A/UX 1.1.1 and Apple 4*8 video cards

[William Roberts]

The Apple 4*8 video card is apparently incompatible with A/UX 1.1.1, though
it works quite happily with A/UX 2.0.

The 4*8 card comes in a box bearing a red triangle sticker and the number
6.0.5, which seems to reflect the fact that attempting to boot any System
below 6.0.5 in a machine with a 4*8 card causes an alert which says that
"This version of 32-Bit QuickDraw requires System 6.0.5 or higher",
followed by a System crash.

Even with a 6.0.5 system in the Mac partition, A/UX 1.1.1 will not
boot with the 4*8 video card: we have tried it in a Mac II and a Mac IIcx
using a card populated for full 8-bit colour. In both cases A/UX gets to

        "run in circles, scream and shout"

and then hangs. Putting an old Apple colour card in either machine works fine.
 
Chatting to the UK A/UX support people, we concluded that the problem is probably
that A/UX 1.1.1 implements Color QuickDraw (not the same thing as 32-Bit
QuickDraw) and also loads the video card driver from the ROMs on the card.
A/UX 2.0 implements 32-Bit QuickDraw so that works ok, and A/UX 1.0 didn't
read the driver from the card so that might work....

None of the documentation with the video card or the monitor mentioned 6.0.5
anywhere - this is a definite deficiency of the documentation and Apple should
take steps to ensure that the video card documentation includes an explicit
warning that System 6.0.5 is required for this card (and that A/UX 1.1.1 won't
work with it). A cryptic red warning sticker just isn't good enough.
-- 

William Roberts                 ARPA: liam at cs.qmw.ac.uk
Queen Mary & Westfield College  UUCP: liam at qmw-cs.UUCP
Mile End Road                   AppleLink: UK0087
LONDON, E1 4NS, UK              Tel:  071-975 5250 (Fax: 081-980 6533)