Radius Rocket & Radius Thunder 24/GT compatible?

[joethezombie]

Another piece of information I will relay from the printed AOL archives that came with my Rocket:

Subj: RocketWare 1.5.1 Patch February 18, 1995
From: RadiusTS
File: RocketWare 1.5.1 Patch.sit (21039 bytes)
DL time (14400 baud): < 1 minute
Download count: 414
AUTHOR: Radius, Inc.
EQUIPMENT: Radius Rocket w/RocketWare 1.5
NEEDS: Rocket w/RocketWare 1.5

Previously available as part of the PhotoBooster 1.1.1 software archive, this patcher has been uploaded separately for the sake of any customers who can benefit from the changes listed below but who do not own a PhotoBooster.

The primary features incorporated into this patch are a fix for an A/ROSE INIT problem and faster floppy mounting. The A/ROSE fix allows the Rocket to work with Token Ring cards and certain Ethernet cards that had not been supported before. In full, this patch, which is to be applied ONLY to RocketWare 1.5:
* Makes RAM physically and logically contiguous;
* Fixes an A/ROSE INIT problem with LockMemory;
* Fixes AppleTalk 58 Network Control Panel; and
* Fixes slow floppy mounting with high density diskettes.

This patcher will not make the Rocket compatible with System 7.5 or do anything beyond what is listed above.


===============
Confirmed virus-free with Disinfectant 3.5; "1.5.1" because you can never have too many decimals.

2/18/96. America Online: StevenBros

I've searched on and off for years to locate RocketWare 1.5.1 or PhotoBooster 1.1.1, but have never managed to discover either. So if you are one of those 414 people who downloaded "RocketWare 1.5.1 Patch.sit" back in the day, could you share the file? Please?


EDIT!

Well imagine that! Thanks to @slomacuser, the archive he pointed to above actually contains PhotoBooster 1.1.1 !!!! And inside that archive, is the Rocketware 1.5.1 patch! Hell yeah! Thanks again @slomacuser! What a time to be alive!

 

[joethezombie]

I feel I'm spamming the thread now, but I will also mention the AOL archives also included the 1996 Rocket Compatibility Guide. It lists hundreds of hardware and software products deemed incompatible with the Rocket. A quick skim for video cards single out RasterOps cards mostly as incompatible, as well as the SuperMac ColorCard/24. I'll try to get a scan or an OCR of the guide uploaded at some point.

 

[JDW]

Thanks to @slomacuser, the archive he pointed to above actually contains PhotoBooster 1.1.1 !!!! And inside that archive, is the Rocketware 1.5.1 patch!

Sorry, but I can't find a link. What is the download link on Macintosh Garden?

I feel I'm spamming the thread now...

Remember, this is Tinker Different, not one of those other forums. Here, freedom reigns. Especially so because I created this thread. Besides, logic dictates that all of your posts are on topic insofar as they pertain to the Radius Rocket, and the word Rocket is found in the title of this thread. Hence, you have the liberty to post away. In fact, if you can point me to the download URL of that 1.5.1 patcher, I wouldn't mind if you posted what you had for breakfast in this thread!

 

[slomacuser]

Index of /mirrors/radius.vintagebox.de/download/radius/software/mac/PhotoBooster/​

and

Index of /mirrors/Radius Software/mac/PhotoBooster/​

 

[JDW]

Thanks.

I also just confirmed that the RadiusWare 1.5.1 Patcher is found inside Download #1 on Macintosh Garden here:

Radius Rocket Software - Macintosh Garden

The software for a Radius Rocket. RocketWare is for running the Rocket in accelerator mode. Version 1.3.2 and 1.5 included. RocketShare is for running the Rocket in a hardware VM mode. A Stage II Rocket cannot run RocketWare. There is 1.0, 1.1 and 1.3.1 provided. Also included: PhotoBooster...

macintoshgarden.org

I also updated that Macintosh Garden page with more info to credit you, Joe, and to make it clear the 1.5.1 patcher can be found there.

And before I patched, I booted with version 1.5 and then inserted a 1.44MB floppy and found it took 6.5 seconds to see it appear on the Desktop. After patching to 1.5.1, it took 4.5 seconds to appear. So that confirms what @joethezombie posted earlier which said "Fixes slow floppy mounting with high density diskettes."

All great stuff. Thanks, guys!

 

[joethezombie]

I feel ashamed that the patcher was staring me in the face FOR YEARS! To be fair, a Google search for "RocketWare 1.5.1" yields only this thread, and it never occurred to me that the patch would be in a Photo Booster archive until I OCR'd that AOL printout yesterday. Thanks for updating the description on the Garden. Certainly easier find now!

 

[JDW]

Regarding "Sound Manager 2.0" which is RocketWARE compatible, I found the following info today...

