• A Macintosh® or Power Macintosh® with a 25 MHz 68040 or faster processor
• 13" or larger color monitor (256-colors with 640 x 480 resolution)
• System 7.0 or later
• 8 MB of RAM, 5MB of free RAM
• Double speed CD-ROM drive
The Installer:
The Installer on the CD will add any necessary support software to your System Folder. You need to insert the CD to run The Universe, as the application, text, sound, and images remain on the CD.
The Universe is a very memory-intensive program. It should run on any Macintosh with at least 8 MB of RAM. With any amount of RAM, however, if 5,120K of memory is not free when you launch The Universe, the CD-ROM may not run properly. Most users with 8 MB of RAM will not experience problems, but if your System takes up more than 2 MB, you may need to adjust memory usage using one of the following techniques. (Note: on Power Macintosh models, it is necessary to have 16MB to run System 7.5)
Quitting other applications:
Run only one application at a time. If other applications are running, close them and re-launch The Universe.
Checking the amount of memory being used by your System software:
To do this, return to the Finder and select About This Macintosh... from the Apple menu at the top left corner of your screen. The Largest Unused Block needs to be greater than 5,120K to run The Universe. If the only item listed in the About This Macintosh dialog is System Software, and the Largest Unused Block is less than 5,120K, you need to reduce the amount of memory consumed by your System software. Refer to your Macintosh documentation for detailed instructions on how to reduce System RAM usage, but some general suggestions follow:
Reducing the amount of memory required by your System software:
a. Open the Memory control panel and check the Disk Cache setting. To free up the most memory for The Universe, set the cache to 32K.
b. Large numbers of fonts and sounds consume excessive amounts of System memory. Removing fonts and sounds that you are not using will free up more memory.
c. The amount of memory consumed by your System is increased by the multitude of standard extensions and control panels in System 7.5, as well as by any third party System extensions such as screen savers, fax software, desktop pictures, menu-modifying utilities and other System enhancements Temporarily disabling or removing some or all of these extensions will increase the amount of memory available to applications.
With System 7.5 or newer, use the Extensions Manager to turn off any extensions and control panels that are not needed. To do so, open the Extensions Manager control panel and choose Save Set... from the pop-up menu at the top of the list. Save the current set as "Normal."
Then turn off everything except the following:
Apple CD-ROM (or any third-party driver), Sound Manager, QuickTime and Sound.
Choose Save Set... again and name this set "The Universe". Then restart your computer and once again select About This Macintosh... from the Apple menu to ensure that the Largest Unused Block is greater than 5,120K. If this technique is successful, then every time you want to run The Universe you should select the "The Universe" set and restart your computer. To reactivate your standard setup later, simply choose "Normal" and restart your computer again. If this technique does not give you 5,120K free, see the paragraph on "Creating the smallest-possible System" below.
With Systems earlier than 7.5, you can disable non-essential extensions and control panels using a third-party startup manager or you can obtain a compatible version of Extensions Manager either from Apple or from many online services. Be sure the correct support software (listed above) is enabled.
With any System, you can also remove extensions and control panels manually. Be sure to save anything you remove from your System Folder and keep track of where it was located so that you can replace it later. The best way to do this is by dragging files from the Extensions and Control Panels folders to new folders you create on your hard drive labeled, for example, "Control Panels (disabled)" and "Extensions (disabled)."
Creating the smallest-possible System to maximize free memory:
Even if you turn off all non-essential Control Panels and Extensions using the Extensions Manager, you may not have enough free memory to run The Universe. To create the smallest-possible System, you MUST manually drag out all non-essential software (as described above). Try removing all but the following files (plus any other essential Apple or third-party drivers for your specific machine):
Control Panels:
Memory
Monitors
Mouse
Sound
Extensions:
Apple CD-ROM
Foreign File Access
High Sierra File Access
ISO 9660 File Access
Sound Manager
QuickTime
Preferred memory size for The Universe application:
The Universe application is pre-set to a preferred memory size of 10,240K. Your system will need at least 5,120K. Your system will use more than 5,120K up to 10,240K, depending on how much is available.
Problems caused by low memory:
Be warned that not having enough memory avilable before running the application may cause the game to perform poorly or crash. If it runs out of memory, The Universe may not play sounds or display all images. If you have less than 5,120K available free memory, these problems are likely to result.
If The Universe seems to run slowly or sounds are interrupted, check the following:
Problems with low memory:
Are you running on a Macintosh with low memory? Check the previous section, MEMORY USE.
