@Andreas_Wolf:
>> I personally think it would be great if the MorphOS Installation
>> CD will not block per se specific G4 processors / PowerMac models /
>> mainboards any longer in future releases.

> https://morph.zone/modules/newbb_plus/viewtopic.php?topic_id=7310&forum=11#75811

> I don't know if these limitations are still valid though.


I guess I just have to wait for the next MorphOS release. Maybe I will be able to run this system on either my Quicksilver G4/800, or on my G4/350 AGP. Anyway, I expect that I would have to test MorphOS extensively, for I do not expect that everything will run out-of-the box right from the beginning. I intend to keep on using these hardware systems in future times, however, so I appreciate that MorphOS is being ported to these computers.

The only thing I upgraded besides memory and bigger HDDs was the graphics card, for I got an ATI Radeon 9200. I think I could use it in both machines, but at the moment I use it in the G4/350 AGP. Yet, I already checked whether the graphics card was compatible with MorphOS before I bought it last year.

Usually I run MacOS 9.2.2, Mac OS X 10.4.11, and Debian Lenny on my G4 PowerMacs. Of course I could use LeopardAssist

http://sourceforge.net/projects/leopardassist/

to install Mac OS X 10.5 on my 4th generation PowerMacs, but it would just be too slow. Hopefully I will not have to use similar tricks just to fool the MorphOS 2.6 installation CD...

As Apple already dropped support for Mac OS 10.4 "Tiger" regarding Security Updates, I assume that this will also happen to Mac OS 10.5 when the next Mac OS X release is out, for that is the usual policy of the Apple company. Then it is likely that even PowerMac G5 users running Mac OS X 10.5 will be left in the lurch. Thus, MorphOS is (apart from a couple of Linux and BSD distros for PPC machines, which are also getting fewer) a way out of this dilemma for people who still want to use their old PowerPC G4 hardware.

And I still hope that it will also be possible to install MorphOS on PowerMac G4 (PCI) computers and PowerMac G3 b/w with G4 upgrades, but I will try this out myself as soon as MophOS 2.6 is out for I do not expect you to actively support these machines.


@amigadave:
> I believe I have read, in more than one place, that MacOS9 only
> supports 1.5gb RAM,

Yes, I remember that several Macintosh magazines and websites, including e.g.

http://www.apple-history.nl/g4agp.html

provide(d) Macintosh users with this information.

> but in my 1.25GHz Dual G4 PowerMac MDD (no FW800) model, it
> recognizes 1.99gb of my installed 2gb RAM. [..] Maybe it cannot
> access all 2gb of RAM, but MacOS9.2.2 shows it in the about
> this Mac menu item.

I cannot check this myself at the moment, for I only use an amount of 384 MB RAM in my G4/350(AGP), and my Quciksilver has only got 3 RAM slots, i.e. in this computer there is a maximum of 1.5GB memory, anyway. Yet, I found a Macintosh user who tried to fix some problems with his G4 MDD here (German speaking forum, sorry):

http://www.macuser.de/forum/f6/os9-boot-cd-534261/

Finally he provided readers with a snapshot of his Mac OS 9 screen here:

http://www.macuser.de/forum/f6/os9-boot-cd-534261/index6.html#post6212726

http://sphotos.ak.fbcdn.net/hphotos-ak-snc4/hs063.snc4/34492_414130509524_780099524_4369341_7262728_n.jpg

I think this proves that at least the fastest G4 Macs capable of running Mac OS 9, the MDD ones, recognize 2GB of RAM if you use this operating system. I remember, however, that even slower G4 Macs could use the full 2 GB at least if you use Mac OS X, for this information was frequently spread in the media at times when Mac OS X was still a fairly new operating system.

If you own proprietary productivity software for Mac OS 9 which uses a lot of RAM, e.g. Adobe's Photoshop or Apple's FCP, you might want to check yourself if your G4 MDD can access all 2GB of RAM by running a number of these programs at the same time. "About this Macintosh" provides you with information on memory consumption. Maybe you would also like to experiment with the "Virtual Memory" control panel, in addition (and _restart_). Probably "Virtual Memory" will still be limited to a maximum of 1GB(?), even if 2GB of physical RAM is installed.


> My G4 came with a dual boot of MacOS9.2.2 & MacOSX10.2.6 on
> the same partition (which I did not know was possible, I thought
> 2 partitions were required for dual booting).

Yes, that is possible, if both system folders were "blessed" (that is what a sort of activation is often called) the way they should be by the operating systems' installers. If you want to, you can, of course, use different partitions. Just remember to always install Mac OS 9 drivers if you add a new hard disk drive to your system to install Mac OS X _before_ you actually start the Mac OS X installation tool. To do this, either use Drive Setup in an already "natively" booted Mac OS 9 or activate Mac OS 9 drivers in the Mac OS X hard disk tool before the partitioning process, though I am not sure if this option ist still offered in Leopard. Thus, you might have to use 10.3 or 10.4 installation discs. It is, however, crucial to install Mac OS 9 drivers if you want to access HFS(+) partitions created by Mac OS X using "natively" booted Mac OS 9.2 systems, and hard disk support for Mac OS 9 cannot be added later.

I wonder, however, how MorphOS can later be added to set up a computer system with three or four (MorphOS, Mac OS 9, Mac OS X, Linux) operating systems. Well, hopefully it can be integrated into a boot loader like yaboot, but I will try to find out all the details about this once MorphOS 2.6 will be released for a variety of PowerMac G4 desktop "towers".

[ Edited by g4QS_redux on 2010/8/26 12:57 ]