A couple of weeks ago TerraSoft released preliminary 64-bit ISO’s of their flagship product, Yellow Dog Linux 3.0.1 (YDL), especially for owners of Apple’s new G5 machines. I was pining for a chance to get an open source OS running in 64-bit mode so I quickly downloaded the three ISO’s.This version of YDL is just a beta, so this won’t be a review of the distribution’s features. YDL just happens to be the first open source OS I got working on my G5 and I would like to share my experiences with you. In this article I’ll use YellowDog mainly as an example.
Ever since I got my dual 2GHz. G5 in September I’ve been dying to get under the hood and see what this system is capable of without Apple’s beautiful but resource hungry GUI. I spent weeks digging through alternative OS websites finding very little, but that would seem logical since the G5 has only been out in the wild for a couple of months now.
My greatest hope for a 64 bit capable OS was with three groups of developers:
NetBSD (being the most multi-platform BSD),
Gentoo and
TerraSoft. Personally I’m a great fan of the BSD’s and feel very much at home using them. However there was little news coming from the NetBSD community. That’s why I went looking around in Linux-land where development is usually faster than with the BSD’s.
Both Gentoo and Terrasoft showed promise. First Gentoo released a live CD from which it’s supposedly possible to bootstrap a Linux system. The Gentoo folks didn’t have the G5’s cooling fans under control yet though, so I decided to wait some more. A G5 without software fan control turns up its fans to full blast all the time and sounds much like a vacuum cleaner. There was little joy in working with the machine this way. YellowDog Linux 3, obviously derived from RedHat Linux 8.0, came with working fan control. My G5 seems even quieter in Linux than it is using Apple’s own OS but getting YellowDog to run in a usable way was quite an endeavour.
Installation
Sure, downloading three ISO’s and doing a RedHat-style install is easy, but the G5 has a few quirks that still need to be addressed. In short I experienced kernel panics, problems getting the machine to dual boot, video issues in X, some problems with OSX 10.2.8 on another partition and
Mac-On-Linux doesn’t work either. These are serious problems, but I don’t blame YellowDog for them. A representative from TerraSoft told me that they are working on these issues and that this beta-release was only meant to provide a bare bones running system, which it does.. eventually.
To get the first CD to boot at all, I had to lower the display resolution in OSX from 1600×1200 to 800×600. In the higher resolution the install CD would boot, and soon afterwards give a string of errors with a full-blown kernel panic as the climax. I only found the remedy to this after a good bit of searching on the web and in newsgroups. Linux boots perfectly in 800×600. A minor annoyance is having to change resolutions back and forth in OSX whenever I want to use one or the other.
With these kernel panics out of the way, I wanted to install Linux and OSX in a dual boot configuration. This wasn’t easy. Apple’s tools aren’t helpful at all for this purpose and I lost my OSX installation twice due to me misunderstanding the way Apple wants me to think about partitioning. Finally I got things to work by first installing OSX on one partition with the rest of the disk remaining unpartitioned. YDL’s automatic partitioning sorts out the rest of the process perfectly when you choose to automatically partition in the installer. OSX is very similar to Windows in its assumption that it’ll be the only OS the user has on the disk. It is therefore imperative that you install OSX first.
Finally, the installation proceeded properly, much like RedHat’s on an x86. Sadly though the configuration of XFree86 is also very much like it is on an x86. I really hope TerraSoft will at some stage provide standard working configurations for all contemporary Macs. Mac users intrinsically know less about the hardware they’re running than most Linux users on x86 computers do and it’s difficult to choose the right keymaps and video driver. Even now, after half a dozen attempts, I have my screen running in 800×600@70Hz. While this is theoretically usable, which I’m proving to myself right now by typing this review within Linux, it is a sad state for a 21 inch monitor and a Radeon 9600 to be in. Surely there must be a way to change this. I just haven’t found it yet.
