I recently inherited a veritable farm of apple computers, running the
gamut from an old Apple 128 (well it's a laser 128 but same thing) to a
Power Macintosh 7100/66. (To be specific:

1 laser 128 w/ external 3.5" FDD
1 classic macintosh
1 macintosh SE
3 macintosh II
2 macintosh performa 631 CDs
1 macintosh quadra 950 (with a LOT of memory)
1 power macintosh 7100/66
various monitors, peripherals, cables switchboxes and whatnots

I have a few questions.

1- Alot of these computers came without operating system installation
media, and I can't seem to get alot of the old manufacturing software
that's on there off and make room for the stuff I want to do. Where can I
go to get operating system software that will work on these computers? I
am aware of the Linux M68k project and the PowerPC Linux versions, but I
am wary of that because I understand you need to have a working macintosh
OS before hand to run them from (at least, so it was explained to me).

2- Some of the installation media I have, such as the 3.5" floppy disks of
A/UX for the Quadra, won't boot up like a PC would. Am I going to need to
boot into the OS, and then access the floppy to install the OS? Or am I
not aware of some switch that needs to be set for it to boot the disk?
Ditto for a few install CDs I have.

3- How can one go about killing a program running on Macintosh OS 7 (the
Performa 631 CDs)? One mac was setup in the kitchen and I intend to use it
as a recipe server, talking back to my linux box in the study which will
house the net connection and most of the recipes. But when it boots up,
some of the old manufacturing software starts automatically and I can't
for the life of me figure out how to get out of it. There is very little
displayed on the screen, no menu, and I can't get to the apple menu (I can
barely even see the mouse pointer - however it's not a monitor problem,
the colors and display are clear and sharp during boot). The program is
unresponsive to keyboard input. I was once able to kill it through some
keystroke combinations, though I was never able to reproduce this. ?? Any
help with this would go along way towards solving problem 1 - if I can
just get to the main OS root screen, I can rip out all the programs I
don't want (mostly) and just go from there. But I REALLY need a way to get
around this program.

Thanks alot in advance for your help. And yes, in case you couldn't tell,
I'm a PC user. Your mac world is slightly foreign to me. :-)

In article <pan.2004.04.15.23.03.54.713294@aklabs.net>,
"Andrew Kesterson" <andrew@aklabs.net> wrote:

> I recently inherited a veritable farm of apple computers, running the
> gamut from an old Apple 128 (well it's a laser 128 but same thing) to a
> Power Macintosh 7100/66. (To be specific:
>
> 1 laser 128 w/ external 3.5" FDD
> 1 classic macintosh
> 1 macintosh SE
> 3 macintosh II
> 2 macintosh performa 631 CDs
> 1 macintosh quadra 950 (with a LOT of memory)
> 1 power macintosh 7100/66
> various monitors, peripherals, cables switchboxes and whatnots
>
> I have a few questions.
>
> 1- Alot of these computers came without operating system installation
> media, and I can't seem to get alot of the old manufacturing software
> that's on there off and make room for the stuff I want to do. Where can I
> go to get operating system software that will work on these computers? I
> am aware of the Linux M68k project and the PowerPC Linux versions, but I
> am wary of that because I understand you need to have a working macintosh
> OS before hand to run them from (at least, so it was explained to me).

Each machine has it's own range of OSes you can use.

A good resource is a freebie called MacTracker which can be found at
versiontracker.com. This little app lists information on Mac models
from day one through recent models.

Versiontracker in itself is a great resource for software.

>
> 2- Some of the installation media I have, such as the 3.5" floppy disks of
> A/UX for the Quadra, won't boot up like a PC would. Am I going to need to
> boot into the OS, and then access the floppy to install the OS? Or am I
> not aware of some switch that needs to be set for it to boot the disk?
> Ditto for a few install CDs I have.


Holding the C key down during intitial bootup will tell the machine to
boot off the CD. Can't say if there is an equivalent for booting off
floppies. Typically if installing an OS on a harddrive, you boot off a
CD or floppie. The early OSes were small and you could fit everything
on a floppie. Alas no more.

