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[This is a past news page, the current news page is at www.xlr8yourmac.com/]
Acard ATA/66 Firmware v3.01 Update: Get it at www.acard.com/download/bios.htm or use this direct download link. See the readme file for more info. Here's a reader report from the forums on the update:
"
Please allow me to share my findings with the new firmware update v3.01. I was glad to see that - in my particular 9500 system - the v3.01 firmware update is an improvement. I saw gains in read/write performance (on par with v2.6) and improved stability. I would recommend users of 95/9600, experiencing lower than expected performance with the Acard, to try the new v3.01 firmware update.
Sincerely,
Alexander
"
As noted earlier today, a Turbomax ATA/66 owner reported the Acard ATA/66 firmware solved his problems as well. An odd reversal of past history (where the Promax firmware was more compatible).
I'm going to flash my Acard ATA/66 card in the S900 as soon as I can put the update on a floppy, since the only hard drive in the S900 are connected to the Acard (which they recommend disconnecting before flashing the card). [Note - the flasher takes a long time (over 30 seconds) to complete with no apparent activity so be patient.]
= 4:20 PM Update Follows =
Today's WWDC/Hardware/Other Net News links have been updated. (Software and TIL listings updated 9PM)
= 3:30 PM Update Follows =
Altivec Enabled Hint Benchmark Results:
"Hi,
I have written a modified version of the HINT benchmark
which utilizes the Altivec unit on the G4. New results for this
modification are on my HINT benchmark page,
http://www.ima.umn.edu/~coult/hint.html
To summarize:
On my modified HINT floating-point benchmark code, Altivec gives
a 34% performance increase overall, and improves the peak performance
by 58% versus code which does not utilize the Altivec unit. Overall and peak
performance of a G4/400 Mhz exceeds that of a
Pentium III/600 Mhz "Coppermine" with a 600 Mhz L2 cache.
Thanks,
Dr. Nicholas Coult, Research Associate
Institute for Mathematics and Its Applications,
University of Minnesota
"
AppleScript 1.4.3 Update:
"Applescript enjoys a v1.43 update today, seemingly a must-have for
current OS users. From the readme:
++++++
There were three problems fixed with this AppleScript Update:
1- The performance of the AppleScript Script Editor could be adversely
affected by an interaction with Carbon Lib 1.02.
2- A crash when attempting to compile scripts simultaneously.
3- Inability of Standard Additions "mount volume" command to mount NT,
OS X or other non-AppleShare volumes.
+++++++++
Available at http://asu.info.apple.com/swupdates.nsf/artnum/n11683
Bob Friede"
Clubmac Firewire Case/Toast 4.1 Report: In response to an earlier post, a Clubmac Firewire case owner reports that Toast 4.1 also works fine:
"Mike
I have my G4 400 and a Clubmac Firewire case for my Ricoh 6x4x24x CDRW
working just fine with Toast 4.1 It is very stable and I have had no
problems with writing to different formats including audio formats.
Francisco D. Vergaray
Boeing Space and Communications
International Space Station - Grafix"
TurboMax ATA/66 Problem Reports: I've received a two problem reports recently regarding these cards. The most recent one is below (from the site mail list):
"Hey guys,
I work at macUpgrades in the DC area and we just installed our first ProMax
ATA 66 card. We have installed alot of the ATA 33's. We are having the same
problem. the firmware updaters are confusing to say the least. There are
two and you must format the drives after running the first one and then run
the second one. Trouble is, only the second one will run. I was able to
format the drives using Remus Lite, so that means that it's an
incompatibility with Drive Setup and HDST.
I too have found that FWB HDTK locks up more machines that it runs on so I
wasn't able to try that one.
Any ideas Mike? Will the Acard updaters run on the ProMax card?
Kevin"
One mail list reader just noted the Acard ATA/66 firmware update solved his problem.
The only question is will it be possible to update the Turbomax ATA/66 card with Promax firmware again in the future. (I.E. Does the Promax flasher look for a Promax firmware ID.) Hopefully Promax will address these ATA/66 card issues ASAP. Based on past history, the Turbomax ATA/33 card firmware was the most compatible of any Mac PCI IDE card.
= 11:30 AM Update Follows =
Toast 4.1 Enables CDRWs in Firewire Cases: In the last two days I've had several reports
that Toast's 4.1 firewire support extension allowed CDRWs to work in Firewire/IDE cases like the ADS Pyro. Yesterday's entries in the Drive Compatibility Database has an example from Brian Biggs:
"
Mitsumi IDE CDRW CR-4802TE
This CD-RW was installed in a PYRO 1394 drive kit. Toast 4.1 reader extension made it all work."
