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Just Updated 9/22/2000 This is a very long update so please take your time :) 6400 Zone Forums image needed: (This is just a continuation from last update) I was wondering if any of you artists would mind making a design logo for my forums? I wanted a image that can represent the forums and place it along with the other images above. I'm thinking of placing it where the 6400 image is right now, so make it about the size of the Amazon image. Thanks. Should you rush out to try OSX? From NewerTech: Here is a link to some info that NewerTech posted on the issue of upgrading to OSX. Basically they are trying to warn people not to rush into anything just because its new and exciting. They make some very good arguments for staying with your current OS and not worrying about OSX yet. I suggest you all go read it if your considering OSX right now. I fit into the group of "because its new" and "cause I can" :) More OSX info: Here is a link to info from MacWeek on OS X. And here is a link to Clan Mac Gaming's info on game compatibility under OSX. Basically it has a list of current games that run either under the Classic or Carbon environments and how well they work. Remember OSX is beta so things may change by the final release. Here is a link to MacWorlds OSX Survival Guide. Has some good tips on how to get around in Aqua. Has anyone tried OSX PB on their 6400/6500 yet? I'm just curious to know if it worked or not :) I have an order pending and I hope it arrives soon! More on OSX System Disk hack for older Macs: I found the same info that I posted on my site last update on Accelerate Your Mac's site but from a different person. Seems others have found the same solution for getting OSX's System Disk utility to work on non-OSX supported Macs. Here is his info.
I did try the Hack with ResEdit on my copy from DP4 and it didn't work :( First I had to use Machine ID 58 instead of 512 which is what my reader used (he had a 5500 and not a 6400). This did keep the error message from showing but it would not allow me to pick the OSX partition on the CD to boot. It only showed Classic OS volumes as bootable. I tried to click on the shaded out OSX CD and then reboot but my 6400 refused to reboot? It just powered on the supply and stayed dark! I had to zap the PRAM to get back to normal again! Back to the drawing board :( Update on TV tuner using QuickCam input only: I have not found a solution to this yet but there may be a reason why? Ian sent me the ReadMe file from Connectix's QuickCam software and there is an interesting point in the second to last paragraph of the Known Problems section. It basically states an issue with older Quadras but may also relate to our systems. It says that Apples Video Player only uses the first video source it finds and that's it. They suggest to try running the QuickCam software before Apples Software so the QuickCam software gets control of the QuickCam and all that's left for Apples Video Player is the TV tuner. They say the only fix is for Apple to change their software in a future update. Maybe they did but I don't use this software so I cannot verify it? If anyone can verify that Apples Video Player can pick multiple sources, please email me. Thanks Orion Rage 128 with Vimages G3 user info: I thought I would post a little info from Kin who wrote to let me know all is well with his Orion video card and a Vimage G3.
The patch he mentions to get the drivers to work were needed for the original 4.0 ATI Universal drivers. I suspect that ATI got the patch incorporated into the current drivers. Thanks Kin I-Jam 101 USB MP3 player info: Ralph sent me some info on his new I-Jam 101 MP3 player he received. Thanks Ralph.
I think a lot of USB devices that act like removable media to the Mac will have the same problem as Ralph describes. Apple will need to address this in their USB drivers or you'll always have to act like your ejecting the disk/device before you can remove the USB cable from it. Later he wrote to let me know he had some sound choppiness with QT and MP3's. He also found out why. It seems that ATI's extensions may be causing all the sound stuttering? Thanks Ralph.
He is going to try a clean install of ATI's drivers to see if the mix of old and OS 9.0.4 drivers may be causing his problem. Apple Manuals online again: A reader sent me a link to a site hosting Apples Take Apart manuals again. I have it linked from my Help Info page. Just click on the link in the 9/20/2000 update. They may not last very long so get them while they're up :) Apple Developer info: Here is a link to Apples Developer info site. There are topics on everything Apple is working on! Now you can get all the info that Apples developers have access to. Very informative if you feel like reading a lot of techi stuff :) PCI wireless network cards for Macs?: At this time only Macs with built in Airport card slots or PC users with PCI wireless cards can access the internet through devices like Apples Airport Base Station wirelessly but I got a tip from John that Farallon is working on one for Macs! This would be great as it would bridge the gap for users of older Macs that want to run a wireless network. Thanks John.
Sonnet makes 7200/8200 G3 upgrade!: Well they finally did it. Now all those 7200/8200 users can finally get a G3 upgrade. Click here for more info. Apparently they did it through the PCI slot and to get the RAM up to speed they moved the RAM slots onto the PCI card! This is about what I was expecting to happen for us way back before the L2 G3 came out. I guess they read my mind :) Bus Doubling from Sonnet: Here is a link to info on Sonnets new Bus Doubling technology which they used to make the PCI G3 upgrade for the 7200. Basically they take the mother board speed and double it on the PCI card so that faster G3/G4 CPU's can be used. You have to remember that the 7200 only had a 33Mhz bus speed so the max G3 you could get would have been a 330Mhz G3. Not bad but with bus doubling (33Mhz bus to 66Mhz bus) they can go up to a 660Mhz G3 if it existed! This is why they moved the RAM to the PCI card so it can gain the new found speed. I'm not sure if new ram is required or not? Probably since the old RAM won't be up to par for 66Mhz bus speeds. I wouldn't expect this technology to be added to the L2 G3 as the L2 cache slot is very small! PCI cards have plenty of room for the extra circuitry and RAM slots. Would be nice though :) Sonnet 1.4.5 Crescendo updater: I don't know if any of you are aware but Sonnet has updated their G3 driver to 1.4.5. The description of what was changed is below. Mostly sounds like added features for the new 7200 G3 but maybe some other mods where made? Please let me know if it has changed anything for you. Thanks
EasiExpansion Case for macs: I just saw an add in the latest MacConnection catalog for a PCI expansion chassis called the EasiExpansion T35. It is made by a company called Mobility. It states that the chassis works on PC's and Mac's and has a built it 2 channel IDE controller card and 2 USB ports! There are 3 open PCI slots and a few external and internal drive bays. The price is listed as $599 which is a great price for all of that! If you subtract $99 for the IDE card and $40 for the USB ports that makes the chassis worth only $450. The lowest price I have seen for these. I emailed their sales people for more info on Mac compatibility and here is the reply I got.
