Power Macintosh 8500

[MacGuy]

I can't really recall the year i purchased this power mac brand new. ( At the time paid $5M Canadian $$$$$$$ plus $3M for the AppleVision 1710av Display )

It had the original factory installed hard drive  ( 2 GB ).

Then many years later I installed a 60 GB hard drive, firewire card, usb card,  and a Sonnet processor .

With those hardware installations done I used Xpost to trick this 8500 to run OS X ( Panther 10.4 ).

Sad to say ( for me ) a few months past it booted but no hard drives appeared on the desktop.

Is it possible to bring this machine back to life by installing ( if i could find one ) a 2 GB or LESS hard drive ?

[MacOS9Lives.com]

Wow your 8500 has stood the test of time... of course I just threw out a box last year labelled "Old Mac SCSI drives - 9GB and less"   I think they were all 50pin SCSI, but don't give up...

"The systems all shipped with SCSI for their internal hard drives and optical drives. SCSI drives to work natively in these machines are very thin on the ground nowadays. Luckily there is an alternative which is IDE - this can be added with a PCI card, and is highly recommend to prolong the life of the system."

See this Link: http://www.macupgrades.co.uk/store/machine.php?name=8500-9600

[MacGuy]

"The systems all shipped with SCSI for their internal hard drives and optical drives. SCSI drives to work natively in these machines are very thin on the ground nowadays. Luckily there is an alternative which is IDE - this can be added with a PCI card, and is highly recommend to prolong the life of the system."

See this Link: http://www.macupgrades.co.uk/store/machine.php?name=8500-9600

Could you please help MR MAGOO here and tell me what is the reference number of that  PCI card ?

Looking at the back side of the 8500/SonnetG4 there is one slot left. The other two slots are used by a USB and Firewire PCI card.

Thanks for your interest in my days of sadness.

[supernova777]

Could you please help MR MAGOO here and tell me what is the reference number of that  PCI card ?

Looking at the back side of the 8500/SonnetG4 there is one slot left. The other two slots are used by a USB and Firewire PCI card.

Thanks for your interest in my days of sadness.

hey there MR Magoo (lol)

heres the machine u have i think? to check specs
http://www.everymac.com/systems/apple/powermac/specs/powermac_8500_120.html

   *By default, this model is configured with a 1.0 GB or 2.0 GB internal SCSI hard drive.

wow.. i hope u didnt last this long using a 2gb SCSI drive

SOLUTION 1 >> GO SATA!
im 99% certain your 8500 will accept a pci card Sata hard drive adapter..  u can buy new sata drives really cheap if its under 100gb...
for under 100$ u could have this machine running faster then ever by using a new 80gb sata3 drive plugged into a mac os9 bootable card like the sonnet Tempo Sata card
http://eshop.macsales.com/item/Sonnet+Technologies/TSATA/
its a bit pricey at the owc but i might be able to help u find one cheaper
this card would allow you to use the new modern standard of hard drives sold practically everywhere
just make sure to remember to buy a sata data cable, and a 4pin molex to sata power adapter

(example: http://www.startech.com/Cables/Computer-Power/Internal/SATA-LP4-Power-Cable-Adapter-12in~LP4SATAFM12)
to be able to plug in power to the newer sata drive using your existing power supply
you can also get a combo adapter that includes the sata cable + power adapter in one! very handy:
see example here (notice it has the oldschool power connection the red sata data cable is actually longer then in this pic on the one i have)

http://www.canadacomputers.com/product_info.php?cPath=79_82&item_id=040227

in my area i can buy a refurb 80gb sata3 drive:
http://www.canadacomputers.com/product_info.php?cPath=15_1086_210_212&item_id=064727

i am using this seagate drive with an acard sata adapter and getting some really impressive disk speed!


