So I got this request about running Mono on the PowerPC. As it stands right now I don’t have a PowerPC box in my home to test, so I thought I’d turn to Qemu & Debian.

And yes, it surprisingly boots!

I opted for the network install, as I didn’t even know if it would work. But not only did the 32bit version of Linux for the PPC boot up, but the 64bit did as well! The flags were a little involved to get going, but it went something like this for the 32bit version:

qemu-system-ppc.exe -m 512 -boot d -hda debian-ppc.qcow2 -L pc-bios -M mac99 -net nic,model=pcnet -net user -cdrom debian-6.0.1a-powerpc-netinst.iso -boot d

And for the 64bit version:

qemu-system-ppc64.exe -L pc-bios -m 512 -hda ppc64.qcow2 -net nic,model=pcnet -net user -cdrom debian-6.0.1a-powerpc-netinst.iso -boot d

And then it’s a matter of waiting… Maybe I should have just torrented the install DVDs or something.. 😐

But booting from the hard disk produces a:

openbios panic: Unexpected exception 704

So close. Perhaps the macintosh machine type I select means the boot type isn’t PReP like for OpenBIOS to find?

I’ve also been told you can find various pre-built images here.