The 6400 Zone is created to help you gain access to useful software updates and great shareware programs that add functionality to your system. It is also a one stop road map to other informative sites for answering your questions. Most of the info here is geared towards the 6400, but it is useful for all PCI Performa models and even the 6500 and all-in-one Macs based on the same. It's even useful to other MAC systems. I will be referring to my 6400/200 clocked to 220Mhz as just 6400/220, OK.

I will keep it updated as often as I can but I don't have much free time to work on it, so I suggest you check back at least once a week. That should be sufficient. If you don't see something you would like to see here or have your own software / web site that would benefit the MAC community, please write to me at TMK12v@aol.com and I will check it out.

Site logo contest web page: Judging has began! Go and check out all the submissions I have and email me with the number of the image you wish to have as my next Home Page logo :) Please put the number of the submission in the subject line of your email so I can sort them easier. Thanks. Good luck all!

My link frame now working: I just turned on the link frame at the bottom of my site. Let me know if you have any trouble with it or any of the links on my site.

Update on Sonnet Clocker II issue: I haven't been able to get ahold of the author of this app but I did get the source code for it. If anyone can rebuild the Sonnet Clocker II app with a registered copy of RealBasic so we can get it working again I would greatly appreciate it :) Even a remake with the demo version might work for awhile? One reader told me that turning the date back on their computer to 12/20/1999 (the date I posted it) made it work again. you might have to restart before it takes affect though?

Aqua Kaleidescope Scheme: In my last Just Update I linked to a site that had the Aqua Theme and Scheme posted. It seems that he removed the link to the scheme from that page. Here is a new link right to the Scheme. Apple sent a letter to the site hosting the Theme to have it removed so it no longer exists :( I think Apple is treating the look and feel of its OS just like it did the iMac! I hope they don't go down the same path that hurt them with MS in the beginning? Right now Apple has the courts on their side but that can all change any second.

DHCP issues with Cox Cable modems: recently I have been using OT 2.6 for DHCP with my Cox Cable modem because the OT that shipped with OS 8.6 had issues with DHCP. Well it seems that DHCP does not work for me at all anymore. Even if I reinstall the older OT? I thought it might have been something related to installing OT 2.6 but no one else that installed it had complained about this. But I did just get a letter from Michael who also has Cox Cable and he has the same problem. Sounds like Cox has changed somthing and DHCP no longer works for Macs? I can connect manually with no problem just like he can but I will have to call them and find out what happend. Click here to read more on the DHCP issues with OS 8.6

[Something you may find interesting. My internet access is through COX Cable. MACs are inherently lower than DOS machines by the way. I have a DOS lap top and my Performa connected via a local hub. The difference in speed is amazing. Anyway, I have to set the TCP/IP on both machines to a static (manual) configuration. They do not work in the dynamic (automatic) configuration which is the preferred set up of COX Cable.
Thank you for your time.
Michael]\

Apple Talk issues with Cable Modems!: I found this page on MacFixIt's web site that is discussing issues people are having with Apple Talk and owning a cable modem. It seems that some of the cable companies are upgrading their equipment which is allowing Apple Talk to cross over into other peoples houses and if someone in your neighborhood is running an Apple Talk server then this may cause problems for your Apple Talk network. Click here to read all about it.

I have not been affected yet as I cannot see any other Macs or printers in my Chooser so maybe COX has not upgraded in my area yet? It seems the only fix for now is to notify your cable provider and hope they shut down the user with the Apple Talk server or get a software/hardware router to isolate your local network.

Sonnet L2 G3 CPU temps: I received this email yesturday from a reader who asked Sonnet what is the range of temps we should expect from their G3 upgrades. Thanks

[From sonnet tech support: The processors have been tested at temperatures up to 105 degrees C. They usually run between 30 - 65 degrees and occasionally at temperatures of 75-85 degrees with no problems at all.]

I believe the 30 - 65 degree range is for the copper G3's and the 75 - 85 degrees is for the non-copper G3's. These corrospond to what everyone has been reporting.

