Iisi Upgrade Options

From: tu@sumex-aim.stanford.edu Subject: Summary on IIsi upgrade Date: Sat, 25 Jan 1992 23:30:20 GMT Many thanks to everyone who answered my query on how to improve the performance of a Mac IIsi. My original query is as follows: >>A friend of mine has a Mac IIsi with which she does desktop publishing and >>graphic design. She has an Apple 13" color monitor, and the slowness >>of the Mac in refreshing the screen is getting to her. She is considering >>some kind of upgrade. >>Is it better for her to get (1) an accelerator that upgrades the CPU (maybe >>one with a 50-mhz 68030 chip), or (2) a graphics accelerator that >>specifically speeds up the video? Are (1) and (2) incompatible (i.e. does >>getting a CPU accelerator board makes it impossible for her to install a >>graphic accelerator when she ready to go to 24-bit color?) What options for >>IIsi are there in the market? First, a summary of the responses: The first thing to try is to get more memory, set Disk Cache to 512K, and see what difference it makes. After that, you should analyze the requirements. Because a IIsi lacks dedicated videoRam, using color slows down the Mac. If this is the source of problem, a graphics card that provides memory to the monitor and a co-processor to drive it will help. One netter recommended Applied Engineering 'QuickSilver' Cache/FPU card. On the other hand, the operation of the IIsi may be slow because DTP and graphic design work are CPU-intensive. Thus, one should find out the effects of COLOR vs CPU processing. One heavy user of DTP programs suggested that CPU is the limiting factor on programs like Quark and PM 4.0, and my friend should consider CPU accelerators. Among the accelerators, two people recommended Daystar Powercache. DayStar bundles DualPort adaptor, so the PDS slot is still available for other add-on cards. Here are excerpts from the responses that elaborates on the summary: "Dieder B." <UOG11854@vm.uoguelph.ca> wrote: >>the IIsi/ci are hybrid machines with no dedicated >>VideoRam...instead, they use a portion of normal memory as the video ram, >>swapping between the video display and the actual memory. The CPU (68030) >>has to work pretty hard doing all this swapping, so there is a performance >>hit. To see the difference, just change bit depth from 8, to 4, to 2, to 1 >>and see how much faster (though less pretty) your applications will run. .. >>Either way you'll have to get an adaptor board to plug into the IIsi's >>slot...if you go for as much speed as you can afford, use the 030 PDS >>option, since there is no NuBus overhead to deal with (NuBus operates at >>half the speed of the IIsi -- 10Mhz vs 20Mhz). Get yourself the >>Applied Engineering 'QuickSilver' Cache/FPU card, and then get a 030 >>video card. Sure...it might be a bit more expensive than going NuBus >>adaptor, and NuBus card...but you'll get more speed (if that's what you >>really need!). Plus, most of the cache (if not all that I've seen in the >>mags.) …