Nisus Writer Classic compatibility with Intel-based Macs?

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dkaplan137
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Joined: 2004-12-14 07:14:39

Nisus Writer Classic compatibility with Intel-based Macs?

Post by dkaplan137 »

I'm considering upgrading to a MacBook Pro, but I still need to be able to run Nisus Writer Classic. Should it be runnable on an Intel-based Mac under an emulator - say Basilisk II or SheepSaver? Is there any other possible workaround?

Dan
dshan
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Location: Sydney, Australia

Post by dshan »

I doubt it. Basilisk II is only supported on PPC Macs AFAIK. And you need the old ROM file from a Mac and an old copy of Mac OS. I suppose it might run under Rosetta, but then you'd be running NW 6.0.1 (68K) under a 68K emulator that was in turn running under a PPC emulator (Rosetta) on an Intel CPU Mac. The odds of this house of cards staying up are not good, and the performance would likely be terrible.

I don't know about SheepSaver, is it available as a universal binary?

It sounds like you'd be better off with a 2nd hand or refurbished PPC Mac than an new Intel box. Stick to real supported hardware and software is my advice.
dkaplan137
Posts: 10
Joined: 2004-12-14 07:14:39

Success! (partial)

Post by dkaplan137 »

I have been running NisusWriter 6.5 under the SheepShaver emulator on my MacBook Pro. It works but it's not pretty! It's slow and unstable, and in "Print to File" I haven't succeeded in duplicating the colors I got in Classic.

I have a large backlog of presentations that I did in NisusWriter under OS 9 and Classic. I use NisusWriter and SheepShaver when I need to change only a few items in a previously prepared presentation. For new presentations I've switched to Keynote.

Whether I'll ever come back to Nisus in OS X remains to be seen. If Nisus Writer Pro costs money I'm unlikely to want to pay for it after all these years of my needs not being met by Nisus Writer Express.
nicklowe
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Joined: 2007-03-15 12:25:22

Basilisk

Post by nicklowe »

Basilisk should work too; there's been a version for Intel Macs for a while now (see http://www.gibix.net/projects/basilisk2/). I don't have one, so can't vouch for it directly - but I have Basilisk running constantly on my Zaurus and have always found it very stable and capable.
rcgordon
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Joined: 2003-07-22 01:31:29

Post by rcgordon »

I have a working version of NW 6.5 running SheepShaver on my MacBook Pro. One hint: SheepShaver's redraw is very slow, and you can greatly improve your experience by setting the number of colors to 256 in the emulated System's Monitors & Sound Control Panel.
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Hamid
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Joined: 2007-01-17 03:25:42

Classic apps

Post by Hamid »

Are you running any other Classic apps in SheepShaver?
I would like to know if anyone is running Oxford English Dictionary CD on Intel Macs in SheepShaver. OED2 CD runs very well in Classic.
rcgordon
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Joined: 2003-07-22 01:31:29

Post by rcgordon »

WordPerfect 6 is the only other one I've tried. (And that only because it was part of the initial configuration). SheepShaver can be a real bear to get running at first.

But at this point, Nisus Writer is the only Classic application I still need. I'm hoping that Nisus Writer Pro can finish that, but I'm finding certain bugs and deficiencies compared to NW Classic which that make accurate PwerFind searches much more difficult (or in some cases impossible), and I have a decade's worth of macros to translate. (And in NW Classic, they just work.)
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Matze
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Post by Matze »

rcgordon wrote:WordPerfect 6 is the only other one I've tried. (And that only because it was part of the initial configuration). SheepShaver can be a real bear to get running at first.

But at this point, Nisus Writer is the only Classic application I still need. I'm hoping that Nisus Writer Pro can finish that, but I'm finding certain bugs and deficiencies compared to NW Classic which that make accurate PwerFind searches much more difficult (or in some cases impossible), and I have a decade's worth of macros to translate. (And in NW Classic, they just work.)
Hi,
the same with me. Couldn't live without NW Classics Macros and F/R-tool and it is the only classic app I need. I'd really like to switch to an intel machine in the future, so maybe I should consider to get a second mac PPC with OS9 or Classic, that is connected somehow in a network with the intel machine. The PPC (NWC) machine would be sth like a Parallels Window besides my Intelmac...

Is this possible?
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