Demand for Performa 630CD?

[trag]

A RAM module having chips on one side or two sides does not really tell you anything definitive.   The important question is whether a SIMM  is single banked or double banked.  Often, chips on one side corresponds with single banked, etc., but not always.

IIRC, it has been well established that the x[x]63n supports a double banked SIMM in one socket and a single banked SIMM in the other socket, for boards with two SIMM sockets.  For boards with a single SIMM socket, a double banked SIMM is supported.

The remaining question is what size of bank does the family support?    I seem to remember that folks have used 128MB SIMMs in them, indicating that a 64MB bank size is supported.  Hardware-wise, 64MB/bank support requires support for 12 X 12 bit addressing in the SIMM slot.  The 72 pin SIMM spec. supports 12 address lines, but not all machines that use 72 pins SIMMs support all 12 lines nor all possible addressing modes.

Double banked 32 MB SIMMs, made of two 16MB banks, e.g., require 11 X 11 addressing, and so will be the maximum if the machine only connected 11 address pins in each SIMM slot.

Anyway, if 12 X 12 (ROW v. COL.) addressing is supported, then 64 MB banks are supported, and the single SIMM slot x[x]63n machines support 128 + 4MB = 132 MB RAM and the two slot machines support 128 + 64 + 4 MB = 196MB RAM.

Double banked 64MB SIMMs are an odd duck because they require 11 X 12 or 12 X 11 addressing and many machines don't support that mode.

 

[Trash80toHP_Mini]

IIRC, it has been well established that the x[x]63n supports a double banked SIMM in one socket and a single banked SIMM in the other socket, for boards with two SIMM sockets.  For boards with a single SIMM socket, a double banked SIMM is supported.

That's what has me thinking that the MoBo RAM is one bank, the second SIMM the other hlf of that pair and the main SIMMs double banks as rounding out a four bank setup.

A riff on the Quadra 605 "Evil RAS Line Hack" would be removing the MoBo ICs of a DOS Compatible 6XX and setting the required lines on a course to the "second SIMM" slot adding support for a double banked memory upgrade? That's a far more simple version of my (insanely complicated) plan for Bank A of the IIsi. The DOS compatibles should be a walk in the park by comparison. The Quadra 630 rigged to support a pair of double banked SIMMs on a 72-pin SIMM doubler would be the more far fetched, but much happier outcome for my single SIMM slot Quadra 630.

 

[Franklinstein]

There were sort of two different versions of these machines: the 63x and 64x. The primary difference is that the 64x has two RAM slots where the 63x has just the one; they're mostly identical otherwise. Some of the 63x machines may have had the double RAM slot board, but I can't tell you off hand which they were (thanks, confusing model numbers!).

They weren't super great machines, but the game Marathon (which is freely downloadable now, btw) has an option to take advantage of the Valkyrie video controller used in these boards. I think that was the only software that ever really did so, aside from maybe an Apple video program of some sort.

For me the model to get would be the 640 DOS Compatible. They're very interesting in that unlike the other DOS Compatible Macs that put the DOS card in a PDS/NuBus/PCI slot, the 640's DOS card physically displaced the 68040 and plugged directly into the processor socket on the logic board, with the '040 being relocated to a special socket on the DOS card. It also used an LC PDS card to provide the game port (and some other low-level functions I'm sure).

Another interesting tidbit is that the Pioneer MPC-LX100, which was the only officially licensed 68k clone, used the double RAM slot version of the 63x/64x board. It also used a full 68040 with a copper slab glued onto the processor to aid in heat dissipation. Very cool machine.

 

[SE30_Neal]

Ok i have the slightly later 6200CD which looks the same but is slightly quicker. I agree its not a Great mac at all but because of that like the 630 they’re cheap, very cheap. I brought mine solely for getting my se/30 up and running, its that bit newer, can get online to download from macintosh garden, then i just use a Zip drive to transfer between machines for what i needed from it, its been a god send and i like the looks too.

 

[Blake]

I have a 640cd dos compatable i believe it used to be in a pre-school or kindergarden as it has a bunch of old educational dos games on it. The hd might need to be replaced tough because it rarely boots up and when i boot from cd it says the hd needs to be initalized. It probaly just needs a re-install but i would hate to get rid of all the old games so im just going to try my luck and hopefully the hd will decide to boot once more so i can hopefully copy the games on cd. 

 

[Zippy Zapp]

The nice thing about the 630/640 is that it has IDE.  So you can replace the HD with an IDE to SD or CF card.  If you like spinning drives, like I do, it is not too hard to get older IDE drives.

On that note, I finally found an original 640CD restore CD.  I know you can download one now from various sources but I like to have the original software to a system if I can.  

 

[trag]

While the built-in IDE is not especially fast, the hard drives that Apple shipped in these machines was even slower.

I remember, back in the 90s, I gave a friend a 340MB (or was it 500?) WD IDE drive to install in his Q630 and he said that it sped it up considerably.

So the stock hard drives were the drive performance bottleneck, not the IDE interface.   Of course, any semi-modern drive should easily max out the IDE interface now days.

I mention all this because anyone who still has a stock hard drive installed could probably get a nice speed bump just by installing an IDE device that is 5 or more years newer.

The really nice thing about these machines back in the day is that they were widely available for under $1000 (usually as a refurb), back when a sub-$1000 Mac was mostly a dream.

 

[SE30_Neal]

I believe The ide interface was only 8-bit wide so not great. That said i have the newer yet even more compromises  6200cd and i like the machine, I brought it for £50 working: popped in a 2gb drive 32mb ram and put MacOS 8.6 and in that config got my se/30 working by acting as a bridge machine and gets online nicely (macintosh garden) be it slowly, all in all enjoy using it and appearance wise same case as your 630. Cheap way into classic mac software