Linux affecting OSX on another partition also has to do with graphics. Sometimes, seemingly randomly, OSX boots in 800×600 instead of 1600×1200. This happens sometimes when I reboot after software updates and also when I just rebooted to reproduce this error on a clean system. Much worse though is the problem I got with OSX 10.2.7 and 10.3.1 where the whole System Preferences dialog simply wouldn’t start anymore after I had booted into Linux and back into OSX afterwards. I was left in OSX without a way to change the screen resolution back to 1600×1200 or to change any other settings on the system. The preferences applet simply didn’t appear at all when I tried to launch it. I only managed to resolve this by reinstalling OSX (which also entails reinstalling Linux, or fiddling with the bootloader by hand). I experienced this problem in both OSX 10.2.7 and 10.3.x.
My final and much smaller gripe with YellowDog on my G5 is the fact that Mac-On-Linux doesn’t work. As far as I can tell this has to do with the kernel modules MOL needs being for 2.4.xx kernels, and YellowDog using a 2.6 testing kernel. I’m hardly sure of this assumption though, and frankly I hope to be proven wrong.
Conclusion
YellowDog Linux for the Apple G5 is quite stable for a beta and it works in SMP mode. It does have problems, which are mostly tied to the video subsystem, and these really need to be resolved before this 64 bit Linux will be a viable working environment. The installer could use an overhaul, especially in the X department, to give Mac owners an easier time configuring their systems. I’d opt for a configurator dealing with all contemporary Macs in their default configurations and an ‘Advanced’ or ‘Custom’ button for those who need to tweak their settings.
I’ll certainly be watching TerraSoft closely in the weeks and months to come to see if they can get their distribution up to date and the problems ironed out. Gentoo also shows a lot of promise and of course NetBSD (“Of course it runs NetBSD!”) shouldn’t lag behind Linux too long if it wants to live up to its slogan. There are exciting times to come in the 64-bit arena, and I’m not even talking x86 here!
About the Author
I’m a graphics designer and journalist by trade. I have been using computers since around 1987 when I got my first Commodore 64 as a kid. More recently, in 2000, I got into alternative OS’es on my x86 PC and completely dumped Windows about a year ago. Last summer I ordered an Apple G5, which I feel is the best computer I ever bought.
what applications do you run that needs a 64-bit processor?
did you say SETI
Nothing. But it is nice to have it because it brings some speed boost and because it is the right time to have it and because you paid for it.
Once upon a time, in the 1980s, people were running on 16bit computers and I am sure some people at the time was asking the same question: “why do you need 32bit for?”
Honestly, I thought Linux will be at the forefront of adopting 64-bit computing. I was told it was as simple as recompiling all your apps with 64 bit flags via GCC and voila. But from what I’ve observed, it’s nothing as smooth as running 32-bit Linux. What exactly is the problem? The inavailability of 64-bit drivers?
Not all apps can be guarenteed to be 64-bit clean, it depends on the app. Linux, the kernel, has been 64-bit capable for years and years now – the Alpha port happened in 1993 I believe. Apps? Most, I’d bet, should recomplile fine but there will always be some that will have issues.
Not all apps can be guarenteed to be 64-bit clean, it depends on the app. Linux, the kernel, has been 64-bit capable for years and years now – the Alpha port happened in 1993 I believe. Apps? Most, I’d bet, should recomplile fine but there will always be some that will have issues.
Yes, there is no such thing as new technology which works out of the box. 64 bit hardware is here, it works, it works well – I’m sure software people will update their proggies one by one as they get that hardware in their hands.
What advantages would Linux have over OSX? Is OSX not tuned or compiled for 64-bit computing on the G5?
> In the higher resolution the install CD would boot, and soon afterwards give a string of errors with a full-blown kernel panic as the climax. I only found the remedy to this after a good bit of searching on the web and in newsgroups.
What was the panic string? How did you solve it? Not that I own a G5 …
Just curious.
Traal, i’m almost certain osx isn’t a 64bit real deal yet.
it’s in transition.
probably be done when linux is done.
Linux scales excellently well on two processors, most especially with 2.6. I don’t know how well compared to OS X though. Even though I have an iMac and I like it, I still can’t live without Linux. 🙂 Whenever I’m in h4xxOr or l33T mode, I switch to linux. That will be 90% of the time.
