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XBox (Games)

GNU/Linux bootable CD on XBOX: dyne:bolic 261

jaromil writes "The dyne:bolic bootable CD distribution is almost getting to its final 1.0 release, includes a whole bunch of multimedia applications making it easy to edit and stream audio and video, encrypt mails, share p2p and of course play games, all with a fancy GNUStep desktop. download the 1.0 alpha 5 ISO (~350Mb) and try it on your PC or XBOX!" One more reason to mod an xbox.
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GNU/Linux bootable CD on XBOX: dyne:bolic

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  • best of both worlds? (Score:5, Interesting)

    by sweeney37 ( 325921 ) * <mikesweeney@gma[ ]com ['il.' in gap]> on Tuesday June 24, 2003 @10:42AM (#6284266) Homepage Journal
    would this work with the 007 Hack [slashdot.org]?

    Mike
  • FIRST POST!!!! (Score:4, Interesting)

    by AlexMax2742 ( 602517 ) on Tuesday June 24, 2003 @10:44AM (#6284276)
    Thanks, but I would rather wait until the "Xbox Live 2.0" comes out.

    Just in case they figured out how to foil current mod chips this time. I still would prefer to use my Xbox for online gaming *gasp* than as a Linux box.

  • by HanzoSan ( 251665 ) * on Tuesday June 24, 2003 @10:45AM (#6284287) Homepage Journal


    These new live CDs finally give us the chance to introduce Linux to the masses. Recently I emailed dozens of my friends, and I will attempt to introduce them to Linux in a way thats safe, with these new CDs you dont have to actually install Linux, It also gives us the ability to introduce Linux to the gamers. So the question here is how many of you people have actually used this to show people Linux? I wish we had a Redhat live-CD, or Mandrake because those are my favorite brand, but a Lindows promotion CD(Thats what I will start calling these CDs) should be given away in stores and to college students.

    How about a grass roots program? I plan to do something like that. I hope through these new live-CDs that it can act as a type of marketing where people who are interested in Linux can try it without actually installing it. The easy way to get them to try it is to give it to them for their Xbox game console, a Console with no OS such as the Xbox would actually be perfect for the gamer who wants to do more than just play games on their Xbox. I also wonder if something like this could be brought to work or run on computer labs in college campuses, I havent tried it so I dont know. But yes, I have ideas for marketing.

    People are going to read this and think i'm some kinda Linux zealot, but the truth is the best thing we can do for the computer industry right now is create competition, Linux is competition, competition fuels growth.

    So all who are with me, please post a reply/response about how you plan to actually use these live CDs for marketing purposes, perhaps it would be wise to put these live CDs in some videogame magazine if possible, or even get Linux to run on the PS2.
  • DVD playback? (Score:1, Interesting)

    by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday June 24, 2003 @10:47AM (#6284316)
    Is there any way to enable DVD playback with this ISO? I only see references to a mp3 player on their site..

    I'd really like to use my Xbox as a region free DVD player....two 'League of Gentlemen' DVDs that only get used on my TiPB :-\
  • Heres some ideas (Score:5, Interesting)

    by HanzoSan ( 251665 ) * on Tuesday June 24, 2003 @10:47AM (#6284318) Homepage Journal
    Why cant we try to use Wine or something like it to trick the Xbox into running the Microsoft gaming live software from withinn Linux?

    Second, if its done right people might use Xbox Linux, if its useful, it depends on how its done. Overall though I'd use it to promote Linux, as a marketing technique.

    Linux needs marketing, so that when the time comes a year or two from now, when Longhorn is released, Linux can take the market or at least be competitive, people have to actually know what Linux is though, as of right now people either dont know what it is, or they believe a bunch of myths about it being a hackerOS.
  • xine on the Xbox? (Score:5, Interesting)

    by gooofy ( 548515 ) on Tuesday June 24, 2003 @10:50AM (#6284348) Homepage
    would be interesting to see what xine [sf.net] could do on this platform. maybe any xbox could be turned into a full-featured dvd player (including menu support) that way?
  • Sounds Good (Score:2, Interesting)

    by trublaha ( 650819 ) on Tuesday June 24, 2003 @10:55AM (#6284396)

    Over the past few months, I've been working towards getting a server up and running on my university network to provide streaming videos of club activities and music from uni-bands.

    The hard part has been scrounging up bits and pieces to create a half-decent server for all this as the Clubs & Societies deperatment of our Student Union has been rather tight-fisted. A cheap x-box preloaded with this software would be perfectly within budget.

    Now to convince the less practical members of the committee to drop their insistance on Win32 platform. Convincing them we can achieve our target with an off-the-shelf, cheap-as console rather than an expensive box will take some work... :-/

  • Linux for Playstation requires the addition of a hard drive and whatnot, which can not then be used for gaming, and which is not (yet?) upgradable to a larger disk. It's an inanely crippled system. On top of that you don't get to treat VU0 and VU1 as different processors or anything, so you're stuck with a single 300MHz processor, which is way too slow, and 32MB of ram, which is way too little.

