Looking for a 486 system

Very interesting reading, I also have a few 8088 games the will not run on todays machines,mostly due the the hardcoded timeing loops. one would think that by now someone would write a cpu slowdown pgm that does not affect the hardcoded graphics code - like all the current ones do. i have most of the ge numalogic "pc loader" for the pc900 - pc1100 and the pc based programer for ge series 6 model 60 plc's. i also have to use a 486 and lower on the plc and motorola radio programming software. the reason that these programs will not run on a faster then 486 (some only run releably on a 286) is that the cpu speed runs the coded loops too fast. that results in the pgm trying to read/write to the device (radio or plc) faster then the programs i/o instructions can respond. i have had no trouble useing high speed serial ports with the newer uart's. the slowdown programs "time wasting cpu loop" does slow down the program run, but the loop chops up the i/o also and the devices always want 100% of the i/o ports attenation - which results in the i/o loop being droped and/or the program hanging or looping. the problem could be a good one though, at least we do have a use for the 8088's to 486's ;) Bill Message: 30 From: "TeoZ" <teoz(a)neo.rr.com> To: <cctalk(a)classiccmp.org> Subject: Re: Looking for a 486 system... Date: Sat, 1 Mar 2003 12:00:32 -0500 Reply-To: cctech(a)classiccmp.org Those packages have the same problems as older dos games. http://www.oldskool.org/pc/help/oldonnew/ "The second advantage is a natural resistance to obscure programming techniques, like self-modifying code. The 80386 doesn't have an internal cache like the 486 and higher, so most self-modifying code works as good as it did on the original 8088." I found alot of install routines written when the 386 was around would cause errors on faster machines because they hard coded timer loops for user input. Since the PLC software uses the comm ports and they are most likely buffered newer computers feed the data too fast for the serial port. One thing to try on faster machines is to disable internal and external cache in the system bios, then hit the turbo button to slow the processor down to 8mhz (if possible) If you really need a 386 motherboards with chip and memory can be found on ebay really cheap, but are not too common. Buying an old 386 from ebay isn't worth it because of the shipping costs of the heavy boat anchors, but motherboards are cheap. Getting a case from a local thrift store to run it in wouldn't be too expensive. ----- Original Message ----- From: "James Rice" <jrice54(a)charter.net> To: <cctalk(a)classiccmp.org> Sent: Saturday, March 01, 2003 6:42 AM Subject: Re: Looking for a 486 system... programming software certain processors. Allen-Bradley would not run on you tried to run it totally down to the point series from ICOM and the comm port system making it the names elludes me hard drive over 240mb. hard drives over crash if either the All of this software 386 that is kind of a couple of months ago.