“But from what I’ve observed, it’s nothing as smooth as running 32-bit Linux.”
That’s because PC are 98% of the market of Linux. So very few people work on powerpc even fewer on PPC64.
AMD64 is different because you could mixed normal x86 code and x86-64 code without problem. Speed up are around 20%. Mostly by the doubling of the number of register i beleive. But what about G5 ?
What advantages would Linux have over OSX? Is OSX not tuned or compiled for 64-bit computing on the G5?
There are a lot of disadvantages to both at the present time.
OS X suffers from a lack of a 64-bit ABI and userland. This is most likely due to the incredible work which is required for Apple to modify their Cocoa development tools to support a secondary binary format, as the current Mach-O format dates back over a decade to NeXT. Consequently, applications can only address 4GB at a time (which can be somewhat disadvantageous if you’re considering using the G5 for a scientific modelling program in which one process uses 8GB of RAM) and code which makes large usage of 64-bit integers does not see a performance boost.
The important thing to consider is that when Apple does define a new 64-bit ABI for MacOS X, they can address a number of problems limiting the performance of the current ABI. Consequently, when the 64-bit rollout occurs on OS X, it should result in an overall system performance increase of 10%-20% from the new ABI alone.
The biggest drawback of 64-bit Linux on the G5 right now is, in my opinion, the software controlled fans. The G5 is a marvelously silent machine… when running OS X. However, with no software regulating the fans, they default to their maximum speed, transforming the G5 from quiet elegance to a noisy monster. This may or may not be a problem for everyone, but it’s certain to wear out the fans faster.
Bascule said –
“The biggest drawback of 64-bit Linux on the G5 right now is, in my opinion, the software controlled fans.”
from the article –
“YellowDog Linux 3, obviously derived from RedHat Linux 8.0, came with working fan control. My G5 seems even quieter in Linux than it is using Apple’s own OS but getting YellowDog to run in a usable way was quite an endeavour.”
I’m personally shocked how fast Linux got support to control the fans, I had thought that might have been difficult and Apple would be less then helpful. Was the fan control code in Darwin 7? I dunno.
Anyone know when that might be? I own a G5 and I’d like to, once its stable, run Linux on my second HD. From the article it sounds like Linux and Mac OS X don’t necissarily get along, would having Linux on a second HD help aleviate some of that?
These advantages:
http://e-scribe.com/osx/freebsd-kde-and-me/
You can compile apps with AltiVec™ gcc vector extensions.
some benchmarks will soon appear here: http://findsabrina.org/altivec/
“But from what I’ve observed, it’s nothing as smooth as running 32-bit Linux.”
That’s because PC are 98% of the market of Linux. So very few people work on powerpc even fewer on PPC64.
AMD64 is different because you could mixed normal x86 code and x86-64 code without problem. Speed up are around 20%. Mostly by the doubling of the number of register i beleive. But what about G5 ?
ALAIK PowerPC G5s also allow to run both 32-bit and 64-bit applications.
There are a lot of disadvantages to both at the present time… OS X suffers from a lack of a 64-bit ABI and userland… disadvantageous if you’re considering using the G5 for a scientific modelling program…
And you can get the IBM xlc and xlf compilers (which you’ll want for those mini-supercomputing projects) only for OS X ;-( (see http://www-306.ibm.com/software/awdtools/ccompilers/ and see also http://hpc.sourceforge.net/index2.php#ibm )
I didn’t write down the exact strings. I searched on Google Groups for kernel panics at boot time on a G5 and it came up with a suggestion to lower screen resolution from OSX. This works excellently even though it’s just a patchwork solution to a problem that still needs dealing with. I’m sure TerraSoft (or someone else) will resolve this issue soon enough..
>> what applications do you run that needs a 64-bit processor?
E.g., 24-bit (16 million colors) only allows for 256 shades of grey (and less of other colors). You need more bits for a cinema-like experience.
If you are lucky, this reply won’t be modded off-topic.
>> >> what applications do you run that needs a 64-bit processor?
