to your System file at the moment of creating ResCompare patch.
IIRC, there were several resources inside System file, that were created/modified by various NIC installers. Possibly others too. I also know of one audio software company that created its own resource inside System file for copy protection purposes.

[Jubadub]

Anyway, your ResCompare patch on System might work and it might not. For it to work, somebody else's System file before applying a patch should be bit for bit identical to your System file at the moment of creating ResCompare patch.
IIRC, there were several resources inside System file, that were created/modified by various NIC installers. Possibly others too. I also know of one audio software company that created its own resource inside System file for copy protection purposes.

Ah, good point. To be fully sure, people ought to consider respatching in boot 2 and 3 themselves (literal copy+paste) if the patch complains with an error message.

[IIO]

i would never try to patch a system releated file while it is beeing loaded, it seems more safe to patch a copy, then switch files, then reboot.

[Jubadub]

I'm afraid I can confirm, at least on a 1.5Ghz Mac Mini, the mouse freezing issue is still there. Oh well :-)

Y'know, I have to comment on this again: by now I must have rebooted the mini from 50 to 100 times since the new ROM, and the mouse freeze glitch bug did not happen even once.

But I think I'm closer to understanding what's going on: @fergycool, if you can and are willing to try, assuming from now on you only use the 10.2.1 ROM for the mini, can you zap the NVRAM and then see if you ever get it ever again?

Basically, something BIZARRE happened when I was using Mac OS 9.2.2 recently, which made many pieces click together: I got System Sounds and FULL volume control e.g. on the Control Strip for me to adjust on the mini. "Suddenly". This is completely unprecedented to ALL of us Mac OS users on the mini.

I go through the findings a bit more in detail on this post. (Recommended read for any Mac OS 9.2.2 user on the mini.)

This is / these are a bizarre and unexpected positive side-effect of this project (or of the stock 10.2.1 ROM itself once it has the mini patches). But I very much welcome it!

[davecom]

Exciting development. It sounds like we're getting near to a v10 of the mini CD.

[smilesdavis]

you guys rock, cant waint for the installer for the rest of us

[ssp3]

In my case, first I tried using the latest Python 3.13.9 both from Windows 7 (bad idea due to resource fork loss) and macOS 10.14.6 Mojave, but neither worked: it seems like that version of Python was just too new. I then retried with Python 3.8.10 instead (which I chose thinking it might be more period-appropriate for the script's age) on Mojave, which worked flawlessly.

FYI. I use one specific software for programming HAM radios that relies heavily on Python. The consensus there is that one has to use nothing newer than Python 3.10, because later versions have bugs/compatibility problems.
I'm using MacPorts version 3.10.5 on Yosemite.

As to the mouse and sound issues, did you try to zap PRAM, remove battery and also press the CUDA button? Is everything OK after these procedures too?

EDIT. Another question. Does your ROM file have ATI Via driver integrated into it?

[RossDarker]

Basically, something BIZARRE happened when I was using Mac OS 9.2.2 recently, which made many pieces click together: I got System Sounds and FULL volume control e.g. on the Control Strip for me to adjust on the mini. "Suddenly". This is completely unprecedented to ALL of us Mac OS users on the mini.

Interesting! So far I haven't been able to reproduce this.
To confirm, do you have sound coming from the Mac mini's internal speaker?

My attempts involved:

• Switching to the 10.2.1 ROM on Mac OS 9.2.2
• Installing System 7.0 (with System Enabler 356 71x from v20251203; boot 2 and 3 copied from System 7.1)
• Experimenting with both leaving the NVRAM alone (after booting 7.0) and resetting NVRAM on different occasions.

So far no luck with changes to the onboard audio on Mac OS 9.

On the other hand, I haven't had any more stuck mouse cursors after any of my numerous restarts today with the 10.2.1 ROM, so that either looks promising or I've been exceptionally lucky.

Exciting development. It sounds like we're getting near to a v10 of the mini CD.

Yes indeed, this would certainly call for a new disc!

For the next CD, I’m hoping there can be a big upgrade, such as onboard audio functionality. The progress being made some time ago looked to be going in the right direction. It’d be great if it’s successful, but still worth investigating nonetheless.

[fergycool]

I'm afraid I can confirm, at least on a 1.5Ghz Mac Mini, the mouse freezing issue is still there. Oh well :-)

Y'know, I have to comment on this again: by now I must have rebooted the mini from 50 to 100 times since the new ROM, and the mouse freeze glitch bug did not happen even once.