Confirmation that tightening the heatsink on the Sonnet G3 makes it cooler: I had been told by a previous read that Sonnets heatsink on their G3's are not as snug as they could be which causes the temps to be hotter then they should be. Well, Greg just wrote to let me know that he found the same thing. Thanks Greg. Lets all go snug up our heatsinks :)

[Hi
The machine is running fine. I have had a couple of freeze ups but that was due to memory problems in the games, not with the sonnet card. With only 72 megs of ram I do have to run Virtual memory to run those big games.
But I have had no problems running quake 1,2,3 , unreal, star wars racer(with 3dfx patch), tomb raider etc.
The voodoo 2 card really does a good job, now that it has a G3 behind it. I also checked the sonnet card today just to take a look. I think I got the idea from another reader. I tightened up the screws just a little on the heat sink. I then ran the machine to check the temperature and it had dropped quit a bit.
My usual temp was around 47C-55C running games, lowest was 41 C. After doing this temp reading was 29 C on start and ran at 37C-43C, reaching a high of 51 C only after hours of computer work and play. Temp would go down to 41C-43C. Tightening up those screw just a little seems to make better contact on the heat sink. Don't over tighten, just snug them up. If anyone out there has a heat problem check the heat sink and just give a little turn, it might help.
Greg]

OrangeMicro's Firewire / USB card not working in a 6500: Rick wrote to let me know that the Orange Firewire/USB card will not work in his 6400 with a 6500 motherboard. Orange replied to one of his messages confirming they know the problem exists with 6500's and are working on a fix. Thanks Rick. Click here to read more on this card.

[Hi Tom,
Some new info. I talked to the people at OrangeMicro and they have told me that their USB/Firewire Card does not work with the 6500. It does work with the 6400. They are working on the problem with Apple at this time. They have no idea when the problem will be fixed. Niether the firewire or the USB will work. It seems the problem lies in the 6500 motherboard. The fix could be in the way of a new rev or a software patch. The 6500 does not like that fact that there are basically two PCI cards stuck into one PCI board as with the OrangeMicro USB/Firewire Card. I hope they fix it soon, as I would like to keep the card.
FYI
Rick]

Firewire / USB card combo from PowerLogix: OrangeMicro was the first to make one of these types of PCI cards. Now PowerLogix is announcing the RapidFire Firewire / USB combo PCI card. It is said to work in the 6400 and 6500. Here is some info I found on the MacInTouch web site.

[http://www.powerlogix.com/news/press.html#rapidfire-
3 Firewire and 2 USB ports
PowerLogix introduced RapidFire, a combination USB/FireWire card for PCI slots, which requires Mac OS 8.6 or 9. RapidFire is scheduled to ship in March at approximately $149-169. ]

Reader Request: Liam is having trouble figuring out how to get audio from the IXTV made by IXmicro. Click here to read more and please email him if you have an answer. Thanks. By the way, I just read that IXmicro just went out of business :( They did it very quietly this week. Its sad to see another Mac vendor go :( I think they but the blame on their failing Voodoo2 Banshee card and that other cheaper version came out which washed them up.

This may be true and I think other Mac only vendors and for that matter PC only vendors need to pay attention. The Mac is Back and you can no longer be proprietary to one side of the field if you want to stay in business. PC companies like 3dfx know this and thats why they are developing Mac drivers for their Voodoo series of video cards. Apple went the way of standardizing they're designs closer to PC's just for this reason. If all it takes is some software magic to make a PC card work on a Mac then why be proprietary any more? And who knows with all the talk about Darwin (base code for OS X) being able to run on both platforms that the Apple / MS / Intel wars may be coming to an end to start something new? Sorry for going on but I thought I would give my 2 cents :)

OS 9 and SCSI scanner issues update: John writes that he was able to fix his SCSI issues with OS 9 by using the old 6360/64xx/65xx update and the latest VistaScan software but then he installed a new HD and the scanner once again failed?

