Windoware/WINDOWARE_1_6.iso/misctext/pcdg9181/pcdg9181

Text File | 1991-04-11 | 26KB | 685 lines

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Date: Thu,  4 Apr 91 00:08:40 GMT+1
From: "Info-IBMPC Digest" <[e-mail]>
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Subject: Info-IBMPC Digest V91 #81
To: "Info-IBMPC Distribution": ;

Info-IBMPC Digest           Thu,  4 Apr 91       Volume 91 : Issue  81

Today's Editor:
         Gregory Hicks - Rota Spain <[e-mail]>

Today's Topics:

Send Replies or notes for publication to:
<[e-mail]>

Send requests of an administrative nature (addition to, deletion from
the distribution list, et al) to:
<[e-mail]>

Archives of past issues of the Info-IBMPC Digest are available by FTP
only from WSMR-SIMTEL20.ARMY.MIL in directory PD2:<ARCHIVES.IBMPC>.

----------------------------------------------------------------------

Date: Thu, 28 Mar 1991 10:00:18 EST
From: "William W. Plummer" <[e-mail]>
Subject: Re: $25 network

Actually, $26.50 with postage!  It works, too.  UNLESS you have a modem
on COM4 the way I do.  Telephone support has suggested several cures,
but I still have to unplug the modem to use the network on COM2.  If
anyone has solved this problem, I would certainly appreciate hearing
about it.  NB, my mouse is on COM1.  There are no TSRs running that use
COM ports.  The problem is almost certain to be a conflict on IRQ 3.
Thanks for any help!

William W. Plummer   Work: 508-967-4870
[e-mail]     Home: 508-256-9570

------------------------------

Date: Thu, 28 Mar 91 14:11:29 EST
From: James Williams <[e-mail]>
Subject: Accelerator cards

>Why use an accelerator card when a complete new mother board doesn't
>cost more.... You will have less trouble with it and you will get a
>faster machine in the end: system performance is not a question of CPU
>speed only -- even  though Landmark suggests this.

A good accelerator card and a new motherboard may cost about the same
amount.  But, it is not a fair comparison.  Replacing the motherboard
has a lot of additional costs.

If you replace the motherboard, you must replace all RAM, the Floppy
Controller, and the Hard Disk Controller.  If your keyboard doesn't have
an AT switch, you must replace it.  And, you will probably also loose
all of your COM: ports.  Don't backup your hard disk with LapLink,
you'll never get the data back. (Unless, of course, you want to buy new
COM: ports).

[Isn't LapLink a program to transfer data/programs from one computer to
another?  I don't recall it being a backup program...  gph]

All of this will run you around $800.

Let's not even talk about your slow hard disk or double density floppy
drive.

Sure, the motherboard is a much better option, but at these prices you
could almost by a new 386 machine.

--------------------------------------------
| James Williams                           |
| Bitnet: [e-mail]    |
| Internet: [e-mail] |
--------------------------------------------

------------------------------

Date: Thu, 28 Mar 91 13:57 MET
From: "Jim Groeneveld" <[e-mail]>
Subject: Re: disable control-C

There exists (somewher on SIMTEL20?) a resident program (in CADEL.ZIP)
CADEL.COM that "eats" control-alt-del, control-c and control-break.
This program may be specified as the first program (to load) from
AUTOEXEC.BAT (or with some utility I remember for that purpose from
CONFIG.SYS). This disables the keys.  BREAK OFF from CONFIG.SYS or DOS
only prevents a break during all DOS operations except during keyboard,
screen, printer or aux input and output operations.  OFF already is the
default.

