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Mac Classic II lives again!


eightbit

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I won a too good to be true Mac Classic II on ebay some time ago as "working" for a whopping $18 shipped. The screen shown in the auction displayed a disk with a question mark, so I expected the hard drive to be dead...which it was in the end. What I didn't expect is to turn it on and not get that screen and just some scrambled garbage. Upon inspecting the board this was yet another cap issue....all of the caps were leaking badly. H454 once again came to the rescue and I shipped the board out to him for recapping. I took a chance on this one as I was not entirely sure it was only a cap issue...but what the heck.

 

Well, it came in today. I installed the board, crossed my fingers and flipped the power. It chimed nice and loud and display! I had some 7.0.1 images (I tried an imaged 7.6 OS card...it worked...but it was laggy) and installed 7.0.1 to a new SCSI2SD from Inertial Computers. I love this device. I have had nothing but like with the V5 board :)

 

And, here is the end result. Picture of how it was, install of the SCSI2SD, and the final result. Very cool to have a B/W Mac. I have wanted a fully functioning one for some time. Thank God the floppy drive worked!

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Edited by eightbit
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Always good to have a fully functioning boat anchor laying around for when you need it! :grin:

 

 

Sorry. lol Looks nice!

 

Stupid story: Had one of these once. Bought it new for $150 in the mid 90's and only because the "deal" was too good to pass up. An Amiga 1200 and a 486 we're my daily drivers at the time, but found room in the bedroom to set it up. Not a Mac guy yet, I rarely touched it, but the wife liked playing Yahtzee on it. Soon after the novelty of *that* wore off, we sold it for a few bucks profit. Should have kept it like new in the box all these years! Then again, should have done that with so many of my purchases throughout the years. :mad:

 

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I'm pretty sure any MacOS is bootable from a compatible, "blessed" System Folder on any disk you specify, so long as it's big enough to hold the thing. You could partition your disk to boot from any of the three supported configurations if you really felt the need to have all versions on tap.

 

http://lowendmac.com/1991/mac-classic-ii/says this one "requires System 6.0.8L, 7.0.1 to 7.6.1"

 

Not sure what the L means here, that's new to me.

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I'm pretty sure any MacOS is bootable from a compatible, "blessed" System Folder on any disk you specify, so long as it's big enough to hold the thing. You could partition your disk to boot from any of the three supported configurations if you really felt the need to have all versions on tap.

 

http://lowendmac.com/1991/mac-classic-ii/says this one "requires System 6.0.8L, 7.0.1 to 7.6.1"

 

Not sure what the L means here, that's new to me.

I assume it stands for "Legacy" but I don't know for sure. I think it's just 6.0.8 for machines that require an Enabler.

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Ended up purchasing another BMOW FloppyEmu for this. If anyone remembers, I purchased one around a year ago and the microSD slot was broken. MicroSD cards would not click in...the mechanism was broken. I returned it and oddly enough the developer said it "worked fine". Well, I kind of kept away from it after that.

 

But, I need this tool. So I ordered it again along with its very annoying to put together case. It arrived today and the microSD slot is NOT broken (thank God) and it works great. I had to flash the firmware for it to work in Mac's and when done mounted "Battle Chess" as a test. Works a treat.

 

This little computer is great! It really is like the Vectrex of the computer world ;) Highly recommended if you can get one cheap in good condition and can get it recapped. I'll be browsing Macintosh Garden quite a bit this weekend I am sure.

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  • 3 weeks later...

You know I probably saw that same machine on the Bay looking to replace my Plus which is just not fast enough for me to play Might and Magic 1-3 on. (Though my physical copy of 3 is the Turbografx one and could be sold for the price of a couple old Macs.)

