Micro_Cornucopia_20_Oct84.pdf

(9000 KB) Pobierz

$3.00

October

1984

TABLE OF CONTENTS

HSC 68000 Co .. Processor .............................................

DynaDisk for the BBII .................................................

BBI: ETX/ ACK Serial Print Driver ................................... 11

More I/O on the BBI .................................................. 13

Serial Printer on a BBI Sans SIO ......................................

Parallel Printer Interface for SWP's Dual Density ................... 16

Pascal Procedures ....................................................... 18

Extended 8" Single Density ............................................ 20

SBASIC Column ....................................................... 22

The Kaypro Column ................................................... 26

Cheap and Dirty Talker for your Kaypro ............................ 30

The Slicer Column ..................................................... 33

FORTHwords .......................................................... 38

C'ing Clearly ............................................................

Xerox 820 Column ..................................................... 48

SOG III .................................................................. 52

On Your Own ........................................................... 62

Technical Tips ........................................................... 68

"THE ORIGINAL BIG BOARD"

OEM - INDUSTRIAL - BUSINESS - SCIENTIFIC

SINGLE BOARD COMPUTER KIT!

Z-80 CPU!

64K RAM!

(DO NOT CONFUSE WITH ANY OF OUR FLATTERING IMITATORSI)

::J

...:

:::i

t:::

::J

THE BIG BOARD PROJECT: With thousands sold worldwide and over two years of field experience, the Big

Board may just be one of the most reliable single board computers available today. This is the same design that

was licensed by Xerox Corp. as the basis for their 820 computer.

The Big Board gives you the right mix of most needed computing features all on one board. The Big Board was

designed from scratch to run the latest version of CP/M*. Just imagine all the off-the-shelf software that can be

run on the Big Board without any modifications needed.

FULLY SOCKETED!

(64K KIT

BASIC I/O)

SIZE:

8'12

x 13

3/.

IN.

SAME AS AN 8 IN. DRIVE.

REQUIRES: +5V @ 3 AMPS

+ - 12V @.5 AMPS.

FEATURES: (Remember, all this on one board!)

':t

64K RAM

Uses Industry standard 4116 RAM's. AII64K Is available to the user, our VIDEO

and EPROM sections do not make holes In system RAM. Also, very special care

was taken In the RAM array PC layout to eliminate potential noise and glitches.

Z-80 CPU

Running at 2.5 MHZ. Handles all 4116 RAM refresh and supports Mode 2

INTERUPTS. Fully buffered and runs 8080 software.

SERIAL I/O (OPTIONAL)

Full 2 channels using the Z80 SIO andtheSMC 8116 Baud Rate Generator. FULL

RS232! For synchronous or asynchronous communication. In synchronous

mode, the clocks can be transmitted or received by a modem. Both channels can

be set up for either data-communication or data-terminals. Supports mode 21nt.

Price for all parts and connectors: $39.95

BASIC I/O

Consists of separate parallel port (Z80 PIO) for use with an ASCII encoded

keyboard for Input. Output would be on the 80 x 24 Video Display.

80 CHARACTER VIDEO

With a crisp, flicker-free display that looks extremely sharp even on small

monitors. Hardware scroll and full cursor control. Composite video or split video

and sync. Character set Is supplied on a 2716 style ROM, making customized

fonts easy. Sync pulses can be any desired length or polarity. Video may be

Inverted or true. 5 x 7 Matrix - Upper

Lower Case.

FLOPPY DISC CONTROLLER

Uses WD1771 controller chip with a TTL Data Separator for enhanced reliability.

IBM 3740 compatible. Supports up to four 81nch disc drives. Directly compatible

with standard Shugart drives such as the SA800 or SA801. Drives can be

configured for remote AC off-on. Runs CP/M" 2.2•

TWO PORT PARALLEL I/O (OPTIONAL)

Uses Z-80 PIO. Full 16 bits, fully buffered, bl-dlrectlonal. Uses selectable hand

shake polarity. Set of all parts and connectors for parallel I/O: $19.95

REAL TIME CLOCK (OPTIONAL)

Uses Z-80 CTC. Can be configured as a Counter on Real Time Clock. Set of all

parts: $9.95

CP/M* 2.2 FOR BIG BOARD

The popular CP/M' D.O.S. to run on Big Board Is available for $139.00.

