Wanting some information about CP/M and the Assembler

[LoTonah]

Hi everyone,

 

I guess this is two questions, loosely related.

 

- CP/M with assembler: is it on tape or disk?

 

- Is the assembler just for making CP/M programs, or Adam programs?

 

I'm interested in playing with CP/M, but I doubt I'd be able to do much. My preferred setup would be 80-columns, CP/M, Turbo Pascal.

 

I'm interested in programming Assembler right on the Adam. Yeah, I know that most people don't do it that way anymore, they program on their Windows boxes and compile to a disk image or whatever the workflow is. Looking for some suggestions on doing it on the Adam itself. I have a stock Adam with only 1 tape drive at the moment (not working, but that's temporary). I'll probably eventually sneak in some upgrades, like memory/RAM disk and maybe a CF reader if I can find one cheap enough.

 

I've been waiting for years to get back into having an Adam and I'm totally psyched to have one again!

[NIAD]

CP/M 2.2 & Assembler was originally released only on Data Pack by Coleco, but they eventually did release it on 5 1/4" Disk as well... the disk version is a tough one to track down. As far as using CP/M, I would recommend not getting serious about it unless you have two working drives as you will go nuts trying to use it with only one drive due to all the DDP swapping that will be required. I would also HIGHLY recommend tracking down an ADAM 5 1/4" Disk Drive or two if you seriously want to use CP/M on the ADAM.

 

What you should do is use the ADAM emulators that are available (ADAMem with ADAMem Manager or Virtual ADAM) to play around with CP/M on your Windows computer. If will function lightening fast and you'll save all the wear and tear on your ADAM and the drives. When you get confortable enough with using it thru the ADAM emulator, than give it a go on the real system.

 

Never bothered trying the Assembler program and don't recall hearing a whole lot of good said about it over the years.

[NIAD]

Almost forgot, there was a replacement CP/M system developed by Tony Morehen in the late 80's and early 90's. It is an incredible improvement over Coleco's CP/M 2.2 and you should check it out. I have included the 4 disk images I have of v4.59 that you can use in one of the above mentioned ADAM emulators.

T-DOS v4.59 (198x) (AJM Software).zip

[NIAD]

Getting forgetful in my old age... follow the link provided for a couple hundred ADAM Newsletters in PDF format from the 80's and 90's that contain some great info on CP/M.

 

http://www.sacnews.net/adamcomputer/newsletters.html

[LoTonah]

CP/M 2.2 & Assembler was originally released only on Data Pack by Coleco, but they eventually did release it on 5 1/4" Disk as well... the disk version is a tough one to track down. As far as using CP/M, I would recommend not getting serious about it unless you have two working drives as you will go nuts trying to use it with only one drive due to all the DDP swapping that will be required. I would also HIGHLY recommend tracking down an ADAM 5 1/4" Disk Drive or two if you seriously want to use CP/M on the ADAM.

 

What you should do is use the ADAM emulators that are available (ADAMem with ADAMem Manager or Virtual ADAM) to play around with CP/M on your Windows computer. If will function lightening fast and you'll save all the wear and tear on your ADAM and the drives. When you get confortable enough with using it thru the ADAM emulator, than give it a go on the real system.

 

Never bothered trying the Assembler program and don't recall hearing a whole lot of good said about it over the years.

 

Good info, thanks! And thanks for the links, I've heard of T-Dos before and didn't realize it was a modified CP/M. Cool.

 

It's weird, even though I do my fair share of emulator-based programming for other platforms, I'd rather do this on real hardware. Maybe because the Adam was my first computer.

 

I'm interested in souping it up, though--I'm wondering if a memory upgrade/RAM card would reduce those DDP swaps?

 

Is there a good list of hardware/software vendors out there?

[NIAD]

You will find that T-DOS is a lot more than a modified CP/M... it is a complete replacement system that offers so much more and gives a more DOS like experience. I hear you re. wanting the experience to be had using a real ADAM system, but while you are working on your Data Drive dilemna, an emulator will be a good way to get your feet wet again.

 

There are a couple ADAM vendors still in operation and the best one to start with is:

 

http://ann.hollowdreams.com/

 

just click on the ANN Catalog (U.S.) link for a nice roundup of products. Think they have considerably more available that isn't listed/pictured.

 

You can also try www.ecoleco.com if ANN doesn't have or can help you track down wanted items.

[LoTonah]

Cool... thanks for the links. It's hard to figure out who's still in business, even the ones that are haven't updated their websites in years!