Re: ][GS Questions

[spec@vax2.concordia.ca (Mitchell Spector)]

In article Frank Carney <frankc@cyberhighway.net> writes...

>Question 1
>I have two RAM cards that I need to populate:
>
>1) Apple ][GS Memory Expansion  by Apple
>
>2) RamPak 4GS by Orange Micro
>
>Can you tell me what each of these take?

    The Apple memory card uses 256Kx1 (256 kilobit) DRAM chips
and expands to a maximum of 1 MB. The Orange Micro RamPak card
uses 256Kx4 (1 megabit) DRAM chips and goes up to 4 MB. If you
look around, you should be able to find these chips off old XT
and AT motherboards.

    The chips should also be of the type which use CAS before
RAS (Column Address Selection- before -Row Address Selection)
for the refresh order, though most are, and be at least 150ns
or faster.

>Question 2
>How do you use Appletalk on the GS?
>Needed are cable descriptions, actual ports that I hook up to, and
>software that can use it.

    If your only hooking up two machines (a Macintosh must be one,
since only client support exists for the IIgs and you need a Mac
to act as a server) a serial cable running between two serial
ports will do--I use a common ImageWriter II cable to link my
Apple IIgs and Macintosh Plus for example. If you only network
a bunch IIgs's, you can't do much except share a printer among
them. You only need Apple LocalTalk connectors (or third party
connectors which use phone chord) if you are using three or
more devices on the network.

    System 6.0.1 for the IIgs has all the necessary drivers to
connect to a Macintosh server (you can log-in from the Finder
desktop on the IIgs side and access the Mac's storage devices
with access properly set). You'll want System 7.0 or higher on
the Mac side to do file sharing, though you should be able to
add support to System 6.0.8. I believe you require AppleShare
2.x or 3.x (5.x possibly) to boot the IIgs from the Macintosh
hardrive though. Finally you must set the slots in the Control
Panel to corrispond to where AppleTalk lives. That only just
describes what you need, but not step by step instructions.
I'll let someone else jump in to discuss that. :) (My knowledge
of setting up AppleTalk on the Mac side is shakey at best)

>Question 3
>What kind of devices can hook to the smart port?

    It supports three kinds of floppy drives:

- The grey Apple 3.5; this should ALWAYS come first in any daisy-
  chain hookup where more than one type of drive is connected.
  Support also includes third party compatibles, not too mention
  the Apple SuperDrive (but only in 800K mode). You can hook up
  a maximum of two 3.5 drives.

- UniDisk 3.5, the "intelligent" drive designed for the IIc.
  This will work on an Apple IIgs, but I would not recommend
  it since it's much slower than the standard 3.5 drive. If
  you hook one up, make sure it comes before any 5.25 drive
  (I believe you can hook up as many as four at once, but
  not in a situtation where other drives are present). Under
  the same catagory would probably be floppy based hardrives,
  such as the Chinook CT series (also not recommended due to
  speed limitations. Better to use SCSI or IDE drives).

- 5.25 drives. The standard is the grey Apple 5.25, but you can
  hook up a UniDisk 5.25, DuoDisk 5.25, Disk IIc and Disk II if
  you have a IDC20->DB19 adapter; compatibles supported as well.
  A maximum of two 5.25 drives can be connected.

>Question 4
>Why does the GS have a drive interface on port 6 when the smartport
>talks to the drives already?
>Where is the connection for this port?

    I'm not sure I understand your question. The Smartport in back
detects whether you plug in 5.25 or 3.5 drives and then maps them
to the appropriate slots. 3.5 drives will be mapped to slot 5 and
5.25 drives mapped to slot 6 (if a IIgs RAM Disk is present, /RAM5,
it will bump a second 3.5 drive to slot 2, drive 1 if memory serves
right).

    If you override the default settings in the Control Panel from
"Disk port"/"Smart port" to install a card in the slot they're in
and set it to "Your Card", the drives will no longer be seen. This
is the case with my 1.44 MB SuperDrive controller in slot 6, I
cannot have both my 5.25 drive and FDHD drive active at the same
time (not usually a problem, since I rarely use the 5.25 drive).

