[comp.os.vms] DEC Mouse and Windows 386

dwploc@monsanto.com (01/10/91)

> I am attempting to get a 386 running Windows in 386 enhanced mode using a
> Digital DEPCA Ethernet board with DEPCA mouse. 
> 
> It appears that the Ethernet cards and mouse driver supplied by DEC for 
> installation under Windows (DEPMOUSE.DRV) does not run under 386 enhanced mode.
> (Windows in enhanced mode is O.K. - I need to run SETUP to load a different
> mouse driver to run it - hence no mouse!) 
> 
> Documentation has suggested that a seperate mouse driver supplied by DEC 
> (DECMOUSE.SYS loaded via CONFIG.SYS) would enable applications to use the 
> mouse as though it was a MicroSoft mouse; it doesn't work when running either
> the DEC Mouse driver or the MicroSoft mouse driver.
> 
> Note that with the DEC mouse drivers loaded it will run O.K. in real mode.
> 
> Configuration:
> 	386 PC with VGA
> 	DEC DEPCA and mouse
> 	40Mb disk, 5.25 and 3.5 inch diskette drives
> 	DOS V4.01
> 	DEPMOUSE.DRV ( 3000 bytes, 26/ 9/1989 9:28:20)
> 	DECMOUSE.SYS (10491 bytes, 10/10/1989 4:24:52)
> 
> Can anybody help or must I wait for LANWorks/Pathworks/???works?
> 
> 	Mike de Laine, 
> 	VAX System Manager,
> 	State Systems
> 
> 	Post:	GPO Box 1095, Adelaide, South Australia, S.A. 5001.
> 	Phone:	+61-8-207 7788
> 	Fax:	+61-8-207 7779
> 	Email:	systemmcd@sa.gov.au
> 	PSIMail:psi%050528372100010::systemmcd

	We are currently trying to use WIN3.0 and PCSA.  We are not using 
DEPCA boards.  3COM 3C523's and 3C503's are our standards.  The BAD news
is:  DEC has finally told us that PCSA 3.0 will DEFINATELY NOT work with
WIN3.0.  There seems to be some timeing problems in the PCSA code when
running under Windows.  The DEC code is not getting enough time to do its
thing.  We have found that the software will work but not consistantly.
Your final comments asking if you must wait for Pathworks leads me to believe
you are not currently using the PCSA product.

David Ploch

KENCB@SLACVM.SLAC.STANFORD.EDU (01/11/91)

David Ploch <dwploc@monsanto.com> wrote in reply to
Mike de Laine <systemmcd@sa.gov.au>:

>
>> I am attempting to get a 386 running Windows in 386 enhanced mode using a
>> Digital DEPCA Ethernet board with DEPCA mouse.
>>
>>  [stuff deleted]
>>
>> Can anybody help or must I wait for LANWorks/Pathworks/???works?
>>
>>       Mike de Laine,
>
>        We are currently trying to use WIN3.0 and PCSA.  We are not using
>DEPCA boards.  3COM 3C523's and 3C503's are our standards.  The BAD news
>is:  DEC has finally told us that PCSA 3.0 will DEFINATELY NOT work with
>WIN3.0.  There seems to be some timeing problems in the PCSA code when
>running under Windows.  The DEC code is not getting enough time to do its
>thing.  We have found that the software will work but not consistantly.
>Your final comments asking if you must wait for Pathworks leads me to believe
>you are not currently using the PCSA product.
>
>David Ploch

We are running VMS V5.4 (recently, what follows also worked under V5.2),
PCSA 3.1 and Windows 3.0 on IBM PS/2's, Compact 386's and Tangent 386's
using DEPCA rev.E's (except in the IBM where we use a 3COM 523(?) card).
We don't use all the features of PCSA (like remote booting, printer
queues, etc.) but mostly its LAT support and transparent file access to
our VAXcluster disks, for via _Disk Services_ and _File Services_, and
it WORKS!  Even backups of PC hard disks to the VAX disk work.
Note the *V3.1* for PCSA, you probably need that...

*However*, we have not been able to make the three-button DEPCA-attached
mouse work since Windows 2 (or 286, whatever it was called).  I find this
extremely annoying and I've told DEC so.  I spent about 6 weeks last Spring
trying to get a solution out of Atlanta to no avail.  There is a DEPCA
mouse driver "hidden" in one of the subdirectories of the PC Client
piece of the software, I think its the one the original poster was talking
about, but it "not supported": some DEC employee wrote it on his own time
and it doesn't quite work (crashes the PC, etc.).

