New Accelerator for Apple II-series soon available!

[Gorgonops]

Well this do?

That is an ethernet card for a NuBus Mac so, no, it's not of much interest to a IIgs owner.

I think you've convinced me that this solution has too many moving parts for you. If I ever get around to writing up a IIgs MacIP howto (or maybe someone else on the forum knows a good one that already exists) I'll try to make a point of putting a link to it somewhere.

 

[NJRoadfan]

For development purposes, the GSport emulator supports an Uthernet card in slot 3. Support has been tested with Marinetti under GS/OS and Contiki. It can also connect via MacIP (if you have a gateway available) using the built-in Appletalk emulation, but that has a bit of a learning curve to setup.

AppleWin also supports the Uthernet in slot 3 if you are exclusively targeting 8-bit environments.

 

[xboxown]

That is an ethernet card for a NuBus Mac so, no, it's not of much interest to a IIgs owner.

I think you've convinced me that this solution has too many moving parts for you. If I ever get around to writing up a IIgs MacIP howto (or maybe someone else on the forum knows a good one that already exists) I'll try to make a point of putting a link to it somewhere.

Thank you! Because I am still...uuuuuuuuuuuh....have no idea what you are talking about and how do I go about doing it and I am afraid I might fry my baby thinking I am doing something correct when I am not. I need either a video or lots and lots of pictures with big letter step by step in doing this. You are aware from the past previous pages and up to now I have no idea what you are talking about and I feel like you are talking chinese with me and all I feel is just piled up frustration.

 

[xboxown]

For development purposes, the GSport emulator supports an Uthernet card in slot 3. Support has been tested with Marinetti under GS/OS and Contiki. It can also connect via MacIP (if you have a gateway available) using the built-in Appletalk emulation, but that has a bit of a learning curve to setup.

AppleWin also supports the Uthernet in slot 3 if you are exclusively targeting 8-bit environments.

I have no interest in applewin or 8 bit support. I am going 16 bit GS/OS exclusive.  If there is a video that shows me how to do it and the guy grabs the hardware and zoom into the hardware and mentions the name of the hardware and so on and then show me detail in how to configure network in apple //gs then that would superb.

 

[olePigeon]

So unbearable.  I want to get one (or two!) before Thanksgiving. :O

Signed up for the email.  I feel like a little kid now, checking my mail every day to see if he has one in stock.  [] ]'>

 

[Gorgonops]

Still going to hold out until there's a IIgs version. We can can dream, right?

 

[xboxown]

I realized that when you exploit the apple //gs custom chipset to the max and produce good graphical games they match bar identical to the console super nintendo and some in beauty and quality much like arcade machines you see in stores. Shame such sweet computer did not get the attention it truly deserved.

I am hoping with all hopes that if this accelerator does become reality we will see new 2017-2018 games for apple //gs 16 bit exclusive titles that push it to the limit and make people go WOW!

 

[Gorgonops]

I realized that when you exploit the apple //gs custom chipset to the max...

Point of order: Yes, you can make very *pretty* games for the IIgs (it has a wider color palette than the Atari ST and it's kinda-sorta easier to get more colors on the screen at once than Amiga because it has multiple palette registers; Amiga has HAM, but that's hard to use for non-static images), but that's pretty much the extent of the tricks available. The IIgs has no sprites, no blitters, no hardware scrolling, etc. Technical breakdown here.

An accelerator certainly does make it capable of better things than a stock machine, but let's be realistic.

 

[xboxown]

Point of order: Yes, you can make very *pretty* games for the IIgs (it has a wider color palette than the Atari ST and it's kinda-sorta easier to get more colors on the screen at once than Amiga because it has multiple palette registers; Amiga has HAM, but that's hard to use for non-static images), but that's pretty much the extent of the tricks available. The IIgs has no sprites, no blitters, no hardware scrolling, etc. Technical breakdown here.

An accelerator certainly does make it capable of better things than a stock machine, but let's be realistic.

