joethezombie
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It's an OR situation. Upon connecting an external display, the internal monitor reverts to black and white operation.
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jt's Random Questions Thread
- Thread starter Trash80toHP_Mini
- Start date
Trash80toHP_Mini
NIGHT STALKER
Figured as much, their setup looks slicker'n snot. Time to hit the schematics while you do the real deal in the adapter cloning thread. I wish I had even half your competence on that side of things. Rock on, zomb. ;D
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Except that on the Performa 630, the A/V card isn't really the personality of the machine, because you can do without it. You still get basically all the functionality a 475/605 or 610 has if you don't install the a/v card, even normal Macintosh audio in and out.Let's say the Personality Card quirk of the BG3s hearkens back to plug and play video playtime on a standard Mac offering that first appeared in the Quadra 630. [] ]'>
There are different levels of the video system (implemented as different cards or different cards that have different things, like the tv card vs the tvfm card, both of which need the base a/v card), but that would be more akin to being able to replace the personality card with, as I mentioned, different versions offering functionality like USB/Firewire, a newer GPU, whatever. Or perhaps with the personality card being an audio card with an optional module into which the a/v functionality installs. (Even then, that card is still the personality card, not one of a few different, possibly interlocking modular expansion options, as a/v on the 630 through 6500 was.)
Plus, Wings has video output, and it works closer to the way the [every AV Mac other than 630-based designs] works. Video output on the 630 & Co, when installed, was more like a built in version of one of those VGA to NTSC conversion boxes.
So, my guess is that the actual circuitry for the Wings personality card came from the 8600, not from the 630, even though the concept of modularity might be "from" the 630.
Even if you want to make a "spiritual successor" argument -- the 6500's successor is the iMac. The 7300 and 8600 are succeeded by the Beige G3.
My guess? For better or worse, VEE combinations and a/v systems weren't really selling to consumers who actually used that functionality, but desktop video for things like building multimedia CD-ROMs and LAN/ISDN video conferencing were increasing in popularity, so Apple was hearing from its customers of 6500-type systems that they wanted cheaper, and they were hearing from 7300 customers that they wanted A/V back.
The solution? Kill a/v altogether on the Performa successor, and make a/v an option on both the new pro tower and desktop. It lets you go down from like ten desktop models to three, with two of them featuring customizability.
But, I'm not sitting in on Apple strategy meetings in the mid-late '90s talking about this with people who would have that survey data and market research.
Trash80toHP_Mini
NIGHT STALKER
Putting the entire sound subsystem on a (required) "expansion" card was kinda dumb and very cost ineffective, but it aided somewhat in the miniaturization of the MoBo. Holding over the Performa's "install an internal modem and just plug up the now useless serial port" was incredibly stupid. No way an ersatz PCI modem (had to have been retention of an even dumber serial bases modem) on the personality daughtercards should have been using a serial port's interrupt I/O mapping in the system.
Adding capability adds value, shuffling resources around lowers "percieved value" even if it works out sort of the same. "Switch boxing" the modem/serial port utility in hardware or software would have been a trivial exercise, but Apple was never really interested in I/O expansion or even retention.
Dropping six slots (effectively 5) of the 9600/9700 development line for three slots with less capable video options on board the BG3 would be a case in point. Abandoning the high end content production market segment that kept the Mac alive in the nineties until the release of the iMac needed to be rectified twice even afterward, the DA partially rectified the lack of expansion by adding another PCI slot and the 2003 MDD OS9 Special edition rectified Apple's abandonment of the Content Creation Community's massive investment in a high end specialized expansion infracture that had been borken badly by Apple's blindered push to a rudimentary, not ready for prime time OS for which reliable drivers for a stable, capable release of X were a long time coming.
Adding capability adds value, shuffling resources around lowers "percieved value" even if it works out sort of the same. "Switch boxing" the modem/serial port utility in hardware or software would have been a trivial exercise, but Apple was never really interested in I/O expansion or even retention.
