NetNews Usenet Archive 1992 #20/NN_1992_20.iso/spool/comp/sys/apple2/20456

Internet Message Format | 1992-09-15 | 34.3 KB

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From: [e-mail] (Brian Tao)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.apple2
Subject: 14-MHz TWGS/ZipGS upgrade info
Message-ID: <[e-mail]>
Date: 15 Sep 92 00:52:40 GMT
Sender: [e-mail]
Organization: The Internet
Lines: 895

[The following is a fairly long compilation of a message thread on the
GNO mailing list regarding upgrading TransWarp GS and ZipGS accelerators
with the Sanyo 14-MHz 65816 chip.  I'm not sure how it was started, but
it is being reposted here for the benefit of comp.sys.apple2 readers who
aren't subscribed to gno-l.  All but the first occurence of a person's
signature was deleted to save space.  Articles are separated by '===' and
followed by the date of the posting and the address of the postter.]

- Brian


===
Date: Sat, 29 Aug 92 13:01:46 -0400
From: [e-mail] (Chris Deschu)

Well, all the components came in, and here's the results...

It's running nicely at 13.75mhz, and I had it running briefly at 15mhz by
cranking the power supply up to 5.73vdc. I couldn't keep it there because
(1) the cache ram test fails (2) the rest of the computer doesn't like the
high voltage levels. So I'm back at 13.75, but I'd bet it would still work
at 14 or 14.5mhz, anyone got a 58mhz crystal? :) This is what dhrystone sez:

Dhrystone(1.1) time for 50000 passes = 43
This machine benchmarks at 1162 dhrystones/second

I think I can live with that for now. I wonder if just faster ram would
fix it, that's relatively cheap, right? Til next time,

Chris Deschu ([e-mail])

===
From: Jawaid Bazyar <[e-mail]>
Date: Sat, 29 Aug 92 11:14:20 MDT

> Well, all the components came in, and here's the results...
>
> Dhrystone(1.1) time for 50000 passes = 43
> This machine benchmarks at 1162 dhrystones/second

  You bum. And here I just got my Zip cranking 590 dhrystones.  My graphics
are just as fast as yours, though. :)

--
 Jawaid Bazyar              |   Ask me about the GNO Multitasking Environment
 Procyon, Inc.              |   for the Apple IIgs!
 [e-mail]         |   P.O Box 620334
 --Apple II Forever!--      |   Littleton, CO 80162-0334   [phone]

===
Date: Sat, 29 Aug 92 13:57:55 -0400
From: [e-mail] (Chris Deschu)

Nobody ever really explained why the ZipGS is faster at graphics, to me at
least... Jawaid, what speed are you getting 590 at, I was getting 750 or so
at 8.5 mhz, and I've got a few extra crystals lying around.
        A note to the adventuresome: don't leave your voltage at 5.7 volts,
it makes the computer lock up randomly (even in proterm). I've been running
at 5.5 for months now fine, I think I'll leave it at 5.6 for awhile and see
what happens... bye...

===
Date: Sat, 29 Aug 1992 14:11:42 -0500
From: Derek Taubert <[e-mail]>

This should be in a FAQ somewhere, but I've been detached for a while...

> It's running nicely at 13.75mhz, and I had it running briefly at 15mhz by
> cranking the power supply up to 5.73vdc. I couldn't keep it there because
> ...

Where did you order the 65816 from and how much did you pay for it?

===
Date: Sat, 29 Aug 92 16:57:59 -0400
From: [e-mail] (Chris Deschu)

Well, I'm not sure if that last mail went thru or not, something was acting
very wierd, so here we go again.

To all that may be interested:

High speed 65c816 processors are available from:

The Western Design Center Inc.
2166 East Brown Road
Mesa, AZ. 85213
[phone]    (I personally think they should have gotten -6502 :)

Talk to Deborah Lamoree when you call...
(She told me quite a few people, including me, have tried to bribe her to
select a really nice and fast one by hand, and she won't do it, so don't
bother
with it unless you are going to offer a lot more than the rest of us, or you
know something we don't :)

Crystals are available from: (crystal info courtesy of Mike Horwath)

DigiKey, number is: 800-344-4539

Part numbers are:

Mhz     Part #  Price
------  ------- -----
32      SE1101  3.60
33.33   SE1102  3.60
36      SE1103  3.60
40      SE1104  3.60
42      SE1105  3.60
46      SE1106  3.60
48      SE1107  3.60
50      SE1108  3.60
55      SE1109  3.60
60      SE1110  3.75

Order one that is four (4) times the speed you want your twgs to go.
like a 55mhz crystal will give you 13.75mhz (probably the fastest you will
want to order) You should also get the 32k cache upgrade if you haven't yet.
Good Luck!

