Lookin' for an SE/30!

Wanna hear a horror story?

Not too long ago, in a land a little too close to home, I was given a free SE/30 with external Radius Pivot monitor. The caveat was that the gosh darn thing didn't work. Or, at least, that's what the previous owner and I believed.

To make a long story short, the SE/30 was eventually shredded for parts. I was quick to discover that, one by one, every single part that I recovered from the dead SE/30 was fully functional. The memory worked, the hard drive worked, the monitor worked, everything just worked. Well, everything but that little pint-sized double A wannabe!

Yes, I sacrificed an SE/30 and relegated it's fully functioning pieces to the resident parts collection. All because of a premature proclamation of death.

Uh, my eyes tear as I now recall the tragic incident, we mistakenly buried an SE/30 alive.

It wasn't the last time that such a tragic error was made; a fully functioning Quadra 605 met with the same fate. The 605 wasn't a total loss, however, because a donor logic board was found and transplanted into the 605 case.

Granted, the 605/LC III hybrid never did make a full recovery, but I'm happy to report that the 605 is now happily living life as an LC III. And with an installation of NetBSD, the poor little guy is a vibrant member of my Macintosh family.

hmmm What I find strange is that the dead of the CMOS battery could actually lead to the mac not responding... *at all*. Not that I don't believe you, I have seen macs being raised from the grave by just dishwashing them. I am really not qualified to express an opinion as to what happenned, and I would like to hear somebody's take at this.

mac

dishwashing mobo????????

I didn't say that the machine didn't respond at all, I said that the machine appeared to have been dead. And, for the record, the PRAM battery in many of the older Macs will make the machine appear dead when it is not. It's a well known fact!

I have some of the remaining parts kicking around still! The monitor I eventually trashed because I had no use for it and it weighed too much to ship to someone.

If you don't believe me, you either have no experience with Macintosh computers, have no experience working on "dead" Macintosh computers, or are just attempting to start an argument.

I'm not gonna argue with you. Facts are facts.

Read the Macintosh Battery Page

Or read this article at LowEndMac

If you still want to question my credibility, you can check out this page at the University of Washington.

You can learn a lot by doing a little research! You can learn even more through experience! I lost a fully functional SE/30 and a Quadra 605, because I didn't do the research! Eventually I learned about the PRAM battery thing, and I haven't lost a Macintosh computer since.

EDIT:

Actually, the above is not entirely true. I have lost a Color Classic since then. But that wasn't due to a misdiagnosis. I lost the Color Classic, because I dismantled it beyond repair. (Don't ask! It involves such tools as tin snips --- Let's just say that it wasn't pretty.)

Judging by the auctions on eBay, SE/30s are becoming more rare... 2 years ago, there were always at least 20 simultaneous auctions for one, and other auctions for parts... now, the average is about 5. But here's an auction that is for the serious SE/30 and other compacts lover:

17 Compact Macs for auction

IMHO this auction is started a little high, as the auctioner is not offering any savings whatsoever for buying the bulk. He should've had the starting bid be closer to $100, as I think the final bid would go higher than as it is... and, poo poo, its pickup only for those in the vicinity of Long Beach, CA (damn... I used to live there...).