The Beep Goes On

Yesterday was a productive day of peripheral card testing. Some frustrations, but that has always been the case when you're playing with >40-year-old hardware and modern devices. The first challenge was to get video out of the IIe. I have three cards that will output HDMI. The most inexpensive is an A2DVI card. The problem with that card is that the HDMI connection faces the backplane of the Apple II, and there is no way to get a thick HDMI cable to bend 90 degrees to make the connection. When I was down at the storage unit, I found a small plastic container that had spare rubber feet, backplane cutout covers, and an HDMI right-angle adapter. I thought I took that with me, but I can't seem to find it. So, Plan B was to use the A2FPGA, a modern device that simulates a number of old peripheral cards, like the Mockingboard sound card, a sprite video board, and a Super Serial card. It also outputs HDMI with the connector facing the keyboard, so there's plenty of room to route the cable. I…