Mystery Apple KanjiTalk Font Card (NuBus) [630-0174-A] Does anyone recongize this?

[Mac84]

I've recently acquired this interesting Apple KanjiTalk Font NuBus card... and I'd love to learn more about what it does and it's purpose, etc.

Doing some research, I've found other websites (example from okqubit.net) wondering what this is. I'm assuming it may have something to do with some software limitation on the Macintosh that benefited or required this type of card to use the potentially thousands of characters Kanji has.

I've installed the card in my Macintosh IIx and tried booting to System 7.1 (English) and System 6.0.7 (Kanji) and KanjiTalk (7.0). Nothing seemingly changes on the surface of the operating system. However, I'm sure I may be missing a software component to take advantage of the card.

Here is a dump of the ROM (AM2732B) from the card: ROM dump

Oddly enough, there is no Apple Computer specific markings on the card. Maybe this card was used for development purposes?

I'm attaching some images, hopefully we can figure out how to use this card, as I think it'll be fun.

-Steve

 

[Melkhior]

I've recently acquired this interesting Apple KanjiTalk Font NuBus card... and I'd love to learn more about what it does and it's purpose, etc.

The declaration Rom simply list a bunch of resources, but no actual code (primary/secondary init or driver):

Format block:
bytelanes = 0x78
testpattern = 0x5a932bc7
format = 0x1
revision = 0x1
crc = 0x84739b4b
length = 4096
offset = -4076
Resource 1
        sRsrcType: 1 0 0 0
        sRsrcName: KanjiTalk Font Card
        BoardId: 21
        VendorInfo:
                VendorID: Apple Computer Japan
                PartNum: KFC-1
Resource 128
        sRsrcType: 9 1 0 0
        sRsrcName: 12dotL0 Math
Resource 129
        sRsrcType: 9 1 0 0
        sRsrcName: 12dotL0 G&R
Resource 130
        sRsrcType: 9 1 0 0
        sRsrcName: 12dotL1 Misc
Resource 131
        sRsrcType: 9 1 0 0
        sRsrcName: 12dotL1 Kanji
Resource 132
        sRsrcType: 9 1 0 0
        sRsrcName: 12dotL2 Kanji
Resource 133
        sRsrcType: 9 1 0 0
        sRsrcName: 16dotL0 Math
Resource 134
        sRsrcType: 9 1 0 0
        sRsrcName: 16dotL0 G&R
Resource 135
        sRsrcType: 9 1 0 0
        sRsrcName: 16dotL1 Misc
Resource 136
        sRsrcType: 9 1 0 0
        sRsrcName: 16dotL1 Kanji
Resource 137
        sRsrcType: 9 1 0 0
        sRsrcName: 16dotL2 Kanji
Resource 138
        sRsrcType: 9 1 0 0
        sRsrcName: 24dotL0 Math
Resource 139
        sRsrcType: 9 1 0 0
        sRsrcName: 24dotL0 G&R
Resource 140
        sRsrcType: 9 1 0 0
        sRsrcName: 24dotL1 Misc
Resource 141
        sRsrcType: 9 1 0 0
        sRsrcName: 24dotL1 Kanji
Resource 142
        sRsrcType: 9 1 0 0
        sRsrcName: 24dotL2 Kanji

That and the category/type suggest it's just ROM storage. Each of the resource above has an entry of type '128', which seem to contain 8 bytes of data. They are for instance:

Found entry 128 offset 504
Found resource entry 128 offset 32 (0x00000020)
Unknown resource entry 128
                raw data: 0x00000000
                raw data: 0xe4ffff01
                raw data R: 0x00000000
                raw data R: 0x01ffffe4

Found entry 129 offset 544
Found resource entry 128 offset 20 (0x00000014)
Unknown resource entry 128
                raw data: 0x02030000
                raw data: 0xc4ffff01
                raw data R: 0x00000302
                raw data R: 0x01ffffc4

Where 'R' is the same data but byte-reversed (little/big-endian). Might some form of indexing in the card slot space.

You could see if you can access data at the beginning of the slot space - beware if there's nothing there the mac will crash with a bus error. If you know the slot number (it's documented by apple for most NuBus machines in DCDMF3), you can have the most trivial of console applications displaying the value pointed by (0xF0000000 | slot << 24) in 32-bits mode (e.g. "printf("0x%08x\n", *(unsigned int*)(0xFC000000));" for slot $C). If you get a result instead of a crash, there's something there... but it could be somewhere else in the card space (the Rom itself is at the end of the slot space in 24 and 32 bits mode).

Edit: also I would guess the 12dot/16dot/24dot in the names is a font size, and there three groups of 5 fonts in Kanji?