SOLUTION 2 >> GO IDE!
if u dont have the hard drive ribbon cables make sure to get one that comes with them!

it may be cheaper for u to just get a card such as the Acard 6280M or 6880M
and buy some refurb IDE hard drives! heres an ATA133 controller *FOR MAC* for sale for 19$ on ebay with FREE Shipping from hong kong
http://www.ebay.com/itm/Acard-AEC-6280M-PCI-Ultra-ATA-133-IDE-Controller-Card-For-Apple-Mac-G3-G4-/261206382868?pt=US_Computer_Disk_Controllers_RAID_Cards&hash=item3cd11d1914

if u got this acard 6280m card then u could just buy an 250gb ide drive, here u can see a number of options all under 30-40$
http://www.ebay.com/sch/i.html?_from=R40&_sacat=0&_nkw=IDE+hard+drive+250GB+western+digital&_sop=15

u can also opt for the "RAID capable" version as its just a few dollars more, but this card is for installing 2 or 4 drive combinations that will show up to the operating system as a single drive but offer you enhanced performance or backup (depending on which raid mode u pick, 0 or 1)
http://www.ebay.com/itm/Acard-AEC-6880M-PCI-Ultra-ATA-133-IDE-RAID-Controller-Card-For-Apple-Mac-G3-G4/261329692663?_trksid=p2047675.c100005.m1851&_trkparms=aid%3D222003%26algo%3DSIC.FIT%26ao%3D1%26asc%3D20131003132420%26meid%3D5806455917226467196%26pid%3D100005%26prg%3D20131003132420%26rk%3D5%26rkt%3D6%26sd%3D111298286716&rt=nc

according to the below thread,
http://www.ebay.com/sch/i.html?_trksid=p2047675.m570.l1313.TR0.TRC0.H0.XPDC20262&_nkw=PDC20262&_sacat=0&_from=R40
this card is mac bootable and 13$

heres more: http://www.ebay.com/sch/i.html?_odkw=PDC20262&_osacat=0&_from=R40&_trksid=p2045573.m570.l1313.TR0.TRC0.H0.Xpromise+ultra66&_nkw=promise+ultra66&_sacat=0

these ata66 cards by promise seem to be really abundant, with good reason, the standard was raised for ata disk speed up to ata100 and then again to ata133.
as i outlined in another thread i posted just the other day ata66 is the speed of the ide controller in most macs up till the mdd models.. the mdds are the only one to feature a ata100 interface
so ata133 is the best ide controller u can get, but ata66 is still an improvement for you considering it gives u compatibility with IDE drives.. and 66mb/s thruput.. u will get the best deals on an ata66 or ata100 controller.. but if u want the best of the best go for ata133 controller..! at least to see if theres one available cheap;) (the first card i linked from hong kong is an ata133 controller)



OTHER IDEAS >>
heres a thread on another forum discussing the options
http://forums.macrumors.com/showthread.php?t=1196504

[supernova777]

just found my box for the "tempo serial ata"
and *Confirmed 100%*
it lists compatibility on the box with the following models:
"power macintosh series 4400, 5400, 5500, 6500, 7200, 7215, 7220, 7300, 7500, 7600, 8200, 8500, 8515, 8600, 9500, 9500/180MP, 9515, 9600, 9600/200MP"
"power macintosh g3 series all-in-one, Blue&white, Desktop, MiniTower,Server"
"power mac g4 (all models except cube)"
"power mac g5 (with pci or pci-x slots)"


althought this information is not posted on their site
http://www.sonnettech.com/product/tempo_serial_ata.html

[supernova777]

if you only needed to use the drives in mac os X
u can buy one of these:
http://www.ebay.com/sch/i.html?_odkw=mac+sata+pci+-%28bracket%2C+express%2C+pcie%29+SIL3112&_osacat=0&_from=R40&_trksid=p2045573.m570.l1313.TR0.TRC0.H0.Xsata+pci+-%28bracket%2C+express%2C+pcie%29+SIL3112&_nkw=sata+pci+-%28bracket%2C+express%2C+pcie%29+SIL3112&_sacat=0

for 8$ on ebay and they will work..
not sure if the drives would show up in 9 at all?
but i do know it would only allow u to install + boot osx from this drive..not os9.
but 8$ is a lot cheaper then 72$
if u watch ebay sometimes theres deals people sel them for around 30-40$

