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Re: AE PC Transporter Questions...

Supertimer wrote:


Jeff Thomas <a2forever@usa.net> wrote:



I got an Applied Engineering (AE) "PC Transporter" installed in my Apple
IIGS (ROM 01 - I believe) computer. It comes with Revision 2.0.4 system
software from 1989/90. Does anyone know where I can find any
documentation for it? What exactly is it, an AT (80286) or XT (8088)
emulator? What features does it have e.g. 640Kb of memory, 2Mhz
clockspeed, Hard disk support, colour, graphics mode: CGA, Hercules,
etc? Will it recognise my "RAM GS" 4Mb memory expansion card from
Sequential Systems? How do I get it going and revert back to the
standard Apple IIGS mode? Do I need an IBM 5.25 inch disk
drive/keyboard/monitor/etc attached to use it?



It uses an NEC V30 processor operating at 7Mhz which is the
equivalent of a Turbo XT with an 8086 processor.  Actually, it was
a clone of the 80186 processor which was somewhere between
the 8086 and 80286
It is up to 50% at the same speed as the 8086, when doing things like division, but in general it gives a 5-15% speed increase. Add to that the faster clock, and you have a pretty responsive DOS machine.
The chip also has the microcode of the 8080, an so can run any CP/M software that doesn't require the later Z-80 chip. 

but this Intel processor received very little

press because most systems just used it as an 8086.  It has up
to 640k of memory and CGA graphics.
The chip, however, like all of the first generation 86 chips, can access up to a meg of RAM, and more if you use the EMS specification, but that probably wasn't supported on the card. 

 You can use your IIGS

monitor to output the display.  There should be a video mixer
card in your case.  The IIGS keyboard and mouse are utilized
as is the IIGS hard disk drive.  The normal IIGS drive can't read
the PC MFM format unless you happen to have a SuperDrive
and SuperDrive card.  Before I got my SuperDrive, I simply
created an MS-DOS hard disk drive file on my IIGS hard drive
and took software over via a modem from the PC to the IIGS.

The PCT will not use IIGS memory so you are stuck with 640k.

The PCT reminds me of how bad PCs were up until 1995.  Let
me tell you, I used Apple IIs for a long time.  The IIGS came
put in 1986.  At the time, most PCs were the specs of the PCT
and the 286 were just beginning to come out. 


IBM released the AT with EGA in 1984.

Both sucked.

The only good point was the business software available for
the PC but that was only because of the IBM name, not any
technical excellence of the PC product.

I had a PCT and used an XT and an IBM AT (286) as well as
a IIGS.  The stock IIGS could outperform either PCs and the
PCT anyday.  It was terrible to see how the XT and AT and
PCT unzipped files or converted GIF graphics or the AT try
to run the early GUIs.
GEM ran rather nicely on a stock XT, and was great on an AT, ditto with GEOS. Windows, of course, sucked so badly, M$ egged Apple into threatening a suit against DRI over GEM, just to buy time for M$ to get Windows working. M$ also bought the rights to use some Mac technology, again, to get Windows off the ground. 

The IIGS was light years ahead when

running GS/OS and unzipped files much faster even using
the 8-bit Angel program.

I know many will disagree, especially those who jumped
ship early in the PC's history to use the available MS-DOS
business programs but speaking objectively, the PC pretty
much sucked up to about 1995-1997.  That was when Win 95
came out, PC sound move beyond the 4-voice SoundBlaster,
SVGA became popular, and it was just before the AMD
K6-2 CPU and the 3dfx Voodoo graphics chipset was
released.  A little after this time, I moved to the PC and the
changes came so fast.  Now I have built 3 PCs and intend
to upgrade soon to dual Athlons.

I feel that I speak from an objective viewpoint because I am
now a diehard PC user.  It is so easy to build an ultra
powerful PC from scratch now, it has become a hobby of
mine.  PC games are stunning, who wants a game console?



Evidently millions of people.



You can built a system powerful enough to render Final
Fantasy.  PCs have left the Mac in the dust.



Choke, cough, snort!




BUT PCs did not get good until recently.  People used to tell
me once I moved on to the PC I would realize how bad the
Apple II always was and how good the PC always was.  Not
true.  The PC is great NOW but for a long time the Apple II
series especially the IIGS was superior.



A IIc (1984) was superior to the AT (984)?
Really? Double High Resolution vs EGA? How about the PGA?
Or the IIc's 80 column 9" monitor compared to the MGA and IBM's 12" monitor?
1 mhz 6502 vs the 8 mhz 286? (Even if you had the original 6 mhz, that machine could run at 8 mhz or faster with a crystal change - I know, I have just such a machine 12 feet from me as I write this on my 1.5 ghz Athlon) 
128K vs 512K?
1 140K floppy vs 1.2m floppy and a 20 m harddrive?
Keep in mind that through much of the Apple II's life, when people wanted really heavy duty business software, they added a Z-80 card so the could run CP/M. PC-DOS had better, faster, more powerful business software than CP/M.
I will grant that the IIgs was superior. But that came out in the fall of 1986, more than two years later, and about six months after that the IBM released the models 25 and 30 (later the model 30-286) which gave much better color graphics than the IIgs, though the first 8 bit 11 voice Soundblasters were still no competition for the IIgs sound. 

Roy