[The Godfather]

The picture is self explanatory:



I am going to try it out this summer. I hope this works.

The Godfather

[tooki]

would you mind telling us where you found this? This is a public forum, so everything (except for commercial software) should be shared.

tooki

Don't let Ca$h68 see this. He already has that rev. A.

[wlonh]

i got yer mezzanine slot right HERE

hey here's a blast from the past: http://www.imac2day.com/peripherals/expansion.shtml

hmm... has anybody done a sherlock mezzanine slot search lately

[This message has been edited by wlonh (edited 05-10-2000).]

[iPaul UK]

Is it me, or does one of Wlonh's links contain 12 pictures of what looks like a partly demolished building!? Or is it time for me to get another eye site check up??

[wlonh]

'twas meant as a wry joke... i guess it bombed heh heh

[ValVashon]

Amazing...the pictures on wlonh's linked site look just like the inside of my iMac after I got done installing the iProRaid card for the tenth time. Wow- it's like you took pictures inside my computer!

Val

[The Godfather]

My source: MacWeek.com, 8/19/1998

http://macweek.zdnet.com/1232/mezzanine.html

The 160-pin slot--called a Perch slot internally at Apple--is located on the underside of the iMac's motherboard (see illustration), and sources say the slot is electrically identical to the personality slot found in desktop G3 Power Macintoshes. The personality slot is essentially a modified PCI slot and is suitable for high-bandwidth applications; Apple's latest use for the Power Mac personality slot is an MPEG-2 decoder card for watching DVD Video.

The parts can be found in www.digikey.com

The Godfather

[martyrart]

What parts EXACTLY does one need?

My Rev. B warranty is up and I'm ready to hack on a vram card if possible. Or is it dvd video only?



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iFinished therefore iBook!

[Ca$h68]

Wait wait wait.... thus my eyes decieve me? I thought the mezzanine slot was really tiny in comparison to a PCI slot? Are they they same size? And, are they electronically IDENTICAL?!?! What gives? Can I get a voodoo6 with some ribbon cable, and just leave it outside of my iMac? THAT WOULD RULE!!!!!


ok sorry, i just got my pants all messy.

Ca$h

[This message has been edited by wlonh (edited 05-11-2000).]

[The Godfather]

Drool



I dont know the relative sizes of the mezz and the pci, but many people say they are electronically compatible.

This is a new never heard of hack, ATTBOMK*, so everything is untested and subject to failure (I am going to let the VCR repairgirl do this job, she is a hottie). I don't know the connector pin combination but it shouldn't be very criptic. Neither I know if I will need some sort of amplifier/bypass/gating in order to make the 66MHz through a relatively long ribbon cable, out the iMac case.

To all those video card freaks: which PCI video cards are out there for the PCI Macs? I would hate to learn that all the good cards are for AGP only.

The Godfather

* ATTBOMK=answered to the best of my knowledge

[This message has been edited by The Godfather (edited 05-11-2000).]

[tooki]

3Dfx's Voodoo 4 and 5 PCI are supposed to come out soon, and with FULL, SUPPORTED Mac drivers, no less!!

tooki, who played Unreal Tournament on his Pismo last night, and had a good 30fps @640x480x32bit

[The Godfather]

That's awesome!

[Feathers]

This pisses me off! I've mentioned on numerous occasions that the mezz was a standard PCI slot with a different form factor(these words ring any bells?) That is, electronically identical but not physically. This isn't even old news. When are people going to start using the search button?

To use a Ca$h-ism, what kind of crack have people been smoking that this is suddenly news now?

[This message has been edited by Feathers (edited 05-12-2000).]

I went to the Digikey site and a mezzanine search found two parts. Are these the ones?

If the mezzanine is a PCI connector with a different form factor, then is this part a simple plug-in adaptor? Is there any more information available, or is this discussion still at the theoretical level?

If this works out I'll definitely get an iMax Power and a Voodoo 5. The only thing is that this corrosion issue now has me worried about trading in my daughtercard. I live in a semi-tropical climate, but there was no apparent corrosion when I opened up the box two weeks ago.

My other concern is a post I read last week about a guy who was already on his third Newer card.

One more thing. Rememer when the 3dfx beta drivers for the Voodoo 2 came out? The early versions didn't work with the iMac and (correct me if I'm wrong) the explanation was that the Game Wizard was not a standard PCI card. I wonder how this reflects upon the mezzanine slot as far as compatability with other PCI Cards is concerned?

