What's new in Virtual ][ 8.1
Jan 31, 2018
- Added a preference to use the H.264 codec for making a screen movie, even if the HEVC codec is available.
- Added a preference to suppress the large "Paused" indicator.
- Making a screen movie in macOS 10.11 and 10.12 now works as it should; the application no longer crashes.
- Fixed an issue that crashed the app when unplugging the game controller.
- Double-clicking a disk in the Finder worked only once per run; this has been fixed.
- When saving a configuration, the save dialog incorrectly gave the option to select a file type (such as disk image). This has been fixed.
- The "Current PC" button in the Inspector could result in blank lines in the disassembly. This has been fixed.
- When rebooting a virtual machine, the main window now stays the active window if the Inspector is open.
- If a configured ROM image file cannot be read, the application now presents an error message identifying the path of the missing file. In the previous version the application crashed.
- Fixed numerous (albeit minor) memory leaks.
- Updated the documentation of the A2V2 disk transfer utility.
New in Virtual ][ 7.5.2 (Feb 15, 2016)
- Fixed an issue that could cause the virtual processor to get stuck in an endless loop.
- The right arrow key did not work correctly when used for game control. This has been fixed.
New in Virtual ][ 7.5 (Feb 15, 2016)
- Support for two Mockingboard cards in one machine, in order to listen to max. 12 channels.
- Corrected an issue with double low resolution colors.
- Added an experimental feature: the super serial card emulation can now work with Unix named pipes (full license only).
- Improved timing of video rendering; the Apple //e cursor now blinks with constant time intervals.
- The RAMWorks card now has a maximum capacity of 16 MB (was 8 MB) (full license only).
- Relaxed the requirements for a custom character set definition: the file can now be either tiff or png, 1-bit or 8-bit.
- The Preferences window now shows the correct tab when opened.
- Simultaneous disk drive and printer sound effects could cause a crash - this has been fixed.
- The print preview now takes the scrollbar preferences into acount.
- Saving the machine state could potentially cause a crash - this has been solved.
- Fixed an issue where "high speed mode" sometimes incorrectly dropped back to regular speed.
- The Quicklook preview for saved state documents works again.
- The preview of saved state documents can now show horizontal scanlines.
- Fixed a Yosemite compatibility issue in the disk transfer application (A2V2).
New in Virtual ][ 7.3 (Sep 23, 2013)
- The "No Slot Clock" now reports Monday as weekday no. 1. Previously it reported Sunday as day no. 1, which was incorrect.
- Added Applescript properties for better control of the connected devices.
- The application preferences now offer two color schemes for high resolution rendering.
- The Inspector now retains its window positions when the virtual machine is restarted.
- Fixed several layout and font issues in the Inspector.
- "Set Disk Properties" in the Media menu no longer refuses volume numbers 0 and 255.
New in Virtual ][ 7.2.1 (Mar 22, 2013)
- Fixed an incompatibility of the new sound emulation with Mac OS X 10.7
New in Virtual ][ 7.2 (Mar 22, 2013)
- Rewrote the Apple II sound emulation. As a result, the application no longer crashes when a headphone is inserted or removed
- Fixed an issue that crashed the application when waking the Mac from sleep
- Fixed a layout issue in the RAMWorks configuration panel
New in Virtual ][ 6.5 (Mar 22, 2012)
- Fixed an issue where the Mockingboard card could halt the virtual machine (this happened, for example, in Ultima IV).
- Corrected an issue in the "floating bus" screen rendering, thereby improving compatibility.
- Fixed an issue that could cause stray pixels on the emulated screen when switching from 80-column text to low-resolution graphics.
- Improved screen rendering perfomance by using Apple's Grand Central Dispatch technology.
New in Virtual ][ 6.3.7 (Apr 27, 2010)
- Fixed an issue that could cause the arrow keys to generate incorrect game paddle values if used in combination with the command key.
- Added a convenience menu in "Quick Settings" to easily invert the direction of the up and down arrows when used as a joystick.
- The Mac OS X Finder now correctly recognizes disk images as Virtual files.
New in Virtual ][ 6.3.6 (Feb 8, 2010)
- The program now accepts "dsk" image files with 41 tracks (the maximum so far was 40).
