Adam's Apple

Working with Vintage Macs

Adam Rosen

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As readers of Low End Mac know, Macs are durable machines that can remain useable and useful a decade or more after they were manufactured. Whether in use to run legacy applications, old games, repurposed as systems for the kids, or acquired as collector's items, many old Macs can (and do) see service long after the warranty expires.

I deal with older (pre-G3) systems regularly, both through my consulting work and my personal collection, the Vintage Mac Museum. Here are some tips I've found for keeping the old beasts running and exchanging data with current systems.

More Tips and Suggestions?

I'm sure there are many other tips and suggestions on the topic of working with old and vintage Macs; write in to the Low End Mac Mailbag or contact me with your suggestions and we may do a follow-up to this column with additional ideas.

This article was originally published on Adam's Oakbog website. It has been adapted and reprinted here with his permission.

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Adam operates Oakbog Professional Services and The Vintage Mac Museum. He publishes The Vintage Mac Museum Blog. If you find Adam's articles helpful, please consider making a donation to his tip jar.

Recent Adam's Apple Columns

Mac OS 9 Isn't Dead Yet, 2011.05.16. In some areas, the need to run Classic Mac software or the cost of upgrading apps to OS X keeps people using Mac OS 9.
Installing Mac OS 9 on the Mirrored Drive Doors Power Mac G4, 2011.03.21. The MDD was Apple's last Power Mac capable of booting into Mac OS 9, and you need to have just the right version of 9.2.2 for it to work.
Vintage Mac Workhorse: Power Mac G4 Cube with Mac OS X 10.4.11, 2011.03.03. The G4 Cube has plenty of power and runs OS X 10.4 Tiger very comfortably, letting it act as a server accessible by new Macs and old.
More in the Adam's Apple index.

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