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| Author | Performa 600 (Read 14462 times) | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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MrKsoft
4 MB  Posts: 5  
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on: February 18, 2008, 01:25
I feel kind of shamed that the only Mac I own is one of the worst made; a Performa 600. (You know, the slightly modified IIvi with 32mhz 68030 on a 16mhz bus) I recently dug it out of the closet after remembering that it existed and after a battery replacement it once again boots in its sluggish System 7.1 glory. Anyway, it is PAINFULLY slow, even for a computer of its time. Even browsing folders in Finder causes long waits and in folders I can watch each file slowly appear in the window. There isn't much turned on extension-wise (pretty much all there is are some printer utilites and After Dark) and the computer was upgraded to 20 MB of RAM back in the day (from 5) so it SHOULD theoretically run better. Only 2 MB of that RAM are in use when it's idle. Running actual programs is worse-- there's performance issues in classic games as simple as Crystal Quest which is so old it is known as one of the first Mac games to support color. ClarisWorks takes forever to start up and sometimes I type faster than the letters appear on screen. This certainly isn't how I remember it was back when I was a kid and using the Performa regularly, and I want some slight speed back. That brings me to my questions. They might be dumb, they might not. I dunno. I haven't really touched a Mac since this P600 went in the attic when I was 7 or 8, so I'm uneducated. Sue me. 1. Is there any kind of software that might help my performance woes? 2. It's currently running System 7.1P5. Would I be likely to have a better experience running 7.5 or 7.6, or would that just bog it down more? 3. If I were to theoretically change over to a higher version of System 7, would it totally wipe my stuff I've got on there now? I've got no networking hardware for it, only a floppy drive, so having to back up the stuff would be a royal pain. Plus, many of my favorite old software disks (ClarisWorks, After Dark, and others) no longer seem to work when I tested them in emulation a while ago and I don't want to lose those un-reinstallable programs. 4. Would 7.5/7.6 have enough space to operate on a 160 MB hard drive? And one bonus question somewhat unrelated: My old Apple ADB Mouse that came with it isn't working too well, causing difficulty moving the mouse in some directions. How would you recommend cleaning it out so the ball rolls smoothly again? Thanks for your help. I really like System 7, it's just really hard to use on such a badly made Mac. |
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madmann
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256 MB Posts: 284
Reply #1 on: February 18, 2008, 03:18
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well very good questions. as i have used a mac II ci for years. I can not quite remember how the 600 performed. I personally disliked all performas. That is only my uneducated preference. as for help you could get a math coprocessor or an accelerator card. this was an option. also you can increase the vram to 1 meg. Moving to system 7.5 or 7.6 will not likley help Sorry instead of using 2 meg for system os you would be using 8 meg or so I do not know of any help for your situation other than turning off all the system extensions you can live without. In mac system 7.1 you will have to move them out of the extension folder and out of the system folder i think. I would create a new folder on your and move the extensions into it and restart. files such as networking printers you are not using etc. i would say that you should check out ebay for a pci machine much faster and upgradable try this and let us know if it helps
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dpaanlka
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1024 MB Posts: 1646
Reply #2 on: February 18, 2008, 09:50
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While a Performa 600 isn't a modern speed demon, the performance issues you describe don't sound right. I've used even slower systems and they feel reasonably responsive with the optimum software configuration. Running System 7.1.x, your Performa 600 should feel a lot better than you describe. Here are some things I would look at...
Quote from: "MrKsoft" 1. Is there any kind of software that might help my performance woes? No, and I would wager a bet that less software will ultimately be the solution to the problem. Quote from: "MrKsoft" 2. It's currently running System 7.1P5. Would I be likely to have a better experience running 7.5 or 7.6, or would that just bog it down more? This is hard to judge. A clean install of Mac OS 7.6.1 may perform better than your bogged down copy of 7.1, but a well optimized copy of 7.1 will run faster than any 7.6. Quote from: "MrKsoft" 3. If I were to theoretically change over to a higher version of System 7, would it totally wipe my stuff I've got on there now? Mac OS 7.6 was the first version that allowed you to "Clean Install" - saving your old System folder and all your files to an "old" folder. Quote from: "MrKsoft" Plus, many of my favorite old software disks (ClarisWorks, After Dark, and others) no longer seem to work when I tested them in emulation a while ago Never ever rely on emulation for anything other than a curiosity. Basilisk and Sheep Shaver are not even close to being reliable tests of anything. Quote from: "MrKsoft" 4. Would 7.5/7.6 have enough space to operate on a 160 MB hard drive? It would be a tight squeeze. I'd stick with 7.1.x. In fact, I'd try to find a copy of 7.1.1 (System 7 Pro) and do a clean install, if you can figure out how to backup your important files. A used NuBus ethernet card may be a good investment, and will expand the possible uses of your computer. Quote from: "MrKsoft" And one bonus question somewhat unrelated: My old Apple ADB Mouse that came with it isn't working too well, causing difficulty moving the mouse in some directions. How would you recommend cleaning it out so the ball rolls smoothly again? Take the ball out, and use a cotton swab dipped in rubbing alcohol or some other strong cleaner to remove build up on the rollers.
