getting system 7.5.3 on disks

[oscaracso]

hi

i own a macintosh classic II

its now running system 7.0.1 and i want to uppgrade to 7.5.3

i downloaded the system from this adress:

http://download.info.apple.com/Apple_Support_Area/Apple_Software_Updates/English-North_American/Macintosh/System/Older_System/System_7.5_Version_7.5.3/

on my PC windows xp.

then i used Macdisc to get the .smi.bin files on my mac formated disk.

when i open the file on my macintosh classic it said that it cant run without part 2, 3, 4, and so on till 19...

so, my guess is that you would have to put all the 19 files on the macintosh hardrive and then open them?

how does the insallation of a system work? ive never worked with macintosh before, does it take care of the old system?

and is there a way to get the into original system 7.5.3 disks?

 

[equill]

The format of the downloadable System 7.5.3 update differs from other downloadable updates, not least because of its sheer size in the era before CD-ROMs were ubiquitous. It is a single image of 19 parts, as the suffixes of the files show, and so designed as a convenience. In the floppy era, the update was still amenable to download and transfer to the target machine by preparation as 19 floppy disks, copied one at a time to the desktop. It was thus possible to put all 19 parts into a single folder on the desktop of the target machine's intended boot volume, and work from that, as you have surmised. Masochists could also use a single floppy disk to transfer the 19 parts.

There was also the Install CD (U96073-016A) option, on which the 16 parts are separate images. This works because the images are already together in a single folder on a single Macintosh volume (the CD). So could the separate images equally well be on 19 separate floppy disks, to be inserted one at a time on demand by the Installer application, and, very rarely, such sets turn up for sale.

de

 

[equill]

When the software to be installed is contained in compressed files called Tomes (the icon is a generic file icon with a tightly cinched belt around its middle), the program TomeViewer allows opening of the Tomes and direct expanding and copying of one or many files to a target volume or folder. Resource files are rather trickier.

Macintosh Installers may (there is no hard-and-fast case, which depends on the age of the System) give you the option to a) make a Clean Install, by relegating the existing System to a folder called Previous System Folder and installing a new System Folder; B) reinstall a new copy of a System over an existing installation of the same System version; c) upgrade or update (they are different) a System with a newer supported System version or update, or d) make a Custom Install, in which the user chooses the elements to be installed. (Caveat factor, or proceed at your own risk.)

de

 

[equill]

Third barrel.

From 1995-98 my wife and I used a Classic II with 6MB of RAM and a 40MB HDD (with an external 80MB HDD for backup) under System 7.5. It coped well with her degree work, our broadcasting work (including a 10-12,000 record music catalogue), my secretarial work and all correspondence. However, unless you limit your use to such prosaic tasks, even 10MB of RAM (max.) will give breathless operation under 7.5.3, which is a System designed for the then-arriving PowerPC Macs, not the 68K Macs. If you wish to have the best of 7.5.x without inducing hypertension in a Classic II, why not look at retrofitting parts of of 7.5.5 to an older System such as 7.1.

de

 

[benjgvps]

you have to use stuffit expander (On the Mac) to expand all the files that you downloaded, then click the smi. If you want a stuffit expander fallow the instructions on my website (Make sure you use the program I provided to write the floppy).

 

[Bugsi]

Do you have a bootable SCSI CD drive for your Classic II? If you do, I may be able to help you get a copy of the 7.5.3 retail installer CD. PM me.

As indicated by equill, 7.5.3 may be a lethargic experience on a Classic II, I recall that mine was always more responsive under 7.1 and 7.0.1. (But there were enough good things in 7.1 to warrant going with it, in my opinion.)

As an interesting point of history: the retail installer for MacOS 7.5.3 can install on anything from a Mac Plus to a PowerMac 9500, including the Mac Portable. Possibly the most challenging install is putting it on a Mac Plus, which obviously requires an external hard drive to install it on. However the 7.5.3 installer must run from a minimum of a booted system 7.5.0, and 7.5 didn't fit on an 800k floppy. Also, the retail CD can boot any of the supported Macs with the exception of the Plus, which Apple knew about, but decided to ship, rather than fix. So you essentially need an *existing* 7.5.3 install on a second external hard drive just to boot with (presumably created by installing it onto a Mac greater than a Plus), then running the installer via either CD or by copying the CD to a hard drive and running the installer from that, or by running the installer on a Mac networked to the Plus via Localtalk. -The Localtalk install takes several hours.

The 7.5.3 installer polls the gestalt ID of the Mac it is installing on, and then runs a script to install only components that are intended fo that platform, unless you do a Universal install, which will install *everything*.

 

[tomlee59]

Equill speaks soothly: You will likely find 7.5.3 a bit sluggish and unsatisfying on that compact. System 7.0.1 is considerably more agile, and is also a free download from Apple.

If the software you want to run requires 7.5.3, you might be able to use Gamba's "digital diet" to create the equivalent of 7.1 out of 7.5.3 bits. For a detailed description of the procedure, see

http://home.earthlink.net/~gamba2/753min.txt