Justin DerrickMar 15

So…. Just a reminder to all the folks working on #MARCHintosh - when tinkering inside your Macs and adding new stuff…. Don’t let random pins on the new equipment touch anything grounded.

I let the magic smoke out of an IDE -> CF adapter… and appear to have killed a 40GB drive… which is the best case scenario…. I hope I haven’t killed the IDE bus on my PowerMac G3.

Thankfully, it was a mostly empty data drive, not my boot disk with all my data.

Show threadJustin DerrickMar 15

#MARCHintosh
Worst case scenario is here…. Plugging anything into the second IDE bus stops the Mac from booting into the finder. It gets about half way, then locks up. I’m hoping I didn’t kill the Zip Drive, since the “click of death” rendered them so rare. It might be time for a BlueSCSI, or maybe it’s time to part this thing out.

I’m genuinely shocked that this thing made it to its 29th birthday.

Show threadErnie (not that one)
@JustinDerrick This might totally not be your thing, but just yesterday I learned some early revisions of the G3 could only have one device on IDE… unfortunately I don’t remember where I read that, but maybe that’s you and not something fried? 🤞
Mar 16 at 5:46pmIvory for iOS
Show threadJustin DerrickMar 16

@soffronoff Nope, this machine has worked quite well with three IDE devices for 20+ years. I saw the spark and the puff of smoke stank up the house. I haven't removed the IDE devices from the G3 to test them with a USB-IDE adapter, but I'm fairly certain the onboard IDE chip got destroyed... I think 12V got shorted to 5v when a lead from an LED touched the case of the Zip Drive.

Thankfully it still boots off the main drive, but I clearly need to be extra careful.

This is a also cautionary tale about using cheap Amazon crap to do something important. I really should have spent the money on a BlueSCSI and an external case.

Show threadErnie (not that one)Mar 16
@JustinDerrick Sorry, then. That really stinks. (For future someone, maybe me, who searches and can't find it, Rev A beige G3 can only have Master IDE devices, not slave, like is documented at https://lowendmac.com/macdan/03/0303dk.html. Later ones can have both.)
Page not found - Low End Mac

The Value and Limitations of the Beige G3, Dan Knight, Mac Daniel, 2003.03.03. As used G3 prices plummet, has the beige G3 become a best buy, or are there good reasons to avoid it?

Low End Mac