[phuture]

Check it:


Yep, isn't that beautiful? Instead of saying, "Calculating... Remaining" forever, it now displays the estimated time remaining, quite accurately, I might add. Here's how I did it.

Ingredients:
A Pismo, best laptop ever made by Apple
OS X Tiger, debatable whether it's the best OS ever made by Apple
OS 9 (Please tell me you've kept it on your drive!)
One small file from the system folder of OS X Jaguar.

What you wanna do is dig into Jaguar's system folder and fetch a file. Go: System> Library> System Configuration> Power Management.bundle> Mac OS. Copy that file.

Next, boot your Pismo under System 9 so that you can dig into Tiger's system folder. Go: System> Library> System Configuration> and find the folder marked "Battery Updater.bundle." Trash that folder. Next, scroll down til you get to "Power Management.bundle" and swap out Tiger's Mac OS folder for the one you lifted from Jaguar.

Close everything up, reboot, and enjoy! Don't forget to repair disk permissions, just in case, as you did some transplanting.

I came up with this hack after upgrading my hard drive, then installing Tiger, and being frustrated with its inability to display battery time remaining / time til full charge. So far it's worked great! Pismo still sleeps then wakes, screen still dims automatically when switching from ac to battery, all the great power management features of Tiger!! Took me about two hours to get this hack right, switching files around. What I found is that much of Tiger's power management actually comes from the power mgmt extension in the extensions folder, but that stays intact.

This hack isn't perfect. I found you only have one setting each for battery power and ac power... no such thing as "normal, custom, high performance, better battery life"... everything is custom. But that's ok because it still switches power settings automatically when running on battery or on ac. Just those presets don't work anymore. Small price to pay, I guess. Also, the battery icons (when using two batteries) are still reversed, go figure.

I need your help, folks. Perhaps an experienced forum member or an admin??? I know not too many people have access to Jaguar, so I'd like to set this file up so Pismo users running Tiger can get that annoying bug fixed. Only thing is, I don't know how to do it. If anyone is interested in hosting this file so others can download it (or teach me so I can do it), I'd greatly appreciate it and so would a lot of Pismo owners!!!

[Tuoder]

It seems like Xcode would help here. I know there is a way to edit .plist files with it, though I couldn't be the one to tell anyone how.

[tooki]

You don't need OS 9 to do this, you could just use the terminal, or log in as root. (Admittedly, a Pismo is likely to have a working copy of OS 9 installed, and it is a quick way to do it.)

tooki

[fisherKing]

what is it about the pismo, and pismo owners??

i had one. loved it.

but my 12" revC alubook blows it away:

faster
more powerful (i can run, for example, reason & logic together; not on the pismo however).
much better screen (and, in fact, THIS screen is blown away by the 15" powerbook).
more ram
more video ram
less weight
better battery life
& has held up better. (my cd drive was failing, the screen had faded, the battery life was bad).

etc...

again, i thought the pismo was an amazing laptop, but i would never go back...

[phuture]

Thank u tooki for getting back to me to let me know how to host that file. Unfortunately, I don't have an ISP of my own, I use my college's wireless network. Too bad I can't host it myself or i would.

UPDATE: So I tried this on another Pismo running Tiger as well and I didn't trash the BatteryUpdater folder on that one, it still runs fine with or without it. So u can leave it in if u want. On the second pismo I did, I measured the ACTUAL running time of the machine before and after the hack, from battery full until nearly empty. Not really any difference in time running. I used a weak battery so I wouldn't have to wait so long and have it be an all-day affair.

Although all of the power management features of Tiger still seemed present, I wanted to make absolutely sure that actual use wouldn't be altered, with there being some of Jaguar's transplanted DNA in Tiger's system. Good news, running time is not affected at all!

[Eriamjh]

Cool.

Let me get this straight: You DELETE BatteryUpdater.bundle, and copy PowerManagement.buncle from Jaguar onto the Pismo? Wouldn't you lose Tiger's powermanagement features?


But why didn't you use the files from Panther instead of Jaguar? Wouldn't the Panther ones be newer and more optimized? Or did you not have Panther?

My problem is I don't have a copy of Jaguar around anymore, but I do have a PPC running panther (G4 iMac). Can I use that file?

I want to try this as I use my Pismo because it has awsome battery life and I I can't justify buying a new MacBook (yet) for what I use the Pismo for. If I need speed, I use my Intel iMac (it rocks).

Update: I did the above using panther files and it works. I'll have to use the powerbook to see if battery life is changed.

[phuture]

Originally Posted by Eriamjh

Cool.

