Does NeXTStep 2.0 run on NeXTstation Color?

Hello all,

has anyone in here ever tried to run NeXTstep 2.0 (not a later version like 2.1) on a non-Turbo NeXTstation Color? I wonder if that will work. I'm also curious, if ROM Rev. 2.0 v58 or 2.1 v59 works.

If anyone has the machines available to test this, I'd be glad to see the results.

Best wishes,
Andreas

I can give it a try on Friday - finally managed to solder my Blue SCSI...

Ah, stupid me - I missed the "non" in "non-Turbo" in the post, sorry. Both of my color slabs are Turbos, I don't have a regular non-Turbo Color station... (so that's another missing piece here in addition to the Turbo Cube).

Unfortunately it needs to be a non-Turbo model. So I hope someone else has the necessary hardware to test this. I'd like to check this before releasing Previous v2.8.

Hello :I think the rare NeXTSTEP 2.2 was the first version to run on Turbo Colors as this is from Mike P. , I think you will enjoy this answer :)

Rob,

The NEXTSTEP & NEXTSTEP DEVELOPER photo is a shot of (most of) the folks who worked on the 3.1 release:  SW, QA, product marketing, admin, SJ.  The photo was taken between Building 1 and Building 2 at 900 Chesapeake.  If you look at the woman in the front row near the center, you'll see she is holding a box of NS3.1  This photo and a commemorative shrink-wrapped box of NEXTSTEP 3.1 was given to everyone who worked on the 3.1 release.  The box I was given is shown in another of the photos in the album.  The box is still unopened -- I don't believe the copies of 3.1 given out to us differed from what customers could buy.  I never heard any of my NeXT colleagues mention they found a golden ticket or the like in theirs  :)

Not surprising you haven't seen a CD copy of Release 2.2 -- they weren't terribly common even back in 1991.  NeXTStep 2.2 (iirc all caps for STEP didn't appear until 3.0) was the first (shipped) release that supported Turbo.  As I was the main person doing OS/ROM/driver work for Turbo, I ended up with some of the 2.2 CDs.  I remember there was a great amount of push-back from PM, SJ and others about making Release 2.2 available at all to non-Turbo system owners.  They didn't want to do it.   And so they also didn't want to put out a Release 2.2 CD so people could get it.

Their stance / spin was that the only changes in 2.2 were to support Turbo and that if you had a Turbo, you had 2.2 because it was shipped with it.  I.e. so if you had a Turbo, you already had 2.2 and if you didn't have a Turbo, you didn't need 2.2 so there was no need for a CD version.

The backstory was that what became 2.2 and what became 3.0 forked / branched many months before.  Most everyone in SW was working on the 3.0 branch.  Only two of us were primarily working on the 2.2 branch for Turbo.  Since 3.0 was seen as the next great thing (and it was already behind schedule), the senior team didn't want to make 3.0 even later by having people spend time putting any non-Turbo features or bugfixes in 2.2.  The reality was while PM didn't want non-Turbo changes to go in to 2.2, they also had to calm some customers down and had directed that some important bug fixes get put into 2.2.  I bellieve there also was some ND related updates dragged along.

There were certain customers who, despite not having Turbos, definitely needed some of what was on the 2.2 CD, and who couldn't do updates or rebuilds over the net.  So the result was, grudgingly, a CD of 2.2 was produced, but at the same time there was an effort to convince most folks they really didn't want or need it.

The packaging for the 2.2 CD release also shows how the CD was somewhat under the radar.  First, unlike most NeXT CD releases, the back of the packaging doesn't list a part number.  And the front of the CD packaging is "SOFTWARE RELEASE 2.2" under a NeXT logo with no mention of NeXTStep.  Or NeXTSTEP.   We thought back then, probably correctly, that the likely reason they left off the word NeXTStep or NeXTSTEP is that it would takes them weeks to decide which capitalization to choose.

-M

Hello Rob, thank you for the story, but my question is about 2.0 on non-Turbo Color Slabs. So this is not exactly the information I am looking for.

