On 1/5/07, <b class="gmail_sendername">Stroller</b> <<a href="mailto:linux.luser@myrealbox.com">linux.luser@myrealbox.com</a>> wrote:<div><blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="border-left: 1px solid rgb(204, 204, 204); margin: 0pt 0pt 0pt 0.8ex; padding-left: 1ex;">
> What about booting linux under the WII as a dedicated linux machine?<br><br>Good question, but as Mr Stanton observed, there's not much benefit<br>to it (I meant to mention this myself in my previous posting. Honest!).
</blockquote><div><br>
Staton, with only one 'n' - sorry to nitpick, but people have been
trying to change my name my whole life, and I'm rather attached to the
one that my parents gave me. :-) <br>
<br>
</div><blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="border-left: 1px solid rgb(204, 204, 204); margin: 0pt 0pt 0pt 0.8ex; padding-left: 1ex;">As a "channel", a FE could be run on an existing Wii "installation",
<br>and the user would be able to switch between games and TV fairly<br>seamlessly. For someone who already has a Wii it'd allow the addition<br>of MythTV without requiring an additional box plugged into the TV -<br>I'm already running out of component-in ports!!
</blockquote><div><br>
I just upgraded TVs for this very reason - running out of inputs.
I grapped a display with a VGA input this time around - hopefully more
TVs will start to come with this so that we don't have to sacrific
component/DVI ports to the HTPC. But then again, component
switchers aren't too expensive these days.<br>
</div><br><blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="border-left: 1px solid rgb(204, 204, 204); margin: 0pt 0pt 0pt 0.8ex; padding-left: 1ex;">> I know the WII has an IBM Broadway processor, but does the linux<br>> kernel support that?
<br><br>Surely so - as Wikipedia observes "Broadway" is PowerPC based; it's<br>made in the same plant (and with the same process?) that fabricated<br>G5 processors for Apple. The Wii is sometimes referred to as "an
<br>overclocked Gamecube" - it runs Gamecube games, and Linux already<br>runs on the GC.<br><br>I guess there's not as much interest in Linux on the GC as on the<br>Xbox, because it doesn't seem as well documented, but you can run
<br>Linux & mplayer on it. <a href="http://www.gc-linux.org/">http://www.gc-linux.org/</a> The advantage of the<br>Wii is that it has some built-in flash RAM for persistent storage, so<br>you don't always need to boot from a CD / DVD (as you do with the
<br>GC); but the Xbox has a hard-drive with more storage space than the Wii.</blockquote><div><br>
I think interest on the GC was limited by a) the lack of mass storage
and b) the lack of a (readily available) network adapter. Since
the Wii has built in wifi and USB ports for mass storge (and wired
ethernet, an IR reciever, keyboard, etc), it has a lot more potential
than the GC did. </div><br><blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="border-left: 1px solid rgb(204, 204, 204); margin: 0pt 0pt 0pt 0.8ex; padding-left: 1ex;">> What I find interesting about the PS3 is that it has EIGHT cores
<br>> (though one is disabled).<br><br>The Wikipedia article described the "eighth [as] disabled to improve<br>production yields" - IE: you MAY get a PS3 with one core that is<br>merely disabled, but on many Cell processors it is disabled because
<br>it's a production failure.<br><br>> Wow... according to<br>> <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PlayStation_3">http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PlayStation_3</a> they already have Linux<br>> running on it, but the low 256 ram was a problem. 256 doesn't seem
<br>> that low to me.<br><br>Linux is actually Sony-supported on the PS3. Ummm... I mean, you<br>can't phone Sony for help with RPM issues, but Sony have encouraged<br>this activity, and offer the tools required for partitioning the h/d.
<br>One downside of Linux on the PS3 is that it is not (supposed to be)<br>possible to use the GPU's hardware acceleration.</blockquote><div><br>
Maybe sony/nvidia will see fit to drop drivers on our doorstep at some
point, but I wouldn't hold my breath for an official release on those.<br>
<br>
</div></div>-- <br>--Brad Staton<br><a href="mailto:Brad.Staton@gmail.com">Brad.Staton@gmail.com</a><br>