Macintosh Plus Setup

[meauxdal]

I absolutely adore the early Mac aesthetic. Right-click > open in new tab to prevent the forum software from scaling the image and ruining the dithering patterns.

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I'll probably edit this post to add more pictures later.

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[shaitan]

So does the MacPlus core support color and other boot.rom files as well now? Is it emulating a 68020 CPU now? Where can I find more info on the updates?

[ericgus09]

I absolutely adore the early Mac aesthetic. Right-click > open in new tab to prevent the forum software from scaling the image and ruining the dithering patterns.

what game is that MAZE one? .. I love a good rouge clone..

Yes I know what you mean about aesthetic , try getting some hypercard decks from archive.org .. I could browse those for hours.

[antonie]

Does anyone know what the relationship is between the latest Mister MacPlus core update and the core previously released on 20210315?

In the latest core update the keyboard behaviour is far less stable than in the 20210315 core. The keyboard usability even regressed from the previous "official" core release.

[jordi]

I absolutely adore the early Mac aesthetic. Right-click > open in new tab to prevent the forum software from scaling the image and ruining the dithering patterns.

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I'll probably edit this post to add more pictures later.

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All these ditherings recall me of my homework until Windows 95... Yes, I had a B/W Macintosh for a lot of years.

[jca]

So does the MacPlus core support color and other boot.rom files as well now? Is it emulating a 68020 CPU now? Where can I find more info on the updates?

This is a Mac Plus so I would be very surprised if it supported color but a Mac Plus CPU could be upgraded with the best one being 68030 at 50MHz.

[meauxdal]

Does anyone know what the relationship is between the latest Mister MacPlus core update and the core previously released on 20210315?

In the latest core update the keyboard behaviour is far less stable than in the 20210315 core. The keyboard usability even regressed from the previous "official" core release.

I have noticed some strangeness with the keyboard input as well on the released core. Sometimes keys seem to repeat infinitely or are delayed. I wasn't having these issues with the previous test core, so it could be a regression if others are seeing the same thing.

[meauxdal]

what game is that MAZE one?

Wizardry II! I really enjoy these Mac ports of other games, as they tend to be pretty custom. The Wizardry ports go further than most in leveraging the UI for their own purposes in a very cool way. Worth messing with even if you have played Wizardry on another platform!

[meauxdal]

Rapid progress is being made on a hard drive image I've been working on for this core. Shoot me an email or message if you are interested in trying it out...

[meauxdal]

Exciting stuff is happening for this core behind the scenes.

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[antonie]

Exciting stuff is happening for this core behind the scenes.

Screenshot 2021-03-30 12-15-42.png

Is this part of a soon to be released core update? Where can I find this version of the core?

[meauxdal]

alanswx posted it in the MiSTer discord server. I've attached it here.

[jca]

Rapid progress is being made on a hard drive image I've been working on for this core. Shoot me an email or message if you are interested in trying it out...

What size HD and what kind of programs?

[antonie]

alanswx posted it in the MiSTer discord server. I've attached it here.

Ok, excellent. Thanks

[meauxdal]

Rapid progress is being made on a hard drive image I've been working on for this core. Shoot me an email or message if you are interested in trying it out...

What size HD and what kind of programs?

It's very much a WIP still, but I'm using a single 2GB .vhd in my current setup. Less than a gigabyte of actual space is used on my current working image, I can't recall how much is in use on the released version. There are several hundred more-or-less compatible monochrome games, and a basic scattering of popular applications. MS Word, MacWrite, ClarisWorks, Photoshop, WorldBuilder, HyperCard, Excel... a few other notable ones, but the games side is much more comprehensive than the app side (for now). There's a system selection function that will let you hot swap between systems 5.1 / 6.0.8 / 7.0.1 / 7.1.2 / 7.5.5... lots of other goodies. DM me if you want to give it a spin. Suggestions are extremely welcome - are there Mac apps you consider essential that should be added? Let me know.

[jca]

Nice to have a Mac without a KB driving you insane. Thanks to the developers.

[jca]

...
There's a system selection function that will let you hot swap between systems 5.1 / 6.0.8 / 7.0.1 / 7.1.2 / 7.5.5... lots of other goodies. DM me if you want to give it a spin. Suggestions are extremely welcome - are there Mac apps you consider essential that should be added? Let me know.

Thanks for the info. Being able to switch OS versions seems to be interesting; being semi illiterate regarding the mac I am curious to see how it is done. Regarding apps I think apps which have/had no equivalent on the PC and which showcased the revolutionary GUI (at the time) would be interesting but my lack of knowledge on the Mac is not helpful to make any recommendation.

[Bas]

There's a System Picker app installed and accessible after you first boot into 7.5.

[ericgus09]

There's a System Picker app installed and accessible after you first boot into 7.5.

Where is this ? part of one of the vhd images?

[meauxdal]

There's a System Picker app installed and accessible after you first boot into 7.5.

Where is this ? part of one of the vhd images?

SavageTaylor's images (linked earlier in this thread) have the application installed, but only one OS present. In the WIP .vhd I've been sharing, there are 5 different OSes (covering most of what you'd want to use on a Plus) installed on the drive, with System Picker 1.1a3 allowing you to switch between them from a single .vhd. It's extremely useful software for this era of Macintosh computing!

[ericgus09]

There's a System Picker app installed and accessible after you first boot into 7.5.

