Apple iie with switch under case?
Sam Latella
Once you flick the switch it goes from the Apple //e to Apple ][. The
Apple //e looks like it was built in 1982, and the case itself is a little
bigger then the other //e I have in use.
Did the IIe case shrink over the years?
Lastly, everytime I boot up this //e with the switch its hard to read the
screen... what could be the possible cause, bad board chip?
Any help would be greatly appreciated.
Sam
Michael J. Mahon
It seems likely that the machine is a home-built, modded machine.
The switch controls an address line on the character generator and
the ROMs (if done properly). Of course, the rest of the machine is
a //e, with only the ][(+) ROMs and character generator.
In fact, it may just switch between enhanced and unenhanced //e...
In any case, reseating the ROMs and character generator is in order,
and flipping the switch a hundred times or more to make sure its
contacts are clean.
If that doesn't cure it, you'll have to provide more specific
symptoms.
-michael
NadaNet 3.1 for Apple II parallel computing!
Home page: http://home.comcast.net/~mjmahon/
"The wastebasket is our most important design
tool--and it's seriously underused."
Sam Latella
][e case.
I booted the Apple IIe with the switch underneath set to one side and I got
the following at the top of the screen.
Apple SS (two ss intertwined in eash other)... what is this?
Then when I flicked the swich to the otherside. I got the following.
Apple ][
So how do I know this is a IIE? It has the symbol //e on the outside of the
case.
I did the self test twice with the switch underneath set to both sides and I
got the following message KERNEL OK
Is this system a total hack?
David Empson
> Okay things just got a little stranger with the switch underneath the Apple
> ][e case.
>
> I booted the Apple IIe with the switch underneath set to one side and I got
> the following at the top of the screen.
>
> Apple SS (two ss intertwined in eash other)... what is this?
>
> Then when I flicked the swich to the otherside. I got the following.
>
> Apple ][
>
> So how do I know this is a IIE? It has the symbol //e on the outside of the
> case.
>
> I did the self test twice with the switch underneath set to both sides and I
> got the following message KERNEL OK
>
> Is this system a total hack?
Sounds like a bog standard International //e, from one of the European
countries. We had the UK English model in New Zealand.
The switch on the underside toggles the character generator and keyboard
layout between two character sets: US ASCII and the local language
variant.
For the UK/AUS/NZ model, this only affected the # symbol, changing it to
a UK Pound ('£', if that comes through for you).
Other language models (e.g. German, French) changed several characters,
and it appears this one has the ']' and '[' characters swapped with
something like the German double-S character 'ß' or '§', so I'd guess it
is a German model (possibly Swiss German).
If you open up the computer and compare the motherboard layout to a US
//e, you will note that the auxiliary slot is directly in line with slot
3, rather than being located in the lower left corner.
The computer probably also generates PAL video at 50 Hz instead of NTSC
at 60 Hz, and as such has a slightly lower master clock frequency (14.25
MHz instead of 14.31818 MHz).
--
David Empson
dem...@actrix.gen.nz
Sean Fahey
> Sounds like a bog standard International //e, from one of the European
> countries. We had the UK English model in New Zealand.
>
> The switch on the underside toggles the character generator and keyboard
> layout between two character sets: US ASCII and the local language
> variant.
I think he has a Canadian //e, as that sounds a lot like what mine
does, eh.
Sean
Sean Fahey
> I just came across an Apple IIe that has a swich underneath the keyboard.
> Once you flick the switch it goes from the Apple //e to Apple ][. The
> Apple //e looks like it was built in 1982, and the case itself is a little
> bigger then the other //e I have in use.
>
> Did the IIe case shrink over the years?
>
Got pics? The //e was introduced in January of 1983 -- and by bigger,
I assume you're referring to the resin case they initially came in vs.
the latter plastic cases. They were the same size but the resin cases
had a few extra reinforcement points in the interior, and the keyboard
(with Apple /// style keyboard) made it look chunkier.
The more I read, the more I think you have a custom machine, or
someone may have put a //e in a clone case or by long shot, you may
have found a seed machine.
Michael J. Mahon
The non-standard case is what made me think clone case, too.
I've never seen an International //e--the west coast was too
saturated with standard ones. ;-)
Tony Cianfaglione
It's the international version - I have several, in different style
cases too. Some look like clone cases but with international motherboards
in them. They all have the switch on the bottom and switch over to
international characters. There were several versions that I know of;
Canadian-US, Canadian-French, French and UK-Australian. The IIc came in
various flavours like this too; with the flip of a switch above the
keyboard - on the US version, the keyboard switch changed from US standard
to Dvorak and on the international versions, the switch changed over to
French and other international characters.
I have one really odd II+ with words printed below each letter on each
key. R has RUN printed below it, P has PRINT, S has SAVE, L has LOAD, B
has BLOAD etc. You activate each word with a function key occupying the
'missing key' space on the keyboard layout and it would save a ton of time
typing these words, if you are programming the II+. The slots on the back
of the case are barely big enough for ribbon cables to emerge and there
are a number of eproms on the motherboards.
Tony
Michael J. Mahon
That's definitely a clone. The "macro" keyboards were a common
substitution.
Linards Ticmanis
> I just came across an Apple IIe that has a swich underneath the keyboard.
> Once you flick the switch it goes from the Apple //e to Apple ][. The
> Apple //e looks like it was built in 1982, and the case itself is a little
> bigger then the other //e I have in use.
Maybe somebody who didn't need the switching between national and
US-ASCII font and keyboard took the international IIe and modified it so
that the firmware ROMs would be switched instead of, or in addition, to,
the keyboard and video ROMs?
