ProfitPress Mega CDROM2 …eeware (MSDOS)(1992)(Eng)/ProfitPress-MegaCDROM2.B6I/UTILITY/SYSTEM/TLB_W120.ZIP/WHATSNEW.120

Text File | 1991-08-01 | 7.9 KB | 188 lines

             WHAT'S NEW IN VERSION 1.20a
             ---------------------------

- Added information on DOS 5.0 and then thoroughly reorganized the
  structure of the documentation.

- All upper memory allocation done by any of The Last Byte Memory
  Manager utilities (*.EXE files) can now also allocate unused
  memory from inside DOS 5 Upper Memory Blocks.

- HIGHDISK.SYS, HIGHUMM.SYS, HIGHEMS3.SYS and HIGHEMS4.SYS now
  automatically load themselves into high memory without needing the
  assistance of either HIGHDRVR.SYS or the DOS 5 DEVICEHIGH command.
  If you are presently using HIGHDRVR or DEVICEHIGH to load these
  drivers, you must edit your CONFIG.SYS file to load them in the
  normal manner, as in DEVICE=HIGHDISK.SYS.  These device drivers now
  perform their initialization down in conventional memory and then
  copy their remaining resident portion into high memory.  This has
  the significant advantage of requiring an order of magnitude less
  free high memory in order to install them, and thus they should
  probably be loaded near the end of your CONFIG.SYS file for more
  optimal use of upper memory (with the possible exception of
  HIGHUMM, which might be needed earlier in conjunction with the DOS
  5 directive DOS=UMB.)

- The Extended Character (e.g., Greek characters, etc.) set can now
  be used in user names when using LICENSE.EXE to install an access
  key.

- Added support for the following memory controller chips:

    Chips and Technologies:

        82C836 - The SCATsx (tm) Single Chip AT VLSI chip

    United Microelectronics Corporation:

        82C212 - From the UM82C210 386SX/286 AT Chip Set
        82C481 - From the UM82C480 50Mhz 80486 Chip Set

    ETEQ Microelectronics Corporation:

        82C491 - From the Cougar 386DX/486DX chipset

    Symphony Laboratories:

        82C361 - From the SL82C360 80386DX/SX chipset
        82C461 - From the SL82C460 80486 chipset

    Forex Computer Corporation

        36C300 - From the FRX36C300/200 chipset

- HIGHKEY.EXE: Added a new utility that implements a command line
  recall editor similar to the DOS 5 DOSKEY program, but which can
  store the command line history in bank-switch memory.  HIGHKEY also
  provides filename completion via the Tab key.

- HIGHHOLE.EXE: Added a new utility to locate unused "holes" in the
  Bios and Adapter ROMs, and a new LASTBYTE.SYS option (HOLE=) that
  allows this unused space to be made available as High-DOS memory if
  the ROM is shadowed.

- LICENSE.EXE: Modified so that a user may re-license a previously
  licensed copy of LASTBYTE.SYS as long as the name and access key
  that are enterred match what is already in the LASTBYTE.SYS file.

- CHIPSET.EXE & LASTBYTE.SYS: These now check the configuration
  registers of the memory controller chip to see if the shadow ram
  has been relocated/remapped.  A new "OVERRIDE" option has been
  added to LASTBYTE.SYS to override relocation if enabled.

- HIGHMEM.EXE: Adjacent adapter bios roms are no longer displayed
  together as a single HIGHMEM entry.

- Eliminated some unnecessary "Wrap Blocks" to reduce the memory
  control block (MCB) overhead.

- HIGHMARK.EXE, HIGHUNDO.EXE: Size of TSR Markers now grow
  dynamically as needed rather than having a fixed size.  This
  minimizes the amount of memory required to hold a mark, and let's
  the maximum number of MCB's that can be marked be limited by
  available memory.

- HIGHMARK.EXE, HIGHUNDO.EXE: These now work with HIGHSPLR, HIGHBFRS,
  and HIGHKEY.

- HIGHSPLR.EXE: Improved performance, especially during a "MONITOR"
  operation.  Now displays whether or not printer is responding
  with its hardware interrupt request line.  If only one copy of
  HIGHSPLR has been installed, it will now default to that device
  rather than to LPT1.  Bugs in HIGHSPLR's parallel (LPT) and
  serial (COM) drivers have been corrected.

