Having now looked "inside," I find that there's no Intel coprocessor, though the
doc's suggest that there should be one, so the mezzanine board has apparently
been removed. The modems are Global Village types, thoguh I don't know what the
baud rate capability is. There's a connector on the back, which I'm sure is
"stock," that has an indicator on the back of the box suggesting it's a network
connector of some sort. It's a 4-pin mini-DIN. There are no add-on cards of
any sort inside, though there's a clearly-marked connector for the video-in
board. The SIMMs are 4 MB, i.e. they have 8 1Mx4 DRAMs on board. With a
half-GB HDD, which was "stock" with the '630, I've got to say this was a
MINIMALLY equipped computer, though the popular functions all seem to be there.
I'm not at all certain how they (Apple) got all that functionality out of the
clearly limited resources. That was their trick for keeping costs low, however.
It makes it hard to understand why the got rid of their CEO at about that time
(/94-94), since he seemingly presided over the generation of this and similarly
high-profit machines. The stockholders should have loved that.
These were released in early '95, and the typical PC of the time had at least
twice the hard disk space and, typically, 16 or 32 MB of RAM, and I do believe
the typical PC of the time had a larger (14") monitor, yet overall system cost
was about 20% less than this model.
I'm just guessing, of course, but that's the way I seem to remember the MAC/PC
price/equipment comparison. I had routine contact with numerous MAC users back
then, in the form of teachers at my kids' middle/high schools, where I was on
several different committees and humg around the school to snoop on them quite a
bit.
Dick
----- Original Message -----
From: "Chris" <mythtech_at_Mac.com>
To: "Classic Computer" <classiccmp_at_classiccmp.org>
Sent: Friday, November 16, 2001 11:00 AM
Subject: Re: OT: paging MAC expert(s) --- What's a Performa?
> >The documentation that came with this machine implies it's already
> >equipped with
> >the DX2/66. Is there some sort of utility in the system that would make
> >it easy
> >to see what the thing perceives itself as having?
>
> If you boot it, you will probably find a copy of Apple System Profiler in
> the Apple menu. That will tell you what you have installed.
>
> The stock 630 series is actually a fairly useful machine. It used 72pin
> SIMMS (FPM, but EDO work just fine), there is only one RAM slot, so it
> will max out the machine at 36mb (32mb chip + 4 on board). The VRAM is
> non upgradable.
>
> As a stock machine, they are good workstations (pending you use non PPC
> only software, since it is a 33mhz LC040.. the LC040 is a 68040 without
> the FPU built into the chip).
>
> I have a 630 running right now as a mail server, keeps up with everything
> I give it no problems (runs Mac OS 8.1, with Stalker Internet Mail
> Server... hosts a few domains and a few thousand emails a day, with a few
> hundred accounts... never even hiccups).
>
> The HD is IDE, which makes it cheap and easy to upgrade.
>
> Other things of interest. It may have an ethernet card, but if you said
> it came with a modem, I doubt it has ethernet (was the modem internal?
> You could get an internal 14.4 geoport fax/modem in the Comm Slot... the
> GeoPort modem is similar to those WinModems that use the processor to
> handle all the modem functions, and the modem acts pretty much as an
> AD/DA converter. HOWEVER, you may have one of the modems that was made by
> global village... THOSE modems are real modems, and VERY VERY good, with
> supurb fax software). If the modem is external, then you might have an
> ethernet card in the Comm slot (look at the back for an RJ45 connector).
> If you have a Global Village external modem (common performa modem), the
> bronze (probably the one you have) is 2400 fax. It is a VERY good fax
> modem, with excellent software... not so good of a regular modem (some
> extension conflicts with the modem control software). There is also a
> Gold version that was 28.8 fax... much better regular modem (newer
> software, cured most of the extension conflicts)
>
> Also, your docs indicate that it has the DOS card installed. However, the
> 630 didn't ship with a dos card... that was the 640 (upgraded version of
> the 630, the 640 came stock with a DOS card... IIRC it was available for
> the 630 as a 3rd party add in by Reply, so it may have been added). The
> quickest way to tell if a dos card is installed is look at the back of
> the machine. You will see an expansion slot. If there is a fairly densely
> pinned DB connector in the expansion slot, you have a DOS card. There
> should be a dongle cable for it that will connect between the DOS card,
> and the Mac's video out. The cable will then provide a RGB connector, and
> a Midi/Joystick connector. If you don't have that cable, the DOS card is
> useless... good luck finding a replacement cable.
>
> Finally, the 630 supports Video In/Out and a TV Tuner. Again, look at the
> back of the machine, if you see RCA connectors for video, left and right
> audio (Yellow, Red and White, RCAs), you have the video In/Out card. If
> you ALSO see a RF Coax screw on connector, you have the TV Tuner... if
> you have these... contact me, I would be interested in possibly
> buying/trading them with you (I have a need for the TV Tuner card, but
> will take them as a pair). If you have the TV Tuner card, you should also
> have a remote control. It will either be a skinny black remote, or a
> little credit card sized remote. Failure to have the remote will not
> prevent the card from working, it just means you have to do all the
> controls on the computer. (The Video Player software supports all the
> remote functions directly, the remote was just a nicity).
>
> What else... If the DOS card is not present, then the 630 has an LC PDS
> slot, there are a few cards available for it (network, video,
> accelerators, odds and ends). I think that is pretty much it. The 630
> series is a very good 040 machine, and can still be used for a number of
> things.
>
> -chris
>
> <http://www.mythtech.net>
>
>
Received on Fri Nov 16 2001 - 13:15:44 GMT