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Apple IIgs proper period correct peripherals?

tblake05

Experienced Member
Joined
Aug 21, 2017
Messages
295
Location
Minnesota
I bought a gs off local auction for 65.00. No monitor keyboard or mouse.

Help me locate the appropriate peripherals.

The gs was the computer I was fond of in gradeschool. We only had 4 out of 12 computers and everyone stormed to the gs’s so I hardly ever got to use one.

Help me recreate my grade school computer. I remember....

-2 disk drives stacked on top of each other. A 5 1/4 and 3 1/2.
-color monitor with matching form factor and vent lines. Slanted power led.
-slim keyboard with number pad. (Slim or skinny. Not really thick)
-trapezoid mouse with 1 button.

Anyone have anything they want to sell? Or maybe even help out with part numbers or eBay search keywords?

Thanks!!!

~Tim
 
The IIgs uses ADB keyboards and mice (same as used on macs of that period). I have some yellowed ones in the garage if you can't find any elsewhere.

There is a IIgs specific keyboard and people love using them on compact macs so they are not too cheap.

The color monitors are IIgs specific and getting harder to find.
 
Oh man. The more “sought-after” one is the one I’d like. Mainly due to nostalgia I guess. I should prob get the second one in the meantime.
 
FWIW there's actually a *third* choice, the Apple Keyboard II, with the same layout. In terms of aesthetics it's kind of a compromise, it looks more like the IIgs keyboard than the "Standard" keyboard; not exactly right but closer. But it's also rubber dome so it has the worst feel. (But, plus side, it's the cheapest, so if you're just looking to get by until you can get the real deal there's an argument there.)
 
“Third” choice is the keyboard I remember using in high school on many macs.... I forget the model. I think is was the successor to the color classic. 550 performa maybe? It was an all in one. Built in cd and floppy. I sort of want one of them too just for nostalgia.

Man I’ve got a problem. Between vintage computers, arcade games, pinball machines, and retro video games.... my poor wife is very supportive.
 
I have an AK2 with my IIgs. I think it looks good:

I was using an AppleDesign keyboard (that 90's rubber dome one that came with late Performas and Beige G3s) with mine and it worked perfectly fine, and, honestly, it looked fine as well given the IIgs had yellowed to about the same color instead of its original whiter shade. I think this is all about matching the box pictures.
 
ADB keyboards in general are fewer then ADB equipped computers these days so they will end up like Amiga keyboards (EXPENSIVE).

I used to have 3 IIgs systems and sold one a couple years ago but kept the OEM keyboard and sold it with a different one because I love the originals look and feel. I also had to resolder one of mine because the ADB connector was loose, not sure if others had that problem.
 
I realize you said "period correct" peripherals but I want to point out that there's tons of great modern hardware for the IIgs, especially when it comes to storage. There's the CFFA3000, the MD/T, the Floppy Emu & the BOOTI to name but a few mass storage plug-in cards that sure beat working with floppies. If you get your hands on an Apple High Speed SCSI card, you can use it with SCSI2SD or BlueSCSI which works great as well (and does feel sort-of period correct ;)).

For display, you can buy or make an RGB to SCART cable and with a cheap scart to hdmi box (works with NTSC & PAL as a bonus), you can get a pretty good picture on a modern HDMI display. You could also invest in a VidHD which is a plug-in slot card for the gs, but which gives it perfect HDMI output.

You can even get an accelerator that makes the IIgs an even more fun toy - the Applesqueezer GS just hit the market (but is a bit scarce already due to chip shortages).

This is the problem with the IIgs - you can almost never have enough modern stuff to go with it, and sadly, the stuff is usually not all that cheap either.

There are also thriving communities of gs users and new software is still being made. It's my favorite machine at the moment and I user it almost daily. My favorite game is BuGS - a pretty new recreation of Atari Centipede. It's awesome!
 
Thanks to the generosity and knowledge of all of you, the machine is up and running. I’m still waiting on a keyboard cable to be delivered. Plus I think I should recap at least the gs power supply (see my other post), and maybe the monitor? What do you guys think? Also need to retro brite. Going for the full submergence method in the sun I think.

Thanks again everyone!!!!

~Tim
 

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Thanks to the generosity and knowledge of all of you, the machine is up and running. I’m still waiting on a keyboard cable to be delivered. Plus I think I should recap at least the gs power supply (see my other post), and maybe the monitor? What do you guys think? Also need to retro brite. Going for the full submergence method in the sun I think.

Thanks again everyone!!!!

~Tim
You can use an S-Video cable in place of the ADB cable until the new cable arrives.
 
You can use an S-Video cable in place of the ADB cable until the new cable arrives.
Ya, I’ve got only 1 svideo cable but it’s case around the plug is too thick to fit into the keyboard so I’ll just wait rather than force it and break something.
 
There are lots of kneejerk recappers around here. My opinion is recapping working systems runs the small chance of screwing them up in the process, unless 1) the system is likely to suffer permanent damage if a cap goes bad or 2) you're very good with your soldering work. In those situations I think it makes sense as a preventive measure but myself I don't think it pays off in others.

The IIgs is around the time Apple had a lot of bad caps (most notoriously in the 68030 era) but, for what it's worth, my ROM 03 IIgs is happily running on its original caps.
 
I concur. I recapped my ROM 03 just because and I have done tons of recapping (mostly monitors but some computers as well) but it still went wrong. It's one I don't use too often but I am going to have to go back and figure out where I screwed it up. It was fine before and as far as I can tell, the IIGS, when caps fail in the PSU, generally survives well. So, if there's no reason, I wouldn't do it again just because. -Stefan
 
The IIgs doesn't use any of those awful surface mount caps that are always leaking on the beige macs and amigas.

For what it's worth, I'm one of those guys that doesn't recap unless it needs it. I have two IIgs'en and two IIes, and neither the boards nor the PSUs in any of them have ever needed recapping. In fact, I installed new guts in one of the IIgs power supplies, because I thought I would need it for the Transwarp/GS. The new guts were actually far noisier than the old ones, so I ended up putting the thing back how it was originally and am still using it like that.

I mean, it's your stuff, so do what you want with it. But it's easy to get over-eager to plug in the soldering iron and fix stuff that isn't broken. I mean, I understand. Messing with this stuff is fun. So if you want to do it just to do it, then do it. But IMO you don't need to unless there is a problem. The IIs were all made with far better capacitors than the beige macs.
 
I recap when problems show up, but that means you need to fire up the thing every 6 months or so to make sure it works.
 
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