On-boot freeze on iBook G4

[l33tmmx]

Hi all!

I'm a first-time Gentoo user, but have used Linux (Red Hat/ Slackware) on my x86 machines for some years. About 5 months ago I bought an 12" Apple iBook G4 (1,2 GHz). My intention was from the start to install Linux on this machine, too, so last week I sliced the hard drive in half, re-installed OS X, and set about to install Gentoo PPC ( from Gentoo-PPC-universal-2004.3 LiveCD) on the first half of the hard drive.

The first part of the installation (started from stage1 tarball ) went quite smoothly, considering that it was my first contact to Gentoo. I've followed the Gentoo-ppc-faq and Gentoo-handbook-ppc as closely as I could. However, whenever I try to boot the newly installed system, the kernel (2.6.10-gentoo-r6, with udev) freezes completely . The last lines before the freeze are (almost every time):

Generic RTC Driver v1.07
Mackintosh non-volatile memory driver v1.1
Using unsupported 1024x768 ATY,Via_A at 9c008000, depth=8, pitch=1024
Console: switching to colour frame buffer device 128x48
fb0: Open Firmware frame buffer device on /pci@f0000000/ATY,ViaParent@10/ATY,Via_A@0
Using unsupported 640x480 ATY,Via_B at 99008000, depth=8, pitch=768
fb1: Open Firmware frame buffer device on /pci@f0000000/ATY,ViaParent@10/ATY,Via_B@1
i8042.c: i8042 controller self test timeout
Serial: 8250/16550 driver $Revision: 1.90 $ 8 ports, IRQ sharing disabled

...then, nothing. At this point the framebuffer is already running (Tux at the top).

Obviously, I have made some mistake when configuring the kernel, but what? Am I missing something vital, or have I compiled in something which shouldn't be there? How could I find out what's wrong?

My knowledge of the Apple hardware is almost nil, so...

Could someone post a kernel config which definitely works on the iBook G4?

JR
_________________
"Trust me, I know what I'm doing!"
- Sledge Hammer

[l33tmmx]

Well, just in case I had made a stupid mistake somewhere I started installation from scratch, and used a kernel config from http://www.aronchi.org/LinuxOnIBookG4 as a basis. Don't remember exactly what I selected first time, but it seems that I built in the kernel something which should have been a module . Anyway, it works now...
_________________
"Trust me, I know what I'm doing!"
- Sledge Hammer

[compraxis]

I've had the *exact* same problem this weekend. I'm also a new Gentoo user (or user-wannabe) and after the long installation procedure am elated that something boots, but frustrated that only half a screen is filled before the boot process hangs. I haven't the foggiest idea what step I screwed up. I guess it has something to do with how I configured my kernel, and I suppose it's a more delicate operation than my ignorant ham-fisted attempt could manage.

I'm glad you found a solution which worked and I'm grateful you reported it here. I will try what worked for you soon myself.

-- Bill

[JoseJX]

If you have the same error as l33tmmx, your problem is that you've enabled serial devices that do not exist on your ibook. Turn off the i8042 driver and the 8250/16550 drivers in your kernel and it should boot fine.

[blixel]