Getting Woz to build a modern System 7 Mac for us :)



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Author	Getting Woz to build a modern System 7 Mac for us :) (Read 51152 times)
Bolkonskij Administrator 1024 MB Posts: 2023	on: September 24, 2021, 15:47 Ok, I posted this elsewhere but since the audience tends to differ, here we go. I hope I can motivate you to participate! :-) --------------------------------------------- The problem Our System 7 hardware gets older. It takes more time & money to keep them running. And some users frown upon the thought of having old hardware in their home. (hi wove! ) So do we all eventually have to move on to Windows machines, emulate Mac OS and pretend we're still System 7 users? We could, but we'd lose a lot by it. And I'm not talking about the software incompatibility issues ... Other niche systems have had the same problem - the Atarians, the Amigans. How do they tackle the problem? They went FPGA. http://frogfind.com/read.php?a=https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Field-programmable_gate_array How would that help us? Essentially it's hardware emulation. It would be new hardware, but acting 100% like the old. Good for the next decades. Imagine: By flashing this FPGA with different cores you could turn the same board into a SE/30 and plant it into an original case. Or you make it an iMac and plant it into the beautiful casing, running Mac OS 9 on it. Or build your own case for it? The Amigans did create such an FPGA, even turning it into a stand-alone computer: The "Vampire". Essentially an FPGA with a core for a 68060 cpu running Amiga OS at high speeds. There's even new software being written for it. I heard the Atarians have the FireBee FPGA though I don't know any details. Imagine running System 7 on a 800 Mhz re-implemented FPGA-based Macintosh? What a screamer ... OK. How do we get a Mac FPGA? For years I had hoped that someone would undertake the task to create a Macintosh FPGA. There has been an attempt at a Mac Plus core for the MIST FPGA, but it stalled again and again. For completion it would require someone with - a deep hardware understanding - a dedication to (classic) Mac OS - not primary financial interest as there is no mass-market and you're likely to "just" break-even - not being afraid of Tim's lawyers I know what you're thinking and you're right. Nobody on earth will fullfil all four criteria. Well, like I said, you're right. But there is one person that comes to my mind that could match at least 3 out of 4. Guess the name? The Woz. Did I lose my mind? No! Consider: - Woz is an overall amazingly cool guy - He's interested in hardware (rather than software) - While he's more of an Apple II guy, he's not a stranger to the Mac. - If he builds e.g. 3.000 FPGAs for hobbyists, Tim Apple won't sue Woz for the bad press alone. Even if The Woz wouldn't want to do it himself, he might know the right people - protected under his sacred wings. If you got a name, you gotta use it, right? How could we ever get Woz to think about it even? Remember the days we pestered companies like LucasArts to port X-Wing to Mac OS? Sometimes it worked, sometimes not. But when it worked, it was because of a collective effort by a community convincing the decision-makers. Let's try the same thing. I don't propose pestering poor Woz! Instead, let's coordinate sending him Christmas Cards for 2021! Wish him a Merry Christmas / Happy Holidays (whatever you'd like) and ask him about creating a classic Mac OS FPGA. Ask nicely. Be polite. Tell him Mac OS is still being used and loved. Tell him, it needs to be preserved. Tell him you trust him to do it. To top it off, you could create the very Christmas Card on System 7 to show how useful it can still be and mention that. Print Shop (Deluxe) is a great software for that. See S7T forums member Europa's thread here: http://system7today.com/forums/index.php?topic=3167 Or pixel a nice Christmas pic, print and glue it onto the card :-) I for one will use Studio/1 and pixel some b&w 1-bit Christmas motive. I'll definitely send him a card, I just wonder if someone else from here would love to join in? I'm writing this September, I know. Christmas 2021 seems far away. But I think we're all busy with our lives and having some lead time will be helpful. Plus if you're sending the card from somewhere around the world to the U.S. (like me!) it'll likely take some more days to arrive. The more cards the man gets the more vivid our community will look like and the more likely such a new FPGA might become. Anyone interested in joining in? Let me know and I'll send you the address.
Last Edit: September 24, 2021, 15:53 by Bolkonskij
Bolkonskij Administrator 1024 MB Posts: 2023	Reply #1 on: October 26, 2021, 11:37 Anyone? push

68040 512 MB Posts: 950 68k - thy kingdom come, thy will be done !	Reply #2 on: November 03, 2021, 12:51 I never understood the frenzy with which the Amiga community keeps developing new systems - and I say that as a die hard Amiga fanboi. Neither OS/2 nor BeOS or any of the many other alternative operating systems ever inspired such a devoted following, long after the original system was intentionally allowed to die a miserable death (bad conscious?) Should I badmouth Atari now? Naa, they feel bad enough about themselves already ;-) But in any case, porting SW to an emulator is ez, as long the emulation is good enough, the software will never mind. But HW is a different topic - specially with as closely fence environment as Apple always was. From the floppy disc to the HD controller - Apple systems were the epiphany of proprietary solutions, with many of the specs never made public (at least not in a legal form). And I am sure the legal department at Cupertino would have a field day if anyone tried to build an actual Apple PC today - that wasn't made by Apple. The difference to the Amiga ecosystem is that for all practical purpose the Original Commodore corporation has long gone and all copyrights that are still being defended there relate to software only. But Apple is a different beast and neither of the two Steves is in any position now, to just grant us a reprieve from the army of corporate lawyers tasked with nothing else, but to defend the brand. What developer turned entrepreneur would want to dig through tons of ancient technical documents, try to fill in the countless blanks - left there by either history or corporate secrecy - only to then risk being dragged into court to be sued silly over ... an enterprise that could never turn him a profit in the first place?

