Bernie ][ The Rescue 2.6

Audio/Video

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1. Video Support

> 1.1 Power Mode

> 1.2 The Preferences

> > 1.2.1 Screen Refresh

> > 1.2.2 Switch Screen Depth at Startup

> > 1.2.3 Bypassing QuickDraw

> > 1.2.4 Smooth Mouse Tracking

> > 1.2.5 Extended Border Area

> > 1.2.6 AppleColor™ Mode (Smoothed)

> > 1.2.7 Power Mode: Switch at Startup

> > 1.2.8 Power Mode: Preserve Border Color

> > 1.2.9 Power Mode: Fade Screen at Switch

> > 1.2.10 Power Mode: Change Screen Resolution at Switch

> 1.3 Copying Content of Video Window

> 1.4 Video Performance Tips

2. Ensoniq Sound Emulation

> 2.1 Sound At A Glance

> > 2.1.1 Turning Sound On/Off

> > 2.1.2 SonicSense: Saving CPU resources

> > 2.1.3 The Sound Window

> 2.2 The Sound Preferences

> > 2.2.1 Playback Mode

> > 2.2.2 Volume Amplifier

> > 2.2.3 Xtra Features

> 2.3 Recommendations

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1. Video Support

Bernie supports the entire range of video modes the Apple IIgs offers, and that's a lot. Video modes range from low resolution graphics and text modes to Apple IIgs' super-hires mode.

Different Video Modes

Bernie is offering three video modes: window mode, zoomed and Power Mode. In window mode, the Apple IIgs video display is contained in a single window and you can work with other windows and applications at the same time. In zoomed mode, the video window is shrinked. Lastly, in Power Mode the Apple IIgs video will occupy the entire screen and your Mac looks like a Apple IIgs.

Different Colors

Your Mac can run at different color "depths": 256 colors, thousands of colors, millions of colors, etc. Bernie has been optimized to run in 256 colors and 16-bit color depth (thousands of colors), and you might want to take advantage of this capability. (It's even a good idea to tell Bernie to switch to 256 or thousands of colors automatically at launch time.) You can still run Bernie at any other color depth, but it will run slower.

Different Refreshes

Bernie is refreshing the video window at 15Hz, 30Hz or 60Hz. There's also an "auto" setting where Bernie will find the best refresh rate for you. An Apple IIgs has a refresh frequency of 50 or 60 Hz, but this is often too often for most work. By reducing refresh frequency, you can free a lot of resources for improved performance.

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1.1 Power Mode

Bernie features a special video mode called Power Mode. Power Mode makes your Apple IIgs emulator look like an actual Apple IIgs. The Power Mode has the following characteristics:

- if possible your monitor will be set to 640x480 or 800x600 (with extended border option)
- the video window will be centered and the space around the Video will be covered by a border
- Power Mode switches to 256 colors and enables a fast video blitter for best performance
- low-level mouse support is activated automatically

Power Mode requires your Mac to be capable of displaying 256 colors. If your Mac does not offer such a video mode, you can't switch to Power Mode. Also, Bernie will only switch resolution if you have installed QuickTime. If you do not have QuickTime active, Power Mode will stay in the current resolution and center the video.

To activate Power Mode, push Command-Shift-F or the function key F8.

In Power Mode, all available colors are reserved for IIgs video. Unfortunately, this prevents Bernie from displaying the border in the proper color. Bernie allows you to put aside one color for the border (see video panel in Preferences). Of course, this one color will not be available in the video window and may result (in extremely rare situations) to cosmetic quirks.

To quit Power Mode push Command-Shift-F or F8 again. You have to remember this keystroke because the menu is not visible. Alternately, you can use the function key F8 to enter or leave Power Mode.

#### Switching to the Finder

If you just want to quickly dive into the Mac Finder and return to Power Mode later, use the shortcut Shift-F8. This command puts Bernie into the background and makes the Finder the active application. When you return to Bernie (for example, by choosing it in the applications menu), you'll find yourself back in Power Mode.