Dropping six slots (effectively 5) of the 9600/9700 development line for three slots with less capable video options on board the BG3 would be a case in point. Abandoning the high end content production market segment that kept the Mac alive in the nineties until the release of the iMac needed to be rectified twice even afterward, the DA partially rectified the lack of expansion by adding another PCI slot and the 2003 MDD OS9 Special edition rectified Apple's abandonment of the Content Creation Community's massive investment in a high end specialized expansion infracture that had been borken badly by Apple's blindered push to a rudimentary, not ready for prime time OS for which reliable drivers for a stable, capable release of X were a long time coming.
Did a modem installed in the slot on the G3's personality card actually disable the serial port? I had been under the impression that that did not happen on Comm Slot II designs, such as the 6500 and the Beige G3. I can't find anything online saying that it happens, as you can for the 6200 & Co.
This should really probably go on my blog or tumblr, but:
Regarding costs: Apple had made the decision to build multimedia onto the personality card, so that's kind of a sunk cost in designing and building the machine. It's a bit of a shame they didn't do more with it, and it would have been a great extension to the strategy of perhaps building out a 7700/8700/9700 either as dual 604ev and G3 capable systems or a third round of 604 systems with faster chips (it's said all over that the 604ev could have gone a few hundred mhz faster and was still faster than the G3 at certain tasks) and then a 7800/8800/9800 as G3-based systems.
It's probably worth noting that the Beige G3 started for less than what its predecessors cost, for better configurations, and for (usually) a much faster system. Prices on Beige G3s fell quickly and by the time the iMac G3 was released, a G3/266 desktop in 32/4 config was around $1299, a thousand dollars less than what a 7300/180 sold for in 1997. (For fairness: That is after the /300 launched and some prices were re-shuffled. The Beige G3 233/32/4 launched at $2399, itself down from the 7300/200's $2,699. So, it's sort of difficult to believe that the personality card design contributed more than a few pennies to the bill-of-materials cost of the whole machine, once the solution was engineered, probably by putting sound on the PCI bus and then moving it onto the card.
If you still build three different physical designs like that, (regardless of what you name them) then the personality card can make the need to differentiate between the 7300, 7600, 8600, and 9600 for a/v functionality less relevant. Especially if you, say, have a 9600 and want to load it with cards, but not for an Avid setup, but you still want to pull in the occasional VHS tape for a cd-rom video or use video conferencing for collaboration.
I think the theory of the personality card, short lived as it is because the need for analog a/v basically died with the coming of firewire, is that any machine in your professional stack should be eligible for a/v, and perhaps that it should be an installable upgrade.
I think there are a lot of possible reasons sound came with to the card, but ultimately I think it's wrong to suggest
Regarding the Power Macintosh G3 QuarkXPress Edition: It was released on the eve of Mac OS X 10.3. OS X was ready by then and many of the other publishers had already published OS X versions of their software, or patches that made their apps work better in Classic mode. I don't thik Quark was the only vendor that had this problem, but it was certainly one of the highest profile ones. The market quickly shifted to inDesign, which had been ported to OS X at a reasonable time.
Upon the release of 10.0 (March 2001), it would have been unwise to release a machine that could only boot OS X. By late 2002 it's not unreasonable to presume the market should have been ready. -- and this was when OS X releases each lasted 2-3 or more years -- I think it's reasonable to presume the market should have been ready. Certainly by 2003 when the G5 and the XPress G4 were released it should have been.
But, Quark had been doing this stuff for years. They were experts at releasing a new version and then sitting on it for years at a time, with longer intervals between major releases than almost anyone else in the software industry. The only software I can think of that lasted longer is big commercial UNIX releases that come with $100,000 high-performance visualization supercomputers or business transaction processing machines.
Anyway, I don't know if I agree with the idea that the beige G3 represented an abandonment of that market, even though it did represent a shift in strategy for Apple, and companies *cough* Avid *cough* building large boardsets would need to adapt somehow. Jobs definitely wanted Apple to succeed and I think he saw that part of what was losing Apple potential money was the fact that they built so many different machines.
