Macintosh IIfx with an Apple 12" RGB Monitor

[harlleysathler]

Hi,

I have an old Macintosh IIfx that I want to give it for my little sister... Well, It has an SuperMac Acellerated video card and the monitor that I have to use with it is an very old (1 year more old) Apple RGB 12" that works in a resolution smaller than 640x480. When I turn on this computer, the image appears, the logo of the video board, the smile mac, I soo the mouse moving, but the image is shown noised. I think this is because the refresh and the resolution is incompatible.

Is there how to put this system (computer+monitor) working?


Thank you very much!


Harlley Sathler

 

[MisterMe]

Re: Macintosh IIfx with an Apple 12" RGB Monitor

Originally posted by harlleysathler
Hi,

I have an old Macintosh IIfx that I want to give it for my little sister... Well, It has an SuperMac Acellerated video card and the monitor that I have to use with it is an very old (1 year more old) Apple RGB 12" that works in a resolution smaller than 640x480. When I turn on this computer, the image appears, the logo of the video board, the smile mac, I soo the mouse moving, but the image is shown noised. I think this is because the refresh and the resolution is incompatible.

Is there how to put this system (computer+monitor) working?


Thank you very much!


Harlley Sathler

My old Mac also has a very noisy display. That may very well be the cost of doing business when you bring back a 15 year old computer that has been out of service for a while. Just leave the machine on to see if the problem clears up.

 

[dahjelle]

Video Card Technical Specs

My Dad received a similar configuration (though I'm not sure which video card) IIfx for free from his employer. We finally figured out that to get the display working properly we had to set some DIP switches on the card itself, rather than have it automatically adjust like modern cards. I'd Google a bit for the particular model of video card you have and see if you can find tech specs that would tell you what switches need to be set.

Hope that helps!

 

[topicolo]

Or you can just toss the 12" and get a 14" or larger monitor from a pawn shop for like $15. If you do, be sure not to get the Apple Performa style monitors they are horribly blurry (due to the .31 dot pitch).

 

[harlleysathler]

Hi,

My video card is a Graphics Accelerator Spectrum/24III made by SuperMac, but it has not a switch do set anything...

Somebody knows this card?

Thanks!

 

[Makosuke]

Quick Google search result (took about 15 seconds--Googe is a handy tool):

http://www.mandrake.demon.co.uk/Apple/radius/spectrum.html

Basically, it sounds like to change the resolution/scanrate of the card, you hold down the option key at startup; after a bit, it'll start cycling through various different modes. Once it hits the right one (the test image displays correctly), let go of the key, and you're good to go.

Amusing method of configuration.

 

[harlleysathler]

Thank you very much!

But, yesterday after my last reply I found this document on google (really, google is a hand tool!).

Well, I tryed this and it don't play. This machine is temporally diskless... I must to have a System Folder for the keyboard plays...

But I have the button that calls this function. After I press it, the cycles appears in various resolutions, but there's no one that show the image on screen visible...

Help!!!

But, Thank you! And sorry my bad english! (I'm brazilian!)

 

[Makosuke]

Originally posted by harlleysathler
But I have the button that calls this function. After I press it, the cycles appears in various resolutions, but there's no one that show the image on screen visible...

If it doesn't show a clear image as it cycles through various different resolution/scanrate settings, then that video card doesn't support the monitor you have. Since that's a pretty high end card, and a really low end monitor (with under 640X480 resolution), it doesn't surprise me at all that it doesn't work. A lot of suff from that period in time (software and hardware) didn't support sub-VGA monitor resolutions.

Your best bet is to hunt for a cheap old 640X480 or larger monitor. They shouldn't be that hard to find.

The resolution probably wouldn't stick without a hard drive anyway, by the way.