talcott@nunki.usc.edu (Adam Talcott) (03/26/90)
In a recent ad in the Wall Street Journal (March 19, 1990) a few sentences in Apple's ad for the IIfx caught my eye and generated a few questions. The ad says, "It is...the first personal computer to have two additional processors--with the power of two additional personal computers--to manage the flow of information inside. So that that screaming 68030 chip isn't slowed down by the more mundane tasks of computer housekeeping." Question: Exactly what type of processors are these and what are they doing? The ad also says, "...the new Apple 24-bit color card...gives you the ability to work with as many as 16.8 million colors..." Question: How many can it display at one time? Posted and/or e-mailed responses are OK. Adam Talcott talcott@nunki.usc.edu
rotberg@dms.UUCP (Ed Rotberg) (03/27/90)
From article <8799@chaph.usc.edu>, by talcott@nunki.usc.edu (Adam Talcott): > The ad also says, "...the new Apple 24-bit color card...gives you the ability > to work with as many as 16.8 million colors..." > > Question: How many can it display at one time? Geez, I always love those claims of 16.7 million colors at once! This is definitely the bread and butter stuff of marketing and ad types (read as suits). In fact, on the standard Mac RGB monitor, no video board will be capable of displaying more than 307,200 colors at once! That is because there are only 307,200 pixels on the screen (640x480). In order to be able to display 16.7 million colors at once, you would need a monitor with a resolution of 4096x4096 pixels. What is really going on is that with direct color (24-bit color) each pixel specifies its RGB (or HSV) value without reference to a color-lookup table (CLUT or palette). This allows a screen image to display any ONE of 16.7 million colors at each pixel. So the answer to your question of how many it can display at once is really 307,200. If you go with a SuperMac 24 bit board that has more resolution (i.e. 1024x768) or something you can display up to number of pixels supported by that hardware, each in a different color. That's not to say, however, that you would be able to visually distinguish between each individual color... - Ed Rotberg -
lindahl@violet.berkeley.edu (Ken Lindahl 642-0866) (03/27/90)
In article <8799@chaph.usc.edu> talcott@nunki.usc.edu (Adam Talcott) writes: >In a recent ad in the Wall Street Journal (March 19, 1990) a few sentences in >Apple's ad for the IIfx caught my eye and generated a few questions. ... > >Question: Exactly what type of processors are these and what are they doing? > There are two dedicated I/O processors that handle low-level I/O tasks for the floppy disk drive(s), Apple Desktop Bus, and serial ports. Don't know what type of processors they are: they appear to be Apple-designed. >The ad also says, "...the new Apple 24-bit color card...gives you the ability >to work with as many as 16.8 million colors..." > >Question: How many can it display at one time? Depends on the size of your display: a unique color (from a palette of 16.8 million) can be assigned to each pixel. If your display were 1000x1000 pixels, you could display 1000000 colors. I doubt that the picture would be very interesting, though :-) >Adam Talcott >talcott@nunki.usc.edu Ken Lindahl lindahl@violet.berkeley.edu Advanced Technology Planning Information Systems and Technology University of California at Berkeley
mithomas@bsu-cs.bsu.edu (Michael Thomas Niehaus) (03/27/90)
>The ad also says, "...the new Apple 24-bit color card...gives you the ability >to work with as many as 16.8 million colors..." > >Question: How many can it display at one time? The card can only display as many colors as there are pixels on the screen. As an exercise, here's some basic calculations: With 24 bit color, there are 2^24 (16.7 million) colors that can be displayed. For a monitor to display all of these colors, it would need to have resolution of 2^12 by 2^12 (assuming for simplicity that the monitor is square), which is 4096 by 4096 pixels. Now with the "standard" 72 dots per inch, this monitor would have to be 56.9 inches by 56.9 inches, or almost five feet square. Although it would be nice to have a monitor the size of a drafting table, I don't think we will see one soon. --- SHAMELESS SALES PITCH FOLLOWS --- On an unrelated note, I am selling my Mac SE. It is in perfect condition. It has a 20MB internal hard drive, one internal 800K floppy drive, 1MB of memory, and a standard keyboard (and a mouse, of course). I will also throw in a copy of Microsoft Works 2.0 and pay shipping and insurance fees (up to a maximum of $50). I would like $1700 for it. Send me mail at any of the following addresses if you are interested, or call (317) 285-3614 at any time. ARPA: mithomas@bsu-cs.bsu.edu Bitnet: 00mtniehaus@bsuvax1.bitnet AppleLink: st0374 CompuServe: 73760,171 (although I don't check this often) -Michael -- Michael Niehaus UUCP: <backbones>!{iuvax,pur-ee}!bsu-cs!mithomas Apple Student Rep ARPA: mithomas@bsu-cs.bsu.edu Ball State University AppleLink: ST0374 (from UUCP: st0374@applelink.apple.com)
