# RetroGeekery: Primordial Mac on a LAN? **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [December 28, 2017, 4:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/retrogeekery-primordial-mac-on-a-lan/805468 "2017-12-28T16:43:27Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 10\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![AHunter3](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ahunter3/32/368_2.png) [@AHunter3](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/AHunter3)\ **Post date:** [December 28, 2017, 4:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/retrogeekery-primordial-mac-on-a-lan/805468/1 "2017-12-28T16:43:27Z")
TL/DR version: How do I get a LocalTalk System 6 Mac onto an ethernet-based LAN as an AppleTalk and TCP-IP client? I have an AsantéPrint LocalTalk to Ethernet bridge but can’t get it working. details: I maintain a “computer museum” consisting of all my prior-edition Macs: an original LC, my PowerMac 7100, a pair of “WallStreet” G3 PowerBooks, a pair of 17" G4 PowerBooks, and the match to this Sandy Bridge i7 MacBook Pro. With the addition of an ethernet PDS card to the LC and a 10baseT transceiver to the 7100’s native AAUI port, I have them all on a LAN, plugged into a NetGear 16 port Gigabit switch, all of them getting an IP address and all of them running some version of Timbuktu (which has astonishingly excellent backwards compatibility, so I can remote in and remotely control a System 7.6 box from this MacOS X 10.11.6 main computer). The one relic missing from the computer museum was the first I ever owned, a Macintosh SE that I discarded when the accelerator fried out and I had no interest at the time in a native 8 MHz / 2 MB RAM computer. Well, I just replaced it (for the obvious geeky cred bragging rights of having at least a facsimile of all the computers I’ve ever owned): a substitute Macintosh SE with a difficult-to-find Applied Engineering 40 MHz '030 accelerator sporting [16 MB of RAM](http://home.earthlink.net/~ahunter3/MoreStuff/IMG_0272.JPG) (which not only works on the SE that theoretically maxes out at 4 but works under System 6 which isn’t supposed to be able to address that much RAM… AE did some cute tricks!) I couldn’t find a Mac SE PDS ethernet card (not yet at any rate) but I scored an AsantePrint LocalTak to Ethernet bridge. I thought that would let me set up the little SE so that it could participate in an AppleTalk network (the 7100 has classic file sharing enabled; the SE has AppleShare installed for the Chooser) and also get an IP (MacTCP is set up and LocalTalk is an option for it). Can’t get it working. I have the Asante manager software installed on the 7100 under MacOS 8.6 and it [sees the Asanté device](http://home.earthlink.net/~ahunter3/MoreStuff/asante%20setup.jpg) [PowerBook G3 under MacOS 9 sees the 7100’s AppleTalk share](http://home.earthlink.net/~ahunter3/MoreStuff/MacOS%209%20sees%20the%20share.jpg) [The SE, on the AsantePrint connector to the LAN, does not](http://home.earthlink.net/~ahunter3/MoreStuff/SE%20Chooser%20No%20Shares.JPG) [MacTCP Control Panel under System 6 on the SE](http://home.earthlink.net/~ahunter3/MoreStuff/LocalTalk%20as%20a%20MacTCP%20Option.JPG) showing LocalTalk as a MacTCP option. The IP Address shown here is manually set up under the “More…” button. If I utilize “obtain from server” I get 0.0.0.0 instead; it isn’t seen by the router as a participant either way. I don’t have prior experience: back when the SE was my everyday computer, it went online courtesy of a 2400 baud modem, and MacTCP did what it needed to using MacPPP; I never networked one with other Macs although at school the Mac lab certainly had all the SEs and SE/30s and older Mac Plusses networked so they could access a file server and print to the LaserPrinters — don’t know if they had a part ethernet / part LocalTalk network or not. Anyone able to help me get this little toaster onto my LAN? (I have Timbuktu of the System 6 vintage… it’s too old for the 10.11.6 box to connect to directly but I could daisy-chain to it via the 7100 as an inbetween-station) ---
**Author:** ![beowulff](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/beowulff/32/542_2.png) [@beowulff](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/beowulff)\ **Post date:** [December 28, 2017, 4:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/retrogeekery-primordial-mac-on-a-lan/805468/2 "2017-12-28T16:48:39Z")
It has been decades since I did any of this, but the fist thing I would do is to configure the IP address , netmask, and router manually, and see if you get any communication. I seem to recall that the Asante bridge wasn’t a full-fledged IP interface, just for printing, but I may be mistaken. ---