The Sound Manager was first introduced in system software version 6.0 and has been significantly enhanced since that time. Prior to system software version 6.0, applications could create sounds using the Sound Driver.​

​

The enhanced Sound Manager included in system software versions 6.0.7 and later provides the ability to have multiple channels of sampled sound produce output on the Macintosh audio hardware concurrently. (Previous versions of the Sound Manager could play only a single channel of sampled sound at a time.) This allows a layering of sound that can bring a touch of reality to a simulation or presentation and permits applications to incorporate synthesized speech output with any other kind of Macintosh-generated sound. Sound Manager version 3.0 extended this capability to allow multiple channels of any kind of sound data to play simultaneously.​

SOURCE (pages 2-6 & 2-14): https://developer.apple.com/library/archive/documentation/mac/pdf/Sound/Sound_Manager.pdf​

This means the thing called "Sound Manager" itself didn't appear until System 6.0 and was "enhanced" (with no version number mentioned) in 6.0.7. We know Sound Manager 3.0 didn't appear until Update 3.0 for System 7.1 and 7.1.1 Pro. But the question remains, in what OS version did Sound Manager 2.0 come out? The System 7 WIKI states the following:

In the theme of Blue, improvements in System 7 are significant but incremental.​

• A new Sound Manager API, version 2.0, replaces the older ad hoc APIs. The new APIs provide significantly improved]hardware abstraction, and higher-quality playback.

So it's not clear if the above means System 7.0 through 7.1.x or just 7.1.x. But it does offer helpful guidance to say that it is not System 6. We already know sound under System 6 should be fine with RocketWare.

Even so, because I won't be running 7.0.1 and instead will use 7.1 or 7.1.1 Pro, just without the Sound Manager 3.0 extension installed, I am guessing that setup should make the OS RocketWare compliant. Meaning, I've clean-installed System 7.1, then installed Update 3.0, then removed the Sound Manager extension from the Extensions folder, because that is version 3, and prior to version 3, there was no Sound Manager extension.

The is important information because we know from Radius documentation that Sound Manger 3.0 and higher is NOT compatible with RocketWare.

 

[joethezombie]

It seems Enhanced Sound Manager refers to any version of Sound Manager which is 2.0 or higher. The following is from the Sound_Manager.pdf linked above:

You can use the SndSoundManagerVersion function to determine which version of the Sound Manager is present. Listing 2-10 shows how to determine if the enhanced Sound Manager is available.

Listing 2-10 Determining if the enhanced Sound Manager is present
FUNCTION MyHasEnhancedSoundManager: Boolean;
VAR

myVersion: NumVersion;
BEGIN

IF MyTrapAvailable(_SoundDispatch) THEN
BEGIN

myVersion := SndSoundManagerVersion;

MyHasEnhancedSoundManager := myVersion.majorRev >= 2;
END

ELSE
MyHasEnhancedSoundManager := FALSE

END;

So by checking the value of SndSoundManagerVersion, Enhanced Sound Manager is FALSE for any SndSoundMangerVersion less than 2.

There is also a third party accounting of SoundManager in the book "Sex, Lies, and Video Games - How to Write a Macintosh Arcade Game" by Bill Hensler. I'll copy-paste the relevant portion of the book, but you should be able to find a scan online. The following is taken from Chapter 11:

Sound Manager: A Brief History
The Mac sound system has had an interesting past. From a simple driver that barely kept the speaker fed to the CD-quality sound playback systems of the current Mac lineup, it's been a case of "You've come a long way, baby." So on with our history tour of the Sound Manager. Keep your hands in the vehicle at all times and please, no flash photography.

Sound Driver
The original Mac came with a sound driver. You wouldn't want to call it a Sound Manager as it barely managed play sounds. The original, phone-book edition of Inside Mac documented the sound driver's simple square wave synthesizer, which could produce Atari 2600-like buzzing sounds. It contained a four-tone synthe- sizer that allowed the programmer to set the waveform that would be used for each of the four channels. You could use any 8- bit sample you wanted as long as it fit into 255 bytes. And the coolest part of the Mac's sound driver was the sampled sound playback. With this part of the driver you could play back 22 kHz 8-bit samples that sounded really impressive. Unless your Mac was parked next to an Amiga.
You could play back sampled sounds with the sound driver but you had no built-in way of recording them. You'd have to drop $125 and buy yourself a MacNifty sound digitizer if you wanted to record annoying sounds for your Mac.

Sound Manager
Time marched on and the Mac II rolled out. Along with a 68020 and color displays, the Mac II had the first Apple sound chip, known as the Apple Sound Chip or the ASC by the technologi- cally hip. With the chip came a whole redesign of the sound driver to support it. The new software interface to the sound hardware was so impressive that the name changed from the sound driver to the Sound Manager and a gained a huge chapter in the new Inside Mac, volume V. Trouble was, the only thing this new Sound Manager managed to do was lie. The documentation for the Sound Manager was not just slightly wrong, it outright lied. And where it did document features that actually existed, it was usually wrong.

Apple tried to fix up the Sound Manager with the release of System 6.0. Strike one. Not only were old bugs not fixed but they introduced new ones. Apple tried again with system 6.0.2. Strike two, a total whiff. Fixed more bugs and added a few more, though 6.0.2 did fix more bugs than it introduced. The preliminary new In- side Mac Sound Manager managed to lie about only a few things. Strike three, you're outta' here. Next batter.

