VPC and hardware emulation

Posted:
in Future Apple Hardware edited January 2014
All:



Years ago, a company called Orange Micro made a board that was basically an x86 (286 that I recall) on an expansion-slot card. It had its own processor, memory, video, the whole schmeer. Has this type of solution simply become unrealistic (cost or difficulty-wise), or is it that running VPC is just so much less hassle and less expensive?



One would think that a VPC solution would be good for the causual user that needs Windows access, the hardware solution might be good for a more serious multi-platform requirement without the extra box sitting next to you.



Additionally, has the state of circuitry gotten to the point where one of these hardware options could be done on a PCMCIA-size card? Maybe double-thick?



Just an intellectual exercise

Comments

  • Reply 1 of 20
    keyboardf12keyboardf12 Posts: 1,379member
    i told the connectix people at macworld i would pay $400 for such a device. there really wasn't much interest. it must be more work for them that they care/can take on.



    oh well. wasn't there a rumor about VPC and jagwire running better?
  • Reply 2 of 20
    cliveclive Posts: 720member
    [quote]Originally posted by keyboardf12:

    <strong>i told the connectix people at macworld i would pay $400 for such a device. there really wasn't much interest. it must be more work for them that they care/can take on.</strong><hr></blockquote>



    Connectix make software, not hardware, so i can't see them being interested anyway.



    Orange still makes such boards don't they?
  • Reply 3 of 20
    progmacprogmac Posts: 1,850member
    i know dealmac had some up a few weeks ago for something like $50. they were 200mhz mmx chips
  • Reply 4 of 20
    havanashavanas Posts: 99member
    I believe they were called "Detente" cards from Orange. I really wish Connectix would create a 500mhz celeron PCI card for Macs that interfaced with VirtualPC. If they were in the $150 - 250 range it would be worth it to me for the speed and space saved from getting a real PC. The celeron should be small/cool enough for this to work, just don't think the market is big enough for this kind of thing.
  • Reply 5 of 20
    [quote]Originally posted by Banana Nut Bread:

    <strong>All:



    One would think that a VPC solution would be good for the causual user that needs Windows access, the hardware solution might be good for a more serious multi-platform requirement without the extra box sitting next to you.



    Additionally, has the state of circuitry gotten to the point where one of these hardware options could be done on a PCMCIA-size card? Maybe double-thick?

    </strong><hr></blockquote>



    I guess my question should be refined a bit...



    It would seem to make sense (in my twisted logic) for Connectix to offer a "hardware accelerator" for VPC. That way, you could use VPC straight out of the box or, if you needed more heavy-duty capacity, buy the hardware accelerator that was really a PIII or even a PIV of some lower-end that was low-power and low-cost.



    Add to that the possibility that this mythic "accelerator" could be done in a PCI card that could be used in a laptop ... well, talk about the best of both worlds :-)
  • Reply 6 of 20
    penheadpenhead Posts: 45member
    Apple even shipped macs with a DOS card in the early nineties i think, with the pizza box 601's. I think they were 66Mhz 486's ..



    Nah I dont think there would be much point in an addon card. If you really need PC hardware, you can get it so cheap it makes me cry (being an apple user, of course) ...
  • Reply 7 of 20
    penheadpenhead Posts: 45member
    If the idea is to forgo graphics, memory and I/O systems in a new PC - to use everything but the processor in the mac hardwar, I think the R&D needed to make the card work would make it more expensive than buying a run-of-the-mill PC.
  • Reply 7 of 20
    I tried using VPC for years, but it was too slow. Finally, I just gave up and bought the cheapest PC I could find, an AMD Duron 1GHz for ?600.



    Sure I felt dirty, but it finally let me take my work home and get something accomplished. It's networked in with my G4 and iBook, and plays well with all my peripherals. And I have to say, XP is more stable than OSX for me, although I admit I use OSX more than XP.



    It would have been nice to have a hardware/software solution from Connectix, which was rumored eons ago, but this is a good solution for me. I can even play games. Solitaire rocks at 1GHz.
  • Reply 9 of 20
    i had a 4867/33 in a poermac 6100. orange micro made similar products that were/are pci compliant cards up to 233MHz (P1). with the PII/III heat and processor size became a limiting factor. I seem to recall Sun Microsystems using AMD Kx processors for there lower-end workstations and I believe that was also on a pci card.



