Without much fanfare we released ROMX+ earlier this year, and that was a little unfair on it to be honest, as its truly a great upgrade to ROMX.

It's not surprising to find some misunderstanding out there about this new item. The most prominent "myth" is that ROMX+ is just a ROMX with the addition of a real-time clock. While the boards do look similar - and ROMX+ indeed does sport a battery holder for the clock - there is plenty more going on.

For the ROMXe, ROMXc, ROMXc+ we took what we had created with the original ROMX, and added the real-time clock, larger flash storage, and a number of other new features including improvements to the built-in image upload function to read both DOS and ProDOS disks directly.

After tackling the Apple IIe, //c, and //c+, we've revisited the Apple II/II+ and have applied all that we learned to create ROMX+.

ROMX+, ROMXe, ROMXc, and ROMXc+ all share a single firmware image. Many of the larger ROM Images like Copy 2 Plus, Choplifter, and the DOS/ProDOS instant loaders can be run on all of these machines. The ProDOS clock driver and non-volatile SRAM work the same on all these units as well. But ROMX+ offered opportunities to take the Apple II/II+ to a new level.

With ROMX+ and MG's new MG ROM++ image, you get many of the features that were only available on later machines. Enhanced reset for easy cold booting or activating a boot menu to select which drive to boot from (including SmartPort devices). Enhanced keyboard input to generate all of the special ASCII characters. Instant access to the ROMX+ menu without power cycling. The mini assembler is also back and more features are planned for a future release.

The original ROMX will continue to be sold at a lower price for those that just need to replace a damaged ROM or don't need the fancy new features offered by ROMX+. In many cases the original ROMX will cost less than replacing original Apple II/II+ ROM chips and you still get plenty of improvements versus a stock machine such as guaranteed cold booting, multiple ROM images, and (optionally) multiple fonts.

Check out the comparison chart below.

Current ROMX+ owners can download the new MG ROM++ image here.

See the ROMX+ Installation Guide and User Guide for more details.