At 2:47 PM -0700 8/29/99, Erin Corliss (Volt Computer) wrote:
>Sigh.  After finally accepting that my LC will never run anything but MacOS,
>I scraped the bottom of my collection and brought up an old SE/30 that
>should be able to do NetBSD.  Problem is, shortly after I got it last year,
>I opened it up to add some RAM and since then it has been sounding "Death
>Chimes" every time I turn it on.  I think it has something to do with the
>video, but I'm not sure because I can't find a list of error tones to
>interpret the message.  The tones it is playing are the normal startup sound
>immediately followed by four tones ascending in frequency.  Anyone know
>where I can get a list of what the tones mean?


To my knowledge a particular Macintosh model will play the same tones
regardless of what the failure is.  Different models use different sounds
-- the chimes of death are common in most 68k macs, first generation
powermacs made a car crash noise, etc.

Besides Frederick's suggestion to remove the RAM, you might want to try
reseating cables that you might have removed when adding the RAM,
particularly the video cable since you think it could be that.

Some SE/30's also have the problem where they will play the chimes of death
when they are stared up cold.  The solution is to boot them, let them play
the chimes, then let the machine sit for a few minutes, then reboot.  I'm
not sure what causes this problem but I have a theory that it might be
faulty wiring.

Hope this helps!

Ben