    peek around ebay and you might find a P1 card for dirt. it would still be better than vpc if you have less than an 800MHz mac.
  • Reply 10 of 20
    fuzz_ballfuzz_ball Posts: 390member
    Orange got out of this business. I contacted them 6 months back when I was debating the hardware vs. emulation to see if they were still making the PC-on-a-card. They said they no longer produced that line, and that software emulation had gotten fast enough that most people didn't want to pay for their card, so they discontinued it.
  • Reply 11 of 20
    onlookeronlooker Posts: 5,252member
    I have an OrangePC card sitting in a box somewhere... I have an AMD K63 550MHz processor in it., It worked fine in my 9600 with Doze 95. It was much faster than VPC is now on my 867 G4 w/GeForce3 Ti Running with wanna b OSX-P Pro in VPC. I never use it. I never liked Doze 95 either. All it ever did was crash, and take forever to boot into safe mode, and run DiscDefrag, then reboot, and have it happen again just like every other Doze user. What's the point? Are you asking if hardware emulation is faster than software? = YES, but why?
  • Reply 12 of 20
    stepsonstepson Posts: 95member
    Sun sells one for use in one of their Workstation machines. Its got a 733Mhz celeron (I think) and you can add memory too it. Lets you run windows apps, although they aren't specific as to if it just runs them, or if its more VPC style, where it loads up the whole OS. Interesting that Mhz-wise, that card has a faster processor than whats in the box (It comes with a 500Mhz UltraSparc II).



    Just food for thought.
  • Reply 13 of 20
    aquaticaquatic Posts: 5,602member
    Onlooker how much do you want for that?



    Would it work in brand new Apple machines (after MWNY )
  • Reply 14 of 20
    yevgenyyevgeny Posts: 1,148member
    Orange Micro's cards were pretty expensive. I agree that a $200-400 card would be a useful thing to have (esp if VPC was smart enough to use the Mac GPU instead of trying to emulate a PC video card).



    Watch out, Matsu will probably join this thread soon and tell us all that this is the stupidest idea he has heard of in a long time.
  • Reply 15 of 20
    [quote]Originally posted by I-bent-my-wookie:

    <strong>i had a 4867/33 in a poermac 6100.</strong><hr></blockquote>



    I too had a Powermac 6100 back in the day, and I too had the 486DX/66 card that went in the oh-so-asinine Nubus slot. Ran Windows 3.1 on it when we needed access to some PC only programs at the time. This was 1994. I must say it worked just fine. It was miles away faster than our fastest PC (a 386 Dell) and proved to me that running Windows on a Mac was at least possible.



    However, the implementation was confusing at best. Apple did a fair half-assed job of putting DOS control panels and such in System 7.5 with it, and while it worked fine once it was configured...that was the problem--it wasn't easy (I bought the PC card after the 6100 itself...).



    If Connectix or anyone else were to approach an OS X solution to this, it would have to be plug-in, install, and go. Otherwise it wouldn't work. But I would be fairly interested in seeing it.
  • Reply 16 of 20
    Apple made two other cards as well... a Pentium 100 and a Pentium 166, both PCI.



    They ran Win95 ok, and you could get the Pentium 100 bundled with the 7200/120 (they called it the PC Compatible, for obvious reasons). You could get the 166 card with the 4400 series, too. I have the 7200 PC Compatible, and it actually runs pretty good, though not well enough for modern stuff. I can definitely say I'd be willing to pay for a laptop-compatible hardware solution - professional accounting software is mostly PC only, at least for the inexpensive varities, and VPC, even at version 4 on a G4, is painfully slow.
  • Reply 17 of 20
    bluejekyllbluejekyll Posts: 103member
    Why not just by a complete PC for the same price? I mean there hardly is any difference. Just saving space really.
  • Reply 18 of 20
    ihxoihxo Posts: 567member
    Actually you guys could just build a P3 1Ghz system for about $350. Get one of those Shuttle SV24 (I got it for about $200)

    <a href="http://www.spacewalker.com/sv24.htm"; target="_blank">http://www.spacewalker.com/sv24.htm</a>;



    Get a CPU for about $100

    Get 256MB Ram for about $30 Maybe I am not sure go check for yourself

    <a href="http://pricewatch.com"; target="_blank">http://pricewatch.com</a>;



    And I am sure you guys should have some 5Gig or maybe 10 Gig harddrive lying around somewhere , just put that in the machine, then you got yourself a P3 1Ghz Machine for about $350 already.



    Forgot about CD-Rom, err... I just took apart my sony USB CD writer and put it in the machine, anyway buying one would be cheap too.



    [ 07-03-2002: Message edited by: ihxo ]</p>
  • Reply 19 of 20
    ihxoihxo Posts: 567member
    Sorry ...



    [ 07-03-2002: Message edited by: ihxo ]</p>
  • Reply 20 of 20
    tabootaboo Posts: 128member
    Orange wasn't the only one, there was Reply as well. Something to keep in mind is that both companies had versions that were upgradable - you could swap out the cpu. I seem to recall that one of the OrangePC cards could take up to a 550 (but I'm not positive).

    Also, last I checked, there was a company in Vancouver writing/selling drivers for these cards that were OS9/Doze 2000 compatible (or so they claimed).
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