Compro, S100 & 8" drives - test-drb@ccmp.vtda.org

22 Jun 1999

I don't doubt that it was possible to build quite a good computer from the
board selection that the CompuPro line had, at one time or another.  I
bought about ten combinations they recommended, however, and not a one of
them worked, so I sent them back.  I still have a couple of their
motherboards in various cardcages.  I will say one thing against the
CompuPro line, though, and I doubt it can be denied.

Once there was a standard, I don't believe that any other single
manufacturer did more to undermine the standard than CompuPro.  Their boards
were not all claimed "compliant" to the standard and even those about which
that claim was made often had little footnotes disclaiming certain things
and indicting where they felt their board didn't comply precisely.  Since
that set a model for others, even if they didn't originate the practice,
because they were at the bottom of the price scale, their non-standard and
non-compliant boards were proliferated throughout the S-100 world, spreading
non-interoperability throughout.  This lead people to throw up their hands
at the prospect of continuing to use S-100 systems in favor of the
relatively risk-free SBC's which were becoming VERY popular, e.g. Ferguson
Big Board, Ampro, et. al. and offered CP/M standard media compatibility at
the disk level and all the basic features built-in.

The IEEE Std.696 board scheme couldn't survive if it wasn't sincerely
implemented.

(now I'll get off my soapbox . . .)

Dick

-----Original Message-----
From: Allison J Parent &lt;allisonp(a)world.std.com&gt;
To: Discussion re-collecting of classic computers
&lt;classiccmp(a)u.washington.edu&gt;
Date: Tuesday, June 22, 1999 5:39 PM
Subject: Re: Compro, S100 & 8" drives

...
 <That's a risky proposition.  CompuPro produced
some of the best but much o
<the worst S-100 hardware ever made.  It seems that Bill Godbout would buy
<couple of boxcar loads of j-k flipflops and the next 5 boards his guys
<produced would be made from them.  Nobody cared if they worked.  People
<bought them because they were cheap.  Interoperability was never a concern
<for Godbout.  If it worked with ONE of their other boards, that was good
<enough.

I have two systems and spares for two more and am using some of them in
other systems, all work.  From some 10 systems I aquired and parted out to
several here.  Those 10 systems ran a small company and I know their history
...
 and the original owner would also argue they were
solid.  Generally the
later IEE696 complient boards are very good and my experience over 20 years
says they were one of the better vendors.  HOWEVER::: The 696 complient
boards often did not work in systems that were way off the spec or were
pre696.  My ALTAIR and the NS* systems are amoung them for the most part.
the NS* mis uses a few lines so the timings are off and a few liknes are
ground that would be otherwise assigned.  Standard S100 problem till about
'83-84ish.

The most interesting and scarce bord they did was the MPX-1 an IO
processing slave.  I'm running one with a DISK-1 and DISK-3 in a z80
system to offload the IO (most of the bios) and it's really a sweet deal.

Allison