I finally made a little time to start cleaning out the "computer graveyard" that has been growing a bit too large in my basement. It was actually a sobering experience in many ways.
Old Stuff!
Firstly, the standardization of hardware/IEEE specs is just enormous. The fact that I can hook up my modern Mac desktop or laptop ("MacBook Pro") to any standard DVI or VGA monitor/projector is great. I had forgotten about the Apple proprietary connectors that surfaced over the life of the Macintosh.
Much of what I dug through just got tossed as it really didn't work - otherwise I'd donate it or find someone who wanted it (techies, you know who you are!). My main goal, however, was to power up my old Quadra 840AV and salvage some music files from it. (I believe I may have had a print server fetish at some point, too, as I found four assorted units: 2 JetDirect, NetGear and a Hawking...why the heck did I have these?).
Lifting the unit up and turning it around showed me that I had already stripped the power supply for something else. Hmmmmm. So, yank the drives and try again. I also have a PowerMac 8100. This one did have a power supply. Of course, the 8100 also had what I used to call the "Martian monitor port." Apple chose to go really weird with this one, and the search began for an adaptor, which I fortunately found. My trusty old AppleColor RGB "High Resolution" monitor (er, 640x480, 13" screen) powered up with no issues. The 8100 was alive!
It powered right up!
Dropping the drives from the 840AV into the 8100 reminded me of another way of life in that era: SCSI addresses and SCSI drivers. One drive mounted, one did not. So, into an external case they would go! (Thank you Robert Polic for SCSIProbe!).
Digging through my SCSI cable collection, I had many 50-pin to 50-pin "SCSI 1" cables, but naturally, the Apple connector was a custom, smaller 25-pin DB style interface, just like a parallel cable (remember those?).
I just could not find the appropriate cable. What did I come up with? An amalgamation of adaptors, which I did have: 25-pin-to-"narrow" SCSI 2 to an Ultra Wide adaptor, finally to an Ultra-Wide to SCSI 1 cable - whew!
Old Adaptors!
The other thing that all of this brought to light: What an elegant OS Mac OS 8.6 was. Naturally, it looks a bit dated at this point, but think of computing in general circa 1998. I'm writing this on a MacBook Pro with an Intel Core 2 Duo processor, 4GB of RAM, running OS 10.5.1 "Leopard" that is 10 years newer. Incredibly, working in OS 8.6 didn't feel slow at all. Quite the contrary - in many cases, it felt faster! I say "felt" as I didn't perform any hard timing tests. Also, there may be places where OS X is artificially slowed down. Usability tests show that without rate limiting certain operations, it's the user that can't keep up, or misses targets when mousing or scrolling.
So, one step forward, two steps back? While OS 8 and 9 really were incredible for the day, modern operating systems such as OS X bring so much more to the table that I wouldn't give up. Better memory protection, true multi-user functionality and better interoperability to name a few.
I do have to recognize the people that were active in those earlier Macintosh days, and helped me retrieve my files from the 8100. The 8100 was not equipped with an Ethernet port, but rather an "AAUI" - an Apple AUI. Back to the stash of cables. I did dig up two AAUI to twisted-pair Ethernet adaptors, along with one AAUI to Coax adaptor! (I remember using the coax adaptor in my Manhattan apartment circa 1995 to play Marathon between me and my flat-mate). Modern (10.5) AppleTalk and OS 8.5 AppleTalk just do not jive for mounting each others volumes. So, how did I move files?
At MacTech magazine, we run a monthly column called the MacTech Spotlight that highlights people in the Macintosh world that are living the dream by using a Mac to make a living, or, someone that greatly influences the Macintosh landscape. In December, we shone the Spotlight on Peter N. Lewis, currently the owner of Stairways Software. Anyone who has been around the Mac scene for any length of time should recognize the name. Sure enough, poking around the 8100 turned up NetPrezenz, an ftp and gopher server! Well, sure! My Leopard box understands ftp! So, thank you again, Peter N. Lewis!
So, all of this was certainly a trip into the past. Would I call those times the "good old days?" No, not really. But they were exciting times. As a tech, that's what you do. Dig into this ever changing landscape. Just like now!
