1ST1
Veteran Member
Hello, since yesterday I have also a CP/M system. And to be honest, it is a very unusual one as on the first view it does not look like a computer system, but as a typewriter... But after switching 'it' on, after a while this message appears and you feel home...
The machine looks like that:
More pictures are here: www.vintage-computer.com/vcforum/album.php?albumid=256
It's an Olivetti ETV 250 made in 1985. It's a video typewriter or a word processor. It is using CP/M as OS and has Z80 CPU with 64 kB ram and integrated bidrectional daisywheel printer with a speed of 15 characters / second. The green on black 80x25 characters monitor could be mounted on an arm which could be fixed at the border of the desk. Some interesting thing is, I also have an ETV 2700, that one is much newer (1989) and it is MS-DOS based. But it's wordprocessor software SWP can read ETV 250 MWP text files directly from the CP/M disks, I have tryed it and it works just fine.
The CP/M environement on the boot disk of my ETV 250 is very poor, there are not many commands on the boot disks I have, for example nothing to format other disks. I remember that many years ago I used to have disks with more commands, basic interpreter, C-compiler, assembler, ETV 240/250/300/350 diagnostic test and some typical CP/M applications (multiplan, wordstar, dbase, etc.) and even some simple games. When I left Olivetti I reformatted all these disks to use them with my Atari ST, Amiga and/or PC, so their content unfortunately is gone.
Now I want to know more about CP/M and how to get more things on these floppys (I have about 15 preformatted disks). I already found the cpmtools for Win 32 and I have to dig out my old IBM thinkpad to have a computer with XP and real floppy, then I hope that I am able to create individual boot disks for my ETV.. But how to do that? The original ETV boot disk starts directly in MWP main menu, but I can press [EXIT] and it returns back to CP/M command prompt. But as you see, beside MPW and STAT and PIP there's almost nothing.
One question is, how does it to start MWP automatically, is there something similar like an autoexec.bat? So, how to go directly to command prompt?
Another question would be, what would make sense to put on such a boot diskette, is there a standard package I should have?
The floppy drives are 3,5 inch singe sided 320 kB, is that a standard compatible to some other CP/M computer?
Which command usually is used to format disks, would it also work on the ETV 250?
How to create floppy image from Windows? (I would like to preserve the existing disks and share them with somebody else who has an ETV 250 (but without any disks...)
Is there anywhere a complete command reference for all CP/M standard commands?
That are my questions in the first step, others are comming while this thread continues...
The machine looks like that:
More pictures are here: www.vintage-computer.com/vcforum/album.php?albumid=256
It's an Olivetti ETV 250 made in 1985. It's a video typewriter or a word processor. It is using CP/M as OS and has Z80 CPU with 64 kB ram and integrated bidrectional daisywheel printer with a speed of 15 characters / second. The green on black 80x25 characters monitor could be mounted on an arm which could be fixed at the border of the desk. Some interesting thing is, I also have an ETV 2700, that one is much newer (1989) and it is MS-DOS based. But it's wordprocessor software SWP can read ETV 250 MWP text files directly from the CP/M disks, I have tryed it and it works just fine.
The CP/M environement on the boot disk of my ETV 250 is very poor, there are not many commands on the boot disks I have, for example nothing to format other disks. I remember that many years ago I used to have disks with more commands, basic interpreter, C-compiler, assembler, ETV 240/250/300/350 diagnostic test and some typical CP/M applications (multiplan, wordstar, dbase, etc.) and even some simple games. When I left Olivetti I reformatted all these disks to use them with my Atari ST, Amiga and/or PC, so their content unfortunately is gone.
Now I want to know more about CP/M and how to get more things on these floppys (I have about 15 preformatted disks). I already found the cpmtools for Win 32 and I have to dig out my old IBM thinkpad to have a computer with XP and real floppy, then I hope that I am able to create individual boot disks for my ETV.. But how to do that? The original ETV boot disk starts directly in MWP main menu, but I can press [EXIT] and it returns back to CP/M command prompt. But as you see, beside MPW and STAT and PIP there's almost nothing.
One question is, how does it to start MWP automatically, is there something similar like an autoexec.bat? So, how to go directly to command prompt?
Another question would be, what would make sense to put on such a boot diskette, is there a standard package I should have?
The floppy drives are 3,5 inch singe sided 320 kB, is that a standard compatible to some other CP/M computer?
Which command usually is used to format disks, would it also work on the ETV 250?
How to create floppy image from Windows? (I would like to preserve the existing disks and share them with somebody else who has an ETV 250 (but without any disks...)
Is there anywhere a complete command reference for all CP/M standard commands?
That are my questions in the first step, others are comming while this thread continues...