Turning off Virtual Memory:
Are you using Virtual Memory? You may find that movies and other sounds are choppy or interrupted. For best performance, turn off Virtual Memory by opening the Memory control panel, disabling the Virtual Memory option, and then restarting your computer.
Turning off File Sharing and AppleTalk:
Is File Sharing enabled? Although File Sharing itself should not cause a problem, any network activity may cause The Universe (as well as other applications) to run more slowly. For best performance, turn off File Sharing in the Sharing Setup control panel, and deactivate AppleTalk in the Chooser.
Checking CD-ROM drive speed:
The Universe is designed to function properly on double-speed CD-ROM drives with 300K/sec or faster transfer rates. Quad-speed CD-ROM drives with even faster transfer rates may provide much better performance in most sections of the product. If your CD-ROM drive has a sustained transfer rate of less than 300K/sec, it may be not be able to supply audio and video information to the Macintosh at the speed required for smooth playback. Contact your CD-ROM vendor for details on your CD-ROM drive's transfer rate and information on improving the performance of your CD-ROM drive.
The Universe is not designed to run on monitors displaying less than 640 x 480 pixels (e.g., Color Classics or 12" monitors). Larger monitors should work properly, but the window may appear too small if resolutions higher than 640 x 480 are used.
Color mode requirements:
The Universe is not designed to run in color modes less than 256 colors. Set your monitor to at least 256 colors before running The Universe.
Problems with screen savers:
It is suggested that you disable all screen savers while playing The Universe. They use up valuable RAM needed for the game to function properly. Furthermore, some of them can cause color or screen image errors if they activate while The Universe is running.
Sounds may be inaudible if the sound level is turned down. To set a default sound level for your computer, open the Sound control panel and experiment with the speaker volume setting until you find a comfortable sound level. Then use the volume control in The Universe to further adjust sound level.
With external speakers, if you set the sound level to maximum you may hear some sound distortion. Ensure external speakers are connected properly and turned on; you will generally be able to adjust sound level with the external speaker volume knob as well as with the Sound control panel.
Turning off Virtual Memory:
If your Macintosh is running with Virtual Memory turned on, you may find that sounds will break up. For best performance, turn off Virtual Memory by opening the Memory control panel, disabling the Virtual Memory option, and then restarting your computer.
Turning off RAM Doubler:
If you are running RAM Doubler, you may find that sounds will break up or not play at all. Disable RAM Doubler by turning it off in Extensions Manager or by removing it from the Extensions Folder in your System Folder, then restart your computer. It is particularly important to disable RAM Doubler when playing the game if sounds do not play at all. If you are running The Universe on a Power Macintosh. check to see if you are running RAM Doubler version 1.5.1. Contact the manufacturer of RAM Doubler for information on updated versions that may solve this problem.
Additional Science Writing and Consulting --- Dr. Donald Goldsmith, Linda Wasmer Smith, Dr. Steven Kawaler, Dr. Martin White, Dr. Charles Jui, and Dr. Joerg Colberg
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Byron Preiss Multimedia Co., Inc.
President --- Byron Preiss
Chief Financial Officer --- James R. Dellomo
Vice President, Imprint Director --- Tim Nolan
Vice President, Technical Director --- John Mayo-Smith
Vice President, Director of Marketing --- Jackie Snyder
Creative Director --- Seth Savarick
Contracts & Licensing Director --- David Lane
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Simon and Schuster Interactive, Inc.
President --- Peter Yunich
Creative Director --- Jeff Siegel
Founded in 1992, Byron Preiss Multimedia Company develops and publishes a wide range of interactive multimedia software under several imprints. Scientific American Library: The Universe appears under the Digital Bauhaus imprint.
Other Byron Preiss Multimedia discs appearing under the Digital Bauhaus imprint are The Ultimate Robot, The Ultimate Frank Lloyd Wright, The Ultimate Einstein, American Heritage: Civil War, Scientific American Library: Planets, Escher Interactive, and The Way Baseball Works.
Please address any questions regarding this product to:
Byron Preiss Multimedia Company, Inc.
175 Fifth Avenue, Suite 2122
New York, New York 10010
Email: welcome@bpmc.com
WWW: www.byronpreiss.com
Copyright 1996 Byron Preiss Multimedia. All rights reserved. Digital Bauhaus is a trademark of Byron Preiss Multimedia. Made with Macromedia Director. Macromedia and Director are registered trademarks of Macromedia Corporation. Macintosh, Power Macintosh, and QuickTime are registered trademarks of Apple Computer, Inc.
