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Solid State Drive for G3?
- Thread starter Iamanamma
- Start date
I am using the version that came with the G3 install CD. I have an install disk for OS 9, I could try that. I could try making the partition even smaller, but I've already surrendered 10 GB, and it doesn't seem to make a difference. The drive is perfectly fine, as long as I do not try to make it my startup disk. I am puzzled.
Hm. Did you say this was an OS 8.6 installation CD? Lime green, maybe some circles on it? I wonder if it's "for" the blue-and-white Power Macintosh G3. If this is a beige G3, it might not like having the blue-and-white's OS installation put on it?
Is it the same CD you used to install onto the SCSI2SD? If so, then the CD itself and the OS install from it should be fine.
Is it the same CD you used to install onto the SCSI2SD? If so, then the CD itself and the OS install from it should be fine.
Yes, Lime green G3 install disk. Came with one of the beige g3's, we have never bought a B&W, but we bought all of the Beiges used, and who knows what was sent with them. No circles, just an apple, a title and some really hard to read tiny print around the edges and to the right hand side. White on lime green is really awful. The disk says 1999 on it, and the part number looks to be 691-2321-A. I am not sure if it's the same disk I used on the SCSI2SD (I know I really should pay attention) I may have used the YIKES! install disk on that. I know where The YIKES! G4 came from and that the disk was its original install media, because it was my personal home computer before I upgraded to an iMac.
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I am starting to wonder if there isn't something wrong with 1) the install disk or 2) this G3. I took the SSD out and put in a 250 GB Maxtor SATA drive. I ran the installer software again, and it stopped while installing Internet Access, saying these was something wrong with Tool.UI.html and I needed to remove it from the folder and try again. When I clicked okay, it told me it couldn't install internet access and asked if I wanted to skip or try again. Since that G3 does not need internet access, I told it to skip it. The installation immediately hung. I restarted from the CD, started a whole new clean install from a custom selected installation with no internet included, and the install finished just like it should. Then, when I attempted to start up the G3 from the new disk, I am back to the System Error 11, and Invalid header node 4,0 again. I am stumped. I don't know if I should try buying a new install disk off of ebay, or try to find out if there is something else wrong with the G3.
Hm. It's tough to say for sure. "The install CD told me some bits were bad" sounds like a bad install CD to me, perhaps scratched or smudged more than the old CD drive liked. (newer optical drives are way more tolerant of scratched/bad CDs than the old ones were.)
One thing that might be worth trying:
If you have a modern Mac or PC with an ISO burning program, go here http://personal.stenoweb.net/oldmac/ (this is my server) and grab macos85retail.zip, extract the ISO from that file, and burn that ISO with your favorite burning software. (Toast, Nero, infrarecorder, or disk utility on an osx computer)
See if that does any better. That's a retail 8.5 (I don't remember if it was 8.5.0 or 8.5.1) CD which should install on all beige PowerPC Macs with no trouble.
(The 91 and 921 discs I do use more often and would be valid for this test, but if this is for use with your CAD program it sounds like sticking with 8 is preferable.)
I don't think that the under-provisioning thing we tried with the SSD should have any impact on a hard disk. A hard disk pretty much comes as a set size whereas SSDs are sort of under-provisioned for reliability purposes.
Just kind of idly, what's the condition on all the cabling/ Are you using a new SATA cable or are using an old one that might have gone bad?
One thing that might be worth trying:
If you have a modern Mac or PC with an ISO burning program, go here http://personal.stenoweb.net/oldmac/ (this is my server) and grab macos85retail.zip, extract the ISO from that file, and burn that ISO with your favorite burning software. (Toast, Nero, infrarecorder, or disk utility on an osx computer)
See if that does any better. That's a retail 8.5 (I don't remember if it was 8.5.0 or 8.5.1) CD which should install on all beige PowerPC Macs with no trouble.
(The 91 and 921 discs I do use more often and would be valid for this test, but if this is for use with your CAD program it sounds like sticking with 8 is preferable.)
I don't think that the under-provisioning thing we tried with the SSD should have any impact on a hard disk. A hard disk pretty much comes as a set size whereas SSDs are sort of under-provisioned for reliability purposes.
