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EUE 

THE SMALL SYSTEMS JOURNAL 



WNO.7 



50 IN UNITED STATES 
IN CANADA / £2.10 IN U.K. 
A McGRAW-HILL PUBLICATION 
0360-5280? 










*Arailahle Spring 1985. © 1985 Affile Computer, Inc. Apple, the- Apple logo \kich w r-\ il on ; \ppleTatk are trademarks oj'Ap r Inc Macintas!) is a trademark licensed to Apple Computer, 

Inc. IBM is a registered trader* r national Business Machines Corporation, DEC \ TIOO and 1752 are trademarks of 'Dij> & d Equipment Corporation. Lotus and jazz are trademarks 

of Lot us Development Corporation. Microsoft and Multiplan are registered trademarks of Microsoft Corporation. 



IBM is finally 
talking to us. 




And were finally talking to them 

Thanks to The Macintosh™ Office. 

Using our AppleLine protocol converter and 
MacTerminal™ software, Macintosh can speak 
IBM® 3270 like a native. Not to mention DEC* 
VnoorVTSrandTTC 

In English, that means you can find almost 
anything that's stored in your company's main- 
frame. Just the same as if your Macintosh was 
an IBM terminal. 

Say, for instance, you want to know how 
sales are going as of yesterday. Where your 
inventor) 7 stands. Or if receivables are staying 
ahead of payables. 

With a Macintosh on your desk, all that 
information is right at your fingertip. Even if 
your mainframes on the other side of the build- 
ing. Or the other side of the world. 

Now if you think that's impressive, you 
haven't read anything yet. 

Once you've located the data you want, you 
can 'cut" it out of the mainframe and "paste" 
it directly into a spreadsheet program like Lotus 4 
Jazz™*Or Microsoft® Multiplaif Then turn the 
numbers into a chart with a business graphics 
program. Such as Microsoft Chart. And last, but 
certainly not least, print out a publication- 
quality report, memo or presentation with our 
LaserWriter printer. 

Total elapsed time: about 20 minutes. 



And if you need to know something that's 
not in your mainframe— like up-to-the-minute 
stock quotes— you can use MacTerminal and 
an Apple Modem to tap into a number of 
commercial information services. Including 
Dow Jones 
News/Retrieval® 
NEXISf LEXIS? 
And The Official 
Airline Guide? 
So you can use 
Macintosh 
for everything 
from scanning 
The Wall Street 
Journal to 
making airline 
reservations. 

All of 
which means 




/// Tlw Macintosh Office, iwrkgroups 
of 5 to 25 people will talk to each other 
over our AjtfneTatir Personal Netuwk. 



you should finally be talking to us. 

Call 800-446-3000, and well tell you more 
about how well The Macintosh Office will it 
into the one you're in now. 

Even if there's a big blue box in one coiner. 

The Macintosh Office 




Dow Jones News/ Retrieval is a registered trademark of Dow Jones & Cotn/wny, Inc. NEX1S and IJLX/Sa?v registered trademarks of Mead Data Central. Vx Official Airline Guide is a registered 
trademark of Official Airline Guides, inc. For an authorized A/iple dealer nearest ymi call (800) 538-9696. In Canada, call (800) 268-7796 or (800) 268-763 7. ' 



CONTENTS 





FEATURES 

■SBnHHMMMBHMSS 

Introduction 104 

Programming Project: New Perspectives on Nearby Stars 

by Bruce Webster 106 

This program, develooed on a Macintosh using MacAdvantage: UCSD Pascal, takes a list 
of stars and shows you where they are in respect to one another. 

Liquid-Crystal Displays for Portables by Glenn J. Adler 119 

The author presents an in-depth look into the workings of LCDs. 

Product Description: The GRiDCase by Rich Ualloy 129 

One member of this family of portables has a gas-plasma display. 

Ciarcias Circuit Cellar: Living in a Sensible Environment 

by Steve Garcia 141 

Steve looks into his junk box for items to use with the Home Run Control System. 

Programming Insight Travesty Revisited by Murray Lesser 163 

Travesty is rewritten in compiled BASIC 

Programming Insight: Real-Number Formatting Your Apple 

by Brent Daviduck 171 

Specify the decimal length of any real number. 

THEMES 



Introduction 176 

Updating the Oldest Science by Russell M. Genet 179 

Observers around the globe are using microcomputers in a variety of astronomical 
applications. 

Microcomputers in NASA's SIR-B by Richard Wilton 192 

The Shuttle Imaging Radar experiment employs a network of personal computers 
for data acquisition and analysis. 

Comet Lines in FORTRAN by David S. Dixon 203 

The program described calculates the positions of asteroids and comets. 

Tracking Earth Satellites by E. H. Weiss 215 

The Stumpff program can help you calculate earth-orbiting satellite positions 
with high precision. 

Automating a Telescope by Louis J. Boyd 227 

A codirector of the Fairborn Observatory describes ways of computerizing 
the repetitious tasks in variable-star photometry. 

Astronomical Computing with Micros 

by Richard Bochonko and William T. Peters 239 

Small systems increase the amateur astronomer's reach. 

Astronomy Sources 244 

An Astronomy Glossary 245 

REVIEWS 



Introduction 248 

Reviewer's NorEBOOK by Glenn Hartwig 251 

Texas Instruments 1 Pro-Lite Professional Computer 

by Richard Grehan and Eva White 252 

A briefcase-size machine that runs MS-DOS. 

BYTE IISSN 0360-5280} is published monthly with one extra issue per year by McGraw-Hill Inc. Founder: lames H. McCraw (I860 1948). Executive, editorial, 
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Europe, and $5 elsewhere Foreign subscriptions and sales should be remitted in United States funds drawn on a U.S. bank. Please allow six to eight 
weeks for delivery of fiist issue. Printed in the United States of America 



2 BYTE • JULY 1985 



COVER ILLUSTRATION BY ROBERT T1NNEY 



NCR Personal Computer Model 4 by Elaine Holden 258 

An IBM PC-compatible with a RAM-disk utility. 

Monitoring Hallevs Comet by ]ohn E. Nlosley 265 

Three programs for tracking the return of the celestial visitor. 

Space-Flight Simulators by Benjamin Bernar 269 

Link up with a space station or travel to Saturn. 

MaxThink by William Hershey 279 

An outline processor for the IBM PC. 

The Anchor Automation Signalman Mark XII Modem 

by George V. Kinal 287 

It's similar to the Hayes Smartmodem but not fully compatible. 

Review Feedback 295 

Readers respond to previous reviews. 

KERNEL 



Introduction 306 

Computing at Chaos Manor: Come to the Faire by }erry Poumelle 309 

Trips to shows and a visit with Niklaus Wirth highlight Jerry's month. 

Chaos Manor Mail conducted by \erry Poumelle 338 

Jerry's readers write, and he replies. 

BYTE West Coast SNOBOL and Icon by Ezra Shapiro 341 

Our West Coast staff interviewed one of SNOBOL4's authors. Ralph E. Griswold. who has 
gone on to create a new language called Icon. 

BYTE U.K.: Starlit Spectrum by Dick Pountain 353 

Dick reports on an astronomical application for the Sinclair Spectrum. 

BYTE Japan. Peripherals, Chips, and New Computers 

by William M. Raike 363 

Bill looks at the Silver-Reed EB50. Fujitsu's new optical-disc coating material, and more. 

According to Webster: Startup by Bruce Webster 367 

The debut of this column covers an assortment of Macintosh products. 

Mathematical Recreations: Parsing and Solving Linear Equations 

by Robert T. Kurosaka 385 

Set up and solve simultaneous linear equations. 

Circuit Cellar Feedback conducted by Steve Garcia 391 

Steve answers project-related queries from readers. 

BYTELINES conducted by Sol Libes 393 

News and speculation about personal computers. 



Editorial: 
Equal Access to Computers: 

Scruples or Rubles? 6 

Microbytes 9 

Letters 14 

Fixes and Updates 33 

What s New 39, 406 

Ask BYTE 48 



Clubs & Newsletters 

Book Reviews 

Event Queue 

Books Received 



58 

65 

85 

395 

Unclassified Ads 461 

BYTE's Ongoing Monitor Box. 
BOMB Results 462 

Reader Service 463 



Address all editorial correspondence to the Editor. BYTE. POB 372. Hancock. NH 03449. Unacceptable manuscripts will be returned if accompanied 
by sufficient first-class postage. Not responsible for lost manuscripts or photos Opinions expressed by the authors are not necessarily those of BYTE 

Copyright© 1985 by McGraw-Hill Inc. All rights reserved. Irademark registered in the United States Patent and Trademark Office. Where necessary, 
permission is granted by the copyright owner for libraries and others registered with the Copyright Clearance Center ICCC) to photocopy any article 
herein for the flat fee of SI. 50 per copy of the article or any part thereof. Correspondence and payment should be sent directly to the CCC. 29 Congress 
St.. Salem MA 01970. Specify ISSN 0360-5280/83. SI 50. Copying done for other than personal or internal reference use without the permis- 
sion of McGraw-Hill Inc. is prohibited. Requests for special permission or bulk orders should be addressed to the publisher. BYTE is available 
in microform from University Microfilms International. 300 North Zeeb Rd.. Dept. PR. Ann Arbor. Ml 48106 or 18 Bedford Row. Dept. PR, 
London WCIR 4 El England. 
Subscription questions or problems should be addressed to: BYTE Subscriber Service. POB 328. Hancock. NH 03449 




VOLUME 10, NUMBER 7, 1985 




248 




306 



SECTION ART BY STEVEN GUARNACCIA 



JULY 1985 -BYTE 3 




Can You Name a 
Dual-Drive Color PC 
That Runs Lotus 1,1,3 
and Costs Under $1500? 

Hints 

• It comes with a 14" RGB monitor 
much like the 14" monitor that comes 
with the $2495 Leading Edge PC. 

• It has dual 800K disk drives much 
like the $2495 Tandy 2000, but it also 
has the ability to read and write to 
popular 160K, 320K, and 360K IBM-PC 
formats. 

• It's an 8088, MS-DOS system with 
256Kof RAM, but it comes with abetter 
free software bundle than the 8-bit Kaypro 
including MS-DOS 2.1 l,HAGEN-DOS 
DOS-TUTOR, WordStar 3.3, Easy Writer 
Spell, Mail Track, PC File III, FILE 
BASE, CalcStar, games, graphics, utili- 
ties, and two BASIC languages. 

• Although it's not PC-DOS compatible 
it will run hundreds of the same pro- 
grams as the IBM including dBASE II, 
Multiplan, the PFS series, Lotus 1,2,3 
and even Flight Simulator. 

• During the dog days of summer 
computer sales, we've lowered the prices 
ofbothourcolor and monochrome systems. 
You can receive a free booklet on these 
systems by calling our machine at 
1-800-FOR A FOX, and leaving your 
name and address at the beep. 

Your time is up the answer is 

ColorFox $1497 

also 
Fox Jr. ... $899 Silver Fox . . $1297 

# 
Scorrsdale Systems, w . 

617 N. Scortsdole Rd. #D, Scortsdole, Az 85257 

(602)941-5856 



The Silver Fox is sold exclusively by Scottsdale Systems 
Ltd., 617 N. Scottsdale Road «B, Scottsdale. AZ 85257. 
Trademarks: Silver Fox. HAGEN DOS. and Datemate. 
Scottsdale Systems Ltd.; WordStar and CalcStar. 
Micropro International; MS-DOS, and Multiplan, Micro- 
soft Corporation; FILEBASE. EWDP Software, Inc.; 
dBASE II. AshtonTate; IBM-PC, and IBM-PC DOS; 
International Business Machines Corporation. Ordering: 
Telemarketing only, Silver Fox price is for cash, 
F.O.B. Scottsdale. prices subject to change, product 
subject to limited supply. We accept purchase orders from 
Fortune 1000 companies and major universities with 
good credit - add 2% Visa, Mastercard add 3%, AZ 
residents add 6%. Returned merchandise subject to a 20 ( Ki 
restocking fee. Personal or company checks take up to 3 
weeks to clear. No COD's or APO's. 



EVTE 



editor in chief 

Philip Lemmons 
managing editor 
Gene Smarte 
consulting editors 

Steve Ciarcia 

lERRY POURNELLE 

Bruce Webster 

senior technical editors 

G. Michael Vose. Themes 
Gregg Williams 
technical editors 

Thomas R. Clune 

Ion R. Edwards 

Richard Grehan 

Glenn Hartwig. Reviews 

Ken Sheldon 

Richard S. Shuford 

Iane Morrill Tazelaar 

Eva White 

Stanley Wszola 

Margaret Cook Gurney. Associate 

Alan Easton. Drafting 

WEST COAST EDITORS 

Ezra Shapiro, Bureau Chief. San Francisco 
Iohn Markoff. Senior Technical Editor. Palo Alto 
Phillip Robinson. Senior Technical Editor. Palo Alto 
Donna Osgood. Associate Editor. San Francisco 
Brenda McLaughlin. Editorial Assistant. San Francisco 

NEW YORK EDITOR 

Richard Malloy. Senior Technical Editor 

managing editor. 

electronic publishing and communications 

George Bond 

user news editor. east coast 

Anthony I. Lockwood. What's New 

USER NEWS EDITOR, WEST COAST 

Mark Welch. Microbytes 

CONTRIBUTING EDITORS 

Ionathan Amsterdam, programming projects 

Mark Dahmke. video, operating systems 

Mark Haas, at large 

Rik Iadrnicek, CAD. graphics, spreadsheets 

Mark Klein, communications 

Alastair I. W. Mayer, software 

Alan Miller, languages and engineering 

John C. Nash, scientific computing 

Dick Pountain. U.K. 

William M. Raike. \apan 

Perry Saidman. computers and law 

Robert Sterne, computers and law 



COPY EDITORS 

Bud Sadler. Chief 
Dennis Barker 
Elizabeth Cooper 
Anne L Fischer 
Nancy Hayes 
Lynne M. Nadeau 
Paula Noonan 

lOAN VlGNEAU ROY 

Warren Williamson 



ASSISTANTS 

Peggy Dunham 
Martha Hicks 
Beverly Jackson 
Lisa lo Steiner 



ART 

Rosslyn A. Frick. Art Director 
Nancy Rice. Assistant Art Director 



PRODUCTION 

David R. Anderson. Production Director 
Denise Chartrand 
Michael I. Lonsky 
Ian Muller 



SENIOR VICE PRESIDENT/PUBLISHER 

Harry L. Brown 

PUBLISHERS ASSISTANT 

Doris R. Gamble 

PERSONNEL 

Cheryl Hurd. 0//ice Manager 
Patricia Burke. Personnel Coordinator 



ADVERTISING SALES (603-924-6 137) 

I. Peter Huestis. Sales Manager 
Sandra Foster. Administrative Assistant 

ADVERTISING/PRODUCTION (603-924-64481 

Lisa Wozmak. Supervisor 

Robert D Hannings. Senior Account Manager 

Marion Carlson 

Karen Cilley 

Lyda Clark 

MlCHELE GlLMORE 

Denise Proctor 

Wai Chiu Li. Quality Control Director 

Julie Nelson. Advertising/Production Coordinator 

CIRCULATION (800-258-5485) 

Gregory Spitzfaden. Director 

Andrew Jackson. Subscriptions Manager 

Cathy A. Rutherford. Assistant Manager 

Laurie Seamans. Assistant Manager 

Susan Boyd 

Phil Dechert 

Mary Emerson 

Louise Menegus 

Agnes E. Perry 

Jennifer Price 

Iames Bingham. Sin^e-Copy Sales Manager 

Linda Ruth, Assistant Manager 

Carol Aho 

Claudette Carswell 

Karen Desroches 

MARKETING COMMUNICATIONS 

Horace T. Howland. Director (603-924-3424) 

Vicki Reynolds. Marketing Production Manager 

Priscilla Arnold. Marketing Assistant 

Stephanie Warnesky Marketing Art Director 

Sharon Price. Assistant Art Director 

Doug Webster. Director of Public Relations (603-924-9027) 

Wilbur S Watson. Operations Manager. Exhibits 

PLANNING AND DEVELOPMENT 

Michele P. Verville. Manager 

Patricia Akerley Research Manager 

Cynthia Damato Sands. Reader Service Coordinator 

Faith Kluntz. Copyrights Coordinator 

MANUFACTURING! FINANCE/SERVICES 

Daniel Rodrigues. Director 

ACCOUNTING 

Kenneth A. King. Assistant Controller 

Vicki Weston. Accounting Manager 

Linda Short, D/P Manner 

Edson Ware. Credit 

Marie Caggiani 

Marilyn Haigh 

Diane Henry 

Vern Rockwell 

IoAnn Walter 

typography 

Sherry McCarthy. Cnief 'typographer 

Nan Fornal 

Len Lorette 

Kathy Ouist 

Donna Sweeney 

BUILDING SERVICES/TRAFFIC 

Anthony Bennett. Building Services Manager 
Brian Higgins 
Mark Monkton 

RECEPTIONISTS 

L. Ryan McCombs 
Cheryl Castro. Assistant 



Editorial and Business Office: 70 Main Street. Peterborough. New Hampshire 034 58 (603) 924-9281 
West Coast Offices: McGraw-Hill. 425 Battery St. San Francisco. CA 94! ) |. (4151 362-4600. 

McGraw-Hill. 1000 Elwell Court. Palo Alto. CA 94303. 14 15) 964-0624 
New York Office: 1221 Avenue of the Americas. New York. NY 10020. (2121 512-2000 

Officers of McGraw-Hill Information Systems Company President Richard B, Miller Executive Vice Presidents; Frederick P lannott. Con- 
struction Information Group; Russell C White. Computers and Communications Information Group; I. Thomas Ryan, Marketing and Interna- 
tional. Senior Vice Presidents: Francis A Shinal. Controller; Robert C. Violette. Manufacturing and Technology. Senior Vice Presidents and 
Publishers; Harry L. Brown. Computers and Communications: David I. McGrath. Construction. Group Vice President. Peter B. McCuen. Com- 
munications. Vice Presidents: Fred O. lensen. Planning and Development: Margaret L. Dagner. Human Resources. 

Officers of McGraw-Hill. Inc.: Harold W. McGraw. Jr.. Chairman: Joseph L. Dionne. President and Chief Executive Officer; Robert N. Landes. Executive 
Vice President and Secretary: Ralph I. Webb. Vice President and Treasurer: Donald L. Fruehling. Executive Vice President. Publishing Operations Group 
Ralph R, Schulz. Senior Vice President. Editorial: Walter D. Serwatka. Senior Vice President. Manufacturing and Circulation Services. Vice Presidents 
Shel F Asen. Manufacturing: George R Elsinger. Circulation. 



BB 



BYTE • JULY 1985 



Great Giffsuggestion 
forunder $9,000: 




It's the MC-186/EL™ Gifford's four-user 
entry level system— just $8,995. 

It's a complete multiuser system with a 23 megabyte hard 
disk. Just add terminals, turn it on, and start using over 100 Gifford 
productivity tools and utilities. You even get word processing, 
electronic mail, and telecommunications. 

You can also run thousands of CP/M® programs (single and 
multiuser, 8- and 16-bit), and use it as a building block in a fast 
local area network with IBM PCs, compatibles, and other MC-186 
family members. 

Call 415/895-0798 for your nearest dealer. Or write to us at 
2446 Verna Court, San Leandro, CA 94577 

The features make it a Giff. The price makes it a present. 



C$ GIFFORD 

^^ COMPUTER SYSTEMS 

A subsidiary of Zitel Corporation 

THE MULTIUSER COMPANY' 



Inquiry 160 



2446 Verna Court, San Leandro, CA 94577 415/8950798 Telex 704521 2050 North Loop West, Suite 116 Houston, TX 77018 713/680-1944 

In Europe: London (01)878-9111 Telex 28106 (UK) 

MC-186 and MC-186/EL are trademarks of Gifford Computer Systems. IBM PC is a trademark of International Business Machines, Inc. 

CIVM is a registered trademark of Digital Research. Inc. 

JULY 1985 -BYTE 



EDITORIAL 



equal access to computers: 
Scruples or Rubles? 

Computer inequity emerges as a gen- 
uine problem when you consider how 
hard it would be for a child without 
a word-processing program to com- 
pete with a student who does have a 
word processor. The student with the 
word processor can revise and polish 
far more than the student without. All 
other things being equal, a once- 
revised essay handwritten on note- 
book paper can't compete with a 
tenth-draft essay neatly printed by 
machine. Of course, word processing 
is only one of the many ways in which 
computers can make schoolchildren 
more productive and therefore give 
some children a competitive advan- 
tage in school and in life. 

Is there, in fact, inequity in access 
to computers? The answer is "yes," 
and the inequity is a function of both 
income and race. The 12.000 most 
affluent schools are four times more 
likely to have personal computers 
than the 12,000 poorest schools 
(Quality Education Data report, 1983, 
quoted in Electronic Learning, February 
1985). Predominantly white schools 
have twice as many computers as do 
schools whose students come pri- 
marily from ethnic minorities (Johns 
Hopkins study. 1983, also quoted in 
Electronic learning, February 1985). 

Soon after taking power, Soviet 
Communist party chief Mikhail Gor- 
bachev called for the introduction of 
small computers throughout the 
Soviet school system. Clearly the new 
Soviet leader believes that the Soviet 
Union will be unable to compete with 
the West unless Soviet students have 
equal access to computers. The Soviet 
electronics industry is far from ready 
to meet the needs of Soviet students. 
The Soviet Apple clone known as 
AG AT (see the November 1984 BYTE, 




page 134), an inferior copy of a 
10-year-old computer, is reportedly 
being manufactured in very small 
volume and with significant reliabili- 
ty problems, and it is said to sell for 
the equivalent of $17,000. But some 
news reports have indicated that 
Apple and IBM may be negotiating 
large sales of personal computers to 
the Soviet Union. 

If the American electronics industry 
is to solve the problem of computer 
inequity for the Soviet Union, why not 
for the disadvantaged of the West as 
well? DEC, Apple, IBM, Zenith, Ikndy. 
and other companies have already 
made significant and commendable 
contributions to the American educa- 
tional system. But many of these 
donations and subsidies have gone to 
organizations such as the Apple Uni- 
versity consortium, made up mostly 
of expensive universities attended by 
the children of the affluent. IBM's joint 
projects with MIT and Carnegie- 
Mellon face the same criticism. 

Playing to Win 

At the opposite extreme from indus- 
try-sponsored programs in prominent 
universities is an organization called 



Playing to Win (106 East 85th St., New 
York, NY 10028). Playing to Win is a 
nonprofit organization dedicated to 
"promoting educational computer 
use among socially economically, and 
geographically disadvantaged peo- 
ple." Antonia Stone, the director of 
Playing to Win, believes that there 
should be public access to computers 
just as there is public access to books 
and magazines in libraries. Playing to 
Win operates a community computer 
center in East Harlem. 

We urge companies in the computer 
industry to support organizations 
such as Playing to Win. Supporting 
equal access will benefit the industry 
as well as the disadvantaged. Ms. 
Stone points out that providing public 
access to computers not only pro- 
motes equal opportunity, but also 
builds a larger long-term market for 
computer products. 

Furthermore, overcoming computer 
inequity in the West makes much 
more sense in the long term than 
bringing the Soviet Union up to speed 
in computer technology. This is clearly 
a case in which scruples should 
outweigh rubles. 

—Phil Yxmmons, Editor in Ckie\ 



6 B YTE • JULY 1985 



maxell 

FLOPPY DISK 




Gold 



The floppy disk that 

packs more facts 

into Compaq, 

sets HP free, 

and takes IBM 

Portable where it's 

never gone before. 

It's great to have a portable computer. 
Especially when your data stays put. 
For error-free performance at home or 
abroad, trust Maxell. The Gold Standard 
in floppy disks. There's a Maxell disk 
for virtually every computer made. v 
Each is backed by a lifetime warranty. 
Maxell. Accepted everywhere, 
without reservation. 

maxell I 

IT'S WORTH IT 

Maxell Corporation of America, 60 Oxford Drive, Moonachie, N.J. 07074 Inquiry 225 




YOUR DAYS OF 
BUYING TERMINALS 
ARE OVER! 

Now there's SmarTerm terminal 
emulation software for your IBM* 
PC, XT, AT or compatible system. 
All SmarTerm products offer com- 
prehensive and exact terminal 
emulation, powerful ASCII and 
binary file transfer facilities, and 
include TTY mode to link you to 
The Source, CompuServe, Dow 
Jones, Easylink, Tymnet or other 
popular services. We've included 
features such as multiple setup 
configurations, XMODEM and PDF* 
protocol support, 
"smart" softkeys, 
plus European 
DOS support. 



NEW! SmarTerm 220 supports 
A-to-Z and other software which 
requires DEC* VT220 terminals. 
It includes the full capabilities of 
SmarTerm 100: DECVT102, 
VT100, and VT52 emulation. If 
you need VT125 ReGIS graphics 
support, choose SmarTerm 125. 
For Data General Dasher* D400, 
D200 or D100 emulation you need 
SmarTerm 400. 
SmarTerm 100 now available for: 

• DATA GENERAL/One • IBM PCjr 

• TANDY 2000 • Tl Professional 
More than 25,000 users are 
already "hooked" on SmarTerm. 
Try it for 30 days with full refund 
privileges, and you will be too. 

Persoft, Inc. - Madison, Wl 
(608) 273-6000 - TELEX 759491 



smarm 

41. 



sfnsrt^ 




AFTER 
SMARTERM, WHAT 

YOU DO WITH YOUR 
OBSOLETE TERMINAL? 



II 




ORIGINAL FISH AD: Back by popular demand! See your name in print! The best ideas for uses of obsolete terminals replaced by 
SmarTerm will be used in future ads. Write Persoft, Dept. FISH II, 2740 Ski Lane, Madison, Wl 53713. 



'SMARTERM is a regfstered trademark of Persoft. Inc. "POIP is a trademark ol Persoft. 
Inc. "IBM is a registered trademark ol International Business Machines Corp. "DEC, VT 
and ReGIS are trademarks of Digital Equipment Corp. "DASHER ts a registered trademark 
of Data General Corp "DATA GENERAL/One is a trademark of Data General Corp. "Tl is 
a trademark of Texas Instruments Inc. "TANDY is a trademark ol Tandy CorpVRadio Shack 



perso/r 



Inquiry 280 



MICROBYTES 



Staff-written highlights of late developments in the microcomputer industry. 



New Multiuser UNIX Systems 

Symmetric Computer Systems, San Jose, CA, is selling a 20-pound computer with a 32016 
16-732-bit processor, one parallel port, four serial ports for up to four terminals, a 
50-megabyte hard disk, a 1-megabyte floppy disk, and 2 megabytes of RAM. Included in 
the Model 375's price of $9950 are compilers or interpreters for C, Pascal, FORTRAN, 
BASIC, LISP, Prolog, Crystal, and APL It also includes SPICE, Ingres, and a number of 
UNIX/GEN IX utilities. Although the machine is now available with National Semiconductor's 
GEN1X implementation of Berkeley 4.1 or 4.2 UNIX, Symmetric plans to offer UNIX System 
V and Berkeley 4.3 versions later this year. 

Cadmus Computer Systems, Lowell, MA, announced CadMac, a 68010-based workstation 
with a 17-inch 1024- by 1024-pixel display, a 65-megabyte hard disk, tape backup, a mega- 
byte of RAM, and a Macintosh-compatible UNIX environment for $23,300. 

Digital Equipment Corp. introduced its expected MicroVAX 11, which reportedly outper- 
forms DEC'S low-end VAX products. Prices for the MicroVAX 11, while much lower than com- 
parable VAX computers, still start at about $20,000. 

AT&T Offers 32-bit Processor to Other Companies 

AT&T announced that its WE32100 32-bit microprocessor, floating-point chips, memory-man- 
agement chips, and other peripheral chips are now available to other companies. AT&T will 
also sell board-level evaluation systems based on the chips. 

The WE32100 is an enhanced version of the WE32000 chip used in AT&T's 3B2/300 com- 
puter; the chip family was originally called Bellmac-32 when developed by AT&T's Bell Labs 
subsidiary before divestiture. The 132-pin WE32100 chip features a 64-word on-chip cache, a 
4-gigabyte address space, 15 interrupt levels, 16 32-bit registers, and a full 32-bit bus. All of 
the new chips are available in 10- and 14-MHz versions. AT&T's chip is not related to 
National Semiconductor's 32000-series processors. 

New 80286 Systems Flood COMDEX 

Late spring saw the introduction of many new IBM PC AT-compatible computers. By mid- 
May, new 80286-based systems had been announced by Kaypro, ITT, Compaq, TeleVideo, 
Corona, Texas Instruments, Zenith, NCR, Tomcat, and Basic Time. Another multiuser AT- 
compatible computer, available from MAD Computer in both floor and desktop models, will 
be sold only to other manufacturers. Wang also disclosed that it is developing an AT- 
compatible system. 

lntertec, West Columbia, SC, has redesigned its HeadStart computer, replacing its 8086 
processor with an 80286 and eliminating its 3 '/2-inch disk drive. The HeadStart ATS's stan- 
dard 256K bytes of RAM can be expanded to 3 megabytes; the computer also includes 
serial, parallel, and network interfaces. The basic HeadStart ATS is priced at $1895 without 
disk drives. A dual 5 '/4-inch disk-drive add-on unit is $495 extra. lntertec also announced 
several 80186-based file servers for its MultiLAN proprietary polling network; a $695 inter- 
face card also allows IBM PCs to be attached to the network. 

Network Products Announced 

IBM PCs and Macintoshes can communicate using two new networking products. 3Com an- 
nounced EtherMac, which allows Macintoshes and IBM PCs to link 3Com's 3Server Ethernet 
network file server to AppleTalk networks. Another product, lBMacBridge from Tangent, is a 
$595 expansion card with software linking the IBM PC to the AppleTalk network and Apple's 
LaserWriter printer. 

Separately. Vianetics announced ViaNet, which links MS-DOS- and UNIX-based computers. 
Rather than requiring a central file server, ViaNet simply treats each node on the network 
as a separate disk subdirectory, addressable using standard MS-DOS or UNIX path names. 
ViaNet will be available only to other manufacturers; Tandy, Wang, and several other firms 
have already licensed the software. 



[continued] 
JULY 1985 'BYTE 9 



Add-on Makers Support Expanded-Memory Specification 

Many of the companies that make expansion cards for the IBM PC have announced 
memory cards that meet the expanded-memory-interface specification announced by Lotus 
and Intel in late April. Maynard Electronics, STB, Quadram, Tecmar, Mega-Omega Systems, 
Emulex/Persyst, and AST Research all announced boards supporting the specification, which 
uses bank switching to allow application programs to directly address up to 4 megabytes of 
RAM. Most cards will be available in midsummer. They will be priced from $349 to $399 
with the first bank'of memory installed and can be expanded to 2 megabytes each. 

Mosaic Unveils 1-2-3 7\vin 



Mosaic Software, Cambridge, MA, unveiled a $14 5 spreadsheet it says is compatible with 
Lotus 1-2-3. Mosaic's Twin has a user interface and features similar to those in the Lotus 
product, but initial versions of the product will not be able to read and write 1-2-3 spread- 
sheet files. Rather than offering graphics identical to Lotus 1-2-3, Twin's graphics module is 
derived from earlier products the company developed. 

Two other companies— Borland International and Paperback Software— are reportedly 
developing low-cost spreadsheet programs compatible with 1-2-3, but neither company has 
formally announced or set availability dates for those products. 

NANOBYTES 



Congress has repealed a law requiring home computer owners to keep a complete daily log 
of computer use in order to claim business-use tax deductions. The law still requires some 
record keeping of computer use to support business-use claims. . . . Novix Corp., Cupertino, 
CA, has unveiled the NC4000, an 8-MHz 16-bit microprocessor that executes FORTH words 
as its machine language. . . . MicroPro plans to introduce a new word processor in mid- 
summer, priced at less than $200. The company says the new program will have a user in- 
terface unlike those of WordStar and WordStar 2000. . . . Acuity Computer, Austin, TX, an- 
nounced The Shell, a $100 program that can either replace or enhance the Finder. . . . 
Franz Inc., Berkeley, CA, planned to begin shipping Franz LISP for AT&T's UNIX PC this 
month. Franz also expects to provide a complete Common LISP for the UNIX PC by late 
August. . . . Prometheus unveiled a 512K-byte buffer plug-in card for its ProModem, which 
can be used to buffer incoming and outgoing electronic mail or as a printer buffer; the buf- 
fer also provides password and callback security features. The buffer card without memory 
is $149 and can use 16K-, 64K-, or 256K-bit chips. . . . Intel is now providing samples of 10- 
and 12-MHz versions of the 80286 processor. . . . Brother unveiled the TwinWriter, a $1300 
printer with both daisy-wheel and dot-matrix print elements. . . . ITT and NEC both in- 
troduced new speech-recognition products for the IBM PC and compatible computers. lTT's 
$1350 Voice Communications System can recognize up to 200 different words and also 
features voice playback and phone features. NEC's SAR-10 Voice Plus supports a 250-word 
vocabulary for $1495 ... . Apple announced in April that it would stop production of the 
Macintosh XL, originally introduced as the Lisa in January 1983 .... Canon announced the 
A-200, a $2995 20-pound IBM-compatible transportable computer with an 80-character by 
25-line LCD. Standard features include a built-in 300/1200-bps modem, composite video out- 
put, two 5'/4-inch disk drives, parallel and serial ports, and 256K bytes of RAM. . . . 
Linguistic Products, The Woodlands, TX, announced two language-translation programs for 
the IBM PC. English/Spanish and Spanish/English programs are $490 each or $790 
together. . . . Kyocera, which manufactures computer products for several other companies, 
announced its first retail product: a 1200-bps modem. The $665 KM1200S will include a 
copy of Microsoft's Access communications program. Kyocera also announced a 10-page- 
per-minute, 300-dot-per-inch laser printer that it will sell to other manufacturers. . . . Per- 
sonal Touch, San lose, CA, announced a touchscreen that can be added to Apple lis and 
IBM PCs through a standard joystick port. The Touch Window will cost $200 for the Apple 
11 and $225 for the IBM PC when it is shipped later this year. . . . Datran Corp., Los 
Angeles, CA, announced the Modem Accelerator, a $795 card that encodes English words 
into tokens. Files encoded with the IBM PC expansion card are reduced to about one-third 
the original size. . . . Micro Focus has announced a Japanese-language version of its COBOL 
compiler for the IBM PC 5550 and PC AT. In Japan, the. compiler is priced at about 
$500. . . . Edsun Laboratories, Wayland, MA, offers a signal-converter VLSI chip that con- 
verts the Intel 80286's signals to work with less expensive 8088 peripherals. The CMOS 
EL286-88 allows the 80286 to operate at 8 MHz while interacting with 4.77-MHz IBM PC 
chips. In quantity, the chip costs $44. 



