Tag: Hardware Review

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From the archive: this hardware review first ran on the Mac Gaming Alliance (MGA), the Mac games site that lived here on DimensionZ in the late 1990s. It was published around 1998 and is reproduced as originally written. More in the Mac Gaming Alliance archive.

Publisher	Advanced Gravis
Tested on	Performa 5260
Overall	4 / 5 apples
Reviewed by	Jonathan Dreyer

The Mac MouseStick 2 is the mid-range Mac Joystick, It’s not the cheapest but, it’s not the most expensive either.

Ease of Use/Setup, Driver software

Of course pluging in the Joystick is simple, plug it in to any ADB port and with it’s Y connector you just plug your other ADB cord in too. The software consists of a Control Panel driver, just drop it in your system folder and restart. Next you open the control panel and configure the mousestick sets for your programs. With the control panels “Application Aware” feature each time you launch a application you set a MouseStick 2 set for it automatically activates that set.

Button Use, Quality

One thing I didn’t like about the MouseStick 2 is the stickiness of the stick and buttons, the stick isn’t as stiff as I would like it to be also the trigger and side buttons I found to be too loose and sticky while the top buttons were just perfect.

The shape of the stick itself is OK it fits my hand, but not as nicely as Thrustmaster’s FCS, or CH Flightstick PRO, but they cost a lot more.

Overall

Overall this is a mid level joystick it has an equal share of PROs and CONs. If you’re looking for a Joystick but are on a low budget this is probably the one you should go for.

Find one today

The Gravis Mousestick 2 hasn’t been made for years, but used units still turn up for collectors restoring vintage Macs. Search for the Gravis Mousestick 2 on Amazon.

Ratings use the MGA’s original 1–5 apple scale. Prices, system requirements and web links in this review are from the time it was written.

This post has affiliate links. If you buy through them, we may earn a small commission at no extra cost to you. Learn more.

From the archive: this hardware review first ran on the Mac Gaming Alliance (MGA), the Mac games site that lived here on DimensionZ in the late 1990s. It was published around 1998 and is reproduced as originally written, with the original screenshots (click to enlarge). More in the Mac Gaming Alliance archive.

Publisher	CH Products
Tested on	Performa 5260/ 100 MHz
Overall	4 / 5 apples
Reviewed by	Jonathan Dreyer

F-16 Fighterstick

The F-16 Fighterstick belongs to the high end of Macintosh joysticks. Therefore when reviewing it I was much more unforgiving then when I review lower end joysticks, I look to get your money’s worth.

Ease of Use/Setup, Driver software

Pluging in the joystick and installing the driver software was easy. I liked the ADB Y plug on this better than the Mousestick’s because there was a 6 inch cord coming out of the male plug, on the end of the 6″ cord is another female plug, this keeps a long stick from forming out of your ADB port.

The software uses a pretty much standard installer that puts the driver parts where they belong in the System Folder and installs a comprehensive electronic manual. The software it’s self is another matter, for the games the software already has sets for it runs great, automatically selecting the set when you launch the game but, if the game you have doesn’t have a pre-installed set or came with a set on it’s disc, programming a set for the game is very very difficult. Learning to program sets for the driver software has a steep learning curve but, once you learn how to do that you can do a lot more with the F-16’s software than the Mousestick’s

Button Use, Quality

The quality of this stick is great, the buttons have never stuck on me and have a nice “click” feeling. I moved the stick around and hit the buttons harder than I would in normal use to test it and found no flaws in their design except if you have small hands/short fingers.

Bugs

There was only one major bug, every once in a while the software says the stick is not connected and I should connect it then restart even though the stick was plugged in.

Overall

Overall this joystick has proved itself worthy of it’s price. The manual should include easier instructions on how to program sets.

Find one today

The F-16 Fighterstick hasn’t been made for years, but used units still turn up for collectors restoring vintage Macs. Search for the F-16 Fighterstick on Amazon.

Ratings use the MGA’s original 1–5 apple scale. Prices, system requirements and web links in this review are from the time it was written.

This post has affiliate links. If you buy through them, we may earn a small commission at no extra cost to you. Learn more.

From the archive: this hardware review first ran on the Mac Gaming Alliance (MGA), the Mac games site that lived here on DimensionZ in the late 1990s. It was published around 1998 and is reproduced as originally written, with the original screenshots (click to enlarge). More in the Mac Gaming Alliance archive.

Publisher	CH Products
Tested on	Performa 5260/100 MHz
Overall	4 / 5 apples
Reviewed by	Jonathan Dreyer

Pro Throttle and CH Pedals

These to products used in conjunction with a good joystick can make you a excellent game player.

Ease of Use/Setup, Driver software

Pluging in the throttle/pedals and installing the driver software was easy. I liked the ADB Y plug on this better than the Mousestick’s because there was a 6 inch cord coming out of the male plug, on the end of the 6″ cord is another female plug, this keeps a long stick from forming out of your ADB port. Also on the Pro Throttle there are 2 additional ADB pass through ports.

The software uses a pretty much standard installer that puts the driver parts where they belong in the System Folder and installs a comprehensive electronic manual. The software it’s self is another matter, for the games the software already has sets for it runs great, automatically selecting the set when you launch the game but, if the game you have doesn’t have a pre-installed set or came with a set on it’s disc, programming a set for the game is very very difficult. Learning to program sets for the driver software has a steep learning curve but, once you learn how to do that you can do a lot more with the Pro Throttle’s/Pedal’s software than the Mousestick’s

Button Use, Quality

The quality of this stick is great, the buttons have never stuck on me and have a nice “click” feeling. I moved the stick around and hit the buttons harder than I would in normal use to test it and found no flaws in their design except if you have small hands/short fingers or really big feet in the case of the Pedals

Bugs

There was only one major bug, every once in a while the software says the stick is not connected and I should connect it then restart even though the Throttle (and this happened sometimes with the Pedals) was plugged in.