Let me get this straight: You DELETE BatteryUpdater.bundle, and copy PowerManagement.buncle from Jaguar onto the Pismo? Wouldn't you lose Tiger's powermanagement features?


But why didn't you use the files from Panther instead of Jaguar? Wouldn't the Panther ones be newer and more optimized? Or did you not have Panther?

My problem is I don't have a copy of Jaguar around anymore, but I do have a PPC running panther (G4 iMac). Can I use that file?

I want to try this as I use my Pismo because it has awsome battery life and I I can't justify buying a new MacBook (yet) for what I use the Pismo for. If I need speed, I use my Intel iMac (it rocks).

Update: I did the above using panther files and it works. I'll have to use the powerbook to see if battery life is changed.

Hey Eriamjh, on my own pismo, I did delete the BatteryUpdater.bundle. On the second pismo I did, I DID NOT delete the BatteryUpdater.bundle and it made no difference. So leave it in if u want. Inside the PowerManagement.bundle, on the first level you'll see the version.plist and info.plist files as well as the Contents folder. Inside that is the MacOS folder, and inside that one is the file u need to replace. The info and version files need to stay Tiger to keep Tiger's power management features, I found. Why, I do not know.

Now... if only I can reverse the battery icons and find a way to get CPU thermal monitoring back into Tiger... any ideas?

***EDIT*** Hey, good to hear that Panther DNA works too!!! Yeah, I didn't have access to Panther but I did have OS X Jaguar handy on my old HD. I installed a Toshiba 100GB drive, 5400rpm/16mb cache and stuck my old 60gig 4200rpm unit inside a MCE expansion bay hard drive case, so the switch was really easy. Ideally, I would've liked to use Panther.

[Eriamjh]

I replace the entire Powermanagement bundle. I looked at the plists inside and didn't see anything spectacular. However, I have the original files so I can restore them at any time.

My Pismo is fully charged and ready for a night of battery use. I'll let you know tomorrow or later if it was any good.

Update: After a few hours, it has been working well. My two batteries reported 8h33m when I started and now report 6:31 left. One battery is a 7000mAh and the other a 2400mAh and the numbers seem right.

I'm satisfied with this hack. I consider it a success.

[phuture]

Special thanks to mBurns for hosting the file. Soon it'll be on the World Wide Web to help Pismo owners everywhere running Tiger! We'll have the address soon, and thanks to Eriamjh for bundling it up into a .sit format for easy download!!!

[Moderator]

easy boy

[mBurns]

It's up on the web. Enjoy!

The site URL is: http://homepage.mac.com/milesburns/P...eSharing6.html

There is also another post about this..

[teknopimp]

Originally Posted by fisherKing

what is it about the pismo, and pismo owners??

i had one. loved it.

but my 12" revC alubook blows it away:

faster
more powerful (i can run, for example, reason & logic together; not on the pismo however).
much better screen (and, in fact, THIS screen is blown away by the 15" powerbook).
more ram
more video ram
less weight
better battery life
& has held up better. (my cd drive was failing, the screen had faded, the battery life was bad).

etc...

again, i thought the pismo was an amazing laptop, but i would never go back...

you forgot better looking.

oh, and, nice job of comparing the pismo to a powerbook that is several generations newer.

[fisherKing]

Originally Posted by teknopimp

you forgot better looking.

oh, and, nice job of comparing the pismo to a powerbook that is several generations newer.

but that's the point...why is the pismo so revered? there ARE newer, better options...
and actually, i prefer the look of my 12" alu.

no biggie, anyway.

whatever gets the job done!

[mBurns]

Originally Posted by fisherKing

but that's the point...why is the pismo so revered? there ARE newer, better options...
and actually, i prefer the look of my 12" alu.

no biggie, anyway.

whatever gets the job done!

Pismo's are wanted by people because they are able to run longer on battery (2 battery) and because of the case (black). I'm not a pismo owner but that is what I've heard from talking to people who enjoy using a pismo.

[tooki]

Compared to my 15" AlBook, my Pismo:

- runs cooler
- has MUCH better ergonomics (no sharp front edge cutting into my wrists!!)
- has much better battery life -- in fact, my Pismo gets nearly as much life off a single 6 year old battery now as my AlBook did when its battery was new.
- has been more stable

tooki

[finboy]

Originally Posted by tooki

Compared to my 15" AlBook, my Pismo:

- runs cooler
- has MUCH better ergonomics (no sharp front edge cutting into my wrists!!)
- has much better battery life -- in fact, my Pismo gets nearly as much life off a single 6 year old battery now as my AlBook did when its battery was new.
- has been more stable

tooki

What he said. Plus, I can boot in 9.2.2 whenever I want to.

