[cctalk] Re: Running DOS executables on other versions of DOSRe: Looking for Sharp PC-5000 disk drive (CE-510F or possibly MZ-80B)

Hi Mike!! Oh I was so nervous taking it apart - I was thinking of you, and worrying about how I'm probably going to end up having to sadly explain why this system doesn't work anymore. But 'lo and behold, I did manage to get it back together! (notes are in my PC-5000 page linked earlier, which is now a bit long winded for a single page - I'll spit it out eventually). I was trying to go after the CMOS battery, or its equivalent - but wow, Sharp made that very difficult. As you'll see in the photos, the component side of the mainboard is actually pointed down. Since this is still very much a working system, I didn't feel comfortable completely disassembling it - you have to get the entire mainboard out. But I got to the vicinity of the area at least. On the positive, my thinking is that since the battery is "inverted" from normal and pointing towards the ground - if it does leak, it'll just leak into the plastic base of the system. With the disk drives, I can now get new software onto the system more easily. But, looks like I'll have to give up on making a boot disk floppy for the system. I've added a ton of notes to my PC-5000 page about it. @Fred Cisin - I did manage to digest and follow your DEBUG.COM advise, and it all did work (in getting past "incorrect DOS version"). But when it came to the business of actually executing a format, they still did not work. As others have suspect, we're just going to need to find that original Sharp MS-DOS 2.00 boot disk someday. In poking around the MS-DOS 2.00 source code on github, it actually doesn't have a pre-built FORMAT.COM - instead it has a FORMAT.DOC file that describes notes on what is expected for an OEM vendor to implement to support doing a format. While we did finally find a format that allows SYS.COM to work, it's still mysterious on why the (bootable) bubble memory report 6 hidden files, but a SYS'd disk is only reporting 2 hidden files (I think someone else here did cover that, in suggesting some vendors did need extra files to fully implementation their DOS?) So it's been a valiant effort, but I'm content enough just being able to move files on/off the system via disks - meanwhile we'll just hunt for that original Sharp MS-DOS 2.00 image, it surely is somewhere "out there" eventually. (again, notes on this are on my PC-5000 page - but the short of it is: - MS-DOS 1.25 FORMAT.COM didn't care about version but didn't even try to actually format (locked up) - (Sharp) MS-DOS 2.11 FORMAT.COM was patched, and would show help on command line arguments, but wouldn't actually run when given /2 /8 or /S, etc. - MS-DOS 3.30 FORMAT.COM was patched, but declared the target drive as ASSIGNed or SUBSTed and refused to proceed The disk controller interface on this system just isn't "PC Compatible" enough. -SL On Sat, Oct 19, 2024 at 12:43 PM Mike Stein &lt;mhs.stein(a)gmail.com&gt; wrote: > Great to see my old PC5000 receiving so much loving attention; thanks > Steve! > > FWIW, related to the discussion elsewhere about BBSs, that PC5000 was > originally owned by Canada Remote Systems, a smaller Canadian version of > Compuserve based here in Toronto, It was a fairly large (by Canadian > standards) commercial BBS system of the 80s and 90s, noted primarily for > its extensive file collection; I think I still have some of their > collection disks on 8" media somewhere. > > On Sat, Oct 19, 2024 at 10:05 AM Steve Lewis via cctalk < > cctalk(a)classiccmp.org&gt; wrote: > >> Some interesting things (on PC-5000): >> >> - I copied over QMATH, and old command line "parsing-calculator" I did in >> Turbo Pascal decades ago (probably about 1992, so post MSDOS5 at least), >> and it runs on the PC-5000! It's packaged in my "VUC" tools here (along >> with CDIR) voidstar78/VUC4DOS: voidstar Utility Collection for (MS/DR/PC) >> DOS (github.com) <https://github.com/voidstar78/VUC4DOS> >> That just speaks well to the PC-5000 really being MS-DOS compatible (and >> that it ran an executable from a much later generation of MS-DOS). Note >> that CDIR itself doesn't run on that MS-DOS 2.00 system (I suspect >> anything >> that "touches color" won't run, based on trying to run a few other similar >> type things) >> >> - VER is saying MS-DOS 2.00, same as the startup/bootup note. Though it >> does say the "Command v2.02" shortly after (I suspect as it is loading the >> command.com, or in any case just prior to invoking autoexec.bat) >> >> - I don't have a "native" DEBUG.COM for 2.X yet (and ended up in a bad >> time >> that archive.org is majorly down again). And trying to run DEBUG.COM >> from >> 3.30 disks on the PC-5000 just says "Incorrect DOS version" (was we've >> discussed, which as mentioned I'll have to debug the debug.com on another >> system first to patch it) >> >> I'll dig into the .COM patching later, have some errands this weekend >> first. Plus, it turns out I "blew up" my parallel port *again*. Modern >> day, we take it for granted about USB being hot-swappable. Well, >> parallel-ports apparently aren't that forgiving - and I keep forgetting >> that. I've zapped two parallel cards now while swapping between parallel >> devices. (which I'm making good progress figuring out the "retro >> printer" >> that will emulator old printers and let us print from old software and go >> straight to a PDF, but still working on it) The LPT devices themselves >> are fine, just I really heard the electrical pop and just the parallel >> port >> is absolutely dead (everything else seems fine though) >> >> More to report later, but was excited that "something from the future" >> (qmath.exe built almost a decade after the PC-5000 was sold) worked. >> >> >> -SteveL >> >> >> >> >> On Fri, Oct 18, 2024 at 6:35 PM Fred Cisin via cctalk < >> cctalk(a)classiccmp.org&gt; >> wrote: >> >>> On Thu, 17 Oct 2024, Steve Lewis wrote: >>> >>>> I follow all that (on the DEBUG.COM notes) and appreciate the notes - >>> that >>>> will save some time, I look forward to trying a few things out >> tomorrow. >>>> I forgot to do VER explicitly, but on boot up it is saying MS-DOS >> 2.00. >>>> And just now, I recalled that on github there is MS-DOS source (and >>> bins) - >>>> I think Dave's Garage, he recently did a video on building and booting >>>> MS-DOS 4.0 from that source. Maybe I should use this as an excuse to >>> try >>>> a 2.0 build? Or least, reading through the FORMAT.ASM, I see all >> the >>>> DOSVER checking stuff - helps confirm patch addresses, or maybe try >> just >>>> recompiling that one utility without this check. >>>> >>>> >>>> Reading through the CONFIG.txt in the MS-DOS 2.0 github repo, it's >>>> interesting near the end: (the use of forward slash instead of >>> backslash, >>>> ha! and just above this, the comments mention /dev/<dev>) >>>> >>>> "A typical configuration file might look like this: >>>> >>>> BUFFERS = 10 >>>> FILES = 10 >>>> DEVICE = /bin/network.sys >>>> BREAK = ON >>>> SWITCHAR = - >>>> SHELL = a:/bin/command.com a:/bin -p" >>> GOOD >>> So, you should be able to patch FORMAT 2.11 ti work on the DOS version >>> that is running. >>> >>> BUT, whether Format /S or SYS will work remains to be seen. >>> >>> >>> I have seen cases where the opening banner does not quite match the >> stored >>> version number, such as 4.01 V 4.00 >>> and a conditional jmp needs an exact match. >>> >>> >>> So, definitely run VER >>> >>> and/or >>> in debug A(Assemble) >>> >>> MOV AH,30 >>> INT 21 >>> INT 3 ; ends program and displays registers >>> >>> and see what it shows in AX >>> (running that in CMD of my Windows 7 gives 0005 (5.00)!) >>> >>> >>> One of the early homework assignments when I taught PC Assembly was to >> go >>> into DEBUG and patch LINK.EXE and EXE2BIN.EXE to eliminate DOD version >>> checking. >>> >>> >>> -- >>> Grumpy Ol' Fred cisin(a)xenosoft.com >>>