[Date Prev][Date Next][Thread Prev][Thread Next][Date Index][Thread Index]

Re: modern Applicard?

wood@futility.com wrote:

On Tue, 18 Nov 2008 07:23:44 -0800 (PST), a2fan@hotmail.com wrote:


FWIW, the CTC was optional--I've never seen a card with it installed.
That suggests that very little software actually used it.

s/very little/no/

Good. Less trouble making a clone. This is a very useful data point.

Count me in as an interested party... because all this CP/M talk has
gotten me curious.

I'd recommend keeping the CTC if possible -- just because little to
nothing was written for it back whenever is moot. The people who are
interested in it TODAY are much more likely to want to tinker with it.
Their motivations are completely different and obviously not
commercially oriented. And how many times have we griped about a card,
whose designers or manufacterer cut corners, features. "If they'd have
only done this or used that... it would have been so much better."

Don't make a JACPMC - just another CP/M card - make something awesome.

Seconded. I have an MS Z-80, I can get a clone for $25. To make me
want it, to make me open the IIe and replace the current card means
that it must do something new. If it is JACPPMC, count me out. If it
is something new, then I'm in. If it has its own CF (hard disk)
storage even better, if it will use my current Microdrive CF, great. 

Do you consider any of this to be new?
Run CP/M 4x faster. (With a little work, most Applicards could be updated to run at 8Mhz. ===> 5x faster.) 

Locally-attached banked memory for ramdisk.

Environment easily extendable with "modern" (all relative) Z-System extensions.
Video at least 10x faster - able to keep up with 9600 baud serial input (yeah, yeah, I know: Big deal by today's standards. But, quite an accomplishment for the day :-). Noticeably quicker for scrolling in text files also). 

Built-in print spooling.

Installable driver support for a wide range of Apple peripherals.

Ability to install on any (and I mean _any_ ProDOS volume).

All of the above and more is supported on an Applicard.
If your only Apple CP/M experience has been via the traditional softcard, you're in for a serious eye-opening! I can only assume that the rising tide of early PC hardware prevented the Applicard / Starcard from proliferating more than it did.
And that's only the Applicard. The CardZ180 adds the ability for faster clock speeds (16-18Mhz. now possible), direct file I/O between CP/M and ProDOS and much more.