[fisherKing]

Originally Posted by tooki

Compared to my 15" AlBook, my Pismo:

- runs cooler
- has MUCH better ergonomics (no sharp front edge cutting into my wrists!!)
- has much better battery life -- in fact, my Pismo gets nearly as much life off a single 6 year old battery now as my AlBook did when its battery was new.
- has been more stable

tooki

hmmm...
compared to my pismo, my 12' alubook:

-runs a little hotter (true...)
-is lighter, smaller, faster, more powerful, burns dvds, has more ram, a bigger harddrive, a better screen, better battery life (4.4 hours to my pismo's 2.6), has been much more stable (not wake-from-sleep crashes, only 1 kernal panic in 2 years)

just mentioning

[phuture]

Originally Posted by fisherKing

hmmm...
compared to my pismo, my 12' alubook:

-runs a little hotter (true...)
-is lighter, smaller, faster, more powerful, burns dvds, has more ram, a bigger harddrive, a better screen, better battery life (4.4 hours to my pismo's 2.6), has been much more stable (not wake-from-sleep crashes, only 1 kernal panic in 2 years)

just mentioning

hmmm...
compared to your 12" alubook, my pismo:

-is slower at ripping cds, video work and 3D (true...)
-is bigger in the right places, has more ram (768), a bigger, faster hard drive with more cache (100GB, 5400rpm, 16MB cache) , a brighter, better glossy screen (now)
-is much more handsome (IMHO, of course)
-burns DVDs faster than yours (8X baby!)
-has better airport reception
-and don't even mention battery life. Given fresh batteries on both machines, any G3 powerbook will outlast any alubook away from the power outlet even without the second battery.

I should know. I bought a brand new 15"al last year, shelved the Pismo... had fun with the backlight, burned my thighs, then 2 weeks later sold it for a loss and went back to my Pismo.

In addition, certain Pismos such as mine (in a single session) can also:
-go from 100GB to 160GB (or more) onboard storage in less than five seconds
-burn DVDs AND
-archive files on diskette or Superdisk for Windows or vintage Mac users
-boot directly into OS 9 without using OS X Classic
-go all all day (literally) on a single charge WITH wireless and bluetooth running... Powers of the expansion bay, baby. Your little al do that??? sure...

My point here isn't to bash your 12" alu, but to illustrate that EVERY machine has its strengths and weaknesses. little al is faster (of course) and Pismo is more versatile. If you don't like your Pismo, fine, sell it to someone who would, sounds like it's neglected anyway, just quit posting how much better you think your machine is. My machine isn't great at everything, and neither is your little al. This thread was about restoring missing features to Tiger, not about how much better your laptop made three generations after its predecessor is.


just mentioning

[fisherKing]

Originally Posted by phuture

hmmm...
compared to your 12" alubook, my pismo:

-is slower at ripping cds, video work and 3D (true...)
-is bigger in the right places, has more ram (768), a bigger, faster hard drive with more cache (100GB, 5400rpm, 16MB cache) , a brighter, better glossy screen (now)
-is much more handsome (IMHO, of course)
-burns DVDs faster than yours (8X baby!)
-has better airport reception
-and don't even mention battery life. Given fresh batteries on both machines, any G3 powerbook will outlast any alubook away from the power outlet even without the second battery.

I should know. I bought a brand new 15"al last year, shelved the Pismo... had fun with the backlight, burned my thighs, then 2 weeks later sold it for a loss and went back to my Pismo.

In addition, certain Pismos such as mine (in a single session) can also:
-go from 100GB to 160GB (or more) onboard storage in less than five seconds
-burn DVDs AND
-archive files on diskette or Superdisk for Windows or vintage Mac users
-boot directly into OS 9 without using OS X Classic
-go all all day (literally) on a single charge WITH wireless and bluetooth running... Powers of the expansion bay, baby. Your little al do that??? sure...

My point here isn't to bash your 12" alu, but to illustrate that EVERY machine has its strengths and weaknesses. little al is faster (of course) and Pismo is more versatile. If you don't like your Pismo, fine, sell it to someone who would, sounds like it's neglected anyway, just quit posting how much better you think your machine is. My machine isn't great at everything, and neither is your little al. This thread was about restoring missing features to Tiger, not about how much better your laptop made three generations after its predecessor is.


just mentioning

easy, there. i sold my pismo 2 years ago to a friend, who loves it.
if yours does what you need, that's great.

i couldn't do what i need most (reason rewired to logic), now i can. and am happy.

whatever works.

peace!