PB165 4-bit mode & odd System behaviour

[croissantking]

I’m trying to figure out why System 7.x doesn’t render the title bar of open windows with nice greyscale shading on my PB165 when set to 16 greys or 16 colours.

Compare these two images:



The second picture is booted off the disk tools floppy but on the same machine. The first picture is a regular install of the 7.5.3 on a hard disk.

If I swap in a PB180 active matrix display to this computer, it will show the ‘nicer’ title bar.

It seems like a bug in the system software that sets the depth of the title bars to 1-bit when using a 4-bit passive matrix display.

Anyone know if there’s a patch/fix for this?

 

[Phipli]

I’m trying to figure out why System 7.x doesn’t render the title bar of open windows with nice greyscale shading on my PB165 when set to 16 greys or 16 colours.

Compare these two images:

View attachment 63173View attachment 63174

The second picture is booted off the disk tools floppy but on the same machine. The first picture is a regular install of the 7.5.3 on a hard disk.

If I swap in a PB180 active matrix display to this computer, it will show the ‘nicer’ title bar.

It seems like a bug in the system software that sets the depth of the title bars to 1-bit when using a 4-bit passive matrix display.

Anyone know if there’s a patch/fix for this?

I think it's a 7.5 thing. I think caused by doing a custom install. It results in a black apple menu in 256 colours too (on other machines).

I feel like it is a bit of a bug as it is sort of... Extreme minimum System File, to a stupid level, even if you select loads of extras on top of the base install. I've accidentally ended up with a load of slightly hobbled 7.5.3 installs on machines and it is part of the reason I'm not a 7.5 fan.

 

[croissantking]

I’d better get on and start baking my 180 LCD.

 

[zefrenchtoon]

Am I wrong or the "picasso mac" icon is in shades on the upper screen capture and in b&w on the lower one ?

 

[croissantking]

Am I wrong or the "picasso mac" icon is in shades on the upper screen capture and in b&w on the lower one ?

You are right, but this is because the disk tools floppy is cut down in terms of icons and suchlike.

 

[zefrenchtoon]

You are right, but this is because the disk tools floppy is cut down in terms of icons and suchlike.

it was just to be sure
so it is very strange to have a somewhat cutdown installed system (with b&w title bar) but containing full icon set on a side and a full "color" title bar with reduced icon set on the other side

I did not know that this kind of result was possible with 7.5 ...

I recently had to make a fresh custom install of 7.5.3 on my 475 to get an optimized system for this computer, I will have to check this kind of details ...

 

[croissantking]

Removed the resource highlighted above (video drivers?) and got nicely shaded title bars back. I wonder what, if anything, this will break. Interestingly, DBLite was a codename for the PowerBook Duo 210/230, not the 160/165/180.

 

[croissantking]

I came across some more info (link) about this ‘feature’. It refers to the Duo but equally applies to the 160 and 165:

Have you noticed that the title bars on your document windows are the old black and white, 2-D type (as opposed to that neat 3-D effect in system 7). The reason for this, is the system 4-bit gray scale Duo monitors do a strange thing with those 3-D bars. They make them look like a current of liquid is running under them - constantly in motion. It's a neat effect but Apple thought it would be distracting.

So the system enabler for your Duo replaces the standard WDEFs (window definition procedures) resource with the old black and white versions. If you want to get the 3-D effect you need to remove this "patch."

To do this make a copy of your system enabler, and open it with res-edit (if you don't know what res-edit is, you probably don't want to be doing this) and remove the WDEF resource. Move your active system enabler out of the system folder (save it - you might want to use it again) and put your "edited" version in it's place. Then restart the computer. I've never heard of any conflicts resulting from this hack - but I doubt it's Apple approved. You've been warned.

Also, a very usefull shareware program Strech 3.0, works by overriding the systemd WDEF resource. Since the enabler is holding the last word for this resource, it overrides Strechs overriding of the systems resource. If you remove the WDEF resource in the enabler (above) Stech works fine.

 

[croissantking]

I came across some more info (link) about this ‘feature’. It refers to the Duo but equally applies to the 160 and 165:

Confirmed this WDEF removal trick works under System 7.1 (but not anything later).

Use my trick to remove a vdpm (see above) under System 7.5.3.

I don’t have a solution for 7.5.5 or beyond yet.