[Tom, I know there are lots of forum discussions regarding problems with theUMAX scanner and the alchemy logic board. I've read enough of them to understand the basic issues. I have previously solved the SCSI ID and startup problems by installing Apple's 6360/64xx/54xx Update. I have also previously successfully installed the UMAX VistaScan 3.5.1 software for compatibility with OS9. I had it all working until I upgraded to the Maxtor hard disk. Now my computer won't find the scanner in the Apple System Profiler. The UMAX software, of course, can't find the scanner either. The scanner (Astra 1200U) is set to SCSI ID #7 and has the terminator plug installed. I've tried the other SCSI ID numbers too but nothing works. The computer (Performa 6400/G3) won't startup if the scanner is turned on. Apple's 6360/64xx/54xx Update won't install on a hard drive that isn't initialized with Apple's HDD utility. Do you have any suggestions?
John]

Later he sent me a letter stating he reinitialized the drive using OS 9 and installed a fresh clean copy of OS 9 and his scanner works again. Maybe this is needed to fix SCSI issues? Could it be an issue with doing a dirty install or maybe just an issue with trying to update an older HD driver with the latest and something going wrong? If you read the last lines of his message you'll notice he got an error stating that the 6360/64xx/65xx update would not install becasue the HD did not have an Apple driver. He told me he never used any other utility other then Apples on this drive so maybe his HD driver was corrupted and this is causing SCSI issues. We might be on to something here? Click here to read more on this topic.

OS 9 may fix sound issues with Sonnets G3?: Regis writes that after updating to OS 9 his sound issues with Performer and his Sonnet G3 have gone away. Thanks Regis. Sonnet has said that OS 8.5.x is needed to get rid of these issues also but a lot of OS 8.6 users seem to have the problem back. Click here to read more on this issue.

[Well, after the bad news about OS9 and my 6400, the good news: with OS9, the sound issue I had with Performer 6.02 and sonnet crescendo 300/1M had gone (previously, with OS 8.6 I could'nt record audio, even with crescendo last extension). So I think I will go with OS9, but it seems to be very important to have all the softwares well installed and with there last versions. I have to throw away ATM 4.5 to speed up video display. Virtual PC 3.0 seems to works greatly and rapidly with OS9 and sonnet crescendo. Thanks for your site.
Regis]

He latter wrote me this.

[Tom,
My choice is to update to OS 9 because it fix the sound issue and it's too hard to have 2 different OS at a time. Disk slowdown stop with 5.0.2 Norton updater on line, so I think it's a good thing that all OS 9 user made this update, if they have Norton 5.0 or 5.0.1. For the video slowdown, ATM was one reason but I think the Formac card is another, I will check this with them and I let you know. I already use sonnet 1.4.1 with sonnet clocker, up to 320 Mhz and it works well. I think I will let go my idea to work with the video slot, because I don't want to go back to stock 6400 video. It's just too slow. Bye and thanks for your site.]

StarCraft on the 6400: Maroney sent me some info on StarCraft being played on the 6400. Thanks Maroney.

[Hi,
Just wanted to tell everyone about what I consider the best game I've played in a long time. Blizzard Entertainments StarCraft and the expansion set Brood War. I've been playing this game over the net since the Beta version was released over a year ago. This is a wonderful strategy game, and it works well on my 6400, even though I have a very slow internet connection (24k best speed). I live in the country and I'm glad to say I can at least play this game over the net with my slow connection. Plus it's fun beating up on PC players!]

More general info from a 6500 user: Tiong wrote to let me know about his experiences on a bunch of topics and how RD9 has changed his life :) Read on to learn more. Thanks Tiong.

[Hi Tom,
After reading Craig's review, I can't help but want to give you a Macbench 5.0 benchmarks (see attachment) for my Sonnet 300/1MB overclocked @ 350 and 375MHz for my 6500. Interestingly, Macbench is showing slightly faster speeds now for my 375MHz (processor 1192, floating point 1235, and graphics 2020).

Wonder if the warmer weather here in TX has anything to do with that? (The figure I had supplied were done when weather was cold and my Sonnet was running at 23 degrees C. The warmer weather results were tested with Sonnet at 31 degrees C. These "cool" Sonnet temperatures were achieved through the use of a modified 3dfxcool Voodoo cooler, with dual fans blowing across the Sonnet's heatsink.)

