• Hello MLAers! We've re-enabled auto-approval for accounts. If you are still waiting on account approval, please check this thread for more information.

SE/30 chime

Hi all,

Did the SE/30 have diferent chimes over time?

Mine has the usual "Macintosh II" chime, just as stated in Macracker for that model. But this sounds wrong to my ears, in regard of old memories. Let me explain: years ago, somewhere in the early nineties, friends of mine had a SE/30. Back then my parents had a SE, and I was pretty jealous of those friends with their powerful computer. They often called me for advice, and I was always very happy to play with that SE/30. Now, I just can't remember it having the Mac II chime. In my memories, it had the same startup beep than the early compacts. I guess my memories are wrong, but anyway: does anybody know of SE/30 having the original startup beep instead of the chime?

 
Every SE/30 I've worked with has used the Mac II chime. Also, the Classic II uses the LC chime. The only Macs that use the standard compact Mac chime are the 128K, 512K, 512Ke, Plus, SE, SE SuperDrive, and Classic I.

 
Seeing how the SE/30 is basically a Mac IIx stuffed in a compact case, I don't think it's likely there have ever been SE/30's with the classic chime. More likely you didn't make any real distinction between the different chime sounds years ago, which is why in your memories they all sounded the same. It's quite easy to understand how someone might not notice the difference in sound quality, if you're not all that interested in the technical details of the machines.

 
Did you know that the Mac II chord is also the first chord in "Norwegian Wood"? Now, if only it played the rest of the song!

 
You guys are probably right. I was pretty much certain my memories were wrong, but anyway. I hadn't seen a SE/30 since that one when I got mine a couple of weeks ago, so I thought it was worth asking, just in case.

Seeing how the SE/30 is basically a Mac IIx stuffed in a compact case, I don't think it's likely there have ever been SE/30's with the classic chime. More likely you didn't make any real distinction between the different chime sounds years ago, which is why in your memories they all sounded the same. It's quite easy to understand how someone might not notice the difference in sound quality, if you're not all that interested in the technical details of the machines.
Well, not making a distinction between the classic chime and the Mac II chime, even for the 11 years old I was at the time, is highly unlikely, since I was already the same geek back then than today. ::) but it's been at least 17 years ago.

Thanks for your replies!

 
You can add a new startup sound pretty much like changing the startup screen, but it's not likely your friends did this if they weren't ResEdit type hackers.

 
You can add a new startup sound pretty much like changing the startup screen, but it's not likely your friends did this if they weren't ResEdit type hackers.
Yeah, you can put a System 7 Sound format file in the Startup Items folder and have it play after the Mac boots up, or I think earlier versions (around System 3) even supported a custom "StartupSound" file that would play while the machine started up. But you cannot replace the boot chime, its burnt into ROM.

 
I think earlier versions (around System 3) even supported a custom "StartupSound" file that would play while the machine started up. But you cannot replace the boot chime, its burnt into ROM.
Never heard of that. Systems before System 7 could not play sounds natively (outside of the system beep, of course, which was located in the System file). With System 7, you could double-click a snd file and hear it play. When QuickTime came around in 1991, placing a StartupMovie in the System Folder would cause it to play over the Welcome to Macintosh dialog.
 
Yeah, I've got a disk with a copy of MacGolf on it...I think it boots into System 3.2 or something around that era, it has both a StartupScreen and a StartupSound which plays while the Mac starts up. I've never managed to make a StartupSound work by myself though...hence why I think it requires a file with a special format, like the StartupScreen.

 
Back
Top