This is my MARCHintosh 2025 project post. My goal was to get the physical hardware of a "classic" Mac online and connected with the other folks participating in GlobalTalk. I'm very happy that after years of trying, I actually have a working solution this year.
Back Story
A few years back, I started to restore a Macintosh SE/30. The process has taken years and it's still not completed. It's challenging to find old information and dig up personal memories containing the nuances of how 30+ year old technology works. The 68K and PowerPC eras of Macintoshes span over two decades. How combinations of software versions lead to disaster or stability are now condensed and the nuances are lost to time and fading memories. There is information online and knowledgable people, but there are aspects to these projects that feel like an archaeological dig. Which can add to the fun.
I have referred to this video multiple times over the past few years to reabsorb information after running into problems or forgetting details. The more people share their knowledge and record it on modern media, the easier it is for these computers to live on. This is very similar to classic car culture and communities that preserve documentation and historical data to aide in restoring a model of car.
On a side note, it's amazing to see how large VCFMW has become. 10 years ago, I would go with a friend back when it was in a large meeting room of a hotel. It only took a few hours to explore the entire show. Now we're planning on making it a weekend event as the show takes up a large room of a convention center.
Restoration
I began restoring a second Mac after my SE/30 project had some twists and turns. I had a Macintosh SE in pretty rough condition. It was functional and stable which is a great place to start.
I picked up a green clear case from MacEffects as the original case was in rough condition. I also ordered a 68030 accelerator card to boos performance. The SE was locked in at 4MB of RAM and the 800K floppy drive, but it should be usable. The original chassis was full of grime and coated with dust. I was lucky to find a local shop that rented out their media blasting cabinets by the hour. I was able to make the chassis look brand new within a matter of minutes.
I wanted to prevent some of the issues I experienced with the SE/30 and I had the analog board and logic board re-capped and swapped out the battery to use a CR2032. I had a small snag with the analog board, and it helped that I've picked up some spare parts over the years to help with troubleshooting. Especially with flickering video issues where there is the analog board, neck board, and CRT tube that require caution while working around. Be sure to discharge the CRT whenever working on a compact Mac like this.
The stylish green case necessitated some custom parts because the original parts would have stuck out like a sore thumb. I designed and printed new feet for the case, the knob for the brightness/dimmer control, and a bracket to mount a BlueSCSI. I also modified a design to hold the speaker in place, but was too tight for my speaker. This filament used was a Green Sunlu PLA+ which is a nice match to the color of the case.
After some trial and error, I was able to have a clean MacOS 7.1 install working with some utilities. I have had this Mac SE running for over a month 24/7. It was important that I had a stable machine that could participate in GlobalTalk for the entire month of March.
Networking
Now to get this SE to talk with other Macs. The BlueSCSI in the SE makes it easy to get connected to the network via WiFi and I had an original iMac hardwired into a switch. My modern Ubiquiti network would allow each machine to surf the web and ping IP addresses but not let AppleTalk pass between the machines. Luckily I had an Apple AirPort Extreme in storage that I could use. I created a separate network connected to a different port on my Fiber ONT box. The AirPort allowed AppleTalk to pass through and the the Macs could see each other in the Chooser and mount shared folders.
I needed to route AppleTalk out of my network to others to participate in GlobalTalk. This can be done using the Apple Internet Router (AIR) software. There are multiple blog posts that detail the steps to make this work, but one that packaged all the software in a format that was easy to unpack and install was this handy writeup on DillerNet.
Unfortunately, the 4MB RAM limitation of the SE led to AIR crashing after the IP tunnel configuration was added. It's a shame because there were some neat utilities like AIRConfig which makes keeping the GlobalTalk IP list updated easy. I really had wanted this project to use all vintage hardware, but reality sets in. I'm not using any hard drives for example and the BlueSCSI and other new mods for these old machines are meant to enhance the original experience. My SE/30 could run AIR, but isn't ready. The iMac running MacOS 8.6 is too new and will not run AIR. I attempted to install it and mess around with the AppleTalk extension, but it failed miserably. It felt like I was going to miss MARCHintosh for yet another year.
jrouter
The jrouter project saved the day by acting as a compatible AIR replacement. I had a spare Raspberry Pi 3 available and while I wanted to use all original physical hardware for my project, I think this is a fair compromise. The Pi can run 24x7 without drawing a lot of power making it easier for me to keep my GlobalTalk zone up and running without relying on a retr0 Mac.
I loaded the Pi with the latest Raspberry Pi OS Lite. I had to use the following commands to install docker:
# Add Docker's official GPG key:
sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get install ca-certificates curl gnupg
sudo install -m 0755 -d /etc/apt/keyrings
curl -fsSL https://download.docker.com/linux/debian/gpg | sudo gpg --dearmor -o /etc/apt/keyrings/docker.gpg
sudo chmod a+r /etc/apt/keyrings/docker.gpg
# Add the repository to Apt sources:
echo \
"deb [arch="$(dpkg --print-architecture)" signed-by=/etc/apt/keyrings/docker.gpg] https://download.docker.com/linux/debian \
"$(. /etc/os-release && echo "$VERSION_CODENAME")" stable" | \
sudo tee /etc/apt/sources.list.d/docker.list > /dev/null
sudo apt-get update
# Install Docker
sudo apt-get install -y docker-ce docker-ce-cli containerd.io docker-buildx-plugin docker-compose-plugin
docker run hello-world
After that I cloned the repo and built a local docker image. Once running, jrouter has a status page that shows all the zones and connection details. There was one trick that was identified by Miguel Arroz where troublesome NAT was causing traffic to shift ports.
sudo nft add table raw
sudo nft add chain raw prerouting {type filter hook prerouting priority -300\;}
sudo nft add rule raw prerouting udp dport 387 udp sport set 387
And that's it. I have a working GlobalTalk setup using physical retro Mac hardware.
Conclusion
I've only visited a few other zones on GlobalTalk so far. I grabbed a copy of Tetris, and a few other goodies. I'm looking forward to adding more machines to my network and finding ways to contribute and share back to the greater community. It's a lot of fun and reminds me of what the internet was like back in the 90's. Exploration, experimentation, and meeting interesting people.
For more information about MARCHintosh visit https://marchintosh.com/ and look for the #MARCHintosh hashtag on your preferred social media site.
#MARCHintosh Event Logo concept and design by Javier Rivera | YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/c/JavMaster | Twitter: @javmast3r