[Ca$h68]

Err... I believe the reason they didnt work was because the gamewizard card wasnt exactly a real voodoo2, it was something else that used voodoo2 hardware. But it wasnt like any existing voodoo2... so... theoretically, a PCI vid card *SHOULD* work... even the profiler thinks its a PCI slot right? Anyone wanna lend me their voodoo3? Or their ATI Rage 128? I'll try it if someone lets me borrow their card.

Ca$h

According to my Apple System Profiler, the PCI is filled with a Rage Pro. I didn't see that the Game Wizard is recognized at all. Interesting.

[Ca$h68]

Anyone want to lend me one? Im not going to keep it, I really dont have a use for it.

Ca$h

[seanyepez]

"tooki", stop "sharing" your experiences with your "super-cool" "Pismo" PowerBook with us... You're getting me envious...

I know I could own you in any first person shooter, and probably most of the people who think they are really great at Quake III: Arena or Unreal Tournament on this forum, too.

My PC graphics card can own your "Pismo"'s graphics card, and probably most of the people who think they have a really good 3D gaming system on this forum, too.

If you want a match, email me at seanyepez@mac.com.

(this was meant to be a joke, but I'll still play with anyone who wants a good match)

[seanyepez]

...If anyone sees me around, I play Quake III: Arena under the tag "The MSG Junkie" or "Rei Ayanami".

I play on servers that I can manage to get a ~10 ping to...

[keyser_soze]

Did you say ANY first person shooter, i've never EVER been beaten in goldeneye 007 on the N64. If you're any where near Utah i challenge ye to a duel.

And my system profiler doesn't recognize my gamewizard in my mezz slot either.

My GameWizard shows as a unknown card in the PCI section of my System profilers. My Rage IIc shows under the Video Card part. *shrugs*
-MM

[sine -''-..-]

I hav a 333,
is there any way to get a Mezz hacked back in?

[Ca$h68]

I have a 333 too. HEhehe. there are 2 ways of going about this. The first would be kinda risky.. but its cheap. Get a mezzanine connector from somewhere (gotta be a source...), take your iMac to a techie person, ask them to solder it in like the reva/b iMacs.... now... I dont know of anyone who's done this.. but it IS possible.

how do I know that? Well.. remember microconversions? The people who make the gamewizard (I'm assuming thats what you want...), they had an option before they closed their doors of soldering the connector in, and installing the voodoo2. The charge for the installation (with soldering) was about 50 bucks. I emailed them a buncha times before they went under, but I didnt have the $ to get a card.

OR, the simple way (but more expensive), is to go out and acquire a rev a or b iMac. The rev B iMac is probably the one you want to get though.. why?

Rev B has the ATI Rage Pro, not the Rage 2, which sucks even MORE than the Rage Pro. Anyway, then all you do is swap daughtercards. Put YOUR 333mhz daughtercard onto the rev A motherboard. That's what I'm going to be doing next week. I'll include details once I get it done.

Ca$h

[stimpEE]

Hi all,

To sine and ca$h, i remember sometime ago that there was this german company called PortBitz that would put a mezzenine back into RevC and RevD imacs for a small fee.
(http://www.imac2day.com/peripherals/expansion.shtml)

However, having been to their website I can't seem to locate the it on their price list (http://www.potzbits.de/PDF/PREIS1.PDF)

My 1 year of school german isn't really helping

keep searching!
stimpEE



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My girlfriend gets upset when I check out other chicks.
A dog can chase a car, but when he catches it doesn't mean he's going to drive it.

For those of you looking for an inexpensive video card that kicks ass, get a Voodoo 3 2000 or 3000. Both are available in PCI form factors, are inexpensive and if you read the instructions from www.xlr8yourmac.com easy as pie. I have the voodoo3 2000 and it took me no more than 15 minutes to get the card working in my 7600 with a 333Mhz G3 upgrade.

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Life is an intelligence test...Don't Fail.

[disectamac]

life is a test of your perception of intelligence....you can't fail unless your human.

I'd put my 2 cents into this topic but I sold my old iMac

[This message has been edited by disectamac (edited 05-22-2000).]