10 BYTE • JULY 1985 



cotnPUTtRswtms 








If you buy aTI 855 printer now, 
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Don't tack just any printer on your 
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investment. 

You see, our OMNI 800™ 
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OMNI 800 is a trademark of Texas Instruments, Incorporated. 



monitor images in the finest detail. 

Of course, these advantages are 
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What's more, since our printers 
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can utilize all the capabilities built 
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You even have a choice of over 30 
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three of which can be printed on the 
same page without ever stopping the 
printer! Just touch the control panel 
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As for reliability, TI printers are 
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So don't downgrade your PCs 
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It's easy. Just call 1-800-527-3500, 
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Creating useful products 
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JULY 1985 • BYTE 11 




If you own an Apple Ik, 
you'd have to add three more Apple Ik's, 

an Extra Keypad, 

30 Block Graphic Sets, 

Color Sprites, 

two more voices, 

four instruments, 

a Cartridge Port, a Joystick Port, 

and a Commodore 64... 















12 BYTE • JULY 1985 






















_ m a m mm m. m m m m m m m m 
m m, m a a mam o uvi m . 
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the most important news is that 



Commodore 128jumpsyouintoa 
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D Commodore 1985 



Inquiry 85 



JULY 1985 -BYTE 13 



LETTERS 



An Infrared Pyrometer 

In the process of completing a master's 
degree in engineering at the University of 
lennessee at Chattanooga, we sought an 
interesting project for a thesis topic. The 
answer to this search was the Micro D- 
Cam that Steve Ciarcia presented in his 
Circuit Cellar column ("Build the Micro 
D-Cam Solid-State Camera"; Part I. 
September 1983. page 20; Part 2 . October 
1983. page 67). We decided to use the 
Micro D-Cam as the basis for an optional 
infrared pyrometer. The results of our in- 
vestigation were interesting, and we 
thought we would share them with you 
and your readers. 

We used an Apple lie and an infrared 
filter that was opaque to visible light with 
the Micro D-Cam. A heating .element 
served as an infrared source. Thermo- 
couples with a digital thermocouple meter 
measured the temperature of the heating 
element. The only real modification to the 
Micro D-Cam hardware was the optical 
filter that we attached to the lens that was 
supplied with the kit. 

When we obtained the hardware we 
conducted a few experiments that showed 
that focusing the Micro D-Cam's lens with 
the optical filter on a hot object produced 
an infrared image. The exposure time was 
shortened as the object's temperature in- 
creased. The lowest temperature from 
which an infrared image could be pro- 
duced was about 650° Fahrenheit. 

After we tested the hardware, we modi- 
fied the software that was supplied with 
the Micro D-Cam to display the percent 
of pixels that are on versus the total 
number of pixels (light-level percent) in an 
area of 56 by 64 pixels located in the 
center of the image. This area of the image 
was that where a temperature measure- 
ment of the object would be made. We 
then used the software to develop a 
calibration curve to relate temperature to 
light-level percent and exposure time. This 
calibration curve showed a nonlinear rela- 
tionship between temperature and ex- 
posure time. For these measurements the 
light-level percent was kept between 45 
and 5 5 percent. Once the calibration curve 
was obtained, an equation was developed 
using polynomial regression that would 
produce a temperature output based on 



an exposure-time input. 

When the calibration work had been 
completed, we modified the software for 
the Micro D-Cam so that on a real-time 
command the program would go to a 
pyrometer subroutine and loop, adjusting 
the exposure times until the light-level per- 
cent for the 56- by 64-pixel array area was 
between 45 and 55 percent. Once the 
light-level percent fell within the range 
established, the calculated temperature 
was displayed on the screen and the con- 
trol of the Micro D-Cam was returned to 
the basic operating program. 

The results of the exercise showed that 
the Micro D-Cam could be used as an op- 
tical infrared pyrometer when used in con- 
junction with an infrared filter. Due to the 
limitations of the laboratory equipment 
available, the calibration was for a tem- 
perature range of 750° to 900° F and the 
resulting equation was as follows; tem- 
perature of object F = 9.12 x 1CT 7 x ET 2 
- (.0281 5 x ET) + 966.89. where ET is the 
exposure time in milliseconds. Later 
testing of the accuracy of the system 
yielded results within 6° of the actual 
temperature. 

For anyone wishing to try this type of 
experiment a few items should be noted, 
based on our experiences. The develop- 
ment of the calibration curve is dependent 
on keeping the aperture and the distance 
between the lens and the object constant. 
The second item is that great care must 
be exercised in measurement of the ob- 
ject's temperature when developing the 
calibration curve. Due to the relatively 
long exposure time required for the in- 
frared system, the temperature of the ob- 
ject tends to vary a few degrees; therefore 
the object needs to be thermally stable 
before the exposure is made. 

Conclusions from our work indicate that 
the optic RAM encased in the lens assem- 
bly is capable of being used as an infrared 
detector, and when used with the Micro 
D-Cam it can serve as an optical infrared 
pyrometer. It is obvious from looking at 
other types of infrared pyrometers that 
there are other pyrometers available that 
are already calibrated and cost about the 
same as the Micro D-Cam. The Micro D- 
Cam. however, offers the hobbyist or ex- 
perimenter a vision system that can, with 



the use of an infrared filter, be turned into 
an infrared pyrometer. 

Virgil Thomason 

Gerald A/Caudill 

Univ. of Tennessee at Chattanooga 

Macintosh BASIC Available? 

The April 1984 BYTE carried an article by 
Scot Kamins about Macintosh BASIC 
(page 318) that excited me, so I called an 
Apple dealer and asked him when the 
product would be released. He informed 
me that it was scheduled for release in 
June 1984. This sounded reasonable, so 
I purchased a Macintosh. In the meantime, 
I've waited, and waited, and waited. Still 
no Macintosh BASIC. 

Dealers do not seem to be able to get 
any information about Macintosh BASIC 
from Apple Computer. I've even pur- 
chased a nice book titled Introduction to 
Macintosh BASIC by Scot Kamins (Rochelle 
Park, NJ: Hayden Book Co.). which in- 
cludes the following statement; 'Apple 
believes that good books are important 
to successful computing. The Apple Press 
imprint is your assurance that this book 
has been published with the support and 
encouragement of Apple Computer Inc., 
and is the type of book we would be 
proud to publish ourselves." 

The unavailability of Macintosh BASIC 
leaves me puzzled. Could Apple have pur- 
posefully delayed the introduction of its 
BASIC in order to allow Microsoft a 
chance to get wide distribution of its 
BASIC? Microsoft BASIC allows you about 
1 5,000 bytes of space for a program, and 
the company has no compiler for it. The 
multiply/divide operates in double preci- 
sion, which is too slow for my use. So, you 

[continued) 



LETTERS POLICY: To be considered for publica- 
tion, a letter must be typed double-spaced on one 
side of the paper and must include your name and 
address. Comments and ideas should be expressed as 
clearly and concisely as possible. Listings and tables 
may be printed along with a letter if they are short 
and legible. 

Because BYTE receives hundreds of letters each 
month, not all of them can be published, letters will 
not be returned to authors. Generally, it takes four 
months from the time BYTE receives a letter until 
it is published. 



14 BYTE • JULY 1985 



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Inquiry 136 




A FULL C 

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FOR 



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The Ecosof t Eco-C88 compiler for the 8088 and MSDOS i s going 1 set a new 
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(1) Computer Language, Feb., 1985, pp.73-102. Reprinted by permission. 

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LETTERS 



can see I'm still waiting. Could you ask 
Apple if it would pay me interest on the 
money? 

Frank Hardison 
Memphis, TN 

Public-Key Patent 

As part of his article titled "Implementing 
Cryptographic Algorithms on Microcom- 
puters" (October 1 984, page 1 2 6), Charles 
Kluepfel described an implementation of 
the RSA Public Key algorithm and the 
BASIC code required. Unfortunately, he 
did not reference that this RSA Public Key 
Cryptosystem was patented by the Mas- 
sachusetts Institute of 'technology in 1983 
(U.S. Patent 4,405,829). The worldwide ex- 
clusive license to this patent was then pur- 
chased from MIT by RSA Security Inc.. a 
company founded by the inventors of the 
RSA algorithm to develop this technology. 

Because the RSA algorithm has been 
published in academic journals, most peo- 
ple assume that it is in the public domain, 
similar to the DES algorithm. Unfortunate- 
ly, some people have developed software 
and other products based upon the RSA 
algorithm without researching this point. 
Nevertheless, the patent exists and, in the 
opinion of our corporate attorneys, will be 
easily defended. As RSA Security Inc. paid 
a great deal of money for the exclusive pa- 
tent rights, we plan to actively police the 
commercial use of the RSA algorithm. 

The purpose of this letter is not to 
criticize either Mr. Kluepfel or BYTE for his 
article. Rather, the purpose is to make you 
aware of our patent position and ask for 
your help in educating your readership as 
to its existence. Based on Mr. Kluepfel's 
article, more people are going to start ex- 
pending money and effort developing 
RSA-based software for commercial pur- 
poses. Regrettably, their effort will be 
wasted unless they obtain a sublicense 
from us. Therefore, we suggest you publish 
a reference to our patent in a future issue 
of BYTE to protect your readers from this 
lack of knowledge. 

Ralph Bennett 

President 

RSA Security Inc. 

Sunnyvale, CA 94087 

Fourier Ripple 

The article "Fourier Smoothing Without 
the Fast Fourier Transform" by Eric E. 
Aubanel and Keith B. Oldham (February, 
page 207) recalled my own experience 
with Fourier transforms as a graduate stu- 
dent in chemistry. In particular, the iden- 
tification of the high-frequency terms as 

[continued) 



16 BYTE • IULY 1985 



Inquiry 207 



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Inquiry 165 



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LETTERS 



noise (I note that this is qualified with the 
word "usually") is not justified in the case 
of crystal x-ray scattering. 

The noise in the examples Aubanel and 
Oldham discuss is typical Fourier ripple, 
which roughly centers around the function 
measured. Although this noise is a factor 
in x-ray structures, the more important 
noise is termination error caused by sig- 
nificant unmeasured high-frequency 
terms. Such noise does not generally in- 
terfere with obtaining atomic coordinates 
but can cause many spurious effects in an 
electron-density map. The high-frequency 
terms, in fact, primarily represent the 
innermost electrons; when they are miss- 
ing, the unpresented electron density can, 
in principle, appear (i.e., be randomly 
smeared) anywhere in space, either under 
real atomic peaks or between atoms. Iron- 
ically, these innermost electrons are the 
least interesting, but the absence of the 
terms that represent them interferes with 
a good representation of the outer 
electrons. 

The more general point, however, is that 
when using Fourier transforms, it is impor- 
tant to develop a "feel" for how they work. 
The integral of a function is entirely con- 
tained in the zero-order term. All the other 
Fourier terms add and subtract precisely 
equal quantities (because they are sine 
and cosine functions) of area or volume 
"under the function," thus "shifting" peaks 
and troughs. If the function has high nar- 
row peaks or discontinuities, such as those 
in a molecular electron-density dis- 
tribution, high-frequency terms will be 
necessary to adequately represent it. If the 
function is relatively smooth, such as 
those in your examples, low-frequency 
terms will represent it and high-frequency 
terms can, with some confidence, be at- 
tributed to noise. A caveat, however, is 
that there ought also to be noise, in prin- 
ciple, in the low-frequency terms. This 
noise will be expressed not as ripple 
around the function but in shifts of the 
peaks, either in height or position. Thus 
"smooth" functions may misrepresent the 
reality they describe, albeit hopefully by 
statistically small degrees of error. 

Steve Goldfield 
San Francisco, CA 

Conversion Correction 

l have received a number of letters regard- 
ing my article "A Unit-Conversion Algo- 
rithm" (March, page 1 5 1). There were two 
problems with the published listing, and 
there is one point that l should clarify. 
Line 3 10 of the listing on page I 54 reads. 

{continued) 



18 BYTE • JULY 1985 



Inquiry 324 for End-Users. Inquiry 325 for DEALERS ONLY 



4 Out Of 5 PC-AT Expansion Board 
Buyers Own Advantage!" 



The overwhelming choice of IBM® 
PC-AT users, Advantage! from AST 
sets the standard in high-powered 
multifunction enhancement. 
Advantage! was the first multifunc- 
tion board for the PC-AL And it 
remains the leader by providing mil- 
lions of characters of memory capac- 
ity, two serial ports, a parallel port 
and a game port. All in a single expan- 
sion slot. 

First In Memory. All it takes is 
Advantage! There's no need to add 
other cards or hard-to-find chips 
on your system board. Whether you 
have an 256K, 512K or 640K AT, our 
unique memory addressing tech- 
nique lets you add up to 3 Megabytes 
of parity checked user memory 
efficiently and economically. For 
flexibility, Advantage! can use either 
64K or 256K memory chips. And 
of course, it supports your AT's high 
performance 16-bit bus and faster 
program processing speed. 

Now you can have the extra 
memory to run integrated business 
software such as Symphony™ and 



Framework™ To make full use of new 
concept windowing software such 
as DESQ™To utilize multitasking pro- 
grams such as IBM's TopView™ or 
multiuser operating systems such 
as XENIX™ To handle larger amounts 
of data, faster. Or for RAM disks. 

First In I/O. Here's all the I/O capa- 
bility you need now, even if you're 
starting with a base model AT. Every 
Advantage! card includes an AT 
compatible serial port and a parallel 
port so you can connect printers, 
plotters, mice and modems. Or with 
the appropriate software, you can 
connect other terminals to create 
multiuser environments. 

With our optional second serial 
port you can attach even more peri- 
pherals, while our optional game 
port lets you plug in joysticks and 
other cursor-control devices for 
business or just for fun. 

First In Quality. AST's reputation 
is built on quality products, qual- 
ity support and quality service. Our 
complete documentation means 
Advantage! is exceptionally easy 



to install and use, but if it's not 
enough we're always here to help. 

Four out of five buyers agree, the 
choice is Advantage! -only from AST. 
Ask your dealer, or call our Customer 
Information Center (714) 863-1333 
for more information. AST Research, 
Inc., 2121 Alton Avenue, Irvine, CA 
92714 TWX: 753699ASTR UR 



FEATURES 


Memory Expansion 


I/O Expansion 


• 128Kb to 3.0Mb in 


• Up to 2 Serial 


a single slot 


Ports (1 optional) 


• User Upgradeable with 


• Parallel Printer 


either 64K or 256K 


Port 


memory chips 


• Optional Game 


• Split Memory Address- 


Port 


ing rounds out AT's 


Advantage! 


system memory to 640K 


Supports AT's Full 


and continues memory 


Program Process- 


expansion at 1Mb 


ing Speed 



Advantage! trademark of AST Research, Inc. IBM PC-AT and 
TopView trademarks of International Business Machines Corp. 
Framework trademark of Ashton-Tate. Symphony trademark 
of Lotus Development Corp. DESQ trademark of Quarterdeck 
Office Systems. XENIX trademark of Microsoft Corp. 




nescnRCH inc. 

Inquiry 9 for End-Users. 
Inquiry 10 for DEALERS ONLY, 





WE INTERRUPT 
PRODUCT 




THIS MAJOR 
INTRODUCTION TO 
YOU SOMETHING 
REALLY 
IMPORTANT. 






iilUi""||||||| 






THE BIG NEWS IN DISK/TAPE IS PC/T, A 
SENSIBLE NEW APPROACH TO ARCHIVAL 
STORAGE. 

We've tamed tape. And made it docile. 
By making it DOS-like. 

So, while this started as an ad for our 
five new HardFile™ subsystems, which 
deliver 25 to 80 megabytes of hard disk 
storage and 60 megabytes of tape backup, 
instead we want to introduce you to PC/T™ 

PC/T is a new format that makes 
tape a more sensible storage solution for 
personal computers. It puts tape on line, 
in real time, for instant access. And frees 
your hard disk for your most current data. 

You already know how to use PC/T. 
Because it responds to standard DOS 
commands. 

Here's the big news: just like any 
DOS-controlled hard or floppy disk, PC/T 
enables you to create directories and files 
on tape. Then you can call up the exact file 
you need, and change a portion of the tape 
without having to erase and overwrite the 
entire cartridge. 





Without PC/T, you have 
to rewrite the entire 60 MB 
cartridge each time you 
make a single change. 



With PC/T, you create and 
directly access files on 
tape, just like with floppy 
or hard disk. 



PC/T formats each new tape cartridge, 
just like you format any hard or floppy 
disk, locking out bad blocks to assure that 
every bit of data you write to tape is 
recorded with utter accuracy. 

What's more, PC/T gives tape true 
error correction capability. 50% redundancy 
during write operations ensures 100% 
reconstruction of data lost because of oper- 
ator error, dust and dirt, or everyday wear 
and tear. 

There is a catch. You can get your 
hands on PC/T just one way: Buy one of our 
powerful new HardFile subsystems. With 
disk plus tape. Or tape alone. Which brings 
us back to where we started. And gives 
you a place to start. Just call 1-800-228- 
DISK for the Tallgrass dealer nearest you. 

TALLGRASS SELLS MORE HARD DISK 
STORAGE WITH CARTRIDGE TAPE 
BACKUP THAN ANYONE IN THE 
WORLD. 



TALLGRASS 6 
TECHNOLOGIES 

COMMITTED TO MEMORY 

Inquiry 348 



HardFile^and Tallgrass^are trademarks 
of Tallgrass Technologies Corporation 
& 1985 Tallgrass Technologies 




Speeds Up Everything... Especially 1-2-31 



The MicroWay NUMBER SMASHER triples the speed of ail 
cpu bound software while doubling the speed of 80 87 bound 
software. When combined with MicroWay's FASTBREAK" it 
results in an increase in the speed of .1 -2-3™ of up to 80 to 1 ! 
if you're tired of WAITing, the SMASHER is the card for you! 

The heart of the NUMBER SMASHER is a 9.54 mhz 
8086 working with a matched high speed 8087. The card 
comes standard with 51 2K of 1 6 bit RAM and can be ex- 
panded to 64GK. It triples the throughput of your original 
8088 by doubling the system clock speed and quadrupling 
the data bus bandwidth. 

Software compatibility is guaranteed by the nature of 
our card. It does not augment the 8088, but replaces it with 
a special 8086 that runs as a true 16-bit processor in the 
first 640K of ram and as an 8-bit processor everywhere else. 



Micro 



Examples of software which show dramatic speed-ups 
include AUTOCAD, 1-2-3 ,M worksheets which depend heavily 
on financial or transcendental functions, and multi-user oper- 
ating systems. Any program written with an MS-DOS compiler 
that supports the 8087, such as MS-FORTRAN or 87BASIC, 
will run on the NUMBER SMASHER at least a factor of 2.5 
times faster! Software that comes with the card also in- 
creases the throughput of I/O bound programs and includes 
a disk cache routine, ram disk and print spooler. 

The NUMBER SMASHER is an upgrade product for 
8088 based PCs and compatibles. It works on the IBM- 
PC and XT, the COMPAQ and compatibles manufactured 
to the IBM-PC hardware standard. Contact MicroWay or 
your local MicroWay Installation Center for technical speci- 
fications and supporting benchmarks. 



The World Leader in 8087 Support 



P.O. Box 79, Kingston, Mass. 02364 USA (617) 746-7341 



NUMBEH 



3EAK are trademarks of MicroWay, Inc. LOTUS and 1 -2-3 are trademarks of Lotus Development Corp. 

Inquiry 248 



LETTERS 



in part. OR X + LEN(I$). This should be 
OR X > LEN(I$). The program will not 
work at all without this correction. Most 
of the letters I received indicated this 
error. 

The PRINT CHR$(12) that occurs in lines 
10. 130. and 4000 deserves some clarifi- 
cation. First of all. in most versions of 
BASIC the CLS statement is preferable. 
Unfortunately, the version of the BASIC 
compiler that I was using did not accept 
the CLS statement. The PRINT CHR$(12) 
worked with both interpreter and com- 
piler. As I prefer to have only one active 
version of the program, and I don't like 
distributing what I don't run, the PRINT 
statement was submitted to BYTE. Also, 
line 130 is unnecessary in the MS-DOS 
version. The TRS-80 version prints some 
material between lines 10 and 130 that is 
not needed with MS-DOS. I left the line 
in to minimize the differences between the 
two versions. 

1 hope these comments are useful to 
you. 

David L. Kahn 
Newton Highlands. MA 

Terse, Terse, Terse 

Permit me to comment on Robert Kong 
Win Chang's one-page article "Build a 
Serial Card" (March, page 129) on building 
a serial card for the Sanyo MBC 5 50 
computer. 

Yes. BYTE, you did not title the article 
"Adding a Serial Card (to the Sanyo)." You 
verily said only "Build" a serial card. How 
we are supposed to actually add this to 
our Sanyos is obfuscated but may hope- 
fully become the subject of a multipage 
article in a future BYTE. 

How does the author expect us to get 
+ 1 2 volts. - 1 2 volts, and + 5 volts? From 
where? Do we simply plug the CNI con- 
nector into the Sanyo and automatically 
get these voltages? Do we have to solder 
wires to the Sanyo? If so. where? (I am 
somewhat reluctant to attack my Sanyo 
with a soldering iron, with such an inade- 
quate set of instructions from Mr. Chang!) 
How about sockets for the chips? Where 
does the perf board mount? How about 
a photograph? (Didn't Confucius say some 
time ago that a picture is worth a thou- 
sand words?) What kind of decoupling 
capacitors are used? (An electronic-sup- 
ply catalog 1 have in my hand lists tan- 
talum, polyester, metallized film, 
aluminum electrolytic, axial lead, radial 
lead, resin-dipped solid tantalum, high- 
frequency aluminum electrolytic, metal- 
lized polyester, stacked metallized film. 

(continued) 



Data 
communication 

problem? 



Solve it with a 

BayTech 

multiport controller 




Fifty easy-to-use models for cost-effective, RS-232C 
serial port expansion. 

■ Adapt your micro to industrial control and data 
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system. 

■ Allow your computer to 
share or select printers. 

■ Enable your computers 
to use the same data 
communication lines by 
multiplexing. 

■ Simplify your network 
with any-device-to-any-device communication. 
These intelligent multiports feature many 
user-programmable functions and are available in 
5, 9, 12 and 18-port sizes, $279 to $1,795. 

Call or write for complete details. 




•{► 



BAY TECHNICAL ASSOCIATES, INC 

DATA COMMLTnHCATIONS PRODUCTS 
800/523-2702 or 601/467-8231 



Highway 603, P.O. Box 387, Bay Saint Louis, Mississippi 39520 
Telex: 910-333-1618 EasyLink: 6277-1271 



Inquiry 48 



JULY 1985 • BYTE 23 



LETTERS 






and disc capacitors, all in a bewildering 
array of voltages, tolerances, and prices!) 
Additionally. 1 find literally dozens of dif- 
ferent types of DB-2 5 connectors offered 
by as many manufacturers. 

How is an ordinary reader— and you 
have hundreds of thousands of readers 
who are not experts— expected to follow 
such extremely abbreviated instructions 
(a total of only 84 words!)? 



I am not being picky. It is just that as 
shown and as printed, your article leaves 
a lot to the imagination and leaves an un- 
sophisticated reader up the proverbial 
estuary without a utensil for propulsion! 

The article is bound to attract many 
readers. Obviously Sanyo (using typical 
contemporary marketing strategy) did not 
include a serial port as standard equip- 
ment so as to advertise a low come-on 






Swap diskettes with 
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Just $69.95 turns one of your PC's floppy drives into 
a CP/M computer "look-alike" with UniForm-PC. 



Imagine a software breakthrough that 
gives your IBM PC, PC-XT, PC-ATor 
compatible the ability to directly read, 
write and format diskettes from most 
popular CP/M computers— 8 or 1 6 
bit! Remarkable UniForm-PC actually 
reconfigures your floppy drive to 
emulate the selected CP/M format, 
allowing your applications programs 
and utilities to directly access data 
files that were previously out of reach. 

Menu-driven UniForm-PC is 
easy-to-use and inexpensive. Simply 
load, select the proper diskette format 
and go! DOS procedures are un- 
changed when you use the CP/M dis- 
kette. You can even start a project on 
a PC at work and finish it on a CP/M 
machine at home without the need for 
additional hardware or modifications! 
Atjust $69.95, CP/M compatibility 
never cost so little! 

UniForm-PC is available now 
from your local computer dealer 
or Micro Solutions. , 



s££ l; 



For CP/M computer 
owners, UniForm bridges 
the gap between 
non-compatible CP/M 
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providing access to 
MS-DOS** files. 
It's also just $69.95. 



Trademarks: 
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h ^ \ 815/756-3411 




price to attract buyers. And since the 
Sanyo 5 5X series computers have such a 
good price/performance ratio anyway, they 
will probably sell by the millions. 

However, having a serial interface to 
enable connection of a modem is becom- 
ing more and more indispensable in com- 
puting. The Sanyo RS-232C board, even 
at discounters, is still around $7 5. So, a 
probable high percentage of Sanyo 
owners, who bought a Sanyo in the first 
place because it did offer a lot for a low 
price, will want to add serial capability, and 
at a cost lower than Sanyo's $75 to $100. 

Do your readers a favor, though, and 
make it easier and simpler to construct 
this good-idea serial card! 

Bernard A. McIlhany 
Marble Hill, GA 

Robert Kong Win Chang replies: 
I would like to make a number of com- 
ments. First, there is absolutely no need 
to attack or otherwise mistreat the Sanyo 
with a soldering iron; once the board has 
been built (preferably some distance 
from the Sanyo to avoid eventual solder 
splashes!), follow the instructions de- 
tailed in the Sanyo Operator's Guide. 
chapter 6; page 6-3 describes how to 
remove the cabinet cover, whereas pages 
6-15 to 6-18 show how to install the 
RS-232C board and how to program the 
correct data rate. Instead of the "blue 
line" mentioned in the manual, read 
"wire I," i.e.. the wire connecting pin 8 
of ICI to pin I of the CNI connector. 

As can be seen from the schematic of 
figure I in my article, all the pin assign- 
ments of the CNI connector on the 
motherboard are listed; in particular, 
they show that all voltages and signals re- 
quired for the correct operation of the 
serial card are provided through this con- 
nector by the Sanyo— all that is required 
for installing the serial card in the Sanyo 
is to screw the card to the rear panel of 
the machine and then to plug the ribbon 
header socket onto the CNI connector 
on the motherboad as described in the 
manual. It is as simple as that! 

As far as the actual building of the card 
is concerned. I am afraid that I assumed 
wrongly that all readers interested 
enough to build the card would have the 
required background to do so. However, 
I tend to believe that Mr. McIlhany is 
somewhat too harsh in his criticism about 
the lack of details for nontechnical 
readers; no recent article in BYTE de- 
scribing a hardware project has given the 
low-level details that he seems to require. 

{continued) 



24 BYTE* JULY 1985 



Inquiry 237 




>$&* 



^ 



&KS 



J%P 



o<^> 




*p* 






rk of AT&T Bell Laboratories . Laserlink and The Skeduler are trademarks of Unisource Software Corp. VENDC/86 is a trademark and an implcmentatii 
of VenturCom, Inc. UNIFY is a trademark of Unify Corporation . The Connector is a trademark of Uniforum Software Systems, Inc. 



LETTERS 



Nevertheless, I do sympathize with him, 
and I wish I could refer him to a good 
manual or article. As a service to BYTE 
readers. I am prepared to mail to inter- 
ested hobbyists an assembled serial card 
upon receipt of a check for $25 (write to 
me at the computer science department 
of Brandeis University, Ford Hall. 
Waltham, MA 02254). The extra $10 
should enable me to cover shipping ex- 
penses and to pay a computer science 
student to build and test the interface. 

Sockets for the integrated circuits were 
not mentioned, though I did socket mine; 
the reason is that opinions differ on the 
usefulness/inconvenience of sockets and 
I preferred to leave the decision to the 
reader. I personally would recommend 
using sockets for all ICs so as to minimize 
the chances of damaging them by over- 
heating during soldering. Besides, 
troubleshooting is made easier should 
any problem arise later on. 

Almost any small low-voltage capacitors 
may be used in this project; I used small 
ceramic disc capacitors rated at 0.01 /uF/ 
16 V—l bought 100 of these for $6 as 



these are commonly used components 
in digital circuits. 

The choice of the DB-25 connector is 
not critical; however, the most convenient 
connector to use is a female one. of the 
'right angle PC solder" type. JDR Micro- 
devices sells them under the reference 
DB25SR. JDR also sell the 20-pin ribbon 
header socket under the reference 
IDS20. 

One thing I did forget to mention was 
the location of pin I of the CNI connec- 
tor on the motherboard to enable plug- 
ging the socket the right way. The orien- 
tation is the same as for all ICs on the 
motherboard, namely that, looking from 
the top and from the front of the Sanyo, 
pin I is the last one on the left row of 
pins. 

MS-DOS 1.25 and 2.11 for the Sanyo 
do not provide adequate support for 
interrupt-d riven serial input/output. 
Unless the user writes his/her own soft- 
ware to handle interrupts coming from 
the serial card, interrupt requests from 
the card should be disabled; the most 
convenient way to do this would be to 



leave out the 74LS32 quad 2-input OR 
gate. Failure to disable interrupts (par- 
ticularly from IxRDY) would cause the 
Sanyo to 'hang up" when a modem is 
connected to the interface. 

Finally, I would like to say that I agree 
with Mr. Mel I ha ny that a picture is worth 
a thousand words; this is why the article 
contained a minimum number of words 
(only 84. as he pointed out) and con- 
veyed (tersely, I must admit) most of its 
technical information in figure I. Note 
that about 20 of the 84 words that make 
up the article convey a lot of implied in- 
formation; The card plugs into the 
Sanyo's serial-interface connector on the 
motherboard and works exactly like 
Sanyo's version." 

RightWriter Rebuke 

In the March Reviewer's Notebook column 
(page 24 5). Glenn Hartwig dismissed 
RightWriter because it did not like Hamlet 
or the Gettysburg Address. He missed the 
point. RightWriter is a tool to help make 
business writing strong, concise, and to 

(continued) 



SLICER-THE 
SYSTEM THAT 
GROWS TO FIT 
YOUR NEEDS 




THE SLICER 

Real 16 Bit Power on a Single Board — 

Featuring the Intel 80186 

m Complete 8 MHz 16-bit micro- 
processor on a 6" * 12" board 
8 256K RAM, plus up to 64K EPROM 

■ SASI port for hard disk controller 

■ Two full function RS232C serial ports 
with individually programmed 
transmission rates— 50 to 38.4K baud 

m Software compatibility with the 8086 
and 8088. 

a 8K of EPROM contains drivers for 
peripherals, commands for hardware 
checkout and software testing 

■ Software supports most types and 
sizes of disk drives 

a Source for monitor included on disk 
» Bios supports Xebec 1410 and 

Western Digital WD 1002 SHD 

controller for hard disks 
Fully assembled and tested only $995 

Also available in several kit forms 

THE SLICER SYSTEM 

EXPANSION BOARD 

For expanded memory, additional ports, 

and real time clock 

a Up to 256K additional dynamic RAM 
a 2 RS232C asychronous ports 

with baud rates to 38.4K for 

serial communication 



a 2 additional serial ports for 

asynchronous RS232C or 

synchronous communication (Zilog 

8530 SCC) 
a Real Time Clock with battery backup 

for continuous timekeeping 
m Centronics type parallel printer port 

Fully assembled and tested only $750 
Available in several kit forms also 

THE SLICER PC EXPANSION BOARD 
Gives your Sheer high performance 
video capability 

m IBM compatible monochrome video 
m Video memory provides 8 pages of 

text or special graphics capability 
a 2 IBM type card slots for color video, 

I/O expansion, etc. 
a IBM type keyboard port 
Fully assembled and tested only $600 

Available in several kit forms also 

Also available: The ^SLICER 188 $700; 
8087 Math Co-Processor Bd. (call); 10 MB 
Hard Disk $700; W.D. 1002-SHD H.D.C. Bd. 
$200; Enclosures, Power Supply, and 
Support Hardware. 

Operating systems are CP/M 86 by 
Digital Research, Inc. ($85), and MS DOS 
by Microsoft Corporation ($175). 

