" This version of Disk First Aid repairs some kinds of damage to Mac OS Extended volumes that have become extremely fragmented and fail to start up. Disk First Aid 8.6 also improves the compatibility of Mac OS Extended format hard disks with Mac OS X.

This version of Disk First Aid is able to repair more kinds of problems on a startup hard disk. However, Apple recommends that you start your computer from a different disk (such as a CD or floppy disk) before repairing the startup disk"

Download the English-North America or English-International versions.

" Mike,
Deja vu all over again... my old PB3400 has had similar probs over the years; service guys (and you) note contacts and shorts... fix was to tweak both; evidently in addition to clean, contacts must make FIRM and CONSISTENT contact, otherwise VSBL (very short battery life) occurs.

Internal contacts may need to be carefully bent out slightly to make the firm part happen, and perhaps a strip (or 2) of tape inside the battery well to help eliminate any wiggle room, and possible shorting, to make the consistent part happen.

Unfortunately, w/o re-asking the tech dude, I can't give an exact size, or location, for the piece(s) of tape, but do know that the fix worked, as old battery has sprung back to life each time.
Rgards,
Buzz McB "

" Hi Mike,
I have a Wallstreet 300, and I have a similar battery problem, although I have never swapped the drive. I do ahve a third-party 128MB upgrade, but it has been installed since day one and the problem has only started in the last six months.

I also had a battery go from 2 hours plus to about 10 mins of useful life. When I hit the battery with the Apple-supplied Battery Reset application it seems to fix the battery for one or two uses, but then it is back to only lasting 10 minutes or so. I worked on this a bit, and even broke down and took the 'book apart and replaced the internal battery (not an easy job on Wallstreets! I had to take it completley apart.) Nothing else seems to help.

one last note, I do see one other symptom. If I let the battery go for a while without resetting it, eventually the 'book will act as though it has lost it's PRAM on startup. It was this problem that led me to investigate this.

Anyway, I hope that's helpful.
Mike Caplinger
System Administrator
Dept of Physics and Astronomy
University of Georgia "

" Maybe Apple's "Battery Reset" download could help. Sort of a stab in the dark, but I doubt it could make the situation worse....

http://asu.info.apple.com/swupdates.nsf/artnum/n11542

Jack Brown
Electrical Engineer
Pacific Aerospace and Electronics "

" Mike,
I was about to sell off my Cube!
After a few months of painfully frustrating awaiting delayed delivery I finally received Microtech's FireSCSI Xpress, which is a Firewire to SCSI adapter. I have several legacy SCSI peripherals which have failed to work with the other Firewire to SCSI adapters currently available (including another company's prototype). In particular, my Polaroid SprintScan 4000 and 4500 film scanners work with this adapter and the Cube. Very transparent, functional product, in keeping with the expectations one would have for Microtech.

Also purchased one of the 12 Radeon cards you highlighted last week--awaiting delivery. I'll let you know how it goes.
Thanks, Jeff Wright"

The URL for Microtech's $119 (list) FireSCSI is here. As noted in yesterday's post on the Ratoc adapter, FWdepot.com recently announced a Firewire/SCSI adapter that supports up to 7 drives, but I've had no reports from owners so far.

" I've got an iMac DV 400 and picked up a FireREX1 to use an Orb drive. I also have an ultra-scsi conner pocket hard drive (240 MB) and an old external CD-Rom drive. The FireREX never worked with the CD-Rom. The Conner drive mounted using the Storage Master software (this software has been sold to a "mystery buyer"- rumored to be Apple, so support for it may be a problem) software, but failed when I tried to copy any significant quantity of data.

The Orb drive worked intermittently. Again, it seemed unstable when copying large files or many small files. It would hang, requiring a hard restart. Eventually an Orb disk was damaged to the extent it can no longer be used or reformatted- the drive just ejects it.

Ratoc Systems email support says the problem may be that the drives aren't providing adequate power, but the Orb power supply is a recent and higher powered version (2 amp). Ratoc sells an external power supply for the FireREX for about $25, but I hesitate to get it without some assurance that it'll work reliably with this additional piece. They've also offered to reformat the Orb disk for me, but I have my doubts whether they can do it.

Overall, an unsatisfactory experience.
Fred Brock
De Novo Systems "

Apparently as with USB/SCSI adapters, the SCSI device must provide terminator power.

" Mike-
I have a question I have not been able to solve on other forums. I've replaced my Wallstreet 300 hard drive twice during the past year (for more space) and each time the battery was trashed. It went from 2 hours of life to less than 10 minutes when I restarted after the replacement.

The first time I went through all kinds of troubleshooting including checking to see if I had dislodged/moved anything, downloading battery reset, extension checks, innumerable power manager resets, power supply checks, replacing the old drive, etc. with no results.

After several months I bought a new battery and it worked great! A few months later I replaced the drive with a third one (using the second as my backup drive) and it happened again. Battery life was over 2 hours before the swap, and is now 10 minutes or less, instantly.

