Loadstar 128 #17/q17.d81/t.diskovery 17

Text File | 1990-01-01 | 5.6 KB | 101 lines

                   D I S K O V E R Y : THE REALITIES OF RAM

                               by Fender Tucker


     When the 128 first came out, 128K of RAM sounded pretty good -- and it
was.  Just about everything was 8-bit in those days and even though it
sounded impossible to squeeze 128,000 bytes into a system that could only
count up to 65535, the C-128 could do it.  But of course we weren't
satisfied.  We wanted 512K of RAM like the IBM people.  So RAM Expansion
Units (REUs) were invented.  These worked pretty good for major systems like
GEOS, or for ingenious, dedicated, one-program companies like Busy Bee, who
makes THE WRITE STUFF word processor.  But we soon found that unless the
software producer specifically wrote code with an REU in mind, the REU
wouldn't work.  As a RAM disk, they were useless because when you turned the
power off, everything in them was lost.

     As an editor I have the power to insist that programmers I work with
add or subtract code as I see fit.  I suppose I could force the wonderful
people who write the programs for LOADSTAR 128 to include REU support -- but
not if I wanted to make a deadline.  Before you can write code that works
with an REU you have to have an REU, and as we all remember, REUs were very
hard to come by for several years.  Also, RAMDOS, the ML code that makes an
REU possible, is not easy to work with unless you are an ML wizard.  Very
few people know how to support an REU in their code.  I'm not one of them.

     So the 16-bit and 32-bit world left us Commodoreans behind.  They
started talking in megabytes, rather than kilobytes.  They started producing
software that did the same thing as old 8-bit software but now it takes up
five times as much disk space.  What did they care, they had hard drives
which began inching up from 20-meg to 40-meg to 200-meg.

     This bothered me not at all because I knew that in real life my C-128
would do what I wanted it to do, and only need kilobytes, not megabytes.
But what about our $200 REUs?  Are they to be relegated to the doorstop
pile, simply because it's too complicated to write code that supports them?

     The answer is NO.  Thanks to Creative Micro Designs, Inc. your REU can
be used as a RAM disk without any programming expertise.  RAMLink has a slot
for an REU so just by plugging it in, you add the REU's RAM to your system.
By using CMD's geoMakeBoot you can create a 1581 partition on RAMLink so
GEOS is immediately available.  Because it's all in RAM, GEOS applications
are fast and Mac-like.  With a battery-backup nothing is lost when you power
down for the night.  If you have hundreds of programs, get one of CMD's hard
drives, which can be configured to have hundreds of MEGABYTES just like the
big boys.

     As a programmer, I mainly appreciate my 3-meg RAMLink because I can
load and save any program instantaneously.  I can save 30 or 40 versions of
my program in progress without swapping disks.  It saves me time.  If I were
a user, it would save me even more time.  My REU finally has a use.

     If this sounds like a testimonial for Creative Micro Designs, it
should.  Thanks to them your 128 is still able to keep up with the IBMs, at
least the ones that sell for under $2000.  You owe it to yourself to see
what life is like with a RAMLink hooked to your system.

*     *     *     *     *     *     *     *     *     *     *     *     *

     I'm on the mailing list of many users' groups and it's comforting to
see that C-128 systems are still readily available at reasonable prices.  I
used to wonder what I would do if my C-128D sprung a leak.  Of course these
are used systems that are for sale, but thanks to Commodore, used 128
systems are all there are.  If your 128 is on its last legs, for reasons
other than just non-working chips, check the local newspapers, shoppers'
news, and newsletters for good deals on used 128s.  I bought one with two
1571s and a 2002 monitor for under $400.

*     *     *     *     *     *     *     *     *     *     *     *     *

     Last issue I asked readers to look around the bulletin boards for good
128 software that could be improved and placed on LOADSTAR 128.  I guess the
word got around to at least one master programmer, because e. g. bell sent
me a terrific program called MAGIC 128.  One of its dozens of functions is
editing the directory of disks, but that's hardly a complete description of
it.  It's 100 blocks of 100% machine code that every power user will want to
have.  e. g., who uses upper case letters in his programs, if not in his
name, knows his stuff and I'm pleased to add him to the list of wizards who
are published on LS 128.

     But we're not all power users, are we?  Jane Jones, from Downunder, has
sent me a nifty program that takes care of many of the day-to-day disk
activities that we all must do.  AUTOPRO-80 takes care of auto-booting, too.

     If you find that HOME REFINANCER on this issue was revealing about how
expensive high interest loans can be, wait till you see what LOAN
ACCELERATOR has to say.  It's the second of Al Vekovius' brainstorms that
I'm proud to publish on LOADSTAR 128, especially in these days of economic
recession.

     Rick Ferreira is working on a new BASIC 8 game but I'd better not go
into details about it -- he may change the whole premise before it's done.

     There will be more, of course.  One of the benefits of a quarterly
magazine over a monthly is that I have more time to juggle the programs so
that you get the very best of what we have every issue.  Maybe a future
LOADSTAR 128 will have one of your programs on it?

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