But I think I'm closer to understanding what's going on: @fergycool, if you can and are willing to try, assuming from now on you only use the 10.2.1 ROM for the mini, can you zap the NVRAM and then see if you ever get it ever again?

Thank you. I will certainly do that and keep rebooting and see if it the frozen mouse issue has gone. Fingers crossed!

[fergycool]

I'm afraid I can confirm, at least on a 1.5Ghz Mac Mini, the mouse freezing issue is still there. Oh well :-)

Y'know, I have to comment on this again: by now I must have rebooted the mini from 50 to 100 times since the new ROM, and the mouse freeze glitch bug did not happen even once.

But I think I'm closer to understanding what's going on: @fergycool, if you can and are willing to try, assuming from now on you only use the 10.2.1 ROM for the mini, can you zap the NVRAM and then see if you ever get it ever again?

Thank you. I will certainly do that and keep rebooting and see if it the frozen mouse issue has gone. Fingers crossed!

I'm afraid that I've done that. Subjectively the mouse freezing issue seems to occur less often. I rebooted 15 times after I reset the NVRAM before it happened. But it did happen.

Also the sound is still muted. I even rebooted into 7.6, changed the volume via the Monitors and Sound control panel, then rebooted into 9.2.2. Still the same. But if you have another tests to do then let me know and I will. Thanks!

BTW I did notice that in the Sound control panel in the INPUT tab if I toggle on SIGNAL METER it locks solid. Not sure if that is new.

[Jubadub]

FYI. I use one specific software for programming HAM radios that relies heavily on Python. The consensus there is that one has to use nothing newer than Python 3.10, because later versions have bugs/compatibility problems.
I'm using MacPorts version 3.10.5 on Yosemite.

As to the mouse and sound issues, did you try to zap PRAM, remove battery and also press the CUDA button? Is everything OK after these procedures too?

EDIT. Another question. Does your ROM file have ATI Via driver integrated into it?

It seems they removed some HQX-related tooling in such later Python versions, yeah. Perhaps others things, too. Can't say I'm a fan of Python and nor of their decision-making, both recent and old.

I zapped NVRAM with the "PRAM" keyboard shortcut, only. Although from other people's testings, it seems zapping isn't really a requirement to reproduce the system sounds and volume control afterall. Something else triggered it (although still NVRAM-related). Some System 7.5.x installer I ran previously, I think from another System 7 system, seems to be what has set it off and enabled it, from what I could tell.

I intend to figure out how to dump my current NVRAM state so that we can get to see what exactly is allowing these to work. Then, perhaps, we might get something closer to being worthy of a "v10" Mac OS 9.2.2 disc for the minis.

About the ATI Via driver, AFAIK, it doesn't come integrated into the ROM. As a ROM that has the patches seen in the "v9" disc, though, it does contain some ATI-related patching (the NDRV?). The exact ATI patching present is in the end of the "macmini.py" Python script: https://github.com/elliotnunn/tbxi-patches/blob/master/macmini.py

Interesting! So far I haven't been able to reproduce this.
To confirm, do you have sound coming from the Mac mini's internal speaker?

Oh, no, sadly, I did not get that to work. To be sure, I just retested that with the mini's USB audio adapter, that I always have, unplugged before booting it fresh, and the internal speaker is still completely mute.

What I meant was 2 sound-related things started working:

- System Sounds: For example, when you get an alert window, if you click outside its window, a regular Mac OS system will beep at you if it's not on mute, with whatever you have configured as your system sound ("Indigo", "Sosumi", "Beep", "ChuToy" etc.). Likewise, if you get an oldschool file select prompt, and you decide to click outside, some programs are coded to beep at you if you do, and that's exactly what we also get now on the mini. There is one exception to this, though: There's also supposed to be a beep when an alert window itself pops up, but that still won't play, curiously enough.

- Overall volume control (via the Control Strip and Sound Control Panel): Before, moving the volume slider did not save its position in the slider, and the top-bar menus would flash blue for a moment, which is what Mac OS does when a system sound is supposed to play, but the system is on mute, as if we had just selected mute each time (despite the slider bar remaining in the middle in the Control Strip IIRC). This is no longer happening: Now I pick a volume via the slider, the system then beeps accordingly with a loudness matching the volume setting (or it doesn't beep at all, if I chose the lowest setting, which mutes the OS), then, in the case of the Control Strip, when I reopen the slider, we see the current volume slider position is still in the position we previously chose. ALL sound output is now louder/quieter accordingly, as it should be.

