4 ms·
Macs did support RS-232, via the MiniDIN-8 "printer" and "modem" ports. This port didn't supply power, though, making it a poor choice for a mouse or keyboard.
by duskwuff 6y ago
Macs did support RS-232, via the MiniDIN-8 "printer" and "modem" ports. This port didn't supply power, though, making it a poor choice for a mouse or keyboard.
(Serial mice typically got away with drawing power from one of the signal pins. This was a pretty gross hack, but it worked well enough.)
- Someone 6y agoThe Mac technically had RS-422 (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/RS-422#Applicationsj https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/RS-422#Applicationsj, which allowed for much higher data speeds and larger cable lengths, but could be used as RS-232, too.
- rvense 6y agoThe Mac serial ports were much better than PC serial parts. They ran faster and could be used over longer distances and had hardware support for networking with those cheap LocalTalk boxes - as I understand it, you're basically physically daisy chaining the computers, and the hardware is capable of looking at a packet and decide whether it's for this computer and if isn't it can pass it on without software intervention.