Hope you find this info interesting. Also, I couldn't get my Sonnet to run at 400MHz reliably. It will crash within 5-10 minutes of use, but 375MHz has no errors or problems so far (it's been running at this speed for almost two months).

BTW, what's the verdict with the 128MB RAM? I have 128MB now in my 6500 but have to use VM now due to the applications (PhotoShop 5.0.2, Freehand 8, Flash 4, GoLive 4.0.1, and Netscape 4.7) I have to have opened when doing my work now (128MB is NOT enough without VM!!). However, VM slows my V3 to a crawl (Macbench graphics from 2020 to 648!!), especially in screen redrawing. Scrolling rate suffers too, but at a still livable speed. Any info would be greatly appreciated! : )
Regards,
Tiong]

I suggested he try RamDoubler and here was his reply.

[Hi Tom,
Thanks again for the RD tip. I bought and downloaded RD9 from Connectix yesterday and have found some interesting things.

On the first reboot after installing RD9, my Sonnet processor score went way down. It was like running at just above 300MHz, even though it was clocked at 375MHz then. However, after a few reboots, Macbench processor score is up once again, though not at pre-RD9 levels, but slightly better than with VM on.

Another thing is that if I'd left the Crescendo extension at it's default start up position, my 2D slows to a crawl a la VM. But if I added a space in front to make Crescendo load first, then 2D is much more up to speed (18xx vs 2020 without VM/RD9, much better then 5xx with VM!!) And BTW, my 3dfx's 2D extension is always loaded as I no longer have the dreaded L2G3V3 bug.

Yet another thing I had found is that although both Macbench and Norton'sSystem Info reports that Disk speed with RD9 is better than with VM, some applications, most notably Norton Anti-Virus (5.0.3), is more sluggish than with VM. Norton's Disk Doctor is about the same speed with VM or RD9.

I haven't tried games yet, but will do so when I have time to see if there are fps differences (have only Unreal and Unreal Tournament installed now as I had to make space for work - : ( ). Will let you know the results if you are interested.
Regards,
Tiong]

And here are the game FPS scores he promised. Thanks Tiong for all this info :)

[Hi Tom,
No difference in the FPS scores in Unreal or UT with RD9 on or off.

In Unreal, I am getting low 28 fps on cycle # 1 of the flyby to high 27 fps on cycle # 2, 3, and beyond @ 1024*768, 85Hz, all settings on high. 25 fps in all flyby cycles @ 1280*1024 (this is the resolution to run if you don't mind a bit of sluggishness as it really makes the game more beautiful). Don't feel any difference in game play with RD9 and no VM.

In Unreal Tournament, I am getting between 17-20 fps during the flyby, and 18 - 35 fps in the actual game, at 1024*768, skin, details, sound quality on high setting. No difference in game play (single player or online) when compared with no VM.

RD9 doesn't seem to affect these two games at all. I didn't try other games as I had to uninstall my D3 and Falcon 4 due to a lack of space on my hard drive. : (

I really like RD9 so far. It's been very stable and the only application that I have problems with it is IE 4.51. However, this app has problems with VM on my 6500 too (so it really isn't RD9's fault). I don't know why as Ihaven't seen/heard of the problem I encountered with IE 4.5/4.51 anywhere. What happens is that if VM or RD9 is enabled, my IE will start eating so much memory that my Mac will eventually crash. For example, using IE to surf for about 5 minutes in 2 different sites (normal, a lot more text than pics sites), About This Macintosh shows my IE using up 169MB already!! In fact, with VM or RD9 enabled, you can tell when my IE is going to crash ( it usually forces me to reboot as force quit won't work on most occasions) when you hear the hard disk spinning like it's reading when it really isn't. (I guess that sound comes from the OS trying to give my IE the RAM it is requesting) Anyway, I don't use IE at all. It's just on my Mac as a back up browser in case something happens to my iCab or Netscape.