I'm sure Apple could have adapted the Beige G3 design up and down a tier or two. Perhaps a flat 6360-shaped machine with the PERCH slot and one PCI slot both on a riser, and perhaps a 6-slot version that was basically the same as the existing tower but with more slots and bays, and we of course know about the all-in-one version for the education market, but I also think Jobs correctly identified that having too many options, many of which were only ever suitable for a slim portion of the market, was slowly killing Apple.
And, for Apple's customers -- the ones who stuck it out with them -- Apple that sells a machine that only 90% meets their needs is better than an Apple that doesn't exist at all, and doesn't sell any machines.
All of this stuff is cyclical. We're seeing Apple come back to the idea of building a big internally flexible tower computer. It is likely they'll float back and then forth again over the coming years/decades.
This should really probably go on my blog or tumblr, but:
Regarding costs: Apple had made the decision to build multimedia onto the personality card, so that's kind of a sunk cost in designing and building the machine. It's a bit of a shame they didn't do more with it, and it would have been a great extension to the strategy of perhaps building out a 7700/8700/9700 either as dual 604ev and G3 capable systems or a third round of 604 systems with faster chips (it's said all over that the 604ev could have gone a few hundred mhz faster and was still faster than the G3 at certain tasks) and then a 7800/8800/9800 as G3-based systems.
It's probably worth noting that the Beige G3 started for less than what its predecessors cost, for better configurations, and for (usually) a much faster system. Prices on Beige G3s fell quickly and by the time the iMac G3 was released, a G3/266 desktop in 32/4 config was around $1299, a thousand dollars less than what a 7300/180 sold for in 1997. (For fairness: That is after the /300 launched and some prices were re-shuffled. The Beige G3 233/32/4 launched at $2399, itself down from the 7300/200's $2,699. So, it's sort of difficult to believe that the personality card design contributed more than a few pennies to the bill-of-materials cost of the whole machine, once the solution was engineered, probably by putting sound on the PCI bus and then moving it onto the card.
If you still build three different physical designs like that, (regardless of what you name them) then the personality card can make the need to differentiate between the 7300, 7600, 8600, and 9600 for a/v functionality less relevant. Especially if you, say, have a 9600 and want to load it with cards, but not for an Avid setup, but you still want to pull in the occasional VHS tape for a cd-rom video or use video conferencing for collaboration.
I think the theory of the personality card, short lived as it is because the need for analog a/v basically died with the coming of firewire, is that any machine in your professional stack should be eligible for a/v, and perhaps that it should be an installable upgrade.
I think there are a lot of possible reasons sound came with to the card, but ultimately I think it's wrong to suggest
Regarding the Power Macintosh G3 QuarkXPress Edition: It was released on the eve of Mac OS X 10.3. OS X was ready by then and many of the other publishers had already published OS X versions of their software, or patches that made their apps work better in Classic mode. I don't thik Quark was the only vendor that had this problem, but it was certainly one of the highest profile ones. The market quickly shifted to inDesign, which had been ported to OS X at a reasonable time.
Upon the release of 10.0 (March 2001), it would have been unwise to release a machine that could only boot OS X. By late 2002 it's not unreasonable to presume the market should have been ready. -- and this was when OS X releases each lasted 2-3 or more years -- I think it's reasonable to presume the market should have been ready. Certainly by 2003 when the G5 and the XPress G4 were released it should have been.
But, Quark had been doing this stuff for years. They were experts at releasing a new version and then sitting on it for years at a time, with longer intervals between major releases than almost anyone else in the software industry. The only software I can think of that lasted longer is big commercial UNIX releases that come with $100,000 high-performance visualization supercomputers or business transaction processing machines.
Anyway, I don't know if I agree with the idea that the beige G3 represented an abandonment of that market, even though it did represent a shift in strategy for Apple, and companies *cough* Avid *cough* building large boardsets would need to adapt somehow. Jobs definitely wanted Apple to succeed and I think he saw that part of what was losing Apple potential money was the fact that they built so many different machines.
