Article 200 of comp.sys.amiga.reviews: Path: menudo.uh.edu!menudo.uh.edu!usenet From: shambarg@netcom.COM (Scott Shambarger) Newsgroups: comp.sys.amiga.reviews Subject: REVIEW: Emplant (software version 1.7) Followup-To: comp.sys.amiga.emulations Date: 23 Jan 1993 15:40:33 GMT Organization: The Amiga Online Review Column - ed. Daniel Barrett Lines: 326 Sender: amiga-reviews@math.uh.edu (comp.sys.amiga.reviews moderator) Approved: barrett@math.uh.edu Distribution: world Message-ID: <1jrothINNt0c@menudo.uh.edu> Reply-To: shambarg@netcom.COM (Scott Shambarger) NNTP-Posting-Host: karazm.math.uh.edu Keywords: hardware, emulator, Macintosh, commercial PRODUCT NAME Emplant MAC II, IIx, and IIcx emulator, with software version 1.7. [MODERATOR'S NOTE: This review was originally posted in comp.sys.amiga.emulations. It was submitted to c.s.a.reviews by the author, and I changed the layout to conform with the c.s.a.reviews "standard." - Dan] BRIEF DESCRIPTION A hardware Macintosh emulator which runs concurrently with AmigaDOS. AUTHOR/COMPANY INFORMATION Name: Utilities Unlimited, Inc. Address: 1641 McCulloch Blvd., Suite 25-124 Lake Havasu City, AZ 86403 USA Telephone: (602) 680-9004 BBS: (602) 453-9767 E-mail: jdrew@cryo.rain.com (Jim Drew) LIST PRICE I don't know the list price. I paid $300 for Emplant with Appletalk. There is a version with SCSI as well, and a version with neither Appletalk nor SCSI, but I'm not sure of their prices. SPECIAL HARDWARE AND SOFTWARE REQUIREMENTS HARDWARE An Amiga 2000 or 3000 with a 68020 or 68030 processor. (68040 compatibility is unconfirmed, A4000 support is promised "soon", and an A1200 board is in the works.) MAC II/IIx/IIcx ROM's. SOFTWARE Macintosh System 6.0.5 or greater COPY PROTECTION None. MACHINE USED FOR TESTING Hardware: A3000/25, 2Meg Chip RAM, 4Meg Fast RAM. Emplant board, Appletalk option Mac IIx ROMs Software: AmigaDOS 1.3, 2.04, 3.0 (SuperKickstart) Emplant MACII v1.7 AmigaVideo v2.2 REVIEW SCOPE I have decided to write this review as a summary of where this product currently stands in development. The product is quite usable, and features that are planned for the near future will make it quite complete. I am not associated with Utilities Unlimited, (except maybe as an unsolicited beta-tester) and have no financial interests in the product's success. OVERVIEW The Emplant emulator is a hardware/software combination that allows the use of an 68020/68030 powered Amiga to run an environment almost identical to that of a MAC II/IIx/IIcx. (68040 compatibility is unconfirmed). The hardware can support Appletalk and a SCSI interface depending on configuration. The software currently supports hard drive support, up to 16-color 640X400 emulation, and it co-exists favorably in the multitasking environment of AmigaDOS on its own screen. REQUIREMENTS The emulator requires MAC II/IIx/IIcx ROMs and System 6.0.5 or greater. It currently ships as a Zorro II card for the A2000 or A3000 computers. A4000 compatiblity is "soon" and an A1200 board is in the works. You have the option of using Chip or Fast memory, but I would suggest using Fast RAM and plan on having A LOT of it. BACKGROUND I have been caught up in the Emplant fervor since the product was first vaporware in early 1992. Having waited over six months for the product actually to ship, I had allowed my expectations to become a little overblown. Hence, when I finally received my Emplant board and associated software (especially after at least a week of panic that Utilities Unlimited had closed up and headed south), I was inclined to give up in dispair together with quite a number of co-patriots in the Usenet community. Since the Emplant board first shipped, the software has gone through quite a few changes. After downloading what must be my 6th or 7th upgrade from the Utilities Unlimited BBS, I can finally approach the product as a functioning entity (although not a complete one). Version 1.7 of the Emplant MACII software now runs at speeds comparable to a true MAC II. Although it still lacks sound, Amiga printer support, and a conventional way of supporting MAC low-density disks, it can now stand as a usable substitute for the real thing. PRODUCT SUMMARY Functional in Emplant version 1.7 software: o MAC II/IIx/IIcx ROM compatible (required) o Uses all 32bit memory on A3000 and some accelerators (VXL at least) o Hard disk compatible, currently only formats up to 20Meg partitions, but can read any size partitions if formated by another MAC entity (ie. AMax). Removable hard drives supported. o RAM disk supported; (all track oriented AmigaDOS devices are supported) o Appletalk printer/network supported (I haven't tested this) o Disk formats supported: AMax: Amiga drive compatible, used by AMax II/II+ Mac Plus emulator by Readysoft, custom. Emplant: Amiga drive compatible, claimed to be faster than AMax format, custom. MAC (low density): Uses additional hardware called SYBIL (sold by Utilities Unlimited) to read on Amiga drives. I've had no luck with SYBIL. o Amiga video supported using a chunky pixel to planer conversion program. This program copies MAC graphics (stored using a method incompatible with the current Amiga custom chips to a displayable form in an Amiga intuition screen. Video update rate for this conversion can be set by the user from 6 frames a second up to 60. I have found 30-60fps very smooth and have not suffered a significant slowdown in MAC system performance. Modes currently supported: Black and White (1 bit) (very fast) 4 color (2 bit) (very fast) 16 color (4 bit) (slower, but usable even at 60 fps video conversion rate) o Multitasks with AmigaDOS; allow a foreground and background priority based on whether or not the MAC screen