IIci - Bringing back my 1st Mac

[IIciNov90]

I just enlisted yesterday. I have been on a quest to resurrect my IIci, my first Mac that I bought new in Nov of 1990 hence my user name.

I was a lucky one who got the metal SIMM clips and not the brittle plastic ones.

I have a long story on this but I appear to have had capacitor bleedout only it does not seem to have localized around the caps. It looks more like it precipitated on nearby ICs. Is this sort of effect common? The residue is kind of thick and oily looking.

I am eager to hear what you all may have to say in regards to the mode of my capacitor sludge. I have also read up on some of the IIci related threads and I think I my be heading in Trag's direction. I also have 2 SE/30s but the IIci comes first.

I got it to boot - once - more on that later...

thanks,

Brian

 

[beachycove]

It does tend to spread, as it seems to behave like any oily film. Does "precipitate" mean fall from above? In this case, I suppose that the caps might have vented/ squirted their contents within the machine. Haven't seen that effect myself in any of my old hardware.

 

[IIciNov90]

> Does "precipitate" mean fall from above?

Yes, pretty much. It almost appears like the capacitor goop went into a vapor phase and then more or less precipitated out onto the surrounding chips. It is spread over a large area but generally within the proximity of the caps. The sound chips are especially slathered with the stuff as are others. My IIci spent many inactive years in the hot eaves of a upstairs with steep sloping roofs and perhaps the high temps contributed to this electrolyte transport effect. I have a long story on the current state of my IIci. I will type it in when I get some additional time. I will say though that when I booted it that one time (no sound of course) I was able to quickly run a few old 68k only games like Crystal Quest and Sky Shadow. I have a 42,000,000+ high score in Sky Shadow dated 1991 or 1992. If I ever get back up I will take a screenshot of it.

Brian

 

[Trash80toHP_Mini]

Welcome to the 68kMLA, Brian!

I was in the "always wanted a IIci" category for a long time, but when the Radius Rocket was introduced and RocketShare was announced I changed my course, I went the used IIx route as the IIfx was waaaay out of my price range.

Got a IIci, lost it, long story, dribs and drabs of it are scattered amongst multiple posts in different threads. BTW, whenever I want to do a story or an information heavy post, I do it in a word processor and edit the heck out of it before pasting it. [] ]'>

Back on topic . . . has anyone posted the chemical makeup/HazMat potential of the various leakages from different time-frames and types of the components involved as yet?

I'm going to go thru my MoBos with a fine tooth comb in the near future to do any preventive maintenance or repair work necessary on what's left of my collection. It'd be nice if we had a good compilation of info.

It seems we're very likely going to have a resurrected "Hacks" forum very soon. A Cap Leakage HowTo and compendium of links to all the posts here and in the rest of the NetWebVerse would be an awesome contribution. [] ]'>

 

[beachycove]

If in your shoes, I would in the first instance give the logic board a good wash, dry thoroughly over several days in a suitable location, and reassemble. No doubt the aged caps do need replacing, but I have had perfectly acceptable results from a simple washing away of the electrolytic goo that failed components spread abroad in old machines.

Were a particular machine mission-critical, I'd no doubt get out the soldering iron. If I were running a machine hard with lots of nubus cards etc., I'd probably want to replace the caps. I do have a couple of such 68k machines, doing very useful service still. Most of the time, though, I am not dealing with machines that are used much, so I tend not to go to the trouble of component-level repair. Eventually, I may have to resort to it (assuming I hold onto the collection), but that time hasn't yet come.

There are folk here who are more confident in tinkering with the electronics, but since I injured a pristine SE/30 by losing a trace when trying to replace leaking capacitors on my first try, I have subsequently tended to favour a more minimalist, tread-light strategy. Unless it doesn't work — then more radical surgery, as opposed to the first-line cosmetic treatment, follows.

And I have 50+ working machines to evidence that this can be a viable way, for the moment, to go about the upkeep of vintage Macs.

Washing is a good policy anyway, because I gather that some of the chemical concoctions that get spread around are not only conductive, but caustic. You can end up with corrosion that will effectively kill the machine if you aren't careful.

