It’s amazing to me that people are still developing addons for such an old system. My first computer was an Apple clone Laser 128 EX, and had some speed selector function through keyboard commands (or holding a number at startup). This little accelerator reminded me of that. A simpler time.
It's more that designing these kinds of things are much more possible by hobbyists: individuals and small teams than ever before. If you can design a PCB, you can have a fabrication company create a board and even assemble it and have it at your door in a few weeks. At least presently depending if you can get the chips. FPGAs power a lot of these things and they are really hard to get right now.
@@alextirrellRI The way things are going at present, I have a feeling that running Rev A iMacs will still be on hobbyists' desks in the year 3000... Assuming there are desks.
I was a LONG time IIgs user. It was my main everyday home computer, not a museum piece. Used both the ZipGS and Transwarp accelerators, don’t remember speeds. I seem to recall Zip was a bit slower but less finicky. I should dig it out of the closet to see if it still works, although might be a problem because CRT display died (and it’s not a standard display). Cool that people are still creating (and buying) new products for it.
Awesome video! I got the AS early on (Order #006!)... And as it turns out I had that early motherboard too. To make the AS fit, I replaced the DIP socket (the original was too loose) and desoldered the number pad/keyboard connectors. So, had random sound interrupt errors and worked with Niek on it. He was extremely responsive and supportive (in fact offering a refund multiple times, of which I refused). Fast forward to yesterday - he sent me an updated core to try out and it WORKS!... Sounds are no issue and the system is very stable. Well done Niek!
I had to replace the socket too, but am still getting the sound interrupts as well as distorted sounds. The new test core for me seems to disable all Ensoniq sounds Niek has been pretty good with trying to work a solution. We just need to figure out the variables between the different variations on the ROM 01 boards
@@lemonherb1 Interesting... I played synthLAB for about an hour without issue - the sounds were perfect. Played Tetris, Arkanoid, and a few other games and the sound was great. I have the DarkSound card.
@@glonch I don't think the stereo card is the variable as the distorted sounds also come through on the stock speaker. I've tested three other ROM 01 boards, two were behaving fine, and one booted to the desktop good, but crashed as soon as I ran SynthLab. Clearly there are some differences between them. They all are the B version of the board, but have different versions of the VGC and Sound GLU
You still might want to re-socket the cpu, using round machine pins stretches out the contacts on wiper-style sockets and makes them lose connection on chips. 👍
The reason the internal keyboard doesn't work is probably because Wolf3D uses a special direct ADB-chip hack to allow simultaneous keypresses. Maybe the //e keyboard header doesn't contain the signals or has some other reduced functionality compared to ADB. If you have Out of This World, that uses the same hack (pioneered by Burger Becky). See if that also doesn't work. Sorry about your CFFA! You really need that to work :)
It's not just that the keyboard can't do simultaneous presses, it can't do key-up events at all. It's basically the same keyboard interface as the original Apple II keyboard back in the late 1970s. On old Apple II games you'd see this all the time, you'd press a key once to start moving, and then again to stop - because the software had no way to detect when you released a key after holding it down.
What you have there is the Apple II GS that Apple could have made, but never would have in a million years, because it would have competed well against the Mac.
Fast forward to 2022, and Mac is a small, minority platform. Only 8% market share. Intel Alder Lake and AMD Ryzen, running Windows 10, rule the world now.
@@DerekDavis213 Since people tend to keep their Macs for longer than their Windows PCs, market share (of sales) is not an accurate indicator of installed base. Browser statistics are better: looking just at desktop OSes, macOS has about 19% share.
@@tookitogo 19% share ? So about 1-in-5 people on Planet Earth are using a Mac? LOL! Don't be ridiculous! Windows has a *HUGE* software base, and is the world leader for gaming. A Windows PC offers *FAR* better price vs performance, compared to any Mac. Windows machines are easily upgraded with more RAM, larger and faster SSD, and the latest monster video cards from NVidia or AMD. Mac is locked-down, dead-end, a disposable computer. Mac has very little quality native software. Mac now uses M1, a processor from a cell phone. Mac can *no* *longer* run Windows software with near 100% compatibility. That makes M1 Macs totally inferior to Intel-based Macs.
@@DerekDavis213 Are you illiterate? I said 19% desktop (i.e. windows and Mac and Linux) browser share, which is a good indicator of installed base. I didn’t say anything about the percentage of humans using a Mac. As for the rest, blah blah blah… different people care about different aspects of a product. If everyone cared about the same things as you, 100% of computer owners would have Windows PCs. The fact that nearly 20% chose Macs instead means there’s a significant number of people who care about other things - like battery life or smooth integration - more than you do.
@@DerekDavis213 As for the other nonsense you spewed: “Slower SSDs” - Nope, not correct. “Price vs performance” - the cheaper M1 Macs wipe the floor with comparably priced PCs “Little high quality native software” - you have ZERO idea what you’re talking about. Yes, there’s more programs for windows in absolute numbers, but the quality often sucks. The higher quality of Mac software is one of the reasons I prefer that platform.
