Over at the #awkwardtv IRC channel, poster "Beyond" just announced that he's gotten Gentoo installed and running on his Apple TV. He used the mach_linux_kernel maker from mactel_linux (aka Gimli's loader). The OS (2.6.20.6 with the AppleTV patch) seems to be up and working after a few initial problems (now solved) with repeating characters. He sent over these screen shots for your viewing pleasure. More as this develops.
| # | Blogger | Posts | Cmts |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Cory Bohon | 55 | 1 |
| 2 | Robert Palmer | 53 | 39 |
| 3 | Steven Sande | 49 | 15 |
| 4 | Mike Schramm | 25 | 0 |
| 5 | Erica Sadun | 23 | 1 |
| 6 | Michael Rose | 23 | 28 |
| 7 | Dave Caolo | 21 | 0 |
| 8 | Giles Turnbull | 19 | 0 |
| 9 | Mat Lu | 18 | 8 |
| 10 | Christina Warren | 13 | 28 |
| 11 | Brett Terpstra | 12 | 0 |
| 12 | TUAW Blogger | 7 | 0 |
| 13 | Victor Agreda, Jr. | 5 | 12 |
| 14 | Scott McNulty | 1 | 0 |
| 15 | Jason Clarke | 1 | 1 |
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Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
4-10-2007 @ 10:36PM
Ioannus de Verani said...
But why? Why? Why, when there is a way to install an operating system on it that beats the living craps out of Linux? I mean, I know linux is great (I use linux, because I can't afford a mac), but what good does linux do on an Apple TV?
--Ioannus de Verani
http://blog.verani.net
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4-10-2007 @ 10:45PM
Colin said...
Excellent! Finally someone has figured out how to take the simple, elegant interface of the AppleTV and combine it with the terrifying startup messages of Linux. I am seriously considering modding my loginwindow message to read "Activating (possible) swap". I think it's hilarious!
I love the hackitude of this. It's so completely useless, but at least it can be done!
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4-10-2007 @ 10:49PM
CyBeR said...
Excellent. These things are like half the hight of a mac mini, so you can send two to a macmini colo facility for the same price!
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4-10-2007 @ 10:51PM
Beyond said...
For those questioning the usefulness of this, I did it because it is a perfect mythtv frontend. And the actual appletv interface is not very useful, and really doesnt do the hardware justice.
That and my roommates wont have a problem with this beside the tv!
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4-10-2007 @ 11:14PM
JeffDM said...
It's definitely an interesting hacker platform. You get a very compact device that's cheaper than going with miniITX. I think that a miniITX board + CPU + memory was about as much as AppleTV, and that didn't include the case, power supply or hard drive. A decent looking case is pretty expensive. A typical miniITX system is larger in volume too, they are thicker because of the rear connector block and heat sink.
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4-11-2007 @ 12:03AM
vahtryn said...
Well I'm glad that it's gentoo that was hacked onto it first. At work all of our servers are gentoo (because of me). It's really the strongest form of linux out there. Makes life a hell of a lot easier when you need to build packages across multiple platforms. Just a /etc/make.conf change and you're good to go.
I currently run gentoo on my linksys NSLU2 for my only linux box at home.
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4-11-2007 @ 12:04AM
Roye said...
The MythTV comment above is spot on. I love my Macs, but Mythtv kicks all kinds of ass with the various modules. As far as MiniITX comparisons, the AppleTV also has component out and built in IR. Once all of this can be harnessed with the power of Myth, this will make an excellent frontend that looks a lot sexier than an xbox. GentooTV FTW!
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4-11-2007 @ 12:52AM
Todd said...
So does anyone actually hook one of these things up to a TV and watch a movie? :)
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4-11-2007 @ 2:02AM
mike said...
I have an idea -- why doesn't TUAW change it's name to TUATVW? Every freaking story is about apple TV hacks.
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4-11-2007 @ 2:48AM
bruno said...
im kinda over the apple tv hacks
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4-11-2007 @ 4:06AM
David said...
Mike...Bruno....relax. There are a lot of posts about the Apple TV because that is what's current right now. There are plenty of readers who are interested in these articles, so if you don't like it, don't complain. Just feel free to move on to the next article, or another weblog.
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4-11-2007 @ 5:30AM
mike said...
i'm not moving to another weblog until i get the cookies and milk i was promised.
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4-11-2007 @ 6:09AM
Adrian vG said...
Oh, that's so interesting! Pictures of text on a screen....
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4-11-2007 @ 7:57AM
CAIN said...
If the sound works this is a worth while hack. If not I will stick with OSX.
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4-11-2007 @ 7:59AM
Edsel said...
Beyond (#4),
Ignore the snickers and jokes, and never give up exploring. This is how Jobs/Gates/Ellesron made it work for them. Leaders explore, everyone else spectates.
Nice work.
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4-11-2007 @ 8:30PM
Reg Muffet said...
@Todd> "So does anyone actually hook one of these things up to a TV and watch a movie? :)"
Far too obvious. Next you'll be saying people who buy a Prius should drive it down the street instead of using it to power their house.
http://uneasysilence.com/archive/2006/01/4939/
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4-12-2007 @ 2:59AM
Matt Carrell said...
Look, I know some of you don't understand why anyone would want something as unautomatic and unrefined as Linux, however, I want to put it on my Apple TV for one reason.. to be able to run a Linux client of Stanford's Folding@Home app. Since Stanford doesn't have a Mac OS X client for Intel that works on single core (requires dual Intel or PPC), this unit can't run the Mac client. Also, it won't work with Boot Camp. Therefore, Linux is the last solution that can be made to work right now. I suspect there are many reasons for many different people to use Linux on it. It's clearly not for everyone. But it has its uses.. Don't knock what you don't know about!
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4-14-2007 @ 2:21PM
codigoeon.blog said...
It's a definitive hack.
The Apple TV is the best home server.
[More in]
[http://codigoeon.wordpress.com]
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5-03-2007 @ 5:35PM
The Belgain said...
So has anyone managed to use one of these as a MythTV frontend yet?
What's the status of Linux hardware support for the Apple TV (eg. do all the outputs (HDMI, component video, optical audio out, ...)) work, is accelerated hardware decoding working, is the box fast enough for HD decoding, ...
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