Does anyone have a suggestion on how to connect SCSI external drives to current iMacs? I have several old SCSI drives that I used with my Power Macint

[macnicol]

Does anyone have a suggestion on how to connect SCSI external drives to current iMacs? I have several old SCSI drives that I used with my Power Macintosh 7600/120 that I would like to check for any archiveable files and then erase and reformat before discarding. Are there adapters that convert SCSI to either USB or FireWire (1394)?

 

[chabig]

I don’t think you’ll find an adapter. You might have to resurrect an old Mac to read the drives. When you’re done with them, I wouldn’t bother erasing or formatting. I would physically destroy them. Hammers and screwdrivers do wonders on the platters.

 

[joevt]

There exists USB or FireWire to SCSI adapters but I don't know if they make them anymore. If not, then maybe you can buy used from eBay.
https://www.synchrotech.com/support/ratoc-scsi-firewire-usb-fr1sx-u2scx-lvd-faq-supplement.html
http://computercableinc.com/ccinc/products.jsp?sub=USB+to+SCSI-2-+(MD50)&id=3322

I have many SCSI disks from old Macs (Macintosh LC, …, Power Mac 8600) but I have never tried any SCSI adapters so I don't know how well they work.

You'll need an external SCSI enclosure or an adapter.
https://iec.net/product-tag/internal-scsi-adapters-w-id50/
https://iec.net/product-tag/passive-devices-w-id50/
https://www.cnet.com/products/belkin-scsi-microdb50-m-to-microcentronics50-m-6-cable/
https://www.globalspec.com/ds/2339/areaspec/prod_type_contr

 

[chabig]

Depending upon the age of the drives, you might get lucky and find SATA drives inside your SCSI enclosures. If you do, then all you'd need would be a simple SATA dock, like this:

Rosewill Dual Bay Docking Station Enclosure USB 3.0 for 2.5"/3.5" SATA III HDD and SSD External Hard Drive Clone Without Computer - RX235 - Newegg.com

Buy Rosewill Dual Bay Docking Station Enclosure USB 3.0 for 2.5"/3.5" SATA III HDD and SSD External Hard Drive Clone Without Computer - RX235 with fast shipping and top-rated customer service. Once you know, you Newegg!

www.newegg.com

 

[Amethyst1]

Depending upon the age of the drives, you might get lucky and find SATA drives inside your SCSI enclosures.

Considering they were used with a 7600, I'd say this is extremely unlikely. Most external SCSI drives were indeed SCSI drives.

 

[chabig]

Considering they were used with a 7600, I'd say this is extremely unlikely. Most external SCSI drives were indeed SCSI drives.

Yes. I agree.

 

[joevt]

I've never heard of SATA inside SCSI. Do you have an example? We are talking here about Parallel era SCSI.

 

[chabig]

I've never heard of SATA inside SCSI. Do you have an example? We are talking here about Parallel era SCSI.

Wow. I'm not thinking back far enough. I think you're right. I was thinking of Firewire enclosures. He's probably going to have to find an old Mac to read those drives.

 

[Amethyst1]

There exists USB or FireWire to SCSI adapters but I don't know if they make them anymore. If not, then maybe you can buy used from eBay.

Ratoc System FireREX1 Firewire Ultrascsi Converter F/S Used 4949090347304 | eBay

Find many great new & used options and get the best deals for Ratoc System FireREX1 Firewire Ultrascsi Converter F/S Used at the best online prices at eBay! Free shipping for many products!

www.ebay.com

Wowza.

Adaptec USBXchange, SCSI to USB adapter, P/N 1861400 | eBay

This is a pre-owned USB to SCSI signal converter.

www.ebay.com

Much closer to the "Let's just give it a try" price range.

 

[joevt]

Ratoc System FireREX1 Firewire Ultrascsi Converter F/S Used 4949090347304 | eBay

Find many great new & used options and get the best deals for Ratoc System FireREX1 Firewire Ultrascsi Converter F/S Used at the best online prices at eBay! Free shipping for many products!

www.ebay.com

Wowza.

Adaptec USBXchange, SCSI to USB adapter, P/N 1861400 | eBay

This is a pre-owned USB to SCSI signal converter.

www.ebay.com

Much closer to the "Let's just give it a try" price range.

but not sure about macOS support.

I suppose a properly constructed USB adapter should just do a straight block device conversion of a single drive. Or it could do multiple drives on a SCSI bus since USB also supports SCSI command set and can address each drive individually. It depends on what features they put in the USB adapter.

Same can be said for a properly constructed FireWire adapter.

Basically, if the adapters use the defined USB or FireWire spec for mass storage devices, then it should work in macOS without extra drivers.

 

[Amethyst1]

I suppose a properly constructed USB adapter should just do a straight block device conversion of a single drive. Or it could do multiple drives on a SCSI bus since USB also supports SCSI command set and can address each drive individually. It depends on what features they put in the USB adapter.

The Ratoc Firerex's (FireWire-to-SCSI) press release says it behaves like a standard mass storage device (SBP-2), no extra drivers required. Their USB-to-SCSI adapter also looks to work like a USB Mass Storage device (according to your link).

The Adaptec USBXChange's manual says...

• you can connect up to seven devices (daisy-chained)
• it needs a driver (so no USB Mass Storage mode)
• on Mac OS, you can switch it from "Mass Storage" to "Other Peripherals" mode (page 18 onwards)

 

[Certificate of Excellence]

Id pick up a cheap powermac (if you don't already have one) with an oem or adaptec scsi card, connect your external scsi drives to that powermac and connect it to your network with sharing enabled kinda like NAS.

 

[velocityg4]

The used PMac might even be cheaper than an adapter. Those adapters are absurdly expensive. Although you can resell either of them and make most of your money back. If this is a one time retrieval.

Really, if you don't have anything really personal on them. You'd probably make the day for many vintage Mac collectors here. Letting them do something useful with their collection. By letting them retrieve the files for you.

Probably for nothing. As many would just find it fun. Although they'd hope to keep the functioning SCSI drives afterward. As those, especially externals, are getting hard to come by at a reasonable price.

At any rate. I wouldn't dispose of them. Properly wipe then resell them. Collectors will pay for functional units. How much depends on the specific unit.

 

[weckart]

I don’t think you’ll find an adapter. You might have to resurrect an old Mac to read the drives. When you’re done with them, I wouldn’t bother erasing or formatting. I would physically destroy them. Hammers and screwdrivers do wonders on the platters.

Do NOT destroy SCSI drives. Particularly those that work with old Macs and especially not if they have Apple firmware. They are getting hard enough to find these days and third party utilities are a lottery with non-Apple drives for formatting and setting up. It was a real pain finding a pair that I could format to work with my Mac SEs.

If you don't need them pass them on. Freecycle or whatever.

 

[Certificate of Excellence]

Yes, please do not destroy working scsi drives. They don't exactly grow on trees these days.

 

[joevt]

There exists SD card to SCSI emulators now that people use with old Macs. There's many YouTube videos that cover a variety of these.
https://store.inertialcomputing.com/SCSI2SD-s/100.htm
https://hackaday.io/project/18974-tiny-scsi-emulator
http://macsd.com
https://scsi.blue
https://github.com/akuker/RASCSI/wiki

 

[Tratkazir_the_1st]

There exists SD card to SCSI emulators

I suppose TS needs quite opposite.

 

[Mac JR]

Find the cheapest Mac with a SCSI port, ensure you have a SCSI Terminator for the drive you want to connect (if it's not built-in), and network it to your current Mac. Though it's a little complicated it would work. Alternately get a PCI USB adapter card for a 7500 or larger-case format Mac and you can copy files directly from the SCSI drive to a USB-connected drive. I use the latter in my 7600, as it's the easiest.

 

[SnakeCoils]

In case someone is interested, I have attached here the MacOS 8.6 drivers for this USB-SCSI adapter I just purchased for few euros.

It is an OEM Shuttle SCM adapter model CM-S18 (rebranded to many other manufacturer like Belkin, Microtech, Lindy, Newertech with different enclosure but same hardware) that works so-and-so on OSX and Win11 but sadly not at all on my MDD with OS9 because the drivers does not support anything above 8.6 resulting in a system crash during the initial boot up when System Extensions are loaded.
I have searched everywhere on the web for updated OS9 drivers but with no luck, if those drivers exists and someone would be so nice to share it would be greatly appriciated
The problem is that almost all the adapters derived from the Shuttle model shares the same 1.0f3 version but customized for different manufacturers so updated drivers from another brand are not recognized and loaded in this case they have to report the "shuttle" word in name extension: renaming it will not do the trick and also looking with an hex editor inside other "1.0f3" version from different brands I see some differences in the code not related to the name so not only the new extension should have to be compatible with OS9 but also to be matched to its brand name!
I do know that Macintosh Repository has updated SCM drivers but for a different model that rely on USB 2.0 protocol while this one is based on USB 1.1 standard, so they did not load, I just tried...
Anyway for everyone commited to use this exact adapter with OS 8.5/8.6 the needed drivers are here, enjoy!