Before you start it might be wise to get yourself a root password if you have not already done so.

Here is how you do it:

sudo passwd root
Enter Your Password: This is the password of the account you made when you originally installed Ubuntu
Enter New Password: This will be the new password for the root account.
Re-enter your password: Just type in the new password you put before for the root account.

You may need this later in some of the instructions below if you get stuck at the command line.

The only advantage is that you can drop the “sudo” portion before the command and do it directly as root.

1) I allowed performed the Upgrade to Ubuntu 7.10. ***EXTREMELY IMPORTANT*** After the upgrade completes do not reboot! (See Step 2)

2) I ran the extra steps mentioned not only by the Ubuntu forum community (http://www.ubuntu.com/getubuntu/releasenotes/710 and blog
http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=580568 - from oddroot’s posting)

Although it probably does not matter much - I performed the steps exactly as outlined by http://psubuntu.com/2007/10/23/upgrade-to-710/ under ogrisel’s posting.

You can only load this “cell” kernel after you upgraded to Ubuntu 7.10. ***EXTREMELY IMPORTANT*** After the upgrade completes DO NOT REBOOT!

$ sudo aptitude install linux-cell
$ sudo aptitude remove linux-image-powerpc64-smp linux-powerpc64-smp linux-restricted-modules-powerpc64-smp

I also ran the following command recommended by orgisel to “Ensure all the dependencies of the ubuntu-desktop metapackage where correctly updated”:

$ sudo aptitude install ubuntu-desktop

Personally on my installation this last command came back with no packages to update, but it may be necessary depending on your circumstances.

3) I rebooted only to find that it wouldn’t boot up into the GUI. Knowing what I know now I should have performed some more commands as detailed below.

Here is what happened when I rebooted:

I got an error like:

BusyBox v1.1.3 (debian 1:1.1.3.-5ubuntu7) Built-in Shell (ash)
Enter ‘help’ for a list of built-in commands
(initramfs)

or

Loading, please wait…
usplash: No usable theme found for 576×460
screen init failed

Ubuntu 7.10 localhost tty1

localhost login:

4) Cursing got worse as time went by…

5) Then I went and saw a posting on another blog (http://www.ps3hax.com/forum/ubuntu-linux/526-installation-guide-ubuntu-ps3.html)

While it was not exactly the circumstance I was in, I quickly realized that at the kboot prompt I could run a command listed on that site:

kboot: /boot/vmlinux initrd=/boot/initrd.img root=/dev/sda1 (DON’T TYPE THIS IN – I AM ONLY SHOWING THE EXAMPLE FROM THE SITE)

Well if you recall other postings about upgrading to Ubuntu 7.10, they stated that sda has changed to ps3da.

So from the kboot prompt I typed:

kboot: /boot/vmlinux initrd=/boot/initrd.img root=/dev/ps3da1

And I got past the “usplash and (initramfs)” errors listed in step 3 above.

6) Still the gui would not come up. Another feature I became quickly acquainted with was the key sequence “CTRL+ALT+F1.” As I learned from other blogs, this can get you to a unix prompt

I was getting this error still:

Loading, please wait…
usplash: No usable theme found for 576×460
screen init failed

Ubuntu 7.10 localhost tty1

localhost login:

7) Just remember if your screen goes blank and you do not see a login prompt like above, do the key sequence “CTRL+ALT+F1.” Then you can login as root and check things out.

I quickly realized that the same files that you can see under the “kboot” prompt like “kboot.conf” also show up under /etc/kboot.conf when you are in Ubuntu. I am a “vi” nut so I quickly vi’d the file while in Ubunt 7.10 at the command line and not in the Gui (although it doesn’t much matter):

vi /etc/kboot.conf

For one thing I moved the timeout from “100″ to “5″ seconds. This just decreases the amount of waiting time at the “kboot:” prompt when you boot it up into Ubuntu.

Then I looked at some more blogs. One stated that if the gui isn’t coming up, to simply rename the /etc/X11/xorg.conf to /etc/X11/xorg.conf.default
(http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=580568 found under oddroot’s posting - they used /etc/init.d/gdm stop, moved the file- mv xorg.conf
xorg.conf.default, and then /etc/init.d/gdm start).

I did that and the gui came up. It was standard resolution, but better than nothing.

That is fine if you are using a standard television. But I tried some of the recommendations on another blog and had some success. They had you editing various lines in the xorg.conf file. I kept trying to get their recommendation of adjusting the screen sizes in the file, but it did not pan out for me (http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=679493).

But also in this same blog (http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=679493) I came across a passage where they state that you can tweak the kboot.conf file and stuff in what video mode you want. tomihasa on that blog uses video mode 5. 5 would not work with my HDMI / HDTV. So I scaled it back to 3. 3 is still decent.

