[ELECTRON] mac classic doctor

[Gordon JC Pearce]

On Mon, 2009-10-19 at 23:00 +0100, Simon Yuill wrote:
> Hi,
> 
> Got a call from the Tramway. They are running a play that is using a
> couple of old Mac Classics which have stopped booting up. Unfortunately
> they don't have the original system disks.
> 
> If anyone has such disks or thinks they can help, could they get in
> touch with Nick Miller:
> 
> 	nick at laika.plus.com
> 
> Please email Nick directly, I am going to be offline for the rest of
> this week and won't be able to forward any messages on.
> 
> The old mac OS is still available for download, so if anyone is a dab
> hand with mac formatted floppy disks they may be able to create a system
> set from these:
> 
> 	http://download.info.apple.com/Apple_Support_Area/Apple_Software_Updates/English-North_American/Macintosh/System/Older_System/
> 

Aha! There's a trick - if you hold down SPLAT-APPLE-X-O when you power
them up, they boot from ROM into system 6 which *might* be suitable for
what they're doing.

If they're struggling to boot from the hard disks it's because the power
supply on the analogue (monitor) board is dying.  Hang the hard disk off
a separate PSU and you should get some life out of it.  Another symptom
of a sick power supply is wobbly verticals or "breathing" when the hard
drive or floppy drive is accessed.

HTH
  Gordon MM0YEQ