In the past the Firewire/IDE bridge chip had to be reprogrammed for ATAPI mode to allow CD/DVD/CDRW drives to work, so this is a pleasant surprise. If anyone has tried Toast 4.1 with a Clubmac Firewire case, please let me know.
One thing to note - with a 10X Firewire CDR costing $399 with bundled software, it often makes no sense to by a Firewire case ($120 or so at least - the Pyro kits can cost upwards of $200 to $250 with card) and a fast IDE CDRW drive, since total costs can be more than an already completed drive with more software and assured compatibility. Of course 4x IDE CDRWs are much cheaper than the faster 8x-10x drives IDE CDRWs which usually retail at $225 to $299 for the drive alone.
More Sonnet PB 1400 G3 Upgrade Reports: Today's updates to the Rate Your CPU Upgrade database had another Sonnet G3/PB1400 owner report. This one had some interesting notes regarding temperatures:
"
PowerBook 1400cs/117
Sonnet G3/333 Upgrade
I was running OS 8.1 when I initially installed the G3 333MHz/1MB card and had "conniptions" because the PB 1400 consistently ran at 71 degrees C or higher.
Two days ago I upgraded to OS 8.5 and 8.6 and now Sonnet's Metronome and Newer's GaugePro report temps of 47-60 C.
The machine is noticeably cooler to the touch and hot air no longer comes from the speaker grill and upper keyboard. Am still curious to know how operating system can affect processor temp in this way, and accuracy of temps as reported by software.
Thurletta B.
"
Thurletta had posted an entry on 5/6/2000 concerned over the high temperatures initially seen. Other entries from Sonnet G3/PB1400 owners had reported lower temperatures. You can see all entries by selecting Powerbook 1400 as the Mac model and Sonnet as the upgrade brand on the search page.
HDT 4 vs Apple Driver Performance (Maxtor Plus40/Apple G4 System): A reader sent some amazing performance notes on the Maxtor Plus40 drive in his Apple G4 system:
"Mike:
Just thought I'd let you know: I just purchased a 40GB DiamondMax Pro 7200
RPM ATA/66 drive for use as a slave in my G4/400 (Rev 2). I tested with
FWB's Hard Disk Toolkit, here's what I got:
| Driver |
Write Rate
(Sustained) |
Read Rate
(Sustained) |
| Apple Drivers |
42 MB/sec |
26.5 MB/sec |
| FWB HDT 4.0 |
40 MB/sec |
27 MB/sec |
I have been using it with my Cannon ZR10 (kick-ass DV cam!) and I have
had no problems capturing (720 x 480 30fps) or with playback.
You really can't beat this drive, for the price. It's twice as fast
(writing) as the RAID setup I had (Initio U2 with 2 Quantum Atlas IV 9 GB
drives).
Jamie Peloquin"
I'm asking him to test using ATTO's Tools benchmark set to 8MB size (without using the system cache), since I'm not as confident in FWB's benchtest (the read rates are higher sustained rates than the drive mfr claims). I reviewed the Plus40 drive several months ago here in a B&W G3 with ATA/33 onboard IDE. Sustained rates were near 30MB/sec for reads and writes. Peaks would be higher with the G4's onboard ATA/66 controller, but past G4 owner reports noted similar sustained rates to those I obtained when using ATTO's benchmark.
FYI: I recently posted a page with another reader's HDT 4.0 vs. Apple driver performance results using SCSI drives.
Beige G3 Rev 1 & IDE Slave Drives: The Beige G3 rev A/rev 1 (ATI RageII chip) models did not support IDE slave drives. Originally it was thought the rev B and later ROM dimms added slave support, but based on info on a Japanese site some readers noted over a year ago there was a motherboard/controller change also (other than the ATI RagePro graphics chip). I thought some readers that upgraded rev A Beige G3s with the ROMs provided with past OWC G3/450 upgrades also noted that it didn't add IDE slave drive support. However one reader today just wrote saying that the ROM update does add slave drive support to rev A models. (There have been one or two reports over the years that some transitional rev As did support slaves, even though they had the ATI RageII chips, but those reports were rare.) If anyone knows the URL to the web page with the info on this issue, or has tested the ROM update in a rev A Beige G3 with a slave drive, please let me know. Thanks!
Acer 10X IDE DVD Drive Report: I saw this in the latest entries in the Drive Compatibility Database:
"
IDE DVD ROM
Acer DVP 1040A (10x/40X)
Using Apple drivers
Speed: 10x/40x, works fine with DVDs, CDs, CDRs, CDRWs, CD DA (both listening and extracting), boots fine with the 'C' key. And it's fast !
It's actually an OEM Pioneer DVD 114. I bought it and quickly dezoned it with a hacked Aopen 1.24 firmware (see perso.club-internet.fr/farzeno/firmware) on a PC. Perfect success, the drive works fine with Apple's DVD Player 2.0 (hacked).