===
From: Tim Meekins <[e-mail]>
Date: Sat, 29 Aug 92 22:26:58 EDT

Chris didn't mention prices in his nice post, but when I upgraded to
13.75MHz I paid $103 for the entire upgrade. As far as I know Chris
and I are the only people to have this work with no problem, and the
only thing we have that noone else does is an AE power supply. But I really
don't know if thisis the reason or not.

Don't worry about getting the "best" CPU from WDC, I got mine from a batch
that was bought, and mine was the last chip after everyone picked through the
good ones, so the ones with the bad statistics still work great.

TIM MEEKINS                    Ask me about GNO/ME! - MultiTasking on a IIGS!
[e-mail]     Procyon, Inc. 1005 N Kingshighway, Suite 309
[e-mail]          Cape Girardeau, MO 63701   [phone]

      "Computers aren't intelligent, they just think they are."

===
From: [e-mail] (Todd P. Whitesel)
Date: Sat, 29 Aug 92 21:32:53 PDT

Ok, now that I am on gno-l again, I can look forward to gobs of mail about
whatever's going on... Might as well respond to everything in one letter.

1. Running your 65816 higher than 5.5v is asking for trouble -- the buffer
        chips in the TWGS and the IIgs are TTL and the design tolerances on
        those don't guarantee they will survive anything above 5.5 volts.
        There's going to be some drop, so feeding the 65816 5.6 would probably
        work since the rest of the machine will still see 5.5, but I wouldn't
        go above 5.6 under any circumstances.

2. Why the Zip's graphics performance grinds the TWGS into the dirt -- this is
        because of the "latch-on-write" bus interface of the Zip. Put simply,
        the Zip hardware is capable of coprocessing a single byte write to
        the IIgs without slowing down the CPU, provided that the next few
        cycles run from cache. Of course, a two-byte write will pause the CPU
        until the first byte is written, but the second byte gets written in
        the background -- this lets standard graphics code run much faster and
        makes MVP/MVN nearly as fast as PEA/PEI (disgusting, eh?).

> High speed 65c816 processors are available from:
> The Western Design Center Inc.
> (She told me quite a few people, including me, have tried to bribe her to

This bit about bribing doesn't make sense -- the report I heard was that WDC
simply bought a huge shipment of 14mhz Sanyo chips and has been distributing
those...

> Crystals are available from: (crystal info courtesy of Mike Horwath)
> DigiKey, number is: 800-344-4539

DigiKey has a $25 minimum order.

Todd Whitesel
toddpw @ cco.caltech.edu

===
From: [e-mail] (Michael Frankowski)
Date: Sun, 30 Aug 92 0:05:17 CDT

> > Crystals are available from: (crystal info courtesy of Mike Horwath)
> > DigiKey, number is: 800-344-4539
>
> DigiKey has a $25 minimum order.

That is a falsehood.  DigiKey doesn't care what your order price is.  When I
had to order some things I couldn't get localy, I ordered through there, and
my bill was only $11.50, so, I think you are wrong there.

> Todd Whitesel
> toddpw @ cco.caltech.edu

Mike

===
Date: Sun, 30 Aug 92 14:34:28 CDT
From: Michael Crane <[e-mail]>

> Nobody ever really explained why the ZipGS is faster at graphics, to me at
> least... Jawaid, what speed are you getting 590 at, I was getting 750 or so
> at 8.5 mhz, and I've got a few extra crystals lying around.

I have to wonder also.  I'm running my 7MHz TWGS with a 32MHz crystal
for an effective speed of 8MHz, and *I* get a Dhrystone rating of 704.
That must be an awfully slow ZipGS you've got there, eh?  <smile>

--
Mike Crane           Bang: uunet.uu.net!edsi.plexus.COM![e-mail]
Internet: [e-mail] | [e-mail] | [e-mail]
GEnie: M.CRANE   AOL: MIKE566      "Who needs drugs...we've got UNIX!" - Me
      (Internet addresses are listed in order of preference of use.)

