Return of the CFFA3000

Good news for Apple II folks: The CFFA3000 is coming back! (It had been discontinued by the creator; from a July 29, 2019 update post: “I currently have no plans to make a new Gen 4 CFFA. So this is most likely the end of the line.”) Prior to this announcement, CFFA3000 cards were selling for an average of over $450, on eBay. What’s the CFFA3000? It lets 8-bit (II, II+, IIe) and 16-bit IIgs) Apple computers use solid state storage. Multiple 32MB “hard drive” or 143K/400K/800K “floppy disk” images can be mounted simultaneously, from a compact flash card or USB stick. It’s a seriously slick piece of equipment, and part of a panoply of devices that have me going “seriously?!” (I can’t believe so much active development is still being done on a platform that debuted in 1977 (Apple II; 1986 for the 16-bit IIgs) and has been discontinued for decades...

• VidHD (HDMI output).
• Uthernet II (Ethernet).
• Mass Storage:
• BOOTI (possibly the cheapest option?).
• A2SCSI (a clone of the Rev. C Apple SCSI card).
• MicroDrive Turbo (the fastest option?).
• Floppy Emu.
• SD DISK][ Plus (discussion | eBay).
• Power Supply
• RAM
• RAMGS/8 and RAMGS/4.
• ByteBoosters 8MB DarkRAM.
• Garrett’s Workshop with an 8MB IIgs card, 8MB IIe card, or 128K IIe card.
• A big RAM / 80-column card for the IIe.
• Wombat ADB/USB translator; use ADB devices on modern computers, or modern USB keyboards and mice on old ADB-equipped Apple (and NeXT) computers.
• Sound cards.
• A relaunched TransWarp GS (someday).
• A Z80 CP/M Card.

Then there’s software ... I’m looking forward to the IIgs port of Nox Archaist. (And I want to read the book.)

The operating system was updated to GS/OS 6.0.4 in 2017. The 8-bit ProDOS was updated to version 2.4 in 2016. Etc.

It’s not the heyday of Applied Engineering and Beagle Bros. (etc.). But, 30 years after the IIe quietly disappeared from Apple’s price sheets (which was, in turn, 9 years after the first IIe was introduced, and 15 years after the Apple II debuted), I find it crazy and awesome this stuff is still around.