3

I have a PowerBook G3 from 2000 or so and would like to put Mac OS 9 on it for nostalgia reasons. There are games that simply don't perform well with SheepShaver, plus networking with SheepShaver isn't reliable with Classic multiplayer games.

  • The PowerBook doesn't have a CD-ROM, just a plastic spacer.
  • Apparently the PowerBook G3 Pismo and Lombard variants cannot boot from a USB stick
  • It has Ethernet, and I have a recent MacBook with an Ethernet dongle, but everything I've read about NetBooting and NetInstalling seems difficult and unapproachable. I tried using BootMania but it won't let me create an image from any of the Mac OS 9 install disk images I have.
  • The PowerBook originally had Linux or BSD on it or something, so a full reformat is needed.
  • It has a 20 GB 2.5" IDE drive and I have a USB to IDE adapter, so I can connect the drive to the MacBook with Mac OS X.
  • SheepShaver cannot use physical media, so I cannot connect the disk to SheepShaver and run the Mac OS 9 installer on it.

I tried creating a new 512 MB disk from SheepShaver and running the Mac OS 9.2 Universal Installer to install OS9 on it. Then I formatted the physical drive with an Apple Partition Map and the partition as HFS Extended Journaled, then I mounted the drive and copied (dragged over) the files and System Folder from the newly-installed disk image. But when I boot the PowerBook with the drive hooked up I just get the blinking folder icon. If I hold Option I get the Reload and Next buttons but no disks are shown.

I also tried dd-ing a working SheepShaver boot image to the physical disk, but I guess that doesn't have a partition map on it or something. It didn't work and diskutil list showed it as "Unknown."

Do you have any ideas how I can get Mac OS 9 back on my PowerBook?

Improve this question
1

1 Answer 1

Reset to default
2

I tried dding the the Mac OS 9.2 Universal Installer to the hard disk, but that didn't work.

@jaume put me on the right path, so I dd-ed the ISO to a USB stick, held down option at boot, and I'm able to install Mac OS 9 to the original hard disk. Success! Thank you!

The real thing I learned is that Mac OS 9 boot volumes need half a dozen special driver partitions. Older versions of Mac OS X, up to 10.12 or something, let you partition OS 9 drives correctly using the Disk Utility which had an "Install Mac OS 9 Drivers" option. I used hdiutil info to check that the ISO had these partitions.

Improve this answer

You must log in to answer this question.

Not the answer you're looking for? Browse other questions tagged .