Thx for the demo, I also would like to thank Mr Wozniak, my father bought his first computer an Apple II+, then I purchased an Apple IIGS when available during the 80's. I miss this computer, was a great fun with all the french programmers in Bordeaux ( France ) and all the demos made to show Apple that the IIGS was truly an amazing machine. I still work in the IT industry and I can thank this machine which help me to get more than a foot in the market. IIGS for ever ! Steve Jobs made several mistake, clearly the IIGS was one of it, they should have merge the Apple II and the Macintosh line, and probably history could have been different !
Great video today. I have an idea for a future video. Have you considered dropping a PiStorm in a 68K Mac as an accelerator? I've seen a lot of Amiga videos about it, but a quick search indicates that it will work in a Mac, just without some of the special features. Keep up the good work!
That function is still very early in getting to work correctly. Memory Maps are mostly complete, and really the boot process is very touch and go still for Pistorm. I have a Mac SE with a newly socketed 68k socket to work on this with my PiStorm and Buffee replacements. BOTH are "sorta" working projects in the mac. PiStorm is great on the Amiga 500 however with some caveats due to DMA and interrupts still being an issue on the Amiga platform.
This was epic! I've always had a fondness for retro computing, as I grew up on the IBM XT and later the 386 (which I upgraded to a 486 -- woohoo!), and while I wasn't fond of Macs when I was younger, I've developed an appreciation for them through your channel and the 8-Bit Guy. Seeing such a limited computer roided up like that was super awesome!
One of my favorite channels. I only sub to a couple and you are one of them. I have purchased several vintage Macs because of your channel and how much fun you have. Thank you and continued success!
When I take apart two components that are stuck together, I usually put a sharpie mark on one corner to make sure they get back together correctly. Also, have you thought of replacing the socket on the board by a ZIF socket? They are perfect for switching stuff around without breaking anything.
Oh man, another great shirt! Justice for Tuvix! I totally remember that Voyager episode, and it was very conflicting, as were many Star Trek episodes from the various series.
It's really cool to see people doing all this stuff with old computer tech. My mom used an Apple II for her masters degree, since it was easier to build/code custom peripherals for educational use. somewhere I think we still have the box of floppies that hold the programs and documents for that.
My revision ROM 01 is the same as yours. I just had to populate they keyboard header for my own clear "Not So Stealth IIGS" But from the get go I had issues with the AppleSqueezer, and I think it's primarily due to the stock CPU socket on my GS. I'm going to see if I can dig up a dual wipe 40 pin dip socket to use as a 'riser' like you have to see if that will work. But I suspect I'll have to replace the socket all together. I did run the AppleSqueezer on a ROM 3 without issue, but that one already had the CPU socket replaced with a machine socket years ago.
Just a bit of a followup on my AppleSqueezer problems. It ends up that it has problems with two of my ROM 01 boards. And interestingly enough both were assembled in January 1987. The date stamp is near the PSU that has a four digit code. The first two indicate the year, and the last two indicate the month. I've sent both these boards to Niek to test and develop a solution for, so I suspect that full compatibility with ROM 01's will be forth coming.
your intro made me giggle your an awesome youtuber i found you during covid and what you do to these old apple machines are fascinating keep up the good work!
I like that computers are becoming more like cars in the sense that something from the 1980s is still getting performance parts. Do I NEED to overclock a IIgs? No Do I need to supe up a Chevette? No But damn it's fun!
Your Chanel brings back so many memories of when I had a gaggle of Macintosh computers. I had just about every model. I threw them all away one day when I had to move. 🤦🏻♂️♥️
Just found your videos. Loving your content. It's awesome, the things that can be done with the power of FPGAs nowadays by talented enthusiasts! I hope you haven't been jumped on repeatedly for this, but I just wanted to politely point out that "Xilinx" is pronounced like "ZYE-links", the "zye" part rhyming with "rye" or "high" or "by". 😻
The main issue here is the same as for SUperCPU C64 accelerator. It still has to keep the video ram in the old slow memory of 2.8Mhz, because video chip can access it only there. So every time the new cpu has to write to video ram, it slows down to 2.8. With applications that do a massive transfer to vram, such as Wolfenstein, it seriously impedes performance.
It's interesting that some of the keyboard keys are not working in Wolfenstein 3D with your IIGS motherboard and the Apple IIe keyboard, especially since that header on the early IIgs boards is a factory deal. Have you confirmed the keys work with other software? With your CFFA 3000, maybe you need to reflash the firmware to get it working properly? As for the rest of your video, pretty cool! I hope the chip shortages go away sooner verses later. There are a lot of cool pieces of hardware I want to get but can't at the moment. Boo!
Your use of Wolfenstein 3D to test the processor performance in your Apple II reminds me of how I'd use Half-Life 2 to test graphics cards in my 2008 Mac Pro. The cl_showfps command is actually a great tool for benchmarking graphics cards.
