[ubuntu-mythtv] Support to install on the AppleTV

[Derek Keefe]

Hi Mario,

Thanks a lot for adding this feature.  Unfortunately today there is no 
easy way to get a standard linux distro on to an appletv however it can 
be done without an intel mac.  The process is roughly the following:

1.  Remove the appletv's disk from the appletv and partition the disk 
with the appletv's recovery guid (this is accomplished using a patched 
version of parted) and copy the recovery files onto this partition.  
Also, the special appletv bootloader requires a ext2 formatted /boot 
partition.  The other partitions are / (formatted as ext3) and a 1 gb 
swap. 

2.  Using a usb to 2.5" hard disk adapter, plug the disk into a normal 
pc and install mythbuntu onto it.

3.  The linux kernel needs to be patched in order to work correctly on 
the appletv.  The next step is to copy a appletv specific linux kernel 
onto the disk.  I am using 2.6.22.1 now.  I usually check the disk 
partitioning again with parted to make sure the mythbuntu installer 
didn't screw anything up.

4.  At this point the disk is ready to use in the appletv.  Install it 
back into the appletv and boot it up.  The nvidia driver and lirc won't 
work because the kernel has changed, so you need to recompile both of 
those.  This usually involves installing a few extra packages (g++, 
libc6-dev, etc.).  Also the xorg.conf needs to be tweaked.  After 
rebuilding the drivers and rebooting, you should be ready to go.

That is it in a nutshell.  If you are interested in building an appletv 
specific mythbuntu installation, I'd be happy to provide you with the 
necessary kernel patches.  The appletv recovery guid patch for parted is 
here:

http://lists.alioth.debian.org/pipermail/parted-devel/2007-May/001732.html

Thanks again for your help,
Derek

Mario Limonciello wrote:
> Derek,
>
> You had asked for there to be an option to disable the bootloader during
> installation (https://bugs.launchpad.net/bugs/130445).  I committed
> changes into Ubiquity that will allow the user to do so now.  This
> affects the GTK, KDE, and Mythbuntu frontends for ubiquity.
>
> Basically, at the Summary screen, you can choose the advanced button to
> enable/disable the bootloader install.
>
> I see this as being very valuable for the final Mythbuntu 7.10 release,
> so what did you have to do to complete the installation?  I had thought
> there were no readable media drives, so did you need to pull the drive
> out to install elsewhere, or did you need to use an external
> USB/Firewire drive?
>
>
> Mario
>   
>
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