Re: Ninjaforce & Second Sight

[ongtatwe@iscs.nus.sg (<< DOTW >>)]

Alexander Siegfried (ug0a@rzstud1.rz.uni-karlsruhe.de) wrote:

: There are positive aspects as well, but for US the bad sides
: outweight the positive sides. We just don't like spending
: $200 for a beta version of a hardware (nor do we like spending

I'd like to voice my opinions about the Second Sight card from the
perspective of a new owner and programmer for 1 day:

Firstly, I had no problems installing the board.  It took me less than 5
mins to pop up my GS cover, move my Zip to slot 5, insert SS into slot 3
and get it up and running with my Apple RGB monitor.  The cable length
is just nice, unlike the first few boards which have short cables.

While there are negative aspects about the card, mostly due to lack of
software, an unstable GIF viewer and an incomplete VGA interface library
for programmers (Jawaid, pls read my comments in the developers' mailing
list!), the card does work as advertised.  I could view GIFs in 640x400
VGA mode on my Apple RGB nicely, and the 24-bit colour palette range is
as pure as it can be.  Even though the programmers library is
incomplete, I can still write useful things in its present state.  As of
now, I've written a skeleton of a SS painting program supporting simple
pencil drawing in different colours.  This is actually a port of a
graphic editor I've written for the SGI, so it'll grow into a full blown
painting program.

I'll call the GIF viewer as beta, but the SS card is more than just a
beta.  It is a fully workable VGA card.  All it needs is more software
support and some fixes to hardware "bug" which do not affect normal
operations.

: any bucks for beta versions of software, but sadly this
: behaviour is becoming more and more significant in the GS
: market these days), that's it.

No comments about this. :)

: Right now, it is true that we (Ninjaforce) are not interested
: very much in developing for Second Sight. This is due to the
: current state of the board, and we are also very skeptical
: about the situation of the GS market. However, if the board

Like I said, the board currently does need some software.  If NinjaForce
could write something for SS, it'll surely help boost the sales.  IMHO,
SS is great for writing demos and games (hint, hint :).

The bottom line is that the SS card does have potential to be a
peripheral that is found in every Apple II.  I guess now is the critical
period during its infancy, and whether it makes or breaks will depend on
the amount of software support that comes out in the next few months.

: the other hand, if we want to leave the GS, we would do it,
: instead of complaining about it.

I hope not.....


- dotw -