>Question 5
>Where does a mouse hook to?

    To the ADB (Apple Desktop Bus) connector on the keyboard.
Generally it plugs into the right-side connector, though if
your left handed you can reverse that. Alternatively, you
can plug the mouse directly into the ADB port in back of the
machine (this is the furthest plug on the right, when facing
the back) but then you won't have access to a keyboard.

    ADB allows you to daisy-chain devices, so you could for
example have a keyboard, trackball, drawing tablet and mouse
all connected at the same time. That would be a clutted desk
mind you. ;) I don't think it is good to hot-swap ADB btw.

>Question 6
>Can I connect a ][e keyboard to the internal connector on the GS?  I
>notices all that this connection is missing is the actual pins.  The
>solder mask actually says keybord along with a numeric keypad too.

    Yep, you can. In fact you can hook up a IIe powersupply as
well, but all these require you solder in the pin connectors
(older motherboards have the pin connectors in place, these
boards were sold as part of a conversion upgrade kit for IIe's,
though many made it into regular production IIgs cases).

    There is little point in doing this, unless you have plans
to stick your IIgs board inside a IIe case (you would also need
a new IIe base pan). Note that the IIe keyboard is *not* ADB
compatible when plugged into a IIgs--for example the numeric
keypad keys are no different from the main keypad number keys
and the cursor keys are just mapped to control characters.
If your using a VT-100 terminal emulator, this is not good. :)

>Question 7
>What kind of monitors can connect to the GS?  Can I hook up a standard
>RGB?

    It requires an analog RGB monitor that uses NTSC scanning
frequency (15.75 kHz horizontal). Apple produced one specifically
for the machine called the "AppleColor RGB" (it looks very much
like the 13" RGB's sold for early Mac II's, but not compatible).
You can use Atari ST and Amiga RGB display (e.g. A1084) with a
properly wired cable.

>Why can't I see color when I hook up standard monitor that takes
>an NTSC signal from the RCA style jack?  It is a color monitor.

    First off, that is not the standard display. While a color
composite screen will function and is suitable for emulating
older Apple II graphic modes which the GS supports, it will not
suffice when used for display native Apple IIgs graphic modes.
The IIgs supports 320/640x200 using a palette of 4,096 colors
and requires an RGB monitor to display that optimally. The
AppleColor RGB (A2M6014) is the standard display.

    You should still see color, unless the previous owner has
toggled the 'Display' setting to "Monochrome" in built-in
Control Panel. Press and hold down Apple-Control-Esc to access
the Control Panel and select 'Display' once in. Under 'Type'
change it from "Monochrome" to "Color". Note that with a color
composite display, text-mode will remain in monochrome
regardless of the setting.

>Question 8
>Does anyone have a schematic for a ][c?

    I'm not sure if one is available online, but you can find
that in Addison Wesley's Apple IIc Technical Reference. You
may be able to purchase a copy through the ByteWorks at:

http://www.hypermall.com/byteworks

>Question 9 (Last One)
>Is this newsgroup archived somewhere?

    Every discussion newsgroup has an archive going back to at
least early 1995 through Dejanews (http://www.dejanews.com).
If you want to find message archives older than that, you can
find a few selected articles from:

http://ground.ecn.uiowa.edu/apple2/MiscInfo

    Back when I first joined this group some 7+ years ago, I
recall someone mentioning there was a regular archive of this
group that was maintained on one of the FTP sites (could it
have been 'wuarchive.wustl.edu'?). If that older archive
still exists, I wouldn't mind checking it out myself. :)
Anyone know?

>One more thing.  I seriously think that the best source for Apple stuff
>is a thrift store.  I bought s Woz and a ROM 01 GS at a thrift store
>today for less than $20 dollars.  They were also throwing away a ][c!

    Definitely. I bought a memory expandable IIc for about $1.50
and a complete Macintosh Plus (2.5 MB RAM, with internal hardrive)
for around $5. I often see II Plus's and IIe's available, including
one that had a Rana Elite 5.25's and controller. I also stocked up
a few hundred 5.25" floppy disks for just a couple of bucks.

Mitchell Spector
spec@vax2.concordia.ca