===
From: [e-mail] (Michael Frankowski)
Date: Sun, 30 Aug 92 20:43:33 CDT

> > > DigiKey has a $25 minimum order.
> >
>
> > That is a falsehood.  DigiKey doesn't care what your order price is.  When
> > I had to order some things I couldn't get localy, I ordered through there,
> > and my bill was only $11.50, so, I think you are wrong there.
>
> No, it is a truehood.  :-)  Catalog #924, July-August 1992, page 128:
>
> o Handling Charge
>       A $5.00 handling charge applies to all orders less than $25.00.

That is a handling charge, that is NOT what Todd had said.

(can't quote literally, but)

"DigiKey won't ship orders less than $25"

(or something to that effect)

===
Date: Sun, 30 Aug 92 22:37:42 -0400
From: [e-mail] (Chris Deschu)

Well Tim,
        Looks like you are king of the mountain again, I'v been getting some
wierd problems in proterm, like strange characters popping up in scrollback,
sometimes it says 'restart $01' I try to run it... dropping back to 12.5 or
whatever seemed to make those go away, but it's still acting strange in
general. I'm gonna order faster ram and that chipset from AE (ick!) and see
what happens... Does anyone know a good place to order really fast TWGS
RAM for the 32k cache? My chips currently are these:

MOSEL
MSG2256A-35NC
9124 U 5S

So so far, I have 35ns ram... Do they make it any faster in that
configuration?
Please let me know, I want to order it asap, of course... I checked with JDR
Microdevices and DigiKey's catalogs and don't seem to find them. I have
another
catalog from Mouser Electronics, I think they might have it. At least, they
have a whole page full of SRAMs... There are three of these things on the
32k cache board. How do you get 32k from 3 256k chips? Does anyone know what
the config of those chips are as in ( 32k x 8 ) or something else?

Thanks everyone, I'll keep you posted...

===
From: Tim Meekins <[e-mail]>
Date: Sun, 30 Aug 92 23:41:43 EDT

interesting...I was talking to Steve Chiang last weekend, and he said ProTerm
is a big culprit of not working at 14 MHz....I guess you've backed up his
statement. In all honesty, I've never tried ProTerm yet, so maybe mine won't
work either.

Also, I really don't know anything about RAM chips..ask around....

===
Date: Mon, 31 Aug 1992 01:25:40 -0400 (EDT)
From: Gregory Ross Thompson <[e-mail]>

[e-mail] (Chris Deschu) writes:
> ... Does anyone know a good place to order really fast TWGS
> RAM for the 32k cache? My chips currently are these:
>
> MOSEL
> MSG2256A-35NC
> 9124 U 5S

  I think that should be MS6, not MSG.  Anyway, Mosel makes a 25ns
chip, but not in the low power configuration like the one you've got.
The part number is:
MS62256-25
  Or you could go for a Sony chip:
CXK58258B-25LL
  Here's an interesting thing.  The LL means Low-Low power.  They also
have a chip with only one L, for Low power.  There's no regular power
chip (no L).  Why didn't they make one with no L, and one with one L?
"Well, ours go to eleven"...

  Or there's the Paradigm chip: PDM41256L-25
  Or the VLSI Tech chips: VT62832{H,HL,UHL}-25
                          VT62832UHL-20

  If you wanted to go totally whacko, you could get Sony's
CXK58258A-15  Now that's a fast SRAM...

                -Greg T.
                 InterNet: [e-mail]
                       or: [e-mail]
                 BITNet  : R746GT0T@CMCCVB
                 AOL     : GRThompson

===
Date: Mon, 31 Aug 92 01:45:54 -0400
From: [e-mail] (Chris Deschu)

Greg T.,
        That's quite a collection of chips you have there. Are all of the ones
you mentioned of the correct number of pins/width, etc. to fit on a TWGS?
I looked in 3 of my electronic catalogs and couldn't find any of the ones you
mentioned. Where would you suggest ordering them from? Maybe Microprocessors
Unlimited? Thanks,

===
From: [e-mail] (Todd P. Whitesel)
Date: Sun, 30 Aug 92 23:06:26 PDT

> That is a handling charge, that is NOT what Todd had said.
> (can't quote literally, but)
> "DigiKey won't ship orders less than $25"

Nope. I said they have a $25 minimum order. Taken literally, that implies the
quote above, but with mail order places "minimum order" becomes a term meaning
'smallest order with no restrictions' -- some mail order places won't ship
under their minimum order, like JameCo, but DigiKey apparently just docks you
extra.

Face it, we were both partially wrong, and the main disagreement was over
terminology. We've got better things to do, so let's drop it.