My system: PM6500, Sonnet 300/1MB running @ 375MHz, Crescendo 1.4.1, 128MB RAM (with RD9 - 240MB), OS8.6, Unreal 224b7, UT 405b, 3dfx 3000 PCI, b10 drivers (1-2fps faster than b11 drivers).
Regards,
Tiong]

Help from a Reader!: McKinney wrote that he has a nice stable system and is willing to help others with similar setups. Thanks McKinney. Please try not to overwhelm him :)

[Tom,
Just a line to let you know how the Sonnet clocker is working for me. I have a 6400 with the Sonnet 300/150 1MB card. I have the clocker running the card at 320/160. I have had no crashes and no temp. problems. My
system is as follows:
136mb ram
Farillon 10/100 ethernet card hooked to a cable modem
ATI Rage Orion 128/16mb card
Zip Drive
Quantum 8.4 HD
External 56k modem (now used for faxing only :(
Phillips SCSI CD-R
Umax 610s Scanner
OS 9
Aqua theme for that cool "OSX look"

I am happy to say that I have no problems with this set-up. I do have the QT 4.1 sound problems when playing MP-3 files but hey...that's what Sound Jam is for!! :) Otherwise I am very happy with the performance of this machine. The Mac Bench Scores are 1039 processor and 1348 floating point....not too shabby!! I would be happy to assist anyone who wants the same set-up.

HB McKinney]

Apples Service Manuals are back!: Gary found a new link to Apples Service Manuals which include TakeApart instructions for just about every Mac model out there. Click here and go get your manuals :) Thanks Gary.

6400 QTVR: Craig just sent me a QTVR image of a 6400. Visit my 6400 Info page to see and play with it. Thanks Craig! Let me know if you have trouble viewing it. It took my a little while to figure out how to even get Netscape and AOL to display it for me :) I think I got all the bugs worked out?

Sonnet Clocker II app not working anymore?: Timo just wrote to let me know that the Sonnet Clocker II app (the one that can also clock the 6100/7100/8100 Macs) no longer works. I tried running it and it displays a message window that is all garbled and when clicked on OK the program quits? Maybe it was written in with a demo version of Real Basic and has expired? The Sonnet Clocker app continues to work but it won't clock the above mentioned Macs. I will email the author to see if he knows what happend?

Sonnet 400/1M card reveiwed!: Craig sent me a wonderful review of Sonnets new 400/1M L2 G3 card for the 6400/6500. Click here to read all about it. Thanks Craig.

More Aqua desktop makeovers: Craig also sent me a link to a site that has links to another Aqua Kaleidoscope scheme and they also have a link to an Apple Apearance Manager theme. Thanks Craig.

[I just got the latest Aqua Kaleidoscope extension (NOT AquaX) from www.interfacelift.com. Their scheme is much more thorough and more realistic than AquaX, which looks like the scheme you're using to create your artwork for your page. Better download it before Apple tells them to take it down :)]

I tried both and the Aqua Theme is nice for an Appearance theme but it needs to be in millions of colors to look its best. The Apple menu icon looks pretty dithered in thousands of colors. On the other hand the Aqua Kaleidoscope scheme looks great in thousands of colors. Also both of these have the Green and Orange minimize and maximize buttons set correctly. Green was shown to be a maximize button in Steve Jobs speach but the AquaZ scheme used the orange button for that?

My new popup menu doesn't working in older browsers: Russ wrote to let me know that my new popup menu for the Hot Topics list gives him errors when he tries to use it. He is running AOL 3.0. Thanks for the info Russ. If anyone with HTML experience can help me correct this I would appreciate it. I have tried it with AOL 4.0 and Netscape 4.6-4.7 and they all work fine.

[ Just tried your Pop up menu and got this:

Could not find a procedure to handle method "POST" of URL
"/_ht_a/TMK12v/(Empty Reference!)" on members.
For further assistance, contact the server administrator


AOL 3.0 built in browser. Just the pop up menu. The pop up pops up but every selection goes to the error page. The "go" button has selectable text in it, not just a button that clicks.
Good luck
Russ]

Newers Guage Pro 1.0.1 released: When Newer released version 1.0 it had some trouble reading some L2 G3 upgrade cards such as Sonnets. This version has correct the problem. Click here to download it and let me know if you have any trouble with it.