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wove
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1024 MB Posts: 1363
Reply #3 on: February 18, 2008, 15:17
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The Performa 600 requires an enabler to use 7.1 (System Enabler 304), so unless you have the original system disks, it will probably be necessary to clean up the existing install or move to System 7.5. bill
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dpaanlka
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1024 MB Posts: 1646
Reply #4 on: February 18, 2008, 17:35
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Quote from: "wove" The Performa 600 requires an enabler to use 7.1 (System Enabler 304), so unless you have the original system disks, it will probably be necessary to clean up the existing install or move to System 7.5. What if one has a copy of 7.1.1 (System 7 Pro) disks?
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Minimalist
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128 MB Posts: 186
Reply #5 on: February 18, 2008, 19:21
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Quote from: "dpaanlka" While a Performa 600 isn't a modern speed demon, the performance issues you describe don't sound right. I've used even slower systems and they feel reasonably responsive with the optimum software configuration. I agree with Dan. I used to use an old LC machine (16 MHz 68020 on a 16 MHz bus) and it performed better than what you describe on your Performa. I've used some 68030 based machines as well. The Classic II and Color Classic all performed reasonably well with System 7.5. So I would guess that there's something wrong with your configuration. This is what I would suggest: If you prefer to stay with your current installation, check these: 1) Zap the PRAM by holding command-option-p-r at startup. 2) Open your memory control panel and do the following: a) Make sure 32 bit addressing is turned on. b) Set your hard drive cache to 512K. c) Make sure virtual memory is turned off. 3) Quickdraw performance can generally be improved by reducing bit depth. So switching from thousands of colors, for example, to 256 colors should speed up screen redraws a bit. 4) Disable all control panels and extensions that you don't want or need. As has been previously mentioned, you don't need anything for hardware that you don't have or use. So you can safely disable anything network, cdrom, or printer related, for example. 5) Make sure Appletalk is turned off if you're not on an Appletalk network or don't need Appletalk for your printer -- if you have one. Appletalk and file sharing can be a real performance killer when your machine is on a network. It's even worse if you have Appletalk and file sharing enabled when you're not on a network. That's just a few things that I can think of off the top of my head. A better idea would be to zap the PRAM, and install System 7.5.3 (which is available from Apple for free). All of the above still applies with System 7.5. ie. Make sure 32 bit addressing is on, set the disk cache to 512K, make sure virtual memory is turned off, make sure file sharing and appletalk are turned off, switch from thousands of colors to 256 colors, disable all unneeded control panels and extensions, etcetera. System 7.5 is not the resource hog you might think it is. With a properly configured System 7.5 install, you would probably be looking at the system using somewhere between 2.5 and 4 megabytes of RAM. That's very reasonable for a machine with 20 megabytes of ram.