[CADEL may be found as PD1:<MSDOS.KEYBOARD>CADEL.ZIP  gph]

I hope this helps,

Regards - Jim Groeneveld.
E-mail: [e-mail] (RFC-822/internet-type Bitnet address)
  [e-mail] (from Internet)  _     _     _      _
File xfer: [e-mail] (EARN address)     | |   | |   | \    / |
NIPG-TNO [postal/visiting address] | Y. Groeneveld       | |   | |   |  \  /  |
P.O.Box 124    | Wassenaarseweg 56 | Schoolweg 14        | |   | |   |   \/   |
2300 AC Leiden | 2333 AL Leiden    | 8071 BC Nunspeet _  | |   | |   | |\  /| |
Nederland (NL) | (+31|0)71-181810  | 03412-60413     | |_| |   | |   | | \/ | |
[office]     Fax (+31|0)71-176382  | [home]           \___/    |_|   |_|    |_|

------------------------------

Date: 28 Mar 91 18:24 -0800
From: Joseph Gil <[e-mail]>
Subject: Disable Ctrl-C

The solution for this problem is quite simple and elegant. In your
config.sys add a 'shell=' directive, specifieng the path to your
command.com. In the end of the parameters list add 'nul'

Example:
    SHELL=c:\command.com/p nul

*most* versions of DOS will start command.com reading and writing from
the nul device. Do not forget to issue

    ctty con

at the end of your autoexec.bat.

-Yossi

------------------------------

Date: Thu, 28 Mar 91 1:07:39 CST
From: [e-mail] (David J. Camp)
Subject: Norton Saves the Day!

We had a major windstorm in St. Louis today that caused many fires and
caused many power line problems.  I had a succession of dropouts while
working on my computer.  A couple of times the partition information on
one of my hard disks was damaged.  Luckily, I had purchased Peter
Norton's Utilities within the last week.  Since I was using Image and
Disk Doctor, the disk was restored in little more time than it takes to
boot.

Later that evening, I saw a spectacular electrical fire atop a utility
pole.  A 2-inch diameter spark was sputtering continuously, as bright
as a streetlight.  It seemed to be located where a cable sat on top of
an insulator, so perhaps the insulator was burning!  -David-

# [e-mail]             ^     Mr. David J. Camp            #
# [e-mail]    < * >   [phone]              #
# ...!uunet!wugate!wubios!david      v     "God loves material things." #
# abs (investment#1 - investment#2) << abs (anyinvestment - anydebt)    #

------------------------------

Date: Thu, 28 Mar 91 13:56 MET
From: "Jim Groeneveld" <[e-mail]>
Subject: Program input/ouput capture

Gray Cluley <[e-mail]> asked about capturing
program input/output:

Dear Gray Cluley,

To solve your problem you may obtain the program PRNDSK from SIMTEL20
(probably a .ZIP file, but I don't know which directory). This is to me
the nicest and mostly extended resident program to capture printer
output to another device (disk). If you load the program, start your
application and press Ctrl-PrtSc (for printing anything scrolling over
the screen) all screen contents (input and output) will go to a
specified device (diskfile).

I hope this helps,

Regards - Jim Groeneveld.
E-mail: [e-mail] (RFC-822/internet-type Bitnet address)
  [e-mail] (from Internet)  _     _     _      _
File xfer: [e-mail] (EARN address)     | |   | |   | \    / |
NIPG-TNO [postal/visiting address] | Y. Groeneveld       | |   | |   |  \  /  |
P.O.Box 124    | Wassenaarseweg 56 | Schoolweg 14        | |   | |   |   \/   |
2300 AC Leiden | 2333 AL Leiden    | 8071 BC Nunspeet _  | |   | |   | |\  /| |
Nederland (NL) | (+31|0)71-181810  | 03412-60413     | |_| |   | |   | | \/ | |
[office]     Fax (+31|0)71-176382  | [home]           \___/    |_|   |_|    |_|

------------------------------

Date: Thu, 28 Mar 91 15:58:38 GMT
From: Pedro Ferreira <[e-mail]>
Subject: Reply to E. Cadima

E. Cadima asked about a utilitie to read n characters from a file starting
in position k, for example:
rf file 10 100
should read 100 characters from file starting in position 10.

In a UNIX system you can combine the head and tail programs to obtain
the desired result.