Apple has some of the early stuff on their web site and you will have to
sort through it.
http://www.info.apple.com/support/ol...twarelist.html

>
> 3- How can one go about killing a program running on Macintosh OS 7 (the
> Performa 631 CDs)? One mac was setup in the kitchen and I intend to use it
> as a recipe server, talking back to my linux box in the study which will
> house the net connection and most of the recipes. But when it boots up,
> some of the old manufacturing software starts automatically and I can't
> for the life of me figure out how to get out of it. There is very little
> displayed on the screen, no menu, and I can't get to the apple menu (I can
> barely even see the mouse pointer - however it's not a monitor problem,
> the colors and display are clear and sharp during boot). The program is
> unresponsive to keyboard input. I was once able to kill it through some
> keystroke combinations, though I was never able to reproduce this. ?? Any
> help with this would go along way towards solving problem 1 - if I can
> just get to the main OS root screen, I can rip out all the programs I
> don't want (mostly) and just go from there. But I REALLY need a way to get
> around this program.


Holding the Shift key down during initial bootup forces the machine to
not load any extentions, control panels or any startup items.

In article <pan.2004.04.15.23.03.54.713294@aklabs.net>,
"Andrew Kesterson" <andrew@aklabs.net> wrote:

> I recently inherited a veritable farm of apple computers, running the
> gamut from an old Apple 128 (well it's a laser 128 but same thing) to a
> Power Macintosh 7100/66. (To be specific:
>
> 1 laser 128 w/ external 3.5" FDD
> 1 classic macintosh
> 1 macintosh SE
> 3 macintosh II
> 2 macintosh performa 631 CDs
> 1 macintosh quadra 950 (with a LOT of memory)
> 1 power macintosh 7100/66
> various monitors, peripherals, cables switchboxes and whatnots
>
> I have a few questions.
>
> 1- Alot of these computers came without operating system installation
> media, and I can't seem to get alot of the old manufacturing software
> that's on there off and make room for the stuff I want to do. Where can I
> go to get operating system software that will work on these computers? I
> am aware of the Linux M68k project and the PowerPC Linux versions, but I
> am wary of that because I understand you need to have a working macintosh
> OS before hand to run them from (at least, so it was explained to me).
>
> 2- Some of the installation media I have, such as the 3.5" floppy disks of
> A/UX for the Quadra, won't boot up like a PC would. Am I going to need to
> boot into the OS, and then access the floppy to install the OS? Or am I
> not aware of some switch that needs to be set for it to boot the disk?
> Ditto for a few install CDs I have.
>
> 3- How can one go about killing a program running on Macintosh OS 7 (the
> Performa 631 CDs)? One mac was setup in the kitchen and I intend to use it
> as a recipe server, talking back to my linux box in the study which will
> house the net connection and most of the recipes. But when it boots up,
> some of the old manufacturing software starts automatically and I can't
> for the life of me figure out how to get out of it. There is very little
> displayed on the screen, no menu, and I can't get to the apple menu (I can
> barely even see the mouse pointer - however it's not a monitor problem,
> the colors and display are clear and sharp during boot). The program is
> unresponsive to keyboard input. I was once able to kill it through some
> keystroke combinations, though I was never able to reproduce this. ?? Any
> help with this would go along way towards solving problem 1 - if I can
> just get to the main OS root screen, I can rip out all the programs I
> don't want (mostly) and just go from there. But I REALLY need a way to get
> around this program.
>
> Thanks alot in advance for your help. And yes, in case you couldn't tell,
> I'm a PC user. Your mac world is slightly foreign to me. :-)

Welcome to the "slightly foreign" world Andrew. :)

First off... for the machines that start up and load the manufacturing
software... when you turn the machine on, press and hold a SHIFT key
until "Extensions OFF" is displayed on the screen. This will boot the
Mac without loading extensions and won't process items in the startup
folder. Once you make it to the desktop, go into the hard drive, into
the System Folder, then into Startup Items. This is likely where the
offending software links are located. Drag them to the trash and restart
without holding the SHIFT key, and hopefully without the manufacturing
software. To kill a program, press Control + Option + Command (the key
with the apple on it) and ESC.

Now... I don't know anything about your A/UX for the 950... maybe
somebody else?

If a floppy contains a system folder, the machine will boot from it
without any special keystrokes or commands.
Boot from a CD with the C key held down.

Once you get one of them running... surf over to
http://www.info.apple.com/support/ol...twarelist.html and download
some operating systems. Apple has a ton of old OS's on their site.
Download them to the machine, open them on the desktop (they open as
floppies) and then copy them to floppies for the machines that you need
to load.

IRC, the PowerPC Linux won't work on any of these... only the 7100 is a
PowerPC, but it's Nubus and I think the OS needs a PCI machine.

On Thu, 15 Apr 2004 21:00:25 -0400, Gary W. McIntyre wrote:

< big informative snips >

Thanks alot Chris and Gary! Saved my bacon on that one. :-)

I've never messed with Macintosh computers before this, but I think
they're kind of a trip. I always thought the little macintosh SEs were
cool. And I'll have a blast getting the machines to talk to one another,
bridging between those wierd little appletalk phone line net adapters and
some ethernet stuff. :-) And the good graphics built in kinda remind me of
Amigas. Before their time.