Edit2: if we take the first number for an offset or a size, then it grows faster for (the presumed) larger font sizes, which is logical for bit-mapped fonts. it also suggests a fairly large amount of a data (hundred of kilobytes), which you couldn't keep in a boot floppy and would be wasteful even on a hard drive in the early days of the II series. Having such large amount of data in ROM would make sense if the board wasn't excessively expensive vs. magnetic storage.

 

[robin-fo]

it also suggests a fairly large amount of a data (hundred of kilobytes), which you couldn't keep in a boot floppy and would be wasteful even on a hard drive in the early days of the II series.

Makes perfect sense. Furthermore, NuBus access would have been a lot faster than hard drive or even floppy access, which should be vital for drawing text.

 

[Anden Selmani]

Seems like a fairly uncommon card. Only found one other picture of it.

 

[retr01]

@Kay K.M.Mods - are you familiar with this Apple KanjiTalk Font Card (NuBus) [630-0174-A] card?

 

[retr01]

I suspect this wasn't a production card for people to use but a tool for Apple to continue developing KanjiTalk software and support for Macs. Or, perhaps, it was created to handle the processing of Kanji to take the load off the CPU in the Mac II modular systems.

Apple started developing KanjiTalk in the latter part of 1984 and released Apple's first Japanese system software, KanjiTalk, to developers in 1986. The second version followed in 1987. That continued for System 7 in the 1990s. With the Power Macs, there is KanjiTalk 7.5, and perhaps that NuBus card wasn't needed. Then, it became part of OS X.

Attached is a scholarly research paper on KanjiTalk.

 

[retr01]

As listed in the ROM, M. Kato, M. Takahashi, et al. apparently were Apple's Advanced Technical Group engineers. This article has a story involving those people and some events that happened in Japan. Read the interview, and you will notice some of those names.

What Happened to General Magic?

 

[Kay K.M.Mods]

@Kay K.M.Mods - are you familiar with this Apple KanjiTalk Font Card (NuBus) [630-0174-A] card?

I just had a question from Steve M. and just talked to him about it.

The Kanji-ROM Card was bundled with the Macintosh II and is a legacy of the System 2 generation. This was abolished after Kanji Talk 1 was released. Kanji Talk 1 is Japanese ver. of System 3.0.

To use this Kanji-ROM card you need an installer for it with System2.1, without the installer it's just a PCB that just consumes current.
Moreover, System 2.1 used the US version instead of Kanji Talk, and the Kanji-ROM card functioned only with word processing functions. This is because it was developed by Ergosoft in Japan.

In addition, not only MacintoshII but also Mac512K has a model called DynaMac only for the Japanese market. This was equipped with a Kanji-ROM card directly connected to the 68000 like an accelerator card.


This is a DynaMac I'm in the process of repairing. I think it was about two years ago. Unfortunately, it was owned by a friend and upgraded to MacPlus, but he showed me the Kanji ROM card for this.

I also have a MacII Kanji ROM card. I have two, so if anyone wants one, please PM me. Only recognition can be confirmed.

 

[sarnau]

From a look at the PCB it seems the 4kb declaration ROM is just part of it. The two MN234000 seem two 512KX8 masked ROMs, so my guess is that this card maps 1MB of Kanji font data into the address space, which seems to make sense.

 

[retr01]

A four-page article, "Japanese To Go," on pages 60-63 of the April 1986 MacUser magazine issue, discussed the complexity of the Japanese language as a barrier for the Macintosh, introduced EgWord and EgBridge, and mentioned DynaMac.

 

[Mac84]

Thanks for the all the information everyone!

It seems like I need the Japanese equivalent of Macintosh System Software 2.0.1 or 2.1 (or similar), this would contain System 4.1/4.x and Finder 5.5/5.x. These would likely have a date of around 1987/1988 to match the release of the Macintosh II.

I've checked my Apple CDs, but I haven't found any non-US system software sets before System 6.

I've only found Japanese versions of System 6.0.7, KanjiTalk 7, and one earlier unlabeled version from 1986 (containing System 3.1 / Finder 5.2), which will not boot on the Macintosh II.

As @Kay K.M.Mods mentioned, System 6 and 7 were too new for this card, so it explains why they aren't useful in this scenario. However, with the right disks, maybe we can get this working.

 

[Mac84]

Thanks to @fogWraith I spent some more time pulling my hair out about this.

I switched from my Mac IIx to my Mac II, as the Mac II can run pre-System 6 versions of the Mac OS. This seems to be what the KanjiCard wants installed.
Sadly, whenever I have the KanjiTalk NuBus card installed, the Mac acts very, very odd. Random boot loops, the FloppyEmu restarting frequently, system hangs and bombs... And even without it... it is finicky, so there is something wrong... somewhere.