>>E.g., 24-bit (16 million colors) only allows for 256 shades >>of grey (and less of other colors). You need more bits for a >>cinema-like experience.
actually that’s just for graphic table
ie, for your video card. you can run 32bit colors on a 8bit cpu.
64bit cpus allow for example more memory to be addressed (32bits are 2G, and a bit more with various tricks, 64bits should be in teras or something)
also it allows to process a 64bit unit in one pass, instead of segmenting it, stuff like that
I’ve been running in 1600×1200 at 16 bits since the second beta
release from Terra Soft. Here’s how I did it:
boot with video=fbonly on your yaboot line
as root, run Xautoconfig –safe to generate a basic 800×600 screen
startx
go in to the Display menu and under the advanced options
select your monitor, graphics memory, and select generic OF
compatable FB (I’ve got the Radeon 9600). Close X and restart
I then went in to the XF86Config file in /etc/X11 and modified
my resolution and screen depth to 1600×1200 and 16 bits.
I’m also dual booting YDL and OS X without any problems….
This worked for me…..
G5 2.0ghz(x2), Radeon 9600, 512Mb, Viewsonic P810.
hmm yellowdog. a lot of mac users use that, but lets not forget their are different distros for mac as well… Mandrake, Gentoo, Debian, slackintosh…. I doubt all of them are up to par with Gentoo when it comes to the g5. YellowDog does only PPC solutions. So obviously theyre going to have an edge. Other distros on linux might be their might not. So its fair to say you cant judge the linux envoirnment on PPC untill you tried different versions. Mandrake barely put g3 optimizations into its latest distro mind you @_@, and its only 9.1. Why do i feel always that macs get jipped lol.
Correction i meant up to par with YDL*. though Gentoo should be high up there since they do optimizations will all processors
First of all, I agree; my dual G5 is probably the best computer I’ve ever bought. 8)
I’m interested in how much the native 64-bit Linux would help performance. I think that GCC 3.3 and XLC will generate binaries on OS X that use 64-bit math on G5s (when dealing with 64-bit integers, for instance), but still only allow for dealing with 32-bits worth of addressable memory. Come kind of mySQL benchmark or something between 64-bit Linux and 32-bit OS X would be interesting to me.
We don’t need no 64-bit computers. My Atari 400 with 4k of RAM, no hard drive, no floppy drive, works great. Just load and save stuff using an audio tape. No one should need more than 4k or RAM or a hard drive.
(Note: The above is the first “PC” I ever used. My best is an 800mhz G4 iMac now. Eventually I’ll get to 64 bit computing…)
Seriously though. Can anyone seriously think that everything is optimized for 64 bit computing when it came out a couple months ago? Two years from now you’ll be wondering how we ever got along with 32 bit computers… jeez. Talk about impatience.
Bascule said –
“The biggest drawback of 64-bit Linux on the G5 right now is, in my opinion, the software controlled fans.”
from the article –
“YellowDog Linux 3, obviously derived from RedHat Linux 8.0, came with working fan control. My G5 seems even quieter in Linux than it is using Apple’s own OS but getting YellowDog to run in a usable way was quite an endeavour.”
I’m personally shocked how fast Linux got support to control the fans, I had thought that might have been difficult and Apple would be less then helpful. Was the fan control code in Darwin 7? I dunno.
Wow, RTFA bascule
Well, color me impressed. Now the big question for me is… does IBM’s XL Fortran compiler for Linux work on a G5?
I know it is currently vaporware (See 5th paragraph of http://www.genesi.lu/press_20031204.php), but does anyone feel like speculating on the geek coolness of running Linux on that platform once (if) it offers workstation level performance, and does anyone feel in a position to speculate whether the Pegasos will actually enter the market with SMP G5s anytime this year? Their G4 and G5 machines already run ports of several Linux distributions.
— Ed
> Their G4 and G5 machines already run ports of several Linux distributions.
I mean their existing G3 and G4 platforms.
I’d rather wonder how fast their FSB will be.
(remember, that it’s RISC)
Where I can download G5 isos YDL 3.0.1
because I don’t have YDL.net Enhanced account and I desire g5-testdriver ??