Some info from the net that might be useful:

• The NeXTstation Color was introduced in September 1990 (https://www.oldsilicon.com/next-station-color)
• Le 18 septembre 1990, Steve Jobs fait un nouveau show pour présenter les nouvelles machines et le nouveau système NeXTSTEP 2.0. (https://www.levenez.com/NeXTSTEP/Logiciels.html)

The NeXTdimension was also introduced in September 1990, so it makes sense to assume that 2.0 was the version to introduce color for Cubes and Stations. Strangely, the release notes for 2.0 don't mention color at all (http://vtda.org/docs/computing/NeXT/NeXTSTEP%202.0%20Release%20Notes.pdf). I couldn't find the 2.1 release notes online.

According to Éric Lévénez' site, NeXTSTEP 2.1 was introduced half a year later, on March 25th, 1991 - that would be too late for the initial release Color stations.

However, things are not that clear. An article on p. 21 of NeXTWorld also mentions the NeXTstation color and NeXTSTEP 2.0 (http://www.nextcomputers.org/NeXTfiles/Articles/NeXTWORLD/NeXTWorld2021/NeXTWORLD-v1n3-Fall1991.pdf). But the table on p. 21 mentions that the Color station (and Dimension) were provided with NeXTSTEP 2.1. But this issue was printed almost a year later, in Fall 1991.

As confirmed by Mike P.'s mail quoted by Rob and also given by Éric, 2.2 was the update to support the Turbo machines.

Kernel versions could be another indication that 2.0 supports Color stations.

NS2.0 uses mk-108.1, whereas NS2.1 uses a slightly later version, mk-108.14 (confirmed by extracting the respective file system images and applying strings to the sdmach kernels).

Since we have a copy of the mk-108.1 sources, we can check for Color support. The Color station's codename is WARP9C (see the codename list at netbsd.org (https://wiki.netbsd.org/cgi-bin/ikiwiki?do=getsource&page=ports%2Fnext68k)), the code contains conditionally compiled sections for NeXT_WARP9C and has this comment in one of the files:

Quote* 12-Sep-90  Mike Paquette (mpaque) at NeXT
*      Updated to reflect final Warp 9C hardware defs.

Six days before the presentation by Steve Jobs mentioned in my post above. These must have been some stressful weeks at NeXT...

Yes, mk-108.1 has support for warp9c in NeXT_init, but won't boot on a non-turbo color slab in Previous.
It will boot on a non-turbo mono slab, however.

We're trying to figure out if this is a bug in Previous, or a bug in NEXTSTEP 2.0's kernel :)

I'm leaning towards the later, but ideally we'd want to see how mk-108.1 handles the real thing to be sure.

--edit--
Also can't rule out a bug in the ROM.  If we had 2.1's kernel source, we'd instantly be able to tell if that was the case, though does nbsd special-case anything re warp9c or ROM versions?

Quote from: andreas_g on February 22, 2023, 04:43:13 PMI'm also curious, if ROM Rev. 2.0 v58 or 2.1 v59 works

I think the 2.0 and 2.1 ROMs were intended for mono stations only - according to previous, both try to write to 0x0b00_0000, which is the location of the mono framebuffer, and crash. Versions 2.4 and 2.5 work for me.

Quote from: verdraith on February 25, 2023, 06:40:11 AMWe're trying to figure out if this is a bug in Previous, or a bug in NEXTSTEP 2.0's kernel :)

I'm leaning towards the later, but ideally we'd want to see how mk-108.1 handles the real thing to be sure.

I see... now someone here should have a non-Turbo color station? Rob seems to have two machines available in the blackhole online store, but I'm not exactly planning to spend $499 + shipping and customs fees for yet another NeXT :).

Quote from: cuby on February 25, 2023, 06:58:50 AMI think the 2.0 and 2.1 ROMs were intended for mono stations only - according to previous, both try to write to 0x0b00_0000, which is the location of the mono framebuffer, and crash. Versions 2.4 and 2.5 work for me.

That is a similar problem as we have with the 2.0 kernel. It seems to think that it is running on something else. The problem seems to have its roots at bad system type detection. Within Previous the 2.0 ROM shows a Cube logo when booting a monochrome NeXTstation, because it thinks it is running on a NeXTcube. Luckily NeXTstation and NeXTcube share the same memory layout and therefore it works. NeXTstation Color has a different memory layout.

If nobody has a machine to test this, someone with 68k assembly skills could disassemble the ROMs and kernels and check if there is a bug in the machine type detection.