My users would LOVE to use the DEC mouse.  So here's a question to the net:

        Has anyone written a driver or otherwise made the DEC 3-button
        mouse work under Windows 386 *or* Windows 3.0?  Do the more
        recent DEPCA rev's (F,G,H) work any differently/better in this
        respect?

+---------------------------------------------------------------------------+
|  Kenneth H. Fairfield         | Internet: Fairfield@Tpc.Slac.Stanford.Edu |
|  SLAC                         | DECnet:   45047::FAIRFIELD                |
|  P.O.Box 4349, Bin 98         | BITNET    Fairfield@SlacTpc               |
|  Stanford, CA   94309         | Phone:    (415) 926-2924                  |
+---------------------------------------------------------------------------+
        "These opinions are worth what you paid for 'em...
                        ...and are mine, not SLAC's, nor the DOE's..."

wajda@tellabs.com (Rich Wajda) (01/12/91)

In article <91010.132200KENCB@SLACVM.SLAC.STANFORD.EDU> KENCB@SLACVM.SLAC.STANFORD.EDU writes:
<<stuff deleted>>
>*However*, we have not been able to make the three-button DEPCA-attached
>mouse work since Windows 2 (or 286, whatever it was called).  I find this
>extremely annoying and I've told DEC so.  I spent about 6 weeks last Spring
>trying to get a solution out of Atlanta to no avail.  There is a DEPCA
>mouse driver "hidden" in one of the subdirectories of the PC Client
>piece of the software, I think its the one the original poster was talking
>about, but it "not supported": some DEC employee wrote it on his own time
>and it doesn't quite work (crashes the PC, etc.).
<<more stuff deleted>>

I have used the DEC mouse with Windows 2.x and 3.0.  The driver I used
came with with PCSA 2.x (which included MS Windows 2.0).  However, in
upgrading my PC to Win3, the driver would cause Windows to abort if 
running in 'standard' mode.  The only way around this was to start 
Windows with the /r option to force 'real' mode operation, at the 
expense of all that extra memory I otherwise could have used.
As far as the board Rev level, I used Rev E02 in my PC but other 
machines I supported used F & G as well.  These all seem to work the 
same way (insofar as Windows is concerned).


-- 
____________________________________________________________________________

 Rich Wajda             |   "The impossible often has a kind of integrity
 wajda@tellabs.com      |    to it which the merely improbable lacks."
                        |                               - Svlad Cjelli
____________________________________________________________________________

michael@ddsw1.MCS.COM (Michael Duebner) (01/15/91)

In article <1991Jan10.074518.3061@monsanto.com> dwploc@monsanto.com writes:
>> I am attempting to get a 386 running Windows in 386 enhanced mode using a
>> Digital DEPCA Ethernet board with DEPCA mouse. 
>> 
>> It appears that the Ethernet cards and mouse driver supplied by DEC for 
>> installation under Windows (DEPMOUSE.DRV) does not run under 386 enhanced mode.
>> 
>> Documentation has suggested that a seperate mouse driver supplied by DEC 
>> (DECMOUSE.SYS loaded via CONFIG.SYS) would enable applications to use the 
>> mouse as though it was a MicroSoft mouse; it doesn't work when running either
>> the DEC Mouse driver or the MicroSoft mouse driver.
>> 
>> Note that with the DEC mouse drivers loaded it will run O.K. in real mode.
>> 
A
[some stuff nuked]
>
>	We are currently trying to use WIN3.0 and PCSA.  We are not using 
>DEPCA boards.  3COM 3C523's and 3C503's are our standards.  The BAD news
>is:  DEC has finally told us that PCSA 3.0 will DEFINATELY NOT work with
>WIN3.0.  There seems to be some timeing problems in the PCSA code when
>running under Windows.  The DEC code is not getting enough time to do its
>thing.  We have found that the software will work but not consistantly.
>Your final comments asking if you must wait for Pathworks leads me to believe
>you are not currently using the PCSA product.
>
>David Ploch

Hm, that is strange.  We have been using Win 2.0 with PCSA 3.0 for the past
6 weeks without any problems.   Each system is running PageMaker as a
commercial application and both are very stable.  Windows even runs in 386
enhanced mode so we can take advantage of the extra speed.

We are using the DEPCA 200 Turbo boards along with the associated DEC
drivers.  While some of the modules shipped with PCSA don't work, i.e. "must
be from an earlier version of Windows" the base system seems reliable
enough.

The only problem we continue to have is with connections to NET drives from
within Windows.  Some day I'll figure out what I broke.