LocalTalk help for n00b?

[CJ_Miller]

Here's the situation. I have had various PowerMacs and new-world machines. All of my prior AppleTalk experiences have been with ethernet and TCP/IP between OS 9 and/or 10. Now what I am trying to do is connect my SE to my newer Macs so that I can set it up with proper software. Mostly I have tried using my PowerrBook 1400cs running 8.6 and my 8600 running 9.2.1. What I need to do is copy files to and from the SE

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Yes, "Google is my friend" and I have read up a bit, but the info has mostly been too recent, or oversimplified. What I have read is that for a connection of two computers, that one has only to connect their printer ports with an RS422 cable, and make sure that AppleTalk is "on" for both machines, and select your connection in the Chooser or Network Browser... Well, for me, this has yielded no results at all. The process is so simplified that I don't even know what I can do to troubleshoot it! AppleTalk is on, but neither machines sees the other. The SE - running 6.0.8 - appears to offer no way to set any parameters.

Am I overlooking something obvious here?

 

[Paralel]

I remember doing something like this a long time ago. I think the order that the machines were booted in made a difference in whether they would see one another or not once Appletalk was turned on.

 

[CJ_Miller]

Got it!

There were a few things confusing me. I had tried various things and opted to delete the 6.0.8 system folder and reinstall. Then I installed AppleShare Workstation 2.0.1. Clicking on the Chooser->AppleShare then showed my 8600 as being connected! Next I had to remember that OS 9 does not have the Users and Groups control panel anymore, that is now a tab of the File Sharing panel. So then I was able to log on to my 8600 and choose my shared directory and bomb! So close, but mounting my share yielded a system error: divide by zero. So I searched the net and found mention of problems accessing volumes of larger than 3 GB or so. My shared folder was only a few MB, but it balked at the *volume*. Since it was a new partition anyway, I wiped the drive and left about 1GB for a share partition.

Now it works fine! I finally copied the files I needed to the SE.

So far as I know, the order in which they are turned on is crucial for using Apple LocalTalk Bridge, but I don't know about other situations. I might try using the bridge for text browsing. Also I bought a box called Shiva FastPath which appears to be a hardware LocalTalk-Ethernet bridge. I will need to use a Mac which is more recent than my SE to set it up, but it might be an easy way to connect older Macs directly to networks of newer machines. Its ethernet uses an AUI connector though and I will need to adapt it for RJ45.

This has been bothering me for a couple of weeks now, I am so happy that I have got it sorted out.