Apple TV news

I've seen the XBMC Ubuntu Mobile thread. It's interesting and I'll most likely start there. Ubuntu Mobile on x86 is still pretty recent. I was actually think something more along the lines of how MythBuntu works but this is not fixed in stone.

AppleTV or MacMini does not really matter. The AppleTV need atv-bootloader to boot Linux, a MacMini can boot Linux directly using either an EFI bootloader (elilo) or grub via the BIOS compatibility layer. While the USB pen drive must be gpt partition based, gpt does support a MBR compatibility. I've not tried it but one should be able to create a USB pen drive that supports both types.

Nvidia vs Intel does not matter, that's an X11 config issue. I'm also following the XBMC on OSX development and that works fine on my 1st gen 1.6GHz intel MacMini so a Linux based XBMC should be fine too.

If I don't get any responses, I'll create a new thread, too late now.

Scott

GeeXboX (LiveCD based) is probably also a good project to take inspiration from, see:
http://www.geexbox.org/en/index.html

I would look at LinuxMCE. They have a wizard that can be started at boot time (by clicking shift) which guides you through a wizard. they also have a distro...

http://wiki.linuxmce.org/index.php/AVWiz...ep_by_Step

boot parser is done, I finally created a c command-line app that can parse grub, kboot, syslinux, ioslinux and mb_boot_tv bootloader config files, extract and format for a kexec load command. Now to integrate with the initramfs and soon, auto-boot.

I know where there are at least 3 aTVs just waiting to check this out. Mine being one of them but it's on the opposite coast for the moment. I'll have it home soon enough and would be happy to help test as would friends I think. BIG thumbs up for working on this, thank you!!

atv-bootloader released. see http://code.google.com/p/atv-bootloader/...BootLoader.

This enables the installation of Ubuntu onto the AppleTV. The next step is building and install XBMC for Linux.

Attempting to follow your guide from the atv-bootloader page, but after running the command:

sudo parted -s /dev/sda mklabel gpt (which completes with no errors)

I then go on to the next command, which is to run parted and have it print information regarding the drive. After I type:

sudo parted /dev/hda (and then print, after parted as loaded)

I get Error: /dev/hda: unrecognised disk label

I've been following all instructions verbatim, and am using a Mythbuntu install CD (pretty sure, version 7.10, just downloaded and burned it) as a LiveCD to work with the ATV drive.

Are you using a LiveCD as well to access the drive? Are there modules that must be loaded in order to use gpt? It seems parted was correctly installed, it is version 1.8.8 and I can see gpt in the list when I type help mklabel in while running parted.

Output of uname -a:
Linux ubuntu 2.6.22-14-generic #1 SMP Sun Oct 14 23:05:12 GMT 2007 i686 GNU/Linux

Any ideas? ;]

sudo parted -s /dev/sda mklabel gpt

sudo parted /dev/hda

one of your parted commands references "sda" then other "hda". "sda" != "hda".

I think you want "sudo parted /dev/sda" instead.

ubuntu 2.6.22-14-generic does not reference disks as "hdx". All drives are "sdx".


URL Correction: http://code.google.com/p/atv-bootloader/

I reinstalled again last night to re-verify the MythBuntu install instructions. Everything was done using the LiveCD including building the patched parted and hfs_support tools. No problems.

This time I installed both mythtv frontend and backend. The front/back end combo is too much for the 256MB ram that the AppleTV has and MythTV is a pig regarding memory. Linux swaps like crazy. This is doing 1080i/720p decode/display from a HDHomeRun. MythFrontEnd is fine to a separate MythTV backend.

The other thing I noticed was that when using the drive attached via USB, boot time to Linux/ATV logo is about 11 seconds. When using the drive attached to the internal ata bus, boot time to logo increased to greater than 60 seconds. This is a mystery that I need to solve. My previous Linux installs take the standard 11 second to logo attached to internal ata. The only real difference is the MBR that grub wrote. gpt format includes legacy MBR support so the there should not be a problem. Should take a day or so to find out the reason.

Oops, thats a typo on top. I copied and pasted that from your guide. I have the Apple TV hard drive hooked up to my computer with a 3.5->2.5 adapter -- so it's attached to my main ide controller. I'm very sure that it is /dev/hda ;]

But when I change it to gpt:


The 40 gig drive is definitely the Apple TV's hard disk, and I can only not print the list of partitions when the label type is gpt.

sometime I've noticed parted doing strange things so generally I womp the disk with "dd if=/dev/zero of=/dev/sda bs=4096 count=1M" to "clean it"

then "sudo parted -s /dev/sda mklabel gpt"


This is the patched parted, correct? And you removed the previous parted "atp-get remove parted" before building the patched parted.

I've never seen this error and I can't believe it a 3.5->2.5 adapter issue. The "hda" naming is strange. Ubuntu changed from using "hdx" to "sdx" after breezy. I remember that well;>.

So you boot off the LiveCD, install the build tools, then build parted and hfs-support tools. Basically following this (http://code.google.com/p/atv-bootloader/...oningLinux).