Ah, the Common Hardware Reference Platform, IBM’s and Apple’s ill-fated attempt at taking on the PC market with a reference PowerPC platform anybody could build and expand upon while remaining (mostly) compatible with one another. Sadly, like so many other things Apple was trying to do before Steve Jobs returned, it never took off, and even Apple itself never implemented CHRP in any meaningful way. Only a few random IBM and Motorola computers ever fully implemented it, and Apple didn’t get any further than basic CHRP support in Mac OS 8, and some PowerPC Macs were based on CHRP, without actually being compatible with it.
We’re roughly three decades down the line now, and pretty much everyone except weird nerds like us have forgotten CHRP was ever even a thing, but Linux has continued to support CHRP all this time. This support, too, though, is coming to an end, as Michael Ellerman has informed the Linux kernel community that they’re thinking of getting rid of it. Only a very small number of machines are supported by CHRP in Linux: the IBM B50, bplan/Genesi’s Pegasos/Pegasos2 boards, the Total Impact briQ, and maybe some Motorola machines, and that’s it. Ellerman notes that these machines seem to have zero active users, and anyone wanting to bring CHRP support back can always go back in the git history.
CHRP is one of the many, many footnotes in computing history, and with so few machines out there that supported it, and so few machines Linux’ CHRP support could even be used for, it makes perfect sense to remove this from the kernel, while obviously keeping it in git’s history in case anyone wants to work with it on their hardware in the future. Still, it’s always fun to see references to such old, obscure hardware and platforms in 2024, even if it’s technically sad news.
Why would Apple meaningfully support CHRP though? So that people could buy a CHRP box from IBM and help themselves to a fully functional Mac with the help of a pirate copy of MacOS 8? Even back when Apple allowed clones, they had to be Mac clones so Apple could keep control of the hardware licensing aspect (and terminate OEMs if they wanted).
About the news, I don’t understand why people install Linux on classic computers such as SGI workstations, Pegasos II workstations, or PowerPC Macs when they could install an OS with much more character on those machines (IRIX, AmigaOS 4.1, MacOS). I mean, you are not daily-driving that classic computer anyway,
kurkosdr,
I agree. Most, maybe almost all, of these “classic” computers keep running for only two purposes: strict backwards compatibility for a very odd need, or nostalgia.
And for nostalgia, Linux does not make sense. As you said, you’d not use them as a daily driver, and a Raspberry Pi 400 will probably have more computing power and resources than these, and of course use much less power and take up much less space.
For backwards compatibility, it usually makes sense to use the original operating system anyway. Otherwise, it might be possible to jury rig an adapter for a modern system and just use Linux on a modern PC anyway.
It only leaves maybe the most extremely odd cases I cannot think about.
Or more realistically: “because we can, because why not?”
Well yes and no. Budget Amiga users want the power of a vampire without paying 500 USD+
So they emulate a 68040/68060 cpu with PiStorm. It is about 130 times to 780 times faster than a stock amiga and 13 times faster on a amiga 500/600 than a amiga 4000 with a 1260 cpu upgrade. The FPU speed of the Pi4 is so much faster, that any more upgrades to the board is useless as it is still limited to chip speed, which maxes out on the 600/1200/4000 at 2.75 with the standard 50 mhz PAL crystal.
If you want a faster and better 68k machine, a minimig2.0 is the way to go and add either a terriblefire or a PiStorm, but keep in mind that the PiStorm has to boot linux before being usable as an accelerator, and thus most people usually go for the terriblefire.
An amiga 4000 with a mediator board from elbox, a killerNIC and a voodoo4 4500PCI and a real 68060 75mhz is still going to blow almost any emulated hardware out of the water when it comes to gaming, but have you seen the price of those things? The mediators have been out of production for ages (same for the g-rex boards). KillerNIC is a susbstitution for a much more expensive PPC upgrade but faster. The 240mhz 604e upgrade card today goes for almost 40k despite it being launched in 2007 at 399USD. (killerNIC is 333mhz btw, and can also run AmigaOS4.*)
It is an expensive hobby, but it is fun. That is why we do it.