Oh I just got one of these! However I have a very early IIGS with the bodge on the bottom. So it crashes. Hopefully they find a solution. Otherwise its an awesome solution! Edit after watching the whole video: It's very interesting that yours works. I wonder If your IIGS has different values on the bodge on the bottom. Its an RC circuit (one resister and one capacitor). With my iigs any program with sound makes the system hang.
I discussed with Niek, and I have the bodge, but don't have an issue. I sent photos and feedback to Nick. I think the key is motherboard contact. The socket on the motherboard does expect flat pins. I changed with a modern CPU socket, it because I was not able to make a solid contact. Now the AppleSqueezer is nearly hard to remove, contact is perfect, and I've had strictly no crash for hours. I don't think the bodge is an issue at all.
@@philippeastier7657 hmm, very interesting, I’ll have to get a machined socket or a zif socket. I replaced my original socket with a double wipe socket that I had on hand, but maybe that isn’t making good contact. However I do need to talk to Niek about one other issue. My ensoinq makes a very loud white noise kind of sound with the sqeezer in, but with my 18mhz TWGS in it works fine with minimal noise. Maybe I have some bad sound ram, I don’t know just yet. Sockets and part changing might be in my IIGS’s future.
Yes Niek mentionned that some boards had issues with other accelerators, which I could not test. At least the bodge is not an indication enough. He does a great job, let him solve the mystery, I fed him with photos and information. BTW, my IIGS is in fact a ROM-00 upgraded to ROM-01, is that your case as well ?
@@philippeastier7657 Thanks a lot for your photos indeed! I may have fixed this issue yesterday, although it was only tested with one user so far, but for him the fix worked! Will do more testing and then release a new core version for everyone.
@@philippeastier7657 Yes it is. my IIGS if I recall correctly was made in the 1st or 2nd batch of IIGS's, and is a WOZ. When I get home (and hopefully remember that I wrote this comment), I'll check my serial number and see. But I do know it was a ROM-00 in the beginning of its life.
I wish such a thing was possible for the C64. Yes, I know about the SuperCPU but they're as rare as hen's teeth and cost thousands of dollars when they show up for sale.
I wonder if a software keyboard translator program could fix the keyboard issue with wolf 3D. You've certainly got the memory for it now. 😂 I'm also curious if that fpga is powerful enough to emulate the cpu as well so you wouldn't need a real one alongside it. I know it goes against using the original hardware at that point but I'm still curious.
I don't have the Apple II version of Wolf 3d, but every other version allows the choice of resolutions. I was hoping the Apple Squeezer was going to allow it to be played at a normal size.
That is some impressive hardware. The performance gains reminds me of the computer I built right after high school that started life as a Walmart special. I managed to take an old Celeron CPU clocked at 700 MHz and push it and the front side bus up to 1.0 GHz before it became unstable. The front side bus was clocked 100 MHz and managed to get it up to 133. Used a 8000 RPM fan and copper heatsink to keep that overclocked CPU nice and cool. This is during when Windows XP was king and vista development had yet to reset. My graphics card was some NVidia card with 128 MB of ram with dual VGA and used a matching set of 17 inch CRT monitors to round the project off. Some time later upgraded to 5.1 surround sound and used not only Creative for my sound card but speakers as well as they were on clearance at the time. That machine would quickly become irrelevant years later as the Pentium 4 got faster, better, and actual dual cores. Oddly enough my next computer would end up being a Toshiba laptop from 2009 built with gaming and vista requirements in mind. I'm one of the lucky people who got to experience vista for how it should have worked in the eyes of Microsoft.
Like so many of these hand created devices for Apple ][ computers, all THREE AppleSqueezers are listed as out of stock. I have a GS, A ][e, ][c, ][+ and an integer based Apple 2. I would love to upgrade my GS and get my non working ][GS 3 1/2 inch drive repaired.
Wait, the apple squeezer plugs into the standard slot that the original processor chip slotted into correct? Couldn't it be slotted (ishh as you'd have to run a set of wires to the card) into the zip 2gs card? What would happen I wonder?
@@mizinoinovermyhead.7523 I guess they thought that without that, people would just leave their original CPU loose somewhere and it would get lost, or damaged by static. The ZipGS manual just calls it a 'storage area' for the original CPU.
Lol at the shirt. Not a big lover of Voyager compared to the other shows, however that particular episode raised some really interesting ethical and moral questions.
Man I've seen a couple of your vids. In reality I never used a commodore or had any Atari but grew up with a apple ii at school and later got one for free from school in 7th grade when they were finally phased out( I went to a small Catholic school so this was 96-97) I've been watching all these guys with their commodores and everything, anyway to get to the point dude your awesome lol good show, making me want to go to my mom's and see if I can't find my aii I think it's called a c? Been a long time, was the streamline ii. I know that's not a iigs but growing up I thought the iigs was and would always be out of my price range. Such a underated computer, we also had a few of those too
I really wanted one of those, but the DMA issues were too much for me. I already have a TransWarpGS (the Reactive Micro rebuild), a VidHD and a MicroDrive Turbo, and while the TransWarp isn't the most stable solution, I don't think I could do without the VidHD or the MicroDrive at this point.
