Gerard Putter today posted v6.4.1 of the popular and awesome Virtual ][ emulator for Mac OS X.  Coming on the heels of the recent major update which among other things, dropped support for Mac OS X 10.4 and PPC Macs, this update is designed to address a couple of minor bugs found in 6.4:

Double-clicking a disk in the Finder didn’t work anymore when Virtual ][ did not run – this has been fixed.

All pictures in the Inspector Help were missing – this has been corrected.

Get the latest version from the Virtual ][ page.

Brendan Robert has released an update to JACE, a Java-based Apple II emulator.  Here’s a list of the latest changes, per his comp.sys.apple2 post:

Changes since last build:
-Better NTSC color emulation
-Fixes to prevent crashes on start (race condition in video initalization)
-Tweaks to sound timing
-Experimental raw sound output (activate/deactivate with F7)
-Help text on start screen now reports correct key shortcuts
-Lots of other things here and there I’ve forgotten about (it’s been a while!)
-Removed some configuration options that were causing unnecessary grief (Program counter shouldn’t be a config variable)

Get yourself a copy at this Sourceforge page.

Gerard Putter’s excellent 8-bit Apple II emulator Virtual ][ for Mac OS X has been updated to version 6.4.  The most significant change is that support for Mac OS X 10.4 and PowerPC Macs has been dropped.  Here’s a list of what’s new:

– Dropped support for Mac OS X 10.4 and the PowerPC processor. The program now requires an Intel Mac running Mac OS X 10.5 (Leopard) or better.
– Added a feature to change the write protection and volume number of disk images.
– It is now possible to configure a 65C02 processor in an Apple ][ or ][+ virtual machine.
– When choosing “Copy as Text” from the Edit menu, international characters on the screen are now correctly copied to the Mac clipboard.
– Improved the quality of the QuickLook preview and thumbnail of a saved state file.
– Some custom character sets were not accepted by the virtual machine – this has been fixed.
– Fixed a number of minor issues, thereby improving the overall stability of the program.

Grab a copy from Gerard’s website.  Virtual ][ is shareware; $49 for a full license, $19 for a limited license, $30 to upgrade.

From Bill Martens over at Call-A.P.P.L.E. comes the news that the FTA ActiveGS plugin Apple IIGS emulation system has been updated to version 3.5.750.  Primarily a maintenance release, this version addresses the following issues:

• [Firefox] Updated package for Firefox 9.0 and beyond
• [Chrome] Added icons
• [OSX/Safari] Restored Async Window refresh

Download ActiveGS here.

Mark. S Ressl has updated his OpenEmulator program to version 1.0.2.  The highlight of this release is, “1977 Apple II” support.  Here’s a short feature list:

• Emulates the 1977 Apple II
• Joystick/mouse support with programmable axis and button mapping, sensitivity, reversal, and joystick auto detection
• Supports PAL/NTSC video generation and crystal frequency (14.31818 MHz vs 14.25 MHz)
• Cycle-accurate video emulation
• Support for several character sets
• Emulates the floating bus
• Support of the Apple II cassette interface
• Support for Apple II revision 0 and 1 or later.
• Added the AppleColor Composite Monitor.

Download OpenEmulator 1.0.2 here.

The RetroMacCast podcast has been on an Apple II emulation kick lately! In Episode 125 (iTunes), hosts James and John talk about Apple II emulators for the Macintosh, including OSXII, AppleIIGo, and KEGS. A week later, in Episode 126, (iTunes) they interview Colin Klipsch, developer of the Catakig emulator.

This is the same podcast that earlier this year conducted a KansasFest interview after reflecting on the Apple II’s various operating systems. Who knew a podcast with “Mac” in the title could be so Apple II-friendly?

Yohanes Nugroho has released WiiApple, an Apple IIe emulator for the Nintendo Wii video game console. You can download the emulator from his blog site (Tinyhack).

Eric “Sheppy” Shepherd has made available Sweet16 2.0 Public Beta 2, otherwise known as Sweet16 2.0b17. In the author’s own words, this new version of the popular Apple IIGS emulator for Mac OS X adds a ton of features, including Ethernet networking support for Marinetti, joystick support, improved graphics, a very handy debugger for Apple II programmers, and CD-ROM support. However, this version apparently does not work on PowerPC systems; an update will be along as soon as the fixed version is tested.

For more information, visit the Sweet16 Web page.

UPDATE: Sweet16 2.0b18 has been released, restoring PowerPC G4 and G5 (but not G3) support back in.