Windows PC to Classic Mac File Transfer Using Zip Disks

My Turn is Low End Mac's column for reader-submitted articles. It's your turn to share your thoughts on all things Mac (or iPhone, iPod, etc.) and write for the Mac web. Email your submission to Dan Knight .

- 2005.11.21

Even by contemporary standards, the Macintosh SE/30 is a great machine. Short of a notebook, there are not many computers as compact as the SE/30. With a 16 MHz 68030, 8 MB of RAM, and a 200 MB hard drive, it's far more capable than its specs would have you believe from a modern perspective.

A while ago, I acquired an SE/30 through eBay and installed System 7.5.5, ClarisWorks 5.0, Claris Organizer, iCab 2.0 , Eudora Mail (I access the Internet using a modem), Claris Home Page 2.0, and HyperCard 2.4. I also bought a Wacom graphics tablet in letter-size (the tablet is larger than the SE/30's screen).

This 1989 Mac does about 70% of the things I need (the other 30% - MP3 playback, Flash, video, etc. - are actually not vital for me). I can even connect my Newton 2000 through the Newton Connection Utilities (a funny thought - the Newton 2000 has a far greater clock speed than the SE/30 and nearly as much RAM!), so I have a cheap PDA/computer combo.

Combined with a portable keyboard and a wireless card, the Newton actually replaces a notebook.

Even though the system is rather simple, I actually increase my productivity, since I focus on the task at hand. When writing a paper, I do not get distracted by incoming emails or a supposedly short check up in the Internet that takes much longer.

Problems

Unfortunately, I encountered two problems with my SE/30. Some contemporary file formats, like the current Word and Excel formats, cannot be translated by ClarisWorks even though the machine and the OS should be capable of handling them.

The solution is to save these files in an older or simpler format. For text files, I use the Rich Text Format (RTF), and for Excel files I use the Excel 4.0 format. This allows ClarisWorks to import my files.

The second problem is transferring large files to the SE/30, since it doesn't have ethernet. Floppy disks have a ridiculously low capacity. Sending data as emails is limited as well. I thought of buying an old CD-ROM drive, but that would be a one-way data route. I can't burn CDs on my SE/30, so I can only load up data burned on another Mac or PC.

Solution

My solution: I bought an old SCSI Zip drive.

My other machines are an aging Athlon PC with a parallel port Zip drive and an iBook G4. Since I cannot connect the parallel Zip drive to my iBook, my first thought was that transporting large files from the PC to the SE/30 via Zips would be simple enough. But I didn't count on the different file systems. Even though the System 7.5 has PC Exchange, it only accepts certain formats, and it can't handle long filenames from Windows.

This spells disaster when transferring downloaded Mac-software from the PC to the SE/30. It just doesn't work.

I found a workaround for this:

• Using "Disk copy" on my SE/30, I create an 80 MB disk image and copy it to a Zip disk (the Zip disk is in PC format, which both the SE/30 and the Athlon PC can access).
• I connect my iBook G4 to my PC via a crossover ethernet cable.
• On my Windows PC, I insert the Zip disk and allowed the Zip drive to be shared by other users without any restrictions.
• I connect my iBook to the Windows PC through SMB and have full access to the Zip drive. (Unfortunately, the iBook is still limited to the Windows file naming conventions).
• I access the disk image on the Zip disk and mount it on the iBook's desktop. Then I copy all the files I need to the disk image. After ejecting the image, the data is safe in its original structure on the Zip disk.
• Insert the Zip disk into the Zip drive connected to my SE/30, copy the disk image to the hard drive (this takes a long time, but it's necessary since disk images can't be mounted from the Zip disk), and mount it using Disc Copy. Now all files are available in their original format and structure, so I can copy them or run installers to my heart's content.

This may sound tedious, but once you get the hang of it, it's quite a good way of doing things. Now TIFF files and Word files too large for a floppy can be copied easily.

