Andrew Weitzel

Power Macintosh 7250/120 + Apple Multiple Scan 15 + Apple Extended Keyboard II

5 May 1992
Dear Dennis,

I have begun to get acquainted with the McIntosh system. I believe this may take some time to get a feel for the possibilites.

Speaking of which, I have also to grasp the intent of McIntosh with the "Desk Top" philosophy. I can't seem to understand the advantages to having several programs spread all over the top of my "computer desk". I don't do this outside of the computer and don't quite understand how this can be an advantage. Any answers?

-A charming excerpt from a SimpleText file found on the original SCSI hard drive in this machine

$20 and a drive down to Rising Sun, MD., netted me all-of-the-above, plus a Bus Mouse I and a random SCSI cable! The monitor took a nasty bump at one point, and repairs are in progress.

Here's the whole haul, as it looked straight out of the barn it used to live in. The property was being cleared out, so I'm guessing someone died. Likely, it was the patriarch of the family contracting business, based on the contents of the HDD (which was out and being imaged at the the time of this photo, hence the "?" disk icon).

No surprises. Just a bog standard 7250/120 w/16MB of RAM...

...and a whopping 2GB SCSI HDD running running System 7.5.3. The 2GB HDD was the higher-end choice; the cheaper default was 1.2GB.

First: The keyboard, an Apple Extended Keyboard II

My first mechanical ADB keyboard! Also, in some opinions, the best keyboard ever made.

Unfortunately, mine did not come with a male-to-male ADB cable. I tried out a random S-Video cable I had lying around, but to no effect. Was the keyboard dead? Luckily, someone on eBay makes brand new ADB cables and only charges $10 for them, and since I only paid $20 for this whole lot, that's not a big ask. The new cable did the trick, so it was time to clean this thing up.

This thing is somewhat gross, so I figured I'd better get her apart and clean her up.

One screw removed and some plastic tabs pushed in, and I was in. This ifixit guide came in clutch here. It wasn't too horrendus inside (my m0110 keyboard was full of dead yellowjackets, for a comparison), but this one had plenty of dust bunnies and animal hair to vacuum out.

The metal tray that the board is attached to: vacuumed and toothbrushed with IPA. Looks much better.

All the keys, along with both halves of the case, got a bath of soap and water in the kitchen sink. What is it with spacebar keys being the only ones that get yellow?

Reassembly wasn't tedious at all! I was listening to Apostolic Majesty's 4-hour discussion on Talleyrand and it took up a nice chunk of that.

Back together and tested on my Power Mac 7600. Everything works, and it looks nice and clean. Definitely has a bit of sunburn, with tan lines where a function key template certainly lived. I'm not a personal fan of the Retro Bright look, so this to me looks fine enough.

https://andrew.weitzel.tech

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Power Macintosh 7250/120 + Apple Multiple Scan 15 + Apple Extended Keyboard II

First: The keyboard, an Apple Extended Keyboard II

My first mechanical ADB keyboard! Also, in some opinions, the best keyboard ever made.

Thanks for stopping by!

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