Re: Please Help w/purchase.

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

In article pubpc1@library.ucla.edu writes...

>Geoff wrote:
>> 1..Has anyone had good dealings with a specific company that sells
>> outdated supplies/computers?
>
>Note: these places sell hardware at "bluebook" value, not the
>dirt cheap prices found at thrift shops or the marketplace
>newsgroup,

    What you refer to as "dirt cheap prices" are what I call true
market value. Vendors such as Alltech and Sun Remarketing do not
reflect that.

>but you are almost guaranteed to be satisfied with
>the results.  Many people including myself have been burned in
>trade with less scrupulous sources (ie. the marketplace).

    I've been been using comp.sys.apple2.marketplace since 1994, and
not once has anyone taken advantage of me. In fact, the majority of
upgrades done to my system are thanks to that group (e.g. my ZipGS,
RamFAST SCSI, Apple II 3.5 Disk Controller Card, SuperDrive mech,
Audio Animator and several other things).

>> 2..It's my understanding that I want a IIGS with a ROM 03 in it, and yet I
>> mostly see people selling IIGSs with ROM 01.  Is there a big difference
>> between the 2? More preciseley, can anyone tell me the major differences
>> between the two.  I understand the board w/ROM 03 comes w/1 meg of ram
>> soldered on.  Other than that i didn't see anything in the FAQ regarding
>> the differences.  I could of overlooked it, afterall it's like 90 pages :)
>> Cool FAQ btw, for this newsgroup..
>
>I've used both.  Personally, I prefer the ROM 3.  It has better
>AppleTalk connectivity (don't have to give up two slots), built in
>EasyAccess tools that are not as buggy as the on-disk ones for
>the ROM 01, more memory built in and more total memory DMA-able
>with an Apple HS SCSI card, and a slightly faster QuickDraw.

    A few things worth adding: In 8-bit mode the 3.5 drive and RAM
Disk perform faster. Under GS/OS you can set slot 4 to 'Your Card'
and still have access to the mouse. A RAM Disk can be resized with
just a warm-boot, and a cleaned up and enhanced text Control Panel.

    On the hardware side there is less electrical "noise" meaning
cleaner sound from the Ensoniq (almost no buzzing)--and sensitive
cards like high speed accelerators are more likely to work. The
MB0 single is present in slots 1 through 6, which means you can
plug a Second Sight or Video Overlay Card into any of those slots.
There is hardware shadowing for text page 2, the clock battery is
socketed, there's a jumper setting to block access to the Control
Panel and the motherboard uses less power overall. There are a few
other minor things as well.

>Some say that very, very old hardcoded GS software won't run
>on a ROM 03, but I've found that the best FTA stuff have ROM 03
>versions and NinjaForce has an install that will let their
>MegaDemo run on a ROM 03.  Overall, the ROM 03 is a better
>machine.  It is rarer because there are less of them around.

    I use a ROM 3 for day-to-day use because it is a better system,
there is no doubting that. However, I also keep a ROM 01 on hand so
I have 100% compatibility with my entire software collection, as
there are the odd few (very old) games or demos that simple won't
run on the former. The other reason is I like to collect things,
so it only seems natural I'd have both major revision of the GS. :-)

>> 3..Does anyone sell the motherboards(That's what i understand
>> is necessary to change from ROM 01 to ROM 03)?
>
>Alltech Electronics (http://www.allelec.com/) sells them.
>Fully tested, warranteed, and shipped in protective packaging,
>unlike the swines in the marketplace newsgroup!

    Thanks, I guess that makes me a swine since I've sold several
things through comp.sys.apple2.marketplace. Incidentally, before
I sell anything I always fully test the item in question (and if
I cannot in a rare case, I make a personal guarentee to refund the
payment should there be a problem) and take special care in making
sure the item is well wrapped and protected for shipping. I expect
no less from anyone else selling on a marketplace group.