 

[IIciNov90]

Thanks for all of the replies. I'm definitely for trying to clean the motherboard. There are no obvious signs of corrosion or "spills" of electrolyte immediately adjacent to the caps like I have seen in other pictures, just that dispersed film of oily goo in the general vicinity that seems to like sticking all over the various chips.

As for cleaning, I have seen that people have even used a dishwasher but I don't have the nerve to try that one. Is there a "best practice" for this? I work at a lab and can mix a batch of just about any solvent or cleaning solution you can think of. I am interested in your cleaning suggestions.

My next plan was to actually remove the board. I might get to it later this week or on Saturday. I will type up my "how I got to here" story tomorrow - maybe over lunch.

thanks,

Brian

 

[beachycove]

Running it through an empty dishwasher with no soap and clean water makes a fabulous job of it, as it happens, but most likely the same magic could be worked by sticking the thing in the shower for a while.

 

[IIciNov90]

OK, here is the promised story:

I purchased my first Mac, a IIci in November 1990. I had been using IBM PCs (XTs and ATs) for the 5 years prior that I spent as a student at The Ohio State University. When I began my new job fresh out of school, my first boss who was 70+ and did not use computers told me on no uncertain terms that I was to learn to use the Mac. I went kicking and screaming - I mean after all these things (SEs) had tiny little screens that were not even color for crying out loud!! I ran that Macintosh "Quick Tour" application that I think was Hypercard based. After what was probably less than 10 minutes I came to a sad realization of what an awful waste of time my last 5 years at school had been in terms of my efforts spent doing assignments by computer. No wonder there were other (much happier) students whose work always looked better and always seemed to have to work less hard. They were using the campus Mac lab, something I had ignored and it all came to me suddenly how I had been getting my butt kicked on assignments! I immediately knew that I had to buy one!!!

Against my friends' better advice and on a measly GS-5 salary, I bought (financed) the IIci system. I had actually waited a few months until the new LC and IIsi systems were unveiled but decided in spite of the cool new sound input capability that I did not like how those systems were crippled and compromised. I bought the IIci from Microage near Boston. This bugger cost over $4000 with 4MB of ram and an 80MB hard disk. The 13" RGB was another $750 and the Extended Keyboard II was another $250. The extended keyboard has been by far the best keyboard I have ever used and was also used with my Powermac 7600/132. The IIci came with System 6.0.4. As much as it was, interestingly an SE/30 cost over $5400 and the wicked fast IIfx was near $10000! In my deluded world the IIci seemed like a bargain and ultimately proved to be. My extra time using it at home and learning the system from top to bottom allowed me to excel at my job and my Mac knowledge soon surpassed that of the experts at my workplace. The IIci was used as my primary machine for over 7 years running all of the Systems up to 7.6.1 until sadly it became obvious that MacOS 8 was not going to run on it. It was then that I purchased the 7600 (the most IIci-like system of the time to maintain my Mac system edge ). The IIci became my 2nd string system. I passed it to my son as a game machine for him to play "Keywhacks" before he was 2 and then later "McGee" when he was 3-4. In 2000 we bought the G4 Cube and the 7600 became 2nd string. The IIci was placed on top of a stereo speaker where it sat for almost 9 years. The rest of the system was placed in the eave of our cape cod style house. Last year the IIci was also moved up there where it got a summer's worth of 120F heat. (Perhaps this is what distributed the Cap electrolyte). During all of this time, and really over the entire 19 years the IIci has never had direct sunlight on it and it thus still looks mint and its platinum white finish is completely intact with no yellowing whatsover.

