Hello,

> - I'm not sure, but the 8600 might be willing to boot MacOS off
>   the ZIP if it just has an HFS filesystem and blessed system
>   folder on it

> - At the risk of putting forth problematic information, I've 
> sucessfully
>   booted the NetBSD installer by putting OFWBOOT.XCF on one disk and 
> then
>   told it to boot the kernel from the install CD. I do not know if this
>   would work with OFW 1.X, though.

OF 1.0.5 can't read HFS but it understands FAT and ISO9660 so putting 
OFWBOOT.XCF on a DOS-formatted ZIP disk should be bootable - as always 
with some caveats, OF 1.0.5 is just plain weird in some ways.

have fun
Michael