>> 4..Can anyone recommend a good start(hardware wise) for this computer?
>> [i.e. 80 column card, 20 meg scsi drive w/xxxxxx scsi card, xxxxxxx ram
>> card, xxxxxxxxx accelerator card,] In other words,.. i want to get a good
>> IIGS system going,.. what is the basic hardware setup for something like
>> this and how much could i expect to spend?
>
>At the very least, since you seem to be a power user, 4MB of
>RAM, a 300MB hard disk drive, and an accelerator card.  That
>will give you a very usable GS (much more functional that a
>Mac Plus, the GS's contemporary of 1986).  Eventually, you
>may want to upgrade further.

    Except that the Macintosh Plus has a higher vertical resolution
(the GS cannot do true WYSIWYG at 640x200) and has had more recent
System Software support than the GS. Otherwise, I agree fully--the
GS is more of a functional machine (once upgraded) than a Mac Plus,
especially in terms of multimedia applications and games.

>My system is a 13.75MHz Zip accelerated GS (faster than my
>25Mhz '486 PC in most tasks...you can't compare MHz accross

    Your comparing a 486SX-25 laptop, I think if you compared
the same GS to an old 486DX-33 desktop machine the same might
not be true. ;-) At least you can play full-screen 3D games
with light sources and texture mapping on a 486 and decompress
JPEG and ZIP on-the-fly, the same cannot be said of even the
fastest accelerated GS. Saying that in general--that a 14 MHz
GS is faster than a 486, is kind of straying from the truth.

>processor lines) more than 1GB of storage online, and 8MB
>of RAM, along with a 33.6 modem (shared using a rotary dial
>switchbox with a PC).  With all that storage, I've found
>myself transferring my collection of music alblums to
>sound files for playing through the GS.  :)

    I do that on my PC, moving the actual 16-bit, 44.1 kHz CD
tracks onto the hardrive (no digitizing involved, so no loss
in quality) and then compressing them into MPEG-3 audio files
so they take up 1-4 MB rather than a hundred or so megabytes.
With a program like WinAmp I have more control than with a
real CD-player (jumping _instantly_ to different parts of a
song for example).

    Even more neat is burning all those MP3's on to a data CD,
thus allowing me to take several of my audio CD's and putting
them all onto a single disk (they're then not playable in a
CD player though, just on a computer capable of handling MP3).

>Did I mention the GS produces near flawless sound and music?

    Compared to today's standards? Having only 8-bit sound
resolution at not much higher than 26 kHz (due to the low
pass filter) doesn't make "near flawless" digital sound.
Nor does it make for "near flawless" wavetable synthesis,
especially when all your samples must fit in a 64K space.

    The Ensoniq is _extremely_ impressive for its time (back
in the 80's and very early 90's)--but you talk about the sound
in the IIgs as if it were still state-of-the-art today.

>Unlike Mitchell, I've outgrown 300MB of storage.  Originally,
>I had 170MB primary and a 170MB backup unit.  Soon, I used
>the backup unit for storage.  Then I gave up and went to
>larger storage.

    I can't imagine the average Apple IIgs user outgrowing
300 megabytes of hardrive storage, unless your filling up all
that space with unusually large digitized sound samples or
tons of generic files like MOD, WAV, MID, GIF and JPG.

>Buyer beware, though, if you want to brave the marketplace.

    If I didn't "brave the marketplace" as you put it, I very
much doubt I would have been able to afford all the upgrades
I made to my IIgs.

>Alltech Electronics (http://www.allelec.com/).  Get a GS
>system from them, then grab a 40MB Focus drive.  Replace
>the 40MB drive yourself with an 800MB IDE 2.5" mechanism
>from Computer Shopper sources.

    On a bit of tangent here, how much is the 2.5" 800 MB
Quantum Go Drive in Computer Shopper? In several posts I
noticed you mentioning that it costs "literally pennies",
which to me would mean a couple of dollars. Is that the
actual case?

Mitchell Spector
spec@vax2.concordia.ca