In any case the following C program should work in MS-DOS, OS-2 and
UNIX systems (I have tested with Borland Turbo C++):
------Program Start-----
#include <stdio.h>

main(int argc,char *argv[])
{
        int rc=0;
        long start, count;
        FILE *fp;

        if (argc != 4)
                bye("Invalid arguments\n");

        if ((fp=fopen(argv[1],"r")) == (FILE *)NULL)
                bye("Error opening input file\n");

        start=atol(argv[2]);
        count=atol(argv[3]);

        rc=file_output(fp,start,count);

        exit(rc);

}

bye(char str[])
{
        fprintf(stderr,"%s",str);
        exit(1);
}

file_output(FILE *fp,long start,long count)
{
        long i;
        int ch;

        if (fseek(fp,start,SEEK_SET))
                return(1);

        for(i=0;i<count;i++)
        {
                ch=fgetc(fp);
                if (ch == EOF)
                        return(1);
                fputc((char)ch,stdout);
        }
        return(0);
}

Pedro Ferreira ([e-mail])

{
        int rc=0;
        long start, count;
        FILE *fp;

        if (argc != 4)
                bye("Invalid arguments\n");

        if ((fp=fopen(argv[1],"r")) == (FILE *)NULL)
                bye("Error opening input file\n");

        start=atol(argv[2]);
        count=atol(argv[3]);

        rc=file_output(fp,start,count);

        exit(rc);

}

bye(char str[])
{
        fprintf(stderr,"%s",str);
        exit(1);
}

file_output(FILE *fp,long start,long count)
{
        long i;
        int ch;

        if (fseek(fp,start,SEEK_SET))
                return(1);

        for(i=0;i<count;i++)
        {
                ch=fgetc(fp);
                if (ch == EOF)

Pedro Ferreira ([e-mail])

------------------------------

Date: Thu, 28 Mar 91 13:55 MET
From: "Jim Groeneveld, NIPG-TNO, Leiden, NL" <[e-mail]>
Subject: system problem (runs CONFIG.SYS, but not AUTOEXEC.BAT)

To:   engp0017@nusvm,[e-mail]
Subj: RE: system problem (runs CONFIG.SYS, but not AUTOEXEC.BAT)

Dear Vincent Chan,

I do not know the configuration of your system, but I assume strongly you have
some SHELL statement in your CONFIG.SYS. If you do not have included the '/p'
like in: 'SHELL=C:\DOS\COMMAND.COM C:\DOS /E:1024 /P' then AUTOEXEC will not
run. You must explicitely include the '/p' option to have AUTOEXEC run.

[The /p option also makes COMMAND.COM permanent...  Kinda like a TSR
but not really.  gph]

I hope this to be the solution of your problem.

Regards - Jim Groeneveld.
E-mail: [e-mail] (RFC-822/internet-type Bitnet address)
  [e-mail] (from Internet)  _     _     _      _
File xfer: [e-mail] (EARN address)     | |   | |   | \    / |
NIPG-TNO [postal/visiting address] | Y. Groeneveld       | |   | |   |  \  /  |
P.O.Box 124    | Wassenaarseweg 56 | Schoolweg 14        | |   | |   |   \/   |
2300 AC Leiden | 2333 AL Leiden    | 8071 BC Nunspeet _  | |   | |   | |\  /| |
Nederland (NL) | (+31|0)71-181810  | 03412-60413     | |_| |   | |   | | \/ | |
[office]     Fax (+31|0)71-176382  | [home]           \___/    |_|   |_|    |_|

------------------------------

Date: Thu, 28 Mar 91 14:55 MET
From: "Jim Groeneveld, NIPG TNO." <[e-mail]>
Subject: RE: reading 41st track of 360k floppies (V91 #53)

I just have uploaded for the subdirectory <MSDOS.DSKUTL> ULTRA.ZIP
Ultra-Utilities, very deep disk manipulations

This set of programs (not by me) a.o. allows for formatting, reading
and writing extra tracks on 360k floppies.

I hope this may help the one(s) looking for such facilities.

