Installing and booting PlayStation 2 Linux

Make sure that you have

• installed wLaunchELF, to be used as the bootloader for PlayStation 2 Linux.

Proceed by either

• downloading a precompiled vmlinuz archive from the actions menu, for either PAL or NTSC systems, or
• building a PlayStation 2 Linux kernel to obtain a vmlinuz Linux kernel file.

The vmlinuz file should be about 4 MB, or less, depending on its configuration, and the size of the initramfs linked within the file. Now,

• copy the vmlinuz file to a USB drive, and rename it to have an .elf file extension, which is required for wLaunchELF to recognise the ELF file format. Valid examples of names include vmlinuz.elf, vmlinuz-5.4.123.elf, linux-5.4.123.elf, linux-ps2.elf, and so on.

Finally, power on the PlayStation 2, with the USB drive inserted, and launch the kernel file using wLaunchELF to boot Linux. Be aware that it can take 10 to 20 seconds, or so, before anything is displayed on the screen. Booting faster is a future improvement.