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hypermush n00b
Joined: 24 Sep 2002 Posts: 7
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Posted: Fri Oct 10, 2003 8:44 am Post subject: The big swap... x86 - ppc, advice needed. |
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Hey guys,
I have recently been offered an iMac g4 867mhz with a 15" tft and all the rest in exchange for my athlon xp 2000+ pc.
I intend to run OSX and linux, and do not beleive i will be missing much in terms of functionality. I hardly play any games at all, and when i do its NWN at a lan using linux, NWN also has a mac version so i am covered.
My question to you is this. On this machine, is gentoo + MOL + OSX 10.2 a workable configuration?
I have seen problems with graphics and sound drivers and am wondering whether my minimum specifications will be met.
These are as follows.
1. Accellerated 2D (or at least not overly laggy 2D, but smooth divx playing is a must)
2. Use of USB and Firewire ports on the iMac, and use of the wonderful lcd screen
3. Dual boot OSX for NWN
4. MOL in a window for Office X, for the times when OO doesnt suffice
5. A web browser worth its salt (I use Opera on x86 linux)
6. Basically most of the gnome stuff and misc. stuff from portage
Could somebody give me some advice here? will i miss any of these and is the swap worthwhile.
Thanks,
-marty |
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peshwengi n00b
Joined: 01 Aug 2003 Posts: 66 Location: London, UK
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hypermush n00b
Joined: 24 Sep 2002 Posts: 7
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Posted: Fri Oct 10, 2003 11:56 pm Post subject: |
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Yes a did a bit of research on MOL, and i think that OSX in a window will work fine for me.
My worry now is the graphics side of things. I have seen lots of reports about the framebuffer not even working on the 15" LCD on the iMac, but even accellerated 2d is fine so if anyone is running gentoo on a 15" g4 iMac please reply and shake my fears |
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hypermush n00b
Joined: 24 Sep 2002 Posts: 7
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Posted: Sat Oct 11, 2003 1:19 am Post subject: |
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for anyone wondering, ive done some more research and i beleive the xfree86 "nv" driver will work fine which means accellerated 2d and flatpanel support.
However this is just what i have gathered from forum posts and such, so dont take my word for it until i get my iMac
-marty |
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pixie Guru
Joined: 29 Dec 2002 Posts: 305
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Posted: Sat Oct 11, 2003 7:11 am Post subject: |
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Use the rivafb frambuffer driver in the kernel and it'll work fine. Does on my iMac anyhow.
then after you get xfree emerge xeasyconf and run it, it'll set up X up really well. You can either use the experimental nvidia driver or fbdev for X, although the 'experimental' nvidia one works fine for me.
the only thing you will really miss is a proper flash plugin. the gpl one isn't too hot really. unuseable for many things. |
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hypermush n00b
Joined: 24 Sep 2002 Posts: 7
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Posted: Sat Oct 11, 2003 8:40 am Post subject: |
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thanks!
well in that case I'm set. the lack of a proper flash plugin is annoying, but not enough to stop me from aquiring this great computer.
Thanks for the help with that, there are so many unresolved old forum posts about xfree on the flatpanels i was beginning to worry.
Thanks for your help, and hopefully i'll be joining you in the ppc forums again, but from a much better looking computer
-marty |
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