17:33 - "I usually give up by this point because it's so slow. But look at how fast it is on this machine." Yup, you accelerate a IIgs fast enough, and it'll be more or less adequate for playing games designed for the Famicom.
@Action Retro - upgrade to the 100mhz "65F02" next? Its a drop-in replacement made with a similiar FPGA to power it, in the same pin-out as the stock 6502 CPU!
I would love to see a 68060@100mhz or like a vampire card running in a 68k mac. I think it could work with a lot of effort, but it would definitely be cool.
Fun fact, the original processor used on the 2gs was rated for up to 20mhz. Apple nerfed it to under 3mhz to make the macintosh line sound more powerful with its 68k Moto processor. However, cycle for cycle the 2gs was more powerful, more expandable, better audio, better graphics, and cost less. Apple was the king of shooting themselves in the foot and still surviving…
Not really. This was explained by another TH-camr in a video I watched yesterday (I think the video is recent). He did a deep dive into the 65816. Due to the mask for the CPU being hand drawn instead of using CAD, it wouldn't scale to smaller manufacturing processes well, had yield issues at 4MHz, leading to many 3MHz parts being released despite not being listed in any official data sheets. The manufacturing process GTE used also had limitations. Eventually they binned 6MHz and maybe some 7MHz parts, but Apple couldn't buy these in quantity, so they were effectively irrelevant. It wasn't until Sanyo, Ricoh, and possibly ASIC Inc. independently re-did the mask with CAD (supposedly ASIC did a clean room reverse engineering job in 6 months), that faster variants became available.
It's funny that one of the boards is a "Spartan" considering there was once a Apple 2+ device for the Commodore 64 that was called the "Mimic Systems Spartan"! ;-)
Have you tried some of the other games that need a bit of help in the speed department like, Lemmings, Out of this World, Zany Golf, Dragon's Lair, etc.? If so, can you show off some of those games as well?
I liked the cut away gag, I can see the improvements in production are paying off.
Same
Got a genuine laugh out of that. Was pretty good!
It’s amazing to me that people are still developing addons for such an old system. My first computer was an Apple clone Laser 128 EX, and had some speed selector function through keyboard commands (or holding a number at startup). This little accelerator reminded me of that. A simpler time.
It's more that designing these kinds of things are much more possible by hobbyists: individuals and small teams than ever before. If you can design a PCB, you can have a fabrication company create a board and even assemble it and have it at your door in a few weeks. At least presently depending if you can get the chips. FPGAs power a lot of these things and they are really hard to get right now.
@@alextirrellRI The way things are going at present, I have a feeling that running Rev A iMacs will still be on hobbyists' desks in the year 3000... Assuming there are desks.
I was a LONG time IIgs user. It was my main everyday home computer, not a museum piece. Used both the ZipGS and Transwarp accelerators, don’t remember speeds. I seem to recall Zip was a bit slower but less finicky. I should dig it out of the closet to see if it still works, although might be a problem because CRT display died (and it’s not a standard display). Cool that people are still creating (and buying) new products for it.
Awesome video! I got the AS early on (Order #006!)... And as it turns out I had that early motherboard too. To make the AS fit, I replaced the DIP socket (the original was too loose) and desoldered the number pad/keyboard connectors. So, had random sound interrupt errors and worked with Niek on it. He was extremely responsive and supportive (in fact offering a refund multiple times, of which I refused). Fast forward to yesterday - he sent me an updated core to try out and it WORKS!... Sounds are no issue and the system is very stable. Well done Niek!
Ah awesome!!
I had to replace the socket too, but am still getting the sound interrupts as well as distorted sounds. The new test core for me seems to disable all Ensoniq sounds
Niek has been pretty good with trying to work a solution. We just need to figure out the variables between the different variations on the ROM 01 boards
@@lemonherb1 Interesting... I played synthLAB for about an hour without issue - the sounds were perfect. Played Tetris, Arkanoid, and a few other games and the sound was great. I have the DarkSound card.
@@glonch I don't think the stereo card is the variable as the distorted sounds also come through on the stock speaker.
I've tested three other ROM 01 boards, two were behaving fine, and one booted to the desktop good, but crashed as soon as I ran SynthLab. Clearly there are some differences between them. They all are the B version of the board, but have different versions of the VGC and Sound GLU
@@lemonherb1 Makes sense
You still might want to re-socket the cpu, using round machine pins stretches out the contacts on wiper-style sockets and makes them lose connection on chips. 👍
Dude writing stupid jokes immediately knew he was in trouble. More please 😄
i loved that.
