Sidebar Sidebar
Become a MacRumors Supporter for $50/year with no ads, ability to filter front page stories, and private forums.

Macintosh Classic Problem

SpookTheHamster

SpookTheHamster

macrumors 65816
Original poster
Nov 7, 2004
1,495
8
London
I bought a Mac Classic (mainly for the keyboard and mouse, but it'd be nice to have it working). When it boots, nothing happens. On the SE, I get a "welcome" screen and a Happy Mac, but the Classic does nothing at all.

If I press one of the buttons on the side (I've since found out it's the "interrupt" button?) I get a Sad Mac with codes of all zeros, one ending in F and the other ending in D. According the the internets, the F is "reserved for Mac compatability" or that an exception occured. D means it cannot access the SCC chip.

Is this Classic salvagable, or should I make use of it for something else (I'm thinking Mac Mini all-in-one, or making it into a small TV)?

It's apparently not been turned on for a very long time, so could that have something to do with it?
 
My memory is a little fuzzy on these, but I seem to recall Interrupt usually giving error messages like that, depending on when you hit it. Sounds like it is not even booting anything. Are you sure you have the right System for this computer? Is it actually accesing the disk?
 
"Nothing at all" is not a good sign. (By this I assume you mean a dark screen.) If the drive isn't bootable, you'll see the flashing question mark on a grey screen. Do you hear the drive accessing?
 
Do you get the startup "bong"? Can you hear the HD spin up? Looks like there's at least some signs of life, since the display comes up.

Sometimes, they'll have trouble starting up if the PRAM backup battery is dead.
 
I get the normal "beep" on startup, but all I get afterwards is a grey screen with the mouse cursor.

I do know the interrupt button generates a Sad Mac, but I thought I'd post it here anyway.

I'll have a look inside it later to see if there's anything obviously wrong.
 
SpookTheHamster said:
I get the normal "beep" on startup, but all I get afterwards is a grey screen with the mouse cursor.
Click to expand...

Assuming the cursor moves with the mouse, that's not necessarily a bad sign. How long did you wait for it to continue booting? I'd give it a minute. If it still doesn't work, then there might be something wrong with the hard drive.
 
SpookTheHamster said:
I get the normal "beep" on startup, but all I get afterwards is a grey screen with the mouse cursor.
Click to expand...

Just a grey screen, with no flashing question mark? If this is the case, I'd suggest disconnecting the hard drive.

It would also be helpful to know whether the drive spins up. A couple of us have asked for that piece of info.
 
I've left it for up to an hour. Grey screen, no question mark, movable mouse and it sounds like the drive is spinning. I forgot to bring my Torx drivers to uni, so I can't open it up today.
 
SpookTheHamster said:
I've left it for up to an hour. Grey screen, no question mark, movable mouse and it sounds like the drive is spinning. I forgot to bring my Torx drivers to uni, so I can't open it up today.
Click to expand...

I'd put my money on a bad hard drive, or a hosed OS. If the Mac can't find what it thinks is a bootable volume, you should get the flashing question mark. IIRC you'll only see the interminable grey screen if it's trying to load the OS and fails. If you can get your hands on another bootable disk for this Mac (good luck), it's worth trying. If not, disconnecting the drive should tell you something.
 
You should be able to create a bootable floppy from your SE. And the old systems are all free for download, so that's no problem.
 
Sweet merciful heavens, help! I finally got round to trying to sort this mess out, I put a floppy into the SE to format it, but it won't initialize and hasn't appeared on the desktop. How do I now get this disk out? Eject disk is greyed out under Special and The little hole seemingly has nothing behind it to push.

edit: got it out, just had to push harder
 
Same with or without HDD plugged in.

According to a troubleshooting/disassembly site, the symptoms (bright screen, arrow in top left corner) mean a dead SCSI chip, but I'm guessing it also means a dead HDD?
 
With the HDD disconnected, you should at least get the floppy-disk-question-mark.

If you don't try different memory, if not, then its the main board.

I think this thread belongs in the "Apple Collectors" forum...
 
Similar Situation

I have a Mac Classic that hasn’t been turned on in years. I have an external hard drive for it that I bought separately that too hasn’t been turned on in years. Both devices appear to power-up but all I see is a flashing question mark on a floppy disk. Is there any solution for this? I'd really like to access the documents which I saved on the system years ago.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Register on MacRumors! This sidebar will go away, and you'll see fewer ads.
Top Bottom
Back