- LASTBYTE.SYS: The <base> values given in command line options can
  now be given in multiples of 0020 (512 bytes) instead of 0080 (2k).
  The <size> values can now be given in multiples of 1k instead of
  2k.  The <base> value may be omitted for the APPEND= option.

- HIGHMEM.EXE: Improved the presentation of "Wrap Blocks" (now called
  "Reserved Memory Group").

- HIGHMEM.EXE: Now displays the names and locations of software
  loaded into UMB blocks by DOS 5's LOADHIGH and DEVICEHIGH
  commands.

- HIGHMEM.EXE: No longer displays the filename extension (e.g.,
  ".EXE") in the Description column.  It simply isn't always possible
  to determine the correct extension, especially for software loaded
  high without the use of HIGHTSR or HIGHDRVR.  HIGHMEM does,
  however, now indicate the type of each memory block, as in "[TSR]",
  "[ENV]", "[DEV]", etc.

- HIGHUMM.SYS: Now works (correctly) with DOS 5.  Version 1.19 had
  introduced a bug that under certain conditions would keep it from
  working with DOS 5.

- HIGHAPND.SYS/EXE: Modified to be compatible with the DOS=HIGH,UMB
  option of DOS 5.

- LICENSE.EXE: You may now specify the memory controller type as an
  option on the command line when you run the LICENSE program, rather
  than letting it automatically determine which controller type is
  present.

- HIGHUNDO: Now issues an error message if removing the mark would
  disable a TSR that it is unable to remove.  (I.e., one not
  installed by HIGHTSR.)

- HIGHUMM.SYS: The name field of UMB blocks allocated by HIGHUMM.SYS
  are now filled with the name of the program that allocated them.

- HIGHMEM: Corrected a bug that caused the number of DOS 3 buffers to
  be omitted from the description column.

- LASTBYTE.SYS and LICENSE.EXE: Repaired a bug that would hang the
  PC if it uses a memory controller chips that provide hardware
  support for EMS (such as the NEAT chipsets) and EMS was enabled
  but no EMS device driver was installed.

- CHIPSET.EXE and LASTBYTE.SYS: Repaired reporting of NEC V20 Cpu
  speed.

- LICENSE.EXE and LASTBYTE.SYS: Eliminated a bug in the code that
  tests for the presence of serial and parallel cards.  This code
  necessarily twiddles bits on these adapter cards, but did not
  have interrupts disabled while it was doing so.

- LICENSE.EXE and LASTBYTE.SYS: Repaired a bug in the hardware
  signature computation that would cause the software to hang while
  determining the types of disk drives attached; repaired an
  incompatibility with certain network adapter cards.

- HIGHUMM.SYS: Repaired a bug that caused requests to allocate
  bank-switch memory to be converted into requests for High-Dos
  memory.

- LASTBYTE.SYS: Repaired a bug that caused warm boots to
  become cold boots when bios rom was shadowed, even though no
  DOS=F000:nn option was in use.

- LASTBYTE.SYS: Corrected a bug in the warm boot intercept code.

- LASTBYTE.SYS: Corrected a bug in the relocation of the Extended
  Bios Data Area (XBDA).  Added a "MOVEXBDA" option to enable this
  relocation; the XBDA is no longer moved without this option.

- LASTBYTE.SYS: Corrected a problem in the cache flushing routine
  that would cause it to not flush the cache, thus causing cache
  coherency problems with bank-switch memory.

- LASTBYTE.SYS, LICENSE.EXE, HIGHMEM.EXE, CHIPSET.EXE: Corrected a
  bug in the test for protected mode (it always reported the
  processor as being in real mode).  This test is used in the cpu
  detection algorithm to avoid code that might cause a protected mode
  fault.

- HIGHUMM.SYS: The docs say that the RESTRICT and EXTRA options
  should be preceded by a forward slash ("/"), but the code didn't
  want it that way.  Corrected the code.

- The hours of operation for our BBS and the Voice Mail system were
  incorrectly listed in LASTBYTE.DOC when 1.19 was released.
  The hours were listed correctly, however, in the README.1ST file.
  The correct hours of operation for the BBS are Monday-Friday from
  5pm to 8am PST, and 24 hours a day on Saturday and Sunday.  The
  Voice Mail system operates between 8am and 5pm, Monday through Friday.