About 2 years ago, we had a late addition to our family. I was talking with my wife and she brought up the old "McGee" game. I decided to haul out the IIci System and fire it up. It was not a surprise to me that the first try got nothing except the whir of the power supply and only when I pressed the button on the back right corner. I removed the battery and it tested at about 1% or so of its expected 3.6V. I ordered a new Li battery and had to wait a few days for the ground delivery to get it to me. When I attempted to boot again, this time it worked from the keyboard and this time I got a video signal with the blinking "?". Progress!!! I was unable to get any floppy to boot and it would not boot from an external CD ROM 300E+. I hauled out my 7600 and took the drive the IIci and installed it on the internal SCSI bus of the 7600 taking care that its ID was different to avoid a conflict. The drive would not mount at all. Disk First Aid could detect it but could not fix it. Norton Disk Doctor and the ancient MacTools Rescue were also nogos. I have a CD with Disk Warrior 2.X. Unfortunately the green dye based CD degraded with age and was not recognized. (Lesson: If you have any important stuff on a dye based CD, copy it onto flash based media or a regular hard drive before it is too late!!!) The Disk Warrior folks would not supply a replacement download of the old version even though I had my legitimate license code. A friend of mine has Disk Warrior 3.X that only runs on OSX. Most fortuitously, about 4 or 5 years ago I had messed around with getting 10.3 Panther to boot on my 604e upgraded 7600/132 now 7600/233!. I had used Xpostfacto and a kernel modified for 604 processors. It booted and we got DiskWarrior to not only see the IIci disk but also to rebuild the entire volume. I guess all of those years sitting on top of the speaker and its strong magnetic field may have taken its toll on the boot sectors. It was a strange scene, a IIci and a 7600 side by side with the coverless 7600 bridging the long years. It looked like some sort of weird scene from a post apocalypse movie where the old geezer who remembered the "before times" was trying to restore technology to the folks who remained. When Disk Warrior finished, I backed it up. Additional hardware diagnostics by Snooper and Tech Tool Pro indicated that there was most likely nothing wrong with the IIci's Quantum ProDrive LPS mechanism so I reformatted it. While this drive was still in the 7600 I decided to install a fresh new System 7.1 from a Quadra 660AV disk I still had. I decided upon 7.1 because it had always seemed to be the best balance between the extreme but crashy speed of System 6.0.4 and the slower but more stable System 7.6.1. I customized the install for a IIci only (I really miss that installer feature!). The installer flew! I then copied over all of the files and relevant extensions and preferences in addition to Macsbug.

After I put the drive back into the IIci I powered up from the keyboard - again silently with no chime. Zapping PRAM would not bring any sound nor would it get me past the blinking "?" that was still there. I remembered that I still had a minimal IIci system floppy with Speed Disk on it floating around somewhere so after sifting through dozens of floppies I rebooted again with it with the lowest of expectations. When the screen came up there was a Happy Mac for a second or so but then the disk ejected and it immediately rebooted again only off of the hard disk!!!. The Happy Mac came up and it booted in 2 bit black & white and with an error that not all memory could be addressed, I had upgraded the IIci to 24MB over the years and it was obvious that it had booted in 24 Bit mode. I toggled it to 32 Bit, turned off VM, set the monitor to 256 colors and rebooted. It came up great! I fired up a few old games like Crystal Quest and Sky Shadow. They all ran fast and smooth but sadly most silent. These games all had great sounds but were not much fun silent. I have some spare IIci/cx parts including a speaker and went to swap it. I shut down the system to reboot with the other speaker only now it would not boot from the keyboard nor from the power button the the rear of the chassis. I also have a spare power supply. I swapped in the spare but again got no response. The system is now dead. I went to my current Mac, an iMac G4 1.25GHz DDR, a great system by the way running Leopard 10.5.8 and with way more character than current one piece glossy screened iMacs and did a search under IIci with my symptoms. It was there that I found this site and read lots of similar experiences from other IIci owners. It has been an interesting 19+ year path. I neglected the IIci for over half of this time but hopefully will be able to bring it back. With the advice from this site and a little luck hopefully the IIci's long journey can continue.

thanks,

Brian

 

[IIciNov90]

I've decided how I am going to clean the motherboard. I'm going to use Alconox.

From their website: (Notice it mentions circuit boards!)

http://www.alconox.com/static/section_top/gen_manual.asp

Recommended Products: ALCONOX, LIQUI-NOX, CITRANOX, CITRAJET, TERG-A-ZYME, ALCOJET, DET-O-JET, LUMINOX, TERGAJET, SOLUJET AND DETERGENT 8

Typical Use: For cleaning small articles such as medical examination instruments, labware or circuit boards, and large articles such as process equipment.

