June 1998: How quickly we forget how revolutionary personal computers are! The first PCs were kits for electronic hobbyists. The Apple 1 came as a kit; users had to add their own keyboard, case, and power supply. The real revolution came in 1977 with the TRS-80, the Commodore PET, and the Apple II – computers […]
June 1998 – As a Mac user and proponent, a taxpayer, and the father of four children enrolled in the Grand Rapids (MI) Public Schools, these news tidbits about our school system migrating to Windows got my attention.
Vintage Macs is a forum for users of 68000, 68020, 68030, and 68040-based Macintosh computers (a.k.a. 680×0 Macs and 68K Macs). This includes compact Macs, the Mac II series, LCs, Quadras, and others.
June 1998: I received an interesting email from Mark Sutherland the other day. He swore he’d seen a picture of the iMac with a VGA port. I quickly grabbed Macworld and looked closely at the pictures (no longer online). No sign of a monitor port. Just audio, USB, ethernet, and modem ports. I asked Mark […]
1998 – On the Mac side of the fence, we all know the processors found in the Power Mac G3, the PowerBook G3, and in G3 upgrades in a host of older Macs are up to twice as fast as Intel’s Pentium II processor. But did you also know that Intel has a long history of […]
Feeling smug about the year 2000, Mac owner? Don’t.
June 1998: The world is trying to tell Apple the iMac is overpriced: “Buyers want a $999 computer.” But the facts speak differently.
With the iMac, Apple is adopting the Universal Serial Bus (USB), replacing the SCSI, serial, and ADB ports Mac users have had for over a decade.
May 1998: The iMac has one flaw: no removable media drive. That’s right, there’s no standard floppy drive, nor is there a SCSI port for adding a Zip drive, optical drive, CD-ROM burner, or other removable media drive.
1998 – Yes, Mac OS 8 takes up more memory than earlier Mac OS versions, but it’s not necessarily what you think. On a machine with 12 MB of memory, OS 8.x takes up less memory than on the same Mac with more memory installed. Here’s how – and Apple’s been doing things like this […]
1998: In his article, Apple Offers Sizzle in Forbes Digital, Michael Noer asks, “Is Apple really back?” Despite claims by Steve Jobs and the fact that Apple Computer is the sweetheart stock of 1998, Noer maintains that Apple is not back. Instead, he claims it is dying.
May 1998: We’ve had over a week to put iMac in perspective – and it’s still a winner.
The article on SCSI Component Order generated some excellent feedback and dialogue. The following comments were written by Keith Bumgarner of MacInformed, the author of the original article.
1998 – I don’t think I’ve been this excited about a computer since I got my own Mac Plus to replace an 8 MHz XT clone.
Per a few private requests, I found enough interest to post a thesis for all to see about the SCSI ID 5 issue.
The PowerBook G3 Series, code named WallStreet, was designed around the same PowerPC 750 (aka G3) processor as the original PowerBook G3 – but don’t confuse it with the original. Although they bear a similar name, this was a whole new computer. Available at three different speeds (233, 250, and 292 MHz) and with three […]
This was posted during a discussion of stripping PowerPC (a.k.a. PPC native) code from the System Folder for use on 680×0-based Macs.
1998 – There is no functional difference between the Power Mac 7100 and the Quadra 650 with the PowerPC upgrade card: They use the same ROM. As for the PPC Toolbox, that appears on all the 68040 Macs I’ve worked with, simply because the PPC Toolbox is 68k code.
Apple launched the Macintosh in 1984 with an 8 MHz 68000 CPU. When this list was published in April 1998, the fastest Mac was the 300 MHz Beige Power Mac G3. Here are Scott Barber’s picks as the best Macs from each CPU family Apple has used to date.
1998 – Okay, kind of a flame, but really specialized. I disagree that Apple should dump the 68k code simply because they want to isolate the 68040 machines from modern use.
1998 – I have this incredible desire to mention a few things about SCSI, seeing the wealth of posts that in some way or another ask whether this drive or that drive will work with this machine or that machine. This isn’t meant to be sarcastic, and it’s very serious – I have clients that […]
All Macintoshes are capable of achieving the 230 kbps (kilobits per second) transfer rate, since this is the speed of LocalTalk. The problem is, unless a device uses the LocalTalk protocol, the port cannot stream that way and is limited to normal serial modes.
1998 – “One topic you you didn’t address was VRAM. Since I use a lousy 15″ monitor, I’m assuming that increasing monitor size will be key to increasing ease of use/performance. Of course, I assume that someone in a prepress use already has two 24″ monitors….”
1998 – It sounds to me like you’re running the kinds and types of software that can create common crashes. I’ve noticed a considerable number of people on the list that don’t have crashes, but I’m not one of them. There are things you can do to shore up your system from crashes and eliminate […]
1998 – First, you’re going to need a lot of memory. All you can afford. Pump your Mac to the maximum memory you can get. Once you get over 80 MB, you’ll be kind of redundant – most CD-writing programs only provide for a 64 MB RAM cache. Aim for at least 64 MB of […]
By request, I’ve searched my personal archives and stumbled on my thesis. It’s rather short compared to the ones I write now, but it should get the point across. Now, there are two complete reposts here, so don’t get confused when the subject changes.
1998 – Long ago, as it has been mentioned, some companies used soft partition software.1 This was an overlay of the hard partitioning format. In some cases, this worked okay, but in most cases, it worked just like Stacker or eDisk2 (for more on these ancient utilities, see Miscellaneous Macintosh FAQ) – sooner or later […]
“How come my folders/apps inflated in size when I moved them from the old drive to the new one? The size of files has jumped by more than 25% across the board. Did I do something wrong in simply dragging the entire contents from the old drive the new one?”
“I’m using my PowerBook Duo 280c over Apple’s LocalTalk Bridge to get access to my ethernet network. What do I need to get TCP/IP to flow through that, too? Where can I get it?”
1998 – Homer Brickley on Nando.net thinks we’ll see $500 computers by Christmas ( The Computer Model T Is Not That Far Away). I beg to differ.
1998 – Go into your Preferences folder and remove Display Preferences and Sound Preferences. One of the problems when Mac system software switched over was that the engineering team at Apple created Monitors & Sound, instead of leaving them separate, when they created Mac OS 7.6. This created two separate versions of preferences files which […]
A Level 2 (L2) cache was a popular way to boost performance on faster 68030-based Macs, including the Mac IIci, Mac IIvx, and Mac IIfx. But none of the 68040-based Macs shipped with an L2 cache, although most were capable of using one. The L2 cache is automatically accessed by the 68040 series processor, whether […]
ISDN is a nearly forgotten service provided by the telephone company to provide digital transmission of voice, data, video, and more over a conventional land line. It is faster and more reliable than the 56k modems that have been in use since the late 1990s. [There was a time when we had ISDN service for […]
I have posted my answer to your question to the Quadlist, simply because it’s the most on-topic question I’ve gotten in a while. Contained within my answer are little tips that I think others need to know so that they can get powerful performance out of their machines as well. I have eliminated a considerable […]
1998 – Quantum makes the best SCSI drives for Apple or Mac clone branded equipment. I think they make lousy IDE drives though and vote for IBM or Maxtor when it comes to IDE.