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Topic: Notebook CD/DVD-ROM drives in CC (Read 529 times) |
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richfiles
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Re: Notebook CD/DVD-ROM drives in CC
« Reply #15 on: Oct 16th, 2002, 3:12pm » |
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I'm still going for the all in one feel. I'd ditch the floppy in a heart beat and make it the CD-ROM drive opening, except, I've lost support for my IDE Imation LS-120 drive, and don't have a networked machine anymore to copy stuff to floppys for my older machines. Mac OS X is responsible for the loss of my drive's use. The drivers no longer work, and they weren't manufacturer drivers either.
I could comprimise with the floppy, replace the floppy with the CD. I'll follow the pins on my 400k external floppy, and then install a 1440k floppy in it and install a floppy connector to the rear of the machine. That's too easy. It'll leave me with floppy capability, but it'll be external. I REALY wanted to make it an all in one unit, but that can always be saved for Takky 2.
I made measurements, and I can modify the button plate to still work around the CD. I'll have to jumper some points, but I can do it. I might even need to route a bit of the side platic out, well, that's if I keep the inner plastic chassis.
As for the MB. I don't know the spacing between the PCI slots. I'll assume it's standard spacing, with the first slot the same height as the 1 PCI riser's slot.
Other than the connectors for the IDE cables, does that el cheapo IDE-66 card have any "thick" components toward the front end. If not, then there might BARELY be room to squeeze the corner of the CD-ROM drive, if necessary, between the cards, with an insulator for protection. Maybe...
as for the Wired4DVD card... What kind hookup does it have? does the VGA from thr video card go in, and then a VGA with DVD image overlay pass out? I can easily wire that up internaly... maybe even so it has a blank PCI cover plate. It'd require hacking up the board, but it'd fit my all in one idea. I have the 630 video module. I can leave it attached to the harness, then use a Mac to VGA converter (if necessary) and one of my VGA ends, and solder that in place of the DVD card's connectors (I'm assuming it has a VGA in and a VGA out, but I really have never seen one). The out could then be soldered straight to the AB harness video lines (since it's the VGA mod anyway), but leave the non video lines to skip the 630 video module and pass straight to the AB harness. With the 630 video module in, I'd also be able to draw out a reset button from it to the external case. (as if the analog board section of a Takky wire harness was bad enough! 
I am curious though, are there any software DVD players that will play (even if it's low framerate) on a G3 upgraded machine with only a 50 MHz bus? If there is a solution to DVD playback, other than Apple's player, I'd love to hear it.
I can give up internal floppy though, if I leave the option for external floppy open. I just have to make an external cable and connector. I'd have used the original, but it looks like I tossed it. I only have the case, though finding another 3.5" external Apple drive can't be hard.
I am using a SCSI hard drive for now, but will likely switch to all IDE once I have the IDE card and a 20+ GB hard drive, maybe more, for MP3s and electronics data. Imagine d/l every PDF datasheet of every common logic chip and any special purpose chip that is regularily used and have access to it in seconds! Every schematic and diagram and parts list you ever need, inches from the soldering iron! Now that's usefull, plus you can use it as a good old boob tube!!! 
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Richard
richfiles@mac.com
http://richfiles.solarbotics.net/
B&W G3: 2 Disp
Quadra 840av: 3 Disp
Color Classic Takky 6500/275: 128 MB, VGA, TV/FM, DVD/CDRW
LC 580 Trinitron: 68040, 96 MB, TV
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Trash80toG-4
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Re: Notebook CD/DVD-ROM drives in CC
« Reply #16 on: Oct 16th, 2002, 4:05pm » |
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Is the Duo Floppy a standard interface unit other than that stupid HDI (could we make the freakin' thing any longer) whatever connector? IIRC, it should be thinner than a standard floppy and might gain you some height.
jt
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StuartBell
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Re: Notebook CD/DVD-ROM drives in CC
« Reply #17 on: Oct 16th, 2002, 11:03pm » |
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on Oct 16th, 2002, 3:12pm, richfiles wrote:
As for the MB. I don't know the spacing between the PCI slots. I'll assume it's standard spacing, with the first slot the same height as the 1 PCI riser's slot.
