[ubuntu-mythtv] Support to install on the AppleTV

[Mario Limonciello]

Derek,

Rather than adapt an Apple TV specific version, it would be more useful
to get all the necessary patches into Ubuntu.  Looking over that parted
patch, it doesn't appear to break anything.  What kernel patch are you
using?  If it's not invasive, the kernel team is very approachable about
adding third party patches.

Why do the recovery files need to be copied to a partition on the drive?
 Is this just in case you want to go back to Apple TV software?  The
rest of the partitioning layout can be worked out using a recipe in the
Ubiquity installer.  Working out recipes for installation is something
else that was already planned anyhow.

Regarding the NVIDIA driver, i'm quite curious as to the performance of
the Apple TV.  Since you can load the proprietary video driver, you can
likely use XvMC for video playback.  It is of course a limited 1GHz
processor, but with offloading the work onto the GPU, does HD playback
handle well/at all?

What sort of tweaks were necessary for the xorg.conf as well?

Mario

Derek Keefe wrote:
> 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
>>  
>> ------------------------------------------------------------------------
>>
>>
>> ------------------------------------------------------------------------
>>
> 
D

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