Re: apple II roms side not...mousetrap ROM chip

["brad" <mrbrad@ll.net>]

I thought i'd ask these guestions due to the recent discussion thread on
eproms and roms on the apple // and //e etc

I have an exotic product called the "moustrap" chip....for the //e ..it was
made (briefly till apple sued them) by a
company that took a switchable ROM (ie. able to hold the old pre-mousetext
char set and also the new mousetext char set) on the same EPROM chip and
switch back and forth between char sets...
and it was all incased in a hard plastic with a nice little label called
"mousetrap" w/date (shinny metal foil label whoo who) with a cable off the
end of it and a toggle switch...so back in the day..(1983 or so)

i popped the chip into my old orig case //e and ran the switch thru the //e
vent ports and drilled a hole in my old system saver //e fan  front and
there
along with my sound switch for the speakers it has resided...along with my
switch for my orig non-autoanswer 300baud networker modem zowie....

anyway...it also runs on an apple ][ i think...and what it does is it allows
me to run programs like orig applewriter or others that were made
before apple made the mousetext roms upgrade chips for mice to be used with
the //e and the //gs software programs

if i toss in a disk and it comes up with garbage characters..game or
whatever it was prob made prior to the mousetext rom upgrades and i
just flip my switch and the old rom char set kicks in or vice versa

i know in the old incider or a+ mags there was a way you could copy the ROMs
onto this said model? of eprom and make your own.version of this
product....(now you see why this guy was sued apple...they did not like
that..apple at the time wanted you to just buy their ROMS for the upgrade
and forget the programs prev to this that gave you problems with character
gibberish game/app or otherwise)

so a person could do that method via the magazine

or is it possible for me using a software program of some type just to copy
to disk the mousetrap ROM (both versions) and then just make a copy
of it...(i assume it is the same as the a+ or incider mag modification) and
then some enterprising individual (syndicomm) or whomever could maybe get
perm
from apple or the author or both or just find the article i mentionend and
make their own version of this for distribution or sale?

does not look like that big a hack but maybe with people wanting clock chips
etc there may be a market for this...either the make your own magazine
hack (this time i'd suggest incasing it in clear plastic neato) or find the
maker of this mousetrap chip mod and get perm from apple for him to
distribute it

prob no one is much interested and re-reading the above just doing the
magazine modification (with added neato plastic covering and cable/switch)
would prob be the best route and just get perm for ROM copy from apple? and
maybe there is a small market for this? or not

just was mucking around and saw the mod chip and figured at the least i'd
mention its existence and the magazine mod version in case all you folks
adding cffa cards and ordering clock chips and transwarp //e cards jazzing
up the old //e want another mod to add to the beast (the sound switch also
works nice)

also works for adding the old pre-autoanswer zoom 300 baud modem with light
....but i doubt anyone wants to add that mod!!...thats my 3rd switch on the
old system saver

anyway...blast from the past ..maybe someone else can point people to the
article mod i mentioned on the net or at least the particular A+ or Incider
magazine the article was in

but if there is a way to copy the contents of the rom chip to a floppy (both
versions) of my mousetrap version or just roms for the apple version in
general..how would it work...or in copying eproms is it a direct copy using
an eprom writer card chip to chip... whatever let me know and i'll do so
just to archive the eprom manufactured verson that i have from 1983 or so
the label says...the eprom copy would require much hand holding for me to
get a direct chip to chip xfer...

anyway just for project consideration to whomever....

brad
former sysop lost-gonzo.com