MasterCard, Visa, Check, Money Order, 
or C.O.D. Allow four weeks for delivery. 
Prices subject to change without notice. 
The SLICER Bulletin Board at 300/1200 
Baud 612/788-5909 



see 



«2£Sf' 



SLICER Slicer Computers, Inc. 

2543 Marshall St. N.E., Minneapolis, MN 55418 
612/788-9481 • Telex 501357 SLICER UD 



26 BYTE • JULY 1985 



Inquiry 319 



Ven-TePs Half Card" modem 
is in all the best computers. 

Here's why. .^ 



Ven-Tel gives you lots of reasons to buy our Half Card 11 
modem for your IBM PC or compatible. The Half Card 1 
is a complete system that lets you communicate with 
other PCs, mainframes, and databases effortlessly. 
It includes Crosstalk-XVI® software. It's reliable 
It's got all of the features you want. And it's 
a good value. 

Do You Own One off These 
Computers? 

Chances are you do. And if you're 
thinking of buying a modem, consider 
the Half Card™. Because of its small size, 
the Half Card™ fits in more computers, 
including all of the models we've listed 
here. The Half Card™ is small, so it fits in 
short slots or long. That means you can 
save your long slots for other expan- 
sion uses. 

Effortless Communication 
Each Half Card™comes with Crosstalk-XVI® 
communications software, by Microstuf. It's 
the easiest to use, whether you're a beginner 
or an old hand, and the most powerful. A full 
on-line help menu makes using Crosstalk® for 
the first time a snap. It can turn your PC into a 
terminal on a mainframe computer with its power 
ful terminal emulation feature. It will even oper- 
ate your PC when you're not there. You can call 
into an information service such asThe Source or Dow Jones News 
Retrieval, or transfer files and electronic mail, all at the touch of 
a button. The Half Card™ connects your computer to the world. 
Effortlessly. 

More Modem for Your Money 

When you buy the Half Card™ you don't need anything else. The 
Half Card™ is a complete communications package that includes 
a full-featured modem and the best known software on the market. 
Complete easy-to-understand instructions with full technical support 
on installation and use. And a very competitive price. The Half 
Card™ with Crosstalk-XVI® software, retails for only $549. 




Features 

. 1200/300 baud auto-dial, auto-answer. 
. Uses the industry standard "AT" 

command set. 
. Runs with virtually all communications 

software, including Smartcom II and PC 

Talk III and integrated packages such 

as Symphony and Framework. 
. Includes Crosstalk-XVI® software. 
. On-board speaker and extra phone jack 

for easy switching from voice 

to data mode. 
• Selective tone or pulse dialing; 

full or half duplex. 
. Automatic answer on any ring. 
. True ring or busy signal detection. 




Reliability 

Ven-Tel has been making 

modems for 10 years. Our 

experience shows. Ven-Tel's 

Half Card™ only has about 70 parts, compared 

to almost 300 on other modems. We reduced the parts 

by building the first LSI modem chip using advanced 

switched capacitor technology. What that means to you is 

greater reliability and lower power consumption, so you can 

load up your PC with expansion boards and not worry about 

heat or power problems. And we back the Half Card™ with a full 

two-year warranty on parts and labor. 

You Can Buy the Half Card™ 
Anywhere 

You can get the Half Card™ at Computer- 
Land, Businessland, the Genra Group, 
Entr§ Computer Centers, Macy's Computer 
Stores and other fine dealers nationwide. 
Also from Ven-Tel: the 1200 Plus™ an 
external modem and the PC Modem 
1200™ an IBM internal with V22 inter- 
national capability. 

Effortless Communication 



Ven-Tel Inc. 



2342 Walsh Avenue 
Santa Clara, CA 95051 
(408) 727-5721 



Crosstalk is a registered trademark of Microstuf, Inc. Smartcom II is a trademark of Hayes Microcomputer Products. Symphony is a trademark of Lotus Development. Framework is a trademark of AshtonTate. 
Inquiry 365 JULY 1985 • BYTE 27 




For everyone who ever tried 
doing five things at once 



The perfect computer program 
for someone as busy as you. 
It lets you keep several other 
programs working at once. 

Do you ever go in so many directions 
so fast not even a computer can keep up 
with you? 

Well, now an IBM Personal Comput- 
er can— thanks to IBM TopView. 



TopView is a new kind of software 
that lets you switch between other pro- 
grams as quickly as you can change your 
mind, even run several programs at the 
same time. 

Once you load TopView into your 
computer, you load the other programs 
you use most— as many as your com- 
puter's memory will permit. 

After that, the greatest distance 
between two programs is just a couple of 



keystrokes, or (optional) mouse moves. 

There's no waiting and a lot less 
diskette swapping. 

But when you're redly busy is when 
TopView really shines, letting you do 
many jobs simultaneously. 

For example, you can print a letter, 
while you search a file, while you analyze 
a spreadsheet, while your clock/calen- 
dar reminds you that your automatic 
dialer is about to place a call for you. 



Little Tramp character licensed by Bubbles Inc.. s.a. 



28 BYTE • JULY 1985 




. . .IBM presents TopView. 



And you can see everything through 
on-screen "windows" and control it all 
with easy-to-use pop-up menus. 

You can even make unrelated pro- 
grams work together; say a "Brand Y" 
spreadsheet with a "Brand Z" word pro- 
cessor 

But simplest of all is a certain 
"Brand IBM", namely the IBM Assistant 
Series— for filing, writing, planning, 
reporting and graphing. 



Many other popular programs also 
work with TopView, and the number is 
growing. 

Naturally, the more computer 
memory you have, the more TopView can 
help you. At least 512K is recommended. 

And the price is only $149 * 

Beyond that, all you need is to be the 
kind of person who never does a single 
thing all day, but who wants to do every- 
thing, at once. 



To learn more, call an IBM market- 
ing representative, or visit an IBM Prod- 
uct Center or Authorized IBM PC or 
Software Dealer. 

For the store nearest you, and a free 
brochure, call 800-447-4700. (In Alaska 
and Hawaii, 800-447-0890.) 



Personal Computer Software 



♦IBM Product Center price. 
Inquiry 176 



JULY 1985 -BYTE 29 



Inquiry 254 




Xerox D25 Diablo daisywheel printer - Ip %)Ht%9 

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This quiet, 25 cps daisywheel printer performs a full range of word and data 
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Diablo printers are known for their reliability, and the D25 is no exception. 
MTI is an authorized distributor for Diablo printers, so we can get these high- 
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LETTERS 



the point. It will help produce better 
manuals, reports, and business corre- 
spondence. It is not meant for poetry or 
great works of literature. Would you want 
to see a user manual written in iambic 
pentameter? Would you write a report say- 
ing fourscore and seven more employees 
are needed for a project? 

How about a real review on an impor- 
tant new product? 1 think your readers 
deserve it. 

Robert W. DePree 
Longboat Key, FL 

Glenn Hartwig replies: 
Mr. DePree accuses us of missing the 
point of his product. In fact, we stated 
that the program could be used to ad- 
vantage in "ordinary correspondence 
and reports." 

Want My Business? 

The vast array of computer hardware and 
software now being marketed is so over- 
whelming that anyone venturing out to 
buy a computer system is soon overcome 
by a feeling of helplessness. The biggest 
and most frustrating problem encountered 
by the prospective buyer is the failure of 
companies in the computer field to provide 
any kind of information on their products. 
A case in point: I have written to more 
than two dozen computer hardware and 
software companies for general and 
specific information, and only four saw fit 
to send me some literature. The rest did 
not even bother to acknowledge receipt 
of my inquiry. Apparently it doesn't mat- 
ter that I am willing to spend up to $13,000 
for a CAD system. Hardly anyone seems 
to want my business. Why? 

Manfred F. Kirchner 
Redmond, WA 

Elegant Logic 

In spite of many very bad experiences in 
responding to articles I have read in April 
issues of magazines. I am compelled to 
write in comment to Marvin Minsky's ar- 
ticle "Communication with Alien Intelli- 
gence" (April, page 126). 

I don't believe in the existence of in- 
telligent civilizations other than ours in the 
universe; I have never seen any evidence 
or heard any argument in favor of them 
that I find embraceable; but Mr. Minsky's 
article is a delightful, optimistic viewpoint 
that makes me hopeful that we may. at 
least, yet find and be able to communi- 
cate with intelligent life here on earth. Mr. 
Minsky's article, though couched in the 

[continued] 



30 BYTE • JULY 1985 



Inquiry 30 



Inquiry 331 — ► 



HOW TO CONTROL 
THE RISE AND FALL 



Your small business compu- 
ter can give you the power to 
raise your productivity. But 
first you have to control the power you give it. 
Because even the slightest dip or surge of elec- 
tricity can result in a shocking surprise. An instant 
loss of important data or misinformation. Even 
worse, a total power line failure can create 
department devastation ... a total system crash. 
You can't afford errors, delays and other 
problems. After all, you've invested in a 
computer to increase efficiency. 
But now there's a solution you can af- 
ford The Sola SPS. This economical, 
UL listed Standby Power System 
is designed to protect personal, 
micro and mini computers 
from AC line disturb- 



OWER. 



fwm ^™ w£ ances and failures. Sola SPS 

' W ■■■ml provides clean, regulated AC 

power to your computer when 

your power line experiences irregular voltage. Line 

dips or line surges are immediately converted to 

proper voltage. When the AC line is present, the 

SPS filters power to eliminate electrical noise. 

And when the AC line fails, the SPS goes into full 

action, providing precise AC power to the load from 

its internal battery. So the only noise you'll hear 

is the sound of performance. There's no maint- 

nance. No installation. No kidding. Just 

plug it in and turn it on. Why let your 

productivity rise and fall with your ' 

power? The solution is as simple 

as SPS. The standby 

system that Sola 

stands behind. 




LETTERS 



complex, esoteric rhetoric required of 
academic communication, makes its case 
with the same sparse, incredibly simple 
logic that is the core of its very argument: 
The simplest thing will always happen first. 
After reading Mr. Minsky's arguments, I 
am reminded of another bit of elegant 
logic which, strangely, now seems to be 
very wise: Anything that can happen will 
happen. 



Mr. Minsky's article is typical of the kind 
of interesting, thought-inspiring, entertain- 
ing (though sometimes difficult) reading 
by which BYTE transcends the label "com- 
puter mag" and through which BYTE's 
readers can aspire to transcend the 
epithet "hacker." 

There is. of course, also a very practical 
side to Mr. Minsky's article. If. some day. 
I turn to speak to an intelligent alien. I will 



I h\ Ll ^ > 



k 



Terminals and monitors known 
by the companies they keep. 



For quite some time we've been 
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reliable and best selling computer 
systems. And we're proud of it! We're 
happy that our level of quality has 
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that in almost every instance we've 
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out exceeding cost requirements; 
And we're delighted the quality of 
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Tatung Terminals and Monitors 
an outstanding value. 
Now you can buy Tatung Terminals 
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operational flexibility and day-in-day- 
out reliability. But, even more 
important to you, is that Tatung 
Terminals and Monitors are now 
priced to make them the most 
exceptional value you can buy. 



U.C.M. COMPUTER PRODUCTS 

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1-416-475-1209 Telex: 06-986222 



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be able to do so from the reference point 
of similarity, rather than polarity. There is 
a world of difference. 

Zack T. Hinckley 
Rockledge. FL 

Honest Interpreter 

The development and impact of computer 
hardware and software is so dazzling that 
one hardly knows which way to turn. 

During calm moments I convince myself 
that if I had to select one and only one 
software utility (beyond the operating sys- 
tem). I would opt for an honest, easy-to- 
interact-with BASIC interpreter, one that 
would never take a single-precision value 
for V2. tack eight arbitrary numbers onto 
it. and fob it off as a double-precision 
number in a double-precision calculation. 

Hal Falk 
New York, NY 

Magic Squares 

l read with interest Robert T. Kurosaka's 
Mathematical Recreations column ("Magic 
Squares," March, page 383) regarding 
magic squares and his computer program 
for generating odd-sided magic squares. 
Although his technique is powerful with 
respect to generating such squares for 
consecutive number entries, it is not able 
to generate squares for any desired magic 
number. 

A number of years ago I was intrigued 
with the question as to whether a general 
solution exists for a magic square of order 
n. With the help of a college text on linear 
algebra— Elementary Linear Algebra by J. R. 
Munkres (Reading. MA: Addison-Wesley. 
1964) — l was able to find the general solu- 
tion of a magic square of order 3. 

The general solution for a magic number 
equal to -a is 

X\ Xi x 3 
X4 Xt, x& 

X7 Xg Xg 



~Xg 



2a 

3 
la 



x 2 = -x 8 - 



x 3 = x 8 + x 9 + -=- 



x 4 = x 8 + 2x 9 + 

#6 = ~Xg ~ 2X 9 



2a 



4a 



x 7 = -x 8 - x 9 - a 



[continued on page 401) 



32 BYTE • JULY 1985 



Inquiry 350 for End-Users. 
Inquiry 35! for DEALERS ONLY. 




COMPAQ doesn't m 
:ompranises. Thaft why wete 
still making hi ' 



PHHHB 



mmm 







Presenting the most capable 



No other computer company has ever 
grown as fast as COMPAQ, because 
no computer company makes computers 
as powerful, as complete and as useful 
as COMPAQ. That's why the original 
COMPAQ Portable, COMPAQ 
PLUS,™ and COMPAQ DESKPRO™ 
became worldwide best sellers overnight. 
Now COMPAQ is introducing two new 
computers that advance the state of the 
art even further. While the original 
COMPAQ products remain cost-efficient 
cornerstones of business and professional 
use, especially for first-time buyers, the 
new products represent the utmost in 
performance for second-time buyers, or 
anyone who needs exceptional power 
and speed. 

Triumphs of advanced technology 

The new COMPAQ PORTABLE 286™ 
and COMPAQ DESKPRO 286.™ 
Advanced technology puts them in a 
class all their own. With power, per- 
formance, speed, and expandability 
that exceed even the IBM® Personal 
Computer- AT.™ They represent a 
new standard that makes others look 




The new 80286 "chip" in COMPAQ 286 
Computers processes data faster. 

like what they are — the products 
of compromise. In fact, the new 
COMPAQ 286 Personal Computers 
can be considered the most useful in 
the world. 

Power with a bonus — portability 

The COMPAQ PORTABLE 286 
redefines portable computers. We 
gave it power to match IBM's most 
powerful desktop computer, the IBM 
PC- AT. Then we designed it to run all 
the popular programs and hardware 
designed for the IBM PC- AT. But we 
didn't stop there. COMPAQ pushed 
the technology further. 
The COMPAQ PORTABLE 286 



runs 30% faster. It can give you up to 
20 Megabytes of internal fixed disk 
drive storage. And can come with 
features to make it even more useful. 
Like our internal fixed disk drive 
back-up system that protects 10 
Megabytes of information on a single, 
pocket-sized tape cartridge. 

But the most amazing thing about 
the COMPAQ PORTABLE 286 is 
that all these features come attached 
to a handle. 

Our most advanced 
desktop computer 

Like the COMPAQ PORTABLE 
286, the new COMPAQ DESKPRO 
286 runs all the popular programs 
designed for the IBM PC- AT, 30% 
faster. And it can also come with 
our convenient internal fixed disk 
drive back-up system for added 
data protection. 

But we didn't stop there. We 
weren't content to compromise. We 
wanted to make the new COMPAQ 
DESKPRO 286 a more powerful, 
more efficient stand-alone personal 




OOMRAQ 

DESKPRO 

286 



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M./1- ,.;■:./■■■■//■ 




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computer, as well as a faster, more 
powerful, more useful file server. So 
we gave the COMPAQ DESKPRO 
286 far more memory and storage 
capacity — over 8 Megabytes of 
RAM and 70 Megabytes of high- 
performance fixed disk storage. 

The legends continue 

Not everyone will need the extra per- 
formance of the newest COMPAQ 
Computers. That's why we built our 
original line to last a long time. 

These workhorses — the COMPAQ 
Portable, COMPAQ PLUS and 
COMPAQ DESKPRO Computers — 
are essential to many professional and 
business users. They run thousands 
of industry-standard programs devel- 
oped for the IBM PC and PC/XT.™ 
They're indispensable tools in use on 
all seven continents (yes, even the 
South Pole!). 

Above all, no compromises 

The unprecedented success of 
COMPAQ came as no accident. While 



others built limited computers, 
COMPAQ built expandable computers. 

While others took two screens to 
display high-resolution text and 
graphics, COMPAQ was the first to 
do it on one. 

While others were looking for ways 
to cut corners, COMPAQ looked 
for ways to eliminate downtime 
by building the most rugged, reliable 
computers in the world. 

The COMPAQ commitment to a 
philosophy of "no compromise" made 
the COMPAQ Portable and COMPAQ 
PLUS the world's best-selling 16-bit 
portable personal computers. In 1983 
COMPAQ sold $111 million worth of 
computers to achieve the most suc- 
cessful first-year sales of any company 
in American business history. 

In 1984, we introduced the COMPAQ 
DESKPRO. In only four months, it 
became the second-best-selling 16-bit 
desktop business system in U . S . retail 
computer stores. And as a result, 
we've concluded the most successful 
second year of any computer com- 
pany, with sales of $329 million. 

The reason for this success is simple. 



COMPAQ computers have been recog- 
nized worldwide. Awards include: 

• COMPAQ PLUS selected and 
voted Europe's 1984 Computer of 
the Year in the portable category. 

• COMPAQ PL US voted by readers 
of PC WORLD as their favorite 
product in its category in the "1984 
World Class PC Contest" 

• COMPAQ PLUS selected as the 
first-place winner in its category in 
the Creative Computing Top 12 
Computers of 1984 Awards. 

• COMPAQ Portable rated best 
personal business computer in over- 
all user satisfaction by the Yankee 
Group market research firm 
opinion poll. 

• COMPAQ DESKPRO named by 
PC Week magazine as one of the 
top ten products of 1984. 



We offer people personal computers 
that simply work better. And make 
no compromises doing so. 





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' ' ■ ■ ■ ••;■ MT\Tft H S 1 1 V ■;■■■■: ; '- ; ' "■ '"■ ■■ :■•:■:,■■ \T.\Tt\ ! 'W HI 




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Anyone can make a portable computer. 
But to make one that runs all the popular 
programs designed for the IBM PC- AT, 
30% faster — in a package almost half 
the size — was no small challenge. But 
one COMPAQ welcomed. 

Go faster, go further 

The COMPAQ PORTABLE 286 is 
paced by the advanced technology of 
the 8-MHz, Intel 80286 micropro- 
cessor. This advanced technology has 
numerous advantages. One advantage 
is the flexibility to work with several 
different operating systems so you're 
not forced to choose a personal 
computer solely on that basis. 

The advanced capabilities of this 
microprocessor become even more 



apparent when you run complex pro- 
grams. You can operate as part of 
a network. Or you can operate more 
than one program at the same time 
using multi-tasking software like IBM 
TopView™ And you can handle the 
most difficult problems with breath- 
taking speed. 

For many scientific and engineer- 
ing programs you have the ability 
to add an 80287 coprocessor, which 
offers even more speed. 

Both offer dramatic speed increases 
over earlier microprocessors. The 
faster response time means less 
waiting, and more productivity. 

Power in a package 

The COMPAQ PORTABLE 286 has 
the power of the IBM PC- AT. But the 
IBM PC-AT doesn't have a handle. 
Ours does. So it goes where you go. 
Works where you work. Whenever 
and wherever necessary. And it's easy 
to share with co-workers. 

That's full-function portability, 
pure and simple. 




A COMPAQ PORTABLE 286 can leave the 
office whenyou do. Take your work wherever you go. 



Expandability without getting bigger 

All the devices that increase the capa- 
bilities of the COMPAQ PORTABLE 
286 go on the inside — not the outside 
— of the computer. 
You can get it with one or two half- 









.. Uur lastest, most powertul portable 
do more- ar^here. 



height 1.2-Megabyte diskette drives. 
Although they can "read" diskettes 
formatted for 360- K byte diskette 
drives, they cannot "write" to them. 
Therefore, as an option, COMPAQ 
offers a 360-K byte diskette drive to 
let you exchange data with other 
industry-standard personal computers. 

There's an additional slot for a 
20-Megabyte fixed disk drive. All 
COMPAQ Portable Computers offer 
fixed disk drive systems that fit inside 
the computer. 

Another of our options: An inter- 
nal fixed disk drive back-up system 
keeps a safety copy of your work, 
reducing the chance of losing your 
data. COMPAQ pioneered the system 
first in desktop computers, and now 
in portables. 

The COMPAQ PORTABLE 286 
even comes with a security lock feature 
that locks "on" to prevent interruption 
of a file transfer, or "off to deny ac- 
cess to confidential information. 

Because it's a portable, self- 
contained unit, the computer can 
be easily stored away after use. 




Two data protection features from COMPAQ: 
an internal fixed disk back-up system that stores 
data on tape cartridges, and a security lock for 
locking keyboard access to your system on or off. 



Who can use it? 

If you're an experienced user, you may 
be ready to upgrade your current equip- 
ment. The COMPAQ PORTABLE 
286 gives you the latest technology. 

For some, power is all-important: 
Speed, performance, and the ability 
to handle the most powerful soft- 
ware. All are leading qualities of the 
COMPAQ PORTABLE 286. 

Starting a business? The COMPAQ 
PORTABLE 286 has tremendous data 
base capabilities to help you keep track 
of your inventory, your customers, 
your employees, your finances. Its 
exceptional storage capabilities make 
it ideal for the complexities of ac- 
counting. Its exceptional speed means 
greater networking ability. Its tre- 
mendous power enables you to get the 
edge on the competition. 

In addition, large corporations can 
place several of these computers with 
field representatives to provide clients 
immediate information on current 
prices, product availability, even 
shipping dates and routing. So deliv- 
ery shortages can be anticipated 
and avoided. 

The COMPAQ PORTABLE 
286 can also travel within the com- 
pany. From office to office. Desk to 
desk. From accounting, to marketing, 
to research. 

It's powerful and versatile enough 
to do almost any job. Light enough to 
carry. And tough enough to survive 
lots of users. 



Established reliability 

Despite its newness, the COMPAQ 
PORTABLE 286 is in many respects 
a proven product. It's based on the 
rugged, reliable design of the original 
COMPAQ Portable and COMPAQ 
PLUS. Many of the construction 
techniques like cross-bracing compo- 
nents and shock-mounting disk drives 
are identical. All of which goes to 
prove our point: No other portable 
computer can measure up to the 
advanced power and potential of 
the uncompromising COMPAQ 
PORTABLE 286. 



The COMPAQ PORTABLE 286 
Specifications 

Processor: 16-bit 80286; 6 or 8 MHz clock 
speed. Software: Fully compatible with all 
major software applications written for the IBM 
PC-AT. Expansion Slots: 3availableslotsin 
base configuration. Memory: 256-K bytes RAM, 
expandable to 2.6 Megabytes. Storage Devices: 
360-K byte or 1.2-Megabyte diskettedrives, 
20-Megabyte fixed disk drive, fixed disk drive 
back-up (10 Megabytes per tape). Interfaces: 
RGB color monitor, RF modulator, composite 
video, parallel printer, and asynchronous com- 
munications interfaces. Keyboard: Standard 
IBM PC-AT layout (84-key). Display: 9-inch 
diagonal green monochrome dual-mode monitor, 
high-resolution text characters, high-resolution 
graphics. Security: Locks in operating and non- 
operating mode to prevent unauthorized key- 
board access. Physical Specifi cations: 20"W x 
$V2"H x 16"D. Options: Technical reference 
guide, MS-DOS 1M /BASIC Version 3, 512/2048-K 
byte memory board. 






The capabilities of the new COMPAQ 
DESKPRO 286 represent a personal 
desktop computer as practical as it is 
technically advanced. Plus, it maintains 
compatibility with the IBM PC- AT. 

Utmost expandability 

That's no exaggeration. The COMPAQ 
DESKPRO 286 can expand to give 
you massive storage and memory. 

Without clutter. Expansion is 
internal. 

It comes with a single, half-height, 
1.2-Megabyte diskette drive. You 



can add a second drive of the same 
capacity, or a 360-K byte diskette 
drive so you can exchange information 
with other personal computers. 

For fixed disk storage, an internal * 
20-Megabyte system is available. 
You can also choose a 30- or 70-Mega- 
byte high-performance internal fixed 
disk drive sytem. The storage capac- 
ity of each is equivalent to 10,240, 
15,360, or 35,840 pages of double- 
spaced data. 

One expansion board works with 
all the fixed disk drives. When you up- 
grade to a larger fixed disk storage 
system, a new board is not required. 



To back up data, use the COMPAQ 
internal fixed disk drive back-up system. 
It's also a safe and convenient way to 
store information for record keeping. 

Hardworking, networking 

Alone, the COMPAQ DESKPRO 
286 is a tremendously useful computer. 
It doesn't limit you to using software 
under any one operating system. It 
runs all the popular programs designed 
for the IBM PC- AT. It can be con- 
figured for advanced color graphics 
display using a color monitor and the 
IBM Enhanced Graphics Adapter. 











more speed and more flexibility 




? ? r T B T T v. V V 



An enhanced keyboard layout, with shift keys in easy reach for touch typists, is standard on the 
COMPAQ PORTABLE 286 and COMPAQ DESKPRO 286. 




The modular design of the computer 
also lets you configure RAM and 
storage to the exact needs of any indi- 
vidual. So you never have to buy 
more computer than you need. Or 
worry about obsoleting your invest- 
ment because you bought less com- 
puter than you need. 

The COMPAQ DESKPRO 286 
also makes the ideal hub of a local area 
network. Using networking packages, 
your computers (and your people) can 
share information and software, and 
can communicate with one another. 
With 70 Megabytes, the COMPAQ 
DESKPRO 286 becomes a powerful, 
high-performance file server. You 




A fixed disk can store enough programs and data 
to handle all the accounting for most businesses. 



can store lots of data, as well as store 
several programs you can run simul- 
taneously when using software 
programs like IBM Top View. Your 
computer will perform at lightning 
speeds. And other configurations 
can make economical "nodes" of 
the network. 

Where to start 

The flexibility of the COMPAQ 
DESKPRO 286 allows you to begin 
at any level of computing power and 
reach beyond the IBM PC-AT. 

You can use your computer for 
writing extensive documents, pre- 
paring professional graphics for 
presentations, and for doing compli- 
cated financial studies. Chances are, 
however, you'll not want to stop 
there. You'll discover new ways for 
streamlining your work. You'll want 
to do customer lists, accounting tasks 
and business taxes, product inven- 
tory, annual sales projections on 
spreadsheets. You have the option of 
adding a second diskette drive, a fixed 
disk drive, more memory, even a 



fixed disk drive back-up system. All 
are available and can be added to the 
inside of your COMPAQ DESKPRO 
286 — easily, affordably, without 
losing your initial investment in hard- 
ware, software, or training. 

A proven heritage 

The COMPAQ DESKPRO 286 is 
of tested lineage. It has many of the 
reliable construction and design qual- 
ities of the COMPAQ DESKPRO. 
It has further conveniences like a 
dual-function security lock to prevent 
unauthorized access. As well as greater 
performance, power, and speed. The 
COMPAQ DESKPRO 286 stretches 
the limits of personal computing — 
with no compromises. 



The COMPAQ DESKPRO 286 
Specifications 

Processor: 16-bit 80286;6 or 8 MHz clock 
speed. Software: Fully compatible with all 
major software applications written for the IBM 
PC-AT. Expansion Slots: 5 slots available in 
base configuration. Memory: 256-K bytes 
RAM, expandable to 8.2 Megabytes. Storage 
Devices: 360-K byte or 1.2-Megabyte diskette 
drives; 20-(half-height), 30-, or 70-Megabyte 
fixed disk drives; fixed disk drive back-up 
(10 Megabytes per tape). Interfaces: RGB color 
monitor, RF modulator , composite video, paral- 
lel printer, and asynchronous communications 
interfaces. Keyboard: Standard IBM PC-AT lay- 
out (84-key). Display: 12-inch diagonal green or 
amber dual-mode monitor, high-resolution text 
characters, high-resolution graphics. Security: 
Locks in operating and non-operating mode to 
prevent unauthorized access; cover lock to pro- 
tect internal components. Physical Specifica- 
tions: System unit— 19.8"Wx 6.4"H x 16.5"D, 
Keyboard unit— 18.0"W x 1.5"H x7.0"D, Dis- 
play unit— 14.75"W x 10.25"H x 13.75"D, 
Weight — 57-64 lbs . , depending on configura- 
tion. Options: MS-DOS/BASIC Version 3, Tilt 
& Swivel Monitor Stand, Desk-Saver, Technical 
Reference Guide, 512/2048-K byte memory board 





If you're anxious to put a computer 
to work for you, but don't need the extra 
power and added performance of our 
most advanced portable computer, we 
have the answer. 

Lots of software, lots of uses 

The COMPAQ Portable and 
COMPAQ PLUS are based on the 
8088 microprocessor, one of the most 
popular computer technologies, so 
software is abundant. Integrated busi- 
ness programs, personal productivity, 
learning tools, even educational 
thoughtware to sharpen your business 
skills. Literally thousands of programs, 
compatible with the IBM PC and IBM 
PC/XT, will run on the COMPAQ 
Portable and COMPAQ PLUS. 

Many businesses put the COMPAQ 
Portable or COMPAQ PLUS to work 
as a full-time computer for part-time 
users. Carry it from desk to desk. 
Office to office. Let several people use 
it for one or more hours a day. Or one 
person use it a few days a week. 




Many companies use a COMPAQ Portable as 
a full-time computer for part-time users. 




For heavy users, a COMPAQ 
Portable or COMPAQ PLUS can 
become a "second computer" for com- 
puting power away from the office. 

With their rugged, uncompromising 
construction, they're built tough 
enough to pass around — something 
that's impractical to do with desktop 
computers. And because you stretch 
its use, you stretch your budget as well. 

If you need more, 
it does more 

How can one computer be so versatile? 

One reason is the ability of the 
COMPAQ Portable to become a 
COMPAQ PLUS with the addition of 
a 10-Megabyte fixed disk drive. This 
expands storage capacity to the equiv- 
alent of 5,120 double-spaced pages of 
information. 




There are other ways to improve on 
your COMPAQ. Hundreds of 
industry-standard expansion boards 
are available. They fit neatly inside 
your COMPAQ. So you can run more 
advanced programs. Communicate 
over telephone lines. Network with 
other computers. 

It's this kind of versatility and ease 
of use that makes COMPAQ Personal 
Computers second to none. 



SPECIFICATIONS 

The COMPAQ Portable 

Processor: 16-bit 8088, 4.77 MHz clock speed. 
Software: Fully compatible with all major soft- 
ware applications written for the IBM PC/XT. 
Storage Devices: One or two 320-K byte diskette 
drives. Expansion Slots: 3 available slots. 
Memory: 128-K bytes RAM expandable to 
640-K bytes. Display: 9-inch green diagonal 
monochrome dual-mode monitor, high- 
resolution text characters, high-resolution 
graphics. Interfaces: RGB color monitor, RF 
modulator, composite video, and parallel printer. 
Keyboard: Standard IBM PC layout (83-key). 
Physical Specifications: 20" W x SWH x 16"D. 

The COMPAQ PLUS 

Specifications the same with the exception of: 
One 360-K byte diskette drive, one 10-Megabyte 
fixed disk drive, 2 available expansion slots, and 
full compatibility with all major software appli- 
cations written for the IBM PC and VClXT. 



Expansion boards let you add memory and extra 
functions inside, not out. 






If you don't need all the extra perform- 
ance of the COMPAQ DESKPRO 
286, you can buy the popularly priced 
COMPAQ DESKPRO and still get 
many advanced features. 

A command performance 
at every level 

The COMPAQ DESKPRO Series 
allows you to buy as much computer 
as you need — not more computer than 
you need. 

It's a polished performer, from 
entry level to advanced computing, in 
one totally expandable unit. Its plug- 
in, modular design accepts up to four 
separate storage devices. You select 
almost any combination of diskette 
or fixed disk drives you desire. And 
there's the practical, internal fixed 
disk drive back-up system to protect 
and store your data. So as your needs 
grow, the DESKPRO grows. 

In fact it will grow from an IBM PC 
to far beyond the IBM PC/XT level 
of functionality. The COMPAQ 





DESKPRO will run all the popular 
programs written for both the IBM PC 
and PC/XT , two to three times faster, 
without sacrificing compatibility. 

Power? It's got what it takes. 

The COMPAQ DESKPRO can 
be easily configured for scientific, 
engineering, and advanced business 
applications. 

A high-performance, 30-Megabyte 
fixed disk drive provides added stor- 
age capacity. 

The ability to add a high-speed 
8087-2 coprocessor lets you deal with 
complex scientific calculations and 
economic models. 



SPECIFICATIONS 

The COMPAQ DESKPRO 

Processor: 16-bit 8086; 4.77 or 7.14 MHz 
clock speed. Software: Fullycompatible with all 
major software applications written for the IBM 
PC and PC/AT. Expansion Slots: 6 slots avail- 
able in base configuration. Memory: 128-K 
bytes RAM, expandable to 640-K bytes. Storage 
Devices: One or two 360-K byte diskette drives, 
lO-(half-height) or 30-Megabyte fixed disk drives, 
fixed disk drive back-up (10 Megabytes per tape). 
Interfaces: RGB color monitor, RF modulator, 
composite video, parallel printer, and asynchro- 
nous communications interfaces. Keyboard: 
Standard IBM PC layout (83-key). Display: 
12-inch diagonal green or amber dual-mode 
monitor, high-resolution text characters, high- 
resolution graphics. Physical Specifications: 
System unit— 19.8"W x 5.8"H x 16.5"D, 
Keyboard unit— 18.0"W x 1 .5"H x 7.0"D. 