Overall

Overall I found the Throttle and Pedals valuable assets in my games, although I personally believe that they should cost less than joysticks, if you can afford even one of them I suggest you buy throttle first because that came in hand more often than the Pedals.

Find one today

The Pro Throttle and CH Pedals hasn’t been made for years, but used units still turn up for collectors restoring vintage Macs. Search for the Pro Throttle and CH Pedals on Amazon.

Ratings use the MGA’s original 1–5 apple scale. Prices, system requirements and web links in this review are from the time it was written.

This post has affiliate links. If you buy through them, we may earn a small commission at no extra cost to you. Learn more.

From the archive: this hardware review first ran on the Mac Gaming Alliance (MGA), the Mac games site that lived here on DimensionZ in the late 1990s. It was published September 1997 and is reproduced as originally written. More in the Mac Gaming Alliance archive.

Publisher	Techworks
Tested on	PowerMac 8600/300
Overall	5 / 5 apples
Reviewed by	Jonathan Dreyer

The Power3D is the first all-gaming 3D accelerator available for the Mac. This card is based on the popular 3Dfx Voodoo chip set which has been all the rage on the PC for a while now. The Power3D provides full-screen 3D acceleration (ONLY full screen, i.e. no 3D in a window) and support for 16 bit color all in one 7 inch PCI slot.

The Power3D comes bundled with some great games also, Quake Episode 1 (3Dfx accelerated), MechWarrior 2 (RAVE), VR Soccer (3Dfx), and Weekend Warrior (3Dfx). As you may have guessed, the Power 3D supports both native 3Dfx games and Quickdraw 3D RAVE games.

Techworks’ listed requirements for the Power3D are: a MacOS PowerPC with at least one available PCI expansion slot, 32mb RAM, and a 640*480 multi-sync monitor. One Note: 32mb of RAM is just not enough! You need at least 48mb, that’s the absolute minimum!

There is a rather nasty bug with the Power3D. The Power3D operates using a pass-thru cable to your OWN 2D video, be it built-in internal or another PCI card, well the pass-thru cable when used with some Apple monitors will not allow you to use some Apple-Only resolutions, it will only let you use VGA specific resolutions like 800*600.

The Games

The Power3D comes bundled with some pretty cool games. The most impressive game is Quake, they only included a non-networked version of the first episode but, the first episode is good enough. Once you play 3Dfx native Quake, you can NEVER go back to plain old software Quake again. With 3Dfx Quake you get picture perfect graphics, smoke, translucent water, and NO jaggies at all. 3Dfx Quake is a thing of beauty, I will never play Quake without my Power3D again!

MechWarrior 2 is the only RAVE accelerated game included with the Power3D. The speed at which this game runs is a testament to the Power3D’s speed. Running MechWarrior with the Power3D and and a ATI Xclaim VR, there is no difference is speed. I bought MechWarrior when it first came out and found the graphics too dull, the RAVE version definitely fixes that, the graphics are smooth and I didn’t experience any slow downs at all, even when standing in the middle of huge fire-fights with 8 other Mechs.

Weekend Warrior is the game show game brought to you by Pangea software, originally this game was RAVE enhanced and was even bundled with some PowerMac 6500, the 3Dfx port was done very well. I had the chance to run both the RAVE and 3Dfx versions of Weekend Warrior and found the Power3D version to be superior. The only problem I found with Weekend Warrior is that it’s not really a game, I thought of it as more of a technological showcase than game.

VR Soccer was renamed for North American’s, it was originally called Acuta Soccer and was scheduled to be released by MacPlay in North America, that was until MacPlay’s bloody spring where they canceled all but 2 of their fore coming titles. At first, I thought VR Soccer was just another techno showcase like Weekend Warrior. That was until I really started playing it, VR Soccer is a well done game with outstanding graphics and excellent gameplay.

For screenshots of these and other 3D accelerated games, visit our 3D Gaming section

Quake Setup

Pixel Doubled to 640 by 480 (Software)

640 by 480 (Software)

3Dfx Accelerated

Frames Per Second

37 fps

16.9 fps

37 fps

Conclusion and Other…

In conclusion, The Power3D is definitely a wonderful GAMING add-on. As I stated earlier, the Power3D can only do 3D acceleration in full screen, therefore you can’t use any 3D graphics programs with it. The closest Mac competitor is ATI’s Xclaim VR using the Rage Pro chipset, the Xclaim only do RAVE accelerated games but can do 3D in windows. More and more 3D accelerated games are coming out all the time now and I believe that 3D acceleration will become the norm in the Macintosh gaming world. So to end, if you’re a serious gamer, go for the Power3D!

Other Resources for 3D Gaming

You can check out the MGA’s own 3D Gaming section here or:

You can go here for a complete list of 3D accelerated games

Find one today

The Power3D hasn’t been made for years, but used units still turn up for collectors restoring vintage Macs. Search for the Power3D on Amazon.

Ratings use the MGA’s original 1–5 apple scale. Prices, system requirements and web links in this review are from the time it was written.