Sterling wrote: > Well, got back from the local garage sale and now have a Mac SE! > > It just says Mac SE FDHD on the front with two disk drives, so it's > probably just a 68000 processor. > If it hasn't been upgraded in some clever way, it should be a straight 68000. > Came with a 40MB external hard drive, two mice and two keyboards > though. > They also had a lot of software with it, so now I have a system disk > or two that can boot into the Mac Plus too. > I checked it out and the HD is working, screen looks good and it > appears to have 4MB Ram in it. > > What can I do with this SE now? > > It doesn't appear to have an expansion slot, but maybe I'm wrong. > But hey, the whole thing was probably worth the $100 I paid for it... > Well, the most common uses for these old machines range from word processing to emailing and light web browsing. Plenty of great old games too. It does have an expansion slot in there somewhere, so there'd be space for an ethernet card if it isn't already taken up by something. Alternatively, a SCSI->Ethernet adapter would work with it.
It isn't clear from your email if it has one or not, but SEs support internal HDs - it should have one in there already, but if not, you could stick one in there and save the trouble of an external. Since it's a FDHD, you can use it to read/write all the 800k disks you want. The hole-taping trick mentioned is a good one, but be prepared for disks to randomly go unreadable. You'll want to make sure to keep disk images ready to re-write them, and not store anything important on them. I've had pretty good luck with the method on my old Macs, but be safe. Honestly... $100 seems a bit high, but if you're happy with it and it suits your needs, then it's all good. It's all about what it's worth to you. > I also bid on another Apple 40MB external Drive for the Plus and won > it for $35 including shipping on Ebay. > So I guess I can format that sucker on the SE and then move it to the > Mac Plus maybe? > Then I will appletalk the two together and can transfer files. > Should work fine. If you're going to use System 7, make sure you do a Universal Install and not a Mac SE-specific install (though for those machines, I doubt it'd matter too terribly much). The Plus and SE have pretty much the same requirements and capabilities, so just about anything that works on one ought to work on the other. > But maybe I still need a bridge machine or method to get stuff from > the internet onto these macs still... > The SE and even the Plus itself with a SCSI->Ethernet adapter would be capable of getting its own stuff from the web. But, a later 68k Mac or Powerbook or even early PPC would make it a lot more pleasant to use. Personally, I use a Powerbook Duo 280c running 7.1 for most of my "bridging". It still supports MFS for creating and reading those ancient disks, runs a decent web browser for browsing and downloading (iCab), has the 1.44 superdrive for reading everything, and has fairly readily available ethernet. The only downside to it is lack of built-in ethernet - but it works and is small. Alternatively, an emulator like Basilisk II on your PC can be Appletalked to either using Ethernet, but you'll need either Ethernet cards or a Localtalk to Ethertalk bridge to the Macs to make it work. I've moved to this method for my Ethernetted Macs since I have much more storage on my PC and can store everything I've ever wanted in a central spot. Scott --~--~---------~--~----~------------~-------~--~----~ You received this message because you are subscribed to the Vintage Macs group. The list FAQ is at http://lowendmac.com/lists/vintagemacs.shtml and our netiquette guide is at http://www.lowendmac.com/lists/netiquette.shtml To post to this group, send email to [email protected] To unsubscribe from this group, send email to [email protected] For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/vintage-macs?hl=en Low End Mac RSS feed at feed://lowendmac.com/feed.xml -~----------~----~----~----~------~----~------~--~---