Advantages: Versatile, inexpensive, effective.

Concerns:Time consuming and labor-intensive. May not be effective on difficult-to-reach areas requiring pre-soak, ultrasonic, or machine cleaning.

Directions: Make up cleaning solution as in mixing directions, or use undiluted detergent on a warm, wet cloth or sponge for non-abrasive scouring. Clean as follows:

Wet the article with solution by dunking or using a soaked cloth or sponge.

Clean with a cloth, sponge, cotton swab, brush or pad that agitates surface soils without marring the surface.

Rinse thoroughly (see Rinsing below). Wear gloves, eye protection, and other safety equipment if recommended.

The mixing ratio recommended for the powder is: 10g/L

I will post again after I do this and try to snap some pics before & after.

Brian.

 

[beachycove]

My understanding is that water was used in the factory for cleaning the boards after assembly, and so that it has to be reasonably safe to use water still. Most likely there will be at least equal danger involved in wiping with a chemical solvent because of the danger of static discharge through increased handling and so forth.

The advantage of the cleaning approach, however it is done, is that it should tell you relatively quickly whether it is the electrolytic goo that is causing the malfunction, and so it is useful for diagnostic purposes, even if you then were to proceed immediately to capacitor replacement. In any case, it will have to be done, as that goo is not good. The wash & dry is also reasonably quick and cheap (well, my method is certainly cheap).

I enjoyed your lengthy post about the history of/ your history with the machine, which mirrors my own experience (including references to some of the subsequent hardware purchased, like the Cube). In my case, however, I began with a Performa 600 (!) rather than a IIci, and from there to a 5200, a Wallstreet, a Cube, and then to a collection of too many machines for my own good. My IIci came to me only last December. It's a marvel I hung around in Macdom after the P600, but I suppose even it was better than the 286 I was given to use at work at the time.... Wish I'd had a IIci or the like in those days, though.

 

[IIciNov90]

I enjoyed your lengthy post about the history of/ your history with the machine, which mirrors my own experience (including references to some of the subsequent hardware purchased, like the Cube). In my case, however, I began with a Performa 600 (!) rather than a IIci, and from there to a 5200, a Wallstreet, a Cube, and then to a collection of too many machines for my own good.

It sounds like we both like the "Mid" tier Macs which sadly do not seem to exist today. My iMacG4 DDR is the closest I have come to getting a "consumer" level Mac though I will say that compared to the current all-in-one designs it at least has a full height DVD Burner and not the notebook slot variety. Also, I waited until the end of the series and bought the best one with GeForce FX5200 graphics as it is the only one that supported Core Image. It is still my main system today though I have maxed out the RAM to 2GB and installed a much larger hard drive.

I am waiting around now for either the next Mid tier Mac to reappear or maybe the next generation Mini. The current one is near perfect - if only it had an external serial ATA port on the back so that I could connect a full speed 3.5" drive.

Wish I'd had a IIci or the like in those days, though.

It and the SE/30 really were definitely the best of the time. It had nice disk access lights!!! (I run an XServe at work now and I love the status lights on that beast - if Apple had them as an option on Mac Pros I think I would pay out the nose & buy one) Sure, the IIfx was faster but it had the hardware bug in its SCSI bus. The IIvx came out with a faster clock speed but had an intentionally crippled system bus. I always liked running speedometer and crushing IIvx scores with my IIci. By the way, the built-in graphics were really fast (smoking!!) in my IIci. I totally lucked into some 50ns RAM (unheard of for the day) at a MacWorld Expo in Boston. My graphics benchmarks were always faster using this than versus a radius or Apple nuBus card. It amazes me that the system was even designed/able to detect this and to run to the higher inherent ability of the RAM. I think I still have the old Speedometer benchmark files on the recently resurrected drive.

Brian

 

[shred]

I really enjoyed reading your post about the reasons that you settled on buying a IIci.

