Difference Between "Macintosh II Video Card" and "High Resolution Display Video Card"

[CC_333]

I have two of the former, and one of the latter.

How are they different? As I recall, the II was available with either the standard monochrome card for the basic Mac II display, or a high resolution card which could drive the HiRes color display.

c

 

[Juror22]

Whenever I have one of these questions, I look up this page ...
https://vintageapple.org/gamba2/vid-mon-matrix.html

It has a pretty good list of cards/monitors/resolutions.

 

[slomacuser]

Macintosh II Video Card | Low End Mac

lowendmac.com

The Macintosh II Video Card is unaccelerated. With an optional RAM upgrade that requires eight 120ns DIP chips, it supports 640 x 480 in 8-bit color. Without the RAM upgrade, it supports 640 x 480 in 4-bit color. It will not drive the Apple 12″ RGB Display or 12″ Monochrome Display, which only operate at 512 x 384 resolution. It only supports 640 x 480 output.

Macintosh II High Resolution Video Card | Low End Mac

lowendmac.com

The Mac II High Res Video Card is unaccelerated. It supports resolutions of 640 x 480 and 512 x 384, which was the resolution of Apple’s 12″ color and monochrome displays. The video card was available in two configurations. The 4-bit model supports 16 color (4-bit) video on a 640 x 480 display, 256 colors (8-bit video) on a 512 x 384 display. The 8-bit model supports 8-bit/256-color video on a 640 x 480 display.

With an optional RAM upgrade, which requires eight 120ns DIP chips, the 4-bit version supports 640 x 480 in 8-bit color.

 

[CC_333]

Hmm, OK. It seems neither one's performance is anything remarkable.

Which one is rarer?

c

 

[Johnnya101]

The high res one is more uncommon, but don't think it's hard to find, either. Just in comparison to the regular video card. I think in terms of being the most common, it's Mac II (Very common) > High Res (Somewhat common) > Display 4*8 (Harder to find common) > Display 8*24 (Somewhat uncommon) > Display 8*24GC (Uncommon) > Display 24AC (Rare)

That's just from me browsing eBay listings for the past few months. If you had to sell one, sell the regular one, but neither are anything special as far as I know.

 

[Iesca]

The 8*24 uncommonness can be mitigated somewhat by upgrading an exisiting 4*8 with some vram, since that's the only real difference, and the 4*8 card has the slots for it.