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Saving Problems in ROM BASIC

M

Manello

Member
Joined
Jan 28, 2014
Messages
12
Location
South-Germany
At the Moment I'm trying to save programs, that i've written bevore in IBM ROM BASIC.
But when I'm Using SAVE"data" then the machine waits a moment, but nothing is going
to be saved on the floppy drive A. Also If I try to LOAD something from it, there is an
I/O Device error. But I think the drive is ok, because when the computer starts the drive is
searching for an bootable disk. Maybe you can help me out with that, its really disappointing that
i cant save the programs at the moment.

Info:
IBM 5155
2 x 5'25 floppy drives
640 kb ram
And no OS, just the IBM PERSONAL COMPUTER BASIC 1.3
 
You'll probably get better answers from some of the "techie" pros but I don't think you can access the drives without an operating system - hence the name "Disk Operating System" I would try the command FILES and see if you get a response. If that is the model with the cassette option you could try that although I have no idea how a person would go about it.
 
Manello said:
Info:
IBM 5155
2 x 5'25 floppy drives
640 kb ram
And no OS, just the IBM PERSONAL COMPUTER BASIC 1.3
Click to expand...

The BASIC is ROM is called "Cassette BASIC" and the only storage allowed is to the cassette tape recorder.

You have posted this to the Commodore Section by mistake. It should have been posted to the PCs and Clones Forum.
 
Manello,
If you have any DOS disks, or it you can get your hands on a copy of DOS v3.3, you will be able to use "Disk Basic" from those DOS disks. The file names you may choose from are BASIC.COM or BASICA.COM (advanced basic) which will allow you to interface with the floppy drives.
 
Last edited:
Agreed.

The original IBM PC came with a BIOS and cassette BASIC in ROM (see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IBM_BASIC#IBM_Cassette_BASIC).

If you power up without a disk installed (or an unreadable boot disk at any rate) - cassette BASIC in ROM will be entered. To save/load your BASIC programs will require an audio cassette recorder (or a suitably adapted MP3 player etc.).

To use the DISK version of BASIC, you will require a bootable floppy with IBM-DOS (PC-DOS?) on it (MS-DOS in wolf's clothing of course) and BASIC.COM (the executable DISK basic). If memory serves me correctly, BASIC.COM still required the ROM-resident cassette BASIC to be installed (at least on a real IBM PC).

Dave
 
An IBM 5155 Portable would not have a cassette port, so ROM basic is mostly useless without PC DOS. Only the original 5150 IBM PC and PCJr would have cassette ports.
 
The BASIC ROM in the IBM PC was developed by Microsoft for the original PC, and only knows how to use the cassette port to load and save data. The BASIC and BASICA versions that are included in PC-DOS add functionality to save/load files to/from floppy drive but those two programs depend on the BASIC ROM for their functionality. MS-DOS includes GWBASIC which doesn't require the BASIC ROM and can be used on non-IBM PC's.

IBM figured out that no-one was using the cassette ports so they left them out of the XT model, but they still included the BASIC ROM because the BASIC and BASICA programs depend it. I think the BASIC ROM was present even in the later PS/2 models, in order to make BASIC/BASICA work, though no model besides the original 5150 IBM PC ever had a cassette port. And of course each BASIC ROM had a SAVE command and a LOAD command that would try to access the non-existing cassette port (it's possible to add it if you have the schematics). The disk version would just override the SAVE and LOAD commands so they work with disks, and they would also add new commands like SYSTEM (to leave Basic) and FILES (to show the directory).

===Jac
 
It's not that huge of a task to make a cassette cable (start with a Tandy DIN-ended cassette cable) and save your programs to cassette. That's what the few people who had cassette-storage systems did in the early days. The IBM PC's that did not ship with a disk drive (the cheapest model) came with a "getting started" cassette.

another option that I believe will work (I not certain) is to write a program that dumps the contents of system memory, including your program, though the serial port. A lot of work for a meaningless task.

Bill
 
jac_goudsmit said:
I think the BASIC ROM was present even in the later PS/2 models, in order to make BASIC/BASICA work, though no model besides the original 5150 IBM PC ever had a cassette port.
Click to expand...

IBM computers as late as the Aptiva series had BASIC in ROM, and the IBM PCjr also had a cassette port, not just the original 5150 PC.

I've heard that the original Compaq Portable has a pinout on its motherboard for a cassette port, but it was never implemented.
 
billdeg said:
another option that I believe will work (I not certain) is to write a program that dumps the contents of system memory, including your program, though the serial port. A lot of work for a meaningless task.

Bill
Click to expand...

I think you bring me to an great idear. I will first of all connect a new pc with the old ibm, and transfer per norton commander a CP/M DiskFile to the IBM.
On the IBM is then a self-written program that will pick-up the packages from the modem and place it then onto an inserted 5'25 Disk drive. So i dont need
to setup another computer with an 5'25 disk drive.
After that i dont need the basic program with the packages and so on, because then I've a ready os that can run too the norton commander.
Maybe complicated but it could run.
 
FYI - when I worked at IBM someone copied a bunch of the very earliest programs written for BASIC / cassette - to a diskette. I saved this disk. I posted the surviving of these files to my site in the IBM section here and there. SO, if you're also trying to experience the oldest IBM PC programs run on disk, try my site. Some will only run properly on the original BASIC (boot from DOS 1.x)
 
Manello said:
I think you bring me to an great idear. I will first of all connect a new pc with the old ibm, and transfer per norton commander a CP/M DiskFile to the IBM.
On the IBM is then a self-written program that will pick-up the packages from the modem and place it then onto an inserted 5'25 Disk drive. So i dont need
to setup another computer with an 5'25 disk drive.
After that i dont need the basic program with the packages and so on, because then I've a ready os that can run too the norton commander.
Maybe complicated but it could run.
Click to expand...


you could also fork the screen output to the serial port to "save" your program and then write to a disk on some other PC that has a 5 1/4 drive. Not sure what the ROM BASIC equivalent of the following would be:
MODE COM1:[baudratehere],N,8,1
CTTY COM1
 
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