An odd "Macintosh" for #MARCHintosh

Posted by blakespot@reddit | retrobattlestations | View on Reddit | 12 comments

My Atari 520ST running the Spectre Mac emulator which features actual Macintosh ROMS (128K) and as of 1989 was (along with its lower-end sister product, Magic Sac (1986)), was "the only legal Macintosh clone." Gadgets by Small, who made the device, called it 20% faster than a Mac Plus, with a 30% larger screen size (640x400 on the ST monochrome display vs. 512x342 on the early Macs).

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12 Comments

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Stoney3K@reddit

Is that an emulator or just an API translation layer (like Proton/Wine) which passes the instructions straight through to the CPU? Because an ST and a Mac aren't that different aside from the I/O arrangement and memory map.

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blakespot@reddit (OP)

It was more of a translator, indeed. I think, as you point out, the memory map and I/O were the main items to handle, as the CPU architecture was the same.

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kY2iB3yH0mN8wI2h@reddit

How was it legal? Amiga had legal roms as well - and superior graphics

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johnklos@reddit

A-Max is legal, but came later than Magic Sac and Spectre. "Superior graphics" is slightly subjective. Could Amigas do higher resolution? Certainly. Could they do higher resolution without interlace? Only on newer hardware like ECS with Productivity Mode, or the Amiga 3000's built-in scandoubler. I still have both my original A-Max floppy drive port module, with 128K ROMs, and my A-Max II Zorro board, upgraded to support A-Max IV. It's a shame that A-Max IV never supported anything newer than System 7.1.2. Having color, multitasking, dynamic memory allocation, multi-monitor support, LocalTalk, et cetera, was quite nice.

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TMWNN@reddit

> It's a shame that A-Max IV never supported anything newer than System 7.1.2. That's still better than Spectre GCR, which I don't believe ever moved out of System 6.

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blakespot@reddit (OP)

You, the user, had to provide the ROMs, ostensibly from opening up your Mac and taking the ROMs out and putting them in the cartridge... The Spectre's earlier sibling, Magic Sac, launched in 1986, while the A-Max for the Amiga launched in 1989. Both took ROMs you had to supply. I would argue the ST's approach had much better graphics due to the rock-solid, monochrome SM124 display running 640x400 non-interlaced at 71Hz compared to the Amiga's interlaced display for this resolution. I had both the Amiga and ST versions of these devices, and preferred the ST solution to the Amiga's.

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TMWNN@reddit

> You, the user, had to provide the ROMs, ostensibly from opening up your Mac and taking the ROMs out and putting them in the cartridge... > > Magic Sac/Spectre owners were never expected to take out ROMs from their own computers (What would be the point of emulating a computer you already own?). Apple retailers sold the ROMs. The Spectre GCR manual that I link to elsewhere lists the Apple product numbers for the ROMs.

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TMWNN@reddit

Spectre GCR, by Dave and Sandy Small, is the final version of a Mac emulator for Atari ST previously known as Magic Sac and Spectre 128. [Its manual](https://archive.org/details/Spectre_GCR_Manual_Macintosh_emulator_1989/mode/2up) is, as the title page says, "FUN TO READ", and >WARNING: This manual is easy to read an actually entertaining. This may ruin your enjoyment of other computer manuals. It also has drawings from the Smalls' small children. As wonderful as the manual is, and amazing the product is as a technical achievement, reading the document provides abundant evidence for why people did not rush out in droves to purchase Spectre GCR and an Atari ST together to run Mac software on a "Mac Plus better than the real Mac Plus". I am *not* talking about the need to buy Mac ROMs separately; any Mac dealer could have ordered them for you. I am talking about the many, many cautions/caveats/warnings/advisories about needing to things (or not do things) to work around various issues, up to and including destroying data on disks.

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scrollingforgodot@reddit

I love the chubbiness of the Atari monitor.

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0KlausAdler0@reddit

You have a spot bot 😁 The little robot on top my sister has one , we have had it since childhood.

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blakespot@reddit (OP)

I have had that thing since I was about 10. I am now 53.

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0KlausAdler0@reddit

That's amazing 😁