Just Updated 7/16/2000 I'm back! Thanks for being so patient with me. I needed the time off. We went to California to visit all the relatives. Me and my son had a great time, but my wife got sick the last few days :( Till then she was also having a good time :) We went to Disney Land and boy did my son have fun there! He is only 3 1/2 years old so we couldn't get on most of the larger rides but so what. They have so much stuff for little ones that it didn't matter. I forgot about most of the smaller rides since I hadn't ridden them in such a long time. Its like an all new park when viewed through your child's eyes :) Problems view entire pages on The 6400 Zone?: While on my trip I had dial up access from Freeinternet.com which worked great but I noticed an issue with my web site. A few of the pages are not fully loading or the images are not fully loading? It seems that my pages might be getting to big or something else is causing the download to time-out? I think it may be my new NavigationMap image so I have diced it up into 3 images. Please let me know if your still having trouble loading my pages. Thanks. I've only changed the image on my home page and a few others so some pages may still not load correctly. Please try reloading the page over or use the contextual menu of your browser and reload images only. This worked for me. If no one has any trouble with my home page now, I will make the changes to my other pages. I did not see this problem at home probably because of my cable modem :) The pages load so fast they don't time-out. New 6400 Zone Archives: Another solution to my ever growing home page is to start posting archives of them and not leaving 2 weeks worth of news posted. Actually I had been posting them on my web server but not really creating links to them. Now I will :) Since these pages are being posted in a different part of my web site, most images and most links to my personally created pages will be broken but external links will still work. I don't have enough web space to post them in the correct locations to keep everything working. My heavy use of non-absolute links has caused this situation. Sorry :( But the info is still valuable and if you must follow a link that's not working then please email me and I will send you the correct link. Thanks Newer brings back L2 G3!: Yes you heard it. Newer is now selling the 400Mhz L2 G3 again for the 6400/6500 and others built on the same mother boards. The price is $399. This is very good news since when they stopped producing them, Sonnet became the only L2 G3 manufacturer around. Looking over their L2 G3 info page seems to indicate that the same card also works in the 4400 and others built on the same mother board. So one card fits all with this baby! If I remember either Newer or Sonnet tried this before and it didn't last long so I wonder if the bugs are worked out? Also, there is a much larger heatsink on this then the previous model had (or at least then I thought it had?). Check out my Newer Info page to see an image of the new card. Final answer on using 128M DIMMS in a 6400/6500, No go!: Michael is the first person I know of that has actually tried the 128M dimm in his 6500 and it only showed 64M worth of ram :( Thanks for the info Michael and for having the guts to try it :) [I received the 128MB 2K refresh rated DIMM via FedEx today. The DIMM is shorter (height-wise that is) than the 64MB DIMM I already have, and the chips on the card are wider, squatty looking things, but the pins are all the same and the notches all align properly. I was a little paranoid about frying my logic board when doing this for the first time, so I took the 64MB DIMM out and put the 128MB DIMM in its place, held the reset button and put everything back together, turning on the Mac with one hand on the power plug while I held my breath. At startup, HAL 9000 always says to me "I'm completely operational, and all my circuits are functioning perfectly." Never have those words sounded more beautiful to me than they did this afternoon. Anyway, the unit started up, and remember this is a 6500 logic board, not a 6400, so I have no RAM apart from the DIMMs in the socket--that is to say if the DIMM doesn't work and it's the only one there, I won't get even a startup, but it did in fact start up and all extensions loaded. So of course the first thing I am going to do is run over to the About This Computer thing and check out how much RAM is running, and what numbers do I see? 64MB. I powered down, swapped the DIMM to another slot and held the reset button, slapped it all together again and started up, same thing with 64MB. I then replaced the old 64MB DIMM and powered up, 128MB total this time. Swapping the 64 and the 128 position gave the same results: 128MB total. Now let's take a look at the possible outcomes I had predicted: 1. The DIMM would not work at all. 2. The DIMM would work but only use half the RAM amount. 