I always discharged any static electricity, I removed all power before the job, I was very careful while working inside the machine, and it doesn't seem to be the computer since the second battery was flawless until the third drive.

Any ideas before I go out and buy yet another battery? Has anyone ever heard of this? The second and third drives were both IBM travelstars (25G and 32G). By the way, the 32G is amazing!
Thanks again for your informative site.
Hugh"

I asked if he checked the battery contacts (he said they were clean and ok), if the drive could be shorting out against anything (component on the drive ckt board) and he seems have to done the usual tips (reset power manager, etc.) but if any readers have a suggestion please let me know.

This story reminded me of an Apple TIL note in the news here recently regarding Apple's comments on resetting the PMU in a G4 tower, noting it could drain the internal lithium battery in minutes if not done correctly.

(Original Dec 14th, 2000 news item follows)

" Dear Editor,
Our company is in a position where we are now building adapters that allow SVGA and DVI capable video cards to connect to the new Apple Display Connector (ADC) for our high end clients. We have noted a vocal group amongst the Mac community who proclaim they would like to use older DVI/SVGA equipped Macs, or new third party DVI/SVGA cards with the new ADC connectors on the current Apple Display offerings. If we can establish that enough interest exists for this expensive solution, we will consider building these units in quantity for public sale.

We would greatly appreciate it if you were to post the following URL to your news page or user list:

http://homepage.mac.com/macspecialist

Thanks for your kind consideration.
The MacSpecialists"

Apple sells a $39 ADC to DVI adapter cable now (that's the easy one, since DVI signals are in the ADC connector). However to go from DVI to ADC means providing a 28V power supply also. Not sure how much demand there is, since I suspect the total number of owners of ADC displays are small and 99% of them (or more) have a ADC port already on the graphics card (comes with new macs, most ADC monitor sales are part of new mac system sales I suspect)

• Newer Tech G3/260 in 4000 (rated 10)
• Metabox Joecard G4/400 ZIF in B&W G3 (rated 9)
• Metabox Joecard G3/500 in PowerTowerPro 225 (rated 10)
  (notes having to update the Miles U2 SCSI card firmware)
• Metabox Joecard G3/400 in 8500/120 (rated 9)
  
  
• Apple G4/400 (PCI/Yikes) OC report (running 450)

You can find these full reports by searching the database selecting the indicated Mac model and upgrade card brand/type. If you've upgraded the CPU on your Mac, please post an entry in the database. Search the database for entries from most every upgradable Mac model *before* you buy. (Searchable by mac model/upgrade brand)

DVD ROM Drives:
• IDE Pioneer DVD-115 (16x) in Beige G3
  
  CDROM Drives:
• IDE LG Goldstar CRD 8400 in Beige G3
  (listed under "Other" brands)
  
  CDRW Drives:
• IDE Plextor 12x/10x/32x in Beige G3
  (Noted spin-down issues, fixed by disabling CD/DVD extension)
• USB Lacie (4x4x8x?) w/iBook
• IDE Sony CDU928E in Beige G3
  (notes Discribe does not recognize the drive)
  
  Hard Drives:
• IDE Maxtor Diamond Max 80GB in G4 (PCI/Yikes)
• SCSI Seagate ST39103LW 9GB in Dual G4 (w/39160 SCSI card)
  (notes 2 failures, waiting for 3rd drive.)

You can find these full reports by searching the database with the drive/brand/mac models listed above selected (the latest reports are shown first in searches).
If you've added a IDE, SCSI, Firewire or USB hard drive, CDRW, tape drive, etc. make sure you add a report to the database.

Software Updates:

• Epson Stylus 1.0cEs (direct download link)
• Adaptec PhotoRelay 1.0.4 [P/O Toast Deluxe] (direct download link)
• Disk First Aid 8.6 (English-North America) (apple)
• Disk First Aid 8.6 (English-International ) (apple)
• Copy Agent 1.0.1
• DynDNS Client
• WebObjects 4.0.1 Patch 3 (Windows NT)
• WebObjects 4.0.1 Patch 3 (Solaris)
• AsanteFAST 590 1.0 Beta (OS X) (direct download link)
• Asante FriendlyNET GigaNIC 1.0 Beta (OS X) (direct download link)
• Asante FriendlyNET GigaNIX Beta 1.0 (direct download link)

Apple TIL Updates:
• Mac OS: Multiple Users Creates a Desktop Folder for Each User
• Disk First Aid 8.6: Software and Information

Mac News: (Note: Regurgitated press releases, etc. are not listed)

• Laptop learning to land for UW-Stout freshmen (JSonline)
• Video Tutorial: Saturation in Adobe Photoshop 6 (digitalmedia designer)
• Dreamweaver 4: Something for Everyone (creativepro)
• Study Finds That Caching by Browsers Creates a Threat to Surfers' Privacy (NYTimes)

Misc. Hardware Related:
• Hard-drive giants to merge (macuser UK)
• Pentium 4 castrated to keep costs down (the register)