Most software packages are very large and would usually be delivered on multiple disks (HyperCard 2.4 is over 20 MB). Now I just copy the files to a disk image and then transfer the Zip disk to the SE/30. Then I mount all install disks with Disk Copy and start the installation. The software is installed without a single disk change, since all disks are open at the same time.

Perhaps it's even possible to circumvent the iBook by using an HFS utility so the PC can mount the disk images. But this is another story that shall perhaps be told another time....

For now my Mac SE/30 is only limited by its component life. Knowing the high level of Apple quality control from the 1980s, it could last quite a while!

• Link: eBay
• Link: MessagePad 2100/2000 with OS 2.1

Share your perspective on the Mac by emailing with "My Turn" as your subject.

Recent My Turn articles

• Upgrading a Digital Audio G4 to work better in Leopard, 06.02. In its original configuration, the dual 533 MHz Power Mac G4 was slow with Mac OS X 10.5, but add the right upgrades, and it runs Leopard quite nicely.
• My 4 favorite PowerBooks, 05.28. The PowerBook 150 has a big screen for a vintage PowerBook, the 165c has color, the 100 is diminutive, and Lombard has USB and a great keyboard.
• Upgraded Quadra a great server for vintage Mac networking, 05.21. The compact Quadra 610 runs quietly, and with a PowerPC upgrade, it rockets past regular 68040 Macs.
• More in the My Turn index.

Recent Content on Low End Mac

• Mac Pro overclocking, Windependence with Darwine, Blu-ray for Macs, and more, Mac News Review, 07.04. Also more on running Leopard on non-Apple hardware, Ubuntu on a Mac mini, the first autofocus webcam with Zeiss optics for Macs, and more.
• Wouldn't life be great with an iSlate?, John Hatchett, Recycled Computing, 07.04. PDAs and smartphones are too small for some tasks, full-fledged Tablet PCs are overkill, and ebook readers are too limited. Apple has the tech to own this niche.
• Mac of the Day: Blue & White Power Mac G3, Jan. 1999 - The most colorful Power Mac introduced an innovative 'drawbridge' enclosure.
• List of the Day: SuperMacs is for those using Umax SuperMac clones.
  
• July 6 in LEM history: 00: 3 user accelerators - 01: SCSI and FireWire Disk Mode - Stick with the Mac - Computers for college - 05: Optimizing OS X performance - Return of the bumper snicker - 06: Can consumer MacBook replace 2 PowerBooks and a ThinkPad? - Vintage Macs with System 6 run circles around 3 GHz Windows PC - Run Windows apps without Windows
• The Macintosh Portable started a notebook revolution, Carl Nygren, Classic Macs in the Intel Age, 07.03. Before Apple introduced the Mac Portable, notebook computers were text-based and ran MS-DOS. Ever since, graphical interfaces have been the norm for laptops.
• More links in our archive.

About LEM | Support | Usage | Privacy | Contacts

Entire Low End Mac website copyright ©1997-2008 by Cobweb Publishing, Inc., unless otherwise noted. All rights reserved. Advice presented in good faith, but what works for one may not work for all. Please report errors to .
  LINKS: We allow and encourage links to any public page as long as the linked page does not appear within a frame that prevents bookmarking it.
  Access our RSS news feed at http://lowendmac.com/feed.xml.
  Email may be published at our discretion; email addresses will not be published without permission, and we will encrypt them in hopes of avoiding spammers. If you prefer your message not be published, mark it "not for publication." Letters may be edited for length, context, and to match house style.
  PRIVACY: We don't collect personal information unless you explicitly provide it. For more details, see our Terms of Use.
  Low End Mac is an independent publication and has not been authorized, sponsored, or otherwise approved by Apple Inc. Apple, the Apple logo, Macintosh, iBook, iMac, eMac, iPod, PowerBook, MacBook, Mac Pro, Apple TV, and AirPort are registered trademarks of Apple Inc. Additional company and product names may be trademarks or registered trademarks and are hereby acknowledged.