Internal expandability saves desk space. 



Features common to COMKQ 

in most other 



Ifs been easy for COMPAQ to recog- 
nize the compromises other personal com- 
puter makers have been making. 

Ifs been just as easy to avoid them. 

Thafs why performance, expand- 
ability, compatibility, durability, and 
versatility are features you'll find in the 
entire COMPAQ family of computers. 

How advanced technology affects 
the choice you make 

There's an ever-growing library of 
fast, powerful programs designed for 
the IBM PC- AT and compatible with 
the COMPAQ PORTABLE 286 and 
COMPAQ DESKPRO 286. These 
programs will utilize the full potential 
of the computer "nerve center" — the 
Intel 80286 microprocessor. 

If you own a COMPAQ Portable, 
COMPAQ PLUS, or COMPAQ 
DESKPRO, you may discover that 



these newer programs are simply too 
big to run on your computer. 

Therefore you have a choice: the 
extra power and speed of the 80286 or 
the popular COMPAQ Personal 
Computers that use the 8088 and 8086 
microprocessors. Remember that the 
COMPAQ PORTABLE 286 and 
COMPAQ DESKPRO 286 offer 
more power, speed and performance 
than any other personal computer. If 
your needs don't require the advanced 
technology, or you need a second 
computer to complement the one you 
have now, consider the COMPAQ 
Portable, COMPAQ PLUS, or 
COMPAQ DESKPRO. All three are 
hardware and software compatible 
with the IBM PC and PC/XT. Our 
intention is to give you a choice with- 
out forcing you to invest in more, or 
less, computing power than you think 
you need. 

Of course, COMPAQ Personal 
Computers maintain compatibility 
with the add-on devices and expansion 
boards available for industry-standard 
personal computers, without any 
alteration or modification. 

Increased power without 
increased size 

All COMPAQ Personal Computers 
can take on more memory and storage 
without taking up more space. The 
COMPAQ Portable becomes a 





Internal add-on devices add greatly to the 
capabilities of a COMPAQ Computer. 

COMPAQ PLUS when you add a 
10-Megabyte fixed disk drive. The 
COMPAQ PORTABLE 286 can 
accept a 20-Megabyte fixed disk drive. 
The fixed disk drive fits neatly beside 
the diskette drive inside the unit. 

With the COMPAQ DESKPRO 
and COMPAQ DESKPRO 286, 
you can install almost any available 
combination of diskette or fixed disk 
drives you desire to achieve the level 
of performance you need. The 
COMPAQ DESKPRO and COMPAQ 
DESKPRO 286, along with the 
COMPAQ PORTABLE 286, can 
accept the fixed disk drive back-up 
system as one of the internal stor- 
age devices. 

There are slots inside each 
COMPAQ Computer for optional 
expansion boards. These boards greatly 
enhance the functionality and versatil- 
ity of your computer. Literally hun- 
dreds are available to plug right in. 
Each lets you do something different. 
Like expanding the amount of memory 
in your computer. Or communicating 
with other personal computers. Or 



even communicating with mainframe 
computers. 

Built tough to take it 

COMPAQ Portable Computers are 
expected to take some hard knocks. A 
specially designed shock isolation sys- 
tem protects the diskette drives from 
jolts and vibration. 

Their inner components are sur- 
rounded by a cross-braced aluminum 
frame. Those equipped with fixed 
disk drives are protected by a triple 
shock mount system. Plus, the outer 
case is molded from high-impact 
plastic, the same kind used to make 
bulletproof windows and space helmet 
faceplates. COMPAQ Portable Com- 
puters are tough, protecting your data 
from every angle. 




COMPAQ DESKPRO Computers 
are no pushovers, either. They're sur- 
rounded by a protective steel shell. 

They're the only desktop computers 
made with protective shock mounts, 
isolating the disk drive compartments 
from those unexpected but inevitable 
bumps and knocks that can cause 
downtime. 

Even our monitors do more 

COMPAQ Computers display data 
on high-quality monitors. All models 
can display high-resolution text and 
graphics on the same screen. The dual- 
mode display saves you the cost and 
clutter of a second monitor. COMPAQ 
DESKPRO Computers give you a 




I -[]■ ■'■■■■■■' 1 I I i » v v 



High-resolution text and graphics on one screen 
eliminates the need for a second monitor. 

choice of an amber or green display. 

From pinstripe suits to 
flight jumpsuits 

The structure and design of COMPAQ 
Computers best characterize their 
widespread usefulness and respected 
capabilities. COMPAQ attentiveness 
to construction details and concern 
for functionality under stressful con- 
ditions are why these computers have 
received worldwide acceptance. 

That's why you'll find a COMPAQ 
Computer on the bench of a major 
league baseball team tracking player 
performance. 



At the South Pole monitoring 
weather conditions for the research 
team of a major university. 

On tour with famous rock stars to 
help plan concerts, keep up with the 
finances, and receive electronic mail. 

On motion picture sound stages 
scheduling production and maintain- 
ing equipment inventory. 

On military surveillance planes 
logging information five miles 
aboveground. 

In the halls of the Supreme Court 
answering complex questions on 
environmental issues. 

Computers people believe in 

It didn't take long for the public to 
recognize COMPAQ Computer qual- 
ity. No one builds them the way we 
do. Which is why no other computer 
company has grown the way we have. 

As personal computers become 
more and more commonplace, more 
and more people have come to appre- 
ciate that quality. Our commitment to 
providing a product that's beyond 
compromise assures a product beyond 
compare. We like to think of it in a 
simple phrase that bears repeating: It 
simply works better. 




COMPAQ Portable Computers have the ruggedness and durability for almost any work environment. 



The Authorized COMPAQ Computer Dealer Network. 
For sales and service, there are over 2,200 worldwide. 




Authorized COMPAQ Computer 
Dealers are carefully selected by a 
special review process. We make sure 
they are established business profes- 
sionals with the expertise to provide 
technical service for every COMPAQ 
Computer they sell. Dealer technicians 



receive rigorous training by COMPAQ 
engineers. 

No matter whether you're a profes- 
sional on the move, or an international 
corporation with branch offices in 
dozens of states and countries, you'll 
find help readily available. 



When you purchase your COMPAQ 
Computer, you'll be buying from the 
best in the business. Authorized 
COMPAQ Computer Dealers work 
hard to earn your respect. Because they 
had to work even harder to earn ours. 







Authorized COMPAQ Computer Dealers, U.S. and Canada 




A-Com-Plus 


Chester Inc. 


Computer Source Inc. 


Entrc Computer Centers 


Light Computer Centre 


PAX Computer Center 


A-V1DD Electronics Company 


Cincinnati Computer Store 


The Computer Slort- 


First National Computer Center 


Logic Tree Computer 


Personal BusincssComputcrs 


ABACUS ComputcrCentcr 


Clancy-Paul. Inc. 


Computer Superstores 


Forsythc Computers 


The Logical Choice 


Personal Computer Centre 


Agriplcx Computer 


Command Performance Computers 


Computer Systems Resources 


Future Information Systems 


Lyceum Computers 


PcrsonalComputcr Institute 


All Things Computers 


Compco Computer Centers 


Computer Systems Specialists 


Future Systems 


M.C.W. Computers 


1'hoto & Sound Company 


Allied Computer Centers 


CompuGroup 


Computer Techniques 


Future Visions Computer Store 


MakcnCompuicr Services 


Pittsburgh Computer Store 


Amcrisource 


Compu Net Computer Solutions 


Computer Town 


Garland Mcars Irrigation 


The Math Box 


Prodigy Computer Center 


The AMS CompuicrStorc 


Compuccntrc 


Computer Trends International 


GatcwayC^omputcr 


MBI Business Center 


Professional Computer Centre 


The Answer 


Compumark 


(Computer Utility 


GcncralMicrocomputcr.Inc. 


Micro Center 


Professional Computer Systems 


Applied Data Systems 


Compumat Micro Center 


Computer Ware 


Hamilton Computer BusincssCcntrc 


Micro Marl 


Quantum Computer Store 


Arcnds& Sons Inc. 


CompuShop Inc. 


Computer Works 


Hamilton Rentals 


MicroAge Computer Stores 


RACComputcrs 


ASAPComputcr Products 


Computer Applications Business Center ComputciCraf t 


H LA Computers 


Microcomputer Solutions 


Rainbow Computing Inc. 


Bamberger's 


Computer Center of Boca Raton 


COMPUTERcasc 


ICA Business Center 


MicronicCompuicrCcntrc Ltd. 


Scars Business Systems Centers 


Bandstra Computer Center 


Computer Center/Palm Beaches 


ComputerLand 


Ideal Computer Systems 


Microsource/ Financial 


Sherman Howe Computer Centers 


BasicComputcr Shop 


The Computer Centre 


Computers Unlimited 


Idcx Business Computer Center 


MidaCorporation 


Silver Creek Computers 


Bell & Howell 


Computer Concepts 


Computcrwarc 


lllini Microcomputers Inc. 


Midwest Computer Center 


SnyderComputerCentcr 


Blumberg Photo & Sound 


Computer Depot 


Computer* orks 


Illinois Valley Computers 


Miss-Lou Computer Center 


Societe Parmic Limilec 


Blumcnihal'sComputers 


The Computer Edge 


Compuiiquc 


Inacomp Computer Centers 


Moore Business Centers 


Solutions Inc. 


Businessland.Inc. 


The Computer Factory 


CompUtopia 


InacompComputcr City 


Morn s Decision Systems 


Southwest Automation 


Byte Shop 


Computer Gallery 


Comuni-Centcr South 


Infomax Computers 


Mr. Micro 


Spectrum Computers 


C.C.C. ComputcrCentcr 


Computer House 


Connolly Data Systems Inc. 


Information Connection 


MSC Computer Store 


Star BusincssComputcrs 


C.T.I. BusincssProductsCentcr 


Computer Innovations 


Contact Office Automation Centers 


Intcrdynamics Data Systems 


Nahih'slnc. 


Sun Computers 


Calculator and ComputcrCentcr 


The Computer Learning Tree 


Custom Computing Systems 


International Computer Systems 


NcccoofNccdham 


Taskforcc Business Centres 


Carolina Computer Store 


Computer Nook 


DataFilc.Thc 


J. W. Kerns, Inc. 


Nonhbrook Computers, Inc. 


Universal Computers 


Castcrlinc Computer Center 


Computer Pla/.a 


DATAGO 


Jonathan's Computer Center 


Office Management Systems Inc. 


Valcom Computer Center 


CBM Computer Center 


Computer Pro 


Data Systemsof New Jersey 


Khalix 


Olscn Computing 


Varsity Computing 


CentralComputcrs 


The Computer Room 


Data Terminal Marl 


Lc Magasin Xerox 


Omni Computer Center 


Wabash Computer Systems 


Central Valley Computer Center 


The Computer Shoppe 


DR A Computer Center 


Legacy Computer Systems 


Omnifax Computer Stores 


WaldecComputcr Center 


Century Microccnters 


Computer Solutions 


Endata Business ProductsCnlr. 


Lexington Computer Store 


OnlincComputcrs Plus 


ThcXeroxStore 


Champlain Computer Systems 













comma 



COMPAQ* is a registered trademark; COMPAQ PLU S ' " , COMPAQ DESKPRO n ' , COMPAQ PORTABLE 286™ , and COMPAQ DESKPRO 286™ are trademarks 
of COMPAQ Computer Corporation. IBM* is a registered trademark; IBM Personal Computer-AT™, IBM TopView™ and IBM Personal Computer XT'" are trademark, 
of International Business Machines Corporation. MS-DOS ™ is a trademark of Microsoft Corporation. © 1985 COMPAQ Computer Corporation. Printed in the U.S.A. 
All rights reserved. 



FIXES AND UPDATES 



ROMDISK Pricing Lowered 



BYTE'S BU 



We provided some out-of-date prices in 
an article in the May What's New section. 
(See "ROMDISK PC Accessory Card." page 
468.) The new prices are lower than those 
we quoted. 

Curtis Inc.. manufacturer of the ROM- 
DISK line of disk emulator boards for 
Apple and IBM computers, reports that it 
recently received new quotations for the 



EPROMS and other semiconductors used 
in its products. A company spokesperson 
stated that its price reductions, especial- 
ly for its PC-2 board, are due to the avail- 
ability of 27C2 56 EPROMs. Previously, 
Curtis had to rely on 27128 EPROMs and 
a piggybacked board to achieve large 
storage capacities. 
The suggested retail price for the ROM- 



DISK A for the Apple lie is now $349. The 
ROMDISK PC-1. which is equivalent to a 
180K-byte single-sided disk, is $495. 
Both are $100 lower than before. Provid- 
ing 360K bytes of storage, the PC-2 is 
$595. which is $400 less than reported in 
May. 

Curtis Inc. is located at 22 Red Fox Rd., 
St. Paul, MN 55110, (612) 484-5064. 



Statement Amplified 



A discussion in the June Fixes and Up- 
dates requires some explanation. (See 
page 33.) 

In the item "Upgrade to Lowercase 
Descenders." the first sentence in the sec- 
ond paragraph could be interpreted as 
saying that the Gorilla Banana printer is 



manufactured by DAK Industries, which it 
is not. 

The Gorilla Banana Printer was pro- 
duced by Leading Edge Products Inc., 22 5 
Ibrnpike St.. Canton, MA 02021. (617) 
828-8150. The printer, however, is no 
longer manufactured. 



DAK Industries Inc. sells electronic parts 
and instrumentation. One of the products 
sold by DAK Industries is the Gorilla 
Banana Printer. DAK Industries is located 
at 8200 Remmet Ave.. Canoga Park. CA 
91304. 

We apologize for the confusion. 



Some Fixes for Sunfix 



An error crept into the references that ac- 
companied Frederic N. Rounds's Sunfix 
navigation article, which appeared in the 
March BYTE. (See "Navigation: Putting the 
Microcomputer to Work at Sea," page 141.) 
The first reference should read as 
follows: 

Maloney. Elbert S.. ed. Dutton's Navigation 
and Piloting. Naval Institute Printing, 1978. 



Mr. Rounds also would like to emphasize 
that the Sunfix program takes the place 
of almanacs and reduction tables by com- 
puting the position of the sun for any time 
and date. The only data inputs it requires 
are your sextant's readings and the 
measurements used to make sextant cor- 
rections. Details, such as RA and SHA, are 
transparent to users of the Sunfix 
program. 



It's also advisable to keep in mind the 
fact that microcomputers can aid sailors, 
but. like ham radios and other electronic 
navigation equipment, they are suscepti- 
ble to the sea's environment. 

For those who are interested, Mr. 
Rounds will supply a printout of the Sun- 
fix program for $5. You can write Mr. 
Rounds at 894 Persimmon Ave.. Sunny- 
vale. CA 94087. 



Bugs in Frequency Analyzer 



A trio of bugs in Vince Banes's article 
'Audio-Frequency Analyzer" have been 
reported. (See page 22 3 of the January 
BYTE.) Two of the bugs are in the accom- 
panying diagrams, and the third bug is in 
a program listing. 
In figure 3 on page 227, the labels of 



the two ports are switched. 

On page 230, you'll find a mix-up in the 
pin numbers in figure 4b. Pin 2 5 of the 
82 55 integrated circuit should be con- 
nected to pin 13 of IC8. 

In the program that determines the end- 
points of the VC0 ranges (listing 5. page 



236). change line 40 to read: 

OUT 1921 ,CC 

Our thanks to David R. Butler of 
Cameron, West Virginia, and Mark Pinker- 
ton of Salem, Wisconsin, for reporting 
these errors to us. 



Name Corrected 



Servo Listing Misserves a Line 



In "Factfinder" by John Markoff (March, 
page 113). the name of a database service 
was incorrectly presented. NEXIS is a full- 
text database of general and business 
news produced by Mead Data Central Inc., 
a wholly owned subsidiary of The Mead 
Corporation. 



John del^aubenfels, a BYTE reader in 
Duluth, Georgia, found a bug in the 
program listing that accompanied Don 
Stauffer's article "Simulate a Servo 
System." (See page 147 of the February 
BYTE.) 
In the TRS-80 Level II BASIC program on 



page 150 (listing 1), line 2040. EM = ER 
is not correct. It should read 

EM = EM + ER*DT 

Our thanks to Mr. del^aubenfels for 
sending this correction. 

[continued) 



JULY 1985 • BYTE 33 



Inquiry 2 51 



Mid West 



PRICE GUARANTEE 

We at MidWest Micro quarantee that we can save you up to 
49% or more on your purchase of new fully warranteed 
equipment and supplies. And we will still give you friendly, 
courteous service. Call today and Save With Confidence! 



Get great hard copy and near letter quality 
with... ^-IL,^ .. 




§IE@|IR 



List st2£T9 



(Replaces the Gemini 10X) 

Hie S6-10 gives you enough versatility for home or office use. It 
operates bi-directionally at 120 cps and includes many special 
features such as near letter quality printing, easy access format 
switches lor a wide range of character modes, friction feed for single 
sheets and tractor feed For fanfold paper, and even hex dump Another 
special feature is the IBM character sets available at the flip of a 
switch. You get all of this plus a 2k memory buffer and Star's full 1 
year warranty at a price you can afford! 
Complete STAR Line $CALL$ 




brother 



printer's give you all the 
features of a letter quality 
■*-t*fX/' ond more with ... U D. 

1 List 5>JKf» SaveS 1 5XL 

The HR-15XL gives you Oaisywheel printing and added attractions 
such as text reprinting, red printing, attachable cut sheet feeder and 
the exclusive Brother keyboard attachment. Your 

Complete BROTHER Line . . . List Price 

HR-10 (12CPS) $399 . $CALL$ 

HR-15XL (17 cps. 13.5" carriage. 3k Buffer) 599. . SCALLS 

HR-15 & HR-15XL Keyboard Attachment 200. .$CALL$ 

HR-25 (23 cps, 16.5" carriage. 3k Buffer) 895 , .$CALL$ 

HR-35 (32 cps, 16.5" carriage, 7k Buffer 1245 . .$CALL$ 

Brother 2024 (160 cps. 24 pin head. NLQ Mode) 1495 . .SCALLS 

Don't spend a fortune to own the world's 
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NEW-' 
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The new EPSON LX-80 prints smoothly and quietly at a speed of 1 00 
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capabilities as standard, your correspondence will be letter perfect. 
The LX-80 comes complete with a parallel interface to quickly 
conne ct it to virtually all computers. Thereare 1 60 typesi vies thai are 
switch selectable and the LX-80 comes with EPSON'S full 1 year 
warranty. Friction feed is standard and an optional tractor feed is 
available. Let the EPSON LX-80 print your next business letter a 
report. Your 

Complete EPSON Line . . . List Price 

LX-80 (100 cps, NOL Mode, 80 Col.) 349, . SCALLS 

RX-100 (100 cps. 136 Col.) 895 399 

FX-80-H16Q cps, 80 Col. 2k Buffer) 699 , 389 

FX-100+O60 cps. 136 Col, 2k Buffer) 999 589 

LQ-1500 (200 cps. NLO Mode, 136 Col.) 1395. . . SCALLS 




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FIXES & UPDATES 



Knowledge Index Numbers Change 



In the December 1984 BYTE article 'The 
On-Line Search" by Suzana Lisanti (page 
2 15), the telephone numbers for the 
Knowledge Index database service were 
incorrect. 



The correct numbers are (800) 227-1927 
and (415) 858-3785. Knowledge Index is 
a service of Dialog Information Services 
Inc., 3460 Hillview Ave.. Palo Alto, CA 
94303. 



BYTE'S BIT 



BYTE Index Produced 



A comprehensive index of* all the articles 
that appeared in BYTE from January 1983 
through December 1984 is available. The 
BYTE '83-84 Index is 48 pages long and 
cross-references articles alphabetically by 
subject. 

Author's Guide Available 



For your copy, write to BYTE '83-84 Index. 
BYTE Publications, POB 372. Hancock. NH 
03449. Please enclose $1 to cover ship- 
ping and handling, as well as a piece of 
paper with your name and address clearly 
legible. 



The latest edition of the BYTE author's 
guide has just been produced. 

Writing for BYTE describes how to sub- 
mit an article to BYTE, the types of articles 
we seek, where to go and whom to turn 
to when writing a BYTE article, and other 

Public-Domain Software Offering 



information. 

For your copy, send a self-addressed 
stamped business envelope to Writing for 
BYTE. BYTE Publications, POB 372. 
Hancock. NH 03449. Please note that we 
cannot honor telephone requests. 



lohn Morse has written and introduced in- 
to the public domain a number of pro- 
grams. Mr. Morse developed these 
BASICA programs on the IBM PC XT 
under PC-DOS. 

The programs include a graphics editor, 
a utility that displays every character of 
any file with its hexadecimal and ASCII 
code as well as its position in a record, 
a drawing-pattern generator, three ver- 
sions of the game Mastermind, and a char- 



acter analyzer in which particular charac- 
ters in a file can be omitted, highlighted, 
or changed. 

You are free to distribute the programs, 
with the stipulation that you include Mr. 
Morse's name in each program. The pro- 
grams are available from Mr. Morse for 
$10. which includes the disk and instruc- 
tions within the program. For more infor- 
mation, write to John W. Morse, 274 State 
St.. Albany, NY 12210. 



FEEDBACK 
Serial Version of Printer Buffer 



Keith Alexander, a BYTE reader "since the 
dark ages of 1976." recently wrote us to 
say how intrigued he had been with Ion 
Bono's printer buffer and with Richard 
Carlsen's comments on the project. (See 
"Build a Printer Buffer" in the June 1984 
BYTE, page 142. and "Printer Buffer 
Messaged" on page 33 of the April 1985 
BYTE.) 

Mr. Alexander reports that he, too, built 
the buffer and that he had to make a 
number of hardware and software modi- 
fications to suit his system, a Southwest 
Technology's 6809-based unit. 



The main problem, according to Mr. 
Alexander, was connecting his serial 
printer to a single RTS (request to send) 
line. After corresponding with Mr. Bono 
and learning a lot about UARTs. Mr. 
Alexander got the circuit to work. His 
SwTPc 6809 now sends data to the buffer 
at 38.400 bps and the buffer, in turn, 
drives his Heath H-l 4 printer at 4800 bps. 

Mr. Alexander has graciously offered to 
correspond with BYTE readers interested 
in his serial version of Ion Bono's printer 
buffer. You can write to Mr. Alexander at 
20426 Lichfield. Detroit. Ml 48221. ■ 



34 BYTE • JULY 1985 



mm. mm 

■M m i&, m 




Draw Your Way to the Top 

PC-Draw Will Increase Your Office Productivity. 
And Upward Mobility. 



10 DAY 

TRIAL 

PERIOD 



I 



Imagine. You now have the capability to graphically 
depict your best ideas, plans, designs and proposals. In 
color or black & white. Accurately. Completely. Dramati- 
cally. Concepts presented so forcefully — yet so simply — 
that you leave that critical meeting 
with upper management. . . totally 
confident of success. 

And you win. Your secret 
weapon? PC-Draw. A powerful in- 
teractive graphics program for the 
IBM PC or XT®— unlike anything 
else on the market. Using PC-Draw 
you create virtually anything that can 
be drawn with pencil and paper. Quick- 
ly. Easily. With far greater detail. 

PC-Draw is ideal for presentation graphics, proposals, 



systems design, forms, diagrams . . . and an endless variety 
of charts, graphs and illustrations. PC-Draw allows you to 
produce drawings up to 99 pages long. Several templates 
come with PC-Draw including Flowcharting, Electrical 
Design, Office Layout, and Alternate Text. In addition 
you create and store your own unlimited supply of user 
defined symbols. 

PC-Draw includes an easy-to-follow interactive tuto- 
rial. Requires IBM PC or XT® or compatible, graphics 
adapter and graphics monitor. Version for PCjr available. 
Graphic boards, plotters at competitive prices. 

Shhh! Don't tell your office competition about PC-Draw. 
They'll catch on soon enough. For free brochure or to 
order call 800/2PC-DRAW. In Texas or for customer 
service call 214/234-1769. Micrografx, Inc., 1701 N. 
Greenville Ave. , Suite 305, Richardson, Texas 75081 . 



(Most popular plotters and printers supported.) 



MICROGRAFX 

The Picture of Success. 



Inquiry 240 



Discover what 50,000 




9UBIE' delivers the finest peripheral 
available in terms of features, reli- 
/ and price /performance. That's why 
corporations like IBM, GM and Exxon buy 
peripheral equipment from Qubie', and 
have for years. Check some of your old 
back issues of PC — we've been satisfying 
PC owners since 1982. 

Select products at low prices, with service and support un- 
paralleled in the microcomputer industry. Our 30 day No Risk 
Guarantee and 48 Hour Repair Service during the 12 month 
warranty period is proof our products are first rate. We stand 
behind everything we sell. No "call the manufacturer" re- 
sponses when you have a question. We also offer our exclusive 
Preferred Customer Plan* l with 24 hour repairs and 24 months 
of coverage. 

Our low, money-saving prices are the total prices. No small 
print telling you to add up for credit card charges or shipping 
and handling. Our prices include surface UPS charges and 
insurance. In a hurry? 2-day air UPS service is available.* 2 



*■->'.«% 
****&*** 



?& ^«ji>i v 









At Qubie', customer satisfaction 
is one of the cornerstones of our 
philosophy. Ask your friends, 
business associates and colleagues 
about Qubie'. Chances are they 
are one of our fifty thousand satis- 
fied customers. 



m 



\$ AT U 



EH) ■ •*, 



INTERNAL MODEM 

PC212A/ 1200 $249 

Auto-dial, Auto-Answer • 300/ 
1200 Baud Operation • Runs 
Hayes Compatible Software 
Like Crosstalk, Smartcom II, 
and Sidekick • Two Phone 
lacks Allow You To Hook Up 
Desk Phone • Includes PC- 




TALK III Software (Complete 
Communications Package), 
Modular Phone Cord, User's 
Manual / Installation Instruc- 
tions • Optional Serial Port 
($30) Allows You To Use Port 
For Other Peripherals When 
Modem Is Not Being Used. 



STANDBY POWER 
SUPPLY 

SB200 $329 
XT300 $429 
AT800 $779 





Noise Filtering /Surge Suppres- 
sion • Powers Your Computer 
For Up To 30 Minutes In The 
Event Of A Blackout Or Brown- 
out • SB200 (200 Watt) For 
Floppy-Based Systems, XT300 
(300 Watt) For Hard Disk Based 
Systems, AT800 (800 Watt) For 
Multi-User Systems 

HIGH RESOLUTION 

MONOCHROME 

MONITORS 

HR39S149 
HR 134 $159 

Plugs Into The IBM Mono- 
chrome or Compatible Adapter 
Card • 720 x 350 Resolution • 
12" Diagonal Screen • Super 
I Crisp Text Capability • High 
I Resolution TTL • Includes 
\ Tilt/Swivel Base and Inter- 
face Cable • HR 134 (Amber) 
I HR 39 (Green) 

MULTIFUNCTION CARD 

BT6Plus(0K)$195 
BT6Plus (384K) $299 

Memory Sockets For Adding 
Up To 384K • Parallel Printer 
Port • Asynchronous Serial 
Communications Port • Battery- 
powered Clock / Calendar • 
BTPak Software - BTDrive 



(Electronic Disk 
Emulation) and BTSpool 
(Print Spooling Software) • 




36 BYTE • JULY 1985 



PC owners now know. 



Optional Game Port — Chips, 
Dual Mounting Bracket and 
Cable ($20) • 64K Memory - 
Installed and Tested ($25) • j 
Includes Cable, Single Slot *J§ 
Mounting Bracket, Instal- 
lation Instructions / User's 1| 
Manual 

INTERNAL HARD DISK 
SUBSYSTEMS 

PC 10 $649 
PC20S699 

Boot From The Hard Disk — No 
Software Patches or Drivers To 
Install • Runs All The Popular 
Software • 




Low Power Consumption • 
High Reliability And Durabil- 
ity — Specially Plated Drives • 
Faster Access Time Than XT • 
Includes ldir "Visual Shell" 
Software, Cables, Mounting 
Hardware, Installation Instruc- 
tions/User's Manual, Full- 
Height Bezel — Optional 
Half-Height Bezel ($15) • Aux- 
iliary Power Supply And 
External Models Are Also 
Available. 




1- I I II LI i- I- I lEEDEl Q 



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KEYBOARD 

115151 $159 

Solid State Capacitive Key 
Switches • 3-Position Height 



Adjustment • Keys In Standard 
Typewriter Positions • Sepa- 
rate Cursor Control and 
Numeric Keypads • Easy-To- 
Read Key Legends • LED 
Indicators On All Lock Keys • 
Extra-Wide Left-Hand Control 
Key Adjacent To "A" • Control/ 
Reset Replaces Awkward 
Contol/Alt/Delete • Plugs Into 
IBM PC, PC/XT and Compaq 
Deskpro 




EXTERNAL MODEM 

212A/1200ES299 

Auto-dial, Auto-Answer • 300/ 
1200 Baud Operation • Runs 
Hayes Compatible Software 
Like Crosstalk, Smartcom II, 
And Sidekick • Two Phone 
Jacks Allow You To Hook Up 
Desk Phone • RS-232C Com- 
— patible • Includes 8' Shield- 
ed Cable (Specify Male Or 
Female) • Eight Status Indica- 
tor Lamps • External Volume 
Control Knob 



HIGH RESOLUTION 
COLOR MONITOR 

HR3 1200 $439 

14" Diagonal Screen • 
Black Matrix Picture 
Tube • Dot Pitch ,31mm • 
Plugs Into IBM Color/ 
Graphics Or Compatible 
Adapter Card • 640 x 200 
Resolution • Includes Inter- 
face Cable And Tilt / Swivel 
Base 



*I *2 

PREFERRED UPS 

CUSTOMER BLUE 

PLAN LABEL 

PC10 and PC20 .... $150.00 $12.00 

Modems 50.00 5.00 

ff5151 35.00 7.50 

BT6Plus 50.00 5.00 

HR 39 and HR 1 34 . . . . 50.00 NA 

HR31200 95.00 NA 

No Risk Guarantee 

If you are not completely satisfied 
with your purchase, you may return 
it within 30 days for a full refund, in- 
cluding the cost to send it back. 

The Acid Test 

If you can get any dealer or competi- 
tor to give you the same No Risk 
Guarantee, buy both products and 
return the one you don't like. 

For fastest delivery, send cashier's 
check, money order, or order by 
Mastercard/Visa. Personal checks, 
allow 18 days to clear. Company 
purchase orders accepted, call for 
prior authorization. California resi- 
dents, add 6% sales tax. 



Hours: M-F 8 am-5 pm PTZ 
Sat 9 am- 1 pmPTZ 

London (01) 223-4569 
Paris (01)321-5316 
Sydney (02) 579-3322 



VISA 



mtsMncharge 



Outside California 



1-800-821-4479 



Inside California 



1-805-987-9741 

4809 Calle Alto 
Camarillo, California 93010 

QUBIE 

Order Today, 
Shipped Tomorrow! 1 



Inquiry 297 



JULY 1985 • BYTE 37 




R?R fleoPLE WHO 

THOUGHT Trim? 

NEVER MEET Trie 

PERFECT IO 

We've got one to knock your socks 
off. The StarWriter™ F10 from Qltoh. 

What sets this daisy wheel apart is 
its fabulous figure of 58 letter perfect 
characters per second, at a price of 
up to $1,000 less than other leading 
printers in its class. 

It's compatible with most of the 
popular PCs and offers a full line of 
accessories, including a cut sheet 
feeder and tractor feed. 

And like the rest of C.ltoh's printers, 
the F10 acts without acting up. 

It has been thoroughly tested and 
proven on the job to assure reliability. 
Plus, you get a full year's warranty, 
backed by over 350 authorized ser- 
vice centers coast to coast. 

The F10 is one hot printer for the 
money. But that's not surprising when 
you consider that C. Itoh 's been pro- 
ducing superior printers for over a 
decade, thanks to the strong backing 
of our 126-year-old parent company 
with over $60 billion in sales annually 

Little wonder C.ltoh printers are the 
best selling printers in the world. 

To meet your Perfect 10, just see your 
local C.ltoh dealer. Or for more infor- 
mation, call toll free 1-800-423-0300. 

Or write C.ltoh Digital Products, Inc., 
19750 South Vermont Avenue, Suite 
220, Torrance, CA 90502. 

'" StarWriter is a Trademark of C.ltoh Digital Products. Inc. 
© 1985 C.ltoh Digital Products. Inc. 



© 1984 News Group Chicago, Inc. 



,l jtmmmwt t mummnwA mammm* 




C.ITPH 

Printers 



38 BYTE • JULY 1985 



Inquiry 65 for End-Users. Inquiry 66 for DEALERS ONLY. 



WHAT'S NEW 



Xerox Products 

Xerox recently an- 
nounced the 6085 
microcomputer, a line of 
personal microcomputers, 
and a laser printer. 

The Xerox 6085 is offered 
in models for network, 
remote, and stand-alone 
operation. The networked 
and remote models can 
share resources linked by 
Ethernet. 

