Dear fellow mac users, I am writing you with the question if you know any way to emulate older mac os'es under snow leopard.
I tried basilisk but since the last update was in 2001 I seem to be up s..t creek when it comes to such.
Please advise, as there are so many gems of games out there that well frankly I'd love to put some time and effort into playing them.

Try SheepShaver. It emulates MacOS 9.0.4 and older (down to 7.6 I think).

Basilisk II works fine under Snow Leopard. You can get the latest build from here.

SheepShaver and Mini vMac work fine also.

The most appropriate one depends on your desired usage: SheepShaver emulates a PowerPC (G3, I think), and can run System 7.5.2 up to Mac OS 9.0.4; Mini vMac emulates a Mac Plus, and can run System 1 through to System 7.5.5; Basilisk II emulates a 68k Mac and can run System 7 through to Mac OS 8.1.

Alexander,

The official Basilisk Ii site is, sadly, out of date. You can find newer versions here:

emaculation.com/doku.php/basilisk_ii

sheepshaver wouldn't run on my macbook pro. I would launch the program, and it would be in my dock for 2 seconds before disappearing (and it never tells me that it crashed or anything like it!) anyone else had a bad experience with sheepshaver?

That's happened to me before. Chances are it's crashing because you need a Mac OS ROM file. SheepShaver won't run without one. You're on your own with finding a ROM file - it's illegal to distribute them.

See here for a setup guide, or look around for Classic-On-Intel, which has a pre-configured build that you can use to get started (it comes with simple instructions to explain how to modify the configuration for your needs).

I don't know if it's just me, but SheepShaver has been a pain to get to work with my Intel Mac mini since 10.5 (I use 10.6.4 on it now). I tried using a DMG image from my Pismo (running 9.0.4) and creating a new disk image and installing from a retail OS 8.0 CD, but so far, no success. It either hangs up during boot or freezes shortly after finishing loading the Finder. My record when running SheepShaver on a PPC is slightly better, it still hangs, but not as often. Ironically, I had more success emulating a Mac on Windows than in Mac OS X itself.

I haven't had any issues since upgrading to Snow Leopard, but SheepShaver is beginning to show its age on newer Macs. Make sure you're running the latest build from the E-Maculation forums to minimise the problems.

Unfortunately, it's long been the case that emulating Classic Macs has been better on Windows than in OS X. I think it's a rather sad and pathetic irony, but it doesn't look like changing anytime soon.

Here's what I've got working under Snow Leopard for Apple OSes:

OpenEmulator or CocoaPom:

Apple I

Virtual ||:

Apple || - ProDOS Apple //e - System 3.2

Sweet16:

Apple IIGS - System 6.0.1

SaraOSX:

Apple III - Business Basic Apple III - SOS 1.3

LisaEm:

Apple Lisa - Lisa O:S 3.1 Apple Lisa - Mac XL

Mini vMac (1.1 - 7.5.5):

Mac 512k - System 1.1 Mac Plus - System 2.0.1 Mac Plus - System 6.0.8 Mac II - System 5.1

Basilisk II (7.0-8.1):

Mac II - System 5.1 Mac IIci - System 7.0.1 Mac IIci - System 7.1.2 Mac IIci - System 7.5.5 Mac Quadra 950 - MacOS 7.6.1 Mac Quadra 950 - MacOS 8.1

SheepShaver (7.5.2 - 9.0.4):

MacOSROM - MacOS 8.6 MacOSROM - MacOS 9.0.4 MacOSROM - MKLinux PR1

PearPC (inside WineSkin, G3-G4):

G4 - MacOS X Beta - won't run G4 - MacOS X 10.0.4 - won't run G4 - MacOS X 10.1.5 G4 - MacOS X 10.2.8 G4 - MacOS X 10.3.9 G4 - MacOS X 10.4.11

VirtualBox (Intel-based OSes):

x86 - MacOS X 10.5.8 x86 - MacOS X 10.6.4 (also host OS) x86 - Rhapsody - in progress; boots but is b&w and is crashy

Haven't tried yet:

Basilisk II: Mac Quadra 950 - A:UX Basilisk II/ShapeShifter: Copland (was going to become 8.0) ShapeShifter: MacOS 8.7 (beta only - became 9.0) PearPC: MacOS 9.1 via 10.4 PPC PearPC: MacOS 9.2.2 via OS X 10.4 PPC VirtualBox: x86 - MacOS X 10.4.11 Intel

Awesome.

I can add to that very impressive list that System 1.0 and System 7.0 both work on Mini vMac with the Mac Plus rom (although System 1.0 has a few issues).

I'm also using System 7.5.5 on a Quadra 950 in Basilisk II.

Good god Em...you went through the insane hassle of actually getting MkLinux to work, and in an emulation environment at that?

You have waaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaay too much time on your hands. I had enough trouble getting it to work on a real PM8500.

Squishy Tia wrote:


Well, I have the advantage that I actually got MkLinux set up on actual hardware back when it came out; so I had all the configs set up for doing it again in when emulating the same device 10+ years later

Still, only an 8BP masochist like you would bother with MkLinux in emulation.

GG.

The Mac OS

More to come....

Oh wow, there's a ton of nostalgia. Nice job _Em!

The only nostalgia I have for OS 9 comes in my like of UT99 and...WARLORDS. Yes, the ancient system 7 era Warlords, a.k.a. the Mac version of the game that fit into an old IBM 6033 tower w/ 1MB RAM.

Well, it's not quite emulation, but I've since got OS X 10.4, 10.5 and 10.6 running inside VirtualBox Now I'm going back and attempting to get Fusion 3.0 to run inside DOSBox, as it can do System 6/7 in colour with full sound (unlike tempermental Mini vMac). And Fusion can do right up to 8.1, so I might attempt to replace all my vMac bundles with FuseBox bundles if I get it working

Also, with DOSPad working on my iPod, I'll be able to run System 6 through OS 8.1 on THAT I'm guessing 8.1 won't be very zippy....

After that, it's back to attempting to get MacOS 9.1 and 10.0 to run somehow; I'm thinking Mac-on-Mac inside PearPC inside WineSkin... seems to be the only theoretically possible combo that'll work.

can you explain how you got 10.4 running in VirtualBox? When I tried that I got Kernel Panics.

step 1: you need an x86 install disc
step 2: copy this *image* into a DL DVD image
step 3: mount this image in vBox running 10.5 or 10.6
step 4: copy the install image off it into the vbox hd
step 5: ASR the image to a blank vbox hd
step 6: boot new guest from this hd with blank image available