3. The DIMM would work and use all RAM present. Since we have a clear result, and we know the DIMM is 2K refresh in and out of the pins, there are a few other factors to consider: 1. Supposedly, the ROM on the logic board won't allow the sockets to address more than 64MB each. 2. The chips on the DIMM are actually 4K arranged in such a way that the card as a whole refreshes at 2K. 3. We know that 4K DIMMs (not necessarily chips) will always halve the total RAM amount on this board. 4. These logic boards can also accept 1K refresh rated DIMMs. Now, here are some conclusions I've drawn from the above with the single outcome I've experienced, some of which are only more hypotheses: 1. It is possible that the ROM is not allowing the socket to address more than 64MB. 2. It is possible that the 4K chips, while arranged in 2K in/out of the DIMM, are keeping the memory the CPU sees halved. 3. It is possible that a 1K refresh rated DIMM could show the entire 128MB to the CPU.(Fat chance of ever seeing a 1K refresh rated DIMM with 128MB though.) This will also only be possible if 1. Above is not the case. 4. It is possible that a 256MB 2K refresh rated DIMM would show 128MB to the CPU, and only if 1. above is not the case.(And there's a big likelihood of diddly for anybody making a 256MB 2K refresh rated DIMM just for us, also.) So that's the news, some of it still speculative and not all of it good, but at least the DIMM works. What I paid for it is approximately what other stores have 64MB DIMMs going for, and only $20 more than their own 64MB DIMM, so I am going to run the 6500 with the thing at least over the weekend and see if I have any ill-effects. Assuming so I will return it for a 64MB DIMM, otherwise, I was going to get more RAM anyway. ~Michael] RoadRunner service in Florida and OS 8.6 DHCP issues: I have posted many time by now how OS 8.6 has problems with DHCP and cable/DSL modems. Mark sent me some info from RoadRunner on how to possibly solve these issues for their service. Thanks Mark. It may also work for other services? Note, I have OT 2.6.1 posted for download which also fixes certain DHCP issues with OS 8.6, but maybe not this same issue? [I've been using the RoadRunner cable modem service with my 6400 with Sonnet 240MHz G3/L2 and OS 8.6 for a month now with no problems. I've been using the version of OT that comes with 8.6. I noticed some info on your site concerning DHCP problems. Here are the suggestions for Mac users from RoadRunner. Thanks, Mark "MacOS 8.6 Update - Road Runner of Central Florida strongly recommends that all subscribers using MacOS 8.5 and MacOS 8.5.1 system software upgrade to MacOS 8.6. Installing the update will eliminate an incompatibility with Road Runner's DHCP servers, and the upgrade is free to all licensed users of MacOS 8.5.x. You can download this 34.3 MB file directly from Road Runner's servers in a fraction of the time it would take you to download it from Apple Computer's Web sites. * MacOS 8.6 TCP/IP Options control panel - Some subscribers using MacOS 8.6 system software have reported problems with very large downloads (100MB+) and instant messaging clients such as America Online's Instant Messenger. When Road Runner's DHCP servers renew client IP addresses, these users' TCP/IP sessions may be interrupted briefly. Although the TCP/IP session is reestablished almost immediately, large downloads may be aborted and instant messaging sessions may be interrupted in the interim. These problems can generally be resolved by installing Apple's TCP/IP Options control panel and checking the checkbox next to "Don't retain DHCP lease on shutdown." (To install this control panel, download it, decompress it with Stuffit Expander and drag the decompressed file -- TCP/IP Options -- on top of your system folder. You'll get a message that the file needs to be stored in the Control Panels folder. Click OK. You should then be able to open this control panel and check "Don't retain DHCP lease on shutdown." You must restart you computer for the changes to take effect.)"] Change to my 6400 front cover removal instructions: Larry sent me some info on how to remove the front covers without the need for prying the edges with a screw driver. I tried it and it works great! Thanks Larry. I posted it on my front cover removal page. USB PCI card issues with USB products?: Lindy writes that she is having problems with a digital camera and her USB PCI card and was told by an HP rep that their printers won't work with USB PCI cards either! Thanks Lindy. [I've been trying to find a way to get my 6400 to connect to my new Olympus C3000 zoom camera, with no luck. First I got a Belkin USB card, but that didn't find the camera. Then I got a Keyspan; that sees the camera on the USB bus, but Olympus claims that non-builtin USB ports won't work for their cameras (is this a power issue?). Also, I just talked to a HP rep at a local Best Buy, and he says HP USB printers won't work on an add-on USB board either. I have a serial