Re: a USB for the Apple II smoke test

[Mitchell Spector <mitch2gs@hotmail.com>]

"Sean Fahey" <a2fan@hotmail.com> wrote:

>I've never plugged an Apple Mouse Card into a GS... for obvious reasons,
>never had the need to. So I can't state what GS/OS would do. I hypothesize
>it would do nothing, except attempt to read the ADB mouse. A mouse card in a
>GS would only become useful when booting 8 bit (assuming ProDOS) apps that
>support mice. ProDOS 16 apps would use ADB mice.

    If you install the Apple II Mouse Card into a IIgs (making sure to set
slot-4 to 'Your Card') it will work under both ProDOS-8 and GS/OS 
and stop polling the ADB mouse. The ROM 3 machine will ignore 
the Apple II Mouse Card except under ProDOS-8 though.

    It's important to remember that Apple expected persons purchasing
the Apple IIe to IIGS upgrade would be migrating their mouse card
and serial mouse. For that reason they made sure built-in firmware 
support was provided. By the time the ROM 3 had been introduced, 
the IIGS Upgrade kit had been long since phased out and that's 
reflected in some ROM 3 motherboard/firmware changes.

    Back on the thread's subject of USB on an Apple II, I'm surprised 
no one has mentioned this project: 

http://www.a2retrosystems.com/workbench.htm

Mitchell Spector