I am getting a 5300cs running OS 8. I ahve two questions:
1) How easy is it to set up a WaveLAN wireless card with OS 8? Anyone with experience in this please advise me.
2) I want to use a compact flash card with a PCMCIA card reader, mostly for file transfer, but maybe for other things--virtual memory, etc.
Please help!
Also, if anyone has any more case mod ideas please keep sharing!
Thanks!!
I'll let others comment on the WaveLAN card, but if (big if) you find drivers, it should be easy.
A CF-to-PCMCIA adapter should work quite well for file transfers and booting (I use one on a PB190cs). If you have any problems formatting the CF card (i.e., "Erase Disk" only gives "DOS" format as an option) then just temporarily pull PC Exchange from your System Folder.
Regarding using flash for virtual memory, you may find that it wears out your flash card. Flash memory circuits have a limited life span of about 10,000 to 100,000 writes to each bit of memory. VM can be pretty write-intensive. We've argued about this one before and it really depends on the card (some cards have circuitry that spreads the wear) and the application (how often the OS writes to flash). My guess is that you could wear the card out in as little as 100 hours or it may last virtually forever.
You might also find that the CF card is slower than the HD. The few tests I've done on the 190cs suggest that my CF card is about 1/2 the speed of the stock IDE HD when tested with Speedometer. But this result may be due to the CF card (a 4 MB KODAK card from a garage sale) or the adapter.
In the end, though, silence is golden. I love running the 190cs with the HD spun down.
Here is a good site for setting up wireless: http://www.penmachine.com/techie/airport1400.html
Thanks!! That's a great resource. I have something else--I have an old external cd-rom that I need to use for installation of drivers etc. It is recognized by System Profiler, but I can't find it on the computer itself--it does not pop up on the desktop or anything. Any thoughts anyone?
This may sound obvious but, try putting a known readable disk in (even just an audio CD should work).
Mutant_Pie
Yep, tried it and it didn't work. Anyway, sold the thing this weekend, so I am now waiting for the arrival of a 1400. Thanks to everyone who posted with ideas!!
Did you check that the Apple CD Rom extensions were loading in Extensions Manager?
I've been using the WavLAN card (Silver and Gold) in my PB 5300 for many years - rock solid. Running 8.1. Drivers are available on several sites
I'm wondering if anyone has ever found a PCMCIA USB card that works in the PB 5300???
THX,
Bob
Most USB (and firewire) cards are CardBus, 32bit, and are not 'backwards compatable' with the old 16bit only hardware, that's why you can't find any that work.
And 16-bit slots are just about fast enough to handle USB, and no where near fast enough for FW.