**CORRECTION** u would only be able to boot osx with this card if u were to flash the card in a windows pc first:
the procedure to do this is outlined here (linked thx to protools5leguy just a few week ago) --> http://forums.macrumors.com/showthread.php?t=1690231


refer to our other main thread on sata adapters for more info/models to look up:
http://macos9lives.com/smforum/index.php?topic=306.0

[MacGuy]

I still don't understand it: although the original 2GB hard drive obviously died the second drive is still there.  That second drive is  partitioned into 2 equal parts. Disk Tools  from OS 9 does "see" that drive but can't help me because it sezs that hard drive is locked.

How come I can't sign into that 60 GB drive ?

I tried to start up from the OS 8.5 and OS 9.0 official installer disks with no luck.

How can i sign into that 60 GB drive ?

[supernova777]

I still don't understand it: although the original 2GB hard drive obviously died the second drive is still there.  That second drive is  partitioned into 2 equal parts. Disk Tools  from OS 9 does "see" that drive but can't help me because it sezs that hard drive is locked.

How come I can't sign into that 60 GB drive ?

I tried to start up from the OS 8.5 and OS 9.0 official installer disks with no luck.

How can i sign into that 60 GB drive ?

im not familiar much with scsi chains but perhaps it means u must remove the first drive that has failed before being able to use the 60gb as a boot drive?  the other 60gb drive, it is SCSI correct?
and is it connected in a chain to the first?

[MacGuy]

I do believe you have come up with the answer.

My computer tech guy at the time no doubt SCSI'd the drives.

MR MAGOO sezs he'll have to get our new tech guy to remove the first drive and format the second drive into a two parts with the smallest being no larger then 2 GB since I doubt we can find a 2 GB drive these days.

Any additional thoughts/advice will be more then appreciated.

[DieHard]

With those hardware installations done I used Xpost to trick this 8500 to run OS X ( Panther 10.4 ).
Sad to say ( for me ) a few months past it booted but no hard drives appeared on the desktop.
Is it possible to bring this machine back to life by installing ( if i could find one ) a 2 GB or LESS hard drive ?

Ok there are a few questions that need to be answered... it is unclear exactly what OS partitioned/initialized each drive..

1) Did you initialized both the 2 GB and 60 GB with Tiger before installing Tiger ?
2) Did you just initialized the 60GB with Tiger... did you check OS 9 drivers ?
3) Are you using the original SCSI controller built onto the MB ?

I am guessing, Basically, the "Locked drive" means that either OS 9 does not not recognized the HD drivers that were used upon the original setup or that the extensions for the SCSI card and not on your OS 9 Boot media...

So I guess, the complete checklist of questions is...

1) What SCSI controller are you using ?
2) Exactly which revision of Mac OS was used to format the 2 GB ?  The 60 GB ?
3) What options were selected at the time they were initialized ?
4) Were and 3rd Party Tools (FWB Toolkit, SCSI Drivers, HDTS) used to update the Hard drive drivers after the original initialization ?

[supernova777]

i dont understand why you need a drive thats no larger then 2gb? for what purpose?

[MacGuy]

DieHard

1)

Did you initialized both the 2 GB and 60 GB with Tiger before installing Tiger ?

No. I purchased this 8500 brand new when it was released on the market. The original factory 2 GB hard drive was initialized by Apple and I went up the ladder updating the OS.  I never initialized that 2 GB at any time. The 60 GB was added many years later when I wanted to trick the 8500 into running OS X ( Tiger ) and was told it required at least 12 GB space to install and run OS X.

2)

Did you just initialized the 60GB with Tiger... did you check OS 9 drivers ?

Only initialized the 60 GB with Tiger utilities and at the same time split that drive in half with Tiger on both halves. Honestly can't recall checking OS 9 drivers since I really did not have a clue at the time of how to correctly initialize and partition a hard drive or that OS 9 drivers should be ticked off.