The 6085 is founded upon 
Xerox's Mesa processor, an 
8-MHz device. The Mesa 
processor has 2 56 auxiliary 
registers and executes 48- 
bit-wide instructions. The 
6085 also uses an 80186 
chip as an auxiliary 
processor. 

The basic 6085 comes 
with 1.1 megabytes of 
memory, a 10-megabyte 
hard-disk drive, two serial 
ports, and a 1 5-inch high- 
resolution (880- by 697- 
pixel) monochrome display. 
You can expand it to include 
3.7 megabytes of memory 
and up to 80 megabytes of 
hard-disk storage. 

Xerox offers hard-disk 
drives with 20. 40. or 80 
megabytes of storage, and a 
360K-byte floppy-disk drive 
is also available. An optional 
board gives the 6085 the 
ability to run software 
prepared for IBM PC-DOS. 

System software includes 
the Viewpoint windowing 
package, which uses icons 
and is controlled with an 
optical mouse. Viewpoint is 
$125. A variety of applica- 
tions software, including a 
software-development 
package, is planned. 

The 6085 begins at $4995. 




The Xerox 6085. 




The Xerox 4045 laser CR 



The Xerox 6060 family of 
PCs comprises four com- 
puters: a pair of IBM PC 
work-alikes. the Xerox 6064 
and 6065. and two dedi- 
cated word-processing 
systems, the Xerox 6067 and 



6068. The 6067 and 6068 
keyboards have been modi- 
fied for word processing. 
Both systems come bundled 
with Xerox's word-pro- 



cessing software and can 
run MS-DOS applications 
software. 

Each Xerox 6060 comes 
with ScreenMate. a menu- 
based shell program for in- 
teracting with MS-DOS. 

The general-purpose 6064. 
with two 360K-byte floppy- 
disk drives and 256K bytes 
of memory, retails for 
$2885. The hard-disk-based 
6065 lists for $4485. 

At $2985. the 6067 in- 
cludes dual floppy-disk 
drives and 384K bytes of 
RAM. The 6068, which is 
equipped with a 10-mega- 
byte hard disk and 51 2K 
bytes of memory, costs 
$5150. Both the 6067 and 
the 6068 use a 640- by 
400-pixel monochrome 
display. 

Xerox rates its 4045 Laser 
CP "lasographic" printer at 
10 pages per minute and 
5000 pages a month. It 
comes with 128K bytes of 
memory, two fonts, and your 
choice of Centronics or 
Dataproducts parallel ports 
or an RS-232C asynchronous 
connection. Additional 
cartridge-based fonts are 
offered. 

If you choose to expand 
the 4045 Laser CP to its full 
512K bytes of memory, you 
can reproduce a 5- by 
7-inch image in a 300- by 
300-dot-per-inch format. 
You can reproduce a full- 
page graphic at 150 by 150 
dots per inch. The 4045 
Laser CP has a 2 50-sheet 
paper cassette, and cas- 
settes for European paper 
are available. It's compatible 
with the Diablo 630 daisy- 
wheel printer. 

A copier option lets the 
404 5 Laser CP function as a 
standard photocopier. Other 
{continued) 



JULY 1985 -BYTE 39 



WHAT'S NEW 



options include an envelope 
cassette, an interface that 
permits four PCs to share its 
resources, and a network in- 
terface for linking the 4045 
Laser CP to IBM 3274/3276 
networks and Systems 
34/36/38 environments. The 
suggested list price for the 
404 5 Laser CP is $4995. 

Contact Xerox Corp.. 
Xerox Square 006. 
Rochester. NY 14644. (716) 
423-5078. 
Inquiry 600. 



IBM PC XT, 

PC AT-Compatible 

Computers 

NCR's PC8 and PC6 are 
compatible with IBM 
PC AT and IBM PC XT com- 
puters, respectively. 

The PC8 can serve as a 
stand-alone computer, as a 
16-member multiuser sys- 
tem, or as a network server 
for up to 63 nodes. In its 
single-user configuration, the 
PC8 runs under NCR-DOS 
3.1. The multiuser operating 
system is XENIX. 

Featuring Intel's 6-MHz 
80286 microprocessor, the 
PC8 is reportedly able to 
run virtually any software 
designed for the IBM PC AT 
without modification. It can 
also use AI-compatible 
hardware. 

Standard are 2 56K bytes 
of RAM. a 1.2-megabyte 
floppy-disk drive, six expan- 
sion slots for devices with 
8-/1 6-bit data paths, two ex- 
pansion slots for devices 
with 8-bit data paths, and a 
battery-backed system clock. 
The keyboard has LED in- 
dicators and 30 program- 
mable function keys. 

Optional are a mono- 
chrome monitor with a non- 
glare 80-character by 2 5-line 
display and 640- by 
400-pixel resolution and a 




The NCR PC8. 



14-inch color monitor with 
16-color capabilities. GW- 
BASIC is available, and inter- 
nal memory is expandable 
up to 4 megabytes. 

The basic PC8 begins at 
$3795. A configuration with 
51 2 K bytes of RAM. a 
floppy-disk drive, and a 
20-megabyte hard-disk unit 
is $5505. 

The PC6 is supplied with 
Intel's dual-speed (i.e.. 4.77/ 
8-MHz) 8088-2 micropro- 
cessor, 2 56K bytes of RAM. 
twin 360K-byte floppy-disk 
drives. RS-232C and parallel 
interfaces, and eight expan- 
sion slots. It comes with 
NCR-DOS, which provides 
compatibility with the IBM 
PC XT. An on-line help pro- 
gram. GW-BASIC. and a pair 
of tutorial software packages 
are also standard. 

A number of mass-storage 
configurations are offered, 
including 20 megabytes of 
hard-disk storage and 10 
megabytes of streaming-tape 
backup. 

Options include mono- 
chrome and color monitors. 
PC6 pricing begins at $2583. 



Contact NCR Corp.. Dayton, 
OH 45479. (513) 445-2075. 
Inquiry 601. 

Visual Environment 
for C Programmers 

Living C— Personal is a 
visual programming en- 
vironment for C-language 
programmers. It facilitates 
the design, development, 
maintenance, and debugging 
of C programs by showing 
you exactly what happens at 
each step of a program's 
execution. 

You can use Living C— 
Personal to animate your 
source code during execu- 
tion. You can do this state- 
ment by statement within 
user-specified breakpoints or 
through the entire program. 
When a bug is found during 
compilation. Living C— 
Personal does not force you 



to abandon the environment 
because its full-screen editor 
is still available. 

With Living C— Personal, 
your program's output is 
separated from the debug- 
ging information by on- 
screen windows. You can 
use the window facility to 
continuously display a vari- 
able's value or to examine 
and alter the variable. 

Living C— Personal pro- 
vides help facilities and ex- 
plicit error diagnostics, and 
it conforms to the Kernighan 
& Ritchie C standard. It runs 
under PC-DOS and is priced 
at $99. Contact Living Soft- 
ware. London House. 243- 
2 53 Lower Mortlake Rd.. 
Richmond. Surry. England; 
tel: 44 1 948 5166; Telex; 
946 240 cweasy. 
Inquiry 602. 

IBM Jetprinter and 
Proprinter 

IBM has announced a 
color ink-jet printer and a 
replacement for its dot- 
matrix Graphics Printer. 

The ink-jet Color jetprinter 
can produce hard copy in 
seven colors. Its dot resolu- 
tion is 100 by 96 pixels per 
inch. The Color Jetprinter 
sells for $745. 

The dot-matrix printer, 
called the Proprinter. is 
compatible with the Graph- 
ics Printer but is faster, with 
an advertised speed of 200 
cps in draft mode and 40 
cps in near-letter-quality 
mode. It has a maximum 
horizontal resolution of 240 
pixels per inch. The 
Graphics Printer, which 
Epson manufactured, is be- 
ing discontinued. The Pro- 
printer is made by IBM and 
sells for $549. 

Contact IBM Corp.. Infor- 
mation Systems Group, 900 
King St.. Rye Brook. NY 
10573. 
Inquiry 603. 

{continued) 



40 BYTE • JULY 1985 






*§* 



They said it couldn't be done. 
Borland Did It.Turbo Pascal 3j0 



The industry standard 

With more than 250,000 users worldwide Turbo 
Pascal is the industry's de facto standard. Turbo 
Pascal is praised by more engineers, hobbyists, 
students and professional programmers than any 
other development environment in the history of 
microcomputing. And yet, Turbo Pascal is 
simple and fun to use! 



TURBO 
3.0 



TURBO 
2.0 



MS 
PASCAL 



COMPILATION SPEED 



EXECUTION SPEED 



CODE SIZE 



BUILT-IN INTERACTIVE EDITOR 



ONE STEP COMPILE 

(NO LINKING NECESSARY) 



COMPILER SIZE 



TURTLE GRAPHICS 



BCD OPTION 



PRICE 




Portability. 

Turbo Pascal is available today for most com- 
puters running PC DOS, MS DOS, CP/M 80 or 
CP/M 86. A XENIX version of Turbo Pascal will 
soon be announced, and before the end of the 
year, Turbo Pascal will be running on most 68000 
based microcomputers. 

An Offer You Can't Refuse. 

Until June 1st, 1985, you can get Turbo Pascal 3.0 
for only $69.95. Turbo Pascal 3.0, equipped with 
eitherdhe BCD or 8087 options, is available for an 
additional $39.95 or Turbo Pascal 3.0 with both options 
for only $124.95. As a matteiioffact, if; you own a 16- 
Bit computer and are serious about programming, you 
might as well get both options right away and save 
almost $25. 



Update policy 

As always, our first commitment is to our customers. 
You built Boriand and we wi/l always honor your support. 

So, to make your upgrade to the exciting new version of 
Turbo Pascal 3.0 easy, we will accept your original Turbo 
Pascal disk (in a bend-proof container) for a trade-in credit 
of $39.95 and your Turbo87 original disk for $59.95. This 
trade-in credit may only be applied toward the purchase of 
Turbo Pascal 3.0 and its additional BCD and 8087 options 
(trade-in offer is only valid directly through Borland and until 
June 1st. 1985). 



O Benchmark run on an IBM PC using MS Pascal version 3.2 and 
the DOS linker version 2.6. The 179 line program used is the "Gauss 
Seidel" program out of Alan R Miller's book: Pascal programs fa- 
scientists and engineers (Sybex, page 128) with a 3 dimensional 
non-singular matrix and a relaxation coefficient of 1.0. 



The best Just got better: 
Introducing Turbo Pascal 3.0 

We just added a whole range of exciting new 
features to Turbo Pascal: 

• First, the world's fastest Pascal compiler just got 
faster. Turbo Pascal 3.0 (16 bit version) compiles 
twice as fast as Turbo Pascal 2.0! No kidding. 

• Then, we totally rewrote the file I/O system, and 
we also now support I/O redirection. 

• For the IBM PC versions, we've even added 
"turtle graphics" and full tree directory support. 

• For all 16 Bit versions, we now offer two addi- 
tional options: 8087 math coprocessor support 
for intensive calculations and Binary Coded 
Decimals (BCD) for business applications. 

• And much much more. 

The Critics' Choice. 

Jeff Duntemann, PC Magazine: "Language 
deal of the century . . . Turbo Pascal: It 
introduces a new programming environment and 
runs like magic." 

Dave Garland, Popular Computing: "Most 
Pascal compilers barely fit on a disk, but Turbo 
Pascal packs an editor, compiler, linker, and run- 
time library into just 39K bytes of random- 
access memory" 

Jerry Poumelle, BYTE: "What I think the 
computer industry is headed for: well 
documented, standard, plenty of good features, 
and a reasonable price." 



t 



BORIAOD 

INTERNATIONAL 



Softwares Newest Direction 

4585 Scotts Valley Drive 
Scotts Valley, GA 95066 
TELEX 172373 



Turbo Pascal Is a registered trademark of Borland International. Inc. 

PC Week is a trademark of Ziff-Davis Pub. Co. 

Inquiry 55 for End-Users. Inquiry 56 for DEALERS ONLY. 




WHAT'S NEW 



siiiiiiiiiimimimiiiniiiMm[#l v iRWwmwmi 



P/aster286. ah 80286 add-in board for the IBM. 



80286 Add-in Board 
for IBM PC and 
PC XT 

Phoenix Computer Prod- 
ucts' Pfaster286 is an 
8-MHz 80286-based add-in 
board that gives the IBM PC 
and PC XT the ability to 
process data at a faster rate 
than the IBM PC AT. It does 
not impair the functionality 
of the PC's or PC XT's resi- 
dent 8088 microprocessor: 
rather Pfaster286 reassigns 
the 8088's intelligence to I/O 
management. 

Pfaster286 can run MS- 
DOS 2.0. 2.1, and 3.1 pro- 
grams, and applications 
designed for the IBM PC 
and PC AT will operate with 
it. Pfaster286 has software 
switches that let you jump 
back and forth into the 
native 8088 mode for those 
applications requiring that 
chip's performance charac- 
teristics. 

The basic Pfaster286 is 
supplied with I megabyte of 
RAM, expandable to 2 
megabytes, and an empty 
socket for an 80287 floating- 
point processor. Your oper- 
ating system and applica- 
tions software can use ap- 
proximately 704K bytes of 
this board's RAM. Some of 
its miscellaneous features 
are disk caching, diag- 
nostics, four DMA channels, 



eight levels of priority inter- 
rupts, and 16K bytes of 
EPROM expandable to 256K 
bytes. 

Pfaster286 is $2395. which 
includes an 8088 service 
program to call up the 
board and to load Pfaster- 
286's AT ROM BIOS- 
emulation software. The 
80287 mathematics co- 
processor is $3 50, and 
512K-byte RAM increments 
are $400. Contact Phoenix 
Computer Products Corp., 
Suite 115, 1420 Providence 
Highway. Norwood, MA 
02062. (800) 344-7200; in 
Massachusetts, (617) 
762-5030. 
Inquiry 604. 



High-Speed Modem 

An asynchronous 9600- 
bps modem, the UPTA 
96. comes in an internal, 
piggyback version for the 
IBM Personal Computer and 
in a stand-alone configura- 
tion with an RS-232C con- 
nector for a variety of com- 
puters. The suggested retail 
price for the add-in card is 
$795, and the stand-alone 
UPTA 96 is $895. 

This intelligent half-duplex 
modem operates over stan- 
dard dial-up telephone lines 
or through computer-to- 
computer links. It's data-rate 
selectable for 4800-, 7200-. 
and 9600-bps transmission 
speeds, with automatic fall- 
back to 72.00 or 4800 bps 
when noisy lines are en- 
countered during 9600-bps 
communications. Standard 



are automatic adaptive 
equalization to ensure data 
integrity, auto-dial, auto- 
answer, full-duplex emula- 
tion, and compatibility with 
the Hayes command set. 

The UPTA 96 comes with 
proprietary error-detec- 
tion/correction circuitry firm- 
ware known as EDI (Ensured 
Data Integrity). EDI orga- 
nizes data into numerically 
sequenced packets, with 
each byte subject to a 
cyclic-redundancy check and 
packet-check generation dur- 



ing transmission. The pro- 
tocol also offers selective 
automatic request for trans- 
mission (ARQ). 

The UPTA 96 supports 
asynchronous 3270 and 
VT100 emulation software. 
It's FCC-certified for direct 
connection to the public- 
switched telephone network 
by means of a USOC RJII 
jack. Contact Electronic 
Vaults Inc., Suite 714, 8350 
Greensboro Dr., McLean, VA 
22102, (703) 883-0331. 
Inquiry 605. 




The Zenith Z-200 is compatible with IBM's PC AT 



Zenith's Zr200 
Advanced PC 

Zenith Data Systems' 
Z-200 Advanced PC, an 
IBM PC AT-compatible com- 
puter, uses Intel's 6-MHz 
80286 microprocessor and 
no-wait-state technology for 
increased processing speed. 
The standard model comes 
with 51 2K bytes of dynamic 
RAM, a single 1.2-megabyte 
floppy-disk drive, six expan- 
sion slots that can accom- 
modate AT hardware, and 
MS-DOS 3.1. It costs $3999. 
RS-232C, Centronics paral- 
lel, and video interface ports 
are provided on this com- 
puter. A choice of video 
cards is offered. The Z-200 
Advanced PC also comes 
with a combination Win- 
chester/floppy-disk controller 



board that can handle two 
floppy- and three hard-disk 
drives. 

The Z-200 Advanced PC's 
keyboard features enlarged 
backspace, delete/insert, 
caps lock, scroll lock, and 
system request keys. Impres- 
sion marks on the home-row 
keys have been included. 

The Z-200 Advanced PC's 
dynamic RAM can be ex- 
panded to 16 .megabytes in 
I.5-megabyte increments. 
XENIX is available for 
multiuser, multitasking en- 
vironments. The Z-200 Ad- 
vanced PC can be obtained 
with a 20-megabyte hard 
disk for $5599. 

Contact Zenith Data Sys- 
tems Corp., 1000 Milwaukee 
Ave., Glen view, IL 6002 5. 
(800) 842-9000. ext. I; in 
Illinois. (312) 391-8949. 
Inquiry 606. 

[continued) 



42 BYTE • IULY 1985 



INFOWORLD'S SOFTWARE PRODUCT OF THE YEAR 



Borland's SideKick Will Clear 

Your Desk In 30 Minutes And 

Increase Your Productivity By 50% 

SideKick is a combination of seven desktop accessories, which makes SideKick the 
single most effective business tool. Just a keystroke suspends your application 
program, giving you a window into : SideKick. Another keystroke brings 

you back to where you were . Instantly It's that easy. 



A FULL-SCREEN W0R0STAR™- 
UKE E0IT0R 

You may jot down notes and 
edit files up to 25 pages long. 

AN ASCII TABLE 

for easy reference! 

AN AUTODIALER 

for all your phone calls? 
It will look up and dial 
telephone numbers for you) 
(A modem is required to use 
this function.) 

A PHONE DIRECTORY 

for your names, 
addresses and 
telephone numbers. 
Finding a name or a 
number becomes 
a snap. 




A MONTHLY CALENDAR 

functional from year 
1901 through year 2099- 

A DATEB00K 

to remind you of 

important meetings 

and appointments. 

A FULL-FEATURED 
CALCULATOR 

ideal for business use. 
It also performs decimal 
to hexadecimal to 
binary conversions. 

COPY-PROTECTED 

$54.95 

NOT COPY-PROTECTED 
$84.95 






» BORlflflD 

B INTERNATIONAL 



4585 Scotts Valley Drive 
Scotts Valley. CA 95066 
(408)438-8400 Telex: 172373 

THE CRITICS' CHOICE 

"In a simple, beautiful implementation of 
WordStar'.?* block copy commands, SIDEKICK 
can transport all or any part of the display screen 
(even an area overlaid by tJje notepad display) to 
tbe notepad. " Charles Petzoid. PC MAGAZINE 

"SIDEKICK desertJes a place in every PC. " 
GanyRay.PCWEEK 

"SIDEKICK is by for the best we've seen. It is also 
the least expensive. " Ron Mansfield, ENTREPRENEUR 

"If you use a PC, get SIDEKICK You '11 soon 
become dependent on it. " Jerry Pournelle, BYTE 

Copyright 1985 Borland International BI-1008 

SideKick is a trademark of Borland International, inc. 

IBM and PC-DOS are registered trademarks of International 

Business Machines Coip. 

lnfoworld is a trademark of Popular Computing, Inc. a subsidiary 

of CW Communications, Inc. 

WordStar is a registered trademark of Micropro International Corp. 

Inquiry 57 for End-Users. Inquiry 58 for DEALERS ONLY. 



1 
1 
1 



V* '-» *.V ' /L^S^^-f^l!- " T^rfofthe dealer 



Please send me w 

copy - p ; d s3 c 3 e o^ 9 -^ j 

(C Ares.add$3.J ^ ^^ 
Quantity: . 

fCA res.add^- lu ^ $Q4 g 5 
Quantity'' — 






software for your 




WHAT'S NEW 




The Tiger-32 accommodates 2 megabytes of no-w ait-state RAM. 



NS32032 Add-in 
Board for IBM 

The Tiger-32 is a 32-bit 
add-in board for IBM 
PC. PC XT. and PC AT com- 
puters. It has a 6- or 
10-MHz National Semicon- 
ductor NS32032 or NS- 
32016 central processor, an 
NS32082 demand-paged 
virtual-memory manager, 
and from 512K bytes to 2 
megabytes of no- wait-state 
RAM. Tiger-32 comes with 
Microsoft-Logica's XENIX-32 
version 3.0. a two-user 
operating system. 

The Tiger-32 can execute 
large programs, but it does 
not execute IBM PC code 



directly. It can function as 
expansion memory or as a 
disk emulator. Among its 
hardware specifications are 
two RAM ports, parity error 
checking, and 150-nano- 
second access time. 

The board has both linear 
and window modes. In its 
linear mode, the Tiger-32 
acts as an expansion mem- 
ory. The window mode lets 
your PC access the 
Tiger- 3 2 "s RAM through any 
one of sixteen 128K-byte 
windows. 

With XENIX-32. this board 
uses PC-DOS 2.0 or higher 
as an input/output pro- 
cessor. The Tiger-32 comes 
with a visual shell interface. 



software-development 
utilities with C and assembly 
language, and communica- 
tions, text-processing, in- 
stallation, interfacing, and 
test software. 

Up to 2 megabytes of 
RAM and a 32-bit floating- 
point mathematics unit are 
optional. Software options 
include remote user capa- 
bility. BASIC. COBOL. FOR- 
TRAN, and Pascal. 

The Tiger-32 with 51 2 K 
bytes of RAM. a 6-MHz 
NS32016. and XENIX-32 is 
$2495. With the NS32032. 
it's $2795. The mathematics 
unit is $42 5 at 10 MHz and 
$275 at 6 MHz. Contact 
DFE Electronic Data Sys- 
tems, Suite 115. 5820 
Stoneridge Mall Rd.. 
Pleasanton. CA 94566. (415) 
847-2024. 
Inquiry 607. 

Macintosh 
Spreadsheet 

Crunch for the 512K-byte. 
single-drive Macintosh is 
an integrated spreadsheet 



* File Edit 




Format Font 

MM 



Directory Graph Database Special 



□d rzm ++ 

C R v 



EHMfflHHBSHH 



Coffee Projections 



B 



5181 


5182 


5183 


5184 


5185 


5186 


5187 


5188 


5189 


5190 


5191 


5192 


5193 



5194 



Light Coffee 

Colombian 
Kenye 
Kone 
Tet*I 

Roast Coffee 

French Roast 

Vienna 
House Blend 

Tetal 




QTR1 QTR2 QTR3 QTR4 QTR5 QTR6 QTR7 



4,362 4,319 

2,319 2,376 

2,114 2,127 

8,795 8,822 



1,973 1,996 2,0 

1,645 1,680 1,7 

1,524 1,593 1,6 

5,142 5,269 5,3 



program with graphics, data- 
management, and notekeep- 
ing capabilities. The sug- 
gested retail price is $295. 

Crunch's spreadsheet gives 
you a 2 50-column by 9999- 
row work area, and it can 
be linked with other work- 
sheets. Depending upon the 
font used, you can display 
up to 3 1 rows on the 
screen. Wide spreadsheets 
can be printed out sideways. 

Seventy-four mathematics, 
trigonometric, statistics, 
logic, financial, table, and 
date functions are built into 
Crunch. In addition, it has 
three special functions and 
gives you the ability to de- 
fine up to 1000 functions. 

Crunch can perform both 
natural-order and row-wise 
calculations. You can hide or 
password-protect cells con- 
taining sensitive data. Other 
features include audit trails, 
variable-width columns, ad- 
justable cell alignment, and 
the ability to assign names 
to cells, ranges, formulas, 
and constants. 

You can link graphs to 
worksheets, and four graphs 
can be displayed simulta- 
neously. Crunch produces 
pie. line. bar. and area 
graphs. 

Crunch's data manager 
organizes worksheet rows 
into database records any- 
where within the worksheet. 
You can use it to perform 
calculations on records, and 
you can sort records. 
Crunch's notepad can be 
used for merging informa- 
tion with other programs 
and to keep VA pages of 
worksheet documentation. 

Crunch uses icons, win- 
dows, and a consistent set 
of commands. It works with 
the Apple Numeric Keypad 
and supports the LaserWriter 
and the Imagewriter. Contact 
Paladin Software Corp.. 2895 
Zanker Rd.. San Jose. CA 
95134. (408) 946-9000. 
Inquiry 608. 

(continued) 



Sample multiwindow display produced by Crunch. 



44 BYTE • 1ULY 1985 



ATTENTION SIDEKICK USERS: SUPERKEY IS 
SIDEKICK'S BEST COMPANION. GET SUPERKEY TODAY! 



Borland's SuperKey 

lets one powerful keystroke do 

the work of hundreds and helps 

keep your confidential files . . . 

confidential! 



SUPERKEY TURNS 1000 INTO 1! Yes, SuperKey can 
record lengthy keystroke sequences and play them 
back at the touch of a single key. Instantly. Like 
Magic. Say, for example, you want to add a column 
of figures in 1-2-3. Without SuperKey you'd have 
to type seven keystrokes just to get started. 
[' shift^-s^-m-shiftO 1 ]. With SuperKey you 
can turn those 7 keystrokes into 1. 

SUPERKEY HELPS PROTECT YOUR 
CAPITAL INVESTMENT. SuperKey, at 
your convenience, will make 
your screen go blank after a 
predetermined time of 
screen/keyboard inactivity 
You've paid hard-earned 
money for your PC. SuperKey 
will protect your monitor's 
precious phosphor . . . and 
your investment. This feature 
alone justifies your SuperKey 
purchase! 




SUPERKEY KEEPS YOUR 'CONFIDENTIAL' FILES . . . 
CONFIDENTIAL! Time after time you've experi- 
enced it: anyone can walk up to your PC, and read 
your confidential files (tax returns, business 
plans, customer lists, personal letters . . .). With 
SuperKey you can encrypt any file, even while 
running another program. As long as you keep 
the password secret, only YOU can decode 
your file. SuperKey implements the 
^> US. government Data Encryption 
Standard (DES). 

SUPERKEY PROTECTS YOUR 
WORK FROM INTRUDERS 
WHILE YOU TAKE A BREAK. 

Now you can lock your 
keyboard at any time. Prevent 
anyone from changing hours 
of work Type in your secret 
password and everything comes 
v \ y y back to life . . . just as you left it. 



BORlPflD 

INTERNATIONAL 



Machine 



4585 Scotts Valley Drive 
Scotts Valley, CA 95066 
(408) 438-8400 Telex: 172373 

inquiry 59 for End-Users. Inquiry 60 for DEALERS ONLY. 

THECmimCHME 

'While most people onfy talk about low-cost 
personal computer software, Borland has been 
doing something about it. And Borland provides 
good technical support as part of the price. " 
John Markoh& Paul Frel forger, syndicated columnists 

"What I think the computer industry is headed 
for: well-documented, standard, plenty of good 
features, and a reasonable price. " 
Jsrry Pournslle, BYTE 



Copyright 1985 Borland International BI-1009 

SuperKey is a trademark of Borland Jmemarional, Inc. 
1-2-3 is a trademark of Lotus Development Corp. 
IBM is a registered trademark of International Business 
Machines Corp. 



GeW our 



\BM 



PC 



compa 1 



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nearest you. » ^ ^^^ 



*69 95 I. 

.„ all ^A I 



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faag| 



vpsi Please rush 
SuperKey tome. 
Send me 
copi es - 



1 
1 




WHAT'S NEW 



Spectravideo 
Product Line 

Spectravideo recently in- 
troduced four com- 
puters: two IBM PC-com- 
patibles, a laptop, and a 
dedicated word processor. 
In a related announcement. 
Spectravideo said that it will 
begin delivering its MSX Ex- 
press (Model SVI-738) com- 
puter in September. This 
computer has a 3 /2-inch 
floppy-disk drive, a 73-key 
keyboard. 64K bytes of 
RAM. and an 80-column- 
display capability The MSX 
Express will sell for $595. 

Spectravideo's Bondwell 
34 and 36 are 16-bit desk- 
top computers that are com- 
patible with the IBM Per- 
sonal Computer. The 2 56K- 
byte Spectravideo Bondwell 
34 comes with dual 5!4-inch 
double-sided double-density 
floppy-disk drives, an 80- 
column monochrome-moni- 
tor interface, and a 
Centronics-type parallel in- 
terface. GW-BASIC and MS- 
DOS are bundled with this 
system. The planned release 
date is in October, and the 
suggested retail price will be 
$1795. 

The Spectravideo Bondwell 
36 carries most of the fea- 
tures of the Bondwell 34, 
except that its storage sys- 
tem comprises a 10-mega- 
byte hard-disk drive and a 
single floppy-disk unit. It, 
too. is scheduled for an Oc- 
tober release. The Spectra- 
video Bondwell 36 will retail 
for $2995. 

An 11 -pound, battery- 
rechargeable device, the 
Spectravideo Bondwell 2 
laptop computer runs under 
CP/M 2.2. It's built around 
the Z80L microprocessor 
and offers an integral 3/2- 
inch single-sided double- 
density floppy-disk drive and 




frv v,v,v,v 



The BT/AT is hardware- and software-compatible with the AT. 



an 80-column by 25-line 
LCD screen. The screen 
resolution is 640 by 200 
pixels, and the formatted 
floppy-disk storage capacity 
is 360 K bytes. 

Six MicroPro software 
packages come with this 
computer: WordStar. Report- 
Star. CalcStar. MailMerge. 
DataStar, and Scheduler 
Plus. Options include an ex- 
ternal 3 '/2-inch disk drive 
and a carrying case. The 
Spectravideo Bondwell 2 
should retail for less than 
$1000 when it's released in 
September. 

The Spectravideo Bondwell 
22 is a 16-bit. 8088-based 
word-processing system with 
dual monitors for text and 
menu displays. Its 97-key 
keyboard has 31 software- 
programmable function keys 
and a trackball cursor con- 
troller. The Spectravideo 
Bondwell 22 comes with a 
pair of floppy-disk drives, a 
hard-disk interface, a real- 
time clock, two RS-232C 
ports, a Centronics-type 
parallel interface, and a 
daisy-wheel printer. 

This system's word-pro- 
cessing software offers 
document merge and forms 
generation, as well as a con- 



version program for access- 
ing WordStar files from 
other computers. A clock 
program with an alarm, 
calendar, and reminder func- 
tions is provided. Shipments 
are to begin in January 
1986. Pricing had not been 
determined at press time. 

Contact Spectravideo Inc.. 
3300 Seldon Court #10. Fre- 
mont, CA 94539. (415) 
490-4300. 
Inquiry 609. 

BT/AT Computer 
Is Compatible 
with PC AT 

The BT/AT from Basic 
Time is compatible with 
hardware and software de- 
signed for the IBM PC AT 
computer. 

Based on Intel's 16-bit 
80286 microprocessor, 
which runs at 6 MHz. the 
BT/AT comes with 640K 
bytes of RAM, eight expan- 
sion slots, and two serial 
and two parallel ports. Its 
monochrome graphics 
adapter card is compatible 
with the Hercules card, and 



the display resolution is 720 
by 348 pixels. The BT/AT's 
12-inch green monitor is 
mounted on a tilt-and-swivel 
base. 

Mass storage is provided 
by a 44-megabyte hard-disk 
drive and a 1.2 -mega byte 
floppy-disk drive that can 
read and write 360K-byte 
floppy disks. The average ac- 
cess time for the hard disk 
is 30 milliseconds. 

The BT/AT comes with MS- 
DOS 3.1 and GW-BASIC. and 
it has an open socket for an 
80287 mathematics co- 
processor. Options include a 
multifunction board, a high- 
resolution monitor, and a 
color graphics adapter. A 
70-megabyte hard-disk drive 
and a 60-megabyte stream- 
ing-tape backup are also 
available. 

The suggested retail price 
for the BT/AT is $4495. Con- 
tact Basic Time. Building 52. 
3350 Scott Blvd.. Santa 
Clara. CA 95054. (408) 
727-0877. 
Inquiry 610. 

Programmable 
Logic Chips 

Altera's EP310 is an eras- 
able programmable- 
logic chip that uses Intel's 
CHMOS technology for low 
power consumption. You can 
program this chip to have 
the equivalent of 300 logic 
gates. 

The EP310 is a 20-pin DIP 
device that can be pro- 
grammed using Altera's 
PLDS2 (Programmable Logic 
Development System), a 
$2 500 software/hardware 
combination that attaches to 
an IBM PC. You can erase 
the EP310 with an ultraviolet 
eraser. 

The EP310 chips cost 
$11.79 in 100-unit quantities. 
Contact Altera Corp.. 3 52 5 
Monroe St.. Santa Clara. CA 
95051, (408) 984-2800. 
Inquiry 611. 

[continued on page 406) 



46 B YTE • JULY 1985 




, Power, Price. 
Borland's Tlirbo Pascal Family. 



The industry Standard. With more than 250,000 users worldwide Turbo Pascal is the industry's de facto standard. 
Turbo Pascal is praised by more engineers, hobbyists, students and professional programmers than any other development 
environment in the history of microcomputing. And yet, Turbo Pascal is simple and fun to use! 

Jeff Duntemann, PC Magazine: "Language deal of the centuiy . . . Turbo Pascal: It introduces a new 
programming environment and runs like magic" 

Oave Garland, Popular Computing: "Most Pascal compilers barely fit on a disk, but Turbo Pascal packs an editor, compiler, linker, 
and run-time library into just 29K bytes of random-access memory" 

Jerry Pournelle, BYTE: 'What I think the computer industry is headed for: well documented, standard, plenty of good features, 
and a reasonable price." 

