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From: lrm3@ellis.uchicago.edu (Lawrence Reed Miller)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.mac.misc
Subject: Re: The Fate of the Macintosh
Message-ID: <1991Mar22.174537.427@midway.uchicago.edu>
Date: 22 Mar 91 17:45:37 GMT
References: <1991Mar22.154811.8691@rucs2.sunlab.cs.runet.edu>
Sender: lrm3@midway.uchicago.edu (Lawrence Reed Miller)
Organization: University of Chicago
Lines: 24

In article <1991Mar22.154811.8691@rucs2.sunlab.cs.runet.edu> rdeal@rucs2.sunlab.cs.runet.edu (Butch Deal) writes, in part,:
>>but I figure the NeXT should be able to (software) emulate the Macintosh
>>and still run faster than even my SE/30.  Hey, the instruction set should
>>be close between the Motorola 68040 and the 68030, huh ?
>
>why should they be close Apple has been having a great deal of trouble 
>settting up a system for the 68040.  The 68040 is vastly different from
>the 68030.  Much of the instructions of the mac are in hardware also.
>

The 68040 _hardware_ is different from the 68030.  However, the 68040 is
able to run 680x0 machine code without any difficulty.  As the Motorola
technical summary puts it..."The MC68040 is user-object-code compatible
with previous members of the MC68000 Family."  What differences are you
talking about?

Much of the Mac toolbox is in ROM, but there is no reason that the toolbox traps
can't be stored in RAM.  In fact, that's how Apple updates the toolbox--traps
that are not in ROM, or which have been changed are loaded into RAM out of the
System File.  Of course, to do this legally you would have to come up with
an independant verson of the Mac Toolbox and System Software.  This would be
difficult, but certainly not impossible.

Lawrence Miller