Yellow Dog Linux announced for the PS3

Posted Oct 16, 2006 at 1:32PM by QJ Staff Listed in: PS3 Tags: Linux, Sony, Terra Soft, Yellow Dog Linux

Hardcore fans of the PS3 might remember the small piece of news that the PS3 would support/run Linux. Personally, being a Linux user, I was very excited with the prospect of being able to run my favorite operating system on my PlayStation 3. But alas! There had been little talk about it since then. Did Sony forget about it? Or did they backtrack on their promises?

Well, looking at a recent announcement by Terra Soft, it seems that the PlayStation 3 will have a flavor of Linux after all! Terra Soft, creator of the Yellow Dog Linux, said that the latest version (v5) of their distribution will support the PS3. Now if this bit of news is true and if the partnership swings both ways, isn't it strange that Sony hasn't announced this partnership yet? Because if this turns out to be more than just a rumor, I would've expected more of a bang instead of this lonely piece of release info on Terra Soft's site.

I'll be waiting for a torrent of news once this is finalized. In any case, we do know now that Linux will grace the PS3. Will it be the killer feature that will "force" everyone to buy it? Probably not; but I do know one thing: Sony is getting one order from me! What about you?

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Comments

# 1st! PWNED — Guest 2006-10-16 08:07

1ST PWNAGE!!!!

and that ill never heard of yellow do linux

# Linux rules the world — Vietone 2006-10-16 08:16

Well if you can run Linux on the PS3 it would put Homebrew at the top of the best features of the PS3.

# gamers day — Guest 2006-10-16 08:26

this is sweet dude and the article guy is kinda slow they are having a gamers day on thursday thats when they are gonna make a big bang

# What is Yellow Dog — Manny151 2006-10-16 08:33

Is it a GUI or what? Somebody please explain to me.

# NoOb SpEaKinG — Guest 2006-10-16 08:36

I dont know ***** bout linux but i am going to get the ps3 definatly $ONY4LIFE

# I hope so! — Guest 2006-10-16 08:37

I really hope it comes out and is easy to install and work with.

I hope my apple bluetooth wireless keyboard and mouse work with it / ps3.... wow that would be nice!

Seems like you might need to partition that hard drive so that part can be proprietary ps3 stuff like gamesaves and demos etc, and a partition for the linux os,.... I dont know how that all works..

What is the deal with the ps3 HD anyhow, can i pop it out and slap a 500GB in there? Will the wireless networking work with Linux? What kind of HD is the 20 and 60gbs?

I have always said "wow we are paying so much money for basicly a computer, it should run windows for that price!" well i hope this become a reality, but either way Im getting one anyways.

Long Live the King, Long Live Sony.

Wii + 360 + PS3 = one heck of a good winter.

# debian?? — Guest 2006-10-16 10:26

what about a deb based distro like debian or ubuntu?so we acn use apt

# no 500 gig drives in ps3 — $s2 2006-10-16 11:48

ps3 use a laptop hdd. the biggest hdd for laptops is like 160GBs. and they are costly.

# Manny — [BOT] Bob 2006-10-16 12:08

Their web site says it uses E17 which stands for Enlightenment 17 which is a GUI.

# But — [BOT] Bob 2006-10-16 12:31

They only mention that it will be available on the same day the PS3 launches, there isn't anything that I could find on their site that led me to believe that it would be installed on the system when you bought it; however it appears that they are only charging 50 bucks for the OS. Not free like other linuxes, but not over 250 dollars either.

# prob free — Guest 2006-10-16 13:00

It will probably be free if you download it, the 50 bucks should just be if you want to order a hardcopy with a case, instruction manual, and probably advanced support and autopatching. I also found this interesting... http://www.hpcwire.com/hpc/967146.html

they talk about using ps3 to create 2 new supercomputer clusters (could this be where some of the PS3 shortages are coming from?)

# Come on!!! — iceatcs 2006-10-16 13:05

It is only about $100 to $160.

But I understand the worth of dollar. We bristish have so powerful pound compare.

# [BOT]Bod — iceatcs 2006-10-16 13:09

You are not read carefully.

