SyQuest EZ135

Martin Russ's terminal terminal finally gives up the ghost and after thinking long and hard about its replacement, he makes a surprising decision...

As you may remember from the last Apple Notes, my Mac IIsi was not well. In fact, just after I had emailed the text to SOS, the IIsi finally died. Rather than just 'freezing' at the wrong moment, it now refused to power up altogether. If I had minor hardware problems before, they were now major!

If you've never had a well‑used computer die on you, you've probably never worried about what happens when you suddenly don't have it any longer. In my case, the IIsi held all my MIDI files, sequencer files, Apple Notes files, and lots of other work in progress — as well as the installs for the copy‑protected music software. And it was now all inaccessible. The word for this situation might be 'disaster'.

But it wasn't. I don't trust computers, and I've always taken great care that everything I do is backed up, as I'm sure all Apple Notes readers already do! In fact, as I have mentioned before, I go one better than just backing up — I have a complete copy of the whole of my work area on a separate SCSI hard disk. The important files in the System Folder are backed up to a removable hard drive, since they don't change very often. But an exact copy of the main drive, which holds all my working files, is held on a partition called Main Backup on an external SCSI 850Mb drive. I use Symantec's excellent CopyDoubler utility program to rapidly copy across only those files which have changed.

The last time I updated my Main Backup was the day before the IIsi died, so the worst scenario I faced was the loss of one day's work. As it was, SOS had my email of Apple Notes, and so I lost very little. All I needed now was a new Mac to connect to the Main Backup drive and get back to normal.

Choices

Last month, I speculated about the choices that were open to any prospective purchaser of a Mac for music and MIDI. They really boil down to these options:

• 68040 Macintosh with NuBus
• 68040 Macintosh with AV options
• PowerPC Mac with NuBus
• PowerPC Mac with AV options
• PowerPC Mac with PCI

The two 68040 Macs offer the widest scope for compatibility with old Mac software which runs under System 6 or earlier. Not all Mac users are willing to join the ongoing increases in complexity and size of the latest Systems, and choose to remain with some of the older but slimmer releases like 6.0.7, which was the last of the pre‑7 Systems. I've heard some very convincing arguments against the burgeoning additions to System 7.5 (and onwards to MacOS 8) when you are using MIDI sequencers — but remember that for more mainstream applications, System 7 has many advantages.

The other advantage of 68040 Macs is their serial ports, where both can be used for MIDI purposes. The hardware changes that have been made to the serial ports on Power Macs have caused some problems with using both serial ports to input and output MIDI information. Of course, if you use AppleTalk (or LocalTalk) to network to another Mac or to connect to a printer, this can also seriously affect the operation of the serial ports, regardless of the type of Mac.

They'Ve Got The Power

For Power Macs, System 7, or even System 7.5, may well be the lowest System which can be used. But the major consideration with Power Macs (and any PowerPC clones as well) is the expansion options: NuBus or PCI. The first generation of Power Macs had the familiar NuBus expansion buss, which first appeared in the 68030 Mac II series, and continued through the 68040 Quadras. Second‑generation Power Macs have the newer PCI buss, which has the advantage of being widely used by many current computers and workstations. PCI replacements for familiar NuBus cards like those from Digidesign are beginning to appear — their recently‑released Audiomedia III card (see the review in last month's SOS) is the first of many.

The AV options of the Power Macs include enhanced video capability, but also better audio input and output facilities than the ordinary Macs. Although using 16‑bit AD converters and DA converters at 44.1 kHz, the actual performance is not felt to be quite up to CD quality, and the distinctly non‑pro mini‑jack connectors serve to reinforce this. More recent Macs have tended to hide their AV capability — generally the higher‑numbered models have some AV facilities, but the helpful AV at the end of the name is no longer added.

Overall, the Power Mac range has seen a bewildering explosion of models in just a couple of years, which has made trying to keep up with them almost impossible. This seems to have affected Apple as well: under new leader Gil Amelio they are trying to slim down the range to just a few models, so perhaps a bit of welcome sanity will return. Even so, I don't think we will ever return to the halcyon days of the Mac II series, when for several years, the IIfx was the tops, and new models gradually filled in the gaps underneath it, all in a nice predictable way. Nowadays, ever‑faster processors mean that the clock speed has become part of the name of the computer, as in the Power Mac 9500/150, and some manufacturers just use the processor type and clock speed, as shown by the Power Computing PowerWave 604/150.

Checking The Spec

The one thing that no‑one ever seems to want to tell you is just how all these Macs compare to each other. Since I needed to have some idea of the relative merits of the major models, I compiled a league table. It shows a very rough ordering (I'm not infallible, and there has been some interpretation of the available figures) of the main Macintoshes and clones (see box 'The Mac OS League Table').

The computers in the middle area of the table may be most suitable for MIDI sequencing and patch editing purposes, whilst those towards the top may be more suited to hard disk recording and 'MIDI + Audio' purposes. You'll need to check on important details like NuBus or PCI expansion slots, the serial port(s), and suitability for specialised applications like MIDI or audio before you purchase, especially if you're considering a second‑hand computer. The lower cut‑off point typically recommended for current MIDI sequencers is somewhere around the Mac IIsi. For professional 'MIDI + Audio' usage, the nearer the top the better.

Decision Time

So what machine did I go for? After considerable thought, serendipity took over, and I was offered a Centris 610 at a bargain price — and I bought it! (Those PC Notes readers who were hoping that I would say that I went for a Pentium Pro PC running Windows 95 can stop reading now...) Why did I buy such a gloriously out‑of touch machine?

The Centris 610 is one of the last of the 680n0 Macs, albeit not a 68040, with a NuBus slot (via an adaptor), should I ever need one. It runs all my ageing freeware and shareware, and it can run both serial ports at full speed to cope with the demands of my heavily‑used Opcode Studio 5LX MIDI interface. It has enough power to cope with my current MIDI sequencing, and I'm still hesitating about adding audio tracks...

The Centris 610 is also small and neat, with the potential to replace the main board for a 6100 Power Mac board — assuming that there are still some upgrades hanging about when I get around to it. Best of all, it cost a fraction of what my IIsi cost three years ago, so I'm quite happy to have it as my temporary friend whilst I save for a Power Mac — and then I'll have a 680n0 and a Power Mac, so I can separate out the writing and Internet stuff from the music and MIDI work, which should result in a much simpler way of working.

Any readers with a humble 680n0‑based Mac who feared that they were about to be ignored can relax for a while. I haven't abandoned the 680n0 processor — in fact, I now have a live one and a dead one!