I wish morphos was x86_64 compatible, had smp and protected memory. Then i would never leave the amiga scene.
FWIW an 060 at 75Mhz would be be around 1 order of magnitude slower than a 68K JIT running on an old x86 @ 2.5Ghz for example.
Xanady Asem the problem with the amiga is not cpu speed per se, it is chipspeed that is the major bottleneck for upgraded amigas. Also there is a few titles that refuses to run in emulation.
Well, I can tell you that back in 2005, when I had a PowerPC Apple machine, it was double booting MacOS and Linux and I spent more time under Linux. Back then, the tooling available on OS X was still not what it has become, and I often felt it was easier to get my stuff done under Linux. Don’t get me wrong: it was the time when OS X felt like a very nice OS, well designed, beautiful and clean and I loved using it for things better done in that environment. And, man, did I love the hardware. But I probably wouldn’t have lasted long without Linux on it.
Nowadays, the hardware is still working, and it can only run Linux, since nothing useful can be done with a supported OS X version. But I admit to very rarely booting it, so I might try reinstalling an old OS X on it for old times sake. This kinda inspired me 🙂
Most people that install Linux on SGI machines, for example, do so because they are actively developing the OS.
That could also be legacy support issues, the people who write compliance rules do not always understand software and hardware so they often link to specific platforms. All they can do is document what is. This is especially the case in some high risk / intrinsically safe industries like medicine or energy. We know it’s crazy, but we also do not want the potential liability or blame if something goes wrong, even if that blame is unfounded. Even is supporting or fixing the legacy hardware is expensive, the cost might still be trivial relative to liability.
On a separate issue, this thread is about Linux dropping support for legacy hardware, I’m not sure why Apple gets dragged into the debate. If the reader restricts the discussion to Linux then they should be quite unhappy, because they probably ended up on Linux because Linux promised support when others vendors dropped it.
And that’s the issue right there, the kind of person who buys an SGI workstation to contribute to the Linux kernel is vanishingly rare, and becomes more rare by the year as those machines become more and more eclipsed by $300 laptops on the performance front and become more and more rare/collectible. Anyone buying an SGI workstation today buys it because they want to run IRIX or IRIX software not available elsewhere.
There is no issue. People can do with their systems whatever they want.
In this case, people who install linux/*BSD on ancient hardware are in many cases directly involved with the development of the system software.
The issue is on the side of the Linux kernel people, who can’t find enough people to work on classic architectures almost nobody has (and even fewer have Linux installed on them), that’s what I meant by “that’s the issue right there”.
They were desperate for companies to buy into the PowerPC ecosystem, so they could get economics of scale and secure a future for their processor? That’s my guess anyway.
Yup. The idea was that the Mac would be the creme de la creme of the platform with other manufactures making cheaper boxes to keep volume of parts up. Working for a hardware company at that time the bought a fair number of Motorola 68k series of cpus, Motorola did come in with the hard sell of making our next product based on the CHRP. They tried selling us everything/anything so not terribly surprising, They also probably knew our owner was a huge huge Mac guy and resented the fact that we had to run/use PC hardware. But he loved money more than Macs. Well, sort of. There were a lot of dumb money and time wasting , lets use macs initiatives, but that was less money.
Maybe it had something to do with application compatibility ?
I agree there is probably not much point in keeping this hardware supported. This is from somebody who thinks the only point of linux is to support orphaned hardware.
Moving to present Mac resurrections under linux, I’m not so chuffed with how Linux works on my 2011 mac mini. I suspect it might be something to do with an unsupported graphic card. IMO it is the more recent intel macs they should focus on.
Similarly, when Asahi Linux was announced, I thought “meh, remind me again in about 8 years”. I’m all for being prepared but it’s usually a better part of a decade before we need to install linux on ARM mac. That in my view was a diversion from linux maintenance on orphaned hardware they could be doing now.