The reason the internal keyboard doesn't work is probably because Wolf3D uses a special direct ADB-chip hack to allow simultaneous keypresses. Maybe the //e keyboard header doesn't contain the signals or has some other reduced functionality compared to ADB. If you have Out of This World, that uses the same hack (pioneered by Burger Becky). See if that also doesn't work. Sorry about your CFFA! You really need that to work :)
ah interesting, thanks!
It's not just that the keyboard can't do simultaneous presses, it can't do key-up events at all. It's basically the same keyboard interface as the original Apple II keyboard back in the late 1970s. On old Apple II games you'd see this all the time, you'd press a key once to start moving, and then again to stop - because the software had no way to detect when you released a key after holding it down.
I've really loved watching your videos evolve, the stupid jokes kill me and I'm kinda glad you're leaning into them! Keep up the great vids
I've quite enjoyed watching your presentation evolve. More stupid jokes please
This!! Stupid jokes 4eva 😂
The cutaway jokes are great, as is the tshirt! What a cool accelerator card.
What you have there is the Apple II GS that Apple could have made, but never would have in a million years, because it would have competed well against the Mac.
Fast forward to 2022, and Mac is a small, minority platform. Only 8% market share.
Intel Alder Lake and AMD Ryzen, running Windows 10, rule the world now.
@@DerekDavis213 Since people tend to keep their Macs for longer than their Windows PCs, market share (of sales) is not an accurate indicator of installed base. Browser statistics are better: looking just at desktop OSes, macOS has about 19% share.
@@tookitogo 19% share ? So about 1-in-5 people on Planet Earth are using a Mac? LOL! Don't be ridiculous!
Windows has a *HUGE* software base, and is the world leader for gaming.
A Windows PC offers *FAR* better price vs performance, compared to any Mac.
Windows machines are easily upgraded with more RAM, larger and faster SSD, and the latest monster video cards from NVidia or AMD. Mac is locked-down, dead-end, a disposable computer. Mac has very little quality native software.
Mac now uses M1, a processor from a cell phone. Mac can *no* *longer* run Windows software with near 100% compatibility. That makes M1 Macs totally inferior to Intel-based Macs.
@@DerekDavis213 Are you illiterate? I said 19% desktop (i.e. windows and Mac and Linux) browser share, which is a good indicator of installed base. I didn’t say anything about the percentage of humans using a Mac.
As for the rest, blah blah blah… different people care about different aspects of a product. If everyone cared about the same things as you, 100% of computer owners would have Windows PCs. The fact that nearly 20% chose Macs instead means there’s a significant number of people who care about other things - like battery life or smooth integration - more than you do.
@@DerekDavis213 As for the other nonsense you spewed:
“Slower SSDs” - Nope, not correct.
“Price vs performance” - the cheaper M1 Macs wipe the floor with comparably priced PCs
“Little high quality native software” - you have ZERO idea what you’re talking about. Yes, there’s more programs for windows in absolute numbers, but the quality often sucks. The higher quality of Mac software is one of the reasons I prefer that platform.
Good to see! The Amiga retro scene has huge FPGA support and numerous cards. Been waiting for the Apple side of retro to get some lovings!
Thx for the demo, I also would like to thank Mr Wozniak, my father bought his first computer an Apple II+, then I purchased an Apple IIGS when available during the 80's. I miss this computer, was a great fun with all the french programmers in Bordeaux ( France ) and all the demos made to show Apple that the IIGS was truly an amazing machine. I still work in the IT industry and I can thank this machine which help me to get more than a foot in the market. IIGS for ever ! Steve Jobs made several mistake, clearly the IIGS was one of it, they should have merge the Apple II and the Macintosh line, and probably history could have been different !
Great video today. I have an idea for a future video. Have you considered dropping a PiStorm in a 68K Mac as an accelerator? I've seen a lot of Amiga videos about it, but a quick search indicates that it will work in a Mac, just without some of the special features. Keep up the good work!
Wow, now that's an extreme upgrade!
That function is still very early in getting to work correctly. Memory Maps are mostly complete, and really the boot process is very touch and go still for Pistorm. I have a Mac SE with a newly socketed 68k socket to work on this with my PiStorm and Buffee replacements. BOTH are "sorta" working projects in the mac. PiStorm is great on the Amiga 500 however with some caveats due to DMA and interrupts still being an issue on the Amiga platform.
Justice For Tuvix! Is there a petition somewhere I can sign??
I always thought Janeway got justice for Neelix and Tuvok, albeit controversially. I never liked the combined Tuvix character.
This was epic! I've always had a fondness for retro computing, as I grew up on the IBM XT and later the 386 (which I upgraded to a 486 -- woohoo!), and while I wasn't fond of Macs when I was younger, I've developed an appreciation for them through your channel and the 8-Bit Guy. Seeing such a limited computer roided up like that was super awesome!
This is an Apple IIGS, not a Mac. Apple II's are cooler than Macs. Have you checked out the Amiga, Atari ST, Atari HCS 8-bits, and C64/128?