So a quick recap -

a) I moved the xorg.conf as xorg.conf.default (or whatever you want to call it) the “.default” does not have any significance other than to let you know it is backed up.

b) I modified the kboot.conf as follows:

message=/etc/kboot.msg
default=linux
timeout=5
linux=’/boot/vmlinux initrd=/boot/initrd.img video=ps3fb:mode:3 root=/dev/ps3da1 quiet splash’
old=’/boot/vmlinux.old initrd=/boot/initrd.img.old root=/dev/sda1 quiet splash’

And Ubuntu booted up cleanly into the gui like I wanted.

For those not as familiar with “vi” here are some quick guidelines (other blogs recommend nano as an editor – I have never used it):

***To move your cursor around when editing a file***
j = down
k = up
l = right
h = left

***To replace a character***
s = replace the current character you are positioned on - A $ will display and then you just type in the character
x = delete the current character you are positioned on
i = insert mode. While in insert mode you can type in anything you want. To exit the insert mode hit the ESC key.

***Saving the file***
for each of these commands you have to hit ESC first
:x! = write and quit - the ! is a force write.
:w = write the changes to the file, but stay in the editor.
:q! = dont’ save any of my changes

So basically I got the gui mode by inserting the “video=ps3fb:mode:3″ in the “linux=” variable, and also changing the “root=” variable to point to “ps3da1″ vice “sda1″ as it was under Ubuntu 7.04.

Just to make clear - I have found that you cannot edit the /etc/kboot.conf file while in the kboot: prompt. You must be in Ubuntu (gui or not) in order to modify that file.

9) The last snafu I found was the network card was not working. I quickly learned that the interfaces file had many of the commands commented out after the upgrade.

Here is how you can tell:

While in the Ubuntu terminal or gui -

Type “ifconfig”
lo Link encap:Local Loopback
inet addr:127.0.0.1 Mask:255.0.0.0
inet6 addr: ::1/128 Scope:Host
UP LOOPBACK RUNNING MTU:16436 Metric:1
RX packets:2 errors:0 dropped:0 overruns:0 frame:0
TX packets:2 errors:0 dropped:0 overruns:0 carrier:0
collisions:0 txqueuelen:0
RX bytes:100 (100.0 b) TX bytes:100 (100.0 b)

If “lo” is the only adapter you see, chances are that your upgrade to Ubuntu 7.10 blew up your network configuration too.

Go to /etc/network

vi the “interfaces” file:
auto lo
iface lo inet loopback

auto eth0
#iface eth0 inet dhcp

auto eth1
#iface eth1 inet dhcp

auto eth2
#iface eth2 inet dhcp

auto ath0
#iface ath0 inet dhcp

auto wlan0
iface wlan0 inet dhcp

Notice that “#iface eth0 inet dhcp” is commented out below “auto eth0″ no wonder it won’t show.

Simply modify the file to look like:

auto lo
iface lo inet loopback

auto eth0
iface eth0 inet dhcp

#auto eth1
#iface eth1 inet dhcp

#auto eth2
#iface eth2 inet dhcp

#auto ath0
#iface ath0 inet dhcp

#auto wlan0
#iface wlan0 inet dhcp

All I did was removed the # mark in front of the iface command for eth0. Also I commented out the remainder because the system only has one onboard ethernet adapter.

I see/know it has a wireless adapter (wlan from above). I commented it out because I really do not use it. But I know from experience using my HP laptop with Ubuntu, you can load the windows driver for a wireless PCMCIA adapter (talking strictly on my laptop) and it works flawlessly! The only thing is you would have to find a comparable Windows driver for the wireless device in the PS3 in order to really use it.

10) You are done!

You can type the “reboot” command and see it boot up into the gui now. Or if you want to stay in Ubuntu (gui or terminal) you can do “/etc/init.d/networking restart” and it should activate your network adapter now.

I restart the system and my screen was black and coundn’t do anything. So I installed one more time the version 7.04

And now, I didn’t have anything when i want to have Ubuntu.
What Can I do ?
What are the commands to be sure that an update will not destroy the installation ???

When my PS3 Linux kept freezing up and would not allow me to get back into Dashboard, I just did that and it came right back up, with an audible sigh of relief from me.

Grrr! I dunno what to do now.

BusyBox v1.1.3 (debian 1:1.1.3.-5ubuntu7) Built-in Shell (ash)
Enter ‘help’ for a list of built-in commands
(initramfs)

- launch the ‘update-manager’ utility to install latest security updates on 7.04
- when everything is up to date, the ‘update-manager’ utility offer the ‘upgrade to 7.10′ which I did trigger (takes a couple of hours to download and install everything) however I closed the ‘update-manager’ WITHOUT automatically restarting
$ sudo aptitude install linux-cell
$ sudo aptitude remove linux-image-powerpc64-smp linux-powerpc64-smp linux-restricted-modules-powerpc64-smp

Ensure all the dependencies of the ubuntu-desktop metapackage where correctly updated:

$ sudo aptitude install ubuntu-desktop

Restart the system, everything should be fine.