Just kind of idly, what's the condition on all the cabling/ Are you using a new SATA cable or are using an old one that might have gone bad?
Fizzbinn
Well-known member
I’m getting back to this now that I’m home, I just wiped the SATA SSD in my Beige G3 using the retail Mac OS 8.5 cd (“Updated” the disk driver too). Install went fine but I get a crash on boot:
”Sorry, a system error occurred.”
I tried updating the disk driver back to the version from my 9.1 install but got the same error on boot. Of note when booted from the 8.5 cd the desk seemed fine.
Hooked up an external hard drive with a copy of the 8.6 updater and ran through that install. Success, it booted to the desktop! I don’t think it matters but the disk driver is now the version from the 8.6 update. I was really thinking the disk driver version might be the issue but guess not. In any case because it wrote it down:
Mac OS 8.5 Drive Setup 1.6 = v8.1.0
Mac OS 8.6 Drive Setup 1.7.2 = v8.1.2
Mac OS 9.1 Drive Setup 2.0.3 = v8.1.4
So there definitely seems to be an OS dependency on this PCI SATA adapter (that is recognized as a SCSI Bus by Apple System Profiler). Mac OS 8.5 seems to be out. On 8.6 I wonder if the CD version you have is machine specific, perhaps lacking something from the general release for all...
”Sorry, a system error occurred.”
I tried updating the disk driver back to the version from my 9.1 install but got the same error on boot. Of note when booted from the 8.5 cd the desk seemed fine.
Hooked up an external hard drive with a copy of the 8.6 updater and ran through that install. Success, it booted to the desktop! I don’t think it matters but the disk driver is now the version from the 8.6 update. I was really thinking the disk driver version might be the issue but guess not. In any case because it wrote it down:
Mac OS 8.5 Drive Setup 1.6 = v8.1.0
Mac OS 8.6 Drive Setup 1.7.2 = v8.1.2
Mac OS 9.1 Drive Setup 2.0.3 = v8.1.4
So there definitely seems to be an OS dependency on this PCI SATA adapter (that is recognized as a SCSI Bus by Apple System Profiler). Mac OS 8.5 seems to be out. On 8.6 I wonder if the CD version you have is machine specific, perhaps lacking something from the general release for all...
Fizzbinn
Well-known member
Okay, spoke too soon. After sitting for a bit 8.6 got weird, I couldn’t drag any icons... Restart and I’m back to “Sorry, a system error occurred.” Sigh...
So back to 9.1. Opposed to what I originally did I just upgraded, installed over the 8.6 install. First boot all good. Restart okay. I guess I should give it more time but I never had a problem with 9.1 and this SATA card in my Beige G3 since I got it in November.
So back to 9.1. Opposed to what I originally did I just upgraded, installed over the 8.6 install. First boot all good. Restart okay. I guess I should give it more time but I never had a problem with 9.1 and this SATA card in my Beige G3 since I got it in November.
Hi Cory: I am using brand new cabling that came with the PCI SATA Card. The only other SATA cables I have came with a Seagate Barracuda I bought to go in my NAS, and I didn't need them. They're still sealed in their plastic bag. Bad cables should not be the issue.
Hi Fizzbin:
I can get the OS installed as well, and everything will look fine. When I try to boot from the SATA drive (or the SSD for that matter) , I get all kinds of irritating errors. I am wondering if it will be more reliable as just a storage device, and not a boot drive. I've spent so much time on this, it's beginning to make me feel pretty hopeless.
Brett B.
Well-known member
I kinda skimmed this so maybe I missed something, but have you tried 9.2.2? Just curious if that might be more compatible with your SATA card, or any storage device, for that matter. I guess I have just never seen a reason to run anything older than 9.2.2 on a G3.
FWIW, both of my G3s came with 8.1 discs. But they were the oldest revision, 233MHz machines built in 1997. Since they were sold for a couple years, I guess yours could have come with 8.6, but they were discontinued in 1999 and the B&W came out in 1999 and that disc is labeled 1999... I'd guess that's what it is supposed to be used with, a B&W G3. That said, I've used that disc and many others on beige G3s without issues so I'm not sure what's going on.
