General Questions [about the Apple IIe]

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General Questions [about the Apple IIe]

So I purchased an Apple IIe yesterday. It wasn't working, had horizontal bars across the screen. After much troubleshooting, replacing the 6502 did the trick.

I had an old Rockwell 65c02 lying around so that's what I put in. I'm not sure if that's going to cause any issues at all? I believe there are some differences between the 6502 and 65c02 but I don't know how those would relate to any issues with the Apple IIe.

 

First question I had I found an answer to on the forum, it was basically about the Delete key and it not deleting characters from the screen. I now know that printing out a delete character is its intended purpose.

 

Next question. The arrow keys, I can move the cursor left, right and down but when I press the up arrow key the cursor doesn't move, it disappears while holding down the up arrow as if it is going to move but it never does so that leads me to believe that the up arrow key is functional. Is the cursor not supposed to be able to move up?

Along those same lines. I have a game, Ms. Pacman... I can use the arrow keys to move but only left and right work, up and down does not.

 

Hoping that someone here could shed some light.. thanks in advance.

 

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That is normal for the IIe.

That is normal for the IIe. Cursor movement is actually done with the ESC key. After pressing esc, you can move the cursor at will with the arrow keys. When you are finished, press the space bar to end cursor movement and you can then copy characters to the right of the new location using the right arrow if you want. When you hit return, anything to the right of the last cursor location will be ignored.

 

As for games and other software, they can use the arrow keys any way they want (or not). Sometimes other keys are used to move in each direction.

 

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Suggest you try a diagnostic

Suggest you try a diagnostic program to test your keyboard fully- you can at least eliminate some doubt this way.

 

See

 

https://mirrors.apple2.org.za/ftp.apple.asimov.net/images/disk_utils/diagnostics/

and 

https://www.applefritter.com/content/best-diagnostic-software-apple-iie

 

For a range of diagnostic utilities. 

 

 

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Bad-Apple wrote:Suggest you
Bad-Apple wrote:

Suggest you try a diagnostic program to test your keyboard fully- you can at least eliminate some doubt this way.

 

See

 

https://mirrors.apple2.org.za/ftp.apple.asimov.net/images/disk_utils/diagnostics/

and 

 

No diagnostic software is needed to test a keyboard.

 

1. Drop to BASIC, either by loading it from diskette, or by using Control+Reset.

2. Press the Esc key (do not hold it, just press it once).  The cursor shape may change with a '+' inside it, depending on the system, or there may be no indication of using the edit mode. 

3. Press the Up Arrow key. The cursor should move up one line. 

4. Press Esc again to exit editing mode.

5. Press the Down Arrow key, at any time in AppleSoft BASIC, including when you are NOT in editor mode, and the cursor should descend one line.

 

If neither of these work, then you may have bad keyswitches, or a few other problems.

 

You can test all symbol characters keys just by pressing them. You can test the shift keys and the capslock key in conjunction with the normal characters. 

 

Press Return and if there is anything on a line that isn't a valid instruction, you'll see 'Syntax Error'. This tests the Return key. 

 

To test the Control key, hold it and press 'G' and you should hear a tone. (Control+G is the ANSI character 'Bell'). 

Beyond that, the only keys to test are the open and closed apple keys, and the reset key (or on a ][ or ][+, the Reset and Repeat keys).  

 

You can the Apple keys those by performing a Control+Apple+Reset, and on a ][/][+, you can test Repeat simply by typing any character, then tapping Repeat. 

 

Everything that you need to fully test any Apple ][ series keyboard, is in ROM. 

 

 

 

For Ms. Pacman (in keyboard mode) the standard keyboard controls are:

A (Up)

Z (Down)

<- (Left)

-> (Right)

Esc (Pause)

Control+S (Toggle Sound)

Reset (Quit)

 

 

 

 

 

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Thank you so much for all of

Thank you so much for all of the info.

 

I was able to sort out the issues with the keyboard. Turns out it was just user error and lacking the understanding of how the Apple IIe keyboard works.

 

About the 65C02? Has anyone had any issues substituting this for the original 6502?

 

Thanks,

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diychris wrote:Thank you so
diychris wrote:

Thank you so much for all of the info.

 

I was able to sort out the issues with the keyboard. Turns out it was just user error and lacking the understanding of how the Apple IIe keyboard works.

 

About the 65C02? Has anyone had any issues substituting this for the original 6502?

 

Thanks,

 

You can use any pin-compatible 6502 in a non-enhanced //e, including the 6502, 6502A, and 6502-II, as well as the 65C02 and 65C02A; while the enhanced //e reuires the 65C02 as part of the complete upgrade spec. 

 

As far as the base //e cares, they are identical 99.99% of the time. 

 

 

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