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Calling all origina media owners

S

Sharkonwheels

Veteran Member
Joined
Sep 21, 2006
Messages
1,640
Location
South Florida
This mess has to be sorted out....

I have been trying to build disks for CFenton's 2/84, and mod it for kayPLUS,
and all the stuff that is out there, is a mess.

For example, there is a set out there (DDunfield's site, I think) claiming to be for a 4/84.

Fine. I image it out, boot it up, no problem - CP/M 2.2F
Do a movcpm 60 *
Save xx CPM60.COM
SYSGEN CPM60.COM

boot the disk, and what's it say? CP/M 2.2 for Kaypro IV.

of course, it did not boot properly...no surprise there.

What I'd like, is anyone who has CORRECT MEDIA, teledisk that stuff up, and let's get a proper archive going.

We REALLY need to sort this mess out. The kay10 stuff out there looks OK, and I have presently:
OSborne 1 Single and double density media
Osborne Exec original media
Genuine Kaypro IV CP/M boot disk with the proper CP/M utilities...
The Altos stuff out there seems correct, though I haven't tried a MOVCPM...most use MP/M on them, anyway...

At present, I can't make him a proper KayPLUS disk, because KayPLUS wants a 62K or smaller system, and the disks out there are 63K CP/M 2.2 I can't movcpm him a system, because what's out there is incorrect.

Anyone who has media, let me know, and I will get an archive going, at least for the stuff that I have, as I can test it, and verify that MOVCPM's actually work.

For reference, I have the following:

Kaypro 10-'83
Kaypro 10-'84
Kaypro 4-'84
Kaypro 2x
Kaypro II
Kaypro 1
Osborne 1
Osborne 1a
Osborne Exec
Altos 5

:mad1:

T
 
Well, unfortunatly, I don't have any CP/M stuff, at all. Getting a Kaypro is towards the bottom of my priorities(just above getting a proper edumacation, and below getting a real job, not just my "home business." But anyhow, when you come up with the archive, make sure to keep it on CD, and send it to people who want it. The best way you can make sure data isn't lost is to back it up, share it, and put it on reliable media.

--Ryan
 
I really do appreciate the effort you're going to. Would the 2X disks work, given that a 2/84 is essentially a 2X with single-sided disks?
 
Here are the files for "QP/M", which is apparently a drop-in replacement for CP/M 2.2 that uses optimized z-80 assembly. Has anyone ever used this? If it's actually faster I might be interested.
 
Gotta have a working system first.
The problem, is that the OS utilities are not matching the boot sector.
MOVCPM, from what I understand, has a "copy" of the CCP+BIOS+BDOS within itself*, for the most part. I see this is true, because on my 4/84, I took a supposed "4/84" boot disk, and while booted under 2.2G, did a MOVCPM and SYSGEN on drive b:, and wrote the image to the boottrack on a:, and it booted up saying "Kaypro IV CP/M 2.2" so the theory is correct.

*ref: :The Soul of CP/M", page 308


T
 
Still gonna need a working CP/M system to start with...

Your only recourse may be using a TurboROM. TurboROM utilities include it's
own movcpm-like tool, for making different size TurboROM-modified CP/M system images.

Tony
 
I gots an idea - stand back...doesn;t happen often...no telling what the consequences are...

<AHEM!>

Like some other forums I;ve been on, what about a "Downloads" forum, where we can attach .ZIP files containing images? I mean, they're not THAT big! We can make "sticky" threads, and put the images in there, and maybe any hints/tips/instructions...

Erik? Vlad? Terry?

Whatcha' think???
At LEAST for the CP/M stuff - scr3w the rest :jumping4:


T
 
Sharkonwheels said:
I gots an idea - stand back...doesn;t happen often...no telling what the consequences are...

<AHEM!>

Like some other forums I;ve been on, what about a "Downloads" forum, where we can attach .ZIP files containing images? I mean, they're not THAT big! We can make "sticky" threads, and put the images in there, and maybe any hints/tips/instructions...

Erik? Vlad? Terry?

Whatcha' think???
At LEAST for the CP/M stuff - scr3w the rest :jumping4:


T
Click to expand...

