How to format Decmate III diskettes...
Bruno Gallichand
Hi,
I recently bought an old Decmate III but it came without any disks or
software. I was told to look in ftp.update.uu.se to find software for
it and the most important software was in fact there.
My problem is that I really have no clue of how to setup or format
diskettes for it. I've found a device driver and program to read/write
decmate diskettes in a PC's 5 1/4 in drive but it cannot 'format' the
disks for usage on a Decmate as the PC's controller doesn't allow it.
Does anyone know how to format Decmate III diskettes?
Also, I'm not familiar with the operation of this small computer, e.g.
how files are organized, executable program synthax (... what is a TD0 file
for example, what is wps,...). If anyone can help me find documentation
about such topics I would appreciate.
Thanks
Bruno Gallichand
bru...@cae.ca
Tom Boldway
raindos is used on an ibm that will format 1.2 meg 5 1/4 floppies.
place the line:
device=c:\raindos.sys
in the autoexec.bat file, and place raindos and th other unzipped files
on your root C directory.
Your computer (IBM compatible) will now assign another drive letter to
the 5 1/4 floppy.
put in double density floppies (360k), and type "format d:," or whatever
drive letter it is assigned.
this formats the floppies for use by the decmate (think of this as
"Fdisk" on a harddrive).
You need another program called teledisk from update.
all the files there have .td0 as the suffix, and td0's are compressed
disk images for the teledisk program.
download the .td0's you want, then type teledisk and use it to write to
the 5 1/4 floppies.
WPS is a neato-keen easy to use word processing program. If there is no
spell check disk at update.uu.se, then try the other main source under
pdp8 files; sunsite, I think.
If you have questions, email at
jbol...@student.umass.edu
P.S. you don't need to run raindos if you run teledisk.
man...@decus.org.au
In article <4ov588$g...@web.cae.ca>, Bruno Gallichand <bru...@cae.ca> writes:
> Hi,
>
> I recently bought an old Decmate III but it came without any disks or
> software. I was told to look in ftp.update.uu.se to find software for
> it and the most important software was in fact there.
Yup!
> My problem is that I really have no clue of how to setup or format
> diskettes for it. I've found a device driver and program to read/write
> decmate diskettes in a PC's 5 1/4 in drive but it cannot 'format' the
> disks for usage on a Decmate as the PC's controller doesn't allow it.
> Does anyone know how to format Decmate III diskettes?
Yup! Lots of people do.
There are several possibilities...
1 get a Rainbow, they of all the RX50 equiped machines that DEC sold
are actually capable of formatting from scratch a floppy.
2 get a program to format RX50 floppies on you PC, assuming you have
one. Can't remember the name, 'cos I have a Rainbow. ;-)
3 use Teledisk running on a PC.... see below.
> Also, I'm not familiar with the operation of this small computer, e.g.
> how files are organized, executable program synthax (... what is a TD0 file
> for example, what is wps,...). If anyone can help me find documentation
> about such topics I would appreciate.
A .TD0 file is the output of the PC program Teledisk. It is a file which is
an image of a floppy. The idea is that you have a PC with a decent 5.25"
floppy drive, and Teledisk. You feed in, say, and RX50 (DEC) type floppy
and Teledisk makes it into a file....obviously the reverse process takes
the file and writes a floppy....in this process, a suitable floppy gets
all the initialisation it needs.
WPS is a Word Processing System....most DECmates were sold mainly as WPS
type systems. You can also run a version of the OS-8, called OS-278,
or COS-310. Given a co-processor board (which is reasonably common)
you might also be able to run CP/M.
As for doco....I have a fairly complete set spare in my garage, but, from
Sydney Australia, it would cost a fortune to mail. :-(
> Bruno Gallichand
> bru...@cae.ca
regards,
CrazyCam