DOUBLE DENSITY ADAPTER BOARD -

$149.95

(A&T~

::J

..J

BLANK PC BOARD - $89.95

The blank Big Board PC Board comes complete with full

documentation (including schematics), the character ROM,

the PFM 3.3 MONITOR ROM, and a diskette with the source

of our BIOS, BOOT, and PFM 3.3 MONITOR.

Requires no cuts or MODS to an existing Big Board. Gives up to 670K storage on

a single sided 8 In. diskette. With software to patch your CP/M* 2.2.

PFM 3.3 2K SYSTEM MONITOR

The real power of the Big Board lies In Its PFM 3.3 on board monitor. PFM commands Include: Dump Memory, Boot CP/M", Copy, Examine,

Fill

Memory, Test Memory, Go To,

Read and Write I/O Ports, Disc Read (Drive, Track, Sector), and Search PFM occupies one of the four 2716 EPROM locations provided. Z-80 Is a Trademark of Zilog.

Digital Research Computers

(OF TEXAS)

P.O. BOX 461565 • GARLAND, TEXAS 75046 • (214) 271-3538

TERMS: Shipments will be made approximately 3 to 6 weeks after we

receive your order. VISA, MC, cash accepted. We will accept COD's (for the

Big Board only) with a $75 deposit. Balance UPS COD. Add $4.00shipping.

USA AND CANADA ONLY

*TRADEMARK OF DIGITAL RESEARCH. NOT ASSOCIATED WITH 'DIGITAL RESEARCH OF CALIFORNIA; THE ORIGINATORS OF CPM SOFTWARE

**1 TO 4 PIECE DOMESTIC USA PRICE.

MICRO CORNUCOPIA

P.O. Box 223

Bend, Oregon 97709

503-382-8048

liaRD aDIRuaD'1l

October 1984

The Single Board Systems Journal

No. 20

Editor

Publisher

David

Thompson

Assistant Editor

Eric Belden

Graphic Design

Sandra Thompson

Technical Department

Dana Cotant

Eric Roby

Advertising Director

Alice Holbrow

Staff Assistants

Dorcas Dsenis

Tracey Braas Cary Gatton

Typography

Patti Morris

Martin White

Irish Setter

MICRO CORNUCOPIA is the

single board systems journal sup-

porting systems programming lan-

guages and single board systems-

including the Big Board, Big Board

II, Xerox 820, Kaypro, and Slicer.

MICRO CORNUCOPIA is pub-

lished six times a year by Micro Cor-

nucopia of Oregon, P.O. Box 223,

Bend, Oregon 97709.

SUBSCRIPTION RATES:

~t>-;(.<c.S

1 yr.(6 issues)

~<c.~

$16.00

1 yr. (first class)

$22.00

1 yr. (Canada

Mexico)

$22.00

1 yr.(other foreign)

$30.00

Make all orders payable in U.S.

funds on a U.S. bank, please.

ADVERTISING RATES: Available

on request.

CHANGE OF ADDRESS: Please

send your old label and new ad-

dress.

SOFTWARE, HARDWARE, AND

BOOK VENDORS: We would very

much like to review your CP/M

MSDOS compatible products. Send

materials to the Review Depart-

ment, Micro Cornucopia.

CP/M is a trademark of Digital Research, Inc.

1984 by Micro Cornucopia

SOG

Aftermath!

Let me warn you now, you're going to be

hearing a lot about SOG III in upcoming is-

sues of Micro C. You see, I was able to tape

most of the sessions and there was a wealth of

information shared in two intense days. One

piece of information that really hit me came

from Philippe Kahn, president of Borland In-

ternational.

Modula II, Wherefore Art Thou?

Philippe was asked how soon Modula. II

would be available. "Shortly," he said. How-

ever, that "shortly" referred only to the

80881

8086 version. There will probably never be a

Turbo Modula for the Z80.

You see, Borland is a market driven

company and marketing says that 70

percent of current sales are for MS/DOS

machines and they expect that within

months they will see that margin go to 85

percent.

I've noticed that a lot of the fancy new

software packages are being offered only

for the PC bunch (including some really

cheap ones like a high-speed WordStar

look-alike for $35) and a really incredible

$49.95 package called Sidekick that Phi-

lippe demonstrated at the SOG.

