[net.micro.mac] A 128K ROM and HFS Question

espen@well.UUCP (Peter Espen) (02/11/86)

	If one upgrades to the new 128K ROM's and the double sided
internal drive, can they still run the version 4.1 Finder and elect NOT
to run the New HFS file system. For example, I might want to take advantage
of many of the new 128K ROM enhancements and yet continue to run old programs
and my currently set-up hard drive until I decide to change over to the
HFS at a later time.
	Let's hear those answers!!!!
	THANKS!
	Peter Espen

jimb@amdcad.UUCP (Jim Budler) (02/11/86)

In article <636@well.UUCP> espen@well.UUCP (Peter Espen) writes:
>
>	If one upgrades to the new 128K ROM's and the double sided
>internal drive, can they still run the version 4.1 Finder and elect NOT
>to run the New HFS file system. For example, I might want to take advantage
>of many of the new 128K ROM enhancements and yet continue to run old programs
>and my currently set-up hard drive until I decide to change over to the
>HFS at a later time.

I booted a Mac disk in a Mac Plus at the dealer the other day, if that
answers your question.  4.1 finder and all.

You can't take advantage of the 800k drive with the standard 4.1 though.
4.1 barfs when you get too many files on a volume. I suppose you could have
lots of LARGE files.

But, why not run the new finder? If you leave your hard disk configured
as several MFS volumes, finder 5.x will still treat them as such while
allowing you to use HFS on the 800k floppy.
-- 
 Jim Budler
 Advanced Micro Devices, Inc.
 (408) 749-5806
 Usenet: {ucbvax,decwrl,ihnp4,allegra,intelca}!amdcad!jimb
 Compuserve:	72415,1200

hedges@calma.UUCP (Tom Hedges) (02/12/86)

In article <636@well.UUCP> espen@well.UUCP (Peter Espen) writes:
>	If one upgrades to the new 128K ROM's and the double sided
>internal drive, can they still run the version 4.1 Finder and elect NOT
>to run the New HFS file system. For example, I might want to take advantage
>of many of the new 128K ROM enhancements and yet continue to run old programs
>and my currently set-up hard drive until I decide to change over to the
>HFS at a later time.

This can be done in general, but there are several pitfalls that prevent
quite a few programs from working:

1) The Standard File Package looks different and does not allow all the
same program customizations to work as did before. Also the old kludge that
way used by several programs (particularly Consulair's: Mac C and MDS Stuff)
to allow operation with the early ROMs in Jan 1984 no longer will worh with
the new Standard File, symptom of this is no files in the dialog box even
though they are really there. If you don't install the update on the disk
some of these problems may not occur (I haven't tested that case extensively)

2) System startup is different, system INIT resources are executed using a
different stack location and a PurgeMem is done on the system heap after
executing all INIT resources. This means some RAM disk and Disk Cache
programs will not work.

	Tom Hedges
_________________________________________

CIS:		74676,1030
US Mail:	377 Bowen Ave
		Aptos, CA  95003

(P.S. Bryan, It is me, but I cannot reply to your mail....)

lsr@apple.UUCP (Larry Rosenstein) (02/15/86)

In article <9417@amdcad.UUCP> jimb@amdcad.UUCP (Jim Budler) writes:
>I booted a Mac disk in a Mac Plus at the dealer the other day, if that
>answers your question.  4.1 finder and all.
>
>But, why not run the new finder? If you leave your hard disk configured
>as several MFS volumes, finder 5.x will still treat them as such while
>allowing you to use HFS on the 800k floppy.

You have to be careful with this because there are patches to the ROM that
are in the new System file but not in old System files.  If you boot from a
disk without the patches then you may run into serious problems.

The orginal question asked whether you could update to the 800K drives and
128K ROM and not use Finder 5.1 or HFS.  

The version of the Finder does not matter.  Finder 5.1 will run on machines
with either ROM, so you might as well use the later version (it is as
reliable as 4.1 and more reliable than 5.0).  The other system software
(Imagewriter driver, DA,s etc.) are much improved over previous versions
and so it is worthwhile to upgrade to them.

This leaves HFS.  I think that the HFS has gotten an undeserved bad
reputation.  It is very reliable (doesn't crash), and MOST applications work
unchanged or with minor changes in the way you use them.  Jim is right in
that any incompatibilities caused by HFS occur only if you are using an HFS
volume.  If you run an application off of an old (MFS) volume then you
should have no problems.

I will have more to say about HFS in a future message.

-- 
Larry Rosenstein
Apple Computer

UUCP:  {voder, nsc, ios, mtxinu, dual}!apple!lsr
CSNET: lsr@Apple.CSNET