One of my favorite channels. I only sub to a couple and you are one of them. I have purchased several vintage Macs because of your channel and how much fun you have. Thank you and continued success!
When I take apart two components that are stuck together, I usually put a sharpie mark on one corner to make sure they get back together correctly.
Also, have you thought of replacing the socket on the board by a ZIF socket? They are perfect for switching stuff around without breaking anything.
Good suggestion ! I did change the socket on my side, but simply because the original one could not retain the Squeezer...
Good to see the IIGS get some love.
Oh man, another great shirt! Justice for Tuvix! I totally remember that Voyager episode, and it was very conflicting, as were many Star Trek episodes from the various series.
It's really cool to see people doing all this stuff with old computer tech. My mom used an Apple II for her masters degree, since it was easier to build/code custom peripherals for educational use. somewhere I think we still have the box of floppies that hold the programs and documents for that.
Mine is on pre-order... in particular I want to play Out of This World at max resolution. Oh, and use AppleWorks GS at a workable speed haha.
My revision ROM 01 is the same as yours. I just had to populate they keyboard header for my own clear "Not So Stealth IIGS"
But from the get go I had issues with the AppleSqueezer, and I think it's primarily due to the stock CPU socket on my GS. I'm going to see if I can dig up a dual wipe 40 pin dip socket to use as a 'riser' like you have to see if that will work. But I suspect I'll have to replace the socket all together.
I did run the AppleSqueezer on a ROM 3 without issue, but that one already had the CPU socket replaced with a machine socket years ago.
Just a bit of a followup on my AppleSqueezer problems. It ends up that it has problems with two of my ROM 01 boards. And interestingly enough both were assembled in January 1987. The date stamp is near the PSU that has a four digit code. The first two indicate the year, and the last two indicate the month. I've sent both these boards to Niek to test and develop a solution for, so I suspect that full compatibility with ROM 01's will be forth coming.
The IIgs will outlive it's demisor for years to come until the electronic will fade away. Impressive Wozniak !
Brilliant video. I just had to put in a pre-order, can’t wait to supercharge my iigs!
I was hoping you'd cover this! I've been looking to get it for months. It gets sold out in minutes.
You had the headroom, you should have increased the view size in wolf3d.
if i'm not mistaken, i don't think the iigs version has the full menu
Make the screen size bigger on Wolfenstein…. The key combo to do this are in the readme.
your intro made me giggle your an awesome youtuber i found you during covid and what you do to these old apple machines are fascinating keep up the
good work!
Thanks that means a lot!
I like that computers are becoming more like cars in the sense that something from the 1980s is still getting performance parts.
Do I NEED to overclock a IIgs? No
Do I need to supe up a Chevette? No
But damn it's fun!
my first computer when i was a kid was an old used apple IIe. Back then i had a blast with it.
That intro is one of your best!
Your Chanel brings back so many memories of when I had a gaggle of Macintosh computers. I had just about every model. I threw them all away one day when I had to move. 🤦🏻♂️♥️
now imagine if we got these machines running at 1 to 5ghz
If the IIgs CPU ran at 5GHz, its video memory would still be hobbled at a pathetic 1MHz on an 8-bit data bus.
Its a QMTech FPGA board! I've got loads of those, it was the cheapest Spartan 6 board with DDR RAM that I could find.
Papilio Duo is another.
Just found your videos. Loving your content. It's awesome, the things that can be done with the power of FPGAs nowadays by talented enthusiasts! I hope you haven't been jumped on repeatedly for this, but I just wanted to politely point out that "Xilinx" is pronounced like "ZYE-links", the "zye" part rhyming with "rye" or "high" or "by". 😻
The main issue here is the same as for SUperCPU C64 accelerator. It still has to keep the video ram in the old slow memory of 2.8Mhz, because video chip can access it only there. So every time the new cpu has to write to video ram, it slows down to 2.8. With applications that do a massive transfer to vram, such as Wolfenstein, it seriously impedes performance.
This man is a treasure and we must protect him.
0:21, I literally lost it, well played😂
I love your shirt! Justice for Tuvix indeed!
It's interesting that some of the keyboard keys are not working in Wolfenstein 3D with your IIGS motherboard and the Apple IIe keyboard, especially since that header on the early IIgs boards is a factory deal. Have you confirmed the keys work with other software? With your CFFA 3000, maybe you need to reflash the firmware to get it working properly? As for the rest of your video, pretty cool! I hope the chip shortages go away sooner verses later. There are a lot of cool pieces of hardware I want to get but can't at the moment. Boo!
Hah, someone elsewhere in the comments mentioned that Wolf3D uses some weird ADB chip hack for better simultaneous keypresses!
Your use of Wolfenstein 3D to test the processor performance in your Apple II reminds me of how I'd use Half-Life 2 to test graphics cards in my 2008 Mac Pro.
The cl_showfps command is actually a great tool for benchmarking graphics cards.
It may have been a dumb joke, but the cutaway gag was perfect.
I came for the Apple Shenanigans and stayed for the IIgs tech talk.