Actually,

I were going to write some

new software, I'd take a hard look at the

PC market too. After all, you'd not only

have a huge and growing hardware

base, but you'd also have a very clearly

defined memory-mapped video moni-

tor.

A Real Standard

Terminal definition is one area that CP /

M 80 ignored because there was simply

no standard terminal. When IBM came

along with the PC it not only sold a sys-

tern, it sold a standard. A lot of writers

yell about gutless me-tooers jumping on

the IBM bandwagon, but it makes a lot of

sense, not because IBM created the

standard, or that the standard is perfect,

but because there finally is a standard.

This standard works because it defines

the video, the expansion bus (you know,

the plug in cards that handle color

graphics, winchesters, more memory,

additional ports ... ), the port address-

es, the system calls, the monitor jump

table, even the control functions on the

keyboard.

is a real standard.

Of course, some systems are better

copies of the standard than others. For

instance, the Compaq and the latest

Heath/Zenith are very compatible, while

the Sanyo is only slightly compatible (al-

though, at the price, it is still a very good

deal

you want a machine to do straight

text editing, spreadsheets, or BASIC).

The Heath machine is available as a kit

which ought to make it interesting to a

number of Big Board folks. However, the

assembly is reported to be 37 hours of

cabinet and cable work, circuit boards

come already assembled and tested.'

(That's a long way from the early Heath

Kits where you carefully wrapped wire

leads around each tube-socket pin and

then held a 75-watt soldering iron

against the pins until you had smothered ..

the entire area with a glistening chunk of

tin and lead.) Ah well, there ought to be

something a person could do with an al-

ready stuffed board-don't you think?

The

Z80

and Up

Of course I would have preferred to

see a Z80 based standard, but one big

thing precluded that. You see, there was

(and is) no chip that was upwardly com-

patible with the Z80. The Z8000 was not

compatible with its little brother (and it

was slow getting into the market place as

was the 68000 chip set). The Z800 which

is supposed to be somewhat compatible

with the Z80 has not yet seen the light of

wholesaler's shelves (it may not ever be

available).

Meanwhile, Intel has a bevy of new

heavies definitely on their way. In fact

(continued on page

61)

LETTERS

Dear Editor,

I discovered an obscure bug in my

Kaypro-II and may even have figured

out why it's there. When I have a value

between 30H and 3FH in the I (index)

lected, my screen display gets weird: it

fades way out and has the jitters.

I'm right, then all Kaypros which

follow your schematic must have the

same bug. According to Zilog's Z80 tech-

nical manual, when the Z80 does a mem-

ory refresh, the contents of the I register

are placed on the upper 8 bits of the ad-

dress bus, and a MREQ signal is issued.

the I register is between 30H and 3FH,

this fools the CPU video access detector

into thinking that video RAM is being ac-

cessed, because it doesn't pay any atten-

tion to the RFSH signal like it ought to.

-As a result, the screen is blanked on ev-

ery refresh cycle! Maybe you can figure

an easy way to fix this.

David Hillman

2006 NE Davis

Portland OR 97232

019FH (both 080H) to OCBH and 027H

respectively. This replaces the two ADD

A,B instructions with one SLA A in-

struction so that the program can store

the two-digit entries in each location as

two BCD nibbles instead of one binary

byte. The commands in DDT would ap-

pear as follows:

Dear Editor,

I installed the Pro-8 ROM package but

could not format the odd numbered

tracks on drive B or A. That problem

turned out to be a trace connecting E40 to

E27. This connected PA2 to PBRDY on

U72, thus no floppy side select.

However, I still could not format drive

A. This turned out to be a bad drive, a

new Teac.

I.have a fairly early Kaypro, but my

board is not exactly like the schematic.

For example, U2 was a 74S04 and all but

one of the inverters were being used. Al-

so, my board did not have the marking

"E40."

Do you know anyone who has a Sor-

cerer (Exidy)?