Important: remember that Bernie can be taught to emulate in background. If you're hiding Bernie with Shift-F8, it might still be running and other application may perform sluggish. To turn it off, check the flag "pause emulation when in background" in the Preferences.

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1.2 The Preferences

Many settings can be controlled through the Preferences window. To open it, choose "Preferences" from the Setup menu:

Each option will be discussed hereafter.

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1.2.1 Screen Refresh

The screen refresh rate controls how often Bernie is redrawing the video window. A Apple IIgs is updating the video sixty or fifty times a second (60Hz/50Hz), but usually it is not necessary to redraw the video window that often. By choosing a slower refresh frequency, you can free considerable resources and make Bernie run faster.

The exact overhead of screen refreshes is not fixed but depends on the software you are using. That's why Bernie is offering a "Auto" setting: it then chooses a refresh frequency that your Mac can handle without being slowed too much which is usually 30 Hz.

The recommended setting is "Auto" or "30Hz".

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1.2.2 Change Screen Depth at Startup

Switches your main monitor to a color depth for which Bernie has a direct video blitter. Drivers exist for 256 colors and thousands of colors.

When launching Bernie and your video is currently set to anything below 256 colors, Bernie will switch to 256 colors. If video is set to millions of colors, Bernie will switch to thousands of colors.

Please note that the 16-bit blitter is not as fast as its 256 colors counterpart. Running Bernie in thousands of colors is very, very approximately 5 to 15% slower.

The recommended setting is to have Bernie switch to an accelerated video mode.

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1.2.3 Bypassing QuickDraw

Bypassing QuickDraw means that Bernie is directly writing into the video window on screen.

The conventional approach is to write changes to a separate memory area and then copy the new content to the video window, but this is slow. That's why Bernie is offering you to directly update the video window.

Note: Bernie can only bypass QuickDraw when the video is entirely visible and not overlapped by other windows, partially off-screen or crossing two or more monitors.

The recommended setting is to bypass QuickDraw.

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1.2.4 Smooth Mouse Tracking

By default, Bernie is updating internal mouse parameters 30 times per second. This is sufficient for most software and reduces mouse emulation overhead. If your software requires a finer resolution, you can tell Bernie to check the mouse position more often (60 times a second) by checking this box.

The recommended setting is to disable smooth mouse tracking.

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1.2.5 Extended Border Area

The Apple IIgs monitor had a pretty large border surrounding the actual content. If you'd like to really feel at home, enable Extended Border to increase border size to about the size of an original Apple IIgs system.

Note: Extended Border should not be enabled on monitors with a resolution of less than 800x600 pixels because it exceeds the size of the monitor and is slowing down emulation. Power Mode will automatically disable Extended Border if your monitor does not support the minimum resolution of 800x600 pixels.

The recommended setting is to turn off extended border.

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1.2.6 AppleColor™ Mode (Smoothed)

In AppleColor™ mode, Bernie smoothes 640x200 superhires video display. This eliminates stripes but some elements (notably text) might look fuzzy. Enabling AppleColor™ mode does not affect any other video mode besides 640x200 superhires.

The recommended setting is to turn off AppleColor™ mode.

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1.2.7 Power Mode: Switch at Startup

Automatically switches to (full-screen) Power Mode when Bernie is launched.

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1.2.8 Power Mode: Preserve Border Color

Puts aside one color for the border color. This one color will not be available for superhires and theoretically can lead to cosmetic quirks. In practice, though, this should never happen.

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1.2.9 Power Mode: Fade Screen at Switch

Yet another check box in the same video panel, "Fade Screen at Switch", introduces a supercool fade out/in while switching between normal (windowed) view and Power Mode.

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1.2.10 Power Mode: Change Screen Resolution at Switch

When switching to Power Mode, you can tell Bernie to set your monitor to 14" resolution. If your monitor does not support 14" resolution, this option does nothing.