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Dangerous assumption! ISTR noticing that the lower slot in the 2-slot riser wasn't at the same height as the one in the 1-slot riser. I can't remember which way round it was, and I no longer have a 2-slot riser to compare with the 1-slot in my 5500/G3.
Stuart
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richfiles
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Re: Notebook CD/DVD-ROM drives in CC
« Reply #18 on: Oct 17th, 2002, 8:40am » |
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Gotta love Apple's love of standards back then...
Shesh!
I almost bought one of those 2 slot risers for only $10 on e-bay. I should see if the guy still has it around. I bid, lost, but the high bidder backed out after winning. I was asked if I wanted it, but decided not to cause of unexpected bills.
Maybe I'll get lucky...
At least I won my TV/FM tuner!
I've also found a "nifty" place for the DVD/CDRW drive if all else fails, but it's not ideal. It's right at the bottom, and the two Torx screws on the bottom would have to be removed, and a solution to closing up the computer would need to be found. It also requires raising the MB and the AB.
I also mapped out the traces of the AB and found a nice line that i can cut across to half the board, and then run jumpers to make the connections. It'd allow the board to bemore easily moved around and packed up into corners if need be.
I definitely appreciate the help I'm getting. I intend to take measurements with photos, so if I do pull this off, it'll be repeatable!
I've also come to the conclusion that I can't type worth anything untill I'm finished typing... 
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Richard
richfiles@mac.com
http://richfiles.solarbotics.net/
B&W G3: 2 Disp
Quadra 840av: 3 Disp
Color Classic Takky 6500/275: 128 MB, VGA, TV/FM, DVD/CDRW
LC 580 Trinitron: 68040, 96 MB, TV
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gothikon
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Re: Notebook CD/DVD-ROM drives in CC
« Reply #19 on: Oct 18th, 2002, 3:53am » |
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A couple of other possibilities to get more space would include using a laptop hard drive with one of thost $5 adaptors. There is also a Japanese guy with a black PCC and he mounted the HD parallel to the tube at the side of the case connecting one end to the frame can't remember the link but I'll upload the file to my server, ok it's at www.gothikon.com/uploads/gazelle.jpg If you do that you could have the CD and floppy side by side and save a ton of space.
About the DVD card it has VGA out and s-video out (I think it's s-video). It also provides AC3 audio (i think that's it) so you can get 5.1 through an decoder box. There is cable that connects the computers VGA out to a custom port on the DVD decoder and then that has a VGA port to connect to to the monitor. Or you can leave the pass through cable out and have VGA on your video card going to your regular monitor and VGA out on the decoder going to a second monitor, or S-video to a TV for DVD playback
This and my VST IDE card are both pretts small and neither has any large components but I'd have to pull the thing apart to confirm that.
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Trash80toG-4
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Re: Notebook CD/DVD-ROM drives in CC
« Reply #20 on: Oct 18th, 2002, 5:22am » |
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on Oct 18th, 2002, 3:53am, gothikon wrote:| About the DVD card it has VGA out and s-video out (I think it's s-video). It also provides AC3 audio (i think that's it) so you can get 5.1 through an decoder box. There is cable that connects the computers VGA out to a custom port on the DVD decoder and then that has a VGA port to connect to to the monitor. Or you can leave the pass through cable out and have VGA on your video card going to your regular monitor and VGA out on the decoder going to a second monitor, or S-video to a TV for DVD playback. |
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I like the sound of that card:
Can you hook up an external consumer grade DVD's S-Video feed to it to get a high res monitor image or does it need to do the full decoding schtick from a computer DVD Drive's raw feed? (I realize I'm dreaming on that one! )
Will it work in a 6360 or the earlier PCI macs?
Can it also act as a standard high res VGA card for computer output or just computer passthru with the capability to drive only its own output on a second display?