> Lastly, everytime I boot up this //e with the switch its hard to read the
> screen... what could be the possible cause, bad board chip?
Maybe the video ROM was replaced by an EPROM and it's starting to reach
the point where bits fail? In that case you'd need to re-burn the EPROM.
You'll need an EPROM burner, but no UV eraser, if you just want to
re-burn the exact same content that's already supposed to be in there.
However if you make a mistake and burn something that differs from
what's already supposed to be in there, it can happen that you'll need
an eraser after that to fix up. I usually use the slow burning algorithm
and burn the chip twice, that should give the burned content maximum
longevity.
If the IIe is a PAL model, the graphics quality issues could be related
to the fact that it has two quartz oscillators, one 14.25 MHz main
quartz, and one 4.43361875 MHZ PAL color carrier quartz. Since the two
quartzes aren't synchronized, their relative speed will drift up and
down a few hertz depending on temperature, causing interference or
what's called a "beat" in acoustics (I'm not sure of the right English
term, the German word is "Schwebung") and thus causing highly annoying
moving moiré patterns to appear on the screen. There's not much you can
do about that except to throw away the PCB and put that of an NTSC Apple
in there, as I did.
--
Linards Ticmanis
Tony Cianfaglione
On Tue, 21 Dec 2010, Michael J. Mahon wrote:
>> I have one really odd II+ with words printed below each letter on each
>> key. R has RUN printed below it, P has PRINT, S has SAVE, L has LOAD, B
>> has BLOAD etc. You activate each word with a function key occupying the
>> 'missing key' space on the keyboard layout and it would save a ton of time
>> typing these words, if you are programming the II+. The slots on the back
>> of the case are barely big enough for ribbon cables to emerge and there are
>> a number of eproms on the motherboards.
>
> That's definitely a clone. The "macro" keyboards were a common
> substitution.
I figured as much. The case was a little too different to be a real
Apple and there are no identification markings on the exterior of the
case. I never considered it to be worth anything and kept it just as a
conversation piece at our user group meetings years ago.
Calibrator
>
> There's not much you can do about that except to throw away the
> PCB and put that of an NTSC Apple in there, as I did.
Throw "out" perhaps - but certainly not "away"!
Some components can come quite handy for repairs.
bye
Marcus
Linards Ticmanis
Well, I pulled and kept all socketed components, if that gives you
peace. ;-)
--
Linards Ticmanis
Tony Cianfaglione
> On Dec 21, 10:37 am, Linards Ticmanis <ticma...@gmx.de> wrote:
> There's not much you can do about that except to throw away the
> PCB and put that of an NTSC Apple in there, as I did.
Why throw out the motherboard? The double interlocked SS is the normal
cursor for the international editions.
Linards Ticmanis
The problem I was talking about has nothing to do with what the cursor
looks like.
Also I am curious... why would the cursor not be a blinking
"checkerboard" as usual? Those national ISO-646 character sets that have
the § character (which I guess is what we've been talking about) have it
in place of the "at sign" @, not in place of DEL (hex 7f) where the
Apple //e cursor character is stored. And it isn't in place of the
square bracket characters or the forward slash either, which makes the
fact that it appears in the power-on message strange, to say the least.
On the German //e the cursor is simply a blinking checkerboard.
--
Linards Ticmanis
Sam Latella
What do you mean by that?
The case itself is about half an inch wider than my other //e. The switch
underneath looks like it was manufactured to be put there and not
customized. The keyboard itself has some other characters on it that are
European looking, however, the ][e itself was purchased from Canada.
I'll have to take some pictures and post them when I get a chance.
I still really baffled by it.
Sam
Tony Cianfaglione
On Wed, 22 Dec 2010, Linards Ticmanis wrote:
> On the German //e the cursor is simply a blinking checkerboard.
On my US-keyboard IIc, the checkerboard cursor is activated when you
press ESC in BASIC so that you move your cursor anywhere on the screen
without disturbing your programming. It allows you to correct your
BASIC programming by selecting and unselecting ESC at the right times.
Linards Ticmanis
Strange ... mine starts up with the blinking checkerboard cursor, it
only goes away (to be replaced by a non-blinking white square) if you
switch to 80 columns via PR#3. Or do you boot directly into 80-column mode?
On my IIe, in normal 40-column mode ESC makes no difference as far as
the look of the cursor is concerned. While using the 80-column firmware,
ESC turns the cursor into an inverted "+" (plus) sign, not a
checkerboard. Or is that inverted "+" what you mean? But anyways there
is no "ง" character (continental paragraph sign) in sight.
--
Linards Ticmanis
Tony Cianfaglione
On Wed, 22 Dec 2010, Linards Ticmanis wrote:
> Or do you boot directly into 80-column mode?
I use the 40/80 switch on the IIc to boot directly into 80 column mode.
> Or is that inverted "+" what you mean?
Yes, in 80 column mode, the inverted plus sign looks like a checkerboard
as I see 4 distinct little blocks.
Linards Ticmanis
>
> On Wed, 22 Dec 2010, Linards Ticmanis wrote:
>
>> Or do you boot directly into 80-column mode?
>
> I use the 40/80 switch on the IIc to boot directly into 80 column mode.
I forgot about that, as I never owned a IIc myself.
>> Or is that inverted "+" what you mean?
>
> Yes, in 80 column mode, the inverted plus sign looks like a checkerboard
> as I see 4 distinct little blocks.
Ok, seems we were simply talking past each other then; what I meant was
the character at ASCII 127, which looks more or less like this:
# # #
# #
# # #
# #
# # #
--
Linards Ticmanis