Native CP/M

From: Christian Groessler <cpg_at_aladdin.de>
Date: Tue Apr 9 18:14:11 2002

Hi,

On 04/09/2002 09:09:48 PM ZE2 "Hans Franke" wrote:

>As a nice give away you also get an 8080 CPU for free. There
>have been two solutions AFAIR. One was booting MS-DOS and
>starting a bootloader for CP/M80 (a), the other was a CP/M
>disguise for MS-DOS (b).
>
>The Bootloader programm loaded an 8080 BIOS which supported
>hard MS-DOS Hard disks into memory, did setup the memory
>tables for the 8080 and switched into 8080 mode to boot CP/M
>from HD. There where several problems regarding disk storage,
>so the system worked only reliable from floppy disks. I heared
>also about a Version which booted from almost ordinary CP/M
>floppies. All switching code fitted into the PC boot sector.
>I never had this version, and I didn't play a lot with the
>hard disk version, but I used the other programm (b) for
>several years.
>
>You could start CP/M programms right from the MS-DOS command
>line, or switch into CP/M command line. The Programm itself
>replaced CP/M and redirected all CP/M functions to MS-DOS
>functions - thanks to the similarities :) There where even
>'utilities' to switch DOS pathes wihile in CP/M, etc. pp.
>The performance was quite acceptable (faster than a 8080 at
>5 MHz), and you could use almost all PC Hardware.
>
>I used this programm to run CP/M applications for several
>years under MS-DOS - I never had the time to redo them for
>the PC. I even kept the XT some time as CP/M machine when
>I already had an 386. The machine was also equipped with a
>screamer add on board, so the CPU was running most of the
>time at 8 MHz.

I have a V20 PC-XT in working order. Do you still have those
tools. I'd like to try out CP/M on it.

IIRC, the German c't magazine once had such tools. Back then I already
had this V20 PC-XT, but didn't want to mess with CP/M.
After just having made the transition from C64 to PC (MS-DOS), CP/M
was "old stuff" back then :-)

regards,
chris
Received on Tue Apr 09 2002 - 18:14:11 BST