3)

  Are you using the original SCSI controller built onto the MB ? 

  Sorry, not a clue because Mr Magoo has eyesight problems and so my local computer repair shop is for hire.

    So I guess, the complete checklist of questions is...

1) What SCSI controller are you using ?
2) Exactly which revision of Mac OS was used to format the 2 GB ?  The 60 GB ?
3) What options were selected at the time they were initialized ?
4) Were and 3rd Party Tools (FWB Toolkit, SCSI Drivers, HDTS) used to update the Hard drive drivers after the original initialization ?   

1) No idea.

2) Never formatted the factory original 2 GB.
     Used Tiger to format the 60 GB.

3) Not a clue at this time.

4) No 3rd Party Tools used to update the Hard drive drivers after the original initialization. Only used DiskWarrior to repair directory  and TechTool Pro to optimize the hard drive. I'm a great fan of both these utilities because they have saved the day on many occasions.

[MacGuy]

i dont understand why you need a drive thats no larger then 2gb? for what purpose?

As best as I understood  it, since I wanted to trick the 8500 into running OS X the hard drive had to be greater than 10 GB. At the time the guys doing the work  had a 60 GB Hard whereby they suggest the 60 GB be partitioned into two 30 GB drives.

It was also nice when I was running my OS 9 DAW's  such as Digital Performer, Cubase, StudioVision  on the 2 GB drive to be able to store the working midi/audio files on the 2nd ( 60 GB ) hard drive. At the time I was not a great fan of external firewired hard drives.

[supernova777]

i dont understand why you need a drive thats no larger then 2gb? for what purpose?

As best as I understood  it, since I wanted to trick the 8500 into running OS X the hard drive had to be greater than 10 GB. At the time the guys doing the work  had a 60 GB Hard whereby they suggest the 60 GB be partitioned into two 30 GB drives.

It was also nice when I was running my OS 9 DAW's  such as Digital Performer, Cubase, StudioVision  on the 2 GB drive to be able to store the working midi/audio files on the 2nd ( 60 GB ) hard drive. At the time I was not a great fan of external firewired hard drives.

u said u wanted a partition that was "no larger then 2gb" that means 2gb + smaller.. not greater then 10gb.
you are totally confusing man;)   i think i might have to delete this thread its giving me a headache
kidding..

there is no way that i know of that a hard drive can show up as "locked"
either in Mac OS X or Mac OS 9 so i have no idea what u meant by the drive being "locked"
i suggest u back up your data and use an application to reformat + repartition your 60gb drive
in order for mac os 9 to boot from a drive it needs to install what people call "mac os 9 drivers" on the disk
this can be done in OSX with "Disk utility" (found under applications/utilities folder)
or can be done with OS9 with "Drive setup" (found under applications/utilities folder again)
the only way to add this "mac os 9 drivers" to a hard disk + make it compatible with os9 is
to do this when the drive is partitioned + formatted (ie EMPTY OF DATA)
so u must first move all your stuff off the drive (using an external disk or via network copy to another machine)
and then REFORMAT + REPARTITION the drive (using disk utility or drive setup)
once this is done u should be able to easily install mac os 9 onto the drive using a retail mac os 8 or 9 cd
but it would be easier if you are in mac os X already to use this download/install method: (click the url and read this page) http://macos9lives.com/smforum/index.php?topic=305.0

in the future if u want specific help like this.. try to provide us the basic info
+ explain things better frm the start.. u have been horrible at explaining the present state of the machine you are
trying to fix and unclear about the goal u wish to attain
also.. you are posting to the general section of the forum we have a general help section
for people to start threads + ask for help.. the general discussion area is more for topics + conversations that apply to everyones general interest
not someones specific problems;)

i will move this thread now to the help section.

[MacOS9Lives.com]

OK... you are not crazy... I have seen drives that show "locked" under OS 9... the reason I asked you all those initial questions was that the issues with the 60GB drive is the way it was initially setup.  The lock is most likes an "Ownership & Permissions" and / or a driver issue... I have to look thru my notes, but I remember there was an OS9 disk utility that would "Update Driver"on a partition without re-initializing (come on guys...mactron ?... someone has to remember).

