SE/30 startup problems

[tommijazz91]

Hello everyone!

My SE/30 has always had a weird problem: if I boot from the internal hard disk, most of the time the system software doesn't load, and the floppy icon appears (as if the HDD took to long to spin). This happens almost every time, maybe it will boot once every 20 times or more, and mostly at cold boot.

But if I connect a SCSI Zip drive (even without a cartridge), the Mac boots just fine to System 7.5.5.

I have a 8gb hard drive with five partitions, the system folder is in partition 1. Otherwise it's a stock SE/30 that needs recapping (no sound). RAM is 8mb.

Anyone knows why this happens?

Thanks a lot!

 

[Crutch]

Sounds like a SCSI issue possibly. Shot in the dark, what happens if you stick a terminator into the SCSI port without the Zip drive? Your internal HD should be terminated but ...

 

[tommijazz91]

Hmm, unfortunately I don't think I have a terminator at home...I just have the Zip drive and somewhere a Jaz drive to connect

Maybe I can find one and buy it.

 

[bibilit]

I will advise to replace capacitors as soon as possible, problem is not the capacitor itself, most of the time is the fluid leaking from the capacitor that causes a lot of troubles, including the one you are maybe talking about.

Apart from being conductive, this fluid can rot traces in the Logic Board.

 

[Crutch]

Yeah I will say I formerly had a similar issue, internal SCSI drive would boot only intermittently. (I didn’t have an external SCSI drive to test with at the time.) The issue was a bad trace near the SCSI chip rotted by cap goo.