[Ca$h68]

Crap. Forget this whole idea.... it wont work. Why? I just remember. Ok, the only reason that the voodooo2 gamewizard card works is because its a pass thru card. Right? Right. The motherboard's output goes into the card, the mezzanine connecter says to the card "Yo beeyatch, you gotsa change dis sh*t to some pimp fly shiznat, aight?" and then the video card OUT goes to the monitor. Hence Pass through. Got it? So.. in theory, you IF converting a mezzanine connector to a PCI slot would work, it would have to be a pass through card. With me so far? Ok, we need a high performance pass through video card with a PCI connection. Ok, that brings us back to where we started. Gamewizard voodoo2. Course, you wouldnt have to use the 8 meg iMac version, you could use the reg PCI 16 meg version, but still... a lot of work for a kinda old card. Hrm. Sorry to bring bad news.

Ca$h

You're giving up too easy....all you gotta do is go forward with your hack, and then bypass the pass thru section, completely disabling the rage video chip altogether, and go straight to the monitor.

And, no, I haven't got a freaking clue how.

Dammit

[Ca$h68]

Hehehe. Sorry. but hey, it IS very easy to add a mezzanine connector to ANY first gen iMac. So thats some good news I gave!

Ca$h

[The Godfather]

Just wanted to bring this forum back to the top.

[SpeedRacer]

Originally posted by The Godfather:
sources say the slot is electrically identical to the personality slot found in desktop G3 Power Macintoshes.

What functions were implemented on these personality cards? I have a buddy with an old beige G3, if the card is "electrically identical" to the mezzanine slot, what does that really tell us about its physical interface - do they use the same connectors or what? If so, could i just drop in a personality card into a mezzanine iMac? Or, on another thought, test to see if the personality slot on a beige will accept a PCI?

Speed

[Ca$h68]

Um.... WTF is a personality card??? I might need one, because some people have a problem with my sarcasm. Wait. No. They need personality cards. HEhehe.

Ca$h

[The Godfather]

What you guys need is to research on PASSIVE BACKPLANES

http://www.nucleus1.com/backplanes/backplanes.htm
http://www.ibus.com/prod_backplanes.htm
http://www.lannerinc.com/ap-psl06.htm
http://www.arisecomputer.com/bp/PCIMG.asp

etc...







Cash, where are thou?

Anybody care to contact a vendor and find out cost???

[This message has been edited by The Godfather (edited 04-05-2001).]

[The Godfather]

Crazy stuff: iMac first generation with 16 (sixteen) PCI slots!



Educational
http://www.netlingo.com/pocketdictio...term=backplane

A vendor cares to put prices on the web http://www.industrial-portable.com/i.../backplane.htm

[This message has been edited by The Godfather (edited 04-05-2001).]

[Bockie]

So have you tried it, yet?

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"Life cannot be contained...Life finds a way."
-Ian Malcom, Jurassic Park (movie version)

[COmie JOe]

couldn't you use one of those in a PCI based Mac too? like a 8600 or 7600?

[The Godfather]

Originally posted by COmie JOe:
couldn't you use one of those in a PCI based Mac too? like a 8600 or 7600?

In fact, that would be twice as easy as trying it with an iMac. The manufacturer says it is all passive components, so it is independent from the software, it just needs to be PCI. However, don't you have enough PCI slots in a 7600, 8600 already??

[finboy]

I remember passive backplanes from the old days, but I think you've probably got a limitation on the number of slots the hardware supports. For a lot of applications of this back in x86-land, you'd just get each card to carry a bios with an address in the right range.

Anyhow, a PCI backplane would be GREAT for me, since my 5400 only has 1 PCI slot and I'd like to add more than one card to it. If you guys can get one working with an 8600 or something, then it will probably work with other Power Macs too.

I'll look locally to see if I can find a backplane in stock. Then maybe I'll give it a try.

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Shop smart, shop S-Mart! You got that!!?!!

[COmie JOe]

yea but arent these the same thing as PCI break-out boxes?

[Bockie]

^BUMP^

Please correct me if I'm wrong with the connection setup:
1) Mezzanine plug would be attached to the motherboard.
2) Ribbon cable would be attached to the Mezzanine plug.
3) Ribbon cable hangs out the open slot on the side of the iMac.
4) Ribbon cable goes into an empty computer case holding PCI connector.
5) PCI connector would be attached to the ribbon cable.
6) PCI cards would be attached to the PCI connector.

My next question is: in the empty case, could you setup a second mobo (without RAM and CPU) and attach more drives (HD, CDRW...) through the passive backplane? If the backplane is passive, shouldn't the primary motherboard in the iMac handle the processes of the second mobo? < hopelessly dreaming >

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"Life cannot be contained...Life finds a way."
-Ian Malcom, Jurassic Park (movie version)