I was sorting through my installers on my hard drive and I found the original 1.0 and 1.1 softwares for the Apple TV, and this got me to thinking how one would go about restoring these files or even just installing OS X on one of them. Anyone on this board own a first gen Apple TV and if so, what's your experience with it? Do you know how to restore from these DMGs or is that impossible by now? Figured this is a better place for this thread because we're tinkerers and it technically is early Intel...
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Anyone here tinkered with the 1st gen Apple TV?
- Thread starter retta283
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Some basic Googling yielded this link for restoring the software on a 1st Gen AppleTV: https://www.tweaking4all.com/home-theatre/appletv/restore-appletv-os-offline-1stgen/
And here's a link to how someone was able to get Tiger on a 1st Gen AppleTV: https://www.appletvhacks.net/2007/04/01/mac-os-x-running-on-apple-tv/
It's been a while, but I remember people getting not just OS X but also Linux running on the AppleTV. I also remember a popular upgrade being swapping the WiFi card with a Broadcom Crystal HD BCM70015 card for better playback of 1080p content (but you apparently had to install XBMC or OSMC on it, to really make the card shine).
And here's a link to how someone was able to get Tiger on a 1st Gen AppleTV: https://www.appletvhacks.net/2007/04/01/mac-os-x-running-on-apple-tv/
It's been a while, but I remember people getting not just OS X but also Linux running on the AppleTV. I also remember a popular upgrade being swapping the WiFi card with a Broadcom Crystal HD BCM70015 card for better playback of 1080p content (but you apparently had to install XBMC or OSMC on it, to really make the card shine).
The file formats for 2.0 and 3.0 software are different than the earlier versions which makes it questionable that such method would still apply. I researched this quite a bit and found nothing related to the earlier software.
My aTV is running 10.5.8 about as well as it can with an internal IDE SSD. The hard drive died last year so I reinstalled everything from scratch to the SSD. Some of the disk images/patch files I used I had already downloaded in ~2010 so I'm not sure if you can still get them on the internet. If you already have the correct files getting 10.5.8 on there isn't difficult.
You should be able to use atvusb-creator to flash those early 1.X firmwares first to a USB flash drive, then to the atV.
Installing linux is pretty straightforward too:
www.vogons.org
You should be able to use atvusb-creator to flash those early 1.X firmwares first to a USB flash drive, then to the atV.
Installing linux is pretty straightforward too:
Messing around with Linux on an AppleTV \ VOGONS
It seems like the atvusb-creator will accept the format of the earlier firmwares. They aren't installers per se, just the software bundled into a DMG. If it does flash them though perhaps this will turn it into something that can install. I hadn't seen this software in my search so thank you for the reference.My aTV is running 10.5.8 about as well as it can with an internal IDE SSD. The hard drive died last year so I reinstalled everything from scratch to the SSD. Some of the disk images/patch files I used I had already downloaded in ~2010 so I'm not sure if you can still get them on the internet. If you already have the correct files getting 10.5.8 on there isn't difficult.
You should be able to use atvusb-creator to flash those early 1.X firmwares first to a USB flash drive, then to the atV.
Installing linux is pretty straightforward too:
Messing around with Linux on an AppleTV \ VOGONS
I didn't know 10.5 was possible on this, I'd be curious how it handles a large monitor resolution (is 1920x1080 or 1920x1200 even supported by the cheap GPU) because even my Mini with a GMA has trouble.
10.5.8 runs better than you would expect given the abysmal hardware (256 MB RAM hurts). The SSD really helps; it was almost unusable with the original spinning hard drive due to memory paging. I use mine at 1920x1080x60Hz via HDMI and it's smooth.
The original AppleTV has a GeForce 7300 Go which I'm pretty confident totally spanks the GMA 950.
And IIRC @LightBulbFun got 10.6.8 running on one but graphics were funky.
Bought an aTV1 for 40 bucks years ago (about the the time, when the black aTV2 hit the shelves), because I was keen to try out FireCore aTV-flash for streaming video in our home network ... It gets pretty warm - something I didn't want to leave in standby for long.
The idea of putting an old SSD inside and install OSX sounds pretty intriguing.
The idea of putting an old SSD inside and install OSX sounds pretty intriguing.
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I ran one for several years with an SSD inside using Leopard as my home server. It doesn’t run half bad with an SSD, but as @uller6 mentioned, you’re gonna have a bad time if you use a spinning disk. I used an IDE—>SATA adapter to run a cheap SSD, then I had a large external drive hooked up via the USB port. It ran surprisingly well for several years before it was replaced by a Mac mini. I’ve still got it in my closet somewhere, just waiting for that mini to crap out so it can shine once again
Seems that I had deleted the file, but I was able to find the link. Apple themselves removed the download so it is an archived version: https://web.archive.org/web/2007071.../OS/061-2988.20070620.bHy75/2Z694-5248-45.dmg
Was never paid software so hopefully posting this is OK with mods.
As a follow-up to my last post, it seems that link is dead. It downloads, but then after waiting 15 minutes it stops at the very end and cannot be resumed. Thought nothing of it other than the Archive's absymal download speeds, my apologies for jumping the gun. Did some research and all copies of this available online are nonfunctional as they are sourced from this same link and missing 75~ MB of data.
In any event, I don't believe there's anything special about 1.1 compared to the original firmware other than the now-useless YouTube app and some security fixes (again for a 16 year old release). The 1.0 firmware is still available: https://archive.org/details/os-dot-dmg-1.0 This one I did have on my HDD, I don't know what I was talking about in my first post with regards to the 1.1 file. Wish I could find it.
In any event, I don't believe there's anything special about 1.1 compared to the original firmware other than the now-useless YouTube app and some security fixes (again for a 16 year old release). The 1.0 firmware is still available: https://archive.org/details/os-dot-dmg-1.0 This one I did have on my HDD, I don't know what I was talking about in my first post with regards to the 1.1 file. Wish I could find it.
In the spirit of the thread topic, here’s an old post regarding my AppleTV 1st gen;
I had Tiger running on it at one stage too, but restored the last Apple TV software for just local media playback as it ran incredibly hot on anything other than the official OS.
I had Tiger running on it at one stage too, but restored the last Apple TV software for just local media playback as it ran incredibly hot on anything other than the official OS.
Update: I bought a 1.1 Apple TV on eBay! It has it in the recovery partition including the DMG. I am going to publish it on archive.org!
I have uploaded 1.1! Sorry if this was late. Make sure your serial number starts with YM7. The 1.0 and 1.1 softwares will work with all of those. YM8, YM9, and YM0 might work. https://archive.org/details/1.1_20240422