Classic II DRAM slots

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Classic II DRAM slots

I recently picked up a classic II for resteration. I am new to Macintoshes, and this is my first one. I noticed there are two DIMM slots that are unpopulated on the motherboard. Do those slots need to be populated for the computer to boot, or can it just boot off the 4 onbord ram chips? 

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SIMM

If you are going to look for memory for the machine, note that it uses 30-pin SIMMs and not DIMMs.

The onboard RAM is 2MB and is perfectly adequate to boot or install System 6, but it is too tight for System 7.

Your options using the onboard 2MB memory are System 6.0.7, 6.0.8, or 6.0.8L.

Please note that the last one is a special version of System 6 to support the full 10MB when two 4MB SIMMs are installed in the Classic II. Prior versions of System 6 can only use 8MB.

The only difference between 6.0.7 and 6.0.8 is that the latter uses the LaserWriter drivers from System 7, so it can be used to share network printers with other computers using that operating system.

System 7.0 already uses 1.3MB for the System itself, leaving very little for applications on a 2MB machine. Later versions are more memory hungry still, so you would benefit a lot from upgrading to 10MB if you want to run software that requires System 7 features.

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Thank you that helps alot. I

Thank you that helps alot. I still have to replace the onboard ram chips i belive some are bad. I get a boot chime on start up, but then a accending tone to a decending tone also vertical bars on the display. I was wondering if the SIMMs being not populated would have the same effect.

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