Best "starter" CP/M machine? (and looking for KAMAS outliner software)

[seaken]

I'm not sure I can offer anything better than what has already been mentioned. My first thought was that I can't think of any best "starter" CP/M systems. CP/M was my first operating system and I inherited it with my North Star Advantage. I had to learn it so I could use it for writing contracts and printing them to paper on a serial attached Smith Corona daisy wheel printer. I had no money for buying a new computer at the time so I learned to use the Advantage and CP/M.

But that was 35 years ago. Back then CP/M was still supported. I learned to connect the Advantage to the phone line and dialed up bulletin boards and got lots of help. I even upgraded the machine with a hard drive and the Z-system. These days, you'll have to be pretty technical to get started with CP/M on any actual old hardware. If you are very handy with repairing hardware then I concur with some of the other comments. Your idea about a Kaypro seems to me to be a good idea, or an Apple IIe or C128. There is a lot more support for those machines than something like the Advantage or some other old proprietary equipment. But if you are a hardware guy then one of those old proprietary machines could be a lot of fun.

Seaken

 

[seaken]

I have been wanting to get my Advantage out and see if it still works. But I am afraid it will blow up since it hasn't been turned on for about 20 years. So, to explore CP/M I decided to go with CP/M-86 on some of my old PC compatibles. I run CP/M-86 from floppy drives on a 286 AT clone with both 3.5" and 5.25" drives and have utilized 22-Disk to make use of the high density floppies. I also run CP/M-86 on an XT clone with dual 720k drives.

I have WordStar, SuperCalc and d:base, and other utilities and some games. I don't use the outline feature of WordStar but I do think that may be a viable substitute for you. It reminds me of using CP/M on my Advantage but it is a different operating system. There is much more software for CP/M-80 in the archives. But I have CRT monitors, (VGA on the AT and mono amber on the XT) and real clicky keyboards and real floppies, etc. It is a very similar experience. To run CP/M-86 your 5160 XT is perfect.

Seaken

 

[MrImprovement]

So I have a nice PCB to be populated, sent by a nice VCF forum member. I have a friend, quite advanced hardware engineer, who will help me put it together.

Have been playing with WordStar under emulation and will play with it more to test the outliing function. I did find kamasoft.com , appears recently created as a website, with Adam Trent's email, the guy who created KAMAS, at the bottom of the page. Emailed but no response yet.

Thanks again for all your comments.