Lawrence Norton

2490 Channing Way

Suite 400

Berkeley CA 94704

Modifying SETCLK

A}ddt

DDT VERS 2.2

-Isetclk. com

-R

NEXT PC

0200 0100

-S019E

019E 80 CB

019F 80 27

01AO 81 •

_AC

A}SAVE 8 setclk2.com

Paul R. Pederson

8601 E. Old Spanish Trail

Tucson AZ85710

Dear Editor,

I enjoyed reading Jan Korrubel's re-

view of SWP's dual density package in

your April issue. Having purchased this

product a few months ago myself I've

been equally pleased with it's perform-

ance although I too found some damage

on arrival.

In my case the daughter board was in-

tact but one of disks in the order had a

stray board pin lodged in it's jacket. Af-

ter carefully coaxing the pin out, I found

it left a ghastly dent in the track area of

the disk. I was lucky enough to be able to

"iron" it out from the convex side so that

I could make a successful copy.

would

certainly be helpful

all distributors

wold ship such packages with disks

sealed in envelopes to prevent this sort

of contamination.

An annoying bug I found with the

special-function keys is that

I try to use

the screen dump in conjunction with the

scroll pause the system locks up forcing

me to reset to get out.

I also found that the SETCLK. COM

program on users disk #1 can easily be

adapted for this BIOS by using DDT.

Simply change locations 019EH and

Dear Editor,

I recently received your Kaypro Disk

K21

and encountered a minor bug in the

screen dump. The first time through the

dump works fine however when it ends

it sends a message to my printer to go

into a 5 CPI mode. The next printing

whether dump or not is wide letters 5

CPI.

I then fiddled around with the source

you sent along trying to insert an initiali-

zation string but to no avail. My capabili-

ties in this area are vey limited, so I'm

looking for help. I have an Okidata 82A

printer and the strings in hex are: 1E

CPI; 1F

5 CPI.

Jim Jensen

353 Willow St.

West Barnstable MA 02668

Editor's note:

seems the non-blinking block cursor of

our Pro Monitor ROM is being passed as a

printer control character. We've fixed the

dump programs on the new disks and will

update any customer's disk that is giving

them problems.

Dear Editor,

Last year you published the letter

wherein I mentioned having 300 used

disks to share with Micro C readers.

Through that letter, I was contacted by,

. and am still writing to, some of the finest

people I know.

, Well, once again I came up with a su-

per deal, only this one will be more than

25 cents per disk. The company I work

for sells MicroPro and they just changed

over from 8" format to 5" and recalled all

the 8" "demo" disks from the field.

Guess who bought them for scrap?

I have about 35 sets of original, legal,

serial numbered, demo disks which in-

clude: WordStar, SpellStar, MailMerge,

CalcStar, DataStar, and SuperSort. I

would like to share these with those Mi-

cro C readers who cannot afford to pur-

chase good commercial software at

standard prices. I cannot sell them, but I

can charge for postage and handling

(there is no documentation, but the

built-in screens should be sufficient to

get someone up and running). I am try-

ing to raise enough cash to purchase a

Kaypro or Slicer.

Neil Joba

4774 Carter Rd

Fiarport, NY 14450

716-377-3042

Micro Cornucopia, Number 20, October 1984

LITTERS

Dear Editor,

When I ordered my PRO-8 ROM on

June 18, you asked me to let you know

when Micro C #18 arrived. Issue #18,

the PRO-8 set, and four Kaypro disks or-

dered separately all arrived yesterday,

June 25. When I renew my subscription I

will go the 1st Class Mail Route. It's

worth the extra money to avoid having

to wait almost one month for the PO to

get around to delivering bulk mail.

The PRO-8 set arrived with the box

squashed and soaking wet. The instruc-

tions dried out OK and the ROMs look

OK, at least there was no water inside

the ROM package and the pins are

straight. The disk cover has a slight

crimp but the disk looks OK. Will have to

wait about two weeks to find out

it real-

ly works since I can't get the the II to 4

conversion right now. My postmaster

saw the package and she will testify

abot;~ d~,o

condition

I have to make a

claim. Have you considered offering to

insure shipments at the buyer's request?

I know it

WGL!:.1

cost more but it could

save some aggravation.

Bill Warshaw

12 Tamara Drive

Roosevelt NJ 08555

rather large cooler partially filled with

ice. I've still got a problem with my disk-

ettes, however. They won't fit with the

Kaypro in the cooler, and the heat near

the furnace causes them to take on funny

shapes. Occasionally, I have to shove

real hard to get them into the drives. Any

ideas on keeping my diskettes cool?