I found the answer in NeXTworld Magazine Plunging into Color Edition on page 19 references NeXT 2.0 scroll to page 220 on the PDF or lower right corner SIMSON00000674 https://www.nextcomputers.org/NeXTfiles/Articles/NeXTWORLD/NeXTWORLD_1991.pdf  actually a really good article ! Also I did not know the I 860 Risc Processor on the NeXT Dimension runs at 33Mhz

Well, on page 220 they say 2.0 and on the next page, where they compare systems, they say 2.1. I can't find the exact reason, but 2.0 just refuses to recognise the NeXTstation Color in Previous. 2.0 also does not like the NeXTdimension - the driver is not even present. Everything works just fine with 2.1.

the release notes from NeXTSTEP 2.0



here on the other hand
https://www.levenez.com/NeXTSTEP/NeXTstation.html
the author specifically links to release 2.1
https://www.levenez.com/NeXTSTEP/Logiciels.html#NeXTSTEP21

...and this BYTE article (https://www.levenez.com/NeXTSTEP/magazine/Byte_1990-11.pdf) mentions 2.0 again, but also notes "NeXT was optimistically hoping to have release 2.0 ready in September. At press time it was still not finished, but NeXT was confident it would be ready in time."

I also found an Installation set of 13 Floppies for version 2.1 , I now there is an optical drive version of 2.1  so I asked Mike as he may have worked on the color port at NeXT:)

After more investigations I can tell the following:
NeXTStep 2.0 expects the color frame buffer (VRAM) at address 0x06000000 (right after main memory), all later versions expect it at 0x2c000000.

Now the final question is: Is the color frame buffer accessible from both locations or just the latter?

Update:
I think I got it: Looking at the cpu.h header that comes with NeXTStep in /usr/include/next I see this difference:

NeXTStep 2.0:
#define P_C16_VIDEOMEM (SLOT_ID+0x06000000) /* COLOR_FB */
NeXTStep 2.1:
#define P_C16_VIDEOMEM (0x2c000000) /* COLOR_FB */
I guess memory locations changed from prototype to final hardware. I'm 90 % sure now that NeXTStep 2.0 won't boot on a real NeXTstation Color. Nevertheless it would be interesting to proof it.

Quote from: andreas_g on February 26, 2023, 10:47:25 AMI guess memory locations changed from prototype to final hardware. I'm 90 % sure now that NeXTStep 2.0 won't boot on a real NeXTstation Color. Nevertheless it would be interesting to proof it.

It seems that NeXT had prototypes of the Color station running at 20 (instead of 25 MHz) which were demoed with NeXTStep 2.0 according to this Usenet posting (https://groups.google.com/g/comp.sys.next/c/EpW16bkpPOw/m/OmzMrAI3uEAJ).

And then there's this probably over-optimistic NeXT brochure which states that NS2.0 comes bundled with the Color station... (https://web.archive.org/web/19971110043401/http://iris.dissvcs.uga.edu/~archive/NeXT/Colorspec.jpg)

...and it would be great to get access to the NeXT museum that existed in 1997 (https://groups.google.com/g/comp.sys.next.marketplace/c/hD8JLos6rRY/m/IKyZ8sEjmI4J)...

• a sun 386 / NeXTSTEP 0.6 (unreleased software) - this is an error, it's confirmed to be a 3/60 later in the thread
• 030-25 NextCube / NeXTSTEP 0.8
• 030-25 NextCube / NeXTSTEP 0.9
• 030-25 NextCube / NeXTSTEP 1.0
• 040-25 NeXTStation / NeXTSTEP 2.0
• 040-25 NextStation Color / NeXTSTEP 2.1
• 040-33 NextCube with NextDimension / NeXTSTEP 2.2
• 040-50 NextStation Color / NeXTSTEP 3.3 (unreleased hardware)
• 88110 NextRiscWorkstation / NeXTSTEP 3.? NRW Alpha (unreleased soft/hard)
• 486-50 Compaq / NEXTSTEP 3.1
• 486DX2-66 Epson / NEXTSTEP 3.2
• Sun SparcStation 20 / NEXTSTEP 3.3
• Some kind of HP / OPENSTEP 4.0 PR1 (the tab shelf)
• Sun Ultra / OPENSTEP for Solaris.

