Thread

Best System 6 'book?

Best System 6 'book? Peripherals 24 posts Jun 4, 2007 — May 15, 2008

#1 Mon, 4 Jun 2007 - 02:10

Roll up, roll up and cast your votes:

What's the best Powerbook for System 6?

Note that speed is not the only consideration here. Other factors that go into making a 'book the 'best include:

Screen: crisp, clear, large, lots of pixels, daylight readable (backlight off?). Colour optional. I'll take a crisp mono over a washed-out grey/colour anyday.
RAM: cheap and easy to find, large capacity
Keyboard: reliable and easy to type on (bye bye, Duos)
Expandable: ports, connectors, etc.
HD: IDE would be nice
Size and weight: less is more
Pointing device: my preference is for trackballs
Battery: easy to find, repair or remake (not "intelligent" 5x0s)
Can boot into 7.x (optional)
... other ?

A FrankenBook would be a possibility.

Let the banter begin :b&w:

hey how come there's no powerbook smilies?

#2 Mon, 4 Jun 2007 - 02:12

The ONLY System 6 bootable portable Macs made (except for the compacts) were the Mac Portable and PowerBook 100. Sorry to say, but the 1x0 PBs are definately System 7 only.

#3 Mon, 4 Jun 2007 - 02:31

That's what I thought. A system 6 powerbook would make my life complete!

#4 Mon, 4 Jun 2007 - 02:36

Run Basilisk II on an Aluminum G4 or Macbook Pro under OS X.

Go here

http://www.users.bigpond.com/pear_computers/BasiliskII.html

There is a version for systems below 7 at the bottom.

#5 Mon, 4 Jun 2007 - 02:44

Run Basilisk on an Aluminum G4.

Yup, I'm afraid I would have to say the Acer Aspire is the best laptop for running 68k Mac OS (not OS 6 though, as that doesn't seem to work in Basilisk II, or maybe it needs a different Rom or something). What other laptop lets you run OS 7 or 8 many times faster than any real 68k Mac, has a 17" colour screen, half a gig of Ram and many many gigs of hard drive space that can be allocated purely to OS 7, allows you to access the web at true broadband speeds over wifi straight from Mac OS 7, and (I think) even lets you use USB storage keys, again right inside Mac OS 7? Not only that, but you can switch between Mac OS 7 and Windows Vista at the touch of a button! Take that, PowerBook 100!

#6 Mon, 4 Jun 2007 - 02:47

Darn it

So: how does the PB100 rate on the above? Not so hot?

You know... a 100 with a 6-booting ROM out of a Mac Classic ... ... ...

#7 Mon, 4 Jun 2007 - 02:48

not OS 6 though, as that doesn't seem to work in Basilisk II

The link I posted is a PPC/Universal translation of Basilisk II that will run on PPC/Intel based Powerbooks/iBooks/Macbooks with OS X installed., and there is a version that will run system 6 listed

#8 Mon, 4 Jun 2007 - 07:09

Darn it
So: how does the PB100 rate on the above? Not so hot?

Regrettably, not so hot, using your criteria. Here are my ratings:

Screen: Passive monochrome (not greyscale), with all that implies.

RAM: Not cheap. Cleverly designed so that you can't even use the otherwise electrically compatible modules from other 1xx 'books to go above 4MB total. Max is 8MB (2MB on board + 6MB module).

Kybd: Not bad, all things considered.

Expansion: SCSI only. Has connectors for external scsi and floppy. No internal floppy.

Size/weight: Very nice; the lightest and smallest of the 1xx series.

Pointing dev: Trackball.

Battery: Finicky, always dead lead-acid. Impossible to find a cheap, working replacement.

OS: Can boot 7.x. It's a 16MHz 68000, so you can actually get reasonable performance running a light 7.x. Runs MacLynx ok.

I love my 100, but I can't use it as a true portable (I took the festering battery out to make it very light). With a scsi-ethernet connector, it surfs the web at a mighty pace!

#9 Mon, 4 Jun 2007 - 07:51

You can put System 6 on a PB 140 and PB 170. There was a special Japanese release (6.0.7.1J from memory) that supported them - probably because System 7 in Japanese was delayed? There are instructions on the web about how to cut and paste string resources to work with it in English.

