Considering a Firebee

[Dopefish]

So I was involved in a bidding war on a new old stock Atari Falcon on eBay. Naturally... I lost the auction after the price shot up a ridiculous 2x within the last three seconds.

 

I'm willing to consider other options, and the Firebee has my attention, but I do have some considerations in order to help me greenlight a purchase.

 

1. Does the Firebee support legacy ST Low, Medium and High resolutions in addition to the modern high-resolution modes like 1080p?

 

2. Does the midi port actually work? I heard for awhile the functionality on the port was missing.

 

3. Additionally, can I use Cubase on here out of the box without bizarre tweaks, or is there other software I should use instead for MIDI composition?

 

4. Is software compatibility as a whole solid for software originally designed for the Falcon? I understand it uses a Cold Fire CPU, which offers additional instructions on top of the ones offered by the 68060.

 

5. Does anyone know where I can get an Atari ST style keyboard formfactor case I can install my Firebee in?

 

6. Is FireTOS essentially the same as regular TOS?

 

Thanks in advance!

[kimchipenguin]

1. No support for ST Low (and most ST Low software wouldn't work anyway)

3. No.

4. The Coldfire is not a superset of the 060 instructions. Software which was designed for the Falcon won't work (no DSP).

6. FireTOS is a modified version of TOS 4.x with various enhancements.

 

Don't think of the FireBee as a super ST or Falcon, it's more like a successor to the Milan or Medusa, i.e. a machine for GEM software.

[MrMaddog]

If you want ST compatibility, then get a MIST instead...

[+DarkLord]

Or a real ST...