I must admit tho, the mouse is difficult to get used to. Kinda like going
through life with one testicle. :-\ hehe

Thanks alot guys!

In article <pan.2004.04.16.02.46.20.481112@aklabs.net>,
"Andrew Kesterson" <andrew@aklabs.net> wrote:

> On Thu, 15 Apr 2004 21:00:25 -0400, Gary W. McIntyre wrote:
>
> < big informative snips >
>
> Thanks alot Chris and Gary! Saved my bacon on that one. :-)
>
> I've never messed with Macintosh computers before this, but I think
> they're kind of a trip. I always thought the little macintosh SEs were
> cool. And I'll have a blast getting the machines to talk to one another,
> bridging between those wierd little appletalk phone line net adapters and
> some ethernet stuff. :-) And the good graphics built in kinda remind me of
> Amigas. Before their time.
>
> I must admit tho, the mouse is difficult to get used to. Kinda like going
> through life with one testicle. :-\ hehe
>
> Thanks alot guys!

The old Mac sure are cool... about two years ago, I set up a small
appltalk network in my living room with 3 old Powerbooks (160, 165 &
180), a Classic II and a HP inkjet printer... found a bunch of old
networkable games and spent a week or so playing with the kids... until
the wife ordered it all out of the room.

As for the mouse... yeah, Apple still seems to believe in one
testicle... all my current Macs have USB and I have ditched the original
mice for optical two button mice... sure makes life so much easier.

Enjoy!

"Andrew Kesterson" <andrew@aklabs.net> writes:
>
> I recently inherited a veritable farm of apple computers, running
> the gamut from an old Apple 128 (well it's a laser 128 but same
> thing) to a Power Macintosh 7100/66. (To be specific:
>
> 1 laser 128 w/ external 3.5" FDD
> 1 classic macintosh
> 1 macintosh SE
> 3 macintosh II
> 2 macintosh performa 631 CDs
> 1 macintosh quadra 950 (with a LOT of memory)
> 1 power macintosh 7100/66
> various monitors, peripherals, cables switchboxes and whatnots

Most of these will only be useful as collector's items, but you may
still enjoy tinkering with them. ...

Also, just in case you were unaware, a Laser-128 is not a Macintosh,
but a third-party clone of an Apple-II. I know it can boot DOS 3.3
(that's Apple-II DOS 3.3, not MS-DOS) from a 5.25" floppy. I don't
know if Apple ProDOS will work with it or not. (ProDOS historically
did not like clones - I hacked ProDOS 1.0.2 to get around this at one
time, but I couldn't figure out how to do it to version 1.1.1.)

> I have a few questions.
>
> 1- Alot of these computers came without operating system
> installation media, and I can't seem to get alot of the old
> manufacturing software that's on there off and make room for the
> stuff I want to do. Where can I go to get operating system software
> that will work on these computers? I am aware of the Linux M68k
> project and the PowerPC Linux versions, but I am wary of that
> because I understand you need to have a working macintosh OS before
> hand to run them from (at least, so it was explained to me).

This web site:
http://www.mactracker.ca/

publishes a quick-reference program with information about all Macs
ever produced. It's really useful. Among other things, it will tell
you what versions of MacOS each model can boot.

http://www.info.apple.com/support/ol...twarelist.html

This web page has official Apple downloads for a lot of outdated
stuff. Most of it is in the form of disk images. You'll probably
need a working Mac to make diskettes from the images, however.
Hopefully, you know of someone who has an already-working Mac with a
floppy drive that you can use.

Note that 800K floppies can only be used on Macs that have built-in
floppy drives. So far, nobody has made a USB floppy drive (for more
recent Macs) that can support this format. 1.44M images can be
written to floppies in almost any floppy drive. (Note, however, that
the Laser-128 and the oldest Macs won't have 1.44M drives.)

Anyway, among the various things on Apple's download page are:

- The Apple II system disk (an 800K disk image with ProDOS). I don't
know if the Laser-128 will boot this, but it's worth a try.

- Macintosh system 6.0.8 (for booting the oldest Macs)

- System 7.5.3, and the updater to 7.5.5 (for booting the newer
models.)

Once you get these machines running, you may find softwre for them
hard to find in stores, but you may have luck at flea markets and
eBay. They can definitely do useful things, even today. For example,
I ran Claris Works version 3 and FileMaker version 2 on a Macintosh
SE for many years. They worked great, albeit slowly.