It already show on the site "a free download"

# hmm — Guest 2006-10-16 14:40

so seeing as how ps3 will be able to run linux maybe they can create something so i can run all my ps2 back up discs in my ps3 oh how i hope!

# iceatcs — [BOT] Bob 2006-10-16 15:40

What? Actually I'm very well read. I'm pretty sure sure that you meant to say that I didn't read carefully; however, this couldn't be further from the truth. You are correct that "a free download" does appear in the text verbatim, but it isn't talking about the OS. If the statement was refering to the entire OS then that would contradict their and I quote "3-phase product roll-out." Also if you look in the YDL store the distro without support is 49.95+shipping; besides it would be dumb to charge only for a hardcopy, because profit margins are higher on digital distribution and no worry about buying materials and packaging(besid es that you can have Ubuntu shipped to you for $0+shipping). So anyway the "a free download" to which you so eloquently referred only applies to product updates. In essence you did not read carefully.

# Bot: look at firefox or other free linux's as examples — $s2 2006-10-16 16:17

the download on firefox is free and some linux's downloads are free. but they charge a lot of a disk copy because of shipping and ect.

# homebrew on ps3 and it sells perfect — Guest 2006-10-16 16:19

I mean, running an xbox emulator, a PS1/2 emulator (running from disc or simply the ISO ) and all the other emulators alone would be GREAT! I mean, what's the fuss about the NES/SNES/MGDRIVE emu the wii gets ( you even have to pay to download new games like 5$ ) when the ps3 get all the emulators without having to pay for it? lol

# WIW CHECK THIS!!!!!!!!!!! ! WHAT A FEATURE!!!! — senjutsu 2006-10-16 16:24

*from the yellow dog features*

«mol 0.9.71-0.ydl.2: Virtual machine capable of running Mac OS and Mac OS X

With MOL you can run Mac OS [X] under Linux - in full speed!

All PowerPC versions of Mac OS are supported (including MacOS MacoS 9 and MacOS X).»

So I can install Mac OS X tiger ( or maybe even leopard ) on my ps3 ? I think I'll get one soon... wow, simply amazing!

# .. — Guest 2006-10-16 20:47

Senjutsu, doubt that's gonna work, since majority of teh ps3 hardware wont be recognised by the said OS'es.

# This is good news? — Demon Slayer 2006-10-16 23:34

I'm confused. If you can run linux, why would you want to run OSX?

On the other hand, if you could find a way to run Windows...

# NOOBZ — Guest 2006-10-17 01:02

PS3 IS CRAP! ITS GOIN 2 SUK BALLS!!!! SONY IS DUMB AND XBOX RULES. MICROSOFT MAKES THE MOST SECURE AND COOL CONSOLE STUFFS!

SO ***** YALL NOOBS WHO TINK SONYS ALL COOL BECAUSE ITS GOT DUMB LINUX. NOW PS3 WONT SUPPORT GAMES BECAUSE OF IT LOLOLOL NOOBZ.

IM HIGHLY INTELLIGENT AND WORK IN MICROSOFTS MAINFRAME DATA UNIT.

# OSX — Guest 2006-10-17 01:36

Yes after hearing that Yellow Dog Linux would install on a PS3 I was very curious about installing OSX. For powerpc mac users yellow dog linux was the only option for a while.

I didnt know about running osx under yellow dog fullspeed. wow that would be nice

so i guess my wireless bluetooth keyboard would probably work under osx. i hope they work (or other bluetooth keyboards) work with the ps3 right away too, for the web browser and stuff.

What i have seen from Sony is they say a lot of things are possible, and then if we are lucky we see these things like 5 years later... i hope its soon tho i gota launch ps3 coming!!!!!!!!

# But — [BOT] Bob 2006-10-17 01:59

That is exactly what a processor's virtualization features solve. If you mean that either OS won't recognize the SPUs; it doesn't matter because the PPE is practically a POWERpc processor, and could run either Mac OS.

# VMware — Hoonatic 2006-10-17 02:09

You could maybe get Windows on top of VMware on top Yellow Dog - But as is already mentioned, the hardware may cause issues.