Regards - Jim Groeneveld.
E-mail: [e-mail] (RFC-822/internet-type Bitnet address)
  [e-mail] (from Internet)  _     _     _      _
File xfer: [e-mail] (EARN address)     | |   | |   | \    / |
NIPG-TNO [postal/visiting address] | Y. Groeneveld       | |   | |   |  \  /  |
P.O.Box 124    | Wassenaarseweg 56 | Schoolweg 14        | |   | |   |   \/   |
2300 AC Leiden | 2333 AL Leiden    | 8071 BC Nunspeet _  | |   | |   | |\  /| |
Nederland (NL) | (+31|0)71-181810  | 03412-60413     | |_| |   | |   | | \/ | |
[office]     Fax (+31|0)71-176382  | [home]           \___/    |_|   |_|    |_|

------------------------------

Date: Thu, 28 Mar 1991 11:47:00 -0500
From: <[e-mail]>
Subject: Adaptec ACB-2070A controller information needed

I have an Adaptec ACB-2070A controller in my IBM-PC/XT.  Recently it
has become necessary for me to swap out the 10 mHz turbo motherboard
and replace it with a 12 mHz turbo motherboard.  12 mHz seems to cause
problems with the Adaptec creating files marked as "cross-linked" by
CHKDSK.  At the same time, the floppy disks perform flawlessly at 12
mHz.  Does anybody have any suggestions to help "persuade" the Adaptec
to work properly at 12 mHz.

On another topic, how does Phoenix bios change the clock speed.  What
value is written to which port to toggle the clock speed.  I would
prefer not to have to disassemble the Phoenix EPROM to find out...

                                Ya'akov N. Miles,
                                <[e-mail]>

------------------------------

Date: Thu, 28 Mar 91 21:37:04 EST
From: Michael Huynh <[e-mail]>
Subject: FTP/INTERNET

Greeting everyone!

I have a Novell NetWare fileserver v3.1 and I would like to know if I
can be able to use FTP/Internet?  Is there an NLM mod. for this
available?  Any suggestions?

My fileserver is connected to the IBM/CMS mainframe through a gateway.

------------------------------

Date: Thu, 28 Mar 91 14:58:44 EST
From: Bill Jones <[e-mail]>
Subject: Help!  Problems.

I have a gateway-2000, 20 MHz 386 system, and have been using a wefax
board (and program) for 6-7 months with no problems.  This Christmas I
got a few accesories that I tried to install, first a second hard disk,
(that went ok), then I switched DOS versions from 3.3 to 4.01 (on the
first logical drive of the first drive, but nowhere else (probably
mistake #1).  Then I installed Windows 3 (seemed to go ok).  Then I
tried to run my wefax program under Windows 3 (it bombed).

 At this point (before rebooting the next day), I tried to install a
new computerized weather station board, but the computer would not even
go through its initial checkout let alone boot up (nothing appeared on
the monitor)!  I pulled out the new board, and although it went through
the checkout, it was going VERY slow, and once through, as it was
beginning to go into the bootup routine it gave an "XCMOS checksum
failure" error message, but then went on to boot normally.

Confused by this, but remembering that a few days earlier the system
had lost a few days on its clock, I thought that perhaps the CMOS
battery was dead, so I checked, and sure enough, it had lost all
knowledge of my second drive.  I replaced the battery, and reprogrammed
in the drive data, but still got the XCMOS error.

I also found that my modem was no longer working properly.  I then
decided to convert over all the drives to DOS 4.  Hours of file
copying, fdisking, and formatting later, I finished, and on rebooting,
got no XCMOS error. Now I tried to run my wefax program again, and it
bombed again (not through windows this time), and after rebooting I had
the XCMOS error back again.  I assumed that my wefax program was not
DOS 4 compatable, so I decided to go back to DOS 3.3.  Hours later,
back with DOS 3.3, I still get the XCMOS error.

Somewhere along the line, however, my modem came back to life, and the
computerized weather station program and board began working, so
everything is back to normal except that my wefax board was shot (I
have tried it on other computers, and found that a few chips had been
destroyed.  I fixed the board and it now works), and my computer still
gives the XCMOS checksum failure message.  The CMOS setup seems to have
the proper information (at least with respect to time, drives,
monitors, keyboards, etc.  It doesn't go into memory allocation,
clocks, etc.).  Anyway....

*    Does anyone have any idea what could have caused all this?

*    Could software incompatabilities cause a board to burn out?