I love your shirt!!!! Justice For Tuvix. He died too young.
I got one of these, but the friend I loaned it to loves it so much on his IIGSthat I haven't even had a chance to see it in action yet! ;-)
The shirt made me smile. Thanks for leaving little Easter eggs in your videos! :-)
Oh I just got one of these! However I have a very early IIGS with the bodge on the bottom. So it crashes. Hopefully they find a solution. Otherwise its an awesome solution!
Edit after watching the whole video: It's very interesting that yours works. I wonder If your IIGS has different values on the bodge on the bottom. Its an RC circuit (one resister and one capacitor). With my iigs any program with sound makes the system hang.
I discussed with Niek, and I have the bodge, but don't have an issue. I sent photos and feedback to Nick. I think the key is motherboard contact. The socket on the motherboard does expect flat pins. I changed with a modern CPU socket, it because I was not able to make a solid contact. Now the AppleSqueezer is nearly hard to remove, contact is perfect, and I've had strictly no crash for hours. I don't think the bodge is an issue at all.
@@philippeastier7657 hmm, very interesting, I’ll have to get a machined socket or a zif socket. I replaced my original socket with a double wipe socket that I had on hand, but maybe that isn’t making good contact. However I do need to talk to Niek about one other issue. My ensoinq makes a very loud white noise kind of sound with the sqeezer in, but with my 18mhz TWGS in it works fine with minimal noise. Maybe I have some bad sound ram, I don’t know just yet. Sockets and part changing might be in my IIGS’s future.
Yes Niek mentionned that some boards had issues with other accelerators, which I could not test. At least the bodge is not an indication enough. He does a great job, let him solve the mystery, I fed him with photos and information. BTW, my IIGS is in fact a ROM-00 upgraded to ROM-01, is that your case as well ?
@@philippeastier7657 Thanks a lot for your photos indeed! I may have fixed this issue yesterday, although it was only tested with one user so far, but for him the fix worked! Will do more testing and then release a new core version for everyone.
@@philippeastier7657 Yes it is. my IIGS if I recall correctly was made in the 1st or 2nd batch of IIGS's, and is a WOZ. When I get home (and hopefully remember that I wrote this comment), I'll check my serial number and see. But I do know it was a ROM-00 in the beginning of its life.
Whiteboard Guy is my favorite recurring character.
The Control Panel needed can be downloaded, but how do I get it to a floppy so I can add it to GS/OS?
Where did you get that clear shelf being used as a monitor stand? That is exactly what I need!
I wish such a thing was possible for the C64. Yes, I know about the SuperCPU but they're as rare as hen's teeth and cost thousands of dollars when they show up for sale.
I'd look forward to seeing your exhibit at vcf east next year.
Very nice! Yes, keep up the shenanigans. We must have more shenanigans.
Mario 1 with Thing on a Spring music is something.
I just watched this whole video and I just noticed what your shirt says. 😂 I love it!
Dude just noticed your shirt! That's sweet
Tuvix for President
I wonder if a software keyboard translator program could fix the keyboard issue with wolf 3D. You've certainly got the memory for it now. 😂 I'm also curious if that fpga is powerful enough to emulate the cpu as well so you wouldn't need a real one alongside it. I know it goes against using the original hardware at that point but I'm still curious.
Those risers alone can be enough to cause some serious issues. The round machine pins also tend to stretch out the regular cpu socket
where did you get the transparent monitor stand?
Now you need a transparent Monitor Casing and also one for the Trackball, too.
Thats pretty increditbale Sean Like the fact that is small but powerful
Wow! It's fantastic seeing what the IIgs could have been with a fast processor.
Thanks for the video! I was curious about this!
What would be for you the best accelerator for apple iic? Thank you!
I don't have the Apple II version of Wolf 3d, but every other version allows the choice of resolutions. I was hoping the Apple Squeezer was going to allow it to be played at a normal size.
That is some impressive hardware. The performance gains reminds me of the computer I built right after high school that started life as a Walmart special. I managed to take an old Celeron CPU clocked at 700 MHz and push it and the front side bus up to 1.0 GHz before it became unstable. The front side bus was clocked 100 MHz and managed to get it up to 133. Used a 8000 RPM fan and copper heatsink to keep that overclocked CPU nice and cool. This is during when Windows XP was king and vista development had yet to reset. My graphics card was some NVidia card with 128 MB of ram with dual VGA and used a matching set of 17 inch CRT monitors to round the project off. Some time later upgraded to 5.1 surround sound and used not only Creative for my sound card but speakers as well as they were on clearance at the time. That machine would quickly become irrelevant years later as the Pentium 4 got faster, better, and actual dual cores. Oddly enough my next computer would end up being a Toshiba laptop from 2009 built with gaming and vista requirements in mind. I'm one of the lucky people who got to experience vista for how it should have worked in the eyes of Microsoft.
Like so many of these hand created devices for Apple ][ computers, all THREE AppleSqueezers are listed as out of stock.