Portability. Turbo Pascal is available today for most computers running PC DOS. MS DOS. CP/M 80 or CP/M 86. A XENIX verison of Turbo 
Pascal will soon be announced, and before the end of the year, Turbo Pascal will be running on most 68000 based microcomputers. 





High resolution monochrome graphics for the IBM PC and the Zenith 100 computers 

Dazzling graphics and painless WindCWS. The Turbo Graphix Toolbox will give even a beginning programmer 
the expert's edge. It's a complete library of Pascal procedures that include: 

Full graphics window management. 

—Tools that will allow you to draw and hatch pie charts, bar charts, circles, rectangles and a full range of geometric shapes. 
Procedures that will save and restore graphic images to and from disk. 
-Functions that will allow you to precisely plot curves. 

—Tools that will allow you to create animation or solve those difficult curve fitting problems, 
and much, much more 

NO Sweat and no royalties. You may incorporate part, or all of these tools in your programs, 
and yet, we won't charge you any royalties. Best of all, these functions and procedures come complete 
with commented source code on disk ready to compile! 








KgP r 






& 



Searching and sorting made simple 

The perfect Complement tO TurbO Pascal. It contains: Turbo-Access, a powerful implementation of the state-of-the-art B+tree ISAM 
technique; Turbo-Sort, a super efficient implementation of the fastest data sorting algorithm, "Quicksort on disk". And much more. 

Jeriy Pournelle, BYTE: "The tools include a B+tree search and a sorting system; I've seen stuff like this, but not 
as well thought out, sell for hundreds of dollars." 

Get Started right away: free database! Included on every Toolbox disk is the source code to a working 
data base which demonstrates how powerful and easy to use the Turbo-Access system really is. 
Modify it to suit your individual needs or just compile it and run. 

Remember, no royalties! 





From Start to Finish in 300 pages. Turbo Tutor 

is for everyone, from novice to expert. Even if you've never 
programmed before, Turbo Tutor will get you started right away. 
If you already have some experience with Pascal or another 
programming language, Turbo Tutor will take you step by step 
through topics like data structures and pointers. If you're an expert, 
you'll love the sections detailing subjects such as "how to use assem- 
bly language routines with your Turbo Pascal programs." 

A must. You'll find the source code for all 
the examples in the book on the accompanying 
disk ready to compile. Turbo Tutor might be 
the only reference on Pascal and pro- 
gramming you'll ever need. 




$34.95 



B 



RORlPflD 

INTERNATIONAL 






Software's Newest Direction 

4585 Scotts Valley Drive 
Scotts Valley, CA 95066 
TELEX 172373 



Inquiry 6! for End-Users. Inquiry 62 for DEALERS ONLY. 



Turbo Pascal is a registered tradematV of Borland Irrternafiona), !nc 




ASK BYTE 



Conducted by Steve Garcia 



Biblical Speech Synthesizer 

Dear Steve. 

Being interested in the teaching of 
English as a foreign language, I would like 
to take from a disk, as input, a previously 
computerized text like the Bible and out- 
put it through a speech synthesizer, mean- 
while delaying the video-screen readout 
to appear following the speech output, 
phrase by phrase or sentence by sentence. 

Among your many circuits, is there one 
that could be used or adapted for this 
purpose? 

G. Kaye 
Paxton, IL 

The Microvox text-to-speech synthe- 
sizer will serve your purpose with some 
additional software. The controlling com- 
puter needs a small program to read a 
line or phrase from the disk, send it to 
the Microvox, wait for the designated 
time while the phrase is spoken, and then 
print it to the screen. This is a simple job 
for the computer, and the Microvox will 
speak the line as it is received. 

The problem with this concept is that 
the text-to-speech algorithm does not 
handle all pronunciations adequately. 
This could be handled with a little extra 
work by editing the text to correct the 
improper pronunciations, using the 
methods described in my October 1 982 
Circuit Cellar article. 

A more sophisticated system was de- 
scribed in the article "Three Tiered Soft- 
ware and VLSI Aid Developmental Sys- 
tem to Read Text Aloud" by Edward 
Bruckert, Martin Mi now, and Walter 
Tetschner in the April 21, 1983, issue of 
Electronics magazine. This system uses 
basically the same conversion algorithm 
as the Microvox. but it has more memory, 
a faster processor (MC68000), and tests 
against more rules. Write to Digital Equip- 
ment Corp. (HL2-I/EI0, 77 Reed Rd., 
Hudson. MA 01749) for information on 
availability and price— Steve 

How About the Sanyo? 

Dear Steve. 

I want to buy an IBM PC-compatible sys- 
tem, and the Sanyo MBC 555 looks very 
promising. I am having great problems 
finding out the extent of the compatibili- 



ty. Scottsdale Systems states that the MBC 
55 5 will run many programs written for the 
IBM PC. while National Computer Prod- 
ucts says the MBC will run all software cur- 
rently available for the PC. What is the 
truth? 

Second, does the Sanyo have IBM PC- 
compatible slots? 

Signor Shark 
Yonkers, NY 

The Sanyo MBC 555 will run a lot of 
IBM PC software. The May 1984 issue of 
Microcomputing magazine lists 29 pro- 
grams written for the IBM PC that will run 
on the Sanyo. Most of these are business 
and word-processing packages, including 
dBASE II, Bottom Line Strategist, and 
Financial Planner from Ashton-Tate; 
Volkswriter from Lifetree; Type Faces 
from Alpha Software; and Perfect Filer 
and Calc from Perfect Software. Three of 
the programs listed in the magazine re- 
quire double-sided drives, which are not 
yet available. 

Generally, any IBM PC program that 
uses only MS-DOS functions can be ex- 
pected to run on the Sanyo, but pro- 
grams that use IBM PC hardware-specific 
functions or interrupts defined in the IBM 
PC ROM BIOS probably won't. Unfortu- 
nately there isn't any way to tell which 
programs will run except to try them. 

An example of the incompatibility is 
that the versions of the Information 
Unlimited Software Easy-series programs 
bundled with the machine won't run on 
the IBM PC. even though the same pro- 
grams are available in IBM PC and MS- 
DOS versions. 

The Sanyo BASIC is somewhat different 
from both the IBM and generic versions 
of Microsoft BASIC IBM BASIC programs 
will run when none of the IBM hardware- 
specific BASIC instructions are used. 

Lastly the Sanyo does not have IBM 
PC-compatible expansion slots, but 
double-sided disk drives commonly used 
in IBMs, like the TEAC 55B half-height 
drives, apparently will work.— Steve 

Victor Software 

Dear Steve. 

Thank you again for your reply to my let- 
ter about Ukrainian word processing. I 



have taken your advice and purchased the 
Victor 9000. I am quite pleased with the 
machine. I only regret that the company 
has gone bankrupt. Now I am using Multi- 
Mate word processing. I also ordered the 
Programmer's Toolkit to be able to create 
my Ukrainian character set, but I am still 
waiting for delivery. Perhaps Victor will still 
be able to come through. 

Victor has come out with a special con- 
troller board that permits the use of IBM 
software, but it costs about $900. If I had 
that much to spend. I would save up a lit- 
tle more and simply get another com- 
puter. 

Do you know if it would be possible to 
connect another drive to the Victor 9000 
so I would be able to use either IBM or 
Apple software? Perhaps the expense 
would not be worth the trouble. In any 
event, I would appreciate your advice. 
Maxim M. Kobasuk 
Glen Cove, NY 

Victor did file for bankruptcy, but the 
company is still in business. You may still 
be able to get the Programmer's Toolkit 
from them. If it turns out that they can- 
not deliver, you may be able to obtain 
the program from United Software Co. of 
Tlilsa, Oklahoma, a company that spe- 
cializes in software for the Victor 9000 
and other IBM PC clones. There are more 
than 100,000 Victor 9000 computers out 
there, so there are still interested soft- 
ware producers and distributors. It was 
recently reported in InfoWorld that the 
Victor dealers have a catalog of WOO or 
so software packages currently available 
in the U.S. and about 1 500 overseas. 

Changing disk drives won't help you 
run Apple or IBM software. The drives 
on the Victor are mechanically able to 
read these disks, but the machine has a 
completely different architecture from 
the Apple II series and would require 
either an emulation program or special 
hardware similar to the QuadLink board 
available for the IBM PC— Steve 

Cheap Long Distance 

Dear Steve, 

In search for a reliable high-speed link 
for microcomputers. I read "Communica- 

[continued] 



48 BYTE • JULY 1985 



COPYRIGHT © 1985 STEVEN A. C1ARC1A. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED. 



Imagine 
dBASEIir 

running up 
to 20 times 
fasten 







Clipper introduces you to the time of your life. 



Developing a com- 
piler for dBASE III was 
just a matter of time. 



Time is your most a time, every time you Developing a com 

valuable commodity. run a program. With piler for dBASE III wa 

Because how you Clipper, once you've just a matter of time. 

spend your time, is how debugged your source Call your dealer or ou 

you live your life. code, it's compiled into toll free 800 number 

At Nantucket, we more efficient machine and ask for Clipper. 

believe you should live code. Your program 

life to the fullest. runs without the time- 
Clipper, the first true consuming overhead of 

compiler for dBASE redundant translation. 

Ill™ is a timely exam- Clipper compiles all 

pie. Now, dBASE com- your existing and future 

piled by Clipper runs 2 dBASE III programs. 



to 20 times faster than 
dBASE with its stan- 
dard interpreter. 
A dBASE interpreter 
painstakingly checks 
and executes your 
source code one line at 



Then go make th 
most of your life tim 



Nantucket 



20456 Pacific Coast Hwy., Malibu, Ca. 90265 (800)' 556-1234 ext. 225. In California (800) 441-2345 exL 225 
inquiry 256 for End-Users, inquiry 257 for dealers only. dBASE III is a registered trademark of AshtonTate 



Inquiry 262 




m 
m 






PC & COMPAT. 

IBM PC w/drive, monitor Call 

IBM PC w/256k (2) 360 drives, 
keyboard, monitor & monitor 

adptr Call 

IBM PC w/(l} 360k floppy & 

20Mb disc drive 2295 

IBM PC as above w/RGB color 

monitor Call 

IBM PC-XT w/256k Call 

IBM AT Enhanced Call 

CANON Athena Call 

COMPAQ PORTABLE w/256k, (2) 
360 disc drives, DOS & 

basic 2099 

COMPAQ PLUS Call 

COMPAQ Desk Pros Call 

LEAOIHG EDGE PC wfl28k (2) 
360 disc drives, monitor & 

adapter, basic DOS 2.11 1499 

LEADING EDGE PC w/256k as 

above but RGB color .,..1995 

LEADING EDGE 10Mb hard disc 

system ..2395 

SANYO MBC 6502 699 

SANYO MBC 555-2 ....979 

ZENITH 2150 w/(2) 360k disc 
drives. 128k RAM, IBM compati 
ble, wffree Microsoft Word & free 
Microsoft Multiplan & Color 

graphics card 1599 

ZENITH ZW 151-52 as above but 
wfcolor monitor & 10Mb hard disc 

system 3495 

ZENITH 3 COM Local Area 

Network Call 

LAP COMUTERS 
HP 110 w*272k RAM. Lotus 121 

60 col display, 95lbs 2295 

MORROW w/(2) 360k, disc 
drives, 13lbs.. 256k. IBM 
compatible 1995 



BOARDS^ 

mo inn* 7 



• oppkz 

A°PLE He w/dnve £^S&49 

APPLE He 899 

APPLE Macintosh 1699 

APPLE lie professional system m 
128k. (2) duo disc drives & 80 col 

card 1429 

APPLE Image Writer 499 



PRINTERS 
& PLOTTERS 

EPSON: 

RX-BO 229 LQ1500, 

JUKI: 

6100 .374 6300 779 

HP: Laser Printer 2795 

HP: Plotter Call 

Sweet Pea Plotter Call 

NEC: 3550 1099 

OKI DATA: NEW' 182 ..239 

NEW 192..349 84 579 

NEW' 193..569 2410 Call 

OLYMPIA: RO 319 

SILVER REED: 

400 249 500 289 

550 449 ?70 769 

TOSHIBA: 

134Q 598 351 .1239 





/MONITORS 



r AMDEK310A 179' 

LEADING EDGE RGB Color. .399 
TTL Green .139 TTL Amber 149 
PRINCETON GRAPHICS: 
HX-12.......4B9 Max-12E...174 

Sfi-12 w/Scan Doubler 899 

TAXAN 410 IBM RGB 349 

TAXAN 420 Hi Res RGB t/iBM419 
XTRON 1000 Lines Hi Res Amber 

(/IBM TTL 149 

ZENITH: 

ZVM-124 IBM Compatible 139 



FOR IBM 

AST 6 Pak Plus wft4k 244 

HERCULES color card 169 

HERCULES graphic card lor TTL 

mono monitor 289 

KOLA game controller 44 

PARADISE MODULAR GRAPHICS 

CARD 269 

TECHMAR CAPTAIN 169 



/HARD 
1 DISKS 

Tall Glass Call Ampec Call 

Bernoulli Box 20Mb 2499 

Mini Scrlba Internal IOMb.,349 



MODEMS 

HAYES: 

300 159 1200 389 

1200B w/Smartcom II ....359 

SMARTCOM II 99 

2400 Call 

Micro Modem He 249 

NOVATION SMARTCAT 

Internal 348 Exln 348 

US ROBOTICS: Passworfl 1200 ..32° 



/ SOFTWARE m 
I f/IBM w W 



Nutshell 89 dBase in ....359 

PFSRB 84 RBase 4000 ..251 

Wordstar Professional 249 

Wordstar 2000 249 

X Y Write Plus II 229 

Word Perfect 40 239 

Vol tawnier Deluxe wfATI 169 

SamnaPlus 349 

Samnalll 299 

Multimale 244 

Leading Edge Word w/Spell....189 

Smart System Call 

Framewort.,349 Enable Call 

Sidekick...... 29 Norton 30 ....53 

Managing Mm Money 104 

Dollar & Sense 109 

Think Tank 108 

Pro Key ver 20, 

Right Simulator 39 

Sargon IB 34 PFS Write 89 

Muttiplan...124 Run*C" 119 



Microsoft X* —;-P* 



DISKETTES 

SS/DD 
Verbatim Data Lite (10)21 

FUJI (10) 18 

MAXELL (10) 19 

BASF (10) 17 

IBM (10) 22 

FAMOUS MAKE ....13 
SPECIAL I TDK 
Quantities ol 100/ea 135 



DSJDD 
29 
24 
28 
23 
29 
19 



s 



=T 




TYPEWRITERS 

CANON Typestar 5 148 

CANON typestar 6 .........196 

BROTHER CE 56 458 

OLYMPIA Compact II 384 

SMITH CORONA 350M *310 

"M« Mms/jdurtfi HtbXt 



CANON & 
COPIERS 



I PC 10 469 PC 20. 665 

|PC25 884 Sland 99 1 



IBM PC , *-k 

Wf64k (1) 360 Disc Drf»355a3 
& Keyboard l£9» 

IBM PC W/256k (2) 360 Disc 
Drives, Graphics Monitor Card, 
Won . Keybd & Software Kit...Call 
IBM PC AT Call 



leading mm 

EDGE PC WM. 

Wfl2Bk, Leading ,j 'mmS» 
Edge Monitor. ( "£!!*£ 
Keyboard, Monitor j. AA 
& Printer Adapter \h\S\} 



SANYO 550-2 

Now Runs Lotus 123 1 

IBM PC Compatible. 

360k Disc Drive. 

128k RAM, Word Slar. 

Calc Star & Easy Writer 

RGB VIDEO CARD 149 



699 



OLYMPIA RO 

Daisy Wheel ., 

Letter Quality. 
14 Cps w/Parallel & 
Serial Ports w/Built In 
Tractor Feed 44A 

3 PtehflNLY! 01 3 



ea 



ZENITH z 150 

W/(2) 360k Drives, 

Microsoft Word, i— ^ _...» u 

Multiplan, Keyboard M O 3 3 =$ Basic Keyboard.. 

as aoove except I COMPAQ 

wflOmb Hard Disk oon c Plus W/Hard Disc .la Stock 




ASK BYTE 



tion Without Wires" in the June 1984 Ask 
BYTE. The system you suggest there may 
be inexpensive, but it does not satisfy my 
requirement of a long-distance, reliable, 
and inexpensive link for my IBM PC. 1 
believe my best bet would be a high-speed 
modem to be used with normal long- 
distance calls. However, a 1200-bps 
modem would yield only about 120 words 
per minute, which makes this system very 
expensive when one has to pay $1.50 for 
those 120 words. 

Do you have knowledge of a truly fast, 
reliable modem not so expensively 
priced? Or perhaps an idea of another 
system for a reliable long-distance link for 
micros? 

Thank you very much for whatever ideas 
you can give me. 

Al Villacres 
Quito, Ecuador 

There essentially aren't any long- 
distance data-communication links meet- 
ing all your requirements. Cost is the 
problem. Amateur radio is an inexpen- 
sive method, but bandwidth restrictions 
limit speed, and, of course, you can send 
only to other hams. 

There is hope in the form of a new ser- 
vice expected to be introduced in 1985 
by AT&T. This service, based on pulse- 
coded modulation, will allow full-duplex 
communication at up to 56,000 bps over 
regular phone lines. See "AT&T Breaks 
the Speed Barrier" in the September 
1984 Computers and Electronics 
magazine. No word on cost, but it may 
be some time before inexpensive equip- 
ment is available— Steve 

File Transfers 

Dear Steve. 

My problem is trying to swap data files 
(mostly but not entirely WordStar) from 
8-inch double-density disks on an Altos 
8002 to either the hard disk or 5!4-inch 
disks on a Tl Professional Computer. 

I do not have a modem on either com- 
puter. 1 plan to add one to the Tl even- 
tually but don't see much need for one 



Table 1 

PIN 
2 


: Null-modem connections. 


PIN 
3 
2 
5 
4 

20 
6 


3 




4 




5 




6 




20 









at present, 
running. 



still have the Altos up and 

John W. Juechter 
East Greenwich, Rl 



If you have RS-232C serial ports i n both 
computers and they are located in close 
proximity to each other (20 feet or so), 
you don't need modems to set up a com- 
munication link. Make or buy a cable con- 
figured as a null modem, as shown in 
table I. You may also need a program to 
facilitate data transmission in one or both 
computers. 

If you are running MS-DOS on your Tl, 
you can use the COPY command to copy 
directly from the communication port to 
a disk file. Simply set up the communica- 
tion protocol using the DOS MODE com- 
mand, e.g., MODE COM1:96,n,8,1 to set 
for data transfer at 9600 bps, no parity 
check, 8-bit words, and I stop bit. See 
your DOS manual for other options. 
Follow this with the command COPY 
COM1: d:filename.ext (you may have to 
say AUX instead of COM1J. The com- 
puter will wait for data to come in. 

I assume you are using CP/M on your 
Altos. Some implementations of CP/M in- 
clude a similar function in the PIP com- 
mand. If yours doesn't, you will need a 
program to read your files and transmit 
the data. An inexpensive one for 8-bit 
CP/M systems is MODEM 7, which can be 
obtained from CP/M Users Group, 1651 
Third Ave., New York, NY 10028 -Steve 

MX-80 Superscripts 

Dear Steve. 

1 teach a course in word processing 
using the Apple 11+ and Apple Writer. We 
have an Epson MX-80 printer. 

Can you please explain to me how to get 
superscript numbers for footnotes using 
this equipment? 

1 have called both the Apple people and 
the Epson people, and both told me to 
contact the other. Help! 

Bettye Jo Martin 
Atlanta, GA 

Certain special characters must first be 
sent to an Epson MX-80 to enable it to 
print superscripts. These consist of the 
ESC(ape) and Control-N characters. They 
are simply commands that tell the printer 
to change to the superscript print mode. 
When using Apple Writer, these charac- 
ters should be placed immediately 
before the text you wish to be super- 
scripted. Of course, you will eventually 
wish to turn off the superscript mode. 

1 [continued) 



50 BYTE • JULY 1985 



DECLARE YOUR 



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MODERN OFFICE DATA STORAGE. 

Free yourself software and data bases on individual 



tations of 

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dynamic and expanding business data 
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deal with critical information. 

The Bernoulli Box,™ with its totally inter- 
changeable 5- and 10-megabyte car- 
tridges, lets you manage data the way you 
manage your business-directly, efficiently, 
by job function 
and applica- 
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update, store, 
and back up 



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BE 



riftuiiTiru&i 



infinitely, by adding more cartridges, not 
more disk drives. You enjoy the conven- 
ience of taking or mailing cartridges 
anywhere-and the security of putting 
them under lock and key. 

The Bernoulli Box works with the IBM 
PC, XT, AT, most compatibles, and the 
Macintosh.™ For your nearest dealer, call 
1-800-556-1234 ext 215. In California, call 
__-,-:. 1-800-441-2345 exL 215. 



OMEGA 

IOMEGA Corporation 
1821 West 4000 South 
Roy, Utah 84067 




See us at NCC Booth #1732. 



Inquiry 194 



Inquiry 3 77 



Forecasting and Statistical 
Analysis for Professionals 



StatPac 



the proven statistical analysis package 

StatPac is convenient. Comprehensive. Inexpensive. Tested in the field for 
more than five years, StatPac has been updated, debugged and enhanced. 
So it's well established and easy to use. StatPac is the answer for researchers, 
statisticians, scientists, and educators. Handles 5,000 cases and 253 
variables on a standard IBM PC. 



T*A#*A/*9c4 *Pftftfe™ a forecasting tool 
JL\Ji ISWCLd 1 JL iUd for the non-statistician 

A combination of data management, exploratory graphics, and over a dozen 
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read a picture, you can use Forecast Plus! 



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INSTANT FINANCIAL PICTURE! 

Corporate Financial Simulation Model on your IBM PC, XT or AT 
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Also available on most CP/M & all Apple 
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A Financial Decision Support System - budgeting, 
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FREE! SuperCalc Electronic Spreadsheet 
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Send more information 

D My check for $10 is enclosed. Please send me a (circle one) black and white/color 
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on the computer. My check for $295 plus $5 



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Mail to: I LAR Systems, Inc. • 1300 Dove St., Suite 105 • Newport Beach, CA 92660 



"1 



ASK BYTE 




This is done by placing the characters 
ESC and ControlO at the end of the text 
to be superscripted. 

To enter the special characters men- 
tioned above, you must use the Apple 
Writer Control-V command. This will 
cause ESC or any control characters that 
you now type to be inserted directly into 
the text at the location of the cursor, in- 
stead of being interpreted as a possible 
command. Control-V must be used since 
ESC. Control-N, and Control-D are all 
commands to the Apple Writer program 
itself. Press Control-V again to exit this 
special insertion mode. 

The characters that must be sent to the 
printer to control its various printing 
styles can be found in the manual that 
came with the printer. The same tech- 
nique described in the above paragraph 
may be utilized to print in elite, empha- 
sized, boldface, or other styles. Simply 
insert the correct characters into the text 
using the Control-V command—Steve 

OSMOSIS ON THE OSBORNE 1 

Dear Steve. 

1 have installed an Osmosis double- 
density modification in my Osborne 1. 
Even after making the circuit-board 
changes they recommend. 1 still do not get 
reliable double-density operation. Can 
you supply a reference that goes into 
detail about the difference between single 
and double density? 

Robert E. Falkoski 
Richland, WA 

A principal difficulty encountered with 
storing data on floppy disks is the 
phenomenon of bit shifting, which refers 
to the physical movement of the location 
of a recorded bit due to the influence of 
neighboring bits. If left uncorrected, this 
shifting could cause unreliable retrieval 
of recorded information. While these bit- 
shifting influences exist on single-density 
disks, the effects are small enough to 
ignore. 

On double-density disks, the effects are 
magnified, and the techniques to record 
and decipher information must become 
more sophisticated. One technique uses 
write precompensation logic to adjust 
the spacing of the bits as they are writ- 
ten to disk, so that they will be evenly 
spaced during subsequent read opera- 
tions. Such logic is usually handled by the 
disk-controller circuitry 

An excellent, and very readable, discus- 
sion of these techniques, as well as a 
source of some practical circuit examples. 

[continued] 



B YTE • JULY 1985 



Inquiry 181 for End-Users. Inquiry 182 for DEALERS ONLY. 




>ktec The Most Powerful C 



for the IBM AT • MACINTOSH • MS DOS • CP/M-80 • ROM APPLICATIONS 
IBM PC/XT • APPLE // • CP/M-86 • TRSDOS • CROSS DEVELOPMENT 



Why Professionals Choose Aztec C 

AZTEC C compilers generate fast, compact 
code. AZTEC C is a sophisticated development 
system with assemblers, debuggers, linkers, 
editors, utilities and extensive run time libraries. 
AZTEC C Is documented in detail. AZTEC C Is 
the most accurate and portable implementation 
of C for microcomputers. AZTEC C supports 
specialized professional needs such as cross 
development and ROM code development. 
MANX provides qualified technical support. 

AZTEC C86/PRO 
— for the IBM AT and PC/XT 

AZTEC C86/PRO provides the power, portabili- 
ty, and professional features you need to 
develop sophisticated software for PC DOS, MS 
DOS AND CP/M-86 based microsystems. The 
system also supports the generation of ROM 
based software for 8088/8086, 80186, and 80286 
processors. Options exist to cross develop ROM 
code for 65xx, 8080, 8085, and Z80 processors. 
Cross development systems are also available 
that target most micro computers. Call for infor- 
mation on AZTEC C86/PRO support for XENIX 
and TOPVIEW. 



POWERFUL - AZTEC C86/PRO 3.2 outper- 
forms Lattice 2.1 on the DHRYSTONE 
benchmark 2 to 1 for speed (17.8 sees vs 37.1) 
while using 65% less memory (5.8k vs 14k). The 
AZTEC C86/PRO system also compiles in 10% 
to60% less timeand supports fast, high volume 
I/O. 



PORTABLE — MANX Software Systems pro- 
vides real portability with a family of compatible 
AZTEC C software development systems for PC 
DOS, MS DOS, CP/M-86, Macintosh, CP/M-80, 
APPLE // + , //e, and lie (NIBBLE - 4 apple rating), 
TRSDOS (80-MICRO - 5 star rating), and Commo- 
dore C64 (the C64 system is only available as a 
cross compiler - call for details). AZTEC 
C86/PRO Is compatible with UNIX and XENIX. 



PROFESSIONAL — For professional features 
AZTEC C86/PRO is unparalleled. 

• Full C Compiler (8088/8086 - 80186 - 80286) 

• Macro Assembler for 8088/8086/80186/80286 

• Linkage Editor with ROM support and overlays 

• Run Time Libraries - object libraries + source 
DOS 1.x; DOS 2.x; DOS 3.x; screen I/O; Graphics; 
UNIX I/O; STRING; simulated float; 8087 support; 
MATH; ROM; CP/M-86 

• Selection of 8088/8086, 80186, or 80286 code genera- 
tion to guarantee best choice for performance and 
compatibility 



• Utility to convert AZTEC object code or libraries to 
Microsoft format. (Assembly + conversion takes 
less than half the time as Microsoft's MASM to pro- 
duce MS object) 

• Large memory models and sophisticated memory 
management 

• Support products for graphics, DB, Screen, & ... 

• ROMablecode + ROM support + separate code and 
data + INTEL Hex Converter 

• Symbolic Debugger & Other Utilities 

• Full Screen Editor (like VI) 

• CROSS Compilers are available to APPLE //, Macin- 
tosh, CP/M-80, TRSDOS, COMMODORE C64, and 
ROM based 65xx, and 8080/8085/Z80 

• Detailed Documentation 

AZTEC C86/PRO-AT $500 

(configured for IBM AT - options for 8088/8086) 

AZTEC C86/PRO-PC/XT $500 

(configured for IBM PC/XT - options for 80186/80286) 

AZTEC C86/BAS includes C compiler (small model only), 
8086 MACRO assembler, overlay linker, UNiX, MATH, 
SCREEN, and GRAPHICS libraries, debugger, and 
editor. 

AZTEC C86/BAS $199 

AZTEC C86/BAS (CP/M-86) $199 

AZTEC C86/BAS (DOS + CP/M-86) $299 

UPGRADE to AZTEC C86/PRO $310 

C-TREE Database with source $399 

C-TREE Database (object) $149 

CROSS COMPILERS 
CrossCompilers for ROM, MS DOS, PC DOS, orCP/M-86 
applications. 

VAX • > 8086/80xxx cross $5000 

PDP-11 ->8086/80xxx cross $2000 

Cross Compilers with PC DOS or CP/M-86 hosts are $750 
for the first target and $500 for each additional target. 
Targets: 65xx; CP/M-80; C64; 8080/8085/Z80; Macintosh; 
TRSDOS; 8086/8088/80186/80286; APPLE //. 



AZTEC C68K 
— for the Macintosh 

For power, portability, and professional features 
AZTEC C68K-C is the finest C software development 
system available for the Macintosh. 

The AZTEC C68K-C system Includes a 68000 macro 
assembler, a linkage editor, a source editor, a mouse 
based editor, a SHELL development environment, a 
library of UNIX I/O and utility routines, full access and 
support of the Macintosh TOOLBOX routines, debug- 
ging aides, utilities, make, dlf f, grep.TTY simulator with 
upload & download (source supplied), a RAM disk (for 
512K Mac), a resource maker, and a no royalty license 
agreement. Programming examples are included. (Over 
600 pages of documentation). 

AZTEC C68K-C requires a 128K Macintosh, 
and two disk drives (frugal developers can make 
do with one drive). AZTEC C68K supports the 
512K Macintosh and hard disks. 

AZTEC C68K-C (commercial system) $500 

AZTEC C68K-p (personal system) $199 

AZTEC C68K-p to AZTEC C68K-C upgrade $310 



MacC-treedatabase $149 

Mac C-tree database with source $399 

Lisa Kit (Pascal to AZTEC C68k object converter) . .$ 99 



AZTEC C65 

-forthe APPLE// 

"...The AZTEC C-system is one of the finest software 
packages I have seen... " NIBBLE review, July 1984. 

The only commercial C development system available 
that runs native on the APPLE II + , lie, and lie, the 
AZTEC C65 development system includes a full floating 
point C compiler compatible with UNIX C and other 
MANX AZTEC C compilers, a 6502 relocating assem- 
bler, a linkage editor, a library utility, a SHELL develop- 
ment environment, a full screen editor, UNIX I/O and 
utility subroutines, simple graphics, and screen func- 
tions. 

AZTEC C65 (Apple DOS 3.3) $199 

AZTEC C65/PRO (Apple DOS + ProDos) $350 

(call for availability) 



AZTEC C ll/PRO 

- for CP/M-80 

The first member of the AZTEC C family was the 
CP/M-80 AZTEC C compiler. It is "the standard" com- 
piler for development on CP/M-80. The system includes 
theAZTECC II C compiler, an 8080 assembler, a linkage 
editor, an object librarian, a full library of UNIX I/O and 
utility routines, CP/M-80 run time routines, the SMALL 
library (creates modules less than 3K in size), the fast 
linker for reduced development times, the ROM library, 
RMAC and M80 support, library source, support for 
DRI's SID/ZSID symbolic debugger, and more. 

AZTEC C ll/PRO $349 

AZTEC CII/BAS $199 

C-TREE Database with source $399 

C-TREE Database in AZTEC object form $149 



AZTEC C80 

— for TRSDOS (Radio Shack Model III & 4) 

"I've had a lot of experience with different C compilers, 
but the Aztec CB0 Compiler and Professional Develop- 
ment System is the best I've seen." 80-Micro, Decem- 
ber, 1984, John B. Harrell III 

This sytem has most of the features of AZTEC C II for 
CP/M. It is perhaps the best software development 
system for the Radio Shack Model III and IV. 

AZTECC80 model 3 (no floating point) $149 

AZTEC C80 model 4 (full) $199 

AZTEC C80/PRO (full for model 3 and 4) $299 

To order or for information call: 



.11 



1-221-0440 

(201) 530-7997 (NJ and outside U.S.A.). Or write: MANX 
SOFTWARE SYSTEMS, P.O. Box 55, Shrewsbury, N.J. 
07701. 



MANX 

TRS 80 RADIO SHACK TRS DOS is a trademark of TANDY 
APPLE DOS MACINTOSH is a trademark of APPLE. 




SHIPPING INFORMATION - Standard U.S. 
shipment is UPS ground (no fee). In the U.S. 
one day shipment is $20, two days is $10. 
Canadian shipment is $10. Two days ship- 
ment outside the U.S. is by courier and is 
freight collect. 



For Technical Support 
(Bug Busters) call: 201-530-6557 



Inquiry 219 



JULY 1985 -BYTE 53 



Inquiry 366 for End-Users. Inquiry 367 for DEALERS ONLY. 



IBM AT THE OFFICE 
APPLE AT HOME 

NO PROBLEM! 



A "Wireless file transfer" package for the IBM PC® to Apple II 
and back. APPLE TURNOVER™ is a firmware board which 
fits into any slot in the IBM PC and some compatibles. NO 
modems, NO serial links, NO hassles, NO problems. APPLE 
TURNOVER™ will format Apple CP/M® and Apple DOS 3.3 
disks. Leave your IBM and Apple computers where they are. 
Simply bring your Apple disk to work and transfer your file to 
a PC-DOS disk. Allows for modifications to text and data 
files. It'sasimple, inexpensive, high performance alternative 
to complicated serial links and modems. 