sidlives@mck-csc.UUCP (David Rho) (03/27/90)
In article <8799@chaph.usc.edu> talcott@nunki.usc.edu (Adam Talcott) writes: >In a recent ad in the Wall Street Journal (March 19, 1990) a few sentences in >Apple's ad for the IIfx caught my eye and generated a few questions. > >The ad says, "It is...the first personal computer to have two additional >processors--with the power of two additional personal computers--to manage the >flow of information inside. So that that screaming 68030 chip isn't slowed >down by the more mundane tasks of computer housekeeping." > >Question: Exactly what type of processors are these and what are they doing? [Stuff Deleted] > >Adam Talcott >talcott@nunki.usc.edu I think that the two processors that they use to help with I/O stuff are 6502s!!! I guess Apple must have been stuck with a lot of those or (more likely) they can get them for real cheap. Disclaimer: This info is presented AS IS. No warrenty is expressed or implied. David Rho sidlives%mck-csc@eddie.mit.edu sidlives@athena.mit.edu
stevem@hpvcfs1.HP.COM (Steve Miller) (03/28/90)
Question relating to the two I/O processors in the Mac IIfx:
>Question: Exactly what type of processors are these and what are they doing?
I believe these are 6502's used as a core in a chip that has RAM/ROM/etc..
making them single chip I/O processors. I believe the 6502's run at a
fairly high clock rate (10 Mhz comes to mind) which would make them
fairly powerful I/O processors indeed.
Steven Millerstevec@Apple.COM (Steve Christensen) (04/12/90)
In article <8799@chaph.usc.edu> talcott@nunki.usc.edu (Adam Talcott) writes: >In a recent ad in the Wall Street Journal (March 19, 1990)... >...says, "It is...the first personal computer to have two additional >processors... >Question: Exactly what type of processors are these and what are they doing? They are custom chips that contain a 6502 (the same CPU as in the Apple II). One processor runs the floppy disks and ADB (mouse/keyboard), and the other one runs the serial ports. Since floppy disk activity is such a CPU hog, using the I/O processor means that the '030 can be doing its thing while the IOP is playing with the floppy disk. And since the floppy and ADB code know about each other, the mouse moves really smoothly even when you're formatting a floppy. >The ad also says, "...the new Apple 24-bit color card...gives you the ability >to work with as many as 16.8 million colors..." > >Question: How many can it display at one time? It depends on how big your monitor is. For example, a 640x480 monitor can display 307,200 pixels, so that's how many unique colors you can display at a time (on that monitor). steve
tempest@walleye.uucp (Ken) (04/12/90)
In article <7642@goofy.Apple.COM> stevec@Apple.COM (Steve Christensen) writes: [...] >one runs the serial ports. Since floppy disk activity is such a CPU hog, >using the I/O processor means that the '030 can be doing its thing while the >IOP is playing with the floppy disk. And since the floppy and ADB code know [...] I suppose the next natural question is: If the I/O processors relieve the main CPU to do its thing, is it possible for the IIfx to format/copy a disk/disks in the background? Ken _____________________________________________________________________________ Kenneth K.F. Lui | Other paths you can use: tempest@csuchico.edu | tempest@csuchico.edu, tempest@csuchico ________________________________|____________________________________________
gchow@undergrad.cs.ubc.ca (george kai yee chow) (04/13/90)
In article <1990Apr12.025646.27266@csuchico.edu> tempest@walleye.UUCP (Ken) writes: >In article <7642@goofy.Apple.COM> stevec@Apple.COM (Steve Christensen) writes: >[...] >>one runs the serial ports. Since floppy disk activity is such a CPU hog, >>using the I/O processor means that the '030 can be doing its thing while the >>IOP is playing with the floppy disk. And since the floppy and ADB code know >[...] >I suppose the next natural question is: If the I/O processors >relieve the main CPU to do its thing, is it possible for the IIfx >to format/copy a disk/disks in the background? Seeing that nothing of the sort was mentioned in the system 6.0.5 documents, I"d suspect it isn't possible with the current system software. Maybe 7?