tminor%brl@sri-unix.UUCP (03/01/84)
From: Thomas C. Minor (IBD) <tminor@brl>
Does anybody out there know anything about the Z-80 Plus
board from Applied Engineering in Dallas Texas? I want to use it
in an Apple IIe that now has a Grappler+ hooked up to an Epson
FX80 printer. My IIe also has the single Apple disk controller
board and the extended-memory 80 column card from Apple. Future
plans include a modem card or a serial I/O card hooked up to an
external modem.
What's the catch? This card sounds so good, but it's really
cheap at $140. It claims to be compatible with Microsoft CPM disks.
Will it boot directly from the Microsoft Softcard operating
system? Does CPM come with the Z80 Plus? Will it handle CPM
3.0? Are there any known problems with other boards, such as
serials, modems, disk emulators, etc? Does it really run Wordstar,
dBase II, etc, as the ads claim?
It just sounds too good to be true. What's the story? Any
help, soon, would be appreciated.
-Tom Minor
301-278-6176Pace@USC-ECLC.ARPA (03/02/84)
From: Chris <Pace@USC-ECLC.ARPA> I can't talk to the question you posed directly, however I just had a bout with a the ALS Z-card that may be worth considering. The Z-card ($129) was purchased mail-order so that I could run wordstar and do some work for downline loading to another z-80 computer. I also had Microsoft's Ramcard. To make a long story short, the z-card came with cpm and several utilities. Most of the utilities didnt bomb, but didnt work either. The 60K system generation utility failed to produce a bootable CPM system. After a long delay and several long distance phone calls to the mail-order firm, ALS finally got back to us saying that there was a "timing problem between the z-card and microsoft's ramcard." After two iterations of this, I gave up and got microsoft's cpm and card which was up and running a 60k system in 15 minutes. Cheapness doesnt always pay off - either in time or money. Chris. -------
POURNE%mit-mc@sri-unix.UUCP (03/02/84)
From: Jerry E. Pournelle <POURNE@mit-mc> ALS I don't now, but Applicard works and the people who make it are good guys. JEP
cpmlist%amsaa@sri-unix.UUCP (03/02/84)
From: Dave Towson (info-cpm) <cpmlist@amsaa> ----- Forwarded message # 1: Received: From rice-gateway.ARPA by AMSAA via smtp; 1 Mar 84 18:54 EST Received: from invader by RICE (AA19334); Thu, 1 Mar 84 17:51:52 cst From: Mike Donegan <mkd@RICE> Received: by invader (AA04725); 1 Mar 84 12:55:31 PST (Thu) Date: 1 Mar 84 12:55:31 PST (Thu) Subject: Re: Z80 Plus Board by Applied Engineering To: info-cpm-request@AMSAA.ARPA Message-Id: <8403012055.AA04725@invader> The catch is no CP/M. mkd ----- End of forwarded messages