I have a GS, A ][e, ][c, ][+ and an integer based Apple 2.
I would love to upgrade my GS and get my non working ][GS 3 1/2 inch drive repaired.
Wait, the apple squeezer plugs into the standard slot that the original processor chip slotted into correct? Couldn't it be slotted (ishh as you'd have to run a set of wires to the card) into the zip 2gs card? What would happen I wonder?
I think the big socket on the Zip2GS card is only for safekeeping your original CPU. It's not connected to anything.
@@owaing that’s kinda an oddity…
@@mizinoinovermyhead.7523 I guess they thought that without that, people would just leave their original CPU loose somewhere and it would get lost, or damaged by static. The ZipGS manual just calls it a 'storage area' for the original CPU.
Lol at the shirt. Not a big lover of Voyager compared to the other shows, however that particular episode raised some really interesting ethical and moral questions.
Have you tried refreshing the CFFA3K's firmware? My CFFA3K died last fall, but a refresh restored it's functionality.
Remember, four dots, back notch
Man I've seen a couple of your vids. In reality I never used a commodore or had any Atari but grew up with a apple ii at school and later got one for free from school in 7th grade when they were finally phased out( I went to a small Catholic school so this was 96-97) I've been watching all these guys with their commodores and everything, anyway to get to the point dude your awesome lol good show, making me want to go to my mom's and see if I can't find my aii I think it's called a c? Been a long time, was the streamline ii. I know that's not a iigs but growing up I thought the iigs was and would always be out of my price range. Such a underated computer, we also had a few of those too
I really wanted one of those, but the DMA issues were too much for me. I already have a TransWarpGS (the Reactive Micro rebuild), a VidHD and a MicroDrive Turbo, and while the TransWarp isn't the most stable solution, I don't think I could do without the VidHD or the MicroDrive at this point.
Does this work on an Apple IIe or this is running on a GS-modded Apple II?
Could you do a post how to configure a browser with uternet2 card?
Always great videos!
17:33 - "I usually give up by this point because it's so slow. But look at how fast it is on this machine."
Yup, you accelerate a IIgs fast enough, and it'll be more or less adequate for playing games designed for the Famicom.
also if you could maybe make a video of attempting to fix that cfa3000
The "bad joke writer" is like Jeff Gerling's "Red Shirt Jeff".
Is it for windows only? How Can I use it on my mac?
You really *NEED* that clear keyboard and a clear monitor case...
@Action Retro - upgrade to the 100mhz "65F02" next?
Its a drop-in replacement made with a similiar FPGA to power it, in the same pin-out as the stock 6502 CPU!
Can you run a screensaver on that Mac?
I would love to see a 68060@100mhz or like a vampire card running in a 68k mac. I think it could work with a lot of effort, but it would definitely be cool.
Yes!
YES
Fun fact, the original processor used on the 2gs was rated for up to 20mhz. Apple nerfed it to under 3mhz to make the macintosh line sound more powerful with its 68k Moto processor. However, cycle for cycle the 2gs was more powerful, more expandable, better audio, better graphics, and cost less. Apple was the king of shooting themselves in the foot and still surviving…
Not really. This was explained by another TH-camr in a video I watched yesterday (I think the video is recent). He did a deep dive into the 65816. Due to the mask for the CPU being hand drawn instead of using CAD, it wouldn't scale to smaller manufacturing processes well, had yield issues at 4MHz, leading to many 3MHz parts being released despite not being listed in any official data sheets. The manufacturing process GTE used also had limitations. Eventually they binned 6MHz and maybe some 7MHz parts, but Apple couldn't buy these in quantity, so they were effectively irrelevant. It wasn't until Sanyo, Ricoh, and possibly ASIC Inc. independently re-did the mask with CAD (supposedly ASIC did a clean room reverse engineering job in 6 months), that faster variants became available.
@@technerd9655 it's youtuber userlanda very good video. A must watch.
Very cool. How much do you think this squeeze board would have been worth back in 1987? This setup is better than the OG Mac.
Do these support DMA?
7:00 - "It's not... *too* bad..."
The Apple IIgs experience in a nutshell
Could you make wof3d full screen?
I just LOOOOVE this guy!
It's funny that one of the boards is a "Spartan" considering there was once a Apple 2+ device for the Commodore 64 that was called the "Mimic Systems Spartan"! ;-)
JUSTICE FOR TUVIX!
Thanks for a peak into a world where the 6502 was king.
It’s nice to see new things made for the gs. I notice you didn’t have or try the transwarp. A transwarp will do the same or better tho.
1:50 i think you forgot the annotation link
What trackball is that
Have you tried some of the other games that need a bit of help in the speed department like, Lemmings, Out of this World, Zany Golf, Dragon's Lair, etc.? If so, can you show off some of those games as well?
Such an awesome machine!😊
Semi related, have you done any looking into Pistorm and compatibility with 68k macs? I’ve seen a couple videos of people working on it.