I just inherited a Macintosh LC II

External Since: Feb 24, 2008 Posts: 1

I checked out the info on http://docs.info.apple.com/article.html?artnum=112185,
and I have a couple of questions I was hoping someone could answer.

My system has 4MB of RAM. What exactly would I be looking for to
upgrade it?

I see that the hard drive is SCSI. What's the biggest hard drive this
will support?

Installed on it now is system 7.0.1, but is capable of running 7.6.1.
When I checked out ebay, I found that 7.6.1 is only available on CD.
What model CD drive would be compatible with the LC II? I have an old
AppleCD 300e Plus, but it doesn't have the right type of connector on
the back.

If I want to pick up some old games, what specifics should I look for?
Am I wrong in assuming that anything on a floppy will run?

Are there any other upgrades I should look into doing? I just want
this machine to run at it's top performance for old time's sake.

Thanks in advance,
-J

External Since: Oct 03, 2004 Posts: 2945

In article
<05ee8b3e-f1db-482c-8ee3-d71734c9fff6 DeleteThis @d5g2000hsc.googlegroups.com>,
Jamisu <james.skow DeleteThis @gmail.com> wrote:

> I checked out the info on
> http://docs.info.apple.com/article.html?artnum=112185,
> and I have a couple of questions I was hoping someone could answer.

This page will be useful to you.

<http://www.lowendmac.com/lc/macintosh-lc-ii.html>

> My system has 4MB of RAM. What exactly would I be looking for to
> upgrade it?

You can add a pair of 100ns, 30-pin 4MB SIMMs. This will give you a
total of 10MB usable in the machine.

> I see that the hard drive is SCSI. What's the biggest hard drive this
> will support?

The biggest SCSI drive you can find will work on it. If you're using at
least 7.5, you can use the whole thing as a single volume. Otherwise,
you'll have to carve it up into 4GB partitions.

> Installed on it now is system 7.0.1, but is capable of running 7.6.1.
> When I checked out ebay, I found that 7.6.1 is only available on CD.
> What model CD drive would be compatible with the LC II? I have an old
> AppleCD 300e Plus, but it doesn't have the right type of connector on
> the back.

Sure it does. It doesn't have the right *shape* connector, but it's
sending exactly the same signals. You just need a 25-pin to 50-pin SCSI
cable, which should be readily available on eBay.

> If I want to pick up some old games, what specifics should I look for?
> Am I wrong in assuming that anything on a floppy will run?

Abstractly, yes. I can't think of specific titles off the top of my
head, but there were certainly floppies on more powerful systems than
yours so it's possible that there's floppy-sized software that will not
run on your machine. What you should really be looking for is software
that doesn't require a higher OS version than you end up with, more
memory than you have (because pre-OS X VM was very inefficient), doesn't
require a 68040, and doesn't require an FPU unless you've determined
that you have one. It'll be on a daughtercard and should be clearly
marked '68882'. And yes, there's at least one 68030-based game that
requires an FPU and doesn't check before trying to use it. I can't
remember the name, but it's a breakout variant.

> Are there any other upgrades I should look into doing? I just want
> this machine to run at it's top performance for old time's sake.

Get the FPU if you can find it cheaply. In particular, I'd be looking
for a 3rd-party card that adds the FPU and an ethernet port.