"Smartcom II" package available

Fred, So would a program written for Microsoft/IBM (just to be clear) DOS work on the 8" DOS distributions? I.E. was the only difference the medium of distribution (a la 3.5" vs. 5.25")? I know DOS had support for 8" drives through 6.22 (see MS KB 75131). The reason I ask is because then one could theoretically use DOS based imagers/zip utilities/etc. for copying 8" disks if you have a system like the NEC one (I assume it is PC compatible since it runs MS-DOS). I haven't ever heard of anyone doing this so I am sure I am missing something. The other option would be some of the turn key systems you alluded to (i.e. ISA controller card with external drives) but finding one now would be very hard to do. Everything else I've read about copying/imaging 8" disks make it sound rather complicated. -Ali -----Original Message----- From: cctalk-bounces at classiccmp.org [mailto:cctalk-bounces at classiccmp.org] On Behalf Of Fred Cisin Sent: Thursday, September 18, 2014 1:50 PM To: General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts Subject: RE: "Smartcom II" package available On Thu, 18 Sep 2014, Ali wrote: vintage? Yes, NEC had 8" MS-DOS. But, when they came out with "high density" 5.25" and 3.5", they made THOSE formats the same as their 8"! (and therefore mutually incompatible with the "standard" (PC-DOS) versions of those formats. That requires a 3.5" drive capable of 360 RPM, or some games with the data transfer rate. In the earliest days, MS-DOS 1.0 was briefly available through Lifeboat on8" as "SB86-DOS"? (based partially on QDOS). MS-DOS versions are generally very similar to MS-DOS of equivalent versions, but NOT mimicing the PC-DOS assumptions of I/O locations, often almost identical to PC-DOS, other than FORMAT, MODE, etc. MS-DOS 5.00 was the first version of MS-DOS that was sold as a retail product, without an explicit requirement that it be sold accompanying a computer (said requirement was oft violated with a wink-wink) -- Grumpy Ol' Fred cisin at xenosoft.com