Format a Zip disk as FAT16 disk format and copy the unopened Mac files to the disk. iso images and leave them alone once downloaded. PC files are not this way and so accessing a Mac file on a PC strips out the resource fork and leaves the file corrupt. The old Mac’s had what’s called dual forks, meaning that one file was actually two, a resource fork and a data fork. Meaning you can’t download and extract them on a PC and then use them on your Mac. Keep in mind that files from vintage Mac’s require vintage Mac’s to access. There are options like getting a SCSI Zip drive and a SCSI card for your PC to use with it, but it’s likely simpler and easier and possibly cheaper to just have two drives, one SCSI and one USB. The SCSI ones don’t have any other interface that you could use on a modern PC. The USB Zip drives do not have any interface besides USB. The disk has a driver on it and it will load itself like it is a common SCSI Hard Disk. If you boot the system with the disk in the drive you don't even need a driver. ZIP drives are totally awesome and I highly recommend them.
The connectors labeled 'zip' and 'AutoDetect" are the side that plug into the Mac. If in doubt - ask for a picture of the back of the drive. If there are NO switches on the back between the connectors then it is a parallel port drive no matter what it is advertised as. If it has 1 switch it is a zip plus that can do either SCSI or parallel and is safe to use also. If they have a picture of the back of the drive and it has 2 switches it is a SCSI drive. Stay far away from drives bigger than 100MB and that say 'parallel port'. I might have had to jump through some hoops to make it work on 10.6 even but I don't remember. I'm not sure about HFS file system support on newer versions of X. Oh - the drivers on modern OSs (ie non classic Mac OS) won't damage your ability to boot. Using a USB zip drive on a Snow Leopard machine is a really easy way to get data onto a vintage Mac. That's an obscure bit of info that you might not run across. I'm using the v4.2 Iomega driver even on my OS9 system for this reason. You can reinitialize/erase the disk using zip tools v4.2 and restore its ability to be a boot disk however. I will add that you must be very careful to never use a disk you intend to boot from on a machine with driver/tools greater than v4.2. I’m sure a moderator will resolve this for you. This category seems to be for site administration announcements. PS: I think this is the wrong category to post this in. Recommend only using the same disks with the same drive for best experience.Īlso, never insert a disk when powered off, or power off a device with a disk inserted. The disks themselves can cause the drive to develop alignment issues, resulting in the “click of death” which kills drives and disks. Highly recommend if you get a working model, that you use brand new disks with it. I have a 100Mb Zip drive and it works well. The higher capacities have issue with older OS versions.
The 100Mb can boot system 6 if you choose. There is a SCSI and a Plus option that both work on your Mac. I would recommend sticking with 100Mb zip. Connecting a PC “parallel port” model to your Mac’s scsi port could damage the SCSI controller. Many are advertised as SCSI and in fact the seller has no clue. Firstly, be careful if you are trying to buy or acquire a Zip drive.