If you reinitialize/repartition the 60GB under Mac OS 9 this would most likely fix the lock issue, but then you will obviously loose the data on the (2) 30GB partitions.

So as a Suggestion... get another Larger SCSI drive... 60GB or so... and Install OS X on it (format it with the OS 9 driver option) and use the same version of X that you originally put on the 60GB.  Reboot to the new drive under OS X and you will most likely be able to see your old drive or at least take ownership of it again.  If you cannot unlockit via the OS X GUI, then try the following..

Run the following terminal commands (copy and paste, please)
 sudo chflags 0 /volumes/*
 sudo chmod a+rx /volumes/*

You'll have to enter your current admin password (which you won't see). that's normal. this should unlock your drives.

Here is a guy that had a 9500 (No solution) with SCSI locked drives
http://forums.cnet.com/7723-21562_102-410394/locked-hd-mac-os-9/

- Diehard

[coachla]

Very perplexing topic. Initialize and partition any drive as large as you want with OS9 drivers in Tiger. Then  OS9's Drive Setup can update driver and/or lock any partition. I use 500MB and 2TB drives this way.

[MacGuy]

Just a summary of what is going on to date:

The original Apple/Seagate 2 GB SCSI hard drive was 18 years old and it is definitely dead.

I have to boot the 8500 with the Apple emergency floppy disk in order to get your typical Apple desktop. The only drives that show on the desktop are the floppy drive and the IDE drive.  The access to the IDE drive is restricted/blocked. I forget the text message that is in the IDE hard drive. There is no way in *** to boot into the IDE drive without the SCSI drive being active with this configuration of the 8500.

Also there is no way in *** to boot up from a OS 8 or 9 CD installer because the CD optical drive in this 8500 is not an apple optical drive. The Yamaha optical drive  in my 8500 it requires the "toast" CD extension.

Since all those required file extensions (e.g.  toast CD extension, Sonnet G4 extensions, PCI USB/Firewire/IDE, etc. etc.etc. )  were on the Apple/Seagate 2 GB SCSI hard drive the 8500 can only boot from a  1.4 MB floppy. And of course there is not enough room on the floppy drive for all the required extensions.

The other thing that should be noted  is that this 8500 PowerMac was  built way way way before the machines that had the internal built in hardware for installing OS X.  So you can't just run an OS X CD installer. You have to "trick" this 8500 with XPostfacto or Sonnet's version of XPostfacto.


I purchased a (used) 3 GB SCSI Quantum that i installed however it was defective in that it had bad blocks and would not hold the initialization using Apple's HD setup. Even tried Disk Manager ( an old piece of Software i had for use on NON apple hardware ) with the same results.

Seller Guy is sending out a replacement SCSI hard drive.

So I am on stand by.     Sure hope the replacement SCSI drive works.

Now I understand and completely agree, it's crazy trying to get an 18 year old machine going, well that's what my wife says, however, it is like old f*** restoring antique cars.

[supernova777]

u should have just bought a pci sata adapter + a brand new 80gb sata drive in my opinion.
u would have been up and running way faster... or even an acard ide raid card, and a pair of 40gb or 80gb ide drives...

ive posted so much info on these cards they are mac bootable. i told u it even says on the box i have that it says its compatible with the 8500.

spending money to buy another scsi drive that is probably just as old as the first one is a pretty big error in judgement imho.

[MacGuy]

spending money to buy another scsi drive that is probably just as old as the first one is a pretty big error in judgement imho.

100% correct.

u should have just bought a pci sata adapter + a brand new 80gb sata drive in my opinion.
u would have been up and running way faster... or even an acard ide raid card, and a pair of 40gb or 80gb ide drives...

ive posted so much info on these cards they are mac bootable. i told u it even says on the box i have that it says its compatible with the 8500.

May do that if this replacement hard drive does not work.