**Author:** ![AHunter3](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ahunter3/32/368_2.png) [@AHunter3](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/AHunter3)\ **Post date:** [December 28, 2017, 4:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/retrogeekery-primordial-mac-on-a-lan/805468/3 "2017-12-28T16:55:47Z")
> [@beowulff](#): > > It has been decades since I did any of this, but the fist thing I would do is to configure the IP address , netmask, and router manually, and see if you get any communication. > > I seem to recall that the Asante bridge wasn’t a full-fledged IP interface, just for printing, but I may be mistaken. Someone else told me that about the Asante bridge device, that it’s no good for anything but printing. Does that mean… • there’s some other LocalTalk to Ethernet bridge that I could obtain instead that handles both AppleTalk and TCP/IP? or • that I need to hold out for an ethernet PDS card if I want to put this box on the LAN? Ultimately I don’t need TCP/IP: Timbuktu of that vintage runs over AppleTalk, and if I can get it and the 7100 on speaking terms over AppleTalk I can TB2 into the 7100 and TB2 from the 7100 to the SE. I’ve daisy-chained Timbuktu connections successfully before in fact. Tested it on the LC which has a System 6 partition. ETA: I did manually input 255.255.255.0, the router’s IP address, and a manual IP that’s within the DHCP range of the router (but not in current use by any other device on the network) but the router doesn’t see it as a client the way it sees all the other devices. I suppose to be sure I need to install an internet-savvy system-6 compatible application, maybe Fetch 2.0 or something and verify that no it isn’t online… but I’m pretty sure it isn’t. ---
**Author:** ![beowulff](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/beowulff/32/542_2.png) [@beowulff](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/beowulff)\ **Post date:** [December 29, 2017, 4:26am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/retrogeekery-primordial-mac-on-a-lan/805468/4 "2017-12-29T04:26:58Z")
Some good information [here](http://lowendmac.com/network/bridge.shtml). ---
**Author:** ![AHunter3](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ahunter3/32/368_2.png) [@AHunter3](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/AHunter3)\ **Post date:** [January 31, 2018, 10:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/retrogeekery-primordial-mac-on-a-lan/805468/5 "2018-01-31T22:00:12Z")
I got myself a DaynaPort SCSI-to-ethernet adapter and now it’s online 🙂 I can connect to the SE from the other computers using Timbuktu, which is good for both remote control and also for transferring files. I discovered that my Basilisk II emulator, which has System 7.6 installed, can connect directly to the SE over TCP/IP. Nice! ---
**Author:** ![beowulff](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/beowulff/32/542_2.png) [@beowulff](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/beowulff)\ **Post date:** [January 31, 2018, 10:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/retrogeekery-primordial-mac-on-a-lan/805468/6 "2018-01-31T22:04:02Z")
Well, I think you win this month’s “Cool, but useless” project contest. 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![AHunter3](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ahunter3/32/368_2.png) [@AHunter3](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/AHunter3)\ **Post date:** [January 31, 2018, 10:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/retrogeekery-primordial-mac-on-a-lan/805468/7 "2018-01-31T22:34:10Z")
> [@beowulff](#): > > Well, I think you win this month’s “Cool, but useless” project contest. > > 🙂 Oh yes, that’s true. Of the entire computer museum, very few of the machines serve any real purpose, and some that do (like the G3 PowerBook that can boot MacOS 9 and hence can make use of a USB slide scanner that doesn’t have an OS X driver) are only rarely used. I doubt the SE can do anything I couldnt do with the vMac emulator. ---
**Author:** ![beowulff](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/beowulff/32/542_2.png) [@beowulff](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/beowulff)\ **Post date:** [January 31, 2018, 10:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/retrogeekery-primordial-mac-on-a-lan/805468/8 "2018-01-31T22:49:26Z")
I keep Sheepshaver around for the very unlikely event that I need to modify some PCB designs I made decades ago. ---
**Author:** ![AHunter3](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ahunter3/32/368_2.png) [@AHunter3](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/AHunter3)\ **Post date:** [January 31, 2018, 11:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/retrogeekery-primordial-mac-on-a-lan/805468/9 "2018-01-31T23:00:46Z")
> [@beowulff](#): > > I keep Sheepshaver around for the very unlikely event that I need to modify some PCB designs I made decades ago. Yep. Sheepshaver is nice. Good ol’ MacOS 8.6 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![seal\_cleaner](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/e274bd/32.png) [@seal\_cleaner](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/seal_cleaner)\ **Post date:** [February 1, 2018, 12:26am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/retrogeekery-primordial-mac-on-a-lan/805468/10 "2018-02-01T00:26:39Z")
i seem to remember connecting to a network using an Asante adapter and the Chooser.