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When Geoworks won't run on your old machine...

Trixter

Trixter

Veteran Member
Joined
Aug 31, 2006
Messages
7,478
Location
Chicagoland, Illinois, USA
...make it older. I have been trying for days to get Geoworks Ensemble working on my AT&T PC 6300 only to get goofy errors from GEOS.EXE on startup, like "coprocessor/memory parity error" or "kernel error". I tried Geoworks 1.0, 1.2, Ensemble Lite, all did exactly the same thing. Tonight I got frustrated and started ripping hardware out of the machine. Network card gone; same thing. 8087 gone; same thing. Tested all the memory; passed. There was only one thing left to try:

I replaced the NEC V30 with the original 8086, and it started working.

I don't understand this, because the NEC V30 has run everything else I've thrown at it. While irritating, it suggests an interesting compatibility issue -- that maybe the 6300 is sensitive enough that, for best compatibility, the CPU should be left alone. I'm going to leave the 8086 in from now on.
 
Weird. I wonder what Geoworks is doing to trigger that. Do you know if Geoworks runs on a V30 in other machines? Because I'd have though the most likely explanation would be a software incompatibility - like Geoworks detecting the V30 as a 286 and then complaining when other 286 instructions don't work right. If it was some kind of hardware incompatibility, I'm very curious about why it only seems to be Geoworks that breaks - subtle bus incompatibilities would be more likely to cause random crashes than a consistent failure in a particular piece of software.
 
Until I swapped the CPU, I was 100% convinced Geoworks ran fine on NEC Vx0 CPUs. Now I'm not so sure -- maybe 99% convinced. There are many old USENET postings from people claiming it runs fine, so my initial conclusion is that this is a 6300-specific issue.
 
No idea; I've only tested Geoworks Ensemble (1.0) and Ensemble Pro (1.2). I don't have access to a 2.0 distribution to test with; if I had it, I'd be happy to test it.

Last night used Ensemble Pro's BannerMaker program to print banners out on the Epson 9-pin dot-matrix for the kids (12 and 15yrs old) -- they complained about the noise and then were amazed by the results and started making requests. There is still no better solution for banners than tractor-feed paper and an old program!
 
Disk images of v2.0 and the v2.01 upgrade disks are easy enough to track down. Bread Box Inc. dropped 286 and lower support a long time ago so it can be considered "abandonware". It is slower than v1.0x though.
 
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I was no-so-subtly hinting that I have already tried to track down 2.0 and been unsuccessful. I've obtained six versions of Geoworks, including one I actually physically own, but not 2.0. So, if you want it tested...
 
I have original disk of Geoworks Ensemble version 1.2
It runs on XT compatible machine well.
 
Caluser2000 said:
Disk images of v2.0 and the v2.01 upgrade disks are easy enough to track down. Bread Box Inc. dropped 286 and lower support a long time ago so it can be considered "abandonware". It is slower than v1.0x though.
Click to expand...

Do you really have original disk image of v2.0 and the v2.01?
If not, v2.0 from the BA seems not to be dumped from original disk.
 
fs5500 said:
Do you really have original disk image of v2.0 and the v2.01?
If not, v2.0 from the BA seems not to be dumped from original disk.
Click to expand...
Yes I believe they are, but not originally my disks. The v2.01 ones I understand are the "upgrade" files which either create the upgrade disks or alternatively upgrade the v2.0 installation from the HD.They were archived by someone else in case of physical disk corruption for legit license holders some time ago, well over a decade now. It's interesting to see how it progressed, or didn't, over time.

Obviously if you've got a 386 or above the right thing to do is to support Breadbox Inc, They have their suite at a discounted price at the moment. Using the Motif interface is just like using v 1.0x on a lower spec system. But course most folk are , shell we say, too tight to do that cause they feel it should be had for nought.
 
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I have had 50/50 luck with NEC chips.
Worked flawlessly in an Epson Equity but made an Apricot Portable not POST.
I'm amazed you found a compatibility issue with the 6300. It was the first 100% compatible clone back then and was running testware like Lotus 123 and Flight Simulator with no problems.
 
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