I'd love to get access to a Canon Object.Station (https://www.old-computers.com/MUSEUM/computer.asp?st=1&c=1153).

this is the oldest post (03/1991) in comp.sys.next I could find where somebody's mentioning to have received his NeXTstation Color. it looks like these systems came with NeXTSTEP 2.1 preinstalled:

https://groups.google.com/g/comp.sys.next/c/FT5MZbELhWE

announcement from NeXT that color-slabs have begun to ship (March 12th 1991):

https://groups.google.com/g/comp.sys.next/c/3OcAb4EQdV4

I have a color non-Turbo station in my collection and could test this. Where to download the NS 2.0 CDs?

Quote from: K-Town Computeum on February 27, 2023, 04:26:53 PMI have a color non-Turbo station in my collection and could test this. Where to download the NS 2.0 CDs?

AFAIK, NeXTSTEP 2.0 was never released on CD-ROM. you could download "Nextstep 2.0 HD Image With Previous" and write the HD image to the mass-storage (HDD or flash) device using the dd command.

https://winworldpc.com/product/nextstep/2x

-

Yet another Usenet posting making the matter more confusing... (https://groups.google.com/g/comp.sys.next/c/75JahLR690w/m/JYhNt9QzF0YJ)

"I ordered my NeXTstation Colour 200MB from NeXT on May 30, and it was shipped on May 31. It was a Developer purchase direct from NeXT. The only thing on backorder is the 2.1 upgrade floppy set." (posted on June 16th, the rest of the post indicates that the machine had already arrived). So this Colo(u)r was probably installed with 2.0? I start to suspect there might have been a special version of 2.0 for (early?) Color slabs...

Then again, this posting states (https://groups.google.com/g/comp.sys.next/c/kwCkxl9LCmk/m/2gvMdZZUdCwJ):

">Fyi, 95% of the bug-fixes in 2.1 do not involve bugs at all. The
>update incorporates stuff for the color machines, all of which are
>shipping with version 2.1 installed. So unless your system falls into
>the subset of systems needing the few minor bug fixes that got thrown
>into 2.1, you don't need to update."

Oh my :o

I've just tested it on my Color NextStation. It doesn't work. It hangs when it starts booting.

Hm, your machine has 26 MB RAM? That's a strange amount...

Quote from: K-Town Computeum on February 28, 2023, 05:49:27 PMI've just tested it on my Color NextStation. It doesn't work. It hangs when it starts booting.

Thank you very much for testing! This is really interesting. Obviously they released NeXTStep 2.0 with code supporting prototypes of the NeXTstation Color but not the final product. I think this might also be the reason, that there are no revision 2.2 and 2.3 ROMs around. These might have supported the prototypes. The older 2.x ROMs only know monochrome systems and the newer ones only the final NeXTstation Color.

If we could find such an 2.2 or 2.3 ROM I could simulate the prototype NeXTstation in Previous.

Quote from: cuby on February 28, 2023, 07:18:24 PMHm, your machine has 26 MB RAM? That's a strange amount...

The memory layout of the non-Turbo NeXTstation Color makes this possible: 3 * 8 + 2.

Quote from: andreas_g on March 01, 2023, 01:07:18 AM

QuoteHm, your machine has 26 MB RAM? That's a strange amount...

The memory layout of the non-Turbo NeXTstation Color makes this possible: 3 * 8 + 2.

Ah, I assumed that the Color slabs were also using 30 pin SIMMs like the Mono stations - this would make 26 MB (4x4MB + 4x2.5MB?) rather improbable, since 30-pin SIMM capacities usually increased by a factor of four and you need four SIMMs for the 32-bit bus.

With 72-pin SIMMs this is still a bit strange. I forgot that there were 2 MB 72-pin (PS/2) SIMMs, but this was probably not a configuration originally provided by NeXT.

But now I'm wondering about a thing, since there was a discussion about versions of the Color station using the Turbo chipset but running at 25 MHz. Most pictures of the Color non-Turbo PCB have eight 72-pin SIMM slots (e.g. this one (https://www.worthpoint.com/worthopedia/nextstation-color-68040-25mhz-1792385269)), but some show only four (like that one (https://www.vintagecomputer.net/next/NextStation-Color/)). However, pictures of the Color Turbo always seem to show four slots only.