But luck and fate brought me what I have been searching for: http://wargamedork.blogspot.com/2018/03/retrocomputing-why-bother-machalla-iisi.html

Its working pretty good so far. But I keep finding MORE STUFF I want for it though hardware wise as opposed to my Atari 8 bits which are just game collecting vacuums that I spend money on every few months when I get a bee in my bonnet or some searches come up. Most old Mac games are either freeware or I have the PC version and can thus play the Mac port with little to no issue because ports are the same thing as legally owning it eh eh eh? (Almost zero old Mac software will ever be put up for even digital purchase. Also see Atari and how they seem to think the company they bought the IP to with that name made nothing besides 2600 and arcade games, leaving the 800 in the dust which is heretical heresy.)

I am just Tim the Toolmanning this thing and its FUN TO DO. I WORK ON THIS BABY THE SAME WAY, GOTTA GET MAXIMUM PERFORMANCE THAT CAN PIERCE THE HEAVENS WITH THE FURY OF A THOUSAND SUNS!

My goal is to have my rig feature complete by the start of Summer. (Which is around my birthday and the machine itself showed up like the first day of Spring or the last day of Winter.) I won't get everything done because I just now (about 6 hours after ordering 4by4meg SIMMs for 22 shipped) found a place with 16by4s for 12 a stick and a wandering Google showed me there is one existing and one probably soon to happen USB to ADB so I can maybe have nice high grade optical mice or maybe even use a nice mechanical keyboard over the MONSTER Extended Keyboard II even if its pretty solid. I doubt a modern mechanical 2 USB gamer type KB would work with the interfaces but any normal modern USB board would work including the nice KB that came with my currently not working G5 Imac. (Capacitors. The bane of a retro electronics geek's existence. My Turbo Duo is close mocking me until I swap out so many surface mount caps. IM SCURRED OK. I HAVEN'T SOLDERED SINCE 1993. DON'T JUDGE ME.)

Like I said ALL THE RAM can be one of the future but not precisely gotta have it things. Same with a NuBus adaptor and an improved video card or at the very least math coprocessor or something silly. Basically though the Clock Crystal, a nice comfy stool to sit on, and a SD2SCSI drive to replace that tiny 40 meg drive are do it ASAP dealies. Ridiculous amounts of RAM and Nubus shenanigans are later and optional.

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In my own sojourn, I lept past my '030 accelerated SE20 to a Performa 636 bundle. The first of only two Macs (out of many I currently own) that were mine from new-in-the-box. The LC'040 in the 636 held sway for quite awhile till the spanking-new 500mHz Imac 2001 arrived. Somewhere along the way, a stray IIci joined the ranks, but i'd moved beyond it and it just seemed old and slow in my "pre-retro" days.

 

Compared to a Plus, however, it was a real screamer! Good score and I like how you're fleshing it out with a few modern toys.

-Ed

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Well I am trying! Sadly the RAM came in today and didn't work. The screen stayed black and I got THE CHIMES OF DOOM. So I contacted the seller for a refund and I will move towards the 64 megs I saw. Perhaps it is a sign from RAPTOR JESUS (Aka Woz.).

 

I did buy a nice barstool to use with the machine and gave the top of the case a nice scrubbing. Which actually took some paint OFF the case but eh. It was mad dirty and now is just schlubby and the nooks n crannies are still icky. I am debating just spraypainting the whole thing in a nice dark blue or purple when it warms up a little here in New England. The case is in rough and cracked shape (some from the shipping) anyhow so its not like I am destroying a vital artifact of computing.. Hell, even opening the case caused a tab to crack off so might as well make it mine eh? Now do I protect the Apple emblem or just repaint it a solid color at the end? I'm thinking the latter because EFFORT. Just some tape over the vents to keep em open and just get some TUSSIN rubbed up all in it!

 

The battery is due tomorrow, the VGA dongle wednesday. Next week I will probably order the SD2SCSI interface and possibly depending on if the not working RAM gets refunded order the 64 megs this week and have a billy boss system. As is its MUCH better than the Mac Plus but somehow my silly butt is still wasting time on it as it is. Sometimes I think its half the fun.....

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