Re: What GSE-Reactive Really Needs to Make

[Mitchell Spector <mitch2gs@hotmail.com>]

"Henry" <apl2research@comcast.net> wrote:

>Yes, I agree that a VGA card or something of the like would be a much 
>welcomed addition to the Apple II community.  The main issue with it is that 
>it's hard and there's only really one example for us to go on.  Simple 
>enough explanation. 

    The Second Sight is more of an example of poor design and engineering
mistakes, duplicating it would hardly benefit anyone from a partical stand
point. The card looked at what the VGC was doing, then, completely from
scratch, attempted to recreate what was happening on screen through
emulation. Think of the analogy of a 7 year old with Attention Deficit
Disorder watching a professional tap dancer, and trying to duplicate all 
his steps. :)

    Bottomline was not only did it not emulate all Apple II modes, even the
ones it did support were often unusable. Maybe if the firmware had been
completed it would have been improved, but a fair bit of the blame could
also be put on its slow data transfer (slow chipsets and interface).

    I'm sure it's wishful thinking, but maybe William St.Pierre's TurboRez
card design could be looked at? There were working prototypes built,
and the last revision had stanard VGA output in the works. I still have
one of the promtional phamplets I can drop in my scanner if you want
a look at its features. I don't see the project resurrected, but maybe 
some ideas could come from it.

Mitchell Spector