Re: [gentoo-user] gentoo on xbox

[Mark Knecht]

On Jan 31, 2008 3:21 AM, KH <gentoo-user@××××××××××××××××.de> wrote:
> Hi,
>
> the current livecd-xbox-20050914.iso.bz2
> <http://ftp.udc.es/gentoo/experimental/x86/xbox/livecd/livecd-xbox-20050914.iso.bz2>
> is from 01-Oct-2005 05:40. The CD is outdated. This is leading to some
> problems when installing gentoo on the xbox.
>
> I was wandering if anybody knows where to find a documentation how the
> last livecd for the xbox was build and how the upcoming livecd for x86
> will be build. Then it might not be that hard to build a new livecd for
> the xbox.
>
> The problems from the current livecd - as far as I know them -
>
> 1. The livecd will not boot when cromwell 2.40 bios is installed.
> 2. One cannot use a current stage3 tarball. When chrooting this will
> lead to a FATAL - Kernel to old
> 3. The 2006.0 tarball one can use to chroot is still using gcc 3.xxx.
> This is resulting in heavy upgrading work
> 4. You are running in the small pam shadow problem.
>

I built one of these a couple of years ago. It's probably covered with
dust somewhere in my garage. ;-)

The big issue I recall running into was not Gentoo but it was the BIOS
and booting. The install disk could only work with older XBoxes before
M$ changed the BIOS. After the BIOS change you could install but not
boot.

There was an open source BIOS project called Cromwell but 2 years ago
I talked to the developer and he wasn't active at that time. He might
be now. I don't know.

There are multitudes of hacked BIOS replacements that give XBoxes lots
of extra capabilities. They are, however, somewhat shady in terms of
the legality. Go there as you see fit.

Note that with the early M$ BIOS I had very limited options in terms
of file system types that the hard drive could use, at least on the
root partition. I don't remember if I could make other partition types
after I was in Gentoo.

If I was going to try this again I'd first look for a Knoppix type
boot CD solution to test that the machine can work. If it could I'd
probably stick with that before I went to all the trouble of hacking
the hard drive and trying to make the XBox a computer.

If you Google 'knecht xbox bios' you will likely run into many of the
conversations I had back in 2005 on this subject.

Hope this helps,
Mark
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