Newer Tech in financial trouble?: There is a lot of speculation going around about a letter that was posted on the web from Newer to their creditors requesting a new payment schedual for their debts. A lot of people are saying this means the end of Newer? It might be and it might not? I'm sure Apple went through all of this many times over their dark period. I for one do not want to count them out yet. They did just announce the new iMac G3 CPU upgrade and are rumored to announce a PB G3 CPU upgrade as well. But times are tough as there are so many G3 upgrade vendors now that it must be very cut-throat for them all! It was brought to my attention that they no longer have the 300/512k L2 G3 listed anymore and the 300/1M card is now $299. I think this puts their 300/1M card on par with Sonnets 300/1M card but Newers runs the Backside cache at 200Mhz instead of 100Mhz and Newers is more compatible with the Voodoo3. I hope they stay around as I would hate for Sonnet to loose their only competition :)

Proof that Sonnet rev'ed their L2 G3 cards: Greg found an ad posted for Sonnets 300/512k L2 G3 cards and noticed that there are 2 ads for almost the same card but one has a rev A at the end of the model number. Thanks Greg.

[Hi. I've been an avid reader of your site, and it's great. I have a 6400/200 power mac. I've learned a lot about it through your site. I was just ordering the Sonnet 300/512k Card From OWC, and noticed that they had two different models of that card. Same card but one is only compatible with certain machines. I asked about it, and it seems that they were having some trouble with the 5400's. Could be possibly related to those start up issues etc. But anyway it is the same card and is Ten Dollars cheaper. $229 from other world computing. (macsales.com)

Hope this info will help anyone who is looking for a card and I will let you no how it works as it should be in today. Keep up the good work.
Greg]

Here is what I just clipped from Sonnets site. It doesn't have a separate model for the 5400 but does have a distinction between the 6400/6500 family and the 4400 family. Maybe this is what they meant to say?

[Two Different Product Categories:

Part #: BG3-250-512, BG3-300-512, BG3-300-1M,
BG3-400-1M*, BG3-500-1M*

(Support the Power Mac 5400, 5500*, 6400, 6500*; Performa 54XX, 6360,
6400, 6410, 6420; 20th Anniversary Macintosh*; Power Computing
PowerBase; and UMAX C500, C600.

*Note: Due to bus speed restrictions, these products run on the Power Mac
5500, 6500; and 20th Anniversary Macintosh only.

Part #: B4G3-250-512, B4G3-300-512, B4G3-300-1M
(Support the Power Mac 4400, 7220; and Motorola StarMax 3000, 4000.)]

I looked over both Sonnets site and OWC's site and they do not seem to match at all? Sonnet has the above distinction between the 6400/6500 and 4400 type Macs and nothing metioned about the 5400 needing a different model. OWC lists one 300/512k model for the 5500/6400/6500/6360/TWA and another model which is $10 more for all Alchemy based Macs including the 4400 and Starmax systems? These clearly don't match! The strange part is that only the 300/512k is listed as having 2 model numbers and not the other speeds of G3? Could only the 300/512k card have had a problem with the 5400? This is very strange and confusing. Anyone with a clue as to what is right please email me. Thanks.

ATI says don't use their Rage128 with a L2 G3!: Michael recieved a reply from ATI that is not very good. according to this letter, ATI is telling us to not bother to try their Rage128 cards as they have a 60% failure rate with any L2 G3 upgrade! This would coincide with the different reports I have been getting over the past year about their video cards. I guess they could not find a fix and decided to just tell us not to use them :( Its too bad as a L2 G3 upgrade and a Rage128 card make for the perfect upgrade to our 6400/6500's.

[Hi,
I emailed you the other day and thanks for your quick response. To let you know I personally talked to a ATI Tech. on a call back on 2/9/200 and he suggested the owners of the 6400 and the 6500 NOT USE THE ATI RAGE ORION 128/16mgs even with the new 4.0.2 drivers on the website and according to him ATI is going to post this on the site. He said that no matter what G3 card you had that the Rage 128 60% of the time wouldn't work on the 6400 and the 6500. He suggested for these models with a G3 card to get the Rage Pro if you can find them. And he told me to send my ATI Rage Orion 128/16mgs back for a refund because it wouldn't ever work like it should no matter what I tried. Thought I'd let you know and its OK with me if you want to post this on your site using just my first name don't want any bad feelings towards me I'm just repeating what the ATI Tech. related to me. Thanks,
Michael]

Here is another letter from Russell who was told by Sonnet that the Rage128 cards don't work with L2 G3's :( Thanks Russell.

