Issues with Farallons Comm 10/100 ethernet drivers version 2.4.x in a TAM: Adrian writes that his TAM (Twentieth Anniversary Mac) has had numerous application freezes and quits after installing the 2.4.1 Farallon Ethernet drivers I posted in January 2006. Thanks Adrian!

[Hi Thomas,

Just some feedback on the 2.4.1 drivers on the main page of the 6400 Zone. I Have a TAM with OS 9.1, upgrade from the 2.2.1 to the 2.4.1 (Actually 2.4) driver is bad

a) System profiler picks up the card as a generic PCI rather than a "Ethernet card" like under 2.2.1

b) I found the system very very unstable with the 2.4 driver installed - Application freezing, Force quits required of all control panels etc.

You may want to update people with this, Maybe 2.4 works better on other OS's but on the TAM with 9.1 its unusable !

Cheers
Adrian]

I would recommend keeping a backup copy of your current ethernet drivers before updating them just in case you run into any troubles such as this.

Avid Cinema forums: Stephen writes to let everyone know that he has created an Avid Cinema community web site www.avidcinema.org. Thank you Stephen!

The 6400 Zone Auctions! I've just finished posting a new service which I hope you will all enjoy. I now have an auction center which you can visit at http://auction.zone6400.com. Currently I'm not charging for any postings but if you wish to make a donation I would greatly appreciate it :-)

The auctions are open for all Mac related items. Non-Mac related items will be removed at my discretion. The auction site won't eliminate my Equipment for sale page but rather compliments it. There is still a need for that section for people requesting items that may not be posted for sale anywhere?

I've already posted several of my own items so go on a take a peek!

Newer version of Farallons Comm II 10/100 ethernet drivers: Bob sent me a version of Farallons drivers that are newer then the version I have posted. His is Farallon FastENPlus v2.4.1. Mine is v2.2.1. Thanks Bob! If anyone tries these, please email me your results.

Sonnets PCI Video card and Firewire driver issues: AJ was wondering if anyone has tried Sonnets PCI video card for older Macs? I'm curious myself to find out how well it works on our Macs. I don't think it will be a screaming gamers card but it should be better then the stock video on at least the 6400. I don't know if this card has any video acceleration or not but it does have a lot of video RAM. Also, AJ notes some issues he found with haveing Apples Firewire drivers installed. Thanks AJ

[I don't know if you've heard anything about this as yet, but Sonnet has apparently just announced a new 16MB PCI video card that it claims is compatible with the 5400/6400 line (actually, with ALL PCI PowerMacs), and works under System 7.5.3 and up (and X, but that's neither here nor there). Sonnet's page for it is:

http://www.sonnettech.com/product/sonata_sd.html

The compatibility and the price ($99) is seriously compelling me to get one to fill the free slot in the 6400 with, and to possibly also take up a slot in the 5400. Before I did that, though, I was wondering if you'd heard anything from any of the Zone's readers on whether it's worth it or not. If you haven't, then cool enough... I'll give it a shot anyway and let you know how it handles, but I figured I'd check first due to the total lack of reviews currently available online.

Incidentally, I was also the dude with the weird bus errors under OS8.6 (on both my 6400 and my G3, though strangely not on my 5400) that stopped when I removed the FireWire enablers from the extensions folder. Well, I'm happy to say that I've updated the OS on both the 6400 and G3 to 9.1, put the enablers back (or, actually, just let 9.1 install it's own enablers wherever it wanted), and the issue has not reappeared.

I still have no idea why it happened in the first place (people on the Apple
support boards insist that it has something to do with RAM, which makes no sense, especially since I tried a few trillion different memory combinations with no luck), but as long as it's not happening now... I'm not going to worry about it.

Take it easy,
AJ]

Please email me if you have tried Sonnets Video card. Thanks.