Re: Hard Disks (and controllers), Connectivity with PC

[supertimer@aol.com (Supertimer)]

"Mr-T" <jonthorp@-no-spam-bigpond.net.au> wrote:

>Three years ago I was given an Apple IIGS by a school that was throwing them
>away for scrap. Using X86 machines only, a IIGS was a really interesting
>experience, but all I had was the machine and a few floppy disk drives (a 3
>1/4" and two 5 1/4" drives) with GS OS 5.xx (I think). As far as I know,
>this is a ROM1 GS with 4Mb of RAM (there's an extra card installed), with no
>extra cards installed
>
>GS OS is great, but I have to constantly keep changing disks every time I
>want to run a program which does become somewhat annoying, but I wouldn't
>mind doing that if I had more than the three or four programs I have on
>disk.

That's because GS/OS was designed for hard disk drives!

>1.) As I understand, there's a wealth of IIGS programs on the Internet, but
>given my GS doesn't have any additional cards and I don't have access to a
>Mac, is there any way at all I can connect the IIGS to my PC? Is there some
>way I can connect the IIGS between the wierd communications port it has and
>the communications port on the PC?

Use a communications cable designed for pre-PPC Macs (Mac SE,
Mac LC to name two that will work) and you can connect it up to
any old external PC RS-232 hardware modem.

>3.) I have many old IDE (ranging from 40Mb-4.3Gb) hard drives (and possibly
>one or two SCSI - but they would be too big, about 1Gb). Is there any way I
>can utilise these disk drives on a IIGS?

1GB is about right for the IIGS.  Don't underestimate the appetite
of the IIGS for disk space.  Usage wise, 1GB on the IIGS "feels"
about the same as 40GB on the PC.  If you are going to configure
the IIGS to the max, 1GB is a nice figure to aim for.

I had (have) a 1GB SCSI hard drive plus a Zip drive, a CD-ROM
drive, and an 80MB internal IDE drive on my IIGS.  The 80MB
internal was filled up and the 1GB was 3/4ths gone by the time
I stopped using it.  I still have my IIGS and intend to revive it as
soon as I find enough desk space.  I actually bought a new desk
but I have to find the space and the time to put it together and
install the IIGS on it.

Two ProDOS and two HFS partitions, in case you are
wondering how I divided up the 1GB drive.  HFS is great
providing you apply the patch.

>The hard drives are fine, but what about the controllers? Anyone know about
>their availability in Australia? I honestly don't want to pay obscene
>amounts of money for an old SCSI/IDE controller for a IIGS, so price is
>definitely an issue.

You can get a Focus hard drive controller card.  Last time I
looked, they were $40 US.  Might have changed.  I have been
out fo the Apple world for almost two years.  Alltech Electronics
http://www.allelec.com/ sold them.  If you look at the IIGS as
any old computer, $40 might seem "obscene" to you but I had
and still do find it reasonable.  This hardware is rare now and
one day it will become collectable.  Don't scoff at the idea.
Remember the Apple Lisa and how they were dumped into
landfills?  I remember Sun Remarketing selling them as
cheap alternatives to Macs and they were certainly treated
as junk then.  Today, they are collectable and fetch a good
price.  Besides, $40 is hardly obscene when you consider a
good game on the PC or a stick of SDRAM will cost you the
same.

Back to the Focus, it is a 2.5 IDE controller so you need to
visit your local PC store and get a 2.5 to 3.5 IDE cable to
make it work with your drives.  That's because its native drives
are notebook models and the card's designed to support the
drives physically so you could have one inside the IIGS'
case.