Bernie requires QuickTime to be installed, otherwise switching resolution is not supported. If QuickTime is not installed or deactivated, Power Mode will simply stay at whatever resolution it is.

Another limitations are tabbed windows in MacOS® 8. For a yet to be found reason, MacOS 8 messes up the positions of popup windows when switching to 14" resolution. This problem does also occur when letting Bernie do the switch. There's nothing we can do about tabbed windows - we feel that's Apple's job to fix.

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1.3 Copying Content of Video Window

Bernie lets you copy the content of the Video window in two ways, either as a bitmap or as a stream of ASCII characters.

The Copy command in the Edit menu automatically chooses the proper action: if the IIgs is in graphics mode, it copies the window as a bitmap, otherwise as text. If you are not happy with how the Copy command works, you can force Bernie to copy the text screen as a bitmap by choosing "Copy Graphics" from the Edit menu.

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1.4 Video Performance Tips

With so many options it's easy to make Bernie dog-slow. Here's a short summary of what you should consider if you're looking for top performance:

- switch your computer to 256 colors. This is the most important and simple tweak.
- be sure the content of the Video window is entirely visible and not overlapped by other windows. (The window border may be hidden.)
- turn off Smooth Mouse Tracking
- go into Power Mode. Enabling Power Mode ensures all of the above performance tips are followed.

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2. Ensoniq Sound Emulation

Bernie features rich, 32 channel stereo/surround sound. The emulator emulates the Ensoniq sound chip for the ultimate sound experience with many games and music software. Classic 1-bit sound is also supported. Bernie 2.5 comes with a new, non-linear and adaptive sound volume calculation for highest fidelity across all Ensoniq loads.

### Getting Help

If you have questions regarding Video support, feel free to go to the Feedback page and submit us your question or comment.

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2.1 Sound At A Glance

Bernie ][ The Rescue supports the full range of "sound reproduction". It supports so-called classic "1-bit" sound found in older Apple II programs as well as the Apple IIgs' Ensoniq® sound chip.

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2.1.1 Turning Sound On/Off

Sound emulation is enabled by checking the menu item "Sound Support" from the Setup menu. When sound emulation is started, you hear a chime.

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2.1.2 SonicSense: Saving CPU resources

Sound emulation requires a tremendous amount of CPU resources because the Macintosh does not have a dedicated sound chip but does all sound synthesis in software. 680x0 Macintosh systems had a sound ASIC or a DSP coprocessor, but all PowerPC-based Macs lack such a coprocessor.

Thus, Bernie gives you a helping hand. It features SonicSense, a technique for enabling sound automatically when software starts playing sounds and turning it off when the virtual sound chip is idle. To enable SonicSense...

- open the Preferences window (see Setup menu)
- click the Sound panel
- check the SonicSense option

SonicSense is only active when both sound emulation is turned on and SonicSense is enabled. If you have disabled sound emulation, Bernie will not play anything.

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2.1.3 The Sound Window

Just for your very personal enjoyment, we have given Bernie a Sound window where you can watch sound emulation at work. The window includes an oscilloscope and a bar of LEDs that represent oscillator activity.

The Sound window has a small LED titled "ON" which shows different stages of operation. If it's just plain red, sound emulation is off. If it's solid green, sound is playing. If it is green and blinking fast, SonicSense has shut down certain routines that reduce sound overhead. (This mode is called "quick sleep".) If the LED is blinking red, Bernie has put the n-sonic driver into "deep sleep", i.e. it has turned off sound completely. (Note: although it's shut off, sound emulation per se is still activated, so SonicSense will recover from deep sleep as soon as a sound is playing again.)

Furthermore, there are two LEDs titled "SVC" (which stands for Smart Voice Cancellation) and RCA ("Rear Channel Automapping"). Rear Channel Automapping is only used in Pro Logic playback mode - for an explanation please see below.