    By contrast the Xbox may not have a 128 bit processor, but it does have a 733MHz one, and it has 64MB of ram, which is still well on the lean side but more than twice as useful as the 32MB in the PS2. In the $130 price for a used console plus another $30 for a memory card with a serial interface, you can hack that mofo and have what ends up being a much more open system than the PS2. That might not be intentional, but it's still more useful.

    The only edge PS2 linux has over Xbox linux is the lack of a need for hacking, but it's still cheaper to buy a hacked Xbox than it is to buy a PS2 with the Linux kit.

  • by burgburgburg ( 574866 ) <splisken06NO@SPAMemail.com> on Tuesday June 24, 2003 @10:58AM (#6284417)
    What is the genesis of the name? There is no mention in the FAQ (that I could see).
  • Re:And just IMAGINE (Score:2, Interesting)

    by calethix ( 537786 ) on Tuesday June 24, 2003 @11:00AM (#6284442) Homepage
    "It's quite invigorating browsing interactive pr0n with the Xbox controls"

    I saw a gamecube controller at gamestop last night that has a fan/ventilation holes in it to keep your hands cool. You might try finding one for your xbox to keep your hands cool/dry. ;)
  • by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday June 24, 2003 @11:07AM (#6284505)
    LiveCDs become more and more widespread, for a lot of possible scenarios. My own effort to this is called jollix [jollix.de]

    - based on gentoo linux
    - kde, wine, some communication & multimedia applications
    - network
    - 1st release let windows-only users play their HalfLife/Counterstrike HD-installation
    It's in an early stage and not well documented yet

    Olli
  • by dhm4 ( 584969 ) on Tuesday June 24, 2003 @11:24AM (#6284670)
    you can already run different linux distributions on a xbox (debian, mandrake, redhat, suse, ...) with a few kernel hacks, _but_ why does nobody make an own linu-X-box? it should be based on debian [sourceforge.net] . just add a few features from knoppix [knopper.net] or XLLPS. make some individual skins for mozilla, gnome or kde (or even an special window maker), gaim, etc. that are optimized for TV-resolution & gamepad as input device, multimedia (divX, mp3, vcr features), emulators (gba, mame, snes, ps, n64, ... + VMware _g_) & if you have an easy disto (just put the cd in), that windows user can use without probs then a new hype is started. what do you think of that idea or is there already an _independend_ X distro?
  • And why not? (Score:3, Interesting)

    by timothy ( 36799 ) on Tuesday June 24, 2003 @12:17PM (#6285268) Journal
    There's nothing wrong (morally or legally) with experimenting with hardware you own.

    Note that this use (running a Linux distro) in particular has nothing to do with "stealing" as in running illegally copied games. I'm not going to debate whether playing illegally copied games should be called stealing, just pointing out that it's not part of running Linux on an Xbox :)

    The reason I bought an Xbox (and am shopping* for a mod-chip) is to use it as a music box for my car. That may sound silly to you (and it may *be* silly to you :)) but it's very similar in price to adding a low-end CD player to my existing car stereo. And I like my head unit (which has a line-in), so I don't want to get rid of it.

    A modded Xbox can also play Ogg Vorbis files, which is the format to which I've been ripping my CD collection for portable use. (Yes, many car decks now will play MP3s, but I don't have more than a handful of those.)

    timothy

    * Can anyone recommend an easy (no-solder), inexpensive, external-switch equipped modchip preloaded with the Cromwell BIOS? :) The external switch would be if I ever decide to buy, rent or borrow an actual XBox game ;)
  • by TheCabal ( 215908 ) on Tuesday June 24, 2003 @12:19PM (#6285303) Journal
    Every time one of these "Linux on Xbox" stories pop up, I ask: Why?

    I've gotten a few vague answers, ranging from "it has a good graphics card, I can now do all that rendering I've been waiting to do!" to "Don't tell me how to use my hardware, you sancimonious pro-Microsoft clone!"

    I still ask: Why? Oh, yeah, there's that giddy little thrill of 'subverting' a Microsoft platform to run Linux, but you have to have actually purchased an Xbox to begin with, so you've already put money in Microsoft's coffers. With all the effort needed to get an Xbox to run Linux, there's tons of easier platforms so you fire up EMACS and check your email.
    Once you done it, what are you going to do with it? Compartively speaking, apart from the graphics controller, it's not that good of a computing platform.
  • by Sherloqq ( 577391 ) on Tuesday June 24, 2003 @12:33PM (#6285456)
    Apparently you can use it to power a PC, too, so given the right kernel support, you could prolly use a BT-based video acquisition board with this. I'll find out shortly, downloading ISO now :)
  • missing the point (Score:3, Interesting)

    by Hatta ( 162192 ) on Tuesday June 24, 2003 @09:52PM (#6290673) Journal
    The point is not that you would want to use linux instead of playing games, but that this makes the x-box an affordable and effective linux box for those not interested in playing games.

    From the Dyne:bolic User's Guide:

    I hope you enjoy using those beasts for something more useful than what they are made for: after all XBOX is about a CHEAP pentium celeron 733, 8Gigs of harddisk and nvidia chipset everywhere; dedicated to everybody who loves reusing hardware leftovers.

    I'm not a big gamer, but with this and Xbox Media Player [xboxmediaplayer.de] an xbox is looking like a more attractive purchase. Especially considering M$ sells these things at a loss.

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