MacintoshSE1987
Well-known member
So, I got a new* Macintosh SE online. Any tips on making sure it lasts?
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New Macintosh SE
- Thread starter MacintoshSE1987
- Start date
ObeyDaleks
Well-known member
Depends on your skill level and/or experience.
The bare minimum for an SE would be to take out the logic board, remove/replace the old battery, blow/brush out any dust, and inspect the logic board for corrosion clean it up if necessary.
The “full treatment” would be to recap the analog board and the power supply, check for and reflow any cracked solder joints, replace the fan, and refurb the floppy drive.
IMHO, the SE doesn’t have any “impending doom” issues other than the battery, so if it works now, it will probably work for the foreseeable future as long as the battery is removed.
The bare minimum for an SE would be to take out the logic board, remove/replace the old battery, blow/brush out any dust, and inspect the logic board for corrosion clean it up if necessary.
The “full treatment” would be to recap the analog board and the power supply, check for and reflow any cracked solder joints, replace the fan, and refurb the floppy drive.
IMHO, the SE doesn’t have any “impending doom” issues other than the battery, so if it works now, it will probably work for the foreseeable future as long as the battery is removed.
Phipli
Well-known member
Yup, Battery removal and/or replacement is top priority.
One of the most rock solid classic macs there are.
I'd only do this on an SE if it was actually showing issues, they're really reliable, and doing it might introduce issues.
One of the most rock solid classic macs there are.
Don't do this unless it is broken. It is a good fan. Clean the dirt from the blades and put a couple of drops of silicone oil in the bearing if it is noisy.
Yeah, cleaning the dust out of the floppy drive, cleaning the heads (don't lift the head up too high or it will break), greasing the eject mechanism, head rails and (silicone) oiling the eject gearbox is good if you plan to use the floppy drive, although if you're in the US, get yourself a BMOW FloppyEMU instead.
Phipli
Well-known member
Also, welcome to the forums
I've had the same SE since the 90s. They're awesome machines!
MacintoshSE1987
Well-known member
Thanks?Also, welcome to the forums
I've had the same SE since the 90s. They're awesome machines!
MacintoshSE1987
Well-known member
*Thanks!
MacintoshSE1987
Well-known member
It is in decent condition from powering it on really quick. So does the floppy emu replace the hard drive or floppy drive?
bigmessowires
Well-known member
On a Macintosh SE, the Floppy Emu adds a second (or third!) virtual floppy drive or a virtual HD20-type hard drive. It doesn't need to replace any of the existing drives.
Phipli
Well-known member
You can use it with the external floppy port to easily load up floppy disk (and hard disk images up to 2GB) from an SD card. It isn't as fast as a SCSI drive, but is convenient.
ObeyDaleks
Well-known member
Yeah it’s probably fine near term as I said, but I’ve yet to see a single compact Mac that doesn’t have some leaking under the analog board caps. Cracked solder is also pretty common. Frankly I do the “full treatment” more for fun rather than out of necessity. SE is so solid it might last another 30 years without any of these tweaks, who knows.
The fans are very good indeed, but I prefer less noisy ones. That’s just me.
Phipli
Well-known member
Hum. I've not seen that on the 6 I've worked on. Not a huge sample, but the SE and SE/30 Analogue boards I've worked in have all been perfect. Suspect environmental considerations are at play if you're seeing it consistently. They're not known for it, unlike the classics.
ObeyDaleks
Well-known member
Usually it can't be spotted until you take the caps off. The leak is literally underneath them. I just finished a Classic II recap and almost every cap on the analog board, other than the very tiny ones, had a small leak underneath it. This is pretty typical in my experience. Despite the leaks, most of these caps probably have a lot of life left.
Phipli
Well-known member
The Classic II is a very different machine to the SE. The components were far more budget.
GRudolf94
Well-known member
SE are 10x as durable as Classic/Classic IIs are. Most of the issue in those is SMD caps on the LB, and the SE has none. ABs are typically fine, easy to inspect, and easy to repair.
ObeyDaleks
Well-known member
Hmm perhaps my memory is a bit skewed. My SE and SE/30 recaps (4 total) were a good while ago and I've done a lot of other recaps since then with lots of leaky radials.
The SE / SE/30 analog caps don't tend to leak - I've never seen it happen, they dry out inside first before they get a chance to leak fluid everywhere. The Classic ones are probably what you are remembering.
Honestly, it's an SE, you've bought probably one of the most rock solid Macs you could, so there's very little you should need to do to it. Look into getting a ZuluSCSI to put inside it to replace the original hard drive, that's the best upgrade you could get. Or a Scuznet so you can have both the luxury of SD card storage + Ethernet !
68kmla.org
Honestly, it's an SE, you've bought probably one of the most rock solid Macs you could, so there's very little you should need to do to it. Look into getting a ZuluSCSI to put inside it to replace the original hard drive, that's the best upgrade you could get. Or a Scuznet so you can have both the luxury of SD card storage + Ethernet !
Trip report: Internal scuznet install in an SE
I have an SE that contains a Radius 020 accelerator. Further PDS expansion on top of the accelerator would have to happen through the MagicBus slot, and there was never an Ethernet card that plugged into that slot. I also had one of @saybur's scuznet boards (built by @aladds), so today @joshc...
68kmla.org
What about the Mac Plus? I recently got a 1MB Mac Plus that I have been working on a bit (see this thread Macintosh Plus odds and ends ). As far as I can tell it is an intermediate model, neither early nor late (ROM B and no text on the front of the machine, only a coloured Apple logo). With Classic I presume you are all talking about the successor to the SE, correct?The SE / SE/30 analog caps don't tend to leak - I've never seen it happen, they dry out inside first before they get a chance to leak fluid everywhere. The Classic ones are probably what you are remembering.
Honestly, it's an SE, you've bought probably one of the most rock solid Macs you could, so there's very little you should need to do to it. Look into getting a ZuluSCSI to put inside it to replace the original hard drive, that's the best upgrade you could get. Or a Scuznet so you can have both the luxury of SD card storage + Ethernet !
Trip report: Internal scuznet install in an SE
I have an SE that contains a Radius 020 accelerator. Further PDS expansion on top of the accelerator would have to happen through the MagicBus slot, and there was never an Ethernet card that plugged into that slot. I also had one of @saybur's scuznet boards (built by @aladds), so today @joshc...
cheesestraws
Well-known member
Yup.
Plus ABs can need some love because they get quite hot. But you don't need to do anything preventative to it, IME.
Thanks, that is great to hear. It took me two hours (with preparation) to get the diode mod on, so anything more will take substantial time and probably better tooling than I have, in particular for removing old solder. For now it runs absolutely fine, even if it makes some slight noises when just powered on. I have no idea what these noises are to be honest, probably just thermal expansion.