I am going to read that article when I go home. You said let's be realistic because of lack of programmers? By the way. Just so you know. Someone can add an accelerator graphics hardware that uses the exact same apple //gs famous graphics output, composite or rgb etc but add missing features such as sprites, blitter, hardware scrolling, etc as a new hardware fpga or whatnot upgrade for the apple //gs. You get to enjoy the way apple //gs display colors and whatever make it different than the other system but just add missing features in the hardware for graphics output and possibly increase the speed of the graphics from 1 Mhz to say for example 14 Mhz for better performance. Yet you still can get the graphics outputted either through composite port or rgb port.

I see no reason why not. 

 

[Gorgonops]

I am going to read that article when I go home. You said let's be realistic because of lack of programmers?

No, I said "be realistic" because it's really something of a stretch to suggest that the IIgs would be such an AMAZING platform if-only-it-had-a-faster-CPU that there'd be oodles of reasons for people to flock to it. Adding an accelerator is basically just a brute-force way of working around the IIgs' fundamentally weak graphics chipset; if you're super-optimistic you could say that it puts it level with its competition, it doesn't make it better.

By the way. Just so you know. Someone can add an accelerator graphics hardware that uses the exact same apple //gs famous graphics output, composite or rgb etc but add missing features such as sprites, blitter, hardware scrolling, etc as a new hardware fpga or whatnot upgrade for the apple //gs.

Famous? I only said that it has a bigger palette than the Atari ST (IE, it's 12 bit instead of 9 bit, which ironically would mostly would make it noticeably better at displaying *grayscale* images) and a couple obscure features that make it kinda-sorta better at a very limited set of tasks compared to its generally superior rivals. There's nothing about its video output that's super-magically-honey-sweet compared to any other system of that era; the quality of its TV/CGA-resolution analog RGB output stacks up pretty evenly compared to systems as pathetic as the $219 Tandy Color Computer 3(*1). In short, it's nice for a home computer built in 1986, but looks kind of like garbage compared even to 1987's VGA.(*2)

As to making some sort of graphics accelerator for it that adds sprites and blitters and whatever, sure, it's certainly technically possible that someone could do something like that... but why? It wouldn't be compatible with any existing IIgs software, so for a potential programmer your already tiny target audience of people-with-Apple IIgs-es-equipped-with-CPU-accelerators would shrink further to the subset of those who've also bought this graphics card.

Realistically speaking, if what you want is a IIgs with gaming-oriented graphics accelerator they already made one. It looks like this:

Footnotes.

(*1) Sadly there are people that would make the case that the 6809 in the CoCo3 is a better CPU than the IIgs' 65C816. Nobody made any version of it that clocked much faster than 2mhz, though.

(*2) I'll take non-interlaced 640x480 over 640x200 for productivity programs any day; the GS/OS desktop in particular is a real eyeball scorcher. And VGA had 320x200 in 256-simultaneous-colors-out-of-262,144 *on the whole screen* vs. the IIgs's 320x200 in 16-colors-per-line-chosen-from-16-possible-palettes-chosen-from-4096-colors for games.)

 

[xboxown]

I am literally laughing and giggling at your post  [ ]  [] ]'>  [] ]'>  [] ]'> But can I say something?  [8D] You are right! Everything you posted above is 100% right and me laughing is not at you but more at how you put the words together hit me in the funny bone . You are right again about the colors of the apple //gs and how it displays GS/OS and that it is real eyeball scrocher and as for "garbage" graphics of the Apple //gs? You are right again! To me that is what makes it magical for me! That!

Any time I want to go into chaos and garbage graphics and colors fix after usage of perfect and clear and HDMI graphics...I can always go back to my trusted Apple //gs and enjoy the primitiveness of it and take me to simplicity world. I use the Apple //gs and it puts me in the same as someone sitting in nature and hearing the gentle flow of water stream. 

Ones I am done with my superior Amiga and enjoyed Playstation 4 and PC game, I go back to Apple //gs for that feeling it brings me.  [] ]'>

I am craving for apple //gs games by the way, new ones so I can get the fuzzy little kid of the 1980's with his new toy! By the way about the SNES part, yes you are right there too! But what makes me really jumping with joy and enter super fuzzy feeling is to get snes like games on my Apple //gs. This way I can hit two birds with one stone. I know it s fantasy.