FWIW, both of my G3s came with 8.1 discs. But they were the oldest revision, 233MHz machines built in 1997. Since they were sold for a couple years, I guess yours could have come with 8.6, but they were discontinued in 1999 and the B&W came out in 1999 and that disc is labeled 1999... I'd guess that's what it is supposed to be used with, a B&W G3. That said, I've used that disc and many others on beige G3s without issues so I'm not sure what's going on.
Fizzbinn
Well-known member
Did you try Mac OS 9.1? That's what I originally ran with no problems and am back on now with no problems. When I tried booting from 8.5 and 8.6 (installed on the SATA disk connected to the PCI SATA adapter) it either would freeze during boot or shortly there after if if it did boot.
Unfortunately, I am kind of stuck with OS 8.6. I wonder how these cards work in the blue and whites, or the early G4, units that shipped with OS 8.6?
I can't use any flavor of 9 with a program I absolutely have to be able to run on the G3.
I'm kind of curious: What if you try to install OS 9 and see if it can boot? At absolute worst, it's an hour or two and we still have some more information.
Another idea: You could see about connecting a conventional hard disk (up to 2TB) up to the SATA card. Partition it for, say, 100GB to boot from and "the rest" and then see how it runs.
Another idea: You could see about connecting a conventional hard disk (up to 2TB) up to the SATA card. Partition it for, say, 100GB to boot from and "the rest" and then see how it runs.
Sorry to take so long to respond to this, but year end mania took precedence over my projects for the last few weeks. I have a Seagate SATA drive I hooked up to the card. It has the same problems. Fizzbin reported he has issues when he tried to boot into 8.6 via a drive connected to this PCI card, but none with OS 9. What I am tempted to do is something you suggested earlier: set up that puppy to be a network storage device. Then I can go ahead and install OS 9, and they'll just have to store and retrieve their programs from the central storage device. Even if I had to make a partition for each user, it would be easier than what I am dealing with now.
That may end up being the best idea. In that scenario, you only really have to make one partition, somewhere under around 200 gigs to boot from, and all the other partitions can be up to the maximum supported volume size for OS9, which is 2TB. I recommend using HFS+ if you do that.
How many people would need to connect to the system?
If you're interested, I can work on and then share/post my guide to ASIP6.
Depending on your interest and needs, linux + netatalk or Windows Server 2003 may also work.
How many people would need to connect to the system?
If you're interested, I can work on and then share/post my guide to ASIP6.
Depending on your interest and needs, linux + netatalk or Windows Server 2003 may also work.
At this time, the most machines we would have connected concurrently is 6. In reality, it's usually only half that many.
ASiP6?
I don't want to get into Windows, I only have 1 Windows user, and he is only using it for Solidworks. Anything he needs to move, he puts on a thumb drive that he has on a hub shared by his iMac (OS X Mountain Lion) and his Yikes G4 (OS 8.6). Linux and netatalk would probably be more than we would ever need, unless we did a major overhaul of our network and computers. Hopefully I will retire before that happens!
Fair enough!
The main advantage to older Windows Server or Linux+Netatalk in this scenario would be if you need a really enormous amount of network-connected storage accessible to older Macs, and didn't want to deal with it being on different disks or partitions.
ASIP stands for AppleShare IP (my apologies for the uncommon abbreviation), which is Apple's server product for Mac OS 9. The main reason to use it is if you need email/web or if you need file server for more than ten years. With under ten, and without needing those other services, I'd say just stick to regular Mac OS 9 file sharing.
The main advantage to older Windows Server or Linux+Netatalk in this scenario would be if you need a really enormous amount of network-connected storage accessible to older Macs, and didn't want to deal with it being on different disks or partitions.
ASIP stands for AppleShare IP (my apologies for the uncommon abbreviation), which is Apple's server product for Mac OS 9. The main reason to use it is if you need email/web or if you need file server for more than ten years. With under ten, and without needing those other services, I'd say just stick to regular Mac OS 9 file sharing.
Now I understand! We don't use email or any kind of web services on the older Macs, and I know how to set up standard file sharing. Now to sell this to the shop manager and my bosses.
