Installing Debian 10 on a PowerMac G5

Prerequisites

• A spare computer with an SSH client, just in case
• configure disk for SATA1 and install - PowerMac G5s use SATA1(1.5gbps), some disks require configuration to lock them into SATA1 mode, usually a jumper documented on the drive sticker or in the datasheet.
• An ethernet cable with an internet connection plugged in. I haven't tried WiFi as I don't have the adapter
• Burn Debian 10 PPC ISO to a CD

Press power button

Enter OpenFirmware

As soon as the mac chimes, press and hold ALT+WIN+O+F or Apple+Option+O+F to enter openfirmware.

Insert the Debian disk

• Type "eject cd", press enter
• insert Debian 10 disc
• Type "eject cd", press enter

Boot the installer bootloader

Type "boot cd:,\install\yaboot"

Select installer kernel and boot the installer

At the boot prompt press enter or type "install" then enter

Run through some Debian installer steps

At this point we should be greeted with the familiar Debian text-based installer. Most of this is bog-standard, but there's a few gotchas later.

• Select your language
• Select your location
• Configure your keyboard
• Enter your hostname - remember this for later in case the GPU driver fails
• Enter your domain name or leave blank
• Enter root password twice
• Enter user name, then username, then user password twice
• Select timezone

Select Partitioning Method

It seems that yaboot is not familiar with the latest ext4 partition features, namely extents and 64-bit block mode. This means we must create a /boot partition. However, none of the guided partitioning options do so. Also, I'm assuming a clean Linux install without dual-booting, as this is complicated enough already. So,

• Select 'Guided - use entire disk'.
• Select 'All file in one partition'.
• Eventually, you'll be presented with the Debian installer partitioning menu.
• Delete the '/' and 'swap' partitions
• Create a new '/boot' partition formatted as 'ext2', mine is 1GB but that's larger than necessary.
• Create a '/' partition, leaving a few GB for swap, formatted as 'ext4'
• Create a 'swap' partition to fill in the remainder of the disk.

More standard Debian installer steps

• Select your installation targe disk.
• Pick your partition layout.
• Make any partition adjustments, then select 'finish partitioning and write changes to disk'
• Select write-changes to disks
• Wait quite a while
• Do not scan another CD/DVD at this point

Skip the apt mirror setup

We need to switch to a debian-ports mirror. However, there's no keychain for debian-ports loaded into the installer. For now, we're going to skip this and fix it later. But the process for doing so is not exactly clear, so I have documented it below:

• Select a country
• select a mirror
• enter any proxy information
• At the 'bad archive mirror' prompt, pick continue
• Select a country
• select a mirror
• enter any proxy information
• At the 'bad archive mirror' prompt, pick continue

At this point the installer should continue until it complains that it cannot access the security repositories. Pick continue then wait while the installer selects and installs software.

Configure Popularity-Contest

I recommend participating in the package usage survey, to give feedback to the Debian project about what packages you use, but you are free not to.

Select software package

Just joking, there is only one package included with the CD, 'standard system utilities', which you probably want. Hit continue.

Wait for the CD to eject, take it out, but do not reboot. Time to fix what we broke

At this point, we're going to add a ports mirror, and install SSH in case the GPU fails.

• switch to VT2 by pressing Alt+F2
• Press enter to activate the console
• Run

  chroot /target bash

  to enter the installation target environment
• Open up /etc/apt/sources.list for editing
• Clear out the existing text
• Enter

  deb http://ftp.ports.debian.org/debian-ports/ sid main

  and close the file
• Tell apt to scan the new mirror with

  apt-get update --allow-insecure-repositories

  It should print some warnings about the mirror not being secured.
• Tell apt to install the mirror keying with

  apt-get install debian-ports-archive-keyring

  When it prompts you to install without verification enter "y"
• Tell apt to rescan the new mirror with

  apt-get update

• At this point, we're going to install a few packages to make things easier

  apt-get install sudo openssh-server

• At this point, we can optionally install some packages useful for developers

  apt-get install git build-essential htop nload

• enter

  exit

  to exit the chroot
• enter

  exit

  again to exit the installer console
• switch back to VT1 by pressing Alt+F1
• select continue to wrap up the installation and reboot

What to do if you have an NVIDIA GPU and the screen turns black on reboot

In short, we need to create this file: /etc/modprobe.d/blacklist-nvidia-nouveau.conf, with the following contents:

blacklist nouveau

With SSH

• From your spare computer, ssh to the hostname you entered for the PowerMac.
• Switch user to root with

  su

  , then enter your root password.
• Create and edit this file: /etc/modprobe.d/blacklist-nvidia-nouveau.conf
• Add the following text

  blacklist nouveau

  and close the file
• Reboot the system with

  reboot

• And you should be presented with a login prompt upon reboot

Without SSH

• If the system is on, tap the power button and wait for the system to shut down
• If the system doesn't shut down after a few minutes, press and hold the power button
• Once powered off, tap the power button, as soon as the system chimes press and hold WIN+ALT+O+F to enter Open Firmware
• Type "eject cd", press enter
• insert Debian 10 disc
• Type "eject cd", press enter
• Type "boot cd:,\install\yaboot" to kick off the installer loader
• At the "boot:" prompt, enter "rescue" to get into rescue mode
• Select your language
• Select your location
• Select your keyboard
• Enter your hostname
• Enter your domain name
• Select your timezone
• If you remember your root filesystem partition, select it
• If you do not remember your root filesystem partition, it's probably /dev/sda3 if you have a single disk and if you used guided partitioning. You can always guess and go back if you were wrong.
• Select "Execute a shell in /dev/disk-partition-goes-here
• Create and edit this file: /etc/modprobe.d/blacklist-nvidia-nouveau.conf
• Add the following text

  blacklist nouveau

  and close the file
• enter "exit" to leave the console
• select "reboot the system", this will leave the CD installed, but it should default to booting from the hard disk
• And you should be presented with a login prompt upon reboot