*    What does the XCMOS error refer to?  (Also, how does one access
the XCMOS memmory, ie where is it in memory, or is it accessed through
ports somehow?  And, where is/are the chip/chips located, on the
motherboard, drive controller board or video board {I assume that it is
on the motherboard, except that if I remember properly I think I found
the string message for the error in a rom area associated with one of
the accessory boards, can't remember which one})

*    All three boards I was having trouble with use Ports (different
ones) and/or interupts, particularly timer interupts.  I was making my
first attempt at using enhanced mode to try some multitasking about the
time the troubles began.  Do the ports behave any differently in
enhanced mode such that a conflict may have appeared that would not
have existed in real mode?  I have read postings about windows-3 taking
control of the timers, could this have interfered with a data
acquisition board which uses D-A's  and A-D's in conjunction with
timers (ie, if the timers are messed up, could a D-A develope too high
of a that could have burned out the chips?

*     When I first got my computer, the CMOS setup described my 65 MB
RLL drive as a 40 MB drive.  This seemed strange, but I had read about
RLL drives functioning by lying to DOS, etc, so I left it alone.  When
I reprogrammed the CMOS to put in the second drive, I likewise lied
about it, but have since changed both to reflect the true size of the
drive.  How might this have affected my problems?  Which should it be?
What is the true dos 3.3 size limit, I have heard 32 MB, but nominal 32
MB is really around 33 MB.  Some of my partitions have 33 MB actual, is
this a problem for dos 3.3?

* Is there more than one CMOS chips?  Ie, one for motherboard and
others for the disk and video controller boards?

Any and all suggestions and/or explanations will be appreciated.
Thanks.

------------------------------

Date: Thu, 28 Mar 1991 17:30:43 EST
From: [e-mail]
Subject: Help finding fast serial card

I am looking to buy a serial board for a 386 AT clone and am concerned
about operating at high baud rates.  I may well be wanting to use
19,200 or 38,400 baud and want to make sure that the board can handle
this without dropping characters.

The book "PCs From Scratch: Designing and Assembling Your Own Custom
PC" by Tom Badgett, Corey Sandler, and Wade Stallings recommends
getting a board based on the 16450 UART if you require 9600 baud or
greater speeds.  However, asking most mail order houses (even their
tech support lines) what serial chip (never mind "UART") their boards
are based on usually gets confused mumblings, or such gems of wisdom as
"the usual one."

Can anyone either
    1. Tell me where I can get a serial board based on the 16450 (or
similar performing) UART.

    2. Describe their experiences (good or bad) they have had operating
their serial ports at high (> 9600) speeds.  Please include, if
possible, the brand/vendor of your board.

Any help will be greatly appreciated.

                        Dave Gentzel
                        [e-mail]
                        [e-mail]

------------------------------

Date: Thu, 28 Mar 91 09:30:28 EST
From: [e-mail]
Subject: INFOMATION ON FAX MODEM AND CD ROM

    I have a couple question about the network fax modem and the cd
rom.

    Does any one currently using or knowing any network fax modem or cd
rom that can work under PATHWORK from DEC for both  PC and MAC.????

    So far I have not seen any products that support BOTH pc and Mac.
They either support pc only or mac only, but not both.

    If any body have any information on the fax modem or cd rom, I sure
would like some information...  If you reply directly to me and not the
list, I will summarize.

   Thank you for your time and information.

Khoi Nguyen
BITNET ---  [e-mail]

------------------------------

Date: Thu, 28 Mar 91 11:05:07 EST
From: "Andrew L. Brant" (IBD) <[e-mail]>
Subject: Maximum amount of memory for a 386

Does anyone know what the maximum about of RAM that can be used in a
386 machine?  Is it different for OS2 or MSDOS4.x?  What is the
limiting factor?

Thanks,
andy      <[e-mail]>

------------------------------

Date: Thu, 28 Mar 91 16:38:31 EST
From: [e-mail] (Howard Weiss)
Subject: MS-Windows and VPIX

Has anyone been successful in running windows under VPix?

I am running VPix version 1.2 on Interactive UNIX 2.2 and I can sort of
get a version of Windows/386 (version 2.1) limping under VPix, but it
tells me that my machine configuration has changed (after waiting for
about two minutes for it to start up) and I can't reinstall it because
the setup program tells me that I don't have a 386 machine (VPix
presents a real mode machine - although the VPix documentation says
that it "supports popular PC aplications and DOS facilities that run on
IBM PC AT-compatible systems" - which sounds like 286 machines).

