Re: Re[2]: DVD expansion

[Remy Davison]

>>The DVD decoder cards are in fact 16-bit PCMCIA, same as Airport - see
>>the developer notes to confirm this. Not that it helps a great deal
>>unless you can get DVD going on a non-CB PB.
>
>What does the DVD card actually do ?  I think I can get a DVD drive 
>into a PB1400, but I am not really familliar with DVD in general. If 
>I have a drive and the card, is that all I need ?
>
>>I'd be interested to know if anyone has got an internal/ext DVD drive
>>going on an older Power Mac - say, a 7300/7500 or something.
I sometimes wish we didn't start these threads 

First off, the only ways I can conceive of getting a DVD unit working on 
a legacy Mac are (i) internal on Power Mac (ii) external FireWire or SCSI 
on PowerMac (iii) FireWire or (maybe) SCSI on PowerBook. SCSI DVDs cost 
the earth (and more). Only recent PBs support FW. 

More importantly, I have no idea what hardware a generic DVD device looks 
for - if it looks for anything on a Mac. I note some PC DVD drives bundle 
an MPEG-2 decoder PCI card with the drive. 

While DVD-RAM is known to work - because Toast supplies the necessary 
drivers, as does Apple - I suspect Apple's driver supports the ATA bus 
only. I've never seen any evidence of FireWire bridge support. 

Bottom line: the 1400's video capabilities are extremely lousy in any 
case. Best off to invest in a Lime iBook 466 or Lombard 400 or something, 
if you want a good, reasonably priced portable DVD machine.

Cheers,

RD 

Remy Davison
Contributing Editor, Insanely-Great Mac 
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Re: Re[2]: DVD expansion

[Tom & Lisa P]

>  >>Ok, here's a poser - does the encoder card take up enough slack to
>>>allow other PB's to play DVD's as well?  I can see a 170mhz (?) PPC
>>>upgraded 540C having enough oomph if nothing else is running.
>>>The PCI ones for schm-Intel boxes say they'll run on a 133mhz so I
>>>think Mac might do better.  Or am I an idiot in need of a village. ;-)
>>
>>More importantly, are these DVD cards 16 bit, or CardBus ?
>The DVD decoder cards are in fact 16-bit PCMCIA, same as Airport - see
>the developer notes to confirm this. Not that it helps a great deal
>unless you can get DVD going on a non-CB PB.

What does the DVD card actually do ?  I think I can get a DVD drive 
into a PB1400, but I am not really familliar with DVD in general. If 
I have a drive and the card, is that all I need ?

>I'd be interested to know if anyone has got an internal/ext DVD drive
>going on an older Power Mac - say, a 7300/7500 or something.
>
>Cheers,
>
>RD

Mad Dog

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Re: Re[2]: DVD expansion

[Remy Davison]

>>Ok, here's a poser - does the encoder card take up enough slack to
>>allow other PB's to play DVD's as well?  I can see a 170mhz (?) PPC
>>upgraded 540C having enough oomph if nothing else is running.
>>The PCI ones for schm-Intel boxes say they'll run on a 133mhz so I
>>think Mac might do better.  Or am I an idiot in need of a village. ;-)
>
>More importantly, are these DVD cards 16 bit, or CardBus ?
The DVD decoder cards are in fact 16-bit PCMCIA, same as Airport - see 
the developer notes to confirm this. Not that it helps a great deal 
unless you can get DVD going on a non-CB PB. 

I'd be interested to know if anyone has got an internal/ext DVD drive 
going on an older Power Mac - say, a 7300/7500 or something.

Cheers,

RD

Remy Davison
Contributing Editor, Insanely-Great Mac 
mail: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
RD's PowerBook page: 



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Re: Re[2]: DVD expansion

[Remy Davison]

>RD> PCMCIA MPEG-2 decoder card (MCE have it and there used to be a WS kit). 
>
>Ok, here's a poser - does the encoder card take up enough slack to
>allow other PB's to play DVD's as well?  I can see a 170mhz (?) PPC
>upgraded 540C having enough oomph if nothing else is running.
>The PCI ones for schm-Intel boxes say they'll run on a 133mhz so I
>think Mac might do better.  Or am I an idiot in need of a village. ;-)
>
>RD> And I don't know what hardware SCSI drives look for.
>RD> Cheaqper in the end to simply get a DVD iBook. 
>
>Probably true but some of us like to challenge ourselves. *grin*
>(Or is that frustrate ourselves?)
Good points, Mike. Though what would worry me is the limitations built in 
to the 3400/Kanga graphics card. Generally, it can do 15fps tops. 
However, the 2MB/12.1" Wallstreet I can run the DVD kit, so this may not 
prove a problem. 

If you wanted a challenge, it would be to get the PC card cage upgraded 
to take FW. Then I'd slam a DVD drive into a 5.25" FW enclosure and try 
that.

Unsure whether MCE will sell their $99 PCMCIA decoder card separately 
from the DVD/CDRW drive - can't think why not, unless there's some 
licensing restriction (e.g., that VST had). Then again, Apple, AFAIK, 
don't own a chunk of MCE.

Cheers,

RD

Remy Davison
Contributing Editor, Insanely-Great Mac 
mail: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
RD's PowerBook page: 



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