While this window is sometimes cool to look at, please close it if you're done with it. The Sound window eats quite some CPU power and does not make you more productive, Bernie faster, or the environment healthier. (It is not even biodegradable.)

Sound emulation can be customized to make efficient use of your Mac hardware. To fine-tune the sound component, open the Preferences window (open the Setup menu) and click the topmost icon.

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2.2 The Sound Preferences

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2.2.1 Playback Mode

The playback mode lets you choose among various settings.

- Mono outputs a mono signal and is the fastest mode requiring only a fair amount of CPU resources.
- Stereo provides you with a stereo output if your Mac can reproduce two channel sound.
- If you are connecting headphones, we recommend you to choose Stereo Enhanced - this mode reduces the stereo effect for more relaxed listening with headphones.
- Dolby® Surround is Bernie's state-of-the-art surround sound engine. If you have your Mac connected to a Dolby® Pro Logic/THX® decoder/preamplifier, this mode outputs 4 channel surround sound (left, right, center, rear). Unfortunately, in order to hear sounds on the center and rear channels, Apple IIgs software must be capable of addressing more than just the standard two stereo channels. See below for information on "Rear Channel Automapping".

The recommended setting is mono for best performance or stereo for games and music applications.

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2.2.2 Volume Amplifier

The Volume slider lets you amplify sound.

If you increase volume, you may experience audible scratches in some situations. Amplifying the volume basically says that you are increasing volume beyond what's mathematically correct, so scratches are necessarily part of the process.

The recommended setting is to set volume to normal.

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2.2.3 Xtra Features

The Xtra Features are a collection of unique functions that make Bernie a top performer:

- SonicSense is a special feature that cuts down sound emulation overhead to an absolute minimum. You should always enable SonicSense. Basically, it means that sound is turned off automatically after 2 seconds of silence and restarted when sound resources are being used again. When sound is turned off by SonicSense, the red light in the "Sound" window is blinking.
- Hi-Fi sound lets you choose between 22kHz (off) and 44Khz (on). Typically, 22kHz is sufficient as the Ensoniq can't play much higher anyway (thanks to a roll-off filter that has a limit of ca. 26kHz).
- Smart Voice Cancellation is a technique for cutting down the number of redundant voices. Enabling it reduces overhead without sacrificing quality.
- Rear Channel Automapping screens the sounds played through the Ensoniq and dynamically maps certain voices to the rear and center channels. This option is only active when used with Dolby Pro Logic sound mode. It allows you to listen to surround sound even if the Apple IIgs software is designed to play stereo only. This is an experimental feature and may not always produce 'good' sound. Check it out!

The "HiFi Sound" option not only doubles sample frequency but indirectly also doubles timing precision. If you feel sound is unsteady or "unprecise", try enabling "HiFi Sound". Bernie will then allocate more bandwidth to sound emulation.

The recommended settings are SonicSense enabled, HiFi sound disabled, and Smart Voice Cancellation enabled.

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2.3 Sound Performance Tips

Sound emulation may slow down Bernie on low-end Power Macs significantly. For best performance, be sure to:

- enable SonicSense and Smart Voice Cancellation
- use Mono playback
- we have found that Macs are somewhat faster when the Mac (not Bernie!) is set to 44kHz: open the Sound control panel and set "Sound Out" to 44Khz.
- the Sound window (see Window menu) displays some fancy controls. However, opening this window eats valuable CPU resources, so better close it when speed is critical.
- some music applications provide options for reducing the number of active voices (Diversi-Tune)

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Mac, Apple IIgs, SmartPort, GS/OS, Finder, MacOS, ProDOS, AppleWorks are trademarks of Apple Computer Inc. Dolby Pro Logic is a trademark of Dolby Laboratories Inc. THX is a trademark of Lucasfilm Inc. All other brand names are trademarks of their respective holders. Bernie is a virtual dog.