Slightly Off Center

About two weeks ago, my desktop computer fritzed out. It had been progressively less reliable, not wanting to boot up when I pressed the On button. It'd flash, but not start; except, occasionally, it would. Sometimes even long enough to get a project done. Sometimes it'd quit again just as I sat down to work. Very frustrating.

It's not my only computer. I have two MacBooks, one that has MS Office and Adobe Creative Suite from the days when you could buy them, and another newer model that I got just because I could no longer do my taxes on my laptop or Denise's. Which will probably not be used for much more than that, because I refuse to rent ("subscribe" to) software I already own, I'm looking at you MS and Adobe. I've also got an Android tablet and cell phone, for internet browsing and photo references for glazing, and of course, processing card payments for the pottery business.

The desktop, though, is important because it can still run OS 9 Classic, which is what I need to use Freehand 7, my preferred graphics software. (Don't talk to me about Illustrator. Freehand was so much better. Which is probably why Adobe bought the parent company and killed it.)

So I'm on my second Mac G4 tower, the first having died in much the same way. Last time, I just bought a used replacement online, but that seemed wasteful, given that the carcass of v. 1 is still in my storage unit. So I took it to MacTonic, my local repair shop, where they had it a week, and told me it needed a $295 power supply, and maybe I should just get a replacement.

I took it home and  went online to my supplier, DV Warehouse, where they indeed had the $295 part. They also had an early G4 for the same price, a later model for $395, and a Mirrored Door (my current) for $495. I thought about getting the cheaper machine. I thought about the dead computer in storage, that probably only needed the same part.

I bought the part.

It landed on my doorstep this morning, a long grey box with multiple cables and connectors, copiously swaddled in bubble wrap. I opened up my machine, taking pictures of every connection. Started unplugging cables, but couldn't figure out how to snake them out from behind all the other bits. Just at the point of hauling it all down to MacTonic, I remembered the internet. Googled "taking apart a Mac G4."

The first video was basically useless: badly lit, badly focused, music but no voice instruction. A dismantling music video. Second one was better, shorter and with specific instructions. I also found another fix-it site with photos and step-by-steps. Between the two, I was able to:

1. Disconnect ribbon cables and power leads from the mother board and drives.
2. Remove the primary hard drive.
3. Remove the back-up hard drive.
4. Unseat and remove the CD drive (and empty Zip Drive bay. Remember Zip drives?)
5. Disconnect and remove the cooling fan.

Which finally allowed me to unthread the power cables, unscrew the anchor, and slide out the power source.

Then I had to put it all back together. So glad I took pictures. I finally got everything reassembled in time for a lunch break; came back and plugged all the peripherals--keyboard, mouse, monitor. CD-R, flash drive, floppy drive. USB extension so I can plug in a thumb drive without reaching around the back of the machine (the one thing I envy about Windows boxes is the front USB port). Ethernet cable.

And, finally, the power cord. And then, heart in mouth, I pressed the "Start" button.

And it booted up first try.

I've turned it on twice since then, every time with a progressively smaller jolt of adrenaline, but it keeps working. Was able to send off a vector version of a logo to a banner maker, find and copy an artist statement for a gallery, download my email (200 items, I'll sort it out this weekend) and update the back-up copy of my pottery ledger.

Damn, it feels good.

Denise is a Library of Congress--certified Braille transcriber. She's been doing it for years, dating back to before we were married (and in fact loaned me her Braille texts when I was briefly dating a blind woman before we got together). She can work with slate and stylus or Perkins Brailler (the equivalent of a manual typewriter, but with only six keys, plus space bar and return), but most of her big jobs use her computer embosser.

This is Juliet. She can run various widths of paper, can do one or two-sided Braille, and is a sturdy, noisy workhorse Denise has used for over a decade. And therein lies a problem.

Juliet has a parallel port and a serial port. Juliet has no USB.

This is Bright Spot. She is an extremely old MacBook laptop. I believe she's still running OS 8. Her battery doesn't hold much of a charge, thus she's tied to her charger cable, no longer portable, but she has a floppy drive, a serial port, and will run an early version of Duxbury Braille Translator.

To produce Braille with Juliet, Denise will first import text to the current version of Duxbury on her newish laptop (OS 10.13), translate to Braille, format, proof, and save to a USB thumb drive. Then she has to boot up my desktop Mac (OS 10.8, I think?), which can still copy to a floppy drive, transfer her files, and then go wake up Juliet and Bright Spot to make noise (and Braille).

This past month, she got her first Braille job in over two years (because global f***ing pandemic), imported the files, did the translation, struggled with the floppy (we discovered that OS 10.13 will read off a plug-in floppy drive fine, but doesn't want to write to it. Hence the extra step through my older desktop, which I keep around to run OS 9/Classic graphics software), but finally was ready to emboss.

And Bright Spot wouldn't start. We tried all the different 3-key resets--remember those?--finally hit the reboot point in the back, and discovered that she was starting, but the screen was so faint, even at maximum brightness, that we could barely see it. We had to close the blinds and turn out all the lights, so Denise was able to emboss the project. But this is clearly not sustainable. And God alone knows whether there are any Mac techs out there that can still fix such an old device, let alone whether they can get parts.

So I went online searching for solutions. Eventually found USB-to-Serial cables, ordered one. The software that came with it was heavily Windows-centric, and the one Mac driver was for an older OS, but I was able to get a current version from their website, although the promised documentation didn't seem to be included in the download. Download, install, plug in. And nothing happened.

So I went back to the internet looking for Printer Drivers. Apparently, the company that built Juliet, Enabling Technologies, has got out of the Braille business in favor of accessible vans, but I finally tracked down someone making open-source drivers for Enabling Braillers. Downloaded that, installed. And the Printer/Scanner Preference panel can't find it.

It's in there, in the folder with the other drivers--Canon, Epson, HP. I just can't make the technology talk to each other.

I need to take a break and do something I know I'm good at. Got a ton of clay in last week. Think I'll go throw some honey jars.