I picked up a Wimodem232 and cables for my //c and IIgs. I can get everything seemingly working fine on the IIgs, but am struggling to get it working on my //c. Which is really what I wanted it for, as I have a Uthernet II for my IIgs. My //c is a ROM 255 with the "bad" serial timing chip instead of the oscillator. But, it can transmit at 115200 baud using ADTPro no problem. So I'm hoping thats not the issue. Plus I've seen at least one person report the 255 worked with the Wimodem, but then again maybe their board had the oscillator fix done. I can't say for sure.
On the IIgs I was able to make it work by launching Proterm 3.1, setting up a 300 baud modem, and basically removing the entire init string. I think I may have left just AT in there, in the event PT is at least expecting an OK when it initializes it. Then I had to play around, as I am not familiar with PT. I used Telix on my IBM compatibles back in the early 90s, but I never had a modem for my //c growing up. As I recall in Telix, I could just issue AT commands directly without doing anything first (I could be mistaken, that was a long time ago). But in PT, it seems like I have to tell it to dial out to a blank number in order to issue commands. On my IIgs, when I do that, the menu in the middle of the screen with open apple shortcuts disappears, the header changes from "Offline" to "Online", and I'm given a cursor where I can type AT commands. I was able to issue the ATI to confirm its working, connect it to my router, and was able to ATDT to a BBS to problem.
But when I do the same on the //c, I get different behavior. To rule it out the baud rate, I set it back to 300 on the IIgs. I boot up PT on my //c, set up the modem in a similar fashion, and PT passes the "Initializing Modem" step, and moves to the terminal. Here I do the same thing, issue a dial to a blank number. For maybe a second at most, the open apple apple shortcuts disappear, and the header changes to "online". But then it immediately goes offline, and the shortcut menu pops back up. No matter what I try, I can't get PT to stay in online mode to issue commands to the Wimodem. Am I doing something wrong?
I've also tried Agate on both the IIgs and //c, and cant even figure out how to get to the point of issuing commands to the modem on either computer.
Any ideas or suggestions on what might be going on with the //c? Or how to make Agate (or any other recommended terminal software) work?
Thanks!
-Nick
The first version of the Apple //c with the model number ending in 4000 had a serial port timing issue that happened to show up pretty much only with third party modems. Apple supported chip replacement by dealers IF the customer became aware of it and requested the fix. This was not a problem in the second batch of //c's with the model number ending in 4100, nor the Apple //c+
Yes, I am aware of the early serial port timing issue. And as noted, mine is one of those units. The strange thing is though that ADTPro works fine, but I couldn't get the WiModem232 to respond properly even at 300 baud, which as far as I am aware, shouldn't even be affected by the timing issue.
I did some more searching, and found a thread over at the WiModem forums that has some recommended init strings for PT 3.1 and Apples. I am now able to get it working on the //c at 300, 2400, and 9600 baud using the recommended init string(s). I didn't even consider the init string could be an issue, as it "just works" on the IIgs up to 9600 with no init string (just an "AT"). Maybe thats because of the fact the IIgs has 8 pins and more signals for proper handshaking, as where the 5 pin DIN on the //c doesn't? I'm not a serial expert by any means, so I'm just guessing. Its also been years since I looked at and wrote custom init strings for my modems. Its possible the inti string is changing the expected signaling to be compatable with the //c. Guess I'll brush up on that.
The link in case anyone else stumbles across this and finds it helpful, is below. I also found that pressing Closed Apple - T drops you to the terminal, to issue commands, without having to "dial" a blank number. A bit more convenient. Also, if anyone else has one, I had inquired with the creator a few days ago as to why my WiModem232 downgraded from 3.5 to 3.4 when I had it check for a firmware upgrade. He said technically 3.5 just has a fix for the non-rs232 version, and 3.4 is the latest for the 232 version. But he also said 3.6 would be out soon, and that will have some new features. He didn't elaborate what though.
https://www.cbmstuff.com/forum/showthread.php?tid=477
I was able to connect to the 80's Apple BBS. Very cool. I'll have to register and actually check it out later. The dog is bothering me for her nightly walk.
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