- A recent Snow Leopard upgrade broke the "Make Movie from Apple II Screen" feature. This has been fixed.
- Cassette tape files now get file name extension "cass" instead of "aif". As a result, the cassette tape icon appears correctly again in Snow Leopard. Old "aif" files can still be read.
New in Virtual ][ 6.3.5 (Oct 19, 2009)
- Improved emulation of Apple II interrupts; as a result, the program "Publish It" version 4 can now be used with the mouse.
- Corrected an error in the emulation of several 65C02 instructions (particularly TSB and TRB). This enhances compatibility with Apple //e applications.
- Relative mouse mode is now correctly restored from a saved state file. This was an omission in previous versions.
- Fixed a few spelling errors in the Inspector and tool tips.
- Fixed an issue that could cause the text color on the Apple II screen to become white after clicking "Cancel" in the the configuration panel.
New in Virtual ][ 6.3.1 (Sep 18, 2009)
- If the preferences were set to skip the "save" question, the application crashed when quitting. This has been fixed.
New in Virtual ][ 6.3 (Aug 28, 2009)
- The program is now fully Mac OS X 10.6 "Snow Leopard" compatible.
- Fixed an issue, introduced in version 6.2, where the video inspector didn't render the text screen correctly.
- Fixed an issue that caused the "open Apple" key emulation to work poorly in full screen mode (in Mac OS X 10.5 "Leopard" only).
- In full-screen mode, the I/O activity indicator sometimes remained visible after I/O activity had ended; this has been solved.
- Fixed an issue, introduced in version 6.2, that could cause Applescript execution to crash the program (in Mac OS X 10.4 "Tiger" only).
- Fixed an issue (in Mac OS X 10.4 "Tiger" only) that prevented the use of the built-in French character set.
- In the configuration window, the character set preview showed a few stray pixels. This has been solved.
- Fixed an issue that could cause a gzipped disk image to be incorrectly renamed when ejected.
New in Virtual ][ 6.2 (Jul 20, 2009)
- Added power management options to save energy and enhance battery life on a notebook Mac.
- Fixed an issue that caused the game disk "World Karate Championship" to fail while booting.
- The Help menu now contains an item to open an online version of the Help section in a web browser.
- In the Inspector, fixed an issue where two lines in the disassembly could be highlighted at the same time.
- Resuming an original Apple ][ from a saved state file could result in incorrect video settings. This has been solved.
- Clarified some topics in the Help section: printing with a limited license, and joystick emulation with the keyboard.
New in Virtual ][ 6.1 (Nov 17, 2008)
- The Inspector now lets you modify Apple II memory and CPU registers.
- Corrected several issues in the game paddle emulation, thereby improving stability and general compatibility.
- Fixed an issue with the 6502 decimal mode emulation, which caused some UCSD Pascal programs to crash.
- Fixed an issue with the Epson FX80 emulation; in some cases double-width characters were not rendered correctly.
- Clicking an I/O address breakpoint in the Inspector made it invisible; this has been solved.
New in Virtual ][ 6.0 (Apr 8, 2008)
- Added a feature that lets you record the action on the Apple II screen as a QuickTime movie.
- Added a new module: DiskIIViewer. It allows the Mac OS X "Leopard" Finder to present Apple II disk images in QuickLook and Cover Flow.
- Improved the quality of high resolution rendering.
- The "Search Disk Images" window now shows the results while typing, just like Spotlight.
- The "Search Disk Images" window now shows all diskette names with the selected file system (it used to omit empty disks).
- Added an Applescript command to make a snapshot of the Apple II screen and save it as a file.
- Added an Applescript command to dump (part of) the Apple II memory into a file.
- A mounted Mac folder (DOS) can now hold up to 200 KB (was 140 KB).
- The numeric keypad "enter" key of the mid-2007 iMac keyboard is now correctly recognized.
- Fixed an issue in the Spotlight module that could cause hdv disk images to be ignored.
- Fixed an issue that caused the program to crash if multiple virtual machines used the same serial port.
- This version requires OS X 10.4 "Tiger" or OS X 10.5 "Leopard". It does not run on OS X 10.3 "Panther" anymore.