H89 CP/M hard-secored boot diskette

From: Dwight K. Elvey <dwightk.elvey_at_amd.com>
Date: Wed Apr 2 11:08:00 2003

>From: "Don Maslin" <donm_at_cts.com>
>
>On Tue, 1 Apr 2003, Dwight K. Elvey wrote:
>
>> Hi
>> As I mentioned earlier, I have a Forth that runs standalone
>> on hard sectored. Since it is standalone, I've used it to
>> make exact copies of other disk. I've done things like changing
>> the interleaving to make about a 10X improvement in load
>> speeds for many programs.
>
>Is it available for download, Dwight?
>
> - don

Hi Don
 Not yet but it could be. Since it is a standalone, I don't
know how one could easily transfer it with HDOS. Still,
I think I can come up with a simple serial to disk boot
strap that would allow one to dump it from a PC onto
the H89 disk, through the serial port of the H89. I've
done this for several other processor ( like my Poly88
for tape images and my IMSAI to bring it back to life ).
 It has been a long time since I've looked at the disk
EPROM's access methods. I'm sure I can figure it out and
get something going. That way you could save the disk
as an image file and all one would have to do is enter
a small boot strap program from the monitor to get it
going.
 I've always felt that this was the way you should be
maintaining the library since it is simpler than sending
media around the world. It does require that the machine
in question have a code monitor or possibly a location to
install a bootstrapping EPROM at worst.
 In any case, it would be good to get my Forth and the HDOS
stuff I have transferred to something that can be easily
distributed.
Dwight

>
>> It has been a while since I had the machine running. I can
>> fire it up and check what I have. The only issue I have for
>> making copies for others is the media. I only have a few
>> hard sectored disk. For some reason, I thought that disk
>> formats would last at least as long as 33 lp records. I
>> didn't realize at the time that media was being obsoleted
>> as fast as it was produced. I know better now.
>> Anyway, if I can get it all running, I'll make copies
>> if someone supplies media.
>> Dwight
>
><snip>
Received on Wed Apr 02 2003 - 11:08:00 BST