[ Tom,
Russsell here. The one you helped with the Sonnet G3/L2 geo modem.
Just after I told you I was getting good results with G3/L2 and Rage Orion some problems have surfaced. I wrote Sonnet tech about some skipping and sound distortion I was experiencing during games during heavy action. It was not the end of the world, but was making playing games like Tomb Raider 3 and Unreal not much fun! Anyway, here is there response. I was surprised at their response! One has to go? Would you give up that quickly and return the Sonnet? (I have had the orion since November, so I doubt I could return it.) What do you think? I bought the sonnet primarily for 3d game enhancement.
Russell

Reply to: RE: Sonnet TechForm
Russell,
Rage Orion has not been tested and is believed to be incompatible with the G3 processor, at this time. One of the products has to go, at least for the time being. If you purchased the Crescendo directly from Sonnet, please let me know, and I will facilitate a refund. If you purchased from a vendor, please contact them for a refund. I apologize for the inconvenience.
Christy
Sonnet Technical Support
support@sonnettech.com]

Here is a letter from the 40% that do get the Rage128 card to work :) Simon sends word that his Vimage 240 L2 G3 works fine with the RageOrion. Thanks Simon. Although from the letters above from ATI and Sonnet I don't think much of us will have the same luck as Simon :(

[My name is Simon and i just want to say that i got my 6400/200 with a Vimage L2/240 to work with a Rage Orion. I have no problem at all with the setup and it works perfect.]

Running Quake3Arena with dual monitors: I found this info on Mike Breedens 3dfx news site. It tells how to configure Q3A to pic the monitor of your choice in a multi monitor setup.

[Subject: Q3 dual monitors
Edit your q3config.cfg file with a text editor.
Set the line

seta r_device "0"

if you want to use primary monitor. Otherwise, try

seta r_device "1"]

Sharing Epson printers over an Apple Talk network: I found this site from a guy who hacked Epsons stylus inkjet drivers to allow for printer sharing over an Apple Talk network! Epson had just released drivers for many of their newer printers and incorporated AT sharing into them. They are version 6.x drivers. They did not update their older drivers for this capability yet though :( So this guy hacked the driver from a 760 AT driver extension and made it work with several older Epson Stylus inkjet printers. I downloaded the Epson 700 and Epson 600 drivers for my printers. Let me tell you that these things work great! I now have my Epson printer shared between all of my Macs and it was free :) Yes thats right. Since he only hacked their driver it would not be right to charge for it since most of the work was done by Epson already. You have to follow a specific installation procedure which he outlines very clearly and then it will just work! remember though that the Mac with the physical connection to the printer must be running with Apple Talk enabled for this to work.

Reader Request page updated: I posted a letter from Andy who is having trouble getting a Sonic Systems COMM II slot ethernet card recognized on his 6400. Click here to read the letter and please email him if you have an answer.

CVGS back in business!: I just read on MacsOnly that Connectix has won their battle with Sony over the making of CVGS. Here is a clip from MacsOnly's site. Hopefully now they can update it :)

[Connectix Wins Appeal of CVGS Injunction just a few days after we bemoaned the lack of news (or updates) in Sony's lawsuit against Connectix over the PlayStation-emulating Connectix Virtual Game Station. Read the 9th Circuit Court's opinion if you can handle the legalese, or just glance through Connectix's press release and the ZD News story.]

More Linux on the 6400 info: Andrew sent me some tips on getting the ATI Rage Orion card to work under LinuxPPC. Just so you know he doesn't have a L2 G3 installed. Thanks Andrew.

