Date: Fri, 9 Dec 2005 06:43:48 -0800 (PST) From: Mel <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Do you know where I might buy 8MB and 16MB 30 pin SIMMs for a Mac IIci? I have been sekeing these for over six months but without success. I would like to bump my 32MB Iici to maybe 48MB or 64MB and up to 128MB to see how the performance changes and after those tests,
The seller for this Ebay auction <http://cgi.ebay.com/16-MEG-60NS-30-PIN-SIMMS-PARITY-SET-OF-4_W0QQitemZ6830061813QQcategoryZ3690QQrdZ1QQcmdZViewItem> regularly sells sets of 4 16MB 30 pin SIMMs. I have no relationship, nor interest, but they are located about a mile from my house and seem to be generally good folks.
Another poster mentioned sales from a few years ago. Was that Sunguk? Or something like that. As I recall he hundreds of sets of four 16MB SIMMs he wrote had come out of Q700s. Kind of made me wonder where all those Q700s went to. When I was ready to buy some, he was gone off of Ebay though. I can't believe he actually sold all of those.
Mention has been made of a "Supermac Nubus video card that allows the IIci to drive large monitors with 24-bit color.
There are many NuBus video cards which will provide 24 bit color on the IIci. The major players were Raster Ops, Radius, SuperMac, and E-Machines. Villagetronics also sold a couple of cards quite late in the NuBus game, which I think were rebadged by Sonnet--MacPicasso 320 and MacPicasso 340. And there were a few offerings by Lapis or Focus Enhancements.
Some video cards only did 8 bit color, but cards to keep an eye out for might be teh E-Machines Futura II SX, LX or MX (make sure you get the "II"), the Radius Precision Color Pro XP, XK or something else (make sure you get the "Pro"), the Radius Thunder 24/GT, or Radius Thunder IV GX 1152, 1360 or 1600. There were good cards by SuperMac and Raster Ops too, but I just don't know their model names. Also, the MacPicasso 340 is a very good card in the same league with the Thunder IV GX series, adn the MacPicasso 320 is serviceable, similar to the Futura II or Precision Color Pro.
All of the above are likely to have certain compatibility quirks and issues depending on which OS you use them with.
For example, the Futura II SX has a slot on which can be installed an Ethernet daughter board (video and enet in 1 NuBus slot) but it only works with Classic networking, not with Open Transport.
Past a certain OS (8.0?, 8.5), the Radius Dynamic Desktop Control Panel no longer works, but the QuickColor extension continues to provide QuickDraw acceleration.
Mention was also made of a Daystar 50MHz accelerator.
Daystar made the PowerCache accelerater which was a 68030 based accelerator, which is the same CPU found in the Mac II series and in the SE/30. However, the accelerator runs at 33 MHz or 50 MHz. There may have been other speeds, but those are the two I've seen. If you get the 50 MHz version, that should, in theory double the CPU speed of your IIci, but it won't do much for your disk access speed nor your video performance.
Daystar also made the Turbo040 accelerator based on the 68040 CPU. This came in the 25MHz, 33MHz and 40 MHz versions. All of these provide a nice boost to the IIci. There are two versions of the Turbo040 card. The newer version has the 128K L2 cache soldered on the card. The original version has a connector on the back for the optional "Fast Cache" 128K L2 cache board. You can distinguish the two, because the older one has a long thin black socket on the back of the card near the top edge for the cache board adn the newer version lacks teh socket (no need with the cache soldered down). Also, the newer version has a large chip (~1" square) on the front of the board next to the 68040 while the older version consists of a bunch of smaller chips.
If you buy one of the older version, check to see if the cache board is attached and included. Often it is, and often the seller has no idea what the piggybacking board is doing on the back of the thing.
The older version with the cache board attached will be two boards sandwiched together pretty closely when viewed from above.
All of the Turbo040s that I have had could be clocked up to 40 MHz without issues even if they were originally the 25 MHz version. However, if you replace a 68LC040 chip (no FPU) with a full 68040 (has FPU) chip, there is a firmware version change required.
Daystar sold versions of all the Turbo040 which had the FPU "Turbo040" or lacked the FPU "Turbo040i".
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