Re: Uprgading IIgs

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

In article Rubywand <rubywand@swbell.net> writes...

>The main disadvantage is incompatibility with a number of GS wares.

    Incompatibilities with a number of GS titles? It was more like a
small handful, and almost exclusively games and demos. The only one
useful program ever affected was Beatbox, which had a problem with
the mouse cursor and screen redraws (also affects DOCVu CDA, by the
same authors).

    The only thing worthwhile that was never patched was a Fillmode
game Antics (from France) wrote, and maybe EA's Skate or Die port for
the IIgs. :) Care to list anything else?

>Since relatively few ROM-03's were produced

    I think they account for 1/4 of all Apple IIgs's, which would
make about 250,000 machines. That is still a fair number if you
ask me.

>very few pieces of software have been designed to require a ROM-03.

    Hmm?  There is no such thing is ROM 3 specific software, and why
would there be if the machine offered no major new enhancements over
the original motherboard (there are no better graphics, no improved
Ensoniq chip or sound RAM, no faster processor, no built-in SCSI or
anything like that to specifically support).

    You will never encounter a single program that will tell you,
"sorry, requires a ROM 3 or higher to run". And to the very best
of my knowledge, no one ever wrote a program that ran flawlessly
on the ROM 3 but crashed on the ROM 01 (if they did and carelesly
released it, I'll bite my tongue ;)

>     If you load up any GS-- e.g. add 4MB Expansion RAM, 10MHz or faster
>accelerator, RamFAST SCSI interface, two 3.5" and two 5.25" drives,
>Focus Hard Card hard disk, ...-- you may find that audio noise,
>glitching, and crashes are a problem. It will, then, be necessary to
>fatten the +5, +12, and GND power supply leads and add power leads on
>the bottom side of the motherboard going to Slots 3 and 7. A ROM-03 is
>slightly less likely to require this mod.

    Let's see, my ROM 3 contains: an Audio Animator, 15 MHz accelerator,
Quickie scanner, SuperDrive controller, RamFAST SCSI (1 MB w/ it set to
supply term-power), 4 MB memory card, two 3.5 drives, one 5.25 drive
and a joystick. This is all feeding of the stock Apple 60W powersupply,
and I don't experience crashes, audio glitches or other problems.

>     On the whole, if you were stuck on a desert island with a complete
>collection of ][ and ][GS software, a fully loaded GS, and, say, a solar
>power unit, you would want the GS to be a ROM-01 model.

    No, I think you'd want the ROM 3, considering it comsumes a bit less
power than a ROM 00/01 motherboard. The ROM 01 would probably drain the
solar cell faster. Of course if I were on a desert island, I'd probably
want to enjoy the ocean, beach and topical weather and forget about
technology for awhile (especially being an eastern Canadian who suffers
bitterly cold and long winters ;)

    Oh, I forgot to mention another advantage of the ROM 3 earlier in
this thread. The MB0 signal is present in slots 1 through 6, whereas
it's only in slot 3 on the ROM 01. This adds to the flexibility of the
slots, you can stick a Video Overlay Card or Second Sight in almost any
slot (and don't forget you can set slot 4 to 'Your Card' and still have
the mouse active under GS/OS. Go try that on a ROM 01).

    There really is no advantage to having a ROM 01, other than being
compatible with 99% of GS software out there (the ROM 3 is probably
just a bit under that). Yep, there are a minute number of programs
written for the ROM 00 that broke when the ROM 01 came out (Bard's
Tale was one I remember, but quickly got patched).

Mitchell Spector
spec@vax2.concordia.ca