Hi all!

I've had this PowerMac G5 for a while now, running MacOS. Last week, at last, I installed MorphOS v3.19 using a USB key, and everything went fine. However, after installing MorphOS, the PowerMac G5 wouldn't boot into MorphOS. It would chime, then show the Mac face and then a question mark and then nothing.

By chance, I realised that, if I entered Open Firmware and typed "mac-boot", then MorphOS would boot and work fine.

By mischance, I thought that this problem had something to do with the PRAM and decided to reset it. Since then, my PowerBook doesn't boot at all. It chimes and then nothing. Pressing Option+Command+O+F doesn't do anything. Pressing Option+Command+P+R makes the computer chime and restart. Pressing "t" doesn't show the FireWire logo. I burned Mac OS Tigrer on a DVD. Pressing the mouse button after the chime opens the DVD tray and I can load the DVD. Pressing "C" after the chime doesn't boot the DVD.

I tried two different batteries, both showing 3.6V on my multimeter.

I tried removing all the RAM sticks except two, then the PowerMac doesn't chime.

I've been on many Apple-related forum and I don't know what to do

Some sites suggest to try a different video card but I'd like your advice before I start buying more stuff

Thanks in advance!
Tygre

PS. I've seen this discussion of course

[ Edited by tygrechingu 10.07.2025 - 16:01 ]

If it chimes, you should be fine hardware-wise. It means the OpenFirmware posts and the graphics card is good. You really need to get to enter OpenFirmware. Try a different keyboard if yours is failing for some reason - old Apple kbs work best in case of such problems. Disconnect any USB device you don't need, just leave the kb. You likely have a misconfigured boot-command in OF settings, which breaks auto-boot. It could be pointing to a partition that no longer exists for example.

Once you get into OF, try:

Code:

This should get it to a state that will boot automagically.

[ Edited by jacadcaps 10.07.2025 - 23:53 ]

Hi Jacadcaps and thanks for your quick answer!

I tried two other, older (Mac) USB keyboards, no difference... I know that they work because I can test them with an iMac. I'll bring a "regular" USB keyboard from work tomorrow to try...

What else could I try to enter OF?

Could I have "broken" OF when installing MorphOS? Resetting the PRAM?

Thanks!

If you don't find a way to enter OF, then you can remove all bootable drives. G5 jumps in that case directly into OF-console and you are able to reset all.


[ Editiert durch Amigaharry2 11.07.2025 - 05:40 ]

Quote:

Unlikely. For starters MorphOS doesn't really touch this stuff on its own. And it chimes, so it isn't dead!

One way to fully reset the OF is to keep holding the power button until it chimes twice or so. Not sure this works on a G5 though. Your G5 also has a small reset button on the motherboard near the battery holder. Try that.

Don't give up on it, I'm sure you'll figure it out eventually.

Hi Amigaharry2 and Jacadcaps!

Thanks a lot for your advice, some progress!

I used a regular PC keyboard and booted the G5 while holding "Windows" + Alt + O + F. The screen, as usual, "switched off" after some seconds. But I noticed that pressing NumLock would switch the LED on/off (as expected). So I "blindly" typed the commands that you suggested and the G5 indeed resetted... So I was in OF! Only without an image on screen...

I tried the same procedure but typed "mac-boot" and the G5 booted into MorphOS!

So, it seems that OF doesn't display on screen, even after resetting everything.
Should I have mentioned that my screen is one of these 30" Cinema HD Displays?

Besides the lack of display, the boot behaves as last week: MorphOS doesn't boot automagically, I must go into OF and type "mac-boot"...

What do you think that I could I try to fix either (or both!) of these problems?

Cheers!

Ooh interesting! I think the easiest way for you to get to OF now is... to use a different display. I've just sold my 30" Cinema Display because it was too much trouble - it has very low tolerance to screen modes. For some reason OF must be trying to use a resolution your monitor cannot display. It could be the cable (too bad it's not removable from the display...). Try connecting it to the 2nd output if your card is a dual DVI one.

Anyway... once you do get to OF, type printenv and see what the boot variables are. I'll look into my OF vars later and paste what those should be...

Wow, thanks a lot, Jacadcaps!

I plugged the screen of a G4 in the second output of the graphic card and I can see OF! I can see again

Still no luck with the booting though... I'll share a screenshot of the variables but I realised something: my "hd:," was set to "/ht/pci@7/k2-sata-root/k2-sata@0/disk@0". This disk is not ATA. When I'd execute "dir hd:,\\", OF would say "not a ATA disk". My boot disk is "/ht/pci@7/k2-sata-root/k2-sata@1/disk@0" (on the second SATA port?).

I managed to change the alias of "hd" in NVRAM by "setenv use-nvramrc? true" and "nvalias hd /ht/pci@7/k2-sata-root/k2-sata@1/disk@0", but it still doesn't boot automatically.

I also "setenv boot-command boot hd:,\\bootinfo.txt", but it still doesn't boot automatically.

So I don't know what's happening, because "boot" or "mac-boot" from OF boot MorphOS no problem...

Cheers!

PS. Regarding the display, I see that "screen-#columns" is set to 100 (by default too) and "screen-#rows" to 40. In http://www.firmworks.com/QuickRef.html, they say that 80 should be the default for "screen-#columns", should I try? 🤔

PPS. I uploaded a screenshot of "printenv" here.

