The
Apple IIgs
The last member of the Apple II line, The Apple IIgs was a also the most powerful. Announced in September 1986, the IIgs was built around a Western Design Center 65C816 processor running at either 2.8 or 1 Mhz. It included expanded graphics and sound functions, and was initially offered with 256k of RAM, expandable to 8 MB. The IIgs also offered 128k of ROM, expandable to 1 MB. The IIgs shipped with a Mac-like interface and a IIgs-specific OS, and introduced the Apple Desktop Bus (ADB) port. (It also ran most other Apple II software.) The IIgs was later offered with 1 MB of RAM, and 256k of ROM. It could also hold a SCSI adapter card, and was discontinued in December of 1992.
Date: Tue, 15 Apr 1997 20:46:11 -0700
From: The Anderson Family
To: glen@apple-history.pair.com
Subject: IIgs processor
Why don't you mention on your site that the Super Nintendo Entertainment System runs on a IIgs motherboard with the exception of accelerated graphics and enhaced 16-bit sound? Make those PC users cry!
Date: Fri, 21 Nov 1997 21:57:31 -0500
From: Peter Chin
To: glen@apple-history.pair.com
Subject: Nit picking / Apple IIGS
Not totally true. The SNES doesn't use the Apple IIGS motherboard, because that would have required Nintendo to have licensed the IIGS ROMs from Apple! If this were the case, since tens of millions of SNES have been sold, Apple would probably have enough money now to have bought out Bill Gates and turned Microsoft into Apple's Redmond Market Center.
What IS true: The SNES uses a special 40-pin version of the 65816, licensed from Western Design Center. It's fast enough to act as the controller for the special Nintendo graphics chips; it doesn't do much except shuffle data to them and let them do the work. How do I know this? I met Bill Mensch, the inventor of the 65816 and the President of WDC at an AppleFest a looooong time ago who told me.
