mintz@hpindda.HP.COM (Ken Mintz) (04/29/88)
I'm replacing my 5-year-old IBM PC (8088) with an AT. I've been assuming
that there was a very high degree of s/w compatibility: that most things
written for the PC would run on the AT.
Is that a reasonable assumption? I know there will be exceptions, esp.
for any games that might be sensitive to the cpu speed. But can I expect
compatibility as a rule for, say, 90% of the s/w? I've seen s/w packages
that specifically state "works on PC, AT,...". If it says only "for IBM PC",
should I presume that it does NOT work on the AT?
If compatibility is indeed the "rule", can anyone suggest some things to
look for which betray INcompatibilities? My thinking is that perhaps the
AT is DOS-call compatible; but programs that go directly to ports or to
memory locations will fail. True?
I have 2 programs that I was surprised could not run on the AT. Can
someone explain why (or provide an intelligent guess)?
(1) BASICA (very old) caused the AT to hang, altho ctl-atl-del worked.
BTW, "BASICA" is the same as "GW-BASIC", right?
(2) Multiplan (very old) also caused the AT to hang, altho ctl-atl-del
again worked. MP is copy-protected on a 360K floppy that I tried
to run from both the 1.2M and 360K drives.
Any insights and pointers to articles discussing PC-AT compatibility would
be appreciated.
Thanks in advance.
Ken Mintzleonard@bucket.UUCP (Leonard Erickson) (05/03/88)
In article <4330064@hpindda.HP.COM> mintz@hpindda.HP.COM (Ken Mintz) writes:
<I have 2 programs that I was surprised could not run on the AT. Can
<someone explain why (or provide an intelligent guess)?
<
< (1) BASICA (very old) caused the AT to hang, altho ctl-atl-del worked.
< BTW, "BASICA" is the same as "GW-BASIC", right?
No, it isn't. IBM's BASICA.COM *requires* the presence of IBM "cassette
BASIC" ROMs on the motherboard. GW-BASIC is a self-contained .EXE.
BASIC.COM and BASICA.COM won't run on clones. GW-BASIC will.
GW-BASIC also has *at least* one extra command (LCOPY, does the software
equivalent of <shift><prtsc>). Also many vendors have had extra features
added to the GW-BASIC for their machines. Tandy, for example has EFA
support built-into the BASIC for their 3000 and 4000 models.
< (2) Multiplan (very old) also caused the AT to hang, altho ctl-atl-del
< again worked. MP is copy-protected on a 360K floppy that I tried
< to run from both the 1.2M and 360K drives.
Spend the $50 and upgrade it to the current version. The current version
(3.0?) isn't copy protected and can be installed on a hard disk.
--
Leonard Erickson ...!tektronix!reed!percival!bucket!leonard
CIS: [70465,203]
"I used to be a hacker. Now I'm a 'microcomputer specialist'.
You know... I'd rather be a hacker."