Re: USB input devices?

["Kelly, Bryan" <bryank@americasm01.nt.com>]

David Empson wrote:
> 
> Mike Kent <Mkent01@voyager.cris.com> wrote:
> 
> > I think the priority for add-on boards should be 1) a 15-20 MHz
> > accelerator,
> 
> No argument there.  Preferably something like the ZIP but with a LOT
> more cache RAM on the card.

Agreed, however my list has this at #3. The accelerators currently
available lessen the immediate need, to me at least.

> 
> > 2) A SCSI-3 card,
> 
> Why?  Even SCSI-1 is too fast for the Apple II.  The bus can't go faster
> than 1 megabyte per second, and SCSI-1 is 5 megabytes per second.
> 
> The only practical use I can think of would be for supporting newer
> drives that only have LVD or other weird interfaces.  (It is getting
> difficult to buy drives that use the standard 50-pin 8-bit SCSI-1
> connector.)
> 
> In any case, most of the current drives are so huge that I can't imagine
> anyone ever using the whole thing on an Apple II.

I have to disagree with you there, David. True, the speed and capacity
of the newer drives may not be fully utilized, but at some point the old
drives are going to give out and having as many options as possible for
replacement can only be a good thing. Still, I would have placed this
item lower on the list at #4.

> 
> > 3) an Ethernet card.
> 
> Yep.  10 Mbps (e.g. 10Base-T) is practical, though the Apple II isn't
> quite fast enough to keep up with it.  Some buffering RAM would be
> needed on the card.  100Base would be pointless.

This seems to be the Holy Grail for Apple II folks. With this and a
small Focus drive (just to avoid network booting) a whole slew of
problems could be solved. I'd put this one at #1.

> 
> > 4) A better graphics card.
> 
> That doesn't interest me much - too little software support and/or too
> much work to add any such support.  Something which supports newer
> monitors but retains the current display would be useful (e.g. a line
> doubling card that supports the existing video modes), since the IIgs
> RGB monitors are dying if not dead already.

My sentiments exactly. What we really need right now is a $50 video
adapter that is supported by the toolbox and software rather than a
$200 card that, at least so far, adds no tangible benefits over what
the cheaper card would provide. A card that allows me to connect an
unused VGA monitor to my Apple that supports all the available video
modes, and perhaps as a bonus scan line doubling, is #2 on my list.
 
> 
> > Beyond that OS support is urgently needed: new drivers for all the new
> > hardware coming out, a read/write MS-DOS FST w/ support for high-capacity
> > devices, and tool patches to support a high-resolution desktop on the
> > Second Sight.

An updated MS-DOS FST and a cleaned-up HFS FST would make life much
easier. Asking for "new drivers" is pretty nebulous and it's hard
to get folks behind it unless they can say "Yeah, I'd like to hook
that box to my Apple. How do we get a driver for it?". Of course what
I'd like to see is Desktop Manager for the Palm Pilot with enough
applications to actually synchronize it to and maybe a port of PalmOS
to the GS. But then I'm a dreamer :)

[David's observations on Second Sight memory access chopped]
> 
> --
> David Empson
> dempson@actrix.gen.nz
> Snail mail: P.O. Box 27-103, Wellington, New Zealand


Enjoy,
Bryan