I'm sure Apple could have adapted the Beige G3 design up and down a tier or two. Perhaps a flat 6360-shaped machine with the PERCH slot and one PCI slot both on a riser, and perhaps a 6-slot version that was basically the same as the existing tower but with more slots and bays, and we of course know about the all-in-one version for the education market, but I also think Jobs correctly identified that having too many options, many of which were only ever suitable for a slim portion of the market, was slowly killing Apple.
And, for Apple's customers -- the ones who stuck it out with them -- Apple that sells a machine that only 90% meets their needs is better than an Apple that doesn't exist at all, and doesn't sell any machines.
All of this stuff is cyclical. We're seeing Apple come back to the idea of building a big internally flexible tower computer. It is likely they'll float back and then forth again over the coming years/decades.
More business thoughts:
I wonder if Apple's annual reports from the mid to late '90s show what particular products sold the most units and made the most dollars. Apple split out different kinds of Macs for part of the 2000s (showing iBook, Power Mac, PowerBook, and iMac revenue separately, for example.).
The 10-K filings don't show it, or I went through them too fast. There is this perception that high end pros buying 9600s kept Apple afloat, but what if it was actually something different? What if it was home users buying Performa 6000 systems or K-12 schools buying LC 5000 systems or governments buying PowerMac 7000 systems?
Apple of course would have numbers on how many they sold, and I'm guessing they came to the conclusion that not enough six-slot Macs were built to make it worth the cost of designing another type of gossamer motherboard (remembering that the dt, mt, and aio all used basically the same board)
Interesting notes from the 1997 10-K form -- Revenues were down in 1998, the cited reason is they discontinued a huge swath of products and 1998's updates to the Power Macintosh G3 were super aggressively priced (Again: down by around $1000). Revenues were down in 1997 compared to 1996, the cited reason being demand was down.
There is also this gem:
The iMac was a third of what Apple sold, and that was under 300,000 systems.
Ultimately, the 1998 report shows a much rosier overall picture than the 1997 one, which talks about the doom and gloom of having to write off the value of huge unfulfilled, canceled orders for Macintosh systems from retailers and then write down the value of unsold inventory as it was being sold. Remember when near-top-spec PowerBook 1400s were available for like $1100 in 1998 from most Mac retailers below the PowerBook G3? Yeah, that wasn't at all good for Apple.
I think the death would have been slower than reports at the time suggested, but I do think without some kind of big changes like the ones Jobs instituted, it would have been inevitable.
Having ultra-fast six slot 604e systems with a 67 or 100MHz bus could have been neat, but if you don't fix basically everything or everything else about Apple, it comes at the expense of Apple's very existence beyond 1999 or so.
I wonder if Apple's annual reports from the mid to late '90s show what particular products sold the most units and made the most dollars. Apple split out different kinds of Macs for part of the 2000s (showing iBook, Power Mac, PowerBook, and iMac revenue separately, for example.).
The 10-K filings don't show it, or I went through them too fast. There is this perception that high end pros buying 9600s kept Apple afloat, but what if it was actually something different? What if it was home users buying Performa 6000 systems or K-12 schools buying LC 5000 systems or governments buying PowerMac 7000 systems?
Apple of course would have numbers on how many they sold, and I'm guessing they came to the conclusion that not enough six-slot Macs were built to make it worth the cost of designing another type of gossamer motherboard (remembering that the dt, mt, and aio all used basically the same board)
Interesting notes from the 1997 10-K form -- Revenues were down in 1998, the cited reason is they discontinued a huge swath of products and 1998's updates to the Power Macintosh G3 were super aggressively priced (Again: down by around $1000). Revenues were down in 1997 compared to 1996, the cited reason being demand was down.
There is also this gem:
Remember that in Q3 and Q4 1998 Apple was selling these things:
- iMac
- Power Macintosh G3
- PowerBook G3
The iMac was a third of what Apple sold, and that was under 300,000 systems.