I did use this link to try KanjiTalk 2.0 (that includes Finder 5.5, 1987) from MacintoshGarden. It contains two floppy images, a Font disk and a System disk. Although maybe the elusive version 2.1 is more bug-free?

I used these disks to install the system onto a BlueSCSI. Either way, when the system boots it asks for the Font disk, you can select cancel on the dialog box and proceed to booting. But inserting the disk seems to freeze the system (at least using my FloppyEmu). If I bypass the Font dialog box, I can get to the Desktop.

Inside the System Folder are "IIcard" and "SEcard" files. These must relate to the KanjiCards for those Mac models. Oddly enough, if I place the font files (from the Fonts Disk) into the root of the HD, or the System Folder, it still is looking for that disk upon boot. Maybe there's something more to it? A screenshot of the ResEdit info for the "IIcard" file is attached below. These files are not present on the KanjiTalk 1.0 (Finder 5.2) disk.

Maybe the HFS support in KanjiTalk 2.1 will fix my issues? Maybe my E-Machines NuBus video card is to blame? I'd love to know...

Still, the system seems very unstable when the KanjiCard NuBus card installed. So I've paused this for now. Was there a different Mac II ROM used for machines in Japan? That may explain why my US Mac II is so unhappy...

 

[Kay K.M.Mods]

Thanks to @fogWraith I spent some more time pulling my hair out about this.

I switched from my Mac IIx to my Mac II, as the Mac II can run pre-System 6 versions of the Mac OS. This seems to be what the KanjiCard wants installed.
Sadly, whenever I have the KanjiTalk NuBus card installed, the Mac acts very, very odd. Random boot loops, the FloppyEmu restarting frequently, system hangs and bombs... And even without it... it is finicky, so there is something wrong... somewhere.

I did use this link to try KanjiTalk 2.0 (that includes Finder 5.5, 1987) from MacintoshGarden. It contains two floppy images, a Font disk and a System disk. Although maybe the elusive version 2.1 is more bug-free?

I used these disks to install the system onto a BlueSCSI. Either way, when the system boots it asks for the Font disk, you can select cancel on the dialog box and proceed to booting. But inserting the disk seems to freeze the system (at least using my FloppyEmu). If I bypass the Font dialog box, I can get to the Desktop.

Inside the System Folder are "IIcard" and "SEcard" files. These must relate to the KanjiCards for those Mac models. Oddly enough, if I place the font files (from the Fonts Disk) into the root of the HD, or the System Folder, it still is looking for that disk upon boot. Maybe there's something more to it? A screenshot of the ResEdit info for the "IIcard" file is attached below. These files are not present on the KanjiTalk 1.0 (Finder 5.2) disk.

Maybe the HFS support in KanjiTalk 2.1 will fix my issues? Maybe my E-Machines NuBus video card is to blame? I'd love to know...

Still, the system seems very unstable when the KanjiCard NuBus card installed. So I've paused this for now. Was there a different Mac II ROM used for machines in Japan? That may explain why my US Mac II is so unhappy...

Try it on system 1-2. Kanji Talk Talk 1.0 is System 3.0. *I made a mistake in my Twitter reply

The Japanese Mac II's onboard ROM is the same as the US version. I used MacII with System7.0.1, no problem.

 

[Mac84]

Try it on system 1-2. Kanji Talk Talk 1.0 is System 3.0. *I made a mistake in my Twitter reply

The Japanese Mac II's onboard ROM is the same as the US version. I used MacII with System7.0.1, no problem.

I tried but it won’t boot on the Mac II.

I think it’s one version too old, judging by the Mac II’s original software version number (System Software bundle v2.0.1 - which includes System 4.1 / Finder 5.5) and release date of 1987.

Also, that system disk doesn’t seem to have the “IIcard” or “SEcard” files. So maybe it was only for the 512K and Plus models?

 

[Kay K.M.Mods]

I tried but it won’t boot on the Mac II.

I think it’s one version too old, judging by the Mac II’s original software version number (System Software bundle v2.0.1 - which includes System 4.1 / Finder 5.5) and release date of 1987.

Also, that system disk doesn’t seem to have the “IIcard” or “SEcard” files. So maybe it was only for the 512K and Plus models?

That's weird. Mine worked! But I switched to IIx ROM now. If I have time, I'll check the ROM Ver of my MacII. MaxII and Mac II fx are heavy and huge, they always sleep in the warehouse I will send you a dumped ROMs if they were special ROMs for Japan models.

 

[ZeFrenchToon]

Can I share this auction ?
It is not from me. I would buy it for fun but not for this price so I share it:

https://buyee.jp/item/yahoo/auction/1093541706