> 2- Some of the installation media I have, such as the 3.5" floppy
> disks of A/UX for the Quadra, won't boot up like a PC would. Am I
> going to need to boot into the OS, and then access the floppy to
> install the OS? Or am I not aware of some switch that needs to be
> set for it to boot the disk? Ditto for a few install CDs I have.

I only tried installing A/UX once, and gave up. I don't think it was
that easy even when it was supported.

You may be better off downloading boot-floppy images of System 7.5.3
and installing that on the Quadra.

> 3- How can one go about killing a program running on Macintosh OS 7
> (the Performa 631 CDs)? One mac was setup in the kitchen and I
> intend to use it as a recipe server, talking back to my linux box in
> the study which will house the net connection and most of the
> recipes. But when it boots up, some of the old manufacturing
> software starts automatically and I can't for the life of me figure
> out how to get out of it. There is very little displayed on the
> screen, no menu, and I can't get to the apple menu (I can barely
> even see the mouse pointer - however it's not a monitor problem, the
> colors and display are clear and sharp during boot). The program is
> unresponsive to keyboard input. I was once able to kill it through
> some keystroke combinations, though I was never able to reproduce
> this. ?? Any help with this would go along way towards solving
> problem 1 - if I can just get to the main OS root screen, I can rip
> out all the programs I don't want (mostly) and just go from
> there. But I REALLY need a way to get around this program.

The keystroke to force a task to quit (or at least try) is
command-option-ESC. ("command" is the cloverleaf-key).

As for preventing stuff from starting up, hold down SHIFT while
booting - this will disable most system extensions and startup items.
If you get a usable system this way, then you can start disabling
system extensions to see what the culprit is. The Extension Manager
control panel can be used for this. To start out, leave all of
Apple's extensions and control panels active and disable the
third-party ones (the Extension Manager will show you where each item
comses from). If that's OK, you can then begin adding the others
back until you find out what the problem is.

It's time consuming, but once it's done, you won't have to do it
again.

> Thanks alot in advance for your help. And yes, in case you couldn't
> tell, I'm a PC user. Your mac world is slightly foreign to me. :-)

It's soon to be your world too :-)

You may be able to find some older books on MacOS setup and
administration at book stores.

-- David

in article m2u0zkbks1.fsf@qqqq.invalid, David C. at shamino@techie.com wrote
on 4/15/04 9:37 PM:

> "Andrew Kesterson" <andrew@aklabs.net> writes:
>>
>> I recently inherited a veritable farm of apple computers, running
>> the gamut from an old Apple 128 (well it's a laser 128 but same
>> thing) to a Power Macintosh 7100/66. (To be specific:
>>
>> 1 laser 128 w/ external 3.5" FDD
>> 1 classic macintosh
>> 1 macintosh SE
>> 3 macintosh II
>> 2 macintosh performa 631 CDs
>> 1 macintosh quadra 950 (with a LOT of memory)
>> 1 power macintosh 7100/66
>> various monitors, peripherals, cables switchboxes and whatnots
>
> Most of these will only be useful as collector's items, but you may
> still enjoy tinkering with them. ...
>
> Also, just in case you were unaware, a Laser-128 is not a Macintosh,
> but a third-party clone of an Apple-II. I know it can boot DOS 3.3
> (that's Apple-II DOS 3.3, not MS-DOS) from a 5.25" floppy. I don't
> know if Apple ProDOS will work with it or not. (ProDOS historically
> did not like clones - I hacked ProDOS 1.0.2 to get around this at one
> time, but I couldn't figure out how to do it to version 1.1.1.)
>
>> I have a few questions.
>>
>> 1- Alot of these computers came without operating system
>> installation media, and I can't seem to get alot of the old
>> manufacturing software that's on there off and make room for the
>> stuff I want to do. Where can I go to get operating system software
>> that will work on these computers? I am aware of the Linux M68k
>> project and the PowerPC Linux versions, but I am wary of that
>> because I understand you need to have a working macintosh OS before
>> hand to run them from (at least, so it was explained to me).
>
> This web site:
> http://www.mactracker.ca/
>
> publishes a quick-reference program with information about all Macs
> ever produced. It's really useful. Among other things, it will tell
> you what versions of MacOS each model can boot.
>
> http://www.info.apple.com/support/ol...twarelist.html
>
> This web page has official Apple downloads for a lot of outdated
> stuff. Most of it is in the form of disk images. You'll probably
> need a working Mac to make diskettes from the images, however.
> Hopefully, you know of someone who has an already-working Mac with a
> floppy drive that you can use.
>
> Note that 800K floppies can only be used on Macs that have built-in
> floppy drives. So far, nobody has made a USB floppy drive (for more
> recent Macs) that can support this format. 1.44M images can be
> written to floppies in almost any floppy drive. (Note, however, that
> the Laser-128 and the oldest Macs won't have 1.44M drives.)
>
> Anyway, among the various things on Apple's download page are:
>
> - The Apple II system disk (an 800K disk image with ProDOS). I don't
> know if the Laser-128 will boot this, but it's worth a try.
>
> - Macintosh system 6.0.8 (for booting the oldest Macs)
>
> - System 7.5.3, and the updater to 7.5.5 (for booting the newer
> models.)
>
> Once you get these machines running, you may find softwre for them
> hard to find in stores, but you may have luck at flea markets and
> eBay. They can definitely do useful things, even today. For example,
> I ran Claris Works version 3 and FileMaker version 2 on a Macintosh
> SE for many years. They worked great, albeit slowly.
>
>> 2- Some of the installation media I have, such as the 3.5" floppy
>> disks of A/UX for the Quadra, won't boot up like a PC would. Am I
>> going to need to boot into the OS, and then access the floppy to
>> install the OS? Or am I not aware of some switch that needs to be
>> set for it to boot the disk? Ditto for a few install CDs I have.
>
> I only tried installing A/UX once, and gave up. I don't think it was
> that easy even when it was supported.
>
> You may be better off downloading boot-floppy images of System 7.5.3
> and installing that on the Quadra.
>
>> 3- How can one go about killing a program running on Macintosh OS 7
>> (the Performa 631 CDs)? One mac was setup in the kitchen and I
>> intend to use it as a recipe server, talking back to my linux box in
>> the study which will house the net connection and most of the
>> recipes. But when it boots up, some of the old manufacturing
>> software starts automatically and I can't for the life of me figure
>> out how to get out of it. There is very little displayed on the
>> screen, no menu, and I can't get to the apple menu (I can barely
>> even see the mouse pointer - however it's not a monitor problem, the
>> colors and display are clear and sharp during boot). The program is
>> unresponsive to keyboard input. I was once able to kill it through
>> some keystroke combinations, though I was never able to reproduce
>> this. ?? Any help with this would go along way towards solving
>> problem 1 - if I can just get to the main OS root screen, I can rip
>> out all the programs I don't want (mostly) and just go from
>> there. But I REALLY need a way to get around this program.
>
> The keystroke to force a task to quit (or at least try) is
> command-option-ESC. ("command" is the cloverleaf-key).
>
> As for preventing stuff from starting up, hold down SHIFT while
> booting - this will disable most system extensions and startup items.
> If you get a usable system this way, then you can start disabling
> system extensions to see what the culprit is. The Extension Manager
> control panel can be used for this. To start out, leave all of
> Apple's extensions and control panels active and disable the
> third-party ones (the Extension Manager will show you where each item
> comses from). If that's OK, you can then begin adding the others
> back until you find out what the problem is.
>
> It's time consuming, but once it's done, you won't have to do it
> again.
>
>> Thanks alot in advance for your help. And yes, in case you couldn't
>> tell, I'm a PC user. Your mac world is slightly foreign to me. :-)
>
> It's soon to be your world too :-)
>
> You may be able to find some older books on MacOS setup and
> administration at book stores.
>
> -- David

just want to add you might want to trash your old prefferences (also in your
system folder) and delete any extensions which came with the offending apps.

the Classic, Mac 2 and SE are capable of running 7.5.5 (the former with the
addition of an external SCSI hard drive), the 631 CD runs best in either
7.6.1 (avoid the 7.5.x/ enabler conundrum if you can) or 8.0, and the
7100/66 in 8.1 (same disk as 8, but with the HFS+ option enabled to shrink
the sector blocks from the standard 97k to 4k- a huge saving in drive space
if you have a substantial number of smaller files); due to its age, i don't
think its worth it to look for 8.6 or 9.x.

myself I have a classic running 7.0.1 (formerly 6.0.7) a 630CD running 7.6
(soon to be 7.6.1) a 6500/225 running 8.6, and an 8100/100AV running 8.1
I once owned a 6320 running 8.1 as well, but after the ROM drive crashed,
became spare parts (thinking of making the 630 a 'sleeper' by replacing the
motherboard with that of the 6320, as the form factor is the same)

as a further aside, as long as you have backup system software for your mac,
you'll probably never have to go to a tech for repairs- the caveat being
this applies only to software errors.