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Load Linux on the Mac mini

Posted by timothy on from the two-great-tastes dept.

An anonymous reader writes "The Mac mini is an ideal low-cost, high-performance PowerPC development platform for numerous applications. Learn how to install and configure Linux on the mini. Future articles will add the software required to make it into a stand-alone multimedia appliance."

15 of 198 comments (clear)

  1. Linux by turtled · · Score: 3, Funny

    Linux keeps on running. I just installed it on my microwave!

    Meant to be funny... not trolling.

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    "I cannot think of any need in childhood as strong as the need for a father's protection." -- Sigmund Freud
    1. Re:Linux by MarkGriz · · Score: 4, Funny

      "If you have to spell it out like that your comment might not be as funny as you think ;-)"

      If you have to spell it out like that it's because some moderators might not be as bright as you'd expect;-)"

      --
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  2. Further software ? by rokzy · · Score: 4, Insightful

    what is linux going to offer over OS X since you get OS X with a Mini anyway?

    plus does linux have support for AirTunes? and will it have support for the possible video streaming over AirPort Express that was hinted at in the discussion of iTunes 4.8? I don't know but I don't think so.

    1. Re:Further software ? by TheRaven64 · · Score: 4, Insightful
      I have a Mac Mini in a co-lo centre, running OpenBSD. For me, it was a very cheap way of getting a co-located host (the mini is a lot smaller than a 1U server, and so hosting was cheap). In a headless box, most of the benefits of OS X are lost (assuming I am too cheap to pay for OS X server - which costs more than the Mini itself).

      I can't really see a reason for installing Linux. The article mentioned that YellowDog was `lightweight', at only 4CDs. OpenBSD is a 4MB boot CD and then you just download the parts you need (around 100MB for the base system). This gives you a secure server, which can easily be administrated remotely. Oh, and unlike OS X, you can upgrade things like Apache separately from the core OS.

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    2. Re:Further software ? by Elranzer · · Score: 4, Funny

      what is linux going to offer over OS X since you get OS X with a Mini anyway?

      The inability to run Macromedia Flash content, for one.

    3. Re:Further software ? by jellomizer · · Score: 4, Insightful

      Well I found that Linux is well geared to developing applience like applications. Take a Distribution strip it down. And make it do what you want and make it do it quite well. A firewall, A spam filter, A way to do remote backups. Or just a multimedia presitation unit. OS X as a desktop operating system is Great, and it is Good for a General Server too. But if you want to a more detailed workhorse then Linux does the job a lot better. Say you want to make a Multimedea system. Install Linux have it open up X-Windows and use your application say Firefox without the menus being displayed full screen. No window managers just firefox. So you have an easy to make multimedea station. Or better yet if you make your multimedea station software as a live CD. You just pop in the CD and boot the Mac. and bingo it is up and running make as many copies as you want and have it spread across your company stores.

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  3. WTF? by baldass_newbie · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Why would anyone waste hardware and time doing this?

    Not to be a troll, but you've got BSD running under the hood with a clean UI, so uh, what do you gain besides bragging rights?

    Or am I missing something? I did read the fine article and I see they want their project to be OpenSource, but THEY ALREADY PAID FOR THE LICENSE!!!!

    --
    The opposite of progress is congress
  4. Nothing New by Horrortaxi · · Score: 4, Insightful

    People have been installing Yellow Dog on Macs for a long time. This is nothing new.

    Since it doesn't support the built in wifi or bluetooth I'm not sure why this would be such a good idea though.

  5. Re:Some statements need addressing. by Scarblac · · Score: 5, Informative

    You cannot compare a G4 at 1.25GHz to a x86 at 1.25 GHz. It just makes no sense whatsoever.

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  6. Linux on Mac by Thijs+van+As · · Score: 4, Interesting

    I initially bought my 12" iBook G3 to install Linux on it. I chose for the iBook because of the size/battery life/price. It was going to be my first mac, I didn't even work with one before.
    After all, I did install Linux on it (YDL), but I didn't use it for longer than an hour! Before that time I used Linux as the OS on my PC. It's just because the sharm of OS X I didn't use it.
    Now, 1,5 years later, I bought a Mac mini and I'm not planning to install Linux on it... I'm totally OS X'ed.

    Plus add the fact that important stuff like Airport Extreme won't work.

  7. Re:This boggles the mind... by metamatic · · Score: 3, Insightful
    Paying the absurd premium for Apple hardware just to rip the already-beautiful OS off of it and install *nix?

    Absurd premium? No doubt you'll post links to equivalent non-Apple machines that are significantly cheaper. Something like a complete fanless mini-ITX system in a Mac Mini size box, for $300, right? Or are you just bullshitting?

    Also: Mac OS X is Unix.

    (But not necessarily UNIX(TM))

    --
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  8. Re:Some statements need addressing. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3, Funny
    (G4 at 1.25Ghz) != (x86 at 1.25Ghz)

    Hey I just did

  9. Load Linux on the Mac Mini by wolf31o2 · · Score: 3, Insightful

    1. Download Gentoo 2005.0 for PPC
    2. Boot Gentoo 2005.0 for PPC
    3. Follow Gentoo Handbook for PPC

    How exactly is this news? Is it really that hard to use other distributions on the Mini?

  10. Re:Some statements need addressing. by Quattro+Vezina · · Score: 3, Interesting

    Actually, if the G4's IPC is similar to the Pentium III, then the G4 is far, far better than an equivalently clocked Pentium 4. The Pentium 4 has one of the worst IPCs of all time.

    The Pentium III (especially Tualatin) has a much, much higher IPC than the Pentium 4. In fact, the Pentium 4 was ridiculed early on because the Pentium 4 was easily outperformed by Pentium IIIs that ran at hundreds of MHz lower. Pentium 4s only started outperforming Pentium IIIs when Intel started ramping up the P4's clock speed like mad, pushing it past 2 GHz in a few months, and past 3 GHz not much later than that.

    Also, the Pentium M is very similar to the Pentium III when it comes to architecture--the PM is basically just a jacked-up PIII with lots of cache and lower power consumption. Right now, we have 1.8 GHz Pentium Ms beating the crap out of 3 GHz Pentium 4s. Why? The P4's NetBurst architecture just plain blows.

    Although I do agree that the grandparent is wrong--it's just that the only time a G4-to-x86 comparison is valid is when you're comparing a G4 to a Pentium M or Athlon 64 (especially the Pentium M, as the G4 is a 32-bit CPU).

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  11. Re:Next up by Winterblink · · Score: 3, Insightful

    I don't know. Why did you read it?

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