How much and how do you like it?
jt
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richfiles
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Re: Notebook CD/DVD-ROM drives in CC
« Reply #21 on: Oct 18th, 2002, 3:50pm » |
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I've hear about the card, and it seems like a great idea. One more question. On the pass through VGA cable. Does it replace the whole display when it plays a DVD, or does it create a blank window on the Mac and then overlay to that window's location, allowing windowed video? Or does it do something else entirely? It doesn't fill the window and mak the OS on top of it like an ATI XCLAIM VR does with desktop TV (windows and icons appear on TOP of a full screen video display). That's my favorite method.
If you can tell me about it's actual use and opperation, I'd love to hear.
Also, if you're willing to let it go, give a price. I'd be interested in the possibility of buying one.
I almost hate to do it, but I'm thinking of putting up my triple monitor Quadra 840av for sale. I love that machine, but with so many machines laying around, I never get to actualy use it (or for that matter, reach it!).
Oh well...
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Richard
richfiles@mac.com
http://richfiles.solarbotics.net/
B&W G3: 2 Disp
Quadra 840av: 3 Disp
Color Classic Takky 6500/275: 128 MB, VGA, TV/FM, DVD/CDRW
LC 580 Trinitron: 68040, 96 MB, TV
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gothikon
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Re: Notebook CD/DVD-ROM drives in CC
« Reply #22 on: Oct 18th, 2002, 4:26pm » |
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I have only ever used the card in my 9600 g3/480 but the min requirements are a ppc at 200 mhz I don't think the actual video card matters as long as it has vga out or a mac to vga adaptor if you use the pass through to get DVD on the primary monitor. You can connect the card straight to a second monitor or TV without having to use the pass through. In theory this allows one person to watch a DVD on a TV plaing back from your computer whilst you do work uninterupted on the primary monitor.
I suspect it would work in and PCI performa with a g3 upgrade and would probably work in a 180Mhz+ I think all that happens in below 200 Mhz situations is a few dropped frames. It's the wired4DVD card i think the site is www.wiredinc.com
The card is no longer in production and I think it was fairly scarce even then which is why I am hesitant to sell, I'd probably want 70 USD but I'm open to offers. The problem is I need the money now (so I can change my working holiday VISA for Australia in to 4yr one through my defacto relationship) but I can guarantee that I'd regret selling it in a year's time when money isn't an issue. <sigh> I may as well mention that the rest of the 9600 is up for sale, an XLR8 carrier card copper 400 MHZ G3 that's rock solid at 480 and 420 Mb of RAM mostly pairs of 2k refresh 64 Mb dimm's, the VooDoo 5 the VST IDE card and an 18.2 gig ultra 160 SCSI drive. There are a few items I'd do trades or p/t exchange for. A powerbook 1400, 2400 or 3400 an airport base station and card or a firewire case.
It's been a great machine and I'd love to keep it but I really don't use it enough now that I have my Cube, apart from burning CD's. Anyway that's going OT
The reason I actually got it is it's the only way to get DVD playback with a Voodoo card and I wasn't gonna pay the stupid prices asked for PCI Radeon's especially when the VooDoo 5 is a better carat least in OS 9. UT still looks better on the 9600 at 800x600 2x FSAA, 50fps than my 450 cube with 64 Mb Gf2 or my g/f's 700 FP iMac at 1024x768 at any resolutions.
The card either does full screen or DVD in a window, I only have one monitor hooked up but I think it can play back on any monitor not just the primary one. It uses it's own software which I have never had a problem with but it is OS 9 only, of course most machines running X wouldn't need this card anyway.
I've often though of putting this in my PCC, just need that damn 3.3v regulator. So that I could hook the critter up to a big TV. The one thing I wish this card did is pass everything on screen out to the TV not just the DVD video.
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gothikon
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Re: Notebook CD/DVD-ROM drives in CC
« Reply #23 on: Oct 18th, 2002, 4:36pm » |
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for got to mention it does not work as a video card, the only thing it can output without using the pass through cable is the DVD video.