is activated. o Support for 32bit Quickdraw. o System 7.0.1 & 7.1 support (I haven't tested this either) o Appletalk serial support from an AmigaDOS driver, so you can use the Appletalk port as a second serial port. o Noclick for Amiga drives NOT functional in version 1.7 software, but forthcoming according to the author: o Disk formats not supported in this version include IBM (low and high density) and MAC high density, slated for next software release. Also, an AMax drive interface is claimed to be forthcoming. o Amiga parallel printer/serial support from MAC side. o Mac sound support. o AGA mode support, all graphics modes, up to 256 colors. PERFORMANCE Speed Tests: (Using Speedometer v3.1) Amiga video: ESC on 25Mhz A3000 Emplant: AmigaVideo Driver v2.2 Mac system: System 6.0.7 ==================================================================== Overall (all with CPU caches ON, and using only 32bit Fast Mem) Software: Emplant Emplant Emplant AMax 2.5 # colors: 4 4 16 2 Update rate (fps): 10 30 60 n/a -------------------------------------------------------------------- CPU 6.03 6.03 5.73 6.60 Graphics (1bit) 6.88 6.13 5.05 6.10 Hard disk speed 1.51 1.50 1.47 1.66 Math 5.83 5.83 3.16 5.56 (1.0=Mac Classic) KWhetstones 7.06 7.06 3.76 5.40 Dhrystones 5.39 5.39 5.18 5.28 (1.0=Mac Classic) FPU KWhetstones 1.86 1.86 1.79 1.91 (1.0=Mac II) ==================================================================== 32bit Quickdraw Video Driver: 2.2 2.2 2.2 2.3 Update rate (fps): 10 30 60 30 -------------------------------------------------------------------- 1 bit (black & white) 1.69 1.50 1.19 1.49 2 bit (4 color) 1.57 1.15 0.86 1.15 4 bit (16 color) 0.85 0.47 0.32 0.48 (1.0=Mac II) Note: The system really bogs down in 16 color mode on an ECS machine. This is due to DMA contention and is a result of the Amiga hardware and not the emulation as such. FINAL NOTES o The emulator requires a program added to the start of the s:startup-sequence. This program reboots the machine the first time it is run, and then patches some system vectors when run on the subsequent boot. There may be some compatibility problems with this.... o I have a few final notes from my experience using Emplant. First I'd like to note that even if you choose only one drive for MAC use, all Amiga drives are disabled (at least under 2.04+). o In 16 color mode, AMax and MAC format disks are not read or written correctly, and even the custom Emplant format is not written correctly. Hard drives work fine in this mode. o The board does not appear to work on the A4000 correctly yet (according to other Emplant user comments). An A1200 board is in the works. o Memory is constrained to the largest continuous block of free memory. I therefore recommend booting the emulator after a system reboot so that the memory isn't fragmented. o No C= installer (yet) o AmigaVideo driver version 2.3 is a memory hog and doesn't appear to speed up ECS machines. (It uses a large MMU table for conversion.) o Mac IIci/IIsi not supported (yet). o On the A3000, a system failure results in a "bus error" (yellow screen) due to the modification of the MMU table. This requires one to turn off the machine to reboot. o When you activate the MAC screen, the MAC mouse also clicks on whatever it is currently over. So if the MAC mouse is over a Delete File gadget, you can't activate the screen without clicking it. o Don't plan on using a 9600 baud modem with Emplant in 16 color mode in the background. COMPATIBILITY I have had a chance to try many programs on Emplant, and I attempted to use the program thoroughly enough to see if it misfunctioned. These programs include (no printer tests): MacWrite II - OK MacDraw II v1.1 - OK Word 4.0 - OK Cricket Draw - OK After Dark v2.0 - OK Risk (B&W) - OK StuffIt v1.6 - OK Tetris (B&W) - OK Lode Runner (B&W) - OK Pipe Dreams (B&W) - OK Robosport (B&W & 16 color) - OK Sim Earth 1.0 (16 color) - not only works but is much prettier and faster than the Amiga version... The only program that didn't work 100% was Excel 3.0. Strangely enough the program itself runs perfectly, but after one quits and the Desktop pops back up, the system crashes (Amiga and MAC). (Sadly I didn't think to test these under MultiFinder, nor test MultiFinder itself. Oops.) CONCLUSION Emplant appears to be just past the threshold of being a usable product. I feel that there are still some key functions that are missing. Among them are Amiga parallel printer support and sound, 100% compatibility, and at the very least AMax interface MAC drive support; but fixes for these appear to be in the making and soon to be completed. In my opinion, this product could become a viable alternative to a the purchase of a complete second system for anyone who needs the use of a Mac II. It remains to be seen if it can become an alternative to such a purchase for a true MAC enthusiast. I believe its true selling point is its ability to multitask seamlessly with AmigaDOS. In fact, most of this review was written in MEmacs while Emplant was running in the background. MAC and MAC II are trademarks of Apple Computer, Inc. Amiga is a trademark of Commodore Business Machines ___________________________________ ______ _____ _____ ______ ______ __ A3000/////Home: 811 Lombardi Lane\ \ ____\ ___\ __ \__ __\__ __ \ ____///// Hillsborough, CA 94010\ \ \ \ \ \ \ \ \\\/ / /Twisted pair: (415)344-4870\ \____ \ \ \ \ \ \ \/_/_/Internet: shambarg@netcom.com\ \ \ \ \ \ \ \ _____________________________________\__\______\_____\_____ \__ \__ _\ --- Daniel Barrett, Moderator, comp.sys.amiga.reviews Send reviews to: amiga-reviews-submissions@math.uh.edu Request information: amiga-reviews-requests@math.uh.edu Moderator mail: amiga-reviews@math.uh.edu