Ultimately, the 1998 report shows a much rosier overall picture than the 1997 one, which talks about the doom and gloom of having to write off the value of huge unfulfilled, canceled orders for Macintosh systems from retailers and then write down the value of unsold inventory as it was being sold. Remember when near-top-spec PowerBook 1400s were available for like $1100 in 1998 from most Mac retailers below the PowerBook G3? Yeah, that wasn't at all good for Apple.
I think the death would have been slower than reports at the time suggested, but I do think without some kind of big changes like the ones Jobs instituted, it would have been inevitable.
Having ultra-fast six slot 604e systems with a 67 or 100MHz bus could have been neat, but if you don't fix basically everything or everything else about Apple, it comes at the expense of Apple's very existence beyond 1999 or so.
The 1400 was a budget-conscious model, but it never started that low.
Introductory pricing on the 1400cs/117 (which was the slowest model, with the passive matrix display) was $2,500.
That price probably fell or the machine was discontinued in favor of the /133 later on, but you get the point. Especially considering the entry price on the 3400c/180 was $4500.
So, a 1400c/133 with 16-32mb of ram, a cd-rom and floppy drive, and a modem or ethernet in 1998 for under $1,300 was a huge deal, even though the model was almost three years old, if only because the introductory/retail price on the least expensive PowerBook G3 was also around $2,500 or so.
Add to that -- they are solidly built machines and pcmcia expandability meant you could add pcmcia networking and storage or other connectivity. You could upgrade the RAM to 64 megs and you could also put in a faster 603e or G3 accelerator.
So... "cheapo" is never a word I'd use about the PowerBook 1400.
It's also worth noting that the 1400 was never really "meant for" home users specifically, although it's likely that many people wanting personal laptops picked them up on the eve of the iBook when they were being fire-sold.
Depending on your needs and interests, the iBook was probably a better deal, but that's neither here nor there.
Introductory pricing on the 1400cs/117 (which was the slowest model, with the passive matrix display) was $2,500.
That price probably fell or the machine was discontinued in favor of the /133 later on, but you get the point. Especially considering the entry price on the 3400c/180 was $4500.
So, a 1400c/133 with 16-32mb of ram, a cd-rom and floppy drive, and a modem or ethernet in 1998 for under $1,300 was a huge deal, even though the model was almost three years old, if only because the introductory/retail price on the least expensive PowerBook G3 was also around $2,500 or so.
Add to that -- they are solidly built machines and pcmcia expandability meant you could add pcmcia networking and storage or other connectivity. You could upgrade the RAM to 64 megs and you could also put in a faster 603e or G3 accelerator.
So... "cheapo" is never a word I'd use about the PowerBook 1400.
It's also worth noting that the 1400 was never really "meant for" home users specifically, although it's likely that many people wanting personal laptops picked them up on the eve of the iBook when they were being fire-sold.
Depending on your needs and interests, the iBook was probably a better deal, but that's neither here nor there.
Trash80toHP_Mini
NIGHT STALKER
It wasn't all that unusual for Apple to keep even what had been a high end model in production well into its obsolescence. The Plus and IIci come to mind offhand.
The 1400 preceded the 3400 and remained in production longer than all its iterations, including the Kanga G3.
It had a great (best ever?) KBD in a holdover form factor that would remain unchallenged in its relatively compact convenience until introduction of the 12" WhiteBooks, IIRC. The 1400's screen resolution 800x600 panel for entry level 'Books finally got an upgrade to 1024x768 at this point. Stereo became available as well. What was up the TSiBooks? Were they mono speaker limited through the entire series?
Lovin' my 1400c/G3/466.
The 1400 preceded the 3400 and remained in production longer than all its iterations, including the Kanga G3.