I have changed:
- "user-nvramrc?" to true, to use the saved "hd" alias (see below)
- "skip-netboot?" to true, to skip that part (save some seconds?)
- "boot-command" to "hd:,\\bootinfo.txt", to force booting on MorphOS

I have also changed the alias for "hd" to "/ht/pci@7/k2-sata-root/k2-sata@1/disk@0" so that "dir hd:,\\" can access/list the content of the boot partition.

Still no luck When starting the G5 without touching anything, MorphOS doesn't boot, and the G5 just shows a gray screen with nothing happening. When going into OF and typing "bye" or "boot" or "mac-boot", the G5 boots into MorphOS...

Your boot-device points to a .tbxi-file on drive hd:. This is a special signed file, what OF is searching at begin and starts it.(like to our startup-sequence).
To start MOS there is also a tbxi-file named bootinfo.txt. This file has to be "blessed" (signed), so that OF can find and start it (refer to doc on ISO - this file is located in mac_ppc32.
It seems that in your case on hd: is no such file or not blessed! This can be done by shell command HFSSetMacBoot bootinfo.txt
Then reboot.


[ Editiert durch Amigaharry2 12.07.2025 - 15:18 ]

Hi Amigaharry2!

Thanks for your suggestion, I "blessed" again the "bootinfo.txt" file but still no luck...

I couldn't find any info. on the Internet: can Open Firmware log what it's doing? Maybe that would contain hints about what's happening?

Best!

Is hd: the right partition with bootinfo.txt on it? And there is only one tbxi-file / partition allowed!

To find out type dir hd:\
bootinfo.txt should be in root-dir.

There is no trace-fktn in OF (afaik). But from all I've seen your issue is not OF! It seems that the tbxi-file can't be found.

If you can't solve that problem, there is a possibility to start several OS via a boot-menue, without tbxi-files..

Thanks Amigaharry2!

Yes, I'm sure that "hd" is properly set because "dir hd:,\\" shows the content of the Boot: volume, and the file "bootinfo.txt" is of type "tbxi" (all the others are "????").

It's very puzzling because starting the G5 "as is" will not start MorphOS but:
- Going into OF and typing "bye" immediately will start MorphOS
- Going into OF and typing "multi-boot" will show the MorphOS "disk" and selecting it will start MorphOS

Crazy, eh?

I think boot-command variable should set back to mac-boot.


[ Editiert durch Amigaharry2 13.07.2025 - 07:11 ]

I don't remember how these go, should probably test... but I guess one option is to set the full path to the partition (pci/ata-....) instead of using the hd: "assign". Either to boot-device or boot-comand, or both... for some reason I have it like that for boot-device in one of my macs, can't remember why.

Hi Amigaharry2 and jPV!

Thanks for your suggestions!

Currently, "boot-command" is set as "mac-boot" (I resetted everything yesterday again to start "fresh"), but still no luck.

I'll try setting "boot-device" with the full path and let you know!

Best!

PS. Just tried to set "boot-device" with the full path, same behaviour: chime and then gray screen...

Hi all!

After many more tests, I think that there's a problem either with the PCI bus or the Maxtor SATA hard disk...

It's the only way to explain that:
- I "setenv boot-command multi-boot"
- I resetted the G5 and could see the MorphOS disk icon in the boot picker (but choosing it brought a "gray screen").
Now I was sure that "boot-command" was doing something, though!

- I "load hd:,\\boot.img" and saw the expected output ("... DO-QUIESCE finished.")
- Then I "go" and MorphOS started.
- I restarted the computer
- I "boot hd:,\\boot.img" and, again, MorphOS started.
Now I was sure that I had the correct "boot-command"!

I "setenv boot-command boot hd:,\\boot.img" and restarted the G5 and got... a black screen!

So the only explanation would be that pressing Option+Command+O+F and typing "bye" give time to the PCI bus or the hard disk or something to initialise???

Guess this'll be the most secure computer at home: only I'll know how to boot it

you should do following.

set boot-device to hd:,\boot.img (need only one "\" when useing direct path!)
set boot-command to boot

This should always boot MOS!

If you wan't to choose different OS (MacOS, Linix, etc.) or OS with different boot-parameters then you should use a boot-menue.

Hi Amigaharry2!

Thanks for all your advice, I really appreciate it!

I tried setting boot-device and boot-command as you suggested, but still no luck: the G5 chimes, then a black screen until I switch it off by pressing the power button.

There's a difference with yesterday, though. When boot-device is "hd:,\\:tbxi" (its default value), the G5 would show a gray screen, but with "hd:,\boot.img", it's a black screen!

https://www.reddit.com/r/ProgrammerHumor/comments/tgogft/sometimes_progress_looks_like_failure/

I put the outputs of printenv and boot (from inside OF) here and here.

Thanks!

Quote:

That sounds ancient, and I did have weird MorphOS only issues with such old clunkers both on G4 PMac and PowerBook (long time ago).

So if you got anything else at hand replace the Maxtor, install from CD (or USB if thats your fancy) and see if that install will boot on it's own.

Might also try out both SATA ports, just to be sure.

A gray screen normaly means that it tries to boot MacOS.
Blackscreen means: doing nothing....

This behaviour is absolutly not normal. Do you have a seperate boot-partition (hfs) for boot.img ? I hope it's noot marked as bootable....