Before we start, we first list what hardware requirements you need to successfully install Gentoo on your box.

For a full list of supported systems, please go to http://www.linuxppc64.org/hardware.shtml.

The Gentoo Installation CDs are bootable CDs which contain a self-sustained Gentoo environment. They allow you to boot Linux from the CD. During the boot process your hardware is detected and the appropriate drivers are loaded. They are maintained by Gentoo developers.

All Installation CDs allow you to boot, set up networking, initialize your partitions and start installing Gentoo from the Internet. We currently provide two Installation CDs which are equally suitable to install Gentoo from, as long as you're planning on performing an Internet-based installation using the latest version of the available packages.

If you wish to install Gentoo without a working Internet connection, please use the installation instructions described in the Gentoo 2008.0 Handbooks.

The two Installation CDs that we currently provide are:

• The Gentoo Minimal Installation CD, a small, no-nonsense, bootable CD which sole purpose is to boot the system, prepare the networking and continue with the Gentoo installation.
• The Gentoo Universal Installation CD, a bootable CD with the same abilities as the Minimal Installation CD. Additionally, it contains several stage3 tarballs (optimized for the individual subarchitectures).

To help you decide which Installation CD you need, we have written down the major advantages and disadvantages of each Installation CD.

The Minimal Installation CD is called install-ppc64-minimal-2008.0.iso and takes up only 124 MB of diskspace. You can use this Installation CD to install Gentoo, but always with a working Internet connection only.

The Universal Installation CD is called install-ppc64-universal-2008.0.iso and uses 460 MB. You can use this Installation CD to install Gentoo, and you can even use it to install Gentoo without a working internet connection.

A stage3 tarball is an archive containing a minimal Gentoo environment, suitable to continue the Gentoo installation using the instructions in this manual. Previously, the Gentoo Handbook described the installation using one of three stage tarballs. While Gentoo still offers stage1 and stage2 tarballs, the official installation method uses the stage3 tarball. If you are interested in performing a Gentoo installation using a stage1 or stage2 tarball, please read the Gentoo FAQ on How do I Install Gentoo Using a Stage1 or Stage2 Tarball?

On PPC64, the kernel is 64-bit and the userland can be 32-bit or 64-bit. The userland is basically the applications you are running, such as bash or mozilla-firefox. They can be compiled and run in either 64-bit or 32-bit modes. The Gentoo/PPC64 team provides both 32-bit and 64-bit userlands, so which one should you use?

You may have heard that 64-bit applications are better, but in fact, 32-bit applications take up slightly less memory and often run a little bit faster than 64-bit applications.

You really only need 64-bit applications when you need more memory than a 32-bit userland allows, or if you do a lot of 64-bit number crunching. If you run applications that require more than 4GB of memory or you run scientific applications, you should choose the 64-bit userland. Otherwise, choose the 32-bit userland, as it is recommended by the Gentoo/PPC64 developers.

Additionally, the 32-bit userland has been available in Portage longer than the 64-bit userland has. This means that there are more applications tested in the 32-bit userland that just work "out of the box." Many applications compiled for the 64-bit userland may be just as stable as the 32-bit version, but they haven't been tested yet. Though testing isn't difficult to do, it can be annoying and time consuming if you want to use many untested 64-bit applications. Also, some programs just won't run in the 64-bit userland until their code is fixed, such as OpenOffice.

The Gentoo/PPC64 team provides stages and Package CDs for both 32-bit and 64-bit userlands, so no matter which one you choose, you'll be able to successfully install Gentoo and get a full system up and running with minimal fuss.

You have chosen to use a Gentoo Installation CD. We'll first start by downloading and burning the chosen Installation CD. We previously discussed the several available Installation CDs, but where can you find them?

You can download any of the Installation CDs (and, if you want to, a Packages CD as well) from one of our mirrors. The Installation CDs are located in the installcd directory.

Inside that directory you'll find ISO files. Those are full CD images which you can write on a CD-R.

In case you wonder if your downloaded file is corrupted or not, you can check its MD5 checksum and compare it with the MD5 checksum we provide (such as install-ppc64-minimal-2008.0.iso.DIGESTS). You can check the MD5 checksum with the md5sum tool under Linux/Unix or md5sum for Windows.

Another way to check the validity of the downloaded file is to use GnuPG to verify the cryptographic signature that we provide (the file ending with .asc). Download the signature file and obtain the public key:

$ gpg --keyserver subkeys.pgp.net --recv-keys 17072058

Now verify the signature:

$ gpg --verify <signature file> <downloaded iso>

To burn the downloaded ISO(s), you have to select raw-burning. How you do this is highly program-dependent. We will discuss cdrecord and K3B here; more information can be found in our Gentoo FAQ.

• With cdrecord, you simply type cdrecord dev=/dev/hdc <downloaded iso file> (replace /dev/hdc with your CD-RW drive's device path).
• With K3B, select Tools > Burn CD Image. Then you can locate your ISO file within the 'Image to Burn' area. Finally click Start.
• With Mac OS X Panther, launch Disk Utility from Applications/Utilities, select Open from the Images menu, select the mounted disk image in the main window and select Burn in the Images menu.
• With Mac OS X Jaguar, launch Disk Copy from Applications/Utilities, select Burn Image from the File menu, select the ISO and click the Burn button.

Place the Installation CD in the CD-ROM and reboot the system. Hold down the 'C' key at bootup. You will be greeted by a friendly welcome message and a boot: prompt at the bottom of the screen.

You are also able to tweak some kernel options at this prompt. The following table lists the available boot options you can add:

At this prompt, hit enter, and a complete Gentoo Linux environment will be loaded from the CD. Continue with And When You're Booted....

The CD should autoboot on your pSeries box, but sometimes it does not. In that case, you have to set up your cdrom as a bootable device in the multi-boot menu. If you start your machine with a monitor and a keyboard attached, you can reach the multi-boot menu pressing the F1 key on startup. But if you start your machine using the serial console, then you have to press 1. Press the key when you see the beginning of the following line on the serial console:

memory      keyboard     network      scsi      speaker

The other option is to jump into Open Firmware and do it from there:

1. Boot into Open Firmware: same procedure as getting into multi-boot (described a few lines above), but use F8 and 8 instead of F1 and 1.
2. Run the command 0> boot cdrom:1,yaboot
3. Stand back and enjoy!

0 > boot cdrom:1,yaboot
 ok
0 >

You will be greeted by a root ("#") prompt on the current console. You can also switch to other consoles by pressing Alt-fn-F2, Alt-fn-F3 and Alt-fn-F4. Get back to the one you started on by pressing Alt-fn-F1.

If you are installing Gentoo on a system with a non-US keyboard, use loadkeys to load the keymap for your keyboard. To list the available keymaps, execute ls /usr/share/keymaps/i386.

(PPC uses x86 keymaps on most systems. The mac/ppc keymaps provided
 on the Installation CD are ADB keymaps and unusable with the 
 Installation CD kernel)
# ls /usr/share/keymaps/i386

Now load the keymap of your choice:

# loadkeys be-latin1

Now continue with Extra Hardware Configuration.