Good day. I own a Macintosh SE/30 with an installed System 7.5.5. When the system boots, it tries to read an external floppy drive that does not exist. What is the problem and how to fix it?
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2010, December 6 - 3:15pm
#1
System 7.5.5 ext. fdd trouble
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2010, December 7 - 2:03am
#2
@ZXSlaver: A more fleshed out description of the problem could possibly be helpful.
For example:
What happens once the Mac OS starts up tries to read this external floppy drive? What does the actual error message (if any) say? Does the Mac crash at this point or can you cancel the error and continue starting up? Can you start up from a boot "Disk Tools" floppy disk? If so, do you still get the same error?
The problem might be as easy to fix as finding and removing an old application's alias file in the System Folder's Startup Items folder, pointing to a (now) non-existent drive. But some more info might help track the issue down.
2010, December 11 - 11:47am
#3
As for booting from a floppy disk and boot from the HDD, the system tries to interrogate the external drive. Get error message http://linkme.ufanet.ru/images/cec9f8efb224c1805d2af96dad8ab021.jpg
In Internet unearthed the following: http://www.mail-archive.com/compact.macs@mail.maclaunch.com/msg02040.html
At the moment, interested in what this "RC filter", it is desirable to Datasheet.
2010, December 11 - 12:03pm
#4
It was possible with this machines with one floppy, to swap disks, under installs/games/etc. The first disk was still on the desktop but dimmed/greyed out. If you tried to shut down, it called for ejecting the disk on startup. This meant you had to re-insert the original first disk and then eject to make the machine shutdown, IIRC!
A crash before this ejecting procedure would certainly set the machine to ask for the missing original disk.
Else as the second line suggests, try to clean main board and re-seat connectors if oxide has settled over the years. Beware of anything connected to the back of the cathode tube!
2010, December 14 - 2:46am
#5
Found via vintage.mac
"One thing worth looking into, despite its not fitting the symptoms you
described, is to make sure that File sharing is off in the Sharing Setup
control panel.
Another thing worth trying is boot with extensions off and see if it still
acts the same way."
worth a try...
2010, December 14 - 2:54am
#6
Can you cancel, and still use the Mac, if so, you might want to try RealEject - ftp://argus.rz.uni-potsdam.de/pub/systems/mac/Disk-File/real-eject-21.hqx , especially if there is a greyed out icon left on the Desktop!
It is shareware, but should work - You could always zap the PRAM, or remove the battery for 10 minutes while completely unplugged.
That's about as far as my thinking takes me.
Also, check the Startup Items folder -- a likely suspect!!!
2010, December 14 - 2:58am
#7
It seems you are booting up from a floppy, which would make the "External" disc the internal HDD (or external HDD) called MacOS.
You could find out the hard way, by hitting Initialise - if it formats MacOS, then you know that there were errors on the drive, and it would have been an idea to format it again anyway - if not, no harm done.
2010, December 14 - 3:00am
#8
The funny thing is, it is not asking for a name, so I don't think it is a physical external floppy disc (which almost always have a name) -- eg. Please Insert Disc "PageMaker 3.0 Install"
???