===
From: [e-mail] (Todd P. Whitesel)
Date: Sun, 30 Aug 92 23:08:50 PDT

>       Looks like you are king of the mountain again, I'v been getting some
> wierd problems in proterm, like strange characters popping up in scrollback,

ProTerm has known problems when you are running very fast. I have a 10.5 mhz
Zip and if I run ProTerm with it cranked all the way up I get lockups when I
do a 14400 connect. The solution in my case is to crank the Zip down to 50%
of max speed to run ProTerm.

===
Date: Mon, 31 Aug 92 04:55:12 -0400
From: [e-mail] (Chris Deschu)

Todd,
        That's rather interesting. I was using the TWGS@8.5mhz with ProTERM
for quite awhile, and it worked fine. Even at 14mhz, it wasn't locking up,
it just got wierd garbled characters in the scrollback. I mean I could be
sitting there reading, and all of a sudden a '@' or other character would
suddenly appear in the middle of the screen, and become part of scrollback.
The other wierd thing it did was the clock would start appearing a few lines
down from where it usually is in the top right corner, and again, screw up
the scrollback... It's like the memory map for the text page is moved over
a few bytes somehow. Also, the mouse pointer would sometimes (only on some
parts of the screen) go off the edge of the screen, and reappear on the
other side... Very wierd. later,

===
From: [e-mail] (Todd P. Whitesel)
Date: Mon, 31 Aug 92 3:32:34 PDT

>       That's rather interesting. I was using the TWGS@8.5mhz with ProTERM
> for quite awhile, and it worked fine. Even at 14mhz, it wasn't locking up,
> it just got wierd garbled characters in the scrollback. I mean I could be

Remember, I'm using a Zip at 10.5mhz, so I'm bound to get different failures.
We know from comparing notes with people that ProTerm has problems running at
really high speeds (probably has to do with software timing loops and mucking
about directly with the SCC), so you have every reason to expect strange
things to happen. Just slow down the accelerator while you're in ProTerm and
you won't have any problems. That's what _I_ do and it works fine. 5 mhz is
plenty fast for ProTerm and it seems quite happy at that speed.

===
Date: Mon, 31 Aug 1992 11:46:08 -0400 (EDT)
From: Gregory Ross Thompson <[e-mail]>

[e-mail] (Chris Deschu) writes:
> Greg T.,
>         That's quite a collection of chips you have there.

  Why, thank you...  I try.

> Are all of the ones
> you mentioned of the correct number of pins/width, etc. to fit on a TWGS?
> I looked in 3 of my electronic catalogs and couldn't find any of the ones
you
> mentioned. Where would you suggest ordering them from? Maybe Microprocessors
> Unlimited? Thanks,

  They're all available in 28 pin DIPS, with tri-state outputs.  Some
may only be available in .3in (300 mil) or .6in (600 mil) packages.  I
don't know which size the TWGS takes.  I know that my Zip takes 600
milers, but someone told me that the newer Zips take the 300's.  For
those of you who don't know how big/small a 600/300mil chip is, the
300's are the size of the usual simple TTL gate chips (quad AND gates,
etc), and the 600's are twice as wide.

  I got all of those part numbers out of IC Master (the ECE Tome).
Just look up 32768x8 general purpose SRAMs.

  I'd order 'em straight from the manufacturer's distributors, just
'cause that's the only place I know of...

===
From: [e-mail] (Michael Frankowski)
Date: Mon, 31 Aug 92 11:21:18 CDT

> Remember, I'm using a Zip at 10.5mhz, so I'm bound to get different
failures.
> We know from comparing notes with people that ProTerm has problems running
at
> really high speeds (probably has to do with software timing loops and
mucking
> about directly with the SCC), so you have every reason to expect strange
> things to happen. Just slow down the accelerator while you're in ProTerm and
> you won't have any problems. That's what _I_ do and it works fine. 5 mhz is
> plenty fast for ProTerm and it seems quite happy at that speed.

With a TWGS, we can't change our speed like that.  We either run at full clock
speed or we run at 2.8mhz.   (or we can change the crystal, which is what I
do most of the time).

===
From: [e-mail] (tuu)
Date: Mon, 31 Aug 1992 09:51:51 PDT

        Does ProTERM work with a 14 MHz Zip if I slow the Zip down before
I run it?  I could live with that.. Proterm's definitely fast enough at
2.8... it's only desktop stuff (and compiling) that I want a Zip for..
so I'd live with the annoyance of having to slow down the Zip every time I
ran ProTERM..

If ProTERM won't even run with a slowed down 14 MHz zip, then I'd consider not
getting a Zip at all (or a slower one maybe)

I sure wish Greg Schaeffer started logging on again so maybe we could get
an answer/small patch out of him why it doesn't work.

--
/[e-mail]   used ADB trackball WANTED          Apple II
Forever!\
\Mail me:Get INFOCOM GAMES RERELEASED for //s, ULT VI GS done,for UNIX GS
info/
What the world needs now is another folk singer like I need a hole in my head.

===
From: [e-mail] (Al Belyea)
Date:   Mon, 31 Aug 1992 14:29:26 -0400

> DigiKey, number is: 800-344-4539
>
>

Anybody have a non-800 number for DigiKey? Just in case the 800 number
doesn't work from Canada (and they usually don't).

BTW, are the crystals that you listed the mini size crystals that fit
right into the TWGS or are they the full size ones that need to be
modified?

I currently have the 32K cache, with 35 ns SRAM. The Schmoo plot that
I got  from WDC seems to indicate that my new 65c816 will run reliably
(loaded) at about 11.5 MHZ - is the 35 ns SRAM fast enough to work at
11.5 MHZ?

Also, I tried calling AE about getting the High-Performance GAL chips
that are mentioned in the TWGS upgrade article. They said that they've
handed the marketing of those chips over to LRO Computers. I called
them and they said that they don't have them yet - call back in a
couple of weeks.


Allan Belyea           UUNet:  [e-mail]        3755 Riverside Dr.
Cognos Incorporated    BITNET: [e-mail]         P.O. Box 9707
[phone] x3822           ^ preferred            Ottawa, Ontario
"This is a sword. You hold _THIS_ end." Sun Wolf      CANADA  K1G 3Z4

===
Date: Mon, 31 Aug 92 15:24:53 -0400
From: [e-mail] (Chris Deschu)

An easy way to use the long rectangular crystals with a TWGS is to
take an 16 pin dip socket, cut 8 pins off of one end, and solder a
jumper wire between the 8th pin (cut off) and the 4th pin (not cut
off) on each side. then voila, you have an adapter. I've been using it
that way for a long time, and it works great, just make sure you plug
it in right, or you'll fry the crystal...

    Um, I haven't called them recently, but the last time I checked,
the GAL set part number was 10MHZPALKIT from AE, and they did have it
then...

===
From: Jawaid Bazyar <[e-mail]>
Date: Mon, 31 Aug 92 14:37:05 MDT

>Also, I tried calling AE about getting the High-Performance GAL chips
>that are mentioned in the TWGS upgrade article. They said that they've
>handed the marketing of those chips over to LRO Computers. I called
>them and they said that they don't have them yet - call back in a
>couple of weeks.

  Oh wonderful!  So the LRO Horror Story (tm) continues!  Please keep
me informed as to the exact status of this transaction.  It's extremely
important.

===
From: [e-mail]
Date: Mon, 31 Aug 92 14:05:00 PDT

| > That's what _I_ do and it works fine. 5 mhz is
|
|   Of course, TelCom is happy at 14MHz or any speed for that matter. Hmm.

So's Z-Link (well, actually, my Zip only goes to 8MHz). Hmmm. Ain't nothing
like going "by the book." Tends to keep one in line with the hardware...

===
Date: Mon, 31 Aug 92 17:10:30 -0400
From: [e-mail] (Chris Deschu)

I tried calling AE & LRO myself, and AE's like duh, we don't know anything
about them anymore, call LRO. Couldn't even tell me who makes them...
LRO on the other hand said duh, we don't have them yet, we don't know when
we will have them either, call back in a few weeks. Sound familiar?  I must
say that they did get my 32k cache out promptly, but other than that, I'm
not impressed with them. They also have absolutely no idea at all when prizm
was going to be out, nor could they tell me who was demoing it at KFest.
        Somebody PLEASE tell me where I can order those ram chips from for
the TransWarp... I don't want to live with a half baked gs for a few weeks.

===
From: Jawaid Bazyar <[e-mail]>
Date: Mon, 31 Aug 92 15:33:48 MDT

> So's Z-Link (well, actually, my Zip only goes to 8MHz). Hmmm. Ain't nothing
> like going "by the book." Tends to keep one in line with the hardware...

  Oh yeah... for everyone who doesn't know, Dave Whitney here is
at least partially responsible for TelCom (he provided the serial drivers
from Z-Link).  Take a bow, Dave :)

===
From: [e-mail]
Date: Mon, 31 Aug 92 15:22:00 PDT


|   Oh yeah... for everyone who doesn't know, Dave Whitney here is
| at least partially responsible for TelCom (he provided the serial drivers
| from Z-Link).  Take a bow, Dave :)

TAA DAA! Thank you thank you thank you. And for my next trick...

===
From: [e-mail] (Michael Frankowski)
Date: Mon, 31 Aug 92 18:58:57 CDT

> Anybody have a non-800 number for DigiKey? Just in case the 800 number
doesn't
> work from Canada (and they usually don't).

There is no normal number listed, but they are in e 218 area code (very north
Minnesota).  Address is:

        Digi-Key
        701 Brooks Ave S
        POBOX 677
        Theif River Falls, MN  56701-0677

Use 1-218-555-1212 for information to get the normal number if need be.

> BTW, are the crystals that you listed the mini size crystals that fit right
> into the TWGS or are they the full size ones that need to be modified?

Those are the ones that fit into a TWGS with no modifications.

> I currently have the 32K cache, with 35 ns SRAM. The Schmoo plot that I got
> from WDC seems to indicate that my new 65c816 will run reliably (loaded) at
> about 11.5 MHZ - is the 35 ns SRAM fast enough to work at 11.5 MHZ?

Yes, 35ns should be fast enough even for 14.  Chris Deschu is trying faster
chips to see if it makes a difference.

===
Date: Mon, 31 Aug 1992 20:37:27 -0500
From: Derek Taubert <[e-mail]>

Just out of curiosity, what numbers are on the stickers on everybody's
TWGS chips?  The version number on my EPROM on the 32K card is 1.8S,
the rams are Toshiba TC55328P-35 (for now), and all of the GAL chips
are labeled TWGSxy-N where x is 1-8 and y is A for all x except 2
(B) and 3 (C).  How about somebody with the faster GAL set?

===
From: [e-mail] (Todd P. Whitesel)
Date: Mon, 31 Aug 92 18:52:53 PDT

>         Does ProTERM work with a 14 MHz Zip if I slow the Zip down before
> I run it?  I could live with that.. Proterm's definitely fast enough at
> 2.8... it's only desktop stuff (and compiling) that I want a Zip for..
> so I'd live with the annoyance of having to slow down the Zip every time I
> ran ProTERM..

Yep. This is what I do. 5.25 mhz (50% of 10.5) seems to work fine for me.

> I sure wish Greg Schaeffer started logging on again so maybe we could get
> an answer/small patch out of him why it doesn't work.

Oh well...

===
From: [e-mail] (Todd P. Whitesel)
Date: Mon, 31 Aug 92 18:54:56 PDT

>Also, I tried calling AE about getting the High-Performance GAL chips
>that are mentioned in the TWGS upgrade article. They said that they've
>handed the marketing of those chips over to LRO Computers. I called
>them and they said that they don't have them yet - call back in a
>couple of weeks.

Uh oh. I've heard some pretty venomous things about LRO lately, mainly with
regard to certain nonexistent Visionary cards (i.e. LRO has none, yet they are
"selling" them). I'd be careful about LRO were I you.

===
Date: Tue, 1 Sep 92 6:52:00 CDT
From: Michael Crane <[e-mail]>

> Anybody have a non-800 number for DigiKey? Just in case the 800 number
> doesn't work from Canada (and they usually don't).

[phone]

> BTW, are the crystals that you listed the mini size crystals that fit right
> into the TWGS or are they the full size ones that need to be modified?

I don't happen to recall what was listed, but you just need to make sure
that you get "1/2 TTL/CMOS" oscillators.  They come in metal and plastic
bodies...I believe the plastic ones work just fine and are cheaper.

> Also, I tried calling AE about getting the High-Performance GAL chips
> that are mentioned in the TWGS upgrade article. They said that they've
> handed the marketing of those chips over to LRO Computers. I called
> them and they said that they don't have them yet - call back in a
> couple of weeks.

Thanks for the info.  I may be needing some of those myself very soon.

===
From: [e-mail] (Al Belyea)
Date:   Tue, 1 Sep 1992 10:52:40 -0400

>>> DigiKey, number is: 800-344-4539

Good news! The 800 number for DigiKey works from Canada!

>
> Those are the ones that fit into a TWGS with no modifications.
>
> Yes, 35ns should be fast enough even for 14.  Chris Deschu is trying faster
> chips to see if it makes a difference.
>

Thats's great news - thanks for the info.

Now with the crystals on their way, I'll be able to get my TWGS up to
9 or 9.5 MHZ almost immediately. However, according to the upgrade
article, I need to  replace the 4 GAL chips with the high-performance
ones if I want to run at 10  MHZ or more.

BTW, when I called AE and asked about the High Performance GAL chips,
they said  that LRO had been handling them for about a year now. And
when I first asked  LRO about them, they said huh? I had to explain
what I wanted very carefully and slowly.

Allan.

===
From: [e-mail] (Al Belyea)
Date:   Tue, 1 Sep 1992 11:01:52 -0400

Re: High Performance GAL chips for TWGS and LRO:

> Uh oh. I've heard some pretty venomous things about LRO lately, mainly with
> regard to certain nonexistent Visionary cards (i.e. LRO has none, yet they
are
> "selling" them). I'd be careful about LRO were I you.
>

Well, if someone knows where to get these High Performance GAL chips for the
TWGS from somewhere other than AE or LRO, I'll be the first person in line.

BTW, I didn't lay any money or credit card with LRO yet. I just asked them if
they had them in stock or not.

===
From: [e-mail] (Al Belyea)
Date:   Tue, 1 Sep 1992 10:57:37 -0400

>Just out of curiosity, what numbers are on the stickers on everybody's
>TWGS chips?  The version number on my EPROM on the 32K card is 1.8S,
>the rams are Toshiba TC55328P-35 (for now), and all of the GAL chips
>are labeled TWGSxy-N where x is 1-8 and y is A for all x except 2 (B)
>and 3 (C).How about somebody with the faster GAL set?

Going from memory, my 32K EPROM and SRAM are the same as yours, but I have an
older set of GAL chips. My GAL #3 is rev B I think.

The upgrade article says you need GAL #3 Rev E to run at 10 MHZ or higher.

===
Date: Tue,  1 Sep 1992 01:59:33 -0400 (EDT)
From: Gregory Ross Thompson <[e-mail]>

  Someone asked how to get Sony's mega-fast chip.  All I've got is a
phone number for 'em.  Try 714-220-9100.  They'll probably tell you to
call some semi-local place.

  Once again, the part number is: CXK58258A-15

  Also, VLSI Tech makes one: VT62832UHL-15 [call 408-434-3100 for them]

  Zip's charging $399 to upgrade to 14MHz.  Seems to me it'd cost
$99 for the '816 (I think), a few bucks for crystals, and some amount
for the SRAM.  Wouldn't 35ns be enough?

===
Date: Tue, 1 Sep 92 13:38:39 -0400
From: [e-mail] (Chris Deschu)

Allan,
        You mean you actually got LRO to admit they had them, and they
didn't tell you to call back in a few weeks? Who did you talk to? I need the
fast GALs for my Transwarp too... Thanks,

===
From: [e-mail] (Al Belyea)
Date:   Tue, 1 Sep 1992 16:23:02 -0400

> Allan,
>       You mean you actually got LRO to admit they had them, and they
> didn't tell you to call back in a few weeks? Who did you talk to? I need the
> fast GALs for my Transwarp too... Thanks,

No, I said that I called them, that it took them a while to understand what I
was talking about, and then they said Oh we don't have them yet. Call back in
a couple of weeks.

Has anyone ever gotten these Hi-Performance TWGS GAL chips from LRO within the
past year?? (which according to AE is when they were turned over to LRO).

===
Date: Fri, 4 Sep 92 20:13:52 -0400
From: [e-mail] (Chris Deschu)

Ok, heres the stats on my TWGS:

ROM: 1.8s
Cache: 32k
GALs: 1A1, 2B1, 3D1, 4B1, 5A1, 6A1, 7A1, 8B1

I don't know of anyone who actually has the fast GAL set.

I just upgraded the cache RAM to 20ns chips, and now it seems that it
will run ok at 15mhz, although I am still experiencing wierd problems,
it seems to just all of a sudden crash & total lockup after 20 mins,
even when the TWGS is set to 2.8mhz. I haven't tried it without the
TWGS yet, I guess that is next, but it passes the TWGS CDA test for
over 6 hours with no failures, the claris memory test with no
failures, the internal diagnostic says system good, and apple's dealer
diagnostics run 50 iterations with no failures. So I am sort of at a
loss at this point. Any ideas? Maybe I shouldn't have turned the
voltage up that high :(... But check out these dhrystone results:

Dhrystone(1.1) time for 50000 passes = 40
This machine benchmarks at 1250 dhrystones/second

Gee, maybe if we all call LRO at the same time, and ask for the GALs,
they'll actually do something about it... later,

===
Date: Sat, 5 Sep 92 15:26:34 -0400
From: [e-mail] (Chris Deschu)

Well, I got the benchmark program from Mike's BBS and here's the results:

[15.00Mhz]
[Result of the 1 runs Averaged (base speed = 100%)]

Base Speed time  Accelerated time  Expected Time  Improvement  Actual MHz
---------------  ----------------  -------------  -----------  ----------
10 iterations of the Sieve of Erastothenes.
         410.00             99.00          69.51       175.9%       10.53
500 strings selection sort.
        1151.00            262.00         194.88       177.2%       11.16
100 iterations of floating point test.
         472.00             93.00          85.69       180.3%       13.82
15000 Gamm units (FPE instruction mix) in
        1535.00            315.00         274.17       179.5%       13.06
10 iterations of Fibinacci calls in
        2006.00            509.00         339.59       174.6%       10.01
5000 itereation Integer math in
        1553.00            308.00         263.04       180.2%       12.81
-------------------------------------------------------------------------
Average                                                117.9%       11.90

Where it says Base Speed time, that's at 2.8mhz.
Here's some other info that was included with the test:

To obtained optimal performance number, run the benchmark program with
no init/DAs.  System disk version will also affect the tests. System 6
will give the best time.

            @Stock GS   *Transwarp +Transwarp  @Zip GSX   @Zip GSX   @Zip GSX
              2.8 mhz     7.5mhz     8 mhz      9 mhz      8 mhz      8 mhz
                        32k Cache  32k Cache  32k Cache  16k Cache  32k Cache
              =======   =========  =========  =========  =========  =========
Sieve          413.40      166.20     153.40     152.50     170.00     170.33
String        1161.20      450.80     422.60     406.50     466.67     444.33
FPE Test 1     479.50      176.00     168.20     188.70     214.67     203.67
FPE Test 2    1561.90      579.00     560.40     612.80     699.00     657.00
Fabinacci     2023.90      772.60     733.40     777.80     853.67     853.33
Integer       1567.00      549.00     517.20     616.00     683.67     680.00

Effective Avg   x2.57       x6.83      x7.20      x6.75      x6.00      x6.17

             *Stock GS  *Stock GS
              1.0 mhz    2.8 mhz
            =========  ==========
              1042.60      411.00
              2923.20     1153.60
              1285.40      473.00
              4112.50     1538.80
              5093.80     2010.80
              3945.60     1557.00

Effective Avg   x1.00       x2.59

(All numbers should be within +/-1%)
( * - denotes numbers obtained by me [Hman] under System 6 w/ no init/DAs)
( + - are obtained under System 5.04)
( @ - compiled by Goose w/ System 5.04)

Since numbers for the Zip are obtained under Sys5.04 this table is not a fair
comparison. Update is needed.

[Goose] :
Both machines look good. It does seem the Transwarp handles the math much
better though

Either way you go you are ripping. The Zip has price and less heat on it's
side. While the TW seems to have a edge on the speed. Wish someone had a 10/64
Zip to test. I would like to see the figures. I would also like to see one of
the 10 mhz TW's they had the text files out about six months to a year back.

        Ok, NEXT.... Soenke, where can we obtain Pepo-Bench? :) Thanks,

===
Date: Fri, 11 Sep 92 19:18:40 -0400
From: [e-mail] (Chris Deschu)

Good News!
        I just called LRO again, cause I felt like buggin them, and apparently
the GAL chipsets are now available. She told me they don't have them in stock,
it will take a week and a half to order them from AE. At least they
acknowledge
that they exist now. Anyway, I ordered one, it's $79.00 + shipping, and we'll
see what happens. Hopefully, I'll recieve it within the next few months...

Later,
                Chris Deschu

===

(Whew!  Sorry about the wrapped lines interspersed here and there...)
--
Brian T. Tao    =*8-) | ::::::::> [e-mail] <::::::::
Dept. of Exobiology   | :::::> generic!terranet![e-mail] <:::::
University of Toronto | "Though this be madness, yet there is method in't."