"NEW!" APPLE TURNOVER™ version 2.0 will read, write 
and format PRO-DOS and Apple P-System Too. 



vertex 

3f systems inc. 



See your dealer or call 
for information: 

(213) 938-0857 



Innovation in microcomputer products 6022 W. Pico Blvd., Los Angeles, CA 90035 



f VTA WEST 
DATA SWITCHES 

M AKE ANY PC SYSTEM 
MORE PRODUCTIVE. 



With a touch of a button, these data trans- 
parent switches let you switch from dot 
matrix to letter-quality printing. Or, two 
computers can share modems, printers, 
plotters, networks, terminals, etc. Serial or 
parallel models available. Saves time and 
frustration of plugging and unplugging 
cables. No power required. Just plug into 
your system. You'll wonder how you ever 




got along without them. And the price is 
right. Write or call for factory-direct 
shipment. 

We also stock a complete line of cables and 
connector adapters. 



DSS S42 00 * RS232 Applications XSS S55 00 * RS232 Applications 



G3-t<^ 



ED- 



MODEM 

PRINTER 

PLOTTER 

TERMINAL 

NETWORK 

CRT 



DSP $4900* Centronics Compatible XSP $69°°* 



Parallel Applications 



EHC| 



I II 






PRINTER 
PLOTTER 


I cpu r 


< > 

X 
■/ \ 

c. \ 










I rpn L 




PRINTER 
PLOTTER 


| CPU t- 







*Shipped freight-collect. Add $4.00 per product 
for postpaid delivery Checks. Visa and MasterCard 



accepted. Quantity discount available. AZ resi- 
dents add 7%. Dealer inquiries invited. 



Wfl WEST, Inc. 

"The Interface Company" 



534 North Stone Ave.. Tucson, Arizona 85705 

To order by phone, call 

(602| 623-5717 



ASK BYTE 



can be found in Microcomputer Interfac- 
ing by Harold S. Stone (Addison-Wesley, 
1982). Another reference that discusses 
aspects of the disk-recording process and 
that may help you is "IBM Compatible 
Disk Drives" by Jefferson H. Harman. 
which appeared on page 100 of the Oc- 
tober 1979 BYTE. 

Manufacturers' service manuals for disk 
drives often discuss the theory of opera- 
tion and outline the necessary timing 
considerations for the disk drive and 
computer These manuals can usually be 
obtained from the drive manufacturer's 
field offices.— Steve 

VIC-20-CONTROLLED ROBOT 

Dear Steve, 

I tried to interface a simple robot I made 
to my VIC-20 via the communications 
port. The robot is run by small DC motors. 
Where can I find information about the 
software needed to control pulses from 
the port (what to poke and where) and the 
hardware needed to convert these pulses 
to a current and voltage to drive the 
motors? Thanks for any help that you can 
provide. 

Michael Levin 
Swampscott. MA 

An excellent series of articles by Joel 
Swank on interfacing to the VIC-20 ("The 
Enhanced VIC-20") appeared in the 
February through May 1983 issues of 
BYTE. This series should give you the 
necessary information about the VIC-20 
and how to interface to it. You should 
also read my article on page 105 of the 
December 1984 BYTE. "Build the Power 
I/O System" for information on how to 
connect real-world peripherals to a 
system. This article will give you a good 
understanding of optoisolators, which 
should be used in computer real-world 
applications— Steve ■ 



IN ASK BYTE. Steve Garcia answers questions on 
any area of microcomputing. The most representative 
questions received each month will be answered and 
published. Do you have a nagging problem? Send 
your inquiry to 

Ask BYTE 

do Steve Garcia 

POB 582 

Glastonbury, CT 06033 
Due to the high volume of inquiries, personal replies 
cannot be given. All letters and photographs become 
the property of Steve Garcia and cannot be returned. 
Be sure to include "Ask BYTE' 1 in the address. 

The Ask BYTE staff includes manager Harv 
Weiner and researchers Bill Curlew. Larry Bregoli. 
Dick Sawyer. Robert Stek. and \eannette Dojan. 



54 BYTE • JULY 1985 



Inquiry 372 



ting the first IBM T 




atible Kit! 



Building your own AT 
is as easy as it looks. 

Now, it's easy to have the IBM AT that you want by 
building your own from ADTEK's SERIES 286XT M com- 
patible, board-level kit. Choose from a complete kit 
(chassis, motherboard, cables, disk controller, keyboard 
and enhancement boards) and add your own moni- 
tor and disk drives. Or buy just the parts you need for 
your project. Either way, all series 286AT products are 
hardware and software AT compatible. 

But you won't be on your own. The ADTEK SERIES 
286AT comes with illustrated, step by step instructions 
that even a beginner can follow (Some basic knowl- 
edge of electronics will be helpful.) With just a few 
simple household tools you can put your new compu- 
ter together in a Saturday afternoon. And you'll feel 
confident about your SERIES 286AT because every 
ADTEK product is protected by a full, one year factory 
warranty. 

And amazingly frugal. 




If you're ready for AT power and speed, 
but don't want to pay IBM's premium 
price, r : esJt easy. A complete ADTEK 
SERIES 286AT'kit is priced significantly 
less chanra comparably assembled IBM 
AT. That's engineering excellence at a 
real bargain! Call or write today for a 
detailed brochure and price li§£ 
on the SERIES 286AT and other fine 
ADTEK products. 



AT compatible keyboard. LED on 
cap, num and scroll lock keys. 



radable to 8MHz. 



Fully AT compatible ch 
optional lock. 
floppy and fi: 





User supplied disk drives. Kit 
supplied with list of compatible 
drive suppliers. 


I/O expansion and user 



User supplied monitor. Ki. 
listofrecom 



IBM is a registered trademark ot International Business Machines Corporation and SERIES 286AT is a registered trademark of ADTEK Corporation. 



COMBINE POWER AND 
ENHANCE YOUR POAT 



Quadram introduces the smart way to enhance your IBM PC- AT. Quadmeg- AT and 
Quadport- AT. Smart because Quadmeg-AT and Quadport-AT make the most of your AT 
system today and expand to meet your system's growing needs in the future. 



Quadmeg- AT comes socketed 
for memory expansion from 
128K to 2 Megabytes. Harness 
this power to create megabyte- 
sized RAM drives, access 

QUADMEG-AT" 



Advance to 4 Megabytes 

When you need more than 
2Mbytes, Quadmeg AX adapts 
with two QuadmegAT 
Expansion Cards. Each packs 
512K or 1Mbyte extra RAM. 



Both cards filled give 
Quadmeg- AT a powerful 
4Mbyte capacity. 
Quadmeg-AT delivers 
the power you need to 
take full advantage of the 
ATs capabilities. 




Maximum Performance in 
Minimum Space 

Quadmeg-AT and Quadport-AT fit 
snugly side by side to deliver a powerful 
4Mb RAM and multiple I/O expan- 
sion in just two AT expansion slots. 



greater amounts of informa- 
tion, and process data faster 
and more efficiently than 
ever before. Plus, with 
"split memory mapping 1 / 
Quadmeg-AT lets you expand 
the AT s base system memory 
to 640K without buying a 
space-wasting 128K card. 



Add a Second 
Quadport 

Tu'O Quadport-ATs give 
your AT system a total 
of 2 parallel ports and 
1 serial ports. Add 
peripheral devices or 
workstations for the 
ultimate in PC-AT, 
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W 



• — t M Look for this seal. It's the 
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vJS^w* -- ^ eac ^ er m microcomputer 
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IBM PC-AT is a registered trademark of 
International Business Machines Corporation. 

56 BYTE • JULY 1985 




EXPANDABILITY TO 
THE SMART WAY 



QUADPOKT-AT 

Quadport-AT combines a 
parallel printer port and a 
serial port to give your AT the 
features found on 
IBM's Serial/ 
Parallel Adapter.^ 
But at a lower 
cost and with 





built-in expandability. Connect 
printers, plotters, modems, 
and other devices for increased 
productivity. 

Advanced Port Expansion 

As your AT becomes the 
center of a high-performance 
LAN or growing multi- 
user, multi-tasking system, 
snap on the optional 
Quadport- AT Expansion 
Kit and add 4 more serial 
ports to your system. The 
Quadport- AT Expansion 
comes with software 
to access these ports, 
making it easy to add 
shared peripherals or 
workstations. 



Enhance the smart way 
with Quadram, 

For basic AT expansion, 
Quadmeg-AT and Quadport-AT 
work together to provide 128K 
memory expansion, a serial port, 
and a parallel port. 
Then, as your system 
grows, Quadmeg-AT and 
Quadport-AT give you up to 
4MB RAM, 1 parallel port, 
and up to 5 serial ports in just 
two PC AT expansion slots. 
Only Quadram combines so 
much power and expandability. 
That's PC AT enhancement 
the smart way. 



Features 


Quadmeg-AT: RAM 


Expansion Cards: Two cards 


expansion from 128K to 


available. Each comes with 


2Mbytes. Expandable in 512 K 


512K or 1Mbyte RAM 


increments. Split memory 


installed. 


mapping assigns 128K or 384K 




to base memory. 


QuadMaster-AT Software: 


Total RAM Capacity: 


RAM Drives and Spooling for 


4Mbytes. 


extended memory. 


Quadport' AT: Port expansion 


Quadport' AT Expansion Kit: 


with 1 Centronics parallel port 


(optional) 4 RS-232C serial 


and 1 RS-232C serial port. 


ports. Software to access ports. 




For a free demonstration visit 
the Quadram dealer nearest 
you. Or, for information, write 
us at 4355 International Blvd., 
Norcross, Georgia 30093 
(404)923^6666. 



QUADRAM 

J An Intelligent ^sterns Company 

Inquiry 293 



1ULY 1985 -BYTE 57 




CLUBS & NEWSLETTERS 



• THE SILENT SPEAK 

A quarterly newsletter about 
electronic aids for the handi- 
capped. Current Expressions, 
contains letters written with 
the aid of special computers 
from victims of otherwise 
disabling diseases. Profiles, 
a calendar of events, new 
products, and advertise- 
ments all relate to easing 
communication for the dis- 
abled. Article submissions 
are welcome. Contact 
Susanne Shealey. Current Ex- 
pressions, Prentke Romich Co.. 
1022 Heyl Rd. Wooster. OH 
44691. (216) 262-1984. 

• DRBBS FREE FOR ALL 
The DRBBS Technical 
Bulletin Board System at 
(402) 896-3 537 is free to all 
personal computer users 24 
hours a day at 300 or 1200 
bps. General messages, elec- 
tronic mail, on-line informa- 
tion, public-domain file 
transfer, and special-interest 
sections are featured. Call 
the BBS or contact J. 
Winslade. DRBBS Technical 
Bulletin Board System. 

1472 5 Emiline St.. Omaha. 
NE 68138. (402) 895-1379. 

• SEPARATE BUT EQUAL 

The Federation of Computer 
Users in Medicine (FOCUS- 
MD) and the Federation of 
Computer Users in Dentistry 
(FOCUS-DDS) are two sepa- 
rate organizations staffed by 
qualified volunteers and run 
by the same nonprofit in- 
stitution. Each group wel- 
comes prospective health 
professionals who use com- 
puters. The annual member- 
ship fee of $100 for each 
group includes a newsletter.- 
Each group maintains a con- 
sultant registry for which ap- 
plicants must pay an addi- 
tional fee to cover the cost 



of testing. Separate seminars 
are scheduled the first Sun- 
day of each month across 
the country; nonmembers 
pay $10 to attend. For loca- 
tions and membership ser- 
vices, contact Specific 
Technology Center. POB 
15579. San Francisco, CA 
94115. (415) 626-4600. 

• ACTR1X IN ACTION 
Actrix Users Southeast sup- 
ports users of the Actrix 
computer and its built-in 
software. A newsletter is 
available, as are purchase 
discounts and updates. Con- 
tact Irv Koch. 19 54 Stanton 
Rd., EastPoint, GA 30344. 
(404) 767-7360. 

• FRIENDS IN THE SE 
People on the Southeast 
AMIS bulletin-board service 
are on line 24 hours a day 
to answer questions about 
Atari. Macintosh, and Radio 
Shack computers. The BBS 
at (704) 541-3306 carries 
Newsoft news net. and plans 
include a national user- 
group listing. Contact 
Southeast AMIS. POB 1041. 
Matthews, NC 28106. 

• TWO SYSTEMS GROUP 

The benefits of joining the 
Micropolis/Vector Graphic 
Users Group (MUG) include 
a monthly newsletter, library 
disks of public-domain CP/M 
and MS-DOS software, and 
directions for obtaining 
parts, service, and commer- 
cial software for Micropolis 
drives and Vector Graphic 
systems. The annual mem- 



bership is $18. Contact Buzz 
or Lynn Rudow, Micropolis/ 
Vector Graphic Users Group, 
604 Springwood Circle, 
Huntsville. AL 3 5803. (205) 
881-1697. 

• SIG FOR CP/M 

The Wayne County CP/M 
Support Group (WCCPMSG) 
of Williamson. New York, 
sponsors training programs 
in CP/M applications soft- 
ware. Members' interests in- 
clude BASIC programming, 
databases, and word pro- 
cessing at all levels. 
Computer-literacy lectures 
are open to the community. 
Club members meet at 7 
p.m. on the second Wednes- 
day of each month at the 
Williamson Public Library. 
Contact the WCCPMSG, POB 
34. Williamson. NY 14589. 

• COMMODORE IN NW PA 
The main chapter of the 
North Coast Commodore 
Users Group (NCCUG) of 
Erie, Pennsylvania, meets on 
the third Tuesday of every 
month. The Edinboro 
chapter meets the first 
Thursday of every month. 
Both chapters enjoy the 
privileges of a public- 
domain library, a monthly 
newsletter, discounted blank 
disks, and special-interest 
groups. An annual member- 
ship is $20; a subscription 
to the newsletter is an addi- 
tional $6. Contact the 
NCCUG. POB 6117. Erie. PA 
16512. (814) 866-1625 for 
the Erie chapter or 398-8146 
for the Edinboro chapter. 



CLUBS & NEWSLETTERS is a forum for letting BYTE readers know what 
is happening in the microcomputing community. Emphasis is given to elec- 
tronic bulletin-board services, club-sponsored classes, community-help projects, 
field trips, and other activities. We will continue to list new clubs and newslet- 
ters. Allow at least four months for your club's mention to appear. Send in- 
formation to BYTE. Clubs & Newsletters. P03 372, Hancock. NH 03449. 



• SCAN THE MBC 

The Sanyo Canadian Users 
Group, devoted to the Sanyo 
MBC 5 50/555 computer, 
welcomes American par- 
ticipation. Members main- 
tain a network for resource 
sharing, a public-domain 
software exchange library, 
and a newsletter, SCAN lines. 
A BBS is planned. Contact 
Eric Lillius, Sanyo Canadian 
Users Group, Box 210 Moun- 
tain St.. Haliburton, Ontario 
K0M ISO. Canada, (705) 
457-2774. 

• COMPUTER FILE 

BLUEGRASS STYLE-The 
Central Kentucky Computer 
Society produces a monthly 
newsletter. Computer File, con- 
taining ads and articles, a 
calendar, and membership 
information. Membership is 
$20 annually. Contact the 
Central Kentucky Computer 
Society Inc.. Suite 100. 
Security Trust Building. Lex- 
ington. KY 40507. 

• AN INDUSTRY FIRST 
The International MIDI 
Association (IMA) is a non- 
profit organization dedicated 
to promoting musical-instru- 
ment digital interface (MIDI) 
and music/computing inter- 
facing. An electronic library 
a database, and a newslet- 
ter, The IMA Bulletin, contain- 
ing MIDI-related product 
and news announcements 
are included with IMA mem- 
bership. Contact the Interna- 
tional MIDI Association, 
4128 Wilkinson Ave.. Studio 
City, CA 91604. (818) 
505-8964. 

• BIRD IN HAND 

The Robin. Owners' Group is 
for users of the DEC VT-180. 
A software library is main- 

{contlnued) 



58 BYTE • ]ULY 1985 



Circuit-Board-Artwork Software 
for the Design Engineer 

in a Hurry H^^ll 








A31j,c 



For only $895, smARTWORK® lets 
the design engineer create and 
revise printed-circuit-board art- 
work on the IBM Personal Com- 
puter. You keep complete control 
over your circuit-board artwork — 
from start to finish. 

Forget the tedium of taping it 
yourself or waiting for a tech- 
nician, draftsman, or the CAD 
department to get to your project. 

smARTWORK* is the only low- 
cost printed-circuit-board artwork 
editor with all these advantages: 

□ Complete interactive control 
over placement and routing 

□ Quick correction and revision 

□ Production-quality 2X artwork 
from a pen-and-ink plotter 

□ Prototype-quality 2X artwork 
from a dot-matrix printer 



□ Easy to learn and operate, yet 
capable of sophisticated 
layouts 

□ Single-sided and double-sided 
printed circuit boards up to 

10 x 16 inches 

□ Multicolor or black-and-white 
display 

System Requirements: 

□ IBM Personal Computer, XT, or 
AT with 256K RAM, 2 disk drives, 
and DOS Version 2.0 or later 

□ IBM Color/Graphics Adapter 
with RGB color or black-and- 
white monitor 

□ IBM Graphics Printer or Epson 
FX/MX/RX series dot-matrix 
printer 

□ Houston Instrument DMP-41 
pen-and-ink plotter 

□ Optional Microsoft Mouse 



The Smart Buy 

At $895, smARTWORK® is proven, 
convenient, fast, and a sound 
value. Call us today. And put it to 
work for yourself next week. 



UAV^W^W 



ij.i 



Wintek Corporation inquiry 380 

1801 South Street 
Lafayette, IN 47904-2993 
Telephone: (317) 742-8428 
Telex: 70-9079 WINTEK CORP UD 

In Europe contact: RIVA Terminals Limited, 
Woking, Surrey GU21 5JY ENGLAND, 
Telephone: 04862-71001, Telex: 859502 

"smARTWORK!' "Wintek" and the Wintek logo are 
registered trademarks of Wintek Corporation. 










For the same reason that 
many Computerlands, On- 
Line Computer Centers 
and Entre' Computer 
stores have become 
dealers for Advanced 
logic Research's 
Challenger! 

Advanced Logic Research Offers: 

• $375 for the standard Challenger! 

• Quality and Reliable Products 

• Friendly Responsive Technical Support 
Maximum Price/Performance Ratio 
Product Features: 

4 Mega bytes memory (128K standard) 
4 Serial Ports (1 standard) 
1 Printer Port Standard 
1 Game Port (Optional) 
VSpool Standard 






$225.00 less than AST's similar product 



Advanced Logic Research, Inc. 

15455 Red Hill Ave., Suite B, Tustin, CA 92680 
(714)832-7808 




basic time and Qubie' are registered trademarks of Basic 

Time, Inc., AST is a registered trademark of AST Research, Inc. 

VSpool copyright of Rimos Systems. 






CLUBS & NEWSLETTERS 



tained, and a newsletter con- 
tains members' contribu- 
tions, product reviews, and 
programming ideas. Contact 
Jim O'Connor, Robin 
Owners' Group, POB 492, 
Rollinsford, NH 03869-0492. 

• NEW FIG FORMS 

Members of the Central 
Arkansas FORTH Interest 
Group (CAFIG) meet twice 
monthly at the National 
Education Center at the 
Arkansas College of Tech- 
nology in Little Rock. For 
more information, contact 
Gary Smith, POB 7668, Little 
Rock, AR 72217, (501) 
227-7817. 

• FOR THE PEOPLE 

Users of the Kaypro 16 can 
join a special-interest group, 
SIG-16. sponsored by the 
National Kaypro Users 
Group (NATKUG). The 
NATKUG 4 Bits x 4 National 
Newsletter is produced for 
users of the IBM-compatible 
Kaypro. Membership in 
SIG-16 is $15 a year; mem- 
bership in People's Com- 
puter (NATKUG) is $12 an- 
nually. Contact Steven 
Bender, People's Computer 
(NATKUG). POB 28360. 
Queens Village, NY 11428. 
(212) 776-2909. 

• PAIR AND REPAIR 

Users and owners of the 
Otrona Attache computer 
can find a listing of repair 
centers and users groups 
from the Boston Computer 
Society (BCS). A $24 annual 
membership entitles you to 
receive both the Otrona 
monthly newsletter and one 
other BCS newsletter. Con- 
tact the Boston Otrona User 
Group, 1 Center Plaza, 
Boston, MA 02108. 

• MEET FOR FREE 

Participants of the North 
Jersey TRS-80 Users' Group 
discuss TRS-80 computers, 
programming techniques, 
and programs. The group 
meets at 7:30 p.m. on the 
second Friday of the month 



60 BYTE • JULY 1985 



Inquiry 19 for End-Users. 
Inquiry 20 for DEALERS ONLY. 



at Fairleigh Dickinson 
University in Teaneck, New 
Jersey. Dues are not col- 
lected. Contact Dr. Howard 
Silver. Electrical Engineering 
Department. Fairleigh Dickin- 
son University. Teaneck. NI 
07666. 

• SINGLE USERS 

The Sytek Network Users 
Group (SNUG) encourages 
communication between 
owners and users of Sytek's 
LocalNet products. Funded 
by membership dues, the 
club meets informally once 
every nine months. Contact 
Greg Scott, lektronix Inc.. 
POB 500, MS 50-454, 
Beaverton, OR 97077, (503) 
627-5007. 

• FRENCH FIDONET 

A Fidonet BBS in Paris, 
France, is available at 300 
full CCITT on 18764.5.6.7. 
The team of ARTS, a non- 
profit organization, is com- 
posed of people involved in 
radio, video, videotex, and 
teleservices. Contact *ARTS, 
POB 100, 94123 Fontenay 
Sous Bois, Paris. France. 

• MINNESOTA MEETINGS 

The Central Minnesota Users 
Group convenes in St. 
Cloud. The general meetings 
are not limited to a specific 
brand of computer but are 
followed by special-interest- 
group meetings. Information 
on public-domain software is 
available. Contact Lee 
Larkey, Central Minnesota 
Users Group, Rt. 1, Box 106, 
Avon, MN 56310, (612) 
356-7402. 

• A WORD EVERY 
QUARTER— A word-process- 
ing newsletter, The Quarterly 
Report, is devoted to the 
latest in word processors, 
issues for businesses con- 
cerning word processing, 
and research information. 
The introductory subscrip- 
tion rate is $30 a year. Con- 
tact The Quarterly Report, POB 
1060, Mercer Island, WA 
98040. ■ 

Inquiry 14 — •• 



IBM PC/XT Compatibility 
AT Performance 
OEM Price 



W 





Ifirlf 1 


W 



High Speed 

4.7 or 8 MHZ 

8088-2 Processor 
With 8087-2 Option 

Highly Compatible 

IBM PC/XT Form, Fit & Function 

Highly Integrated 

Built-in Disk Controllers 
• Up To 4 Floppies 
• SASI Hard Disk Interface 

1 Megabyte On-Board Memory 

ips standard, raising 

Parallel Port 



in our entry level 
5K« This makes 
ur expansion up 
<abyte. 

s£ that memory 

sarder, we're uv 

.AM Disk software 

i memory addressing 



2 Serial Ports 

Time of Day Clock 

54K User Definable ROM 



1ZE CONTROL OF YOUR HARDWARE DESTIN 



The switchable 4.7 or 8 
iZ speed of the ACS-1000 
>erComputer coupled with 
optional 8087*2 number 
ncher provides AT-Mke per- 
manee without sacrificing 
XT compatibility ♦ ., or 
e! 

If your company is using 
rd level microcomputers as a 
of your own product, you 
increase profits and improve 
ability by using the 
S-1000 single board 
perComputer. 
The ACS- 1000 is compati- 
ble with both software and 
•^'dware designed for the IBM 
/XT, It even has the same 
unting holes and the same 
ver supply connections. The 
ference is that the ACS- 1000 
ers a much higher level of 
~gration and — c~" 
in OEM quai 



Disk controllers, I/_ 
and extensive memory are a 
ready built-in, simplifying pro- 
duction and freeing the 6 
expansion slots to take on the 
specialized work of your pre""' 
control, CAD/CAM or of fit 
automation applications* 
There's even a special port 1 
low cost piggyback modem. 

A 256K evaluation boj 
is available to qualified OEN 
for $595. Power supplies, p 
aging, keyboards and other j 
tern support available on 
request. To order, call or wi 

ACS International, Inc 
2105 Luna Road, Suite 
Carrollton, Texas 7500 

214*247*5151 



In Canada: 
Soltech Industries 
9274 194th St. 
Surrey, B.C. V2T4W2 

4-888*2606 



ADVANCED COMPUTER^OLUTIONS 
INTERNATIONAL, INC. 



IRS. I f^^"T .V A^S- • riu 



r°*rfW? ,rU ..* m\ 



In the 92 seconds it 
find any file you need 




//////// //////////////////f////ll II If IIIIIIUII\\\\\\\\\\\\\\V\\\\\\\\\\\\ 



Ampex 20 MB hard disk with 25 MB tape backup. 



\ 

\\\ 




T "PC Megastore is a trademark of Ampex Corporation. 'IBM-PC is trademark of International Business Machines. tApple II and lie are trademarks of Apple Computer. 
62 BYTE • JULY 1985 



takes to read this ad, 
on our backup streamer. 



O In the 1 hour, 4 minutes other streamers take, you could 
call your broker. Linger over coffee. Wade through the Wall Street 
Journal © And read this PC Megastore™ ad too. © So take the time. 
You'll more than make it up with a PC Megastore hard disk and tape 
hooked to your IBM-PC* or compatible, Apple II or IleJ because all the files 
you need -both current and archive -will always be right where you need them. 
© Just a keystroke away. © The secret? Only Ampex backs up a 20 MB hard disk 
with another 25 megabytes* of addressable storage -a unique, bootable streamer with 
cache memory. That not only means you can address a file in 92 seconds, you can 
backup files offline just by touching a couple of buttons. © Without tying up your 
computer. Q Your time. © Or a small fortune in floppies. (In fact, our 45 megabytes of 
available storage cost about half the price per MB of other hard disks.) So consider 
your time, money and convenience. ©And our quality. The PC Megastore system is 
backed by a full year warranty from Ampex, a company known for manufacturing 
quality computer peripherals for over 20 years. © Take a moment Contact: Ampex Com- 
puter Products Division, Marketing Communications, 10435 N.Tantau Ave., Cupertino, CA 
95014. 800 421-6863, 213 640-0150 in CA. We'll give you a dealer's name so you can buy a 
PC Megastore system. ©Then in no time at all, you'll Jf\ l\ Jl ^3^S^^ 
make up for the 92 seconds you spent reading this ad. ^^1™ W^ mJr^ 



Ampex Corporation • One of The Signal Companies 



'PC Megastore is upgradeable and comes in four models: 20 MB with 25 MB tape, 10 or 20 MB disk, or 25 MB tape. 

Inquiry 31 JULY 1985 • BYTE 63 




THE AT&T PC 

THE COMPUTER WITH 

THE FUTURE BUILT IH. 




Before you buy a personal com- 
puter for your business you should 
ask yourself two essential questions. 
One: What do you need today? Two: 
What will you need tomorrow? 

The AT&T PC 6300 is the answer 
to both. Tbday, you'll get a high per- 
formance computer that's competi- 
tively priced. A computer that not 
only runs the broadest selection of 
software available, but has the power 
and speed to make the most of it. A 
computer with superb graphics in 
monochrome or color. And a high reso- 
lution screen that's easy on the eyes. 

For tomorrow, you'll get a com- 
puter with the future built in. With its 
modular architecture and seven expan- 



That's a commitment from AT&T. 
And the AT&T PC, the computer with 
the future built in. 

For more information, call your 
AT&T Account Executive, visit an 
authorized AT&T dealer, or call 
1-800-247-1212. 



sion slots, it's ready now to work with 
future technology, and meet your 
future needs. From additional power 
to multi-tasking capabilities, even to 
features yet to come, it can be easily 
enhanced as time goes by. 



AT&T 

The right choice. 



BOOK REVIEWS 



PERSONAL COMPUTERS 

AND SPECIAL NEEDS 

Frank G. Bowe 

Sybex 

Berkeley, CA: 1984 

171 pages. $9.95 

DIGITAL IMAGE 

PROCESSING: 

A PRACTICAL PRIMER 

Gregory A. Baxes 

Prentice-Hall 

Englewood Cliffs. NJ: 1984 

192 pages, $14.95 

PASCAL APPLICATIONS 
FOR THE SCIENCES 
Richard E. Crandall 
John Wiley & Sons 
New York: 1984 
2 56 pages, $16.95 



PERSONAL COMPUTERS 
AND SPECIAL NEEDS 
Reviewed by John Wilke 

In 1977, a group of ac- 
tivists with a variety of 
disabilities staged a sym- 
bolic sit-in at the Department of Health. Education, and 
Welfare to demonstrate support for a bill frequently called 
"the civil rights act for the disabled." 

Since that legislation became law, engineers and city 
planners must design public buildings that are accessible 
to all people. The young man who led the HEW demon- 
stration and lobbied successfully for the new law has 
turned his attention to overcoming another set of barriers: 
software, computers, and communications equipment 
that, by design, shut out the disabled. 

Frank G. Bowe is quick to point out in Personal Computers 
and Special Needs that just as new technology is beginning 
to make it possible for disabled individuals to not only 
communicate more effectively but also pursue meaning- 
ful employment in the information industry, there is a lack 




ASSEMBLY COOKBOOK 
FOR THE APPLE II/IIe 
Don Lancaster 
Howard W. Sams & Co. 
Indianapolis, IN: 1984 
368 pages, $21.95 

1985 PROGRAMMER'S 

MARKET 

Brad M. McGehee, editor 

Writer's Digest Books 

Cincinnati, OH: 1984 

343 pages. $16.95 



of physically compatible 
and affordable computer 
interfaces. This paradox is 
an underlying theme in 
Bowe's book, a survey of 
personal computer periph- 
erals and communications 
prostheses available to people whose hearing or vision 
is impaired or who are unable to manage normal move- 
ment. 

Bowe takes what might have been little more than a 
listing of the latest in speech synthesizers and keyboard 
emulators and peoples it with firsthand accounts of how 
the devices are making life more productive for disabled 
people. Unifying this effort is his concern that with the 
transition to an increasingly information-based economy— 
with its obvious promise of fuller participation for the 
disabled— the danger remains that a new set of barriers 
will prevent them from participating. 

The book, then, addresses both how-to and why. It was 
written first for the nearly 30 million Americans who might 

[continued) 



ILLUSTRATED BY JAMES ENDICOTT 



JULY 1985 • BYTE 65 



BOOK REVIEWS 



benefit from the use of microcomputers for writing, 
"reading," and "hearing" or handling the everyday tasks 
that can be daunting for even the most determined dis- 
abled person. Bowe offers handicapped people and their 
families, teachers, and friends a practical guide contain- 
ing prices, sources, and descriptions of scores of spe- 
cialized interfaces designed to close the gap between 
disabled people and their computers. These details weave 
through the text and are then gathered together in an ap- 
pendix for quick reference. 

The products Bowe surveys range from speech- 
recognition units and speech synthesizers to optical text 
readers and software such as Logo (used increasingly by 
educators for their dyslexic and developmentally disabled 
students). The Information Through Speech Unit (from 
Maryland Computer Services Inc., Forest Hill, Maryland), 
for example, allows the blind aural access to the popular 
NEXIS and LEXIS databases. Bowe explores the state of 
the art in optical character recognition: an extraordinary 
unit that can scan almost any printed text and read it aloud 
in synthesized voice. The $29,000 machine (from Kurzweil 
Computer Products, Cambridge, Massachusetts) is clear- 
ly beyond the fiscal reach of most people, but Bowe 
reports that engineering advances will bring prices down 
dramatically on similar units. 

Beyond just describing various adaptive products, Bowe 
visits with people using these interfaces every day, letting 
them describe in their own words the frustrations and joys 
the new technologies bring. 

The Role of Companies 

Despite such adaptations, much of the promise of the new 
technology remains to be realized, Bowe points out. This 
is true in part because companies working on devices to 
help the disabled must overcome discouraging dis- 
economies of scale, producing their wares for just a small 
slice of the market. Indeed, he laments, many of the most 
significant technological advances come not from research 
meant to make computers more accessible to handi- 
capped people but from industry efforts to develop talk- 
ing vending machines, say, or devices allowing a business- 
person to dictate letters without a secretary. 

Another problem, Bowe writes, is that use of the adap- 
tive systems now available is often hampered by incom- 
patibility with popular applications software. Most of the 
software designed for disabled people is limited to ad- 
dressing a specific need, such as keyboard emulation for 
people with severely limited mobility. But this software 
frequently does not then work with widely used software 
such as spreadsheets and word processors, which are 
often "locked" to prevent modification. For example, the 
popular Echo II speech synthesizer (from Street Elec- 
tronics, Carpinteria, California) does not yet work with such 
protected programs as MicroPro's WordStar. Hardware, 
too, must often be altered to function with special devices 
for the disabled. 

Bowe is optimistic that at least some computer makers 



will respond to these concerns. Toward this goal of mak- 
ing manufacturers more aware of the difficulties of the dis- 
abled, last year the author conceived and carried out a 
conference on computer accessibility, under the auspices 
of the White House Office of Private Sector Initiatives. The 
conference, which Bowe describes briefly, brought 
together experts on the needs of the disabled with 
representatives from AT&T Bell Laboratories, International 
Business Machines, " Apple Computer, l&ndy, and 
Honeywell. Approaches to enhancing accessibility in- 
volved relatively simple accommodations, including the 
introduction of standard ports for adaptive interfaces. 
Some companies expressed concern that the computer 
market is too fast paced and competitive to meet the 
needs of such a small market segment. Bowe answers with 
convincing demographic data suggesting potential market 
opportunities for firms willing to respond to the special- 
needs buyer. 