(Then there's the mouse freeze bug during boot, which I still have to encounter since.)

To get the internal speakers working, we will have to tweak the ROM scripting further, so that we either tweak Apple's sound drivers to somehow cooperate with the existing speakers in the mini, OR write brand new drivers for it at worst, I'd suspect. I think we cannot unfortunately dodge meeting one of these requirements with Rairii's patching alone.

I'm afraid that I've done that. Subjectively the mouse freezing issue seems to occur less often. I rebooted 15 times after I reset the NVRAM before it happened. But it did happen.

Also the sound is still muted. I even rebooted into 7.6, changed the volume via the Monitors and Sound control panel, then rebooted into 9.2.2. Still the same. But if you have another tests to do then let me know and I will. Thanks!

Thanks for checking all that again. I guess there's still some step of the puzzle I missed out on documenting... When I think back to the things I did up until the point I noticed I had system sounds suddenly, I remember I was installing various System 7.5 ~ 7.5.3 versions, then booting into them, and perhaps even installing them at one point from within another System 7 instance? Or... did I always install from Mac OS 9?

So, I really ought to capture the state of my NVRAM somehow while it lasts... This way whatever it is doing right, it can be transferred. (E.g. specific values for sound-related varibles stored in it.)

The hard way would be to get System 7.5.x installs / booting to trigger these sound features again, and pin down which install and install procedure exactly did it. That will be the last resort.

Same for the mouse freeze... There is something preventing it from happening in my machine entirely now, it would seem... (Could the mouse freeze bug, all along, have a correlation with the other sound bugs I described? Meaning that if those sound features are in order, so is the mouse movement...?)

BTW I did notice that in the Sound control panel in the INPUT tab if I toggle on SIGNAL METER it locks solid. Not sure if that is new.

I can guarantee this was always the case: anything involving a microphone / sound input has always caused a hard crash or failed to work on the mini under Mac OS 9.2.2, for all 4 mini models, documented in the vastness of the original Mac mini thread somewhere.

I just rechecked it on my mini in its current state, and I can see that behavior remains unchan--- WTH?! It's actually working now on my end! What the?!

On the "Input" tab, I see I have an "External Mic" option whose device is marked as "USB Audio", which I can click on to be my input source, and if I click on "Check signal level", it doesn't freeze, but actually does as it advertises. (Meanwhile, "Play sound through output device" is greyed out, which I guess makes sense?)

So I went ahead and started digging through my old stuff to see if I had an old style microphone I could plug into the USB audio adapter and... it... works? As in, the OS didn't crash, the "Sound" Control Panel didn't crash, and when I picked the "Alerts" tab and then clicked on "New Sound" and then recorded new audio, it actually captured the sound input! All of this would previously freeze or crash the OS, as far as I'm aware!

Thing is, however, the volume of the sound was extremely low, even if I was extremely loud (being loud helped a bit, though). So I decided to search for another microphone candidate I'd have immediate access to...

... which I did. At first, it seemed to take no sound, so I rebooted. After that, it'd register the audio, but... the audio was just some random kind of static! Still "worked" in that nothing crashed and a sound file generated, but that wasn't sound from the outside per se like that...

So now I ordered in an ultra cheap microphone that should be a bit more appropriate for the task. Once it arrives, I will try again later, to see if any of them will record audio properly.

I really would love to figure out how exactly this "sound features medicine" was set up in my mini (almost guaranteed to be NVRAM, as I touched nothing in my Mac OS 9 install). Or, at the very least, how I can "capture its state" so that we can manually set it on any Mac we want (e.g. NVRAM script).

Oh, for the record, I also went ahead and retested the "External Mic" option of the "Built-in" type, and that doesn't get to record any audio at all, still. So just how the internal speakers still don't work, the internal mic also doesn't. At least there are no crashes normally if I try using them, though at one point I got the Control Panel to crash the Finder in a way I had to reboot, and an actual bomb which also required a reboot. (But I never got any of these with the "USB Audio" source for the mic, now that is stable OS-wise.)