Overall, a good drive."
Darwin QT Streaming Server Ported to Mac OS 9:
"
Hey Mike,
Since I did not seen this mentioned on the so called larger Apple News
sites, I figured you'd be interested in this darwin to Mac OS port of
Quicktime server.....
off of the darwin streaming dev list:
http://qtss.interlink.com.br/
has a binary source for DL.....
hope this info is useful for your site....
enjoy
-Jeff Carvalho"
BTO Petition Status: As of this morning there are about 3,500 entries in the 3Dfx BTO Petition. (400 added in the last 24 hours). Thanks for all those that signed up. We need a lot more however so spread the word to anyone that wants more choices at BTO.
Review/Ratings Databases Updated: The searchable Rate Your CPU Upgrade, Mac Game/Video card framerates and
Drive Compatibility databases were updated this morning with new entries from this weekend.
Software Updates/TILs/Other Net News: (Thanks to Barney Buoy)
The recent features page also lists articles posted (most recent first) as does the sidebar links here. The site topics pages (systems, cpu upgrades, etc. - see top and sidebar links on this page) also are places to check as well as the FAQ.
Wednesday's News Summary
- Sony 10X Firewire CDR/S900 Test Results
- Proformance 3 Firmware Update
- IE 5 Security Issues
- Reminder on TomeViewer
- First Reports of New IBM 75GXP IDE Drive Performance
- Ricoh 10X CDRWs
- Que! Firewire CDR/Toast 4.1 Tip
- IE 5/Outlook Express 5 Crashes
- Rage128 PRO AGP & MM Update Performance Boost
- Rage128 Pro AGP/Sony CDP-L181 LCD Display Problem Report
- BTO Petition Status
- Rate Your CPU Upgrade, Drive Compatibility and Mac Game Framerates databases updated.
- Software Updates Listing
- Other Net News (WWCD/hardware/general news)
Tuesday's News Summary
- huge list of WWDC/Hardware news, TILs & Net News links
- Apple Multimedia Update Direct Download
- More Logic Audio/G4 Upgrade Problem Feedback/Workaround
- Panasonic 9.4GB DVD RAM Drives
- Promax Working on Turbomax ATA/66 Card Deep Sleep Update
- More on DirectCD 1.05
- More on Logic Audio/G4 Upgrade Problems
- Orange Micro Firewire/USB Combo Card Sleep Issue
- Firewire/USB Combo Card Owner Feedback
- More Info on Molex DVI Adapters
- Toast 4.1 Update
- Mac BSSEYO Koan Plugin
- Prosoft WWDC Radialogic Giveaways
- Rate Your CPU Upgrade, Drive Compatibility and Mac Game Framerates databases updated.
- Software Updates Listing
- Other Net News (WWCD/hardware/general news)
Monday's News Summary
- Toast 4.1 Update adds firewire CDR support & more
- Apple's WWDC/OS X Related Press Releases
- Maya (3D) Coming to Mac (OS X):
- OWC G3/400 & G3/450 ZIF Reader Specials
- Direct CD 1.05? (European reader notes buying v1.05 online)
- Good News Regarding Future Epic Mac Games
- MicroMat's Drive10 Disk Util for OS X
- DirectCD Patch for Plextor 12X CDRW Updated
- Epic Dropping OpenGL and Glide APIs for Unreal 2?
- Firewire/USB Combo Card Owner Feedback
- Apple Multimedia Update Feedback
- Sony 10X Firewire CDRW First Impressions
- New Driver for MS Natural Keyboard Pro
- PCI IDE Cards & Deep Sleep
- Sonnet Lowers CPU Upgrade Prices (again):
- DFP to DVI Adapters
- Rate Your CPU Upgrade, Drive Compatibility and Mac Game Framerates databases updated.
- Software Updates Listing
- Other Net News (WWCD/hardware/general news)
For links to older news pages see the Archives page. The recent features page has a lists reviews/articles you may have missed.
For a guide to finding answers to questions - see my Site Guide page.
Considering a CPU Upgrade? Search the CPU Upgrade Owner's Survey results and search for owner reports by Mac model and/or card brand. The current database has more than 3,700+ reports and growing.
Make a Difference: Be the Difference
Randy Mita, Brad Lau and I came up with a new slogan and theme for Mac advocacy - "Make a Difference: Be the Difference". We're asking that all Mac owners take advantage of every opportunity to let others know the Mac advantage. It's a grass-roots approach that will surely help. You might save someone from a lifetime of Windows in the bargain.
Thanks to my wife Kay, the ultimate computer widow
for putting up with all the time I spend with the site work, tests and email.= Top of Page =
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