Ken

#10 Mon, 4 Jun 2007 - 15:44

some more info on that please. can´t find somethin on the net.

#11 Mon, 4 Jun 2007 - 16:24

Kallikak -- VERY interesting! A little Googling turned up references to 6.0.7J and the early 'books.

The most intriguing one was a Japanese site. The fractured translation can be found here:

http://translate.google.com/translate?hl=en&sl=ja&u=http://www.mamina.jp/mac/mysystemold.html&sa=X&oi=translate&resnum=3&ct=result&prev=/search%3Fq%3D6.0.7j%26start%3D10%26hl%3Den%26sa%3DN

It would seem that it's so!

Now I'll have to hunt down a copy of 6.0.7J to see how it can be hacked to install in English.

Thanks, Kallikak -- now you've triggered a major hunt!

#12 Mon, 4 Jun 2007 - 22:58

For this very reason I keep a copy of 6.0.7J.

http://groups.google.com.au/group/comp.sys.mac.system/browse_thread/thread/edfe5ff7d8905f8c/a2fbf161f4d5f4a4?lnk=st&q=%22System+6%22+170&rnum=1&hl=en#a2fbf161f4d5f4a4

#13 Tue, 5 Jun 2007 - 02:35

Only on a 140 and 170, or should it be possible on any of the other 1xx's?

#14 Tue, 5 Jun 2007 - 04:58

I don't think it will work on any others. This isn't a hack, but was actually done by Apple. Still, no difficulty giving it a try on a PB 180 say...

#15 Tue, 5 Jun 2007 - 05:57

It should also work on a 145 or 145B without much trouble...the 140, 145, 145B and 170 all use the same mobo, and IIRC they have similar ROMs too.

#16 Tue, 5 Jun 2007 - 06:29

Sweet! Thanks for that on-topic answer. Not that I have any of them here to try it on... hint hint

#17 Tue, 5 Jun 2007 - 14:43

...gonna try it on my 145b

EDIT:

another source for kanji: http://www1.linkclub.or.jp/~kenfuji/KANJI%20Talking.htm

#18 Tue, 5 Jun 2007 - 17:55

works on 145b...

#19 Wed, 6 Jun 2007 - 01:38

I wonder what the chances are of this working on newer '030's, such as a PowerBook 180c or LCIII? (both of which require 7.1 w/ their System Enabler) I might give it a go over the weekend.

I remember about 10 years ago i once managed to hack up a copy of 6.08 with resources out of System 7, and i actually managed to get it to boot on my LCIII, although once it got to the Finder a dialog box came up saying that it didn't support that model Mac

I might have to have another hack at it one day.

#20 Wed, 6 Jun 2007 - 02:17

Seeing the source code for System 7.1 is in the wild, maybe it would be possible to see how it loads the enablers and write an INIT that does the same job for System 6...

Certainly not easy, and maybe not even possible, but could be worth a look...

#21 Wed, 6 Jun 2007 - 02:21

Yeah...writing an INIT to do the job may not be possible, as i'm certain that the System Enabler is one of the first things that the Mac loads, before it starts loading extensions. I'm thinking more in terms of a ResEdit hack or something...the hack i'm talking about that i did on my LCIII was using ResEdit.

#22 Wed, 14 May 2008 - 17:01

...gonna try it on my 145b
EDIT:

another source for kanji: http://www1.linkclub.or.jp/~kenfuji/KANJI%20Talking.htm

Evidently the copies of System 6.0.7J have been removed.

It claims System 6.0.8J is identical to 6.0.7J except for the System 7 printer drives (which would make sense). Can anyone confirm it still works with PowerBook 140/170?

#23 Wed, 14 May 2008 - 23:10

I just tried the 6.0.8J from that link you listed, Mac128, and it failed on my PB170. I get the happy Mac, then a message in English that 6.0.8 isn't supported on my model of Mac. It's the exact same message I get if I try and boot a standard version of 6.0.8.

I can boot this version just fine in Mini vMac, which is emulating a Plus.

Too bad the links for 6.0.7J aren't working - I'd love to run 6.x on my 170!

#24 Thu, 15 May 2008 - 07:59

i think i still have the 6.0ß.7j images. i can upload them to ueberlando very warm line later today.