Where is this ? part of one of the vhd images?

SavageTaylor's images (linked earlier in this thread) have the application installed, but only one OS present. In the WIP .vhd I've been sharing, there are 5 different OSes (covering most of what you'd want to use on a Plus) installed on the drive, with System Picker 1.1a3 allowing you to switch between them from a single .vhd. It's extremely useful software for this era of Macintosh computing!

Oh nice .. do let me know when its done..

[meauxdal]

New update is out for anyone testing my .vhd. Please update to the latest version linked in the Google Doc. The old version has an old Macintosh virus called nVIR A. It's harmless, but annoying - not something you want infecting your files. It's been eradicated in the new test image and future tests will be scanned with Disinfectant before upload. My apologies.

I do think it's kind of funny that this over 30-year-old virus is still kicking around, now on FPGA

[retrodroid]

What is the status of the core?
The latest OS 7.1 VHD posted in this thread does not work with the official release 2021/03/03 but works with the rbf posted in this thread 2021/03/15.
Shouldn't the official repository be updated?

Today's update fixed the "problem" and is now booting the OS 7.1 VHD. As a bonus the screen got back its rounded corners on the right hand side. The addition of the RTC should allow the use of OS 7.5 and the VIA, I suppose, for serial communication.
Thanks to the developers. MISTer impresses me more and more almost daily

So I last had this core working back in mid-March, using the 6.0.8 .vhd file from this post:
viewtopic.php?p=21009#p21009

Today I ran update_all script and then downloaded the mac os 7.1 us.vhd file from this post:
viewtopic.php?p=20752#p20752

Now my 31khz CRT reports it is out of range when I boot this core. I do hear the boot sound. VGA output is scaler off, which was working fine with the 6.0.8 os.

Thoughts?

[dmckean]

This core outputs 1024x768 @48 khz (512x384 @24hz line doubled). Does your monitor support that?

[retrodroid]

This core outputs 1024x768 @48 khz (512x384 @24hz line doubled). Does your monitor support that?

It should I think, tri-sync arcade monitor; 31khz, 25khz, 15.7khz.

As I said it was working fine with the earlier build. I'll see if I can get 6.0.8 to work now.

[dmckean]

This core outputs 1024x768 @48 khz (512x384 @24hz line doubled). Does your monitor support that?

It should I think, tri-sync arcade monitor; 31khz, 25khz, 15.7khz.

As I said it was working fine with the earlier build. I'll see if I can get 6.0.8 to work now.

A tri-sync arcade monitor won't support a 48khz sync. Maybe a native 24hz mode can eventually be added, your monitor could sync to that.

[meauxdal]

v12.01 of my image was just released. Please update! It is by far the best version to date. Includes some extras this time. Knock on wood, this one should be mostly stable so barring any reported showstoppers (testers, let me know if you can boot this thing up, etc.), I may take some time to work on the Amiga/ShapeShifter image next. There are oodles of lovely color games that we can get up and running via that core that I haven't tested yet.

As usual, anyone interested in test driving, shoot me a PM.

[BigMac2]

v12.01 of my image was just released. Please update! It is by far the best version to date. Includes some extras this time. Knock on wood, this one should be mostly stable so barring any reported showstoppers (testers, let me know if you can boot this thing up, etc.), I may take some time to work on the Amiga/ShapeShifter image next. There are oodles of lovely color games that we can get up and running via that core that I haven't tested yet.

As usual, anyone interested in test driving, shoot me a PM.

Awesome, I might give ShapeShifter a try. Current MacPlus core is a good start but still far away from being a usable desktop environnement. Let's hope a SE/30 core is achievable, but I doubt an NeoGeo/Furtek levels of reverser engineering is coming soon for getting this task done.

[retrodroid]

This core outputs 1024x768 @48 khz (512x384 @24hz line doubled). Does your monitor support that?

It should I think, tri-sync arcade monitor; 31khz, 25khz, 15.7khz.

As I said it was working fine with the earlier build. I'll see if I can get 6.0.8 to work now.

A tri-sync arcade monitor won't support a 48khz sync. Maybe a native 24hz mode can eventually be added, your monitor could sync to that.

Yeah, no go with the updated core either, as expected I guess. I can't explain it but it did work when I tried in March, before the lastest updates. In any case, I just enabled the scaler and it's all good.

[jca]

v12.01 of my image was just released. Please update! It is by far the best version to date. Includes some extras this time. Knock on wood, this one should be mostly stable so barring any reported showstoppers (testers, let me know if you can boot this thing up, etc.), I may take some time to work on the Amiga/ShapeShifter image next. There are oodles of lovely color games that we can get up and running via that core that I haven't tested yet.

As usual, anyone interested in test driving, shoot me a PM.

Thanks for your efforts, I did not do much testing on the MacPlus side as I also wanted to test ShapeShifter. It took me a long time as I had problems with Minimig and USB drive. I finally managed to make it work. When you decide to work on this disk image could you put Speedometer as want to make a comparison between the MacPlus core, ShapeShifter on Minimig core and Basilisk II on the Linux side. On the Macplus and Bsilisk II it is not a problem but on Minimig side it would be more problematic for me: I did not use the Minimig core in more than a year and forgot a lot of stuff, at that time I also tried to install ShapeShifter but failed miserably. I wouldn't know where to start.