Sound Manager Part II
The next Sound Manager to take the plate was the one contained in system 6.0.7, Sound Manager version 2.0. This Sound Manager came with a whole new chapter in the new Inside Mac, volume VI, a tome so large it has its own climate. This new manager docu- mented how you could record sounds from your Mac without buy- ing a third-party digitizer. How you could play sound files directly off the disk. How you could compress sounds in a format that the Mac could play back from other programs. How you could play multiple channels of sound. And for the game programmer, an ap- proved way to handle double buffering. The best part about these features was that they actually existed. You could read about them and spend a few evenings coding and actually get sounds out of the speaker just as it was documented. This Sound Manager wasn't a home run, but it was a legitimate stand-up triple.

Sound Manager Part III
The pitch: low and inside. The swing. Whack! It's going ... going . . . gone. With Sound Manager 3.0 Apple said good-bye to Mr. Spaulding and said hello to a whole feast of features. Backwards- compatible with Sound Manager 2.0, it also managed to squeeze in support for 16-bit, 44.1 kHz sound. A plug-in sound component ar- chitecture. Support for third-party sound boards. And best of all a two- to threefold increase in speed. This gain in speed allowed many game programmers to stop handling their own sound pro- cessing and use the Mac's. Which was the goal of the Sound Man- agers from day one.

Of course, this isn't official Apple documentation, but reading that seems to infer the earliest versions of Sound Manger were in System 5, with a somewhat improved version introduced in System 6.0, and further fixes in 6.0.2. Sound Manager 2.0, the start of Enhanced Sound Manager, took flight in 6.0.7. And of course we know Sound Manager 3.0 premiered in System 7.1 Update 2.

 

[JDW]

Joe, thank you.

As far as the Radius Rocket with RocketWARE is concerned, it boils down to this...

Compatibility: The Rocket hates sound.* The system tricks it uses to run make handling sounds a pain (if not impossible). Do not install Sound Manager 3.0 or later! It can handle SM 2.0 for some programs, and I never have had problems with Finder Sounds, but many games will not work, most notably Ambrosia games, but you can still use the motherboard processor for those.​

SOURCE: https://lowendmac.com/1992/radius-rocket-ii-in-a-mac-ii/​

and this...

Since the Rocket doesn't have its own sound chip, it needs to rely on the host CPU chip. Trying to deal with audio from the host while the Rocket is actually controlling the bus is very tricky, and doesn't work very well. RocketWare 1.5 works fairly well with Sound Manager 2.0, however the Rocket is totally incompatible with Sound Manager 3.0 and Sound Edit Pro. Radius does not recommend the use of the Rocket whenever audio is concerned.​

SOURCE: http://archive.retro.co.za/mirrors/68000/www.vintagemacworld.com/radius/rockets.html​

 

[Trash80toG4]

Great info, gang. Can't wait to play with mine again.

@JDW looks to me that you have the 25MHz Rocket, given the lack of heatsink? If so, the power requirements ought to be lower than the 33/40MHz versions of the Rocket?

Has anyone got info on the power required for the three versions?

 

[JDW]

@JDW looks to me that you have the 25MHz Rocket, given the lack of heatsink? If so, the power requirements ought to be lower than the 33/40MHz versions of the Rocket?
Has anyone got info on the power required for the three versions?

I absolutely have the 33MHz version. I added the gold heatsink to the CPU (which is a CPU that has the FPU). I also purchased some purple RAM from SiliconInsider, and I must say it's the lowest profile RAM I've ever used. Love the gold-plating too, which you don't see on most other RAM SIMMs made today.






Now, regarding your question about "power required" (i.e., Current Consumption), the Radius Rocket MANUAL covers both the 33MHz and 25MHz versions, and the power requirements are given on Manual pages 54 & 55 here:

Radius Rocket Users Manual : Radius Inc. : Free Download, Borrow, and Streaming : Internet Archive

User's Manual for Radius Rockets.

archive.org

And that's another reason I purchased the Purple RAM, because it only has 2 chips (and yet it's NOT "composite RAM"), which means overall current consumption for RAM should be significantly lower than the old 8-chip RAM of the 1990s, on which the power consumption numbers in the Rocket Manual are based.

Lastly, if you're wondering why I filled all RAM slots on the Rocket, since filling only 1 slot is perfectly acceptable, it's because I can boost READ speeds from 36MB/sec to 50MB/sec via Interleaving. That is discussed in the Rocket MANUAL here:

Radius Rocket Users Manual : Radius Inc. : Free Download, Borrow, and Streaming : Internet Archive

User's Manual for Radius Rockets.

archive.org

 

[Trash80toG4]

Very curious, until yours, I'd not seen a 33MHZ Rocket sans heatsink?

Slight clarification:
As you did, I filled both of the four SIMM Banks (about $2,500 worth!) when the Rocket (in my purpose bought IIx launch pad) was a new product. As you said, that enabled interleaved memory access.

 

[JDW]

I acquired my Rocket from the original owner who at some point in the past had removed the CPU in order to repurpose it in another Mac. So before he shipped the card to me, he acquired another 68040 CPU which of course did not have a heat sink on it, and he sent that CPU to me along with the Rocket. When I received it, I put on the gold heatsink shown in my photo.