To avoid cluttering up the forums with my retro computing fluff, I decided to reclaim my blog and actually use it for something - it’s been a year since I’ve touched it. I’ll still post the occasional IRIX tidbit as they come along, but right now I’m having a lot of fun with retrocomputing in general. For those that come here just for the IRIX news items, you should be able to collate them via the category options.
On that note, I finally managed to chase down the CP/M diskette for the Microsoft SoftCard III.
After buying a bare SoftCard III on eBay last May, I’d put out a call on the Vintage Computer Forum hoping to find a diskette/disk image/what-have-you, but came up empty. Unbelievably, a factory original diskette showed up on eBay, and I was even able to grab it for less than $10.
The diskette boots just fine:
The next task is to figure out a way to backup the diskette and create an image file. SOS didn’t want anything to do with it when I tried to duplicate it that way; ditto for the Apple IIgs (it just wanted to format it). I’m going to try ADTPro but first need to build or buy the proper serial cable.
If anyone has any suggestions on the best method to copy and archive this diskette, please let me know.
ADT should be able to rip this disk no problem; other Apple /// disk images have been ripped with it, and stored on the Asimov FTP archive.
If copy protection gets in the way of ripping a straight .dsk file, then you can try ripping a nibblized (.nib) image using Saltine's Super Transcopy:
http://apple2.org.za/gswv/a2zine/Docs/SaltinesSuperTranscopyDocs.txt
(It's convoluted but it's worked for like 90% of my copy-protected disks.)
If you do get an image ripped of your SoftCard disk, I beg you to upload it to Asimov or somewhere else so that it's not lost to the ages!
Oh, and just FYI, there is now an Apple ///-native version of ADT!
I've uploaded APPLEIIICPM.DSK to Asimov's incoming directory, and sent an e-mail note to the address listed on the MOTD. I'll mirror a local copy as well.
Hi, I have a few Apple ///s, one ///+ with 512KB Ram, Softcard ///, X-Profile running BOS Selector and a few CP/M Master discs. I have a lot of Apple II CP/M programs e.g. Wordstar (which is available as a .dsk image) but don't seem to be able to transfer them onto the Apple /// to run on SOS and CP/M.
Any ideas on how this is done?
It should be pretty straightforward. Just now to confirm, I stuck my Apple II CP/AM boot floppy in the Apple III's B: drive and it read just fine under Apple III CP/M 2.2 (executed the SDIR program from the CP/AM diskette as a test).