Syntho 64 MB Posts: 103 System 7 Newcomer!	Reply #3 on: December 04, 2021, 04:31 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=USHvvSbYmJA - if only someone could whip up something like this that runs System 7.

Bolkonskij Administrator 1024 MB Posts: 2023	Reply #4 on: December 04, 2021, 17:06 I'm almost certain if the Mac had gone down back in 1996 / 1997, we'd have as many cool System 7 FPGA systems like the Amigans. Hence, many may not seem the need for such a device as the Mac "is still around". Which is why it's important to remind folks it'd be a great idea. Because it fits in a thread on writing Woz about old tech, here's a photo taken by Applefritter's Tom Owad. He met Woz and showed him an Apple I board he owns. (I reuploaded the pic because I'm sure they won't like hotlinking, the full story is on applefritter) http://images.macintosh.garden/2021/12/04/woz-apple1.jpg Look at it! Look at those eyes. I love how excited he is seeing his 40+ year old work. I'm stressing the excited because that's what you don't see very often anymore. But it's the same kind of excitement that I forever connect with System 7 Macs.
Last Edit: December 04, 2021, 17:15 by Bolkonskij
68040 512 MB Posts: 950 68k - thy kingdom come, thy will be done !	Reply #5 on: December 27, 2021, 02:20 I wonder how much (little?) RAM that thing has... And what might he think of a guy who build himself a complete MacOS Workstation ... fully loaded ... on MacOS 8.1 and refuses to abandon 68k no matter what? I'd really like to know his point of view on people who actually use vintage systems, rather than just hanging on to them.
Last Edit: December 28, 2021, 11:49 by 68040
Bolkonskij Administrator 1024 MB Posts: 2023	Reply #6 on: December 27, 2021, 09:32 Good question. Given that he attended Kansas Fest (a retro computing festival) as a regular visitor and hung around chatting with folks a few years ago I'd say Woz doesn't think we're lunatics. That would have been the other Steve who obviously had no respect whatsoever for anything from the past. P.S. Your typo of 60k is an unintended pun. While it should probably be 68k (cpu architecture), it also makes sense in terms of money P.P.S I saw I didn't mention here that I sent my Christmas card. Hope it go through on time.
Last Edit: December 27, 2021, 13:37 by Bolkonskij
68040 512 MB Posts: 950 68k - thy kingdom come, thy will be done !	Reply #7 on: December 28, 2021, 11:52 Ooops, typo is gone. :-O And "that other Steve" wasn't so much an enemy of vintage stuff, as he wasn't fond of people who didn't buy Apple tech from him (and him alone). Reusing old Apple hard- and software meant less purchases from Cupertino - and I am convinced that Jobs' ego and his sales figures were linked at the hipp.

Old Mac Geezer 64 MB Posts: 112	Reply #8 on: August 01, 2023, 21:23 I wonder if it's possible to run System 7, in ProxMox?

17lifers 32 MB Posts: 57	Reply #9 on: August 23, 2023, 13:11 you could use sheepshaver/qemu-ppc in a lightweight linux+x11 enviorenment (debian xfce, lubuntu, Slax)

Old Mac Geezer 64 MB Posts: 112	Reply #10 on: September 09, 2023, 12:22 How do you go about doing that, though, without violating Apple's patents? Apple has never been a company that shies away from a good patent fight, and they have the legal muscle to pummel anyone into submission. A C&D letter, alone, will probably be enough to scare away anyone wanting to do this. I don't think Woz, or anyone else, will touch this project idea with a 50 foot pole. It's not as if Apple has been defunct for decades, like many other computer companies of the 70's and 80's. They are still here, stronger than ever, and ready to vigorously defend their intellectual property, as they have shown repeatedly, in the past.
Last Edit: September 09, 2023, 12:23 by Old Mac Geezer
Bolkonskij Administrator 1024 MB Posts: 2023	Reply #11 on: September 09, 2023, 13:28 I agree @Old Mac Geezer regarding Apple's legal department but I have strong doubts they'd really sue Steve Wozniak over building a replica. That would be extremely bad press. And because of that I sent him a postcard about this. Since then, I noticed someone created a Macintosh Plus core for the MiSTer FPGA. It is, however, pretty rough around the edges and bugged. To make matters worse, the maintainer obviously didn't get the feedback he had hoped for an quit further development. Too bad.

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