Back in the day, I felt that the IIci was the pick of the Mac product line. It was way out of my price range (AU$ 12,000), but I used to work on them quite frequently in my line of work. They always felt fast and "snappy". When System 7 was released, the Apple training was conducted using a lab of Mac IIci machines. System 7 seemed somehow "tuned" to run really well on the IIci. The ROM "Easter Egg" in that model was quite a novelty for the time too.

By the late 90s, we had a 10 year old IIci kicking around in our workshop. It became a dedicated MP3 player machine: a role it filled well. How many other 1980s computers could play MP3s? Even Windows 95/98 on a Pentium struggled, mainly due to poor CPU scheduling.

To this day, the most responsive computer I have used was a IIci with System 6.0.4, Word 4 and Excel 3. Boot up / launch apps / shutdown / whatever. Everything seemed instantaneous.

 

[IIciNov90]

It looks like it will be a bit longer before I clean the board. I thought about going in to work to do it today but it looks like we're in a blizzard now here on the US east coast. I don't have an antistatic bag big enough for the board. I took a couple of shots of the board now removed. It looks dusty for the most part with the exception of the ICs in the vicinities of all of the various caps which all have the wet oily look to them. I really want to clean it in the controlled setting of my lab where we have high grade deionized water that I plan on using for the rinse. I was thinking about using an old soft cotton Tshirt (no synthetics) for transporting the board to limit static. Does anyone have a better suggestion for static free transport?

thanks,

Brian

 

[IIciNov90]

I finally cleaned my IIci motherboard. I used a large diameter bucket with Alconox detergent mixed with warm water. It really brightened things up. It worked so well actually that I was able to notice there was corrosion on some of the solder contacts of some of the really small chips adjacent to the caps - something I could not see at all before. This was crusty stuff that had bridged across the chips contacts rendering the chips contacts a crusty mess. Plastic bristle brushes would not remove this stuff at all. I ended up using a painters old trick used to clean out HVLP guns. You can break the skinny wooden Q-tips to produce a very fine point end that will not scratch the board nor the traces. Using this end, I was able to scrape the crust out and restore the empty gap between the contacts. I have pictures and will eventually post which chips were the trouble ones for me. I will probably try to fire up the system on Sunday. It already seems quite dry but I will let it go for at least another day.

Brian

 

[JRL]

It's actually a good idea to wait several more days. There is a good chance that while it may seem dry, it may not actually be really dry.

 

[IIciNov90]

Thanks JRL,

I will wait until New Years Eve so that I can maybe get a second official boot in for the 2000-2009 decade.

That makes a total of at least a good 8 days in dry winter air - that should theoretically be enough one would hope...

I am certain though that I still will need to replace all of those caps. All of that gunk coming out certainly had to have changed the capacitance...

My guess is my chances for a successful boot as they currently stand are 50:50.

Brian

 

[IIciNov90]

My motherboard looks absolutely beautiful and after waiting some extra days as advised I decided to go for it.

I reassembled the IIci and it immediately booted up (spontaneously) when I inserted the power plug. I switched it to 32 bit addressing and restarted. There is sound but it is so incredibly faint that you have to have your ear right up against where the speaker is to even hear it. I powered down the machine to try it out with a cache card and it would not reboot at all again - sort of like before. No response from ADB or via the button on the right rear. I have pulled out the power for now. I may plug it back in later and see if I get another spontaneous startup.

I think that the capacitors that spewed their guts are probably no longer doing their jobs. Does anyone agree with that assessment based upon my symptoms?

I think that it is time to be thinking about the tantalum capacitor replacement set.

On the plus side I suppose though that I did get that last boot for the decade that I was hoping for in though...

thanks,

Brian

 

[beachycove]

I'd say your assessment is correct, but that the cleaning (which had to happen) not only helped establish that, but also helped establish that the machine may otherwise be just fine.

It is characteristic of logic boards urgently needing new caps to have sound problems, and to fail when additional load is placed on them, in this case in the form of the cache card.

 

[IIciNov90]

Any ideas on the spontaneous bootup and the lack of "influence" via the ADB? Could the power supply also have issues? I do have a spare but it is about the exact age as the other one.

I appreciate your tips.

I would like to get my IIci back to 100%.

I will see if letting it rest for another day will let me boot it again.

Brian