Now, are the Color non-Turbo machines with only four SIMM slots ones using the Turbo chipset clocked at 25 MHz, but the eight slot PCBs use the old chipset? What are the memory limits of the two different non-Turbo mainboards?

Edit: RTFM helps, this is confirmed by the FAQ, section 5.27 (http://nextcube.org/board/browse/3121/7)...

Quote from: cuby on March 01, 2023, 01:57:20 AMBut now I'm wondering about a thing, since there was a discussion about versions of the Color station using the Turbo chipset but running at 25 MHz. Most pictures of the Color non-Turbo PCB have eight 72-pin SIMM slots (e.g. this one (https://www.worthpoint.com/worthopedia/nextstation-color-68040-25mhz-1792385269)), but some show only four (like that one (https://www.vintagecomputer.net/next/NextStation-Color/)). However, pictures of the Color Turbo always seem to show four slots only.

Now, are the Color non-Turbo machines with only four SIMM slots ones using the Turbo chipset clocked at 25 MHz, but the eight slot PCBs use the old chipset? What are the memory limits of the two different non-Turbo mainboards?

The first picture shows a board with original chipset that supports up to 32 MB of RAM and the second picture shows a board with Turbo chipset that supports up to 128 MB of RAM.

Quote from: andreas_g on March 01, 2023, 01:07:18 AMThe memory layout of the non-Turbo NeXTstation Color makes this possible: 3 * 8 + 2.

Yes, that's exactly the RAM configuration that I have in this machine.

Quote from: andreas_g on March 01, 2023, 01:07:18 AMI think this might also be the reason, that there are no revision 2.2 and 2.3 ROMs around. These might have supported the prototypes. The older 2.x ROMs only know monochrome systems and the newer ones only the final NeXTstation Color.

If we could find such an 2.2 or 2.3 ROM I could simulate the prototype NeXTstation in Previous.

Hm, if I recall correctly (I'm in the office right now) the ROM in my NeXTstation Color has a sticker on it that declares it to be a 2.2 ROM. But it seems somebody has written 2.4 by hand with a pen on the sticker and as you can see from the screenshot (see above) it actually is 2.4 (now).

I have two more Color NeXTstations. Once I'm back in my nerd cave, I'll check their ROMs.

Quote from: K-Town Computeum on March 01, 2023, 03:01:01 AMHm, if I recall correctly (I'm in the office right now) the ROM in my NeXTstation Color has a sticker on it that declares it to be a 2.2 ROM. But it seems somebody has written 2.4 by hand with a pen on the sticker and as you can see from the screenshot (see above) it actually is 2.4 (now).

Very interesting! If 2.2 and/or 2.3 ROMs have really worked with the prototypes (that is just my theory), we won't find them in a NeXTstation Color as they won't work with the final hardware. Probably we could find one in some old monochrome NeXTstation or 68040 Cube.

Quote from: K-Town Computeum on March 01, 2023, 03:01:01 AMHm, if I recall correctly (I'm in the office right now) the ROM in my NeXTstation Color has a sticker on it that declares it to be a 2.2 ROM. But it seems somebody has written 2.4 by hand with a pen on the sticker and as you can see from the screenshot (see above) it actually is 2.4 (now).

Here's a picture of it:

I found this topic after trying unsuccessfully to boot 2.0 with Previous emulating a NeXTstation Color. Wasn't sure if it was a bug or error at my end.

Did you end up finding a 2.2 ROM? MAME has one in its NeXTstation BIOS archive. You can download it here (https://archive.org/download/mame-merged/mame-merged/nexts.zip).

It boots fine in Previous as a NeXTstation and NeXTstation Color.

Quote from: protocol7 on January 26, 2024, 07:30:02 AMDid you end up finding a 2.2 ROM? MAME has one in its NeXTstation BIOS archive. You can download it here (https://archive.org/download/mame-merged/mame-merged/nexts.zip).

Thank you very much! This works with the normal (non-prototype) NeXTstation Color. So it won't work with the prototypes. I guess there were none of those prototype ROMs in the wild.

I do not wiling down grade and work/play for with stuff.

Space

I can now handle to down grade 2.X. I might even be able run it angainst 3.3 or 4.X ur choice. On two Different NextStations and Just got a Cube too. If needed

Mercì

Rob, to all on this site Meci Beaucoup


Space