 

[olePigeon]

And this is peak into how they did a lot of it.

 

[xboxown]

I AM IN LOVE WITH NINJA FORCE! I AM GETTING THAT 8 MB RAM AND HDD JUST FOR THAT KABOOM GAME HAHAHAH!!

I want to support ninja force and have them release new stuff for the apple //gs! I will donate, anything just to make sure they keep on running!!!!!!!!!!

Apple //gs to me is the true Mac 68k!!!

 

[Gorgonops]

Just remember one thing about demos: as impressive as they can look they're rarely a good demonstration of what the *realistic* capabilities of the machine actually are; definitely watch and take careful note of the "how they did it" video before getting too excited about what kind of amazeballs video games the IIgs might be capable of. These demos are basically just amazing exercises in coming up with ways to shovel pre-calculated data onto the screen according to an excruciatingly rigid script, while a real video game needs to do a lot more than that.

(Also note that these demos target an 8mhz accelerator, almost three times as fast as the stock machine. I do kind of want to download it and see what it does at 2.8mhz, though, given their talk about the limiting factor for a lot of it is the 1mhz video RAM bus.)

Having lived through owning an 4.77mhz IBM PC for years I feel like I'm pretty sure I have a good idea of what you can reasonably expect from a game written for it, but if I *didn't* know seeing these demos might give me some unrealistic ideas:

(Of note: both of these demos target the original 4.77mhz CPU speed, not an accelerator; the first one is for a *fully* stock computer including the crude single-voice audio, the second one uses a soundblaster card. The 8088 is a *famously* sluggish CPU; reams of Internet paper have been spent arguing over just HOW sluggish compared to various other popular-at-the-time CPUs, but suffice it to say that most people would agree that even at the stock 2.8mhz a IIgs should have at least a moderate advantage over it.)

 

[xboxown]

Just remember one thing about demos: as impressive as they can look they're rarely a good demonstration of what the *realistic* capabilities of the machine actually are; definitely watch and take careful note of the "how they did it" video before getting too excited about what kind of amazeballs video games the IIgs might be capable of. These demos are basically just amazing exercises in coming up with ways to shovel pre-calculated data onto the screen according to an excruciatingly rigid script, while a real video game needs to do a lot more than that.

(Also note that these demos target an 8mhz accelerator, almost three times as fast as the stock machine. I do kind of want to download it and see what it does at 2.8mhz, though, given their talk about the limiting factor for a lot of it is the 1mhz video RAM bus.)

Having lived through owning an 4.77mhz IBM PC for years I feel like I'm pretty sure I have a good idea of what you can reasonably expect from a game written for it, but if I *didn't* know seeing these demos might give me some unrealistic ideas:

I agree! But Apple //gs is famous for adventure games and click and play adventure games like king quest etc.

So the only games I want to develop for is very funny, most intensive graphics possible, animated, with hilarious and good stories with seasons and episodes like telltale game did with walking dead, etc, but with style of king quest or space quest. 

I have seeing there is an animation program for apple //gs from ninja force website. I will contact them and see how did they did, I may be able to implement this feature into my games with ability to play audio (voice+music) in the background of the animation for in-game cut scene. I believe apple //gs is superb for adventure games as it can do it just fine.

 

[kerobaros]

xboxown: I hate to disappoint you further, but I don't think anyone else has pointed out the fact that the accelerator discussed in the original post of the thread is only compatible with the IIe, not the IIgs. To get a IIgs accelerator, you'll either have to get one of the cloned TransWarp cards from ReactiveMicro or get exceedingly lucky on the used market.

 

[xboxown]

I know. In previous posts I declared in hopes they make a llgs version. I am aware of that fact.

 

[olePigeon]

Well, now I know who bought all the FASTChips.  They're selling them on eBay at a huge markup.  "Hard to obtain!"  No freaking kidding ya jerk.  >

 

[xboxown]

hehe...someone cranky

 

[olePigeon]

Yeah.  Been checking the website daily for a few months, but I'm not about to pay $100 markup for one.