Hi Doug. Thanks for writing. There are three possible fixes that I know of for your problem—which I also experienced with my PowerCenter Pro 210 and its original Teac CD drive:

• After a search of the MacFixIt Archives, I found this in the November 1999 Archive: CD-ROM ToolKit and Mac clones: a follow-up Regarding our report last time on using CD-ROM ToolKit with Mac clones: Eric Johnston writes that, with his Power Computing PowerCenter Pro 210 running Mac OS 9, he fixed his CD-ROM drive woes by deleting FWB’s CD-ROM ToolKit and using Apple’s CD-ROM 5.3.x driver from Mac OS 7.6 (a solution that has been recommended for several OS iterations). He adds: “While Apple’s newer CD/DVD-ROM drivers don’t recognize my OEM Teac CD drive, the OS 7.6 Apple driver works just fine.”
• There is a ResEdit hack available at the wonderful ResExcellence site if you’re up to playing with a few lines of code. :-)
• I have a copy of the hacked CD/DVD Driver that I would be happy to e-mail to you to try.

I hope this helps, and, once again, thanks for reading ATPM! —Edward Goss

Thanks for writing. With virtual memory turned off (which is the way I always run my Macs) your friend should not have any problems unless he is woefully short of RAM, or has allocated so much memory to the programs he uses that he runs out of available memory. Make sure he checks the “About This Macintosh (or Computer)” in the Apple menu to see how much built-in RAM he has, and the largest unused block available. With VM off, if you allocate more RAM than you have a program will not open—or freeze the Mac—requiring a forced restart. The space available on his hard drive would only be a concern if his hard drive were nearly full, or he set virtual memory so high that it didn’t have enough room to function. But with hard drive prices so low now, he really should consider a much larger drive if he plans to stay with his 7500. —Edward Goss

When you turn on your Mac and the screen doesn’t light up, do you still hear the “chime” that sounds when your Mac starts up? If you do then the problem is related to your video board or VRAM. If you do not, then the problem is related to your accelerator card.

When your Mac doesn’t chime it indicates that there is a problem with the timing of the accelerator. On a machine such as the 7100 which was a pre-ZIF design, you must configure the bus timing between the accelerator and the logic board so that they can both run at speeds that yield a stable system. There should be DIP switches on the accelerator card itself which configure the bus timing, and the manual that accompanied the accelerator should describe the switch settings. Likewise they may be described on the manufacturer’s Web site.

The best method is to start at the “slowest” speed which will be sure to work. Then switch up faster and faster until the machine no longer works. At that point, go back to the last setting and you’re done. If you find the machine is not stable or crashes or freezes more often than expected, switch the card down to one setting slower. With a G3 upgrade even the slowest setting will result in vastly improved performance over a 7100 so don’t worry about whether or not you are squeezing the maximum MHz out of your accelerator board. Always shoot for a stable system. Running your machine too hot is bad for all the components.

If you do hear the startup chime when you start up your Mac, then the problem is likely an incompatibility with your video card, or if you are using on board video your VRAM is too slow to keep up with the accelerator and you must replace it with VRAM that has a higher refresh rate. If this is the case let me know and we can pursue this further. But my hunch is that you aren’t hearing the chime and so we’re talking about a simple DIP switch issue on the G3 card. —Evan Trent