[Tom,
I realise that there are a couple of other things I meant to say when I last e-mailed you but forgot:

1.) The ATI Orion works brilliantly under Linux as wells as MacOS on the 6400, but the release 9 of Xpmac and a later kernel (I'm using 2.2.12) are needed to get the full benefit (i.e. that's the ATI accelerated version of X windows). The X server is available at "Blue G3 Linux":

http://www.linuxppc.org/blueg3/

That site also talks about special kernels being needed. This is not true for the 6400, as these are for supporting the newer G3 machines' USB bus and other new stuff. If you just want ATI acceleration, only the X server is needed and a standard (but recent) kernel.

My 6400 just gets nicer and nicer as a Linux box!

(As an aside, the 3rd edition of "Running Linux" by Matt Walsh et al (O'Reilly, 1999) mentions LinuxPPC with a section entitled "LinuxPPC 4.0 and 4.1 Uideo Issues". Its recommendation is to go for a modern kernel and use KDE version 1.1 or higher OR upgrade to release 5.0 (aka LinixPPC 1999) or highrt as the video will be accelerated. I remember that your initial comments on Linux was with a version 4 and you mentioned the slow video. For the stock 6400 video, this has now been cured and the video in LinuxPPC 1999 is acceptable. However, the ATI board has a slowness problem unless you use the accelerated X server I mentioned above.)

2.) Your site mentions possible SCSI problems with MacOS 9 which "Apple is aware of" and a possible fix in 9.0.1. I'm puzzled as I've not seen any problems and I have a Umax 1220S scanner, which is one of those devices that show problems first. I have all the latest Umax drivers, though (VistaScan version 3.5).

All the above and no L2 G3 card or Geoport modem. I notice that Newer is in financial woes and Vimage has gone, which will leave Sonnet as the sole supplier of L2 G3 cards.
Yours,
Andrew]

Click here for more on running Linux on the 6400. Also note he isn't having any issues with his SCSI UMAX scanner and OS 9. Not everyone is having trouble but a majority are. Click here for more on this topic.

My Vimage Info page on Vimage's G3 upgrade for the 6400

My Vimage Compatibility page

My Vimage User Letters page

My Vimage install reviews

My Sonnet Tech Info page on Sonnet's G3 upgrade for the 6400

Hack to make Sonnets G3's more stable

My Sonnet Compatibility page

My Sonnet User Letters page

My Sonnet install review

My Newer Tech Info page on Newer's G3 upgrade for the 6400

My Newer Compatibility page

My Newer User Letters page

My PowerLogix Info page on PowerLogix's G3 upgrade for the 6400

L2/G3 comparison page

I was wondering if anyone would be interested in purchasing a CD with my entire up-to-date site as well as my 6400 Take Apart manual plus many of the past Just Updates included? I think this would be a great idea for anyone who hasn't been able to keep up or never saw my site until recently. Also for those of you with Sherlock the CD is even better cause you can tell Sherlock to index the CD and then you can do a search on any topic and if I ever talked about it, you'll find it! I have info as far back as mid 1997. I'm asking $15 which includes shipping for US residents (not sure what the price for international shipments would be yet?) and I will even include a few surprises! To make this offer even juicier I can add some download that you've been trying to get but just couldn't for some reason. Lets put my cable modem to work :)

I found a great way to earn some money while getting great deals to you on Macintosh books and software plus they have all kinds of other books, music, and more. Please click on the amazon.com link on the top of this page whenever you feel like purchasing something to help sponsor this site. If you're unsure of what you want and wish to get a list of Mac related items, just type Macintosh in the search field on their home page and you will be presented with many choices to select.

Jeff did some digging in to the new code that displays the frames on my site with AOL ads and found a link that can be used which will not show those annoying ads. Here is the address. http://members.aol.com/_ht_a/TMK12v/home.html
Thanks Jeff, for sending this info. PS don't let AOL find out :)

Here's an even better link http://members.aol.com/zone6400 I like this one better :)

I use a Performa 6400/180 OS 8.6, Performa 6400/200 OS 8.6, B&W G3/350 OS 8.6, PowerBook G3/233 OS 9, and a PowerBook DUO 270c OS 7.5.5. All of the software updates posted here are currently running on one or the other with minimal problems. If I do encounter a problem, I will post it for all to read and respond to. If you are having any problems and would like help just email me and if I can answer it I will, or I will post it here for others to read and respond to.