Don't forget that my computer repair skills are zilch. I know how to turn a computer on and off, remove/add RAM, replace batteries or simply plug in pci cards.

When the talk at this and other forums is about sata adapter, ide cards i'm lost. I know the 8500 has 3 PCI slots and at this time one has the  the ide card and the other two have the usb and firewire cards.  Also when the talk is about jumpers and pins i'm also lost. I have yet to find via Google good picture/diagrams as to exactly  how pins and jumpers are set and what tools do you use (hammer/screw driver, saw ). I envey guys that seem to have first hand working knowledge I don;t.   For example, the IDE drive and the 3 PCI cards were installed for me by a PC/Mac repair shop. I installed the Sonnet G4 card only because Sonnet provided an excellent book with pictures for dummies on how to and in addition provided live telephone guidance when i was really unsure about the CUDA switch ( which for me  is not a switch per say, for me it's a object on a  circuit board you press down but don't hear any sound of a switch going on or off ).

So although spending money to buy another 18 year old scsi drive is indeed foolish it is somewhat my opportunity to learn something about working within a computer.  And also not much further damage i can do to a machine that is not working at this time.

And so that's why i joined this forum to get first hand knowledge and help from guys that know how to. I have really learned from this group and other forums. I think i now understand IDE and SATA.

[supernova777]

all u need is the pci sata card, a sata cable, and a 4-pin molex to sata power adapter
i show u pics of these things if u want

err the pics are already in this thread above..


see this pic.. thats all there is to it
it makes the harddrive bootable by the computer and youll have access to whatever size it is too , so you are safe buying a 80gb, 250gb, or 500gb drive.

1t or 2tb might work too but thats overkill for the powermac 8500.

like the picture shows u can put up to 2 drives on the same card

if u were to get an IDE based card, some of them support up to 4 hard drives
and instead of connecting via the Sata cable youd connect via a IDE 40pin ribbon cable that should be
similar to a scsi ribbon cable

the ide card adapters may be available cheaper u can order one from china/japan on ebay for like 25$
with shipping included the one i bought was made by acard (6880m) and its also compatible with windows computers!
i have mine inside a win98se computer atm but it will work in windows xp and probably vista/windows 7 too
so its highly compatible and totally worth the purchase if you use ddesktop macs + pcs to have around

heres the auctions that are up now: (but remember ud have to order an ide drive to work with these ide adapters)

http://www.ebay.com/itm/Acard-AEC-6280M-PCI-Ultra-ATA-133-IDE-Controller-Card-For-Apple-Mac-G3-G4-/261206382868?pt=US_Computer_Disk_Controllers_RAID_Cards&hash=item3cd11d1914

ok sorry this one above ^^^ is a 6280m.. the difference between 6280m and 6880m models is that the 6280m doesnt have raid capability (to combine 2 drives as one for faster speed access) if u just want to use it normally without RAID then its perfect for you! and its 19$ shipped!!

http://www.ebay.com/itm/Acard-PCI-Ultra-ATA-133-Adapters-64-Bit-4-Channel-Raid-PCI-Adapter-Card-AEC-6885-/301229220798?pt=US_Computer_Disk_Controllers_RAID_Cards&hash=item4622a923be

last of all there is this card:

http://www.ebay.com/itm/ACARD-AEC-6293M-1-CH-eSATA-1-CH-SATA-1-CH-IDE-PATA-Adapter-/251338746920?pt=LH_DefaultDomain_0&hash=item3a84f4ec28

which seems to provide 1 sata port + 1 ide port.. but its $60
but having 1 of each might be very convenient for you in your situation! providing compatibility to have one sata drive + 1 ide drive . either or. or both at the same time!



oh and it seems it also supports 1 ESATA connection which would let u have an external drive that was just as fast as an internal drive!
thats why its 60$ but u could always accomplish this by getting a sata to esata bracket and wiring the internal port  like this:

if u are interested in E-sata (external sata) then be carefull to get the appropriate cable the cables come in "I" shape connector and "L" shape connector. the one in the pic above seems to be L shape