There is a review at XLR8yourmac.com
http://www.xlr8yourmac.com/Graphics/wired4dvd/index4.html
The link will take you to the features page of the review. Also I think some people mentioned a problem with contrast which I have not had.
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Trash80toG-4
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Re: Notebook CD/DVD-ROM drives in CC
« Reply #24 on: Oct 18th, 2002, 5:52pm » |
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One last question, what is the actual size of a letterboxed DVD window in pixels that's practical to run on the card. I googled the reviews already because the max resolution was impresssive, but it doesn't sound like it can display a feed from a standard DVD player so I don't think it's right for me anyway. I'm looking at the Viewsonic 1024x768 tuner box to use with my standalone VCR and DVD, but a 1600 or 1920 pixel wide letterbox might be worth buying a DVD for a computer if I can find one of these cards!
From your comments, it sounds like a nice piece of equipment, maybe you should keep it even if you sell the computer out from around it!
jt
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gothikon
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Re: Notebook CD/DVD-ROM drives in CC
« Reply #25 on: Oct 19th, 2002, 1:44am » |
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I normally run my 20 inch apple multiscan at 1280*960. I'm not quite sure how to work out the size in pixels of letter box DVD playback presumably you work it out from the apspect ratio which I can't remember off hand.
If you let me know how to work it out I might pop down to the video shop tomorrow I've been meaning to rent Sprigan on DVD for a while now, seems like a good excuse!
Seeing as you seem to know quite a bit about video I/O on these older Macs can you let me know if the video/TV tuner kit for the performas has video out, or do you have to use the Apple presentation kit?
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Trash80toG-4
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Re: Notebook CD/DVD-ROM drives in CC
« Reply #26 on: Oct 19th, 2002, 5:50am » |
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on Oct 19th, 2002, 1:44am, gothikon wrote:| . . . can you let me know if the video/TV tuner kit for the performas has video out, or do you have to use the Apple presentation kit? |
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No video out, I bought a presentation system, but it hasn't been out of the box yet. It's for using with an LCD TV display on a hack (once I buy one!), the only good TV I have to test it on would be to feed it back into another 630 card! The old 19" TV's picture isn't as good as I can get on my worn out IntelliColor 20 from the 630 Video System.
The 1280 pixel figure tells me what I need to know, but check out this thread for the 2.35:1 aspect ratio limitations of the video system:
http://www.applefritter.com/cgi-bin/YaBB/YaBB.pl?board=hacks;action=disp lay;num=1034203489
That's why I said you might want to do your best to hold onto that card, check this thread for the solution I'm considering that doesn't sound mearly as effective as the card you have for DVD played and decoded on a computer, even if it is much more flexible in terms of VHS/Cable and external DVD player input:
http://www.applefritter.com/cgi-bin/YaBB/YaBB.pl?board=other;action=disp lay;num=1033881709
It sounds like that card is a far better platform than anything else I've seen for DVD and would give legs to any system with PCI and the 630 TV/FM Tuner/Video System, which is certainly capable enough for VHS/Cable on its own. However, once I;ve seen VHS on a 1024x768 display, I might not be able to say that any longer!
jt
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richfiles
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Re: Notebook CD/DVD-ROM drives in CC
« Reply #27 on: Oct 19th, 2002, 10:20pm » |
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Well, I am officialy the owner of a PowerMac 6500/275 MB with video, cache, ethernet, and the 2 slot PC riser. Not only that, but I also got a Wired4DVD card for $59.
I won't have the DVD player or the IDE card for a while yet, but I may buy a cheapo low speed early desktop style DVD drive. saw those as low as $12 on e-bay, but they had a little time left though. I might have it in an external case temporarily till I have cash for the notebook drive. Who knows.
At least I have the hard to find parts anyway.