Shark,
I think it is a good idea. For some of the less common machines I have restored finding boot disks and documentation has been troublesome to say the least. It usually ends up with me and a few others gathering up whatever info we can and bundling it into small caches of related data.

Setting up a user account protected Wiki would work, especially one using existing these VC forum accounts to limit the spammers. It'd be nice to have a "safe harbor" where I could dump some of this stuff for others benefit.

Case in point, the Wavemate Bullet is practically a lost platform based on what little information is available on the internet but based on help from some friends I have been able to gather some information. It would be good to have a place online I could dump this before it is lost again.

Same story for Vector Graphic, NorthStar Horizon, Zenith Z-90, etc. The NorthStar machines are better supported with Dave's site and the Yahoo group I started. The VG has its own mailing list and www.vector-archive.org which is a good start.

The bitsavers, the Majzel archives, and the Harte archives have been pretty good. Still, getting files into those archives can be a hit-or-miss proposition. I know I have sent what I thought were valuable files to the archives only to have them disappear into the "bit bucket". They are volunteer services so I am not complaining but I suspect lots of vintage computer information is lost that way.

I think it would be an easier solution to have a VC forum user account with a directory we could just dump unsorted relevant files into if that is even possible.

Thanks!

Andrew Lynch
 
Well, I know Gen Buckle (retroarchive.org) has been working his tail off on THAT site for a few years, and I've sent him snippets here and there - nothing major.

The biggest problem, is like what happened with the late Don Maslin - if it all rests with ONE person, it is doomed from the start. If we could set something up, that could be swept by archive.org, that would be great. That would mean, not too many nested directories, files not too big, etc...

I dunno - I'll pitch in whatever ideas I come up with, but I think for now, if we can make some sticky threads with disk images, that would be a good start. At least what we put in the stickies, will have been tried by us, and pass/failed by us, so newbies/new owners will be ASSURED they work, at least to a certain degree.


T
 
I have DD/SS original Osborne 1 disks. I'm happy to share the disk contents for an archive but I have no idea as to how to get a disk image of them.

From reading previous posts it looks like you might already have valid copies of these disks though, yes?
 
Count me in as favoring multiple sources of information (including whatever can be done here). Case in point, the oak.oakland.edu archives or Don M's collection as opposed to Tim Olmstead's efforts, which were multiple mirrored, so as not to be lost forever.

--T
 
Don's collection was mirrored? A few people on the forums swear it was all lost forever. If it is mirrored, and still around, I would like to know. As I had brought up, multiple sources is a good idea, and I would be willing to give the original host of the stuff a DVD and some cash once a year to get a copy of it all. I would just hate to see it all be lost in the future.

--Ryan
 
No - he's saying how Don's and oak were basically lost to the bit-bucket, and Tim Omstead's was not.

Why?

Mirrored like crazy..

I almost had a tasteless moment, inadvertently.
I was going to say "mirrored to death," which would've really sucked on my part. Glad I caught that - that would've been a tad tasteless, even though inadvertent.

anyways, back to the subject, yes, we need mirroring, but at the same time, hosting bandwidth/space costs money.


T
 
Well, the untimely death of Don might be in poor taste, but oak is a different story, since we're not talking about a person, just a bit of data. Some time after it went down, I was able to get in touch (after much effort) with the person who claimed to have the very hard drive in his hands as we spoke by telephone. All that he could tell me was that he was not at liberty to give up the drive or it's contents due to orders from above. Apparently, Oakland U (which was physically located about 30 miles away from me at the time), would not allow anyone to even borrow the drive for copying, due to some (imaginary?) security concerns. They just wouldn't take the risk that someone might be able to use the data for some nefarious purposes. AFAIK, that hard drive is still sitting around there somewhere, waiting to be 'discovered' by some future historian or whatever...

--T
 
Oh yeah, the oak.oakland archives are still available thru the Wayback machine, but it requires some digging to find anything useful, as the last few dozen listings are just error messages that the board is temporarily down. Everything from about '94 on back is (was?) still available.

--T
 
Oh yeah, AFAIK the oak.oakland archives are still available thru the Wayback Machine, but it requires some digging to find anything useful, as the last few dozen listings are just error messages that the board is temporarily down. Everything from about '94 on back is (was?) still available.

--T
 
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