[net.micro.6809] NEW 64k CoCo II / Color Disk Asse

emjej@uokvax.UUCP (04/04/84)

#R:micomvax:-25500:uokvax:3500032:000:1641
uokvax!emjej    Apr  2 10:02:00 1984

/***** uokvax:net.micro.6809 / micomvax!ottmar /  8:14 am  Mar 31, 1984 */
>Since I haven't yet heard of this product, I am still not
>certain that the saleman didn't merely sell me an UPGRADED CoCo II ...

Unless I'm mistaken, the newer 64K CoCos *are* CoCo IIs, with appropriate
RAM chips and a jumper installed near one of the PIAs.

>	1. The signals read from cassette are no longer played through
>	   the TV speaker.

Eh? You should be able to control that with the Color BASIC "AUDIO ON" and
"AUDIO OFF" statements. I have a CoCo I and it never feeds cassette data
through to the TV by default (I'm glad I have the choice, after seeing all
the hacks that Model I users had to put on their cassette decks...). If yours
does, then you might have ROM problems. (I haven't tried a CLOAD on a CoCo II;
corrections on the above cheerfully welcomed.)

>P.S. - Does anyone know how it compares with the OS9 assembler? The latter is
>       described as "rudimentary" in Radio Shack's own catalog, and can only
>       produce relocatable code. It seems to me to be a poor choice for non-
>       OS9 applications.

Well...it has no macros, but otherwise it seems like a canonical assembler
(I don't use assembler often, so be forewarned). It *will* generate code that
violates the conventions for OS-9 modules (non-PIC), but it will gripe about
it. (Dunno why they didn't supply macros, so they wouldn't have to wire in

	OS9	<system call code>	-->	SWI2
						FDB	<system call code>

maybe they were worried about space?) The assembler that comes with the
Microware C compiler has macros, if you need them.
/* ---------- */

					James Jones