E-Maculation

Hi,

I just installed and set up SheepShaver using the online instructions but, whenever I try to launch it it starts up as a gray screen and ejects my Mac OS 8.5 CD and a floppy disk with a blinking "?" comes on the gray screen. I can't figure out how to fix this problem so any help would be greatly appreciated.

Hi,

What is your host system?

Best,
Cat_7

I am running 10.11.6 right now on an iMac using an external super drive for the CD, sheepshaver version is 2.4, hosting OS 8.5

Hi,

As of Mac OSX 10.8 you can't access real CDs anymore. You will need to make a disk image of the CD and add that to the volumes list, using the preferences editor.

Best,
Cat_7

I made a disk image of the CD and added it to the volumes list but I still get the floppy disk with the ''?''.

Hi,

Please check that you made the cd image read only by locking it in the finder.

Can you post a copy of your sheepshaver preferences?
Just open a terminal and type "open .sheepshaver_prefs" (no quotes, and mark the dot) and paste the content in your answer.

Is your CD known to boot a real mac?

Best,
Cat_7

The CD image is read only and I can boot a mac off of it.

SheepShaver preferences:

disk /Volumes/Mac OS 8.5 2
disk Mac OS 8.5.dsk
floppy /dev/disk3
cdrom /dev/disk4
extfs Shared
screen win/640/480
windowmodes 0
screenmodes 0
seriala
serialb
rom Mac OS ROM
bootdrive 0
bootdriver 0
ramsize 104857600
frameskip 8
gfxaccel true
nocdrom false
nonet false
nosound false
nogui false
noclipconversion false
ignoresegv true
ignoreillegal false
jit true
jit68k false
keyboardtype 5
ether slirp
keycodes true
keycodefile keycodes
mousewheelmode 0
mousewheellines 1
dsp /dev/dsp
mixer /dev/mixer
ignoresegv true
idlewait true

Please also make sure non of the disk images you are going to use are mounted on the desktop. If they are, unmount them before starting SheepShaver.

It seems strange to have the first disk at:
disk /Volumes/Mac OS 8.5 2

I'm assuming this is the disk image on which you want to install Mac OS?
Please put the disk image in the same folder as the sheepshaver program. The pref should then read:
disk Mac OS 8.5 2

next, assuming the 2nd entry is your cd image, put it as first entry in the list.
disk Mac OS 8.5.dsk

As SheepShaver always starts from the first entry in the list, the prefs should read:
disk Mac OS 8.5.dsk
disk Mac OS 8.5 2

You can edit the prefs through the editor. Also check that you have "Boot from" set to CD-ROM

Finally, what type of disk image did you choose when you made the CD image?
You should make sure to use either “read/write” (.dmg) or “DVD/CD Master” (.cdr)

For comparison, here is my prefs file allowing boot from CD image:
disk MacOS8.5.iso
disk MacOS85_500.img
cdrom /dev/poll/cdrom
extfs Shared
screen win/1024/768
windowmodes 0
screenmodes 0
seriala
serialb
rom MacOSRom
bootdrive 0
bootdriver -62
ramsize 67108864
frameskip 1
gfxaccel true
nocdrom false
nonet false
nosound false
nogui false
noclipconversion false
ignoresegv true
ignoreillegal true
jit true
jit68k false
keyboardtype 5
ether
keycodes false
keycodefile
mousewheelmode 1
mousewheellines 3
dsp /dev/dsp
mixer /dev/mixer
ignoresegv true
idlewait true


Best,
Cat_7

I did what you said and my preferences now look like this:

disk Mac OS 8.5.dmg
disk Mac OS 8.5.dsk
floppy /dev/disk3
cdrom /dev/disk4
extfs Shared
screen win/640/480
windowmodes 0
screenmodes 0
seriala
serialb
rom Mac OS ROM
bootdrive 0
bootdriver 0
ramsize 104857600
frameskip 8
gfxaccel true
nocdrom false
nonet false
nosound false
nogui false
noclipconversion false
ignoresegv true
ignoreillegal false
jit true
jit68k false
keyboardtype 5
ether slirp
keycodes true
keycodefile keycodes
mousewheelmode 0
mousewheellines 1
dsp /dev/dsp
mixer /dev/mixer
ignoresegv true
idlewait true


The first disk is my cd image which is a .dmg and the second is where I want to install OS. I am still having the same problem so I'm not sure if I made a mistake changing my preferences since some their are some differences between your preferences and mine

Try to use my prefs with your disks. Just copy the content below into your .sheepshaver_prefs file and try again.

disk Mac OS 8.5.dmg
disk Mac OS 8.5.dsk
cdrom /dev/poll/cdrom
extfs Shared
screen win/1024/768
windowmodes 0
screenmodes 0
seriala
serialb
rom Mac OS ROM
bootdrive 0
bootdriver -62
ramsize 67108864
frameskip 1
gfxaccel true
nocdrom false
nonet false
nosound false
nogui false
noclipconversion false
ignoresegv true
ignoreillegal true
jit true
jit68k false
keyboardtype 5
ether
keycodes false
keycodefile
mousewheelmode 1
mousewheellines 3
dsp /dev/dsp
mixer /dev/mixer
ignoresegv true
idlewait true


From where did you get the rom file? If it is from the redundant robot site, then it should be OK.

Best,
Cat_7

Your Preferences had no effect. I used the ROM file that came on the Mac OS 8.5 CD.

Ah,

That will not work.
Please download the one from the redundant robot website marked "best for sheepshaver"
and rename it to Mac OS ROM (please make sure the file has no hidden extension).

Best,
Cat_7

The problem is with the disk image, I think. A proper CD image will be called .cdr; .dmg is for compressed images, which won't boot properly. You can choose Image Format CD/DVD Master from the Disk Utility save dialog.

Nog all .dmg images are compressed. A read/write .dmg disk image created with Disk Utility will also work fine. See the setup manual about how to create and use a disk image with SheepShaver.

Hi,

I swapped out the ROM file but it doesn't seem to make a difference and I did use disk utility to make the .dmg read/write.

Maybe an image proven working would clarify things?

The 120 MB image from Redundant Robot should do for a trial:
http://www.redundantrobot.com/sheepshav ... es/OS9.img

Or the 7.5.3 image here, the OldWorldROM would be needed in that case:
http://macintoshgarden.org/apps/macos-753-emulators