They do have a large list of compatible devices but looks like they where all tested on PC's. I asked for more specific Mac info. I'll post it when I receive it. Just to warn any of you wishing to try this, I have tried Farallons PCI ethernet card and ATI's Rage128 card in my chassis (from Magma) and they did not work. The ethernet card was not recognized and the ATI Rage128 locked up after a few minutes of use. This is not to say Mobilities chassis will have the same problem but it might? Basically it depends on how well the PCI card was designed to work over a PCI bridge which is needed to bridge the new PCI bus with the old PCI bus. As with the Magma chassis, the T35 requires a PCI card in the host computer with a cable running to the chassis which is the bridge for both. So your max number of PCI slots becomes 4 since you loose one in the 6400 but with the USB and IDE being supplied in the chassis, you won't need those kind of cards anymore :) Voodoo3 PC BIOS's posted: Here is a link to a page where the host has placed many versions of the Voodoo3 BIOS for those of you that lost yours and want to reflash your card back to PC. He really did it for PC user to get the latest ROM image for their cards but it works for us as well :) New ROM flasher for SGRAM Voodoo3's?: I received some info from Michael on a new V3 ROM flasher app that is supposed to work on V3 cards with SGRAM installed. It seems that 3dfx upgraded their V3 cards from SDRAM to SGRAM which is faster but they did not upgrade the flasher app so many Mac users are not able to flash their new V3's. This utility seems to have come from out of no where as even the site hosting the app doesn't know where he got it? Anyway Michael says it worked great for him and speculates that 3dfx made it but didn't want to show support for the unsupported V3 since the V5 started shipping. Makes some sense and looking at 3dfx'x track record, it could be true? Well, here is his info and please let me know if it works for your SGRAM upgraded V3. Thanks.
HardDrive drivers from 7.5.3 not being updated unless the disk is initialized?: Michael also sent some info on an issue he had with his hard drives drivers not being updated from the ones installed by OS 7.5.3 no matter which version of Apples Drive Setup he used until he initialized his drive. Once he initialized the drive with a newer driver, subsequent driver updates worked fine. I don't recall having this problem as my OS updates all reported fine as he noted his did but I never checked to see if the driver was actually updated. My HD has been formatted awhile ago so I can no longer check. If this is true then some of you having problems with newer OS's might try initializing the HD if you never have as your HD driver may be outdated? Thanks Michael.
The HD version as noted in the GetInfo window of my HD for my 6400 with OS 9.0.4 is version 3.2.5. This is using Apples DriveSetup 1.9.2 from OS 9. Using 128M 4k DIMMS that are cheaper then 64M 2k DIMMS on a 6400?: Michael also sent me some news on his 128M DIMM and how he saved money by purchasing more 128M DIMMS instead of 64M DIMMS. Now don't get confused by this! They are only showing 64M each as that is all the 6400/6500 memory controller can access but if it saves you money and they work then why not try?
This is a try at your own risk thing. Michael states it works fine but I just thought I would warn people that this is not in any way a supported mod! If you try then please let me know. Thanks Farallon COMM II card user experience with tech support: Rick wanted to let me know how well his call to tech support went with Farallon when he found that his COMM II ethernet card was not working. Apple should take note of this :) Thanks Rick.
Yellow Dog Linux Server on a non-G3 upgraded 6400: Mike writes that he got YDL to run fine on his 6400/180 with a newer 2.2.17 kernel. Thanks Mike. Click here for more Linux info.
Reader Requests updated: Doug is having some serious SCSI issues on his 6400. Click here for more info. Robert is having trouble capturing video with iMovie. Click here for more info. Thanks. 4x4 EVO test updated: They just released TEST2 for download. It includes more vehicles and other improvements. Click here to read more and download. I was unable to last night as traffic on their server must have been high? Update on HP slide adaptor for scanners: VESPark sent me some more info (based on info I posted 2 years ago from Dave) on the HP slide adaptor for their scanners for use with other scanners. Thanks VESPark.
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CD containing the 6400 Zone plus past history for sale 9/3/1999
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 :)
amazon.com, books and more 7/2/98
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.
Link to my site that gets rid of AOL's ads! 9/16/98
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 :)
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.
I use a Performa 6400/180 OS 9.0.4, Performa 6400/220 OS 9.0.4, B&W G3/350 OS 9.0.4, PowerBook G3/233 OS 9.0.4, PM 6100 G3/240 OS 9.0.4, 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.
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This page last updated 9/22/2000
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