Also, I could use some advice on my

next project, interfacing a Kaypro to my

new hang glider. I can't find a place on

the frame to bolt both the computer and

two 12 volt batteries.

Captain Mick, UFO Ret.

1924 N. 6th St.

Concord CA 94519

file is associated with. The RECOVER

command in FIX seems to hang the sys-

tem while accessing the hard disk. How-

ever, when the system is reset, the file

appears to have been restored correctly

and the directory structure is intact, but

this is hardly confidence-inspiring.

Is this behavior of UNERA and FIX

known to others?

so, has anyone de-

veloped a version of either program

which is more comfortable with the Kay-

pro 10 hard disk, or (even better) does

anyone have a patch for one of the exist-

ing programs?

Christopher Pettus

10920 Palms Blvd. Suite 110

Los Angeles CA 90034

Editor's Note:

We know that bulk mail is slow (it's sup-

posed to be

days maximum), but the price

is right

(12

cents per copy vrs. over a dollar).

Also, only a very small percentage of the

packages we send get damaged by the post of-

fice

we take a chance by not insuring them.

If any part of your shipment was damaged,

just return it and we'll se11d a replacement

free.

Editor's 1lote:

Mick,

folded your letter into an airplane

and attacl1fd a Kaypro.

didn't fly. (We are

going to try from the top of a neighbor'S flat-

bed truck but we need to replace a cracked

CRT first.)

The idea of controlling an automatic coal

shoveler doesn't auger well. Considering the

environmental problems, you probably

should buy a shovel and then use your cooler

for beer.

Perhaps other folks could offer advice on

creative new interface ideas. We're planning

to install a Kaypro-II in a

1967

Volkswagon

Bug (if we can keep the bug running). At first

it will be pure research, the driver will always

have current informatio1l on paveme1lt tem-

perature, wind velocity, and satellite-based

relative position. Then, for instance, we can

tell if the vehicle is running by watching the

relative position over a

hour time period (it

would also be great for checking the progress

of migrating turtles and the post office.)

Editor's Note:

Well, help has arrived. We have found an

UNERA that works well on the hard disk and

have replaced the old copy of UNERA. with

the new version. However, FIX still occa-

sionally hangs up on the 10. We haven't

found an update for it yet. Those hard disk

and hard luck purchasers of disk

can send

their disk in for an updated UNERA.

Dear Editor,

Thought your readers might like to

know that I've just finished interfacing

my Kaypro-II to a 1908 steam locomo-

tive. The Kaypro rides up front with the

engineer and controls an automatic coal

shoveler that's R5232 compatible. In ad-

dition, I've dedicated an unused parallel

port to control the pitch and duration of

the steam whistle.

I had a problem with heat, but I've

solved that by keeping the Kaypro in a

Dear Editor,

Having recently purchased a Kaypro-

10, and being all-too-human when it

comes to accidental file deletions, I pur-

chased a copy of Kaypro user disk K2,

mainly for the UNERA and FIX pro-

grams. I have, in playing with them, dis-

covered that they have considerable

trouble with restoring files on the Kay-

pro 10 hard disk.

The UNERA program says it is unable

to locate the erased file, no matter which

logical disk (A: or B:) or user number the

Dear Editor,

I have modified a Xerox 820-II so that it

will display black characters on a white

background. The problem I'm having,

however, is that the people who built the

display started with a good design and

then removed parts until the unit was

just barely working. So, I am having

some problems with retrace blanking

and there is a dark vertical bar in the cen-

ter, probably due to unsufficient quies- .

cent current in the horizontal output.

Can anybody help me find schematics

of the analogue part of the Xerox 820-II

monitor? I have tried Xerox-Finland etc.

bu t they regard the analogue portion as a

nonserviceable module.

A W Gustafsson

Kaptensgatan 2A5

SF-22100 Mariehamn

Aland Islands, Finland, Europe

{Letters continued on page

64}

Micro Cornucopia, Number 20, October 1984

Plik z chomika:

TirNaNog

Micro_Cornucopia_20_Oct84.pdf

Plik z chomika:

Inne pliki z tego folderu:

Inne foldery tego chomika: