I'm thinking of the cost of getting an ideal Macintosh collection . So , I plan to buy the Powerbook Duo 230 on eBay , which has the floppy disk adapter and a floppy drive included , and that costs $150 . Then , including the shipping cost , that would be about $200 . Then , I'm wondering if I can get a floppy drive for my PC that will transfer the files from Basilisk II . Anyone knows where I can get a drive like that?

{EDIT} Does an AppleTalk cable work with a Dell Inspiron 6400?

Can anyone give any information about this?

Your PC has no floppy drive whatsoever?

What vintage Macs did you collect so far?
Moving files to and from a PB might be troublesome.
I recall PCMac LAN would provide a good AppleTalk server with Win98SE, Win2k or XP.
The server was capable of a (very slow) AppleTalk connection via serial port as far as I can recall.

Maybe you could find a SCSI CD ROM drive as well?
You might burn your BII volumes to ISO and read it with the CD ROM at the PB.
OS 7.6 worked fine with an Apple CD300.

If you should own a PC with a SCSI host adapter you might also consider Syquest, Zip or MO removables.
I used the SQ555 a lot with my MacII, Amiga and a '386. FAT formatted removables should be readable on most platforms.

Nope . No floppy drives .

I haven't collected any other Macintoshes yet .

I don't have a SCSI bus .

I'm thinking of Appletalking from Basilisk II to the Powerbook , but I'm wondering if I have to pay to network it (such as signing up for an internet connection or something) . On the other hand , I'm thinking I could just get the Apple Personal Modem and see if it works .

So AppleTalk by serial port seems to be the only possibility.
Grab a old Windows box, a PIII will do, and set up the free AppleTalk server PCMacLan with it.
You might also try Dave, an app that could connect your Mac to a PC network.
If you want to transfer very small files only, an online storage may do too.
I remember very well how painful a 5 kByte connection was...

That's the point . All of these require networking . I need tips about doing this with Appletalk , but I cannot use the internet . Does the Powerbook have an internal network card that can connect to Appletalk? If not , is there any external card or modem that can be bought without subscribing to a internet service or a paid connection of some sort? I think the Apple Personal Modem can handle this .

According to this: http://www.everymac.com/systems/apple/p ... eries.html
there is one standard serial port.

1.)It should be possible to build a NULL-modem connection to some PC with a serial port.
The Mac and PC serial ports are compatible but you may need a home soldered cable.
File transfer can be done with ZTerm on the Mac side.
I do not recall the names of the terminal software for PCs right now, but there were many.

2.)As far as I remember, you just had to plug in a LocalTalk cable and its dongle in the Mac´s serial port,
to have your Mac use LocalTalk. The Macs were daisy chained like those with BNC ethernet.
You will need at least one other computer capable of LocalTalk, of course.
A solution with PCMacLan would work with a LocalTalk connection and WIN98, but it would require
a LocalTalk adapter too in the PC. I doubt such an adapter can still be found.

3.)Maybe you should look for a 68k version of Dave, to connect to a Windows network.
Someone else might tell you about Dave, I never used it.

Is Dave capable of connecting to a wireless network? If any 68k Macintosh can connect to a wireless network , my problem's solved already .

Wait , can UltraISO read HFS CD-ROMS in a physical drive? I have UltraISO , and it can read HFS filesystems . If I can buy a CD-ROM drive for the Powerbook , connect it and format a CD to HFS , I might be able to insert it to the modern computer .

According to your link , an internal modem is optional . Do you think I can find a internal modem , install it in the Powerbook and network the two of them?

A modem wont be needed. Just get a cross-over cable with the correct interfaces.

A CD ROM drive for the PB would be perfect. Handling HFS with a non Mac OS is not a big problem.
Can you find the specs for the PB´s docking interface?
On a second thought, it schould be possible to open the PB and attach a longer 50pin flat cable to the logic board
and the internal HDD. The remaining tail could connect to a SCSI ROM or removable. Such a flat cable must be
properly terminated at its end, of course.

I don't want to cable both of them (because I might not have the slot) . Networking is a bit expensive , as well .
So , CD-ROMs are pretty much the candidate here .

The slot dock is an Apple Double Floppy Adapter . It has an ADB port and a HDI-20 port .

Unfortunately , all the eBay listings have been sold out! If I want a Powerbook Duo 230 , I gotta start looking again .

Personally I was thinking of getting a Mac II: ci, fx or maybe cx. Maybe even a Quadra 900 or something...

No desktops , please . My apartment space is small enough .