I have been following this and other discussions from afar; time to weigh in with my FIRST POST! Better make it a good one.
I have one of these Daystar cards, and so have had reason to do a little digging and can fill in the blanks. It is a Daystar Quad 040 running at 40 MHz with a 128k SRAM cache, and works in the Quadra 610, 650, 660av, 700, 800, 900 and 950 (the 610 and 660 required, so far as I know, a Slotsaver adapter - which plugged right into the cpu socket and so left the one pds expansion slot in the 610 and 660 free). The card brings any of these machines up to the level of a Q840av (40 MHz). Yes, there would have been a point in buying one of these c.1993. But it's not (in itself) an AV card, and there are no DSPs. Daystar, however, clearly had the av machines in its sights. Though there are no DSPs (presumably what have been identified are just the cache chips), what there is is a smallish QUIC (Quadra Universal Interface Connector) slot, to which can be plugged a Daystar Charger QUIC daughter card, which does have twin DSPs. It plugs onto the side of the card, very like the daughter card for, say, the Radius Thunder IV card. I don't have a QUIC daughter card, so I can't speak about it first hand, but Daystar advertised that the two cards together would boost a non-av mac like the 700 to run around 30% faster than the 840av. It runs beautifully under OS 7. Haven't tested it with OS 8. Does not work happily with A/UX, though I have had it running under A/UX on my Q950. The trick is to do the A/UX installation with the card installed, and not to put it in later. But since it makes A/UX rather cranky, there's not much point, really. There is a reference (from whch some of this is taken) in _Upgrading and Repairing Macs_, Que publishing, 1994, pp.604-5 if anyone's really keen. Gary -- Quadlist is sponsored by <http://lowendmac.com/> and... Small Dog Electronics http://www.smalldog.com | Enter To Win A | -- Canon PowerShot Digital Cameras start at $299 | Free iBook! | Support Low End Mac <http://lowendmac.com/lists/support.html> Quadlist info: <http://lowendmac.com/lists/quadlist.shtml> --> AOL users, remove "mailto:" Send list messages to: <mailto:quadlist@mail.maclaunch.com> To unsubscribe, email: <mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]> For digest mode, email: <mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Subscription questions: <mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Archive: <http://www.mail-archive.com/quadlist%40mail.maclaunch.com/> iPod Accessories for Less at 1-800-iPOD.COM Fast Delivery, Low Price, Good Deal www.1800ipod.com