Bowe's excitement when he considers what microcom- 
puters might mean for the disabled in the not-too-distant 
future illuminates his book. Within a decade, Bowe 
believes, affordable computers will be able to "hear" 
speech in real time and print out what is being said. "As 
someone who has not heard a word in three decades," 
he explains, "this prospect fills me with a wonderful sense 
of anticipation." 

)ohn Wxlke covers technology and telecommunications for Business 
Week (Suite 1200, 1 1 20 Vermont Ave.. Washington, DC 20005). 



DIGITAL IMAGE PROCESSING: A PRACTICAL PRIMER 
Reviewed by Richard ). Cass 

In the preface to Digital Image Processing: A Practical Primer, 
Gregory A. Baxes states his intention to provide "an 
elementary overview of digital image processing at a prac- 
tical level." On a technical level, he succeeds admirably. 
The book is a sound and detailed introduction to the con- 
cepts and practices of processing images using digital 
computers. An entire section on the hardware considera- 
tions related to image processing would be helpful for 
those who are interested in designing and configuring 
systems for digital image processing. A practical advan- 
tage of this book is a section that contains entries for each 
of the most commonly used digital image processing oper- 
ations; a catalog format makes this section most useful 
as a reference for the beginner and the experienced 
reader alike. 

In part I, the author defines image processing in general 
and discusses methods of image processing other than 
digital, such as optical and analog. He also details the 
historical development of digital image processing, from 
the early 1960s and the space program's attempts to 
gather pictures of the moon's surface to the later work 
done by NASA in the Mariner and Pioneer projects. Baxes 

[continued) 



66 BYTE • JULY 1985 



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BOOK REVIEWS 



moves on to an overview of some of the more recent 
business applications that have been made possible by 
image processing, including factory automation and com- 
puter graphics. 

The Image 

Part II covers the characteristics of the digital image— how 
it is formed how brightness and resolution affect the way 
the image looks— and explains such terms as digitizing, 
pixel, frequency, and frame rate. One chapter concentrates 
on the image histogram, a tool used to measure and 
assess digital images. The histogram provides a graphic 
representation of the contrast qualities of the digital image 
by plotting the number of elements in an image against 
their brightness levels. Manipulating an image's histogram 
can affect the image, as the author demonstrates. 

Baxes discusses the concept of "point processing," 
where each element of an image can be modified by a 
mathematical or logical process to create a new image. 
He also discusses operations such as contrast enhance- 
ment, corrections for photometric and geometric distor- 
tions, and applications for these techniques in graphic arts, 
as well as the fundamentals of processing picture elements 
in group relationships. 

The chapter on image data handling describes, in great 
technical detail, the major functions that a hardware sys- 
tem must accomplish. Baxes provides examples of hard- 
ware specifications from several manufacturers to illustrate 
the types of hardware used to perform these functions. 
Digitization, storage, display of images, and the internal 
interface between where the memory is stored and the 
hardware image processor, as well as the system's inter- 
face to the host computer, are covered. The author goes 
into the mechanics of the hardware device that actually 
processes the digital image data, with block diagrams and 
product-specification sheets. He discusses the charac- 
teristics of single- and dual-pixel point processors, group 
processors, and frame processors. 

Image Processes 

The catalog of 19 digital image-processing operations con- 
cisely explained in part IV is extremely useful. It provides 
a detailed explanation, with images from before and after 
processing, of the most commonly used image-processing 
operations. The section includes more specific examples 
of histogram manipulation, as well as discussions of con- 
trast enhancement, filtering, and edge enhancement. Each 
entry in this section contains a description of the purpose 
of the operation, possible applications for it, and prac- 
tical hints on how to implement the process. The image 
that accompanies each piece reinforces the reader's 
understanding of the associated operation. 

Comments 

With a few exceptions, the book is well structured. The 
author introduces terms and concepts only as necessary, 

[continued) 



68 BYTE • IULY 1985 



Inquiry 355 



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ae 



NEVADA Please send me these NEVADA Software packages: 

□ COBOL □ FORTRAN DEDIT □ PASCAL □ BASIC □ PILOT DBIGPRINT 
(Extra manuals-$14.95 each; diskettes alone-$19.95 each. Specify number & formats 

of manuals and/or diskettes required.) 

Please specify the diskette format you want: 

□ 8" SSSD (Standard CP/M IBM 3740) 

□ 5VV Diskette for: q Access/ Actrix; D Apple CPM; □ DEC VT 180, or 

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UTAH Please send me these UTAH Software packages (IBM-PC diskette): 

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Send your order to: 

ELLIS COMPUTING, INC. 

3917 Noriega Street, San Francisco, CA 94122 

Phone (415) 753-0186 
SINCE 1977 




TOTAL . 



Send me software packages: 

Other: extra manuals, extra diskettes, 
Nevada COBOL application Book 1, BIGPRINT: TOTAL . 

California residents add sales tax (6% or 6V2%) 

Handling/shipping: add $5 for first package or manual, $2 each 

additional. OVERSEAS: add $15 for first package or manual, 

$5 each additional. 
D Check D MasterCard DVISA 

Checks must be in U.S. Dollars, drawn on a U.S. bank 
DC.O.D. (add $4) 

Enclosed: TOTAL . 



CARD # . 



Exp.. 



SIGNATURE. 



SHIP TO NAME. 
STREET 



CITY/STATE/ZIP 

CP/M is a Digital Research TM: MS isa Microsoft Corp. TM; Apple II is an Apple Computer. Inc. TM; 
Osborne is an Osborne Computer Corp TM; Xerox 820is aXerox Corp TM: Kaypro is a Non -linear 
Sys. TM; Heath/Zenith is a Heath Corp. TM; IBM is an International Business Machines. Corp. TM: 
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puting TMs. 'Cj 1985 Ellis Computin g. Inc. 



JULY 1985 -BYTE 69 



As a programmer, 
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(718) 458-3700. Ifwe're shipping to a NYS address, please add 8 l A% sales tax. 



70 B YTE • JULY 1985 



Inquiry 323 



BOOK REVIEWS 



and each discussion of technical material builds logically 
upon the information and terms already explained. Defini- 
tions and explanations of the intricacies of image process- 
ing are lucid enough to instruct the beginner without 
insulting a more knowledgeable reader. The book is, as 
promised, a practical introduction to digital image 
processing. 

I have only one serious misgiving about the book: All 
the technical information is presented in clear, coherent 
prose, but the rest of the writing could have used better 
editing. 

Richard J. Cass (29 High St., Peterborough. NH 03458) is a 
technical writer for Apollo Computer in Chelmsford, Massachusetts. 



PASCAL APPLICATIONS FOR THE SCIENCES 
Reviewed by Steven H. Rogers 

In Pascal Applications for the Sciences, Richard E. Crandall 
tackles the problem of teaching scientific programming 
in a minimal amount of time. The book is intended to be 
used largely in a self-paced manner; to get the most out 
of it you should have ready access to a computer running 
Pascal. It is organized with short blocks of text followed 
by exercises illustrating the important points just covered. 
I found this technique effective in keeping my interest. 
The first five chapters provide the basic tools for writing 
scientific programs in Pascal. Crandall then presents more 
advanced examples of scientific applications. The balance 
of the book consists of five appendixes containing libraries 
of functions and procedures for scientific programming. 

Scientific Programming 

Crandall begins with an intentionally brief review of the 
fundamentals of Pascal programming. Those readers with 
a background in Pascal can skip the review without miss- 
ing anything; readers new to the language will need a stan- 
dard Pascal text as a supplement. Exercises relate to scien- 
tific applications. 

Next, the reader is introduced to mathematical program- 
ming. The author demonstrates numerical methods for ap- 
proximating the derivatives and integrals of a function, 
proceeds to coverage of differential equations, and then 
moves on to the use of matrices to solve systems of si- 
multaneous linear equations. One example and several 
exercises that I found quite enjoyable involved modeling 
a satellite orbiting the earth. 

Crandall's coverage of probability presents a concise ex- 
planation of the problems involved with modeling prob- 
abilistic phenomena on computers, which are by nature 
deterministic. This means a given input will always yield 
the same output, though some people maintain that their 
computers don't fit this description. Examples range from 
population biology to card games. An introduction to the 
statistical analysis of data concludes this chapter. 

[continued) 



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Inquiry 12 3 



IULY 1985 -BYTE 71 



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mouse. 

KEYTRONICS 5150 & 5151. Keyboards for PC and Jr. 
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FROM $129 

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and ISOBAR surge protectors, 4 & 8 plug. 

POLAROID Palette. $1345 

Monitors and CRTs 

PGS Max12 (E), Amber, Monochrome thatalso runs 

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QUADRAM Quadchrome, 690 Dot RGB. $429 

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Inquiry 235 



IULY 1985 'BYTE 73 



o 

COMPUTERBANC 




10UJCST PRICCS nNVUJH€R€! flNYTIMC! flNVPMCC! 

THOUSRNDS OF RVRILRBL6 IT6MS. CRLL FOR COMPl€T€ PRICING. 



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AMDCX300 129.00 

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©Copyright 1985 COMPUT€RBRNC. All Rights Reserved 



BOOK REVIEWS 



Graphics programming in Pascal is covered in sufficient 
detail for most scientific and engineering applications. 
Crandall provides a graphics library of two- and three- 
dimensional graphics procedures for the Tektronix 4012 
graphics terminal and the Hewlett-Packard HP 7 4 70 A plot- 
ter. These procedures would have to be modified for use 
with other systems. 1 found this to be fairly straightforward 
for Ttirbo Pascal version 2.0 running on my Hyperion. 

Advanced Techniques 

The last four chapters are devoted to more advanced 
applications in mathematics, chemistry physics, and 
biology. Most readers will want to be selective about the 
exercises they do from these chapters. Many of them are 
exploratory in nature and take on the character of a major 
project. Because the methods illustrated in a particular 
application area can be used in other fields, 1 advise 
against completely skipping a chapter that may fall out- 
side your specialty. Advanced examples from mathematics 
include fast Fourier transforms for signal analysis and a 
method for doing arithmetic of arbitrary precision. 

Chemistry applications include modeling chemical reac- 
tions and graphical modeling of molecular structure. Ex- 
amples from quantum mechanics appear as both 
chemistry and physics applications. An interesting illustra- 
tion of computer graphics in physics models the pertur- 
bation of Saturn's rings by the gravitational field of one 
of its moons. Biological applications vary from ecology 
to biological signal processing. 

In addition to the graphics library, this book furnishes 
functions and procedures for matrix manipulation, 
statistics, special functions (Bessel functions and the like), 
and dynamic models. Many people would find these li- 
braries alone sufficient justification to buy this book. 

Developed in parallel with a course for undergraduate 
science students, Pascal Applications for the Sciences also meets 
the needs of graduate students, practicing scientists, and 
technically oriented hobbyists. Richard Crandall does a 
generally good job of presenting the material clearly and 
concisely. This book has something of the flavor of a travel 
guide, especially in the advanced section. It gives you the 
information that you need to go exploring on your own. 

Steven H. Rogers (108 Brook lane, Midwest City, OK 73130) flies 
F-4s for the USAF Reserves when not occupied as a graduate student 
in industrial engineering. 



ASSEMBLY COOKBOOK 
FOR THE APPLE II/IIe 
Reviewed by Roger Ccx 



Most programmers find a need for doing at least 
some assembly-language programming. For Apple 
users this usually means venturing beyond Applesoft's 
PEEKs and POKEs to acquire the knowledge needed to 

[continued) 



74 BYTE • JULY 1985 



Inquiry 103 








>,ttfM&**?'- 



Does your 

VOUT 



U 



lerun 



■>■%% *'W- 





Mark Williams knows that 
programmers are like everyone 
else: you tend to put your pants 
on one leg at a time. 

But you still have to get your 
programs up and running as fast 
as possible. With all the buttons 
buttoned and all the zippers 
zipped. 

That's why we developed the 
C Programming System. So you 
don't get caught with your pants 
down. 

To err is human-to debug, 
superhuman. 

Normally, nothing is more frus- 
trating for a programmer than 
the debugging process. You've 
spent months just getting the 
code written, but you know it's 
going to take at least that much 
more time to get the program 
running right. 

That's where our C Source 
Debugger (cscf)can be a big help. 

csd lets you debug like a 
human being— in C, not assem- 
bler-looking right at your code 
through the csd window, an 
exclusive Mark Williams feature. 
You can set trace-points to stop 
program execution at particular 
program lines, trace and display 
the value of any C expression or 
variable, and much more. 



With csd you can run the 
target program a line at a time, 
continue to the next tracepoint, 
or even restart the whole pro- 
gram right in the middle of 
debugging. Meanwhile, you're 
squashing bugs as you find 
them. And your program will 
run without modification. 
Get a leg up on the 
competition. 

Every company says its compiler 
produces the fastest, densest 
code. But Mark Williams actually 
proves it. Take a look at the 
benchmark tests below and see 
if you don't agree. 

Now imagine just how much 
more competitive this kind of 
performance could make your 
products. 



EXECUTION TIME (SECONDS) 



The C Programming System 
supports the complete C lan- 
guage as defined by Kernighan & 
Ritchie. But it also goes on to 
include void and enumerated 
data types, register variables, 
structure assignments, Berkeley 
structure rules, and the biggest C 
library available. With support 
for a wide variety of third-party C 
libraries and utilities. 

You also get MS-DOS compat- 
ibility, large and small memory 
models, 8087 in-line support, and 
one-step compiling. A full range 
of options increases your flexibil- 
ity, letting you compile without 
linking, link without compiling, 
and more. 

With all these advantages, it's 
no wonder Intel, DEC, Wang, and 



PROGRAM SIZE (BYTES) 




MWC L M DRI CI MWC L M DRI CI 



many others have made MWC86 
their compiler of choice. (After 
all, they're only human.) 
A human interest story with 
a happy ending. 

All right, you're interested-which 
proves you're not only human, 
but smart. So what do you 
do now? 

Easy. Just call 1-800-MWC- 
1700. You'll talk to another 
human being who'll answer any 
questions you have. And if you 
want to order, we'll send you the 
complete system, including 
MWC86 compiler, csd debugger, 
complete library of functions, 
and more. All for just $495. 

The sooner you call, the 
sooner you can be winning the 
race to get your products out the 
door. Which is, after all, a very 
human race. 

■-Small Memory Model 
■-Large Memory Model 

NOTE: Sort program as in Byte , August 
1983, p. 91. Register declaration added. 
Further information on these benchmarks 
available from Mark Williams Company 
upon request. 



Mark 

Williams 

Company 



1430 West Wrightwood Avenue 
Chicago, Illinois 60614 



Call 1-800-MWC-1700 To order. 

IN ILLINOIS CALL 312-472-6659. VISA/MC ACCEPTED 



Inquiry 220 



JULY 1985 'BYTE 75 



Three more firsts 
from the people who 
invented the wheel. 





XEROX 



L 



From day one, Xerox and Diablo 
have been known as the two best 
names in daisy wheel printers. And 
now there are three more in the 
Xerox line to ehoose from. 

The Xerox Advantage D-25 
Diablo printer turns out letter qual- 
ity documents quickly and quietly. 
And it does all that for the price of 
~ a dot matrix printer. 
to At 80 



c.p.s., the D-80IF is the fastest 
daisy wheel printer ever made by 
Xerox. It has a built-in double bin 
sheet feeder. As well as 
the capacity to handle up 
to 16 computers at once. 

And the D-36 spells 
reliability. It averages 4,000 hours of 
printing between maintenance calls. 

But Xerox didn't stop there. 
Each of these new machines is 
compatible with most computers 
on the market, including the 
IBM-PC. And they're 
■** all easy to use. 





They're also a part of Team Xerox,* 
so they can be serviced by the 
national Xerox service force and 

authorized service loca- 
tions across the country. 

So if you're looking 
for the latest in daisy- 
wheel printing technology, go with 
the people who've been in the busi- 
ness the longest. Call 1-800-833-2323, 
ext. 25, your local Xerox office, an 
authorized Diablo or Xerox dealer 
or send your business card to Xerox 
Corporation, Dept 25192, EQ 
Box 24; Rochester, NY 14692. 

For more information from Xerox, 
Circle 382 on the Reader Service card. 



ig#» 



ns$&* 



XEROX®, Diablo* and the identifying numbers herein are trademarks of XEROX CORPORATION. 
IBM" is a registered trademark of International Business Machines Corporation. 



Inquiry 158 for End-Users. Inquiry 159 for DEALERS ONLY. 




KEYPATCH™ -10 - A full travel mini-keyboard. 
Plugs between keyboard connector and CPU. 
Automatically activates NUM-LOCK placing your 
IBM™ keyboard into the number pad mode while 
KEYPATCH™ -1 provides separate cursor and 
screen control functions without the use of the 
NUM-LOCK key. Saves time — eliminates errors. 
KEYPATCH™ -10 requires no software. A must 
for spread sheets; word processing; graphics; etc. 



For Immediate Shipment 
Genest Technologies, Inc. 



IBM PC/XT $84- 98 

Compatibles* $89- 98 



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Santa Ana, Cal if. 92705 - please specify system- 

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(714) 547-OooU Visa, Master Card, Check. Money Order 

'"Patents Pending Plus $2 M Shipping 

KEYPATCH'" is a trademark of Genest Technologies. Inc. 
IBM'" is a trademark of International Business Machines Corp. 



What IBM™ 
left out . . . 

The Enhancer offers: 

• BIOS Enhancer reduces eye-strain with flicker-free scroll*, adjust- 
able rate of display, touch a key to see text that has scrolled away* (or 
other display pages*), optionally pause at screen full, choose an 
attribute (color) for input, switch to non-blinking reverse-video block 
cursor, more 

• Keyboard Device expands keyboard buffer (variable up to thousands 
of keystrokes), open KBD device to read, write, and flush the buffer; 
supply input to interactive programs from batch files 

• Status Line reserves bottom line of screen for status information: 
displays keyboard buffer and allows simple editing, displays Caps- 
Lock, NumLock, and Hold (ctrl-NumLock) states; avoids conflict 
with full-screenapplications,can expand display and usea26th line* 

• Resident Clock time display at the touch of a key or on status line, 
optionally chimes on the hour and half-hour, reminds you of 
important events with alarm and message 

• Character Menu eases entry of special/graphics characters 

• with Color Graphics Adapter 

$50 

For IBM PC and PC/XT with DOS 2.0 or later. 
Not copy protected. Make check/MO payable to: 

GENERAL SOFTWARE 

Dept.47 P.O. Box 3272 
Boulder, CO 80307-3272 



BOOK REVIEWS 



write efficient assembly-language code. Assembly Cookbook 
for the Apple \ll\\e is written for people who want to learn 
assembly-language skills and some of the tricks specific 
to the Apple itself. 

As "cookbook" implies. Don Lancaster approaches his 
subject matter from a practical point of view. The book 
serves two audiences— Apple programmers looking for 
education and challenge and people interested in writing 
profitable commercial software. The 'Tun and profit" 
theme begins in the introductory chapter and continues 
throughout the book. 

The two obvious advantages of assembly-language pro- 
grams are high execution speed and small size. Yet another 
primary reason for programming in machine language, ac- 
cording to the author, is economics. He makes the rather 
convincing argument that nearly all commercial programs 
sold for the Apple today consist at least partially of 
machine-language code to achieve the high performance 
standards of the software marketplace. A would-be 
developer of commercial software, Lancaster contends, 
must learn assembly-language skills to be competitive. 

Getting Started 

This book begins with a brief explanation of how 
assemblers work and contrasts the types of assemblers 
available: miniassemblers, macroassemblers, disassem- 
blers, cross-assemblers, and assemblers that generate 
relocatable code. After this introduction. Lancaster empha- 
sizes how to get started; he provides lists of recommended 
hardware, software tools, reference books, and other pro- 
gramming aids. Since assembly-language programming is 
so machine-dependent, the author also introduces the 
newcomer to the broader resources of the Apple com- 
munity. An appendix in the book lists magazines specializ- 
ing in Apple machine-language programming, article 
reprints, users groups, newsletters, and bulletin boards. 

Chapter 2 explores the anatomy of an assembler source- 
code line: line number, label, operation or pseudo op- 
code, operand, and comment fields. Lancaster uses 
Apple's EDASM assembler (from Apple's DOS Tool Kit 
package) in all examples, but most assemblers are similar 
enough that the owner of any software package should 
benefit from most of the discussion. While the author 
assumes that the reader is already familiar with the 6502's 
operation codes, he does offer a clear, concise review of 
the chip's addressing modes along with suggestions to 
help eliminate confusion when specifying a particular ad- 
dress mode. The book was released just before the an- 
nouncement of the Apple He and, unfortunately, does not 
include the additional operation codes and address 
modes of the He's 65C02 processor. 

In chapter 3, Lancaster encourages the assembly-lan- 
guage programmer to structure source code to improve 
readability and maintainability. He suggests how to 
organize equate and constant statements and the various 
subroutines into a large program. He then explores the 

[continued) 



78 BYTE • 1ULY 1985 



Inquiry 156 




Power, Performance, and Price 
Zorro is where it's AT 



Our new Zorro AT systems give you: on 80266 CPU operating or o quick 6 Mz„ eight 
expansion slots, o clock/calendar with battery backup, a 1 .2 Megabyte 5 1/4" floppy disk drive, 
ond IDM-AT campotlblllry. 

Zarro AT's alio come with a 060K drive for PC/XT media compatibility and 51 2K of RAM, 
features that would cost you hundreds of dollars from big blue. 

Zarro AT-20's feature a 20Mb. Winchester drive from NEC, and you still hove room to odd o I 
fourth drive or tope backup. 

To be quite f rank, we believe our Zarro AT's are built better, ond we bock each system with o 
limited warranty foro full year. Our quality and features Invite comparison, our prices speak for 
themselves. 

Zorro AT $2695 

i Zorro AT-20 $3895 j 




The Silver Fox Trots 
Through Lotus Like 1,2,3 

The Silver Fox Is not IBM-PC compatible yet It runs hundreds of MS-DOS programs Including 
Lotus 1,2,3, dDASE II, Mulfiplon, and even Flight Simulator. 

TheSllverFoxdoes not hove IBM compatible expansion slots but you con economically odd 
printers, serial ports, modems, 10-40 Mb. hard disks, clock/calendar cords, RAM. joysticks, on 
6067 co-processor, ond more. 

What mokes the Sliver Fox unique, however, isn't what you con odd to if. but what comes 
with It. Each Silver Fox comes with on 6066 CPU, 256K of RAM. four video ports, and o printer 
port. Plus you get more than twice the storage of o standard PC, 1.6Megabytes on dual 5 1/4" 
ftoppys. and the Fox will read and write to standard 1 60K. 320K. and 360K IDM-PC formats. 

Standard equipment also includes a better keyboard, a 1 2" high resolution monitor with o 
full 25x60 display, and we back each Sliver Fox with o one year limited warranty. 

Were this not enough each Sliver Fox comes with the best free software bundle in the 
business Including: MS-DOS 2.1 1/HAGEN-DOS 2.1 1. DOSTuror. Wordstar 3.3. Easy Wrirer. Spell. 
Moll Track. PC File III, FILEDASE, ColcSfor. gomes, graphics, utilities, and two BASIC languages. 

Decouse computer sales usually slow down during the summer we've given you on extra 
incentive to buy a Fox by lowering our prices. If you wont to get the most for your computer 
dollor. coll our machine ot 1-800-FORAFQX. leave your nome ond address ot the beep, ond 
we'll send you a Silver Fox booklet that will tell you how It con. 

Silver Fox $1 297 

Color Fox $1 497 




Altos ^i,,,.,,, 

High-performance, Xenix-based, mulrl-user systems from 
lAlfos-worid leaden In multi-user systems and applications 
| software. 

As part of TRWs marketing support group we con have your 
I Altos system installed on your site (additional charge). 

Altos systems are easy to expand and with shared printers 
land hard disks are cost competitive with multiple single user 
■ systems. Coll for oddltionol pricing and availability. 

1486-20 $4539 

1586-40 $7249 

1966-40 $6829 

Ofos Acc'r $2779 

PRINTERS 




I The Bernoulli Box: 

i Hard disk capacity ond performance 
| ■ Removable cartridge economy 
i Cartridge convenience ■ Flexible disk economy I 
■ Winchester capacity ■Unporolleled reliability I 

J 10 Mb $18391 

1 20 MB $2529 1 

15 Mb./Moc $13791 



Fox Jr' 



8088*Dual 360K Drives 
1 28K«Keyboard«Soffware 




|StarSG-10 $236 

SfarSR-15 $599 

EpsonFX-60*- >9T$141 off 

LX-80 J»«60 off 

Okldoto 182 Z... $225 

Okfdafa 192 $374 

Olymplo NP $329 

Panasonic 1091 $269 

Citizen MSP-10 $295 

Toshiba 1340 $579 

l Toshiba 351 $1198 

LETTER QUALITY 

| Olympia RO $329 

Juki 6100 $399 

Juki 6300 $719 

Silver Reed 500 $299 

Silver Reed 550 $409 

Silver Reed 770 $724 

Diablo Coll 

| NEC Coll 

Doisywriter 2000 $824 

HOUSTON INSTRUMENTS 

DMP-29 $1795 

DMP-40 $745 

DMP-41 $2340 

other models Coll 



Columbia 4220 or 2220 




$1698 



CLOSED M/ EEK 
0F JULY 4th 



Scottsdale Systems ud. 

1 617 N. Scorrsdale Road, Suite B, Scottsdale, Arizona 85257 

S(602) 941-5856 



.^\ Call 8-5MorvFri. 

\ m/^m. We participate In arbitration for business and customers through the Defter 
s . Business Bureau of Maricopa County. 



SINCE 1980 



TELEMARKE ING ONLY: If you plan to stop by please phone ahead. Pricesllsted are far 
cash. P.O.'s from Fortune 1200 companies and universities with good credit add 2% / 
Mastercard and Visa add 3% / Arizona residents add 6% sales rax / Shipping extra / All 
Items are new with manufacturers warranty / Returned merchandise subject to 20% 
restocking fee / Personal or company checks toke up to 3 weeks to clear / No COD's or 
APO's. Trademarks: Sliver Fox. HAGEN-DOS. and ZarTO AT. Scottsdale Systems. Ltd.: 
Wordstar and CalcStar.MIcropro International: MS-DOS. and Mulriplan. Microsoft Corporation: 
FILEB'ASE-. EWDP Software. Inc.: dDASE II. Ashton-Tate; IBM-PC, IBM-PC DOS. and IBM-AT, 
International Business J^acjSines. 



TERMINALS 



Qume 

V7101 $298 I 

Wyse 50 $449 | 

ADDS View- 
point 60 $479 f 



1200 BPS Modems 



i Volksmodem 12 $199 

| Password Coll 

Prometheus $315 

Hayes 300/1200 5429 



$899 



ft OLYMPIA 




ISITSICKTO 
LOVE A PRINTER? 

If you love your Okidoto 92 or Epson FX80 
don't read any further because the new 
Olympia NP Is rated as faster, Is noticeably 
quieter and has a near letter qualify mode 
fhot Is much superior to anything in Its price 
doss. 

Plus, unlike the Okldoto or the Epson 
the Olympia comes with adjustable tractor 
feed (as well as friction feed) as standard 
equpmenr. The tractor feed is the "punch- 
type" and the NP has a tear bar so thot If 
woiks great with continuous forms. 

The NP uses standard Epson type 
ribbons, comes with the quality that has 
mode Olympia woild leader in typewriters 
and is backed by nationwide service. 

To quote PC magazine. "The (NC) 
prlnferls o sure thing If it falls info your price 
range and even if if doesn't if may be 
worth considering . . 

If you're considering the purchase of on 
Okldoto. on Epson, or even a Toshiba, give 
us o call and let us send you on actual print 
sample from the CHumpIo NP and odditlonol 
Information. 

Because if you were to buy on Epson 
FX-80 or on Okidoto 92 with tractors and o 
cable for the lowest odvertlsed prices, you 
would pay about $50 more for an inferior 

Rrtnter. Scottsdale Systems sells the Olympia 
P with a 10' shielded coble foro mere: 



$344 



JULY I985 -BYTE 79 



WHO MAKES 

THE HIGHEST 

QUALITY 

15" DISK? 

ASK SONY. 

WE 
INVENTED IT. 



Long before there was a market for 3.5" disks, in fact, four years before, there was Sony. 

And while every single 3.5" disk manufacturer has duplicated the Sony design, 
there's one thing they haven't been able to duplicate. Sony quality. 

Such error-suppressing materials as VIVAX™ magnetic particles (the very core of 
the disk itself) have been developed by Sony. As is the case for our manufacturing pro- 
cess. It includes a burnishing technique that eliminates projections as small as 1/1 ,000,000 
of a millimeter from the disk's surface. 

The result? Every time you use a Sony 3.5" disk you're assured you're using the 
best magnetic medium you can buy. 

With somebody else's, you can only guess. 



© 1985 Sony Tape Sales Company, A division o| Sony Corporation of America, Sony Drive, Park Ridge, New Jersey07656. Sony is a registered trademark of Sony Corporation. Vivax is a trademark of Sony Corporation. 

Inquiry 335 JULY 1985 -BYTE 81 



Inquiry 162 



ATTENTION 
BERNOULL BOXERS 

Give your IOMEGA a Boot! 



FiXT/B PLUS for 
IBM AT, XT, PC and compatibles 



FiXT/B PLUS gives you the utility of a bootable 

hard disk while preserving the performance of 

your Bernoulli Box. 

You can have it all 

with FiXT/fi PLUS! 



Golden Bow Systems 



$95-$H0 

Add $3 for shipping/ 

handling 

California residents add 

6% sales tax 




3368 Second Ave., Suite F 
San Diego, CA 92103 
(619) 298-9349 



IBM COPY 
PROTECTION 



MultiGuard provides maximum protection for your PC soft- 
ware at a reasonable price. Ten disks or thousands — formatted 
or fully duplicated. Call today for complete information. 

DISK 
COPYING 

Whether you need 50 disks or thousands, we have years 
of experience in creating the highest quality copies. Reasonable 
prices — fast turnaround. Call today for our free booklet on 
software duplication and packaging. 



Call ALF first 

1-800-321-4668 

in Colorado (303) 234-0871 

J^L,F ALF products • i)enver ' < 



BOOK REVIEWS 



questions of programming technique and style His discus- 
sion of speed-optimization techniques covers straight-line 
code, shared loops, table-lookup methods, and minimal 
use of subroutines, in time-critical sections. 

With the Apple (as with any other computer), the abil- 
ity to create the smallest possible program is often im- 
portant. Lancaster discusses several techniques for doing 
this, such as custom interpreters, memory overlays, com- 
pressed text and picture files, and options for building 
relocatable code modules; he illustrates many of these 
concepts with examples from commercial programs. 

Lancaster devotes two chapters to the mechanics of edit- 
ing assembler source-code files. He deals with the use of 
the line-oriented editor supplied in the EDASM package 
and extols the advantages of the screen-oriented Apple 
Writer word processor for source-code editing. 1 found this 
discussion repetitive and wordy. Lancaster belabors the 
differences between the two approaches; one short 
chapter would have been sufficient. 

The eight assembly-language modules presented in the 
remainder of the text amply demonstrate efficient pro- 
gramming techniques. The reader is treated to Lancaster's 
humorous style as his analysis of these routines reveals 
the secrets of writing quick and compact Apple programs. 
Each programming example highlights several specific 
techniques, many of which are further illustrated through 
examples of similar methods used in actual commercial 
programs. Lancaster has obviously spent many hours dig- 
ging into the innards of several popular software packages. 

The actual code examples Lancaster presents include 
subroutines for generating random numbers, sound 
effects, and music; handling message strings; and select- 
ing program options using a table-driven subroutine. Lan- 
caster includes complete source listings and flowcharts for 
all the routines. He also includes an additional module, 
called an "empty shell," that lists about 200 label names 
equated to base-page locations, entry points to DOS and 
Applesoft routines, soft switches, and other hardware- 
specific memory locations. 

Assembly Cookbook for the Apple WlWe is written with a free- 
wheeling, irreverent style. If you approach personal com- 
puter programming from an academic perspective and are 
looking for a computer science textbook, you will be 
disappointed. Lancaster writes using both slang and 
humor, and many of the commercial programming exam- 
ples are from games rather than business applications. 
If you are new to the Apple culture, the anecdotes and 
examples make the learning process more interesting and 
concrete. Besides developing the fundamentals of assem- 
bly-language programming, the book provides good in- 
sight into many of the practical issues that must be ad- 
dressed when writing commercial software. 

Assembly Cookbook succeeds in addressing the needs of 
programmers new to assembly language as well as those 
considering writing commercial software for the Apple. 
The two groups obviously have different needs, but Lan- 
caster emphasizes techniques of interest to both. 



82 BYTE • JULY 1985 



Inquiry 22 



BOOK REVIEWS 



Roger Cox (POB 45, Pitkin. CO 81241) is a consulting engineer 
specializing in computer technology and signal processing. 



1985 PROGRAMMER'S MARKET 
Reviewed by E. Francis Avila 

Writer's Digest Books has for many years produced 
popular guides