I'm going to be building up a 6360 MB based Takky and selling it, selling a pair of 68040 MBs for Takky upgrades, and I think I'll also offer my Quadra 840av, as much as it pains me to see the beast leave (three monitors!!!).
Hopefully it will fund a notebook drive. I may not worry about CDRW. Most data will be from my B&W G3 to the Takky. It'll also be networked. My G3 has a DVD/CDRW drive, so making CDs is no problem. If I ever need to, I can just network everything over.
Maybe someday
I've decided the drive is officialy gonig to sit at the bottom of the machine. It's lower than I would like, but it'll do just fine. There will be exposed drive metal on the bottom of the case until I can build a beige cradle for the bottom. About 6" X 6" is all I'll need to build, and only about 1/2" thick. The drive tray will be pretty low, but it won't be an issue if I get a cheap VCR and let it sit on top. VCR sitting side ways to match the lenth vs. width of the CC. Tape loader to the side and maybe an IR window mod to move it to the side of the VCR? I might even paint the VCR beige and slap an Apple logo on it just so it looks right!
OK, that's excessive, but it'd look nice!
Oh, and I had planned to move the hard drive to the side above the AB all along. With the PCI cards in place, I imagine that area will be chopped open and filled. I may yet add the Imation LS-120 drive if I get the IDE card any time soon. Otherwise, till then, I'll just leave a floppy. If the floppy gets in the way of a PCI card, I'll try making a short PCI cable (1-3 inches). PCI slots are easy items to find. A card edge might be tricky though!
If all else fails, I'll put the DVD drive where the floppy is (lower profile and all), and make an external floppy port on the rear. Not ideal, but possible...
I intend to have my custom Power LED/Switch on the top of the unit, and replace the light guide on the power LED with a 2 way (or 3 way), for the IR detector (for Tuner remote), the hard drive activity LED, and probably the power LED. I might set up the controller with my Power LED/Switch board so the color actualy switches from power color to Hard drive color, instead of mixing the two (instead of Green and amber (ren and red mixed), I could get green and red, or equaly so, green or blue, or any color. I should simply get an RGB LED. They are spendy but can produce any color. A simple logic selection circuit can take the inputs and select a specific color to output (3 trimpots per state). I could have green be power, blue be hard drive access, yellow be CD/DVD access, purple be CD and hard drive at once, red be floppy, orange be floppy an HD, etc... You get the idea. I could have a rainbow of colors from one LED, a few logic gates, and a whole load of transistor drivers attached to trios of trimpots. I got one of those huge red 6 element LEDs from Radio Shack as an impulse buy and I thought the effect of sequencing the elements in rotation or random patterns looked pretty cool. I'm thinking of building a logic board that will have 3 modes of operation...
Mode 1: Computer is off. Logic board leaches the 5v+ trickle from the PSU to operate. Does not detect 5V+ on the drive power cable. LED pushbutton switch pulses out to ADB power line to triger power on.
Mode 2: Computer is on. Button is pressed and released. Logic detects power on drive cable, and bypasses output to ADB. Instead sends pulse to LED controller to change sequence patterns (rotate, random, fade, all on, one on, etc...). This would be handles by a small microcontroller or a simple low part count circuit (if a microcontroller is used, it could operate all logic functions of the circuit and the logic for the front indicator LED even).
Mode 3: Computer is on. Button is held down for about 2 or 3 seconds. The previous mode only detects a button press on release of the button. a simple RC time constant circuit would charge while the button is pressed (and drain when released). This would allow the circuit to disable the LED controller pulse, and also send a pulse to the ADB power connection. This would presumably trigger the shut down dialog, as it is when pressing the keyboard power key while the computer is on.
And that would be my "useless but cool" mod I'm planning for my CC Takky. Now that's excessive!
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Richard
richfiles@mac.com
http://richfiles.solarbotics.net/
B&W G3: 2 Disp
Quadra 840av: 3 Disp
Color Classic Takky 6500/275: 128 MB, VGA, TV/FM, DVD/CDRW
LC 580 Trinitron: 68040, 96 MB, TV
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