It had a great (best ever?) KBD in a holdover form factor that would remain unchallenged in its relatively compact convenience until introduction of the 12" WhiteBooks, IIRC. The 1400's screen resolution 800x600 panel for entry level 'Books finally got an upgrade to 1024x768 at this point. Stereo became available as well. What was up the TSiBooks? Were they mono speaker limited through the entire series?
Lovin' my 1400c/G3/466.
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The PowerBook 1400 was formally discontinued in May 1998.
The PowerBook 1400s you could buy in late 1998 and early 1999 wasn't something Apple specifically wanted to happen, but it was a problem that regularly happened to Apple through the '90s -- they would build a bunch of something and then sales channels would get stuffed. Mac Zone then discounts 1400s and 3400s so those can sell through so they can make space on shelves for PowerBook G3s and iMac G3s.
They talked about this in their 1997 annual report, too. Retailers were canceling orders to replenish their stock because of slowing demand.
The PowerBook 1400s you could buy in late 1998 and early 1999 wasn't something Apple specifically wanted to happen, but it was a problem that regularly happened to Apple through the '90s -- they would build a bunch of something and then sales channels would get stuffed. Mac Zone then discounts 1400s and 3400s so those can sell through so they can make space on shelves for PowerBook G3s and iMac G3s.
They talked about this in their 1997 annual report, too. Retailers were canceling orders to replenish their stock because of slowing demand.
Trash80toHP_Mini
NIGHT STALKER
Yep, vagaries of inventory, market lineup planning and whimsical demand from consumers whipsawed by economic swings of the era led to some pretty sweet spots here and there through the 90s. Got my remaindered PB100 inexpensively, but only after demand for it at its lowest price levels brought the going rate back up a bit. It's too bad I never took note of bargain basement PB1400s. Wouldn't have mattered though, the Duo2300c was still a far better platform for my needs in that time frame.
Still lovin' Beater, my first wardriver though. Maxed out and snagged off craigslist for a Benjamin sometime in or around '03.
Be the unintentional deals as they may along with actual production dates and inventory fluctuations, Apple's announcements tell the story of what they were trying to sell and from there you can figure out the market segmentation. Availability of products compared to official lineup's a moving target as well, we've seen a lot of that of late, even "official" MacRumours at the Pro level.
At any rate, the first 1400 was announced four and a half months before the 3400 and the last 1400 was dropped from the lineup a hair less than two months after the Kanga G3 iteration of the 3400 "High End 'Book" was discontinued. That 10.1.96 to 5.6.98, nineteen month period was one hella "product lineup run" for a single logic board tweaked PowerBook in that rapidly changing technological climate.
The 1400 was definitely a sweet spot form factor that held its own until general adoption of 1024x768 panels hit the lineup. It was the ultimate NuBus Architecture PowerBook. The 1400's mature technology and traditional form factor held up well through the PCI Architecture sea change, fruit-loopy styling fads and adoption of new I/O configurations in that era.
Undoubtedly the "Classic" PowerBook at its best.
Still lovin' Beater, my first wardriver though. Maxed out and snagged off craigslist for a Benjamin sometime in or around '03.
Be the unintentional deals as they may along with actual production dates and inventory fluctuations, Apple's announcements tell the story of what they were trying to sell and from there you can figure out the market segmentation. Availability of products compared to official lineup's a moving target as well, we've seen a lot of that of late, even "official" MacRumours at the Pro level.
At any rate, the first 1400 was announced four and a half months before the 3400 and the last 1400 was dropped from the lineup a hair less than two months after the Kanga G3 iteration of the 3400 "High End 'Book" was discontinued. That 10.1.96 to 5.6.98, nineteen month period was one hella "product lineup run" for a single logic board tweaked PowerBook in that rapidly changing technological climate.
The 1400 was definitely a sweet spot form factor that held its own until general adoption of 1024x768 panels hit the lineup. It was the ultimate NuBus Architecture PowerBook. The 1400's mature technology and traditional form factor held up well through the PCI Architecture sea change, fruit-loopy styling fads and adoption of new I/O configurations in that era.
Undoubtedly the "Classic" PowerBook at its best.
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