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MrKsoft
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4 MB Posts: 5
Reply #6 on: February 18, 2008, 19:42
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Okay, I've taken you guys' advice and done some changes. As it turned out, I'd forgetten about the disk cache. Since the PRAM battery had been long, long, LONG dead (for about 6 years, probably), the settings were definitely reset. The disk cache was sitting at 64K! I bumped it up to 768K for now. There is a slight increase in how fast icons appear in drive windows. Virtual memory is off (for the sake of having hard drive space) and 32-bit addressing is on. The Mac is already running at 256 colors. AppleTalk is off. The hard drive currently has 41.9 MB available on it, so roughly 25% free. I can probably free more if I get some old paint images and files off it. But as it is, it should have plenty of free space. I started digging through the extensions folder, and there was a LOT of crap in there that was totally useless, like Speech and drivers for the Mac's old printer which no longer works. I removed about 15 extensions, however there were some I did not remove because I wasn't sure whether they were important or not. They are "Claris Kermit Tool" "Serial Tool" "Text Tool" "TTY Tool" "TTYFont" "VT102 Tool" "VT102Font" All the "tool" ones have a different icon than other extensions and I THINK they're related to ClarisWorks (well the Claris Kermit one obviously is and has the same icon as the others)... but I don't know if removing them will cause a problem with it. As for the two font suitcases... I'm not even sure if they're supposed to be in the Extensions folder. They're FONTS. I'm also not sure whether the MIDI related extensions actually serve any use. It's not like I have any MIDI hardware, but I dunno if they also handle, for instance, MIDI playback. I'm not really seeing an absolutely big speed increase. Some things feel a little zippier, but not to the point where it makes a difference.
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Minimalist
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128 MB Posts: 186
Reply #7 on: February 18, 2008, 21:17
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The extensions you listed above are all part of Apple's Communications Toolbox. They were probably installed with Clarisworks to support the terminal emulator that is part of Clarisworks. If you do not have a modem on your Mac you can safely remove these without any adverse consequences. I can't imagine why anyone would use the terminal emulator in Clarisworks anyway; it's total crap. If you do have a modem connected to your Mac and you need to dial in to something -- though I can't imagine what you'd be dialing into in this day and age -- you'll be much happier with Zterm. Zterm is available free on the Internet and also shipped on several magazine cover disks back in the day. Also, just as a friendly tip, it's generally better to create a folder in your system folder called 'extensions disabled' to store your unused extensions in. This is what extensions manager in later versions of Mac OS does. What it does, is gives you a safe place to store extensions that you don't want loaded when the system boots. It also serves to give you a safe way of determining which extensions you can get by without. It can be a real pain in the ass to delete an extension only to find out that you need it. By moving extensions into the disabled folder they're always available should you ever need them.
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MrKsoft
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4 MB Posts: 5
Reply #8 on: February 18, 2008, 21:32
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Oh, don't worry, I wasn't dumb enough to totally delete the extensions. I have a Disabled Extensions folder. I'll go boot the Mac up a bit later and move those last extensions out, since I definitely do not have a modem or a use for one.
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wove
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1024 MB Posts: 1363
Reply #9 on: February 19, 2008, 15:23
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The last installer I have for System 7.1 installs 7.1.2. The installer contains all the system enablers. Whether they are there because they are needed or are there for some other reason I can not say. The Pro version of 7.1 was a bundling of components with 7.1 and as such was not really a separate system. The Finder was replaced with a scriptable Finder. Extensions were added to the system folder (Drag Manager comes to mind). PowerTalk and AppleScript were added packages. At the end it also included Quicktime, but that was available for free to everyone. I did use the Communication module of ClarisWorks. I imagine there were better packages around, but I had ClarisWorks and so that is what I used. The Comm Toolbox was used by a number of communication packages at the time. BlackKnight was a well respected package that was built on the Comm Toolbox. BlackKnight sold separately the TCP Tool, which allowed one to connect to a shell over ethernet without using AppleTalk. There was an IBM terminal tool as well that allow for communication with AIX systems. bill
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Minimalist
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128 MB Posts: 186
Reply #10 on: February 19, 2008, 19:38
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Quote from: "wove"
I had ClarisWorks version 2.x, I believe. It came bundled with my LC 575 and I thought it to be a horrendous piece of software. I quickly purchased WordPerfect 3.5 for my word processing needs, Filemaker Pro for my database needs, and got my mits on a copy of Zterm for my BBS calling activities. I never ever had a use for a spreadsheet and I'm far from being artistic enough to need or use a paint program. Though I did pick up a bargain basement copy of UltraPaint -- just because it was cheap and gave me something to play with. Quote
There's really very little need for a terminal emulator these days. I still keep Zterm installed on my Macs for doing serial console on my old SGI Indy, but aside from that... Well, I can't think of another reason to need a terminal emulator. Most of my terminal needs are now satisfied by MacSSH over TCP/IP as opposed to a serial cable with Zterm.
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