When I start up Windows-3, I get the startup screen and then VPix
crashes with a "General protection fault, cannot emulate instruction"
message.  The VPix version 1.2 release notes say that "VPix has been
made less prone to failure when using the serial mouse.  This will
alleviate problems seen when using the Microsoft serial mouse with
Microsoft Windows."  This leads me to believe that there is a way to
get windows running on VPix.

Any experiences would be appreciated.

Thanks,
Howard Weiss
[e-mail]
[phone] x201

------------------------------

Date: Thu, 28 Mar 91 10:50 EST
From: "Bob Newlin" <[e-mail]>
Subject: OCR

Is there any good PD or SW OCR programs out there that will read files
from a TEFAX scanner or BSP, PCX, TIF files these can be converted to?

Thanks,  Bob

Bob Newlin, PhD                   BITNET: DBHIVE@DUKEMVS
Associate Dir., Planning Office   INTERNET: [e-mail]
106 Jordan Bldg
Duke University,  Durham, NC 27706  919-684-2331

------------------------------

Date: Thu, 28 Mar 91 14:47 GMT
From: "Hu Weiping" <[e-mail]>
Subject: Program execution timer

Hello, all.  I remember there was a program in simtel for measuring the
excution time of other programs, but can't recall the name and
directory of the file.  Could any kind soul remind me of that?  Also,
if I am going to write my own program to do that, what function should
I use, if I am using Turbo C 2.0?  I tried gettime, but that gives
strange values for the same program, I mean different values.  Any help
would be appreciated.

Weiping Hu, Dublin City University, Ireland

------------------------------

Date: Thu, 28 Mar 91 11:17:47 EST
From: Russ Nelson <[e-mail]>
Subject: 9.x release of Clarkson packet driver collection
Summary: Reposted by Keith Petersen

The 9.x release of the Clarkson collection of packet drivers is now
available from SIMTEL20:

pd1:<msdos.ka9q-tcpip>
DRIVERS.ZIP     Clarkson packet drivers wo/src for KA9Q TCP/IP
DRIVERSS.ZIP    Clarkson packet drivers w/src for KA9Q TCP/IP

Please discard the 8.x release, as the -n switch is broken in it.

The packet drivers are for MS-DOS, and serve to hide the difference
between network cards, and allow multiple protocol stacks to access the
same card.  Most often people are interested in running Novell's
Netware and TCP/IP at the same time.

Summary of changes in the 9.x release:

    The -n switch works again.  It was broken in the 8.x release.  Bugs
fixed: ibmtoken, others.

        The Clarkson packet driver collection

Availability

The Clarkson collection of packet drivers is available by FTP, by
archive-server, and by modem.  They come in two flavors -- executables
only (drivers.zip), and source+executables (driverss.zip).  All of the
following instructions apply to both drivers.zip and driverss.zip.

Mail:

I distribute the packet drivers on two 360K 5.25" disks, or a 720K 3.5"
disk.  I charge a fee for the service of copying and mailing these
disks. You can send me a check for $20, or you can send me a purchse
order and I will bill you for $22.  NY residents add 7% sales tax,
overseas orders add $3 for shipping.  If you send a check, please be
sure it is in US dollars -- the bank charges me $15 to convert checks
drawn in foreign currencies.

    Russell Nelson
    11 Grant St.
    Potsdam, NY 13676

FTP:

sun.soe.clarkson.edu:/pub/ka9q/drivers.zip
grape.ecs.clarkson.edu:/pub/msdos/tcpip/drivers.zip

E-mail:

Send mail to [e-mail] and put the following
command as the body of your message: help This will send you a help
message.  Reading this help message will tell you how to fetch the
packet drivers.

Modem:

Call the Clarkson Heath User's Group's BBS: [phone], 8N1,
1200/2400 Baud, 24 hours.  You may need to press break, or simulate it
using several nulls.  Download pub/msdos/tcpip/drivers.zip.

------------------------------

End of Info-IBMPC Digest V91 #81
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