cable kit for the camera on order; if that doesn't work it looks like I have to buy a new computer to download from this thing! Argh! Just FYI on the USB boards; I'd be happy to hear I'm wrong about this, but I'm pretty convinced so far.... lindy] I would like to add that I bought an MGE Ellipse 500 UPS which is supposed to interface with the Mac via USB and use OS 9.0.4's power management features for shutdown purposes. Well my 6400 with an ADS USB card will see the UPS but OS 9.0.4 never acknowledges that its running on battery power? I have emailed them but did not get a fix. Only that it should work with OS 9.0.4. I suspect they mean OS 9.0.4 and an iMac or G3/G4. My sons JamCam digital camera seems to work fine with the USB card though. Audio capture with the VR128 and a 6500: I found on Mikes Accelerate Your Mac site info from a 6500 user that got audio to work by quitting the Xclaim Video Player, trashing the XclaimVR preferences and relaunching the Xclaim Video Player. I also noted that he had a Sonnet 350Mhz L2 G3 installed which is amazing since not everyone has good luck even running a Rage128 card without a G3 in their 6400/6500. Apple TIL stating the Geo modem is not OS 9 compatible: Well, we all pretty much knew this already but I thought I would post it for final proof that they are not going to make them compatible :( Sigh! http://til.info.apple.com/techinfo.nsf/artnum/n60536 unsupported technologies in OS 9 Update on plugging in/out headphones to unfreeze your 6400: Lars and Tiong both sent me their experiences on the use of a headphone to unfreeze their 6400/6500. Thanks guys [Hello! I don't think it was I who wrote to You about the "unplugging-the-head-phone-fix" for a Sonnet upgraded 6400, but I have had the same problem. There was one occasion when I was playing warcraft when I had to pull or insert the plug at least 30 times... I have not been able to find a specific cure for it, but trimming extensions and regularly rebuilding the desktop has made my machine so stable that this particular problem is now extremely rare. Furthermore, it almost never happens twice within a short time any longer. I don´t think, however, that this problem is directly caused by the Sonnet card. My feeling is that this is a latent problem with the 6400, and possibly with other models as well. The latent problem is only triggered by the instability that can occur because of extension conflicts or desktop corruption when using the Sonnet card. But this is only my guess. Yours sincerely Lars] [Regarding the headphone fix: this was actually one of the fixes I used when I had the L2 G3 bug with my first L2 G3 (old design Sonnet) and V3. Whenever my 6500 froze, I plugged my headphone in and out of the jack and my 6500 will run again. However, this worked only in 3D. I wonder if your reader has a PCI card in his Mac? Regards, Tiong] Reader Request page updated: I have added several requests for help and info so please go check them out and email the ones you think you have an answer for. Thanks :) Update on the 6500 with Sonnets 400Mhz G3 and using the Sonnet Clocker: I am getting feedback that even the 2 hacked extensions I have posted below are still not having the desired affect on the G3. The 425 does nothing and the 500 freezes the 6500. It may be possible that Sonnet did away with software speed selection for this particular version and the Clocker app may never work on it :( Just Updated 6/17/2000 Sonnet Clocker Update: The author of the original Clocker has sent me 2 more Crescendo extensions for testing. One set to 425Mhz and another set to 500Mhz again. If you try either, Please let me know how it goes. And just for the record, clocking the 400Mhz card any faster will only work on a 6500 (or 6400 with a clocked mother board). The 6400 is maxed as it is at 400Mhz :( The 6400 Zone Archives

L2 G3 Upgrades PCI Timing Extension My 6400 TA manual Sonnet Clocking Gaming News ATI Rage128 Voodoo3 OS 9 info OT 2.6 for older OS's iTools info iMovie info Run Alternate OS's Apple Service Manuals Spec Comparison Page Vimage compatibility user letters install review Sonnet Tech compatiblity user letters install review hack for stability Sonnet clocking Crescendo 1.4.2 installer Newer Tech compatibility user letters Power Logix 6400 Clocking Info 6400 TA manual Alternate OS's Archives: 6400 Zone ATI Rage128 Avid Cinema Cable/DSL Modems CD/DVD Drives Cooling The 6400 Digital video help Firewire and USB cards Geo Modem Gaming News Help Links iMovie info iTools MacOS 7.5.x - 9.0 info Mac Equipment for Sale Magazines Magma PCI Chassis Misc Mac Info Reader Reqests Readers Reviews Software Links USB and Firewire cards Voodoo2 Voodoo3 6400 Icons ColorStyleWriter4000 OS 9 Crescendo 1.4.2 OT 2.6 and OT 2.6.1 SetVolume to 1 script Sonnet Clocker Sonnet Clocker II UK Telecom software Vimage drivers, latest From Apple- Mac OS Forums Performa 6400 Forums From Accelerate Your Mac- 3DFX Forums From MacSpeed Zone- 6400 Forums