It would be interesting to see how fast Windows would run (even with the linux/vmware layers dragging down the performance slightly). But i can't think of a really could reason to have windows on PS3?

# yeah maybe, but the program emulate mac OS on linux — Guest 2006-10-17 03:18

so I suppose we do not need mac hardware becaise it's anyway more simple to dual-boot then to emulate. But emulate give you two OS at the same time?

anyway, maybe it won't work, but I'm pretty sure I will work perfect! Because emulation in on "working" OS hardware, so MAC think he's alright on hardware, even if he's not. And I suppose the PS3 is better then a normal powerPC anyway, so I'm pretty sure It'll work! this is looking so great! hoping a lopt on this#

# @Demon Slayer — Guest 2006-10-17 03:26

Because OS X is the best OS I saw in my entire life! ( 21 years old ). Windows is crap ( at least if you cannot install PC games on it ), linux is okay, but nothing spectacular or really special ( but to emulate mac OS X lol ) but tiger is special, you really need to try it for yourself, but after you tryed, you cannot let go... it's sooo beatifulll.... ps: i love mac, but it cost too much for me, so the ps3 really is a bargain after all, lol. a computer and a console combine with a cd/dvd/BD player that output HDMI and also ( for the higher end wich I won't buy ) a media card reader and wireless device ( to plug wireless keyboards, mouse, psp, etc )

# yes exactly! — Guest 2006-10-17 03:29

I was said in the "yellow dog" features that it could run mac OS X Full speed. So this will be GREAT! and even in linux your keyboard and mouse will work anyway.

# Linux — Guest 2006-10-17 04:24

Yellow Dog is one of the many variations of linux.

What's Linux?

A completely different operating system that's essentially designed for progamming... it's just awesome, you can probably get a load of PC games to work with the right programs installed on Linux

# ***** 360 — Guest 2006-10-17 04:24

PS3 = +1,000,000

Xbox 360 = Sayonara Baby!

# Yeah — [BOT] Bob 2006-10-17 04:51

You could either try to figure out WineX which creates a windows directory and registry, DirectX games don't run too well but OpenGL games run better on linux than windows. Also there is Cedega which figures everything out for a monthly fee(kind of a really wierd structure for such a service, but they are the only ones so they can charge however they want). You download updates so you can play the latest releases.

# PS3 hacked and cracked? — Guest 2006-10-17 07:01

If this is true then hacking the PS3 and PSP will be so much easyer

# hm — Guest 2006-10-17 07:52

I bet you're right about partitioning, and i can imagine the keyboard and mouse will work.

Also, the PS3 HD can be upgraded with any HD, as long as it's laptop sized and not normal sized.

# you know what this means.... — Guest 2006-10-18 21:48

you know what this means.... HOMEBREW, EXPLOITS, CUSTOM OS's (linux, possibly windows) Dr DivX encoding at *****FAST speed. better than my inspiron 5150. is it possible to execute exe on this? sorry for the noob question im a windows person.

# old times — Guest 2006-10-18 22:07

it will be just like the time the apple logo "accidently" appeared on the PS3 site...

# amazing — Guest 2006-10-24 06:39

another reason to buy the ps3. hopefully osx wont be far behind? with the talks between sony and apple, and the ps3-mac pic on ps3.com a few months ago, maybe.i sincerely doubt any windows though,lol

# Mac OSX on PS3.... hmmm... — Guest 2006-11-13 01:18

I have to admit that I'm not a big fan of Sony right now (the actions agains Lik-Sang pushed me over the edge with them). However, seeing as I am a user of Mac OS X (I have a Power Mac G5 and a MacBook Pro), I know how nice the operating system is, even when you have to pay a premium for hardware to use it. Being able to have another fully capable Mac OSX computer to work with would be wonderful, and only having to pay $600 (for the 60GB version) would make it sweet (just partition it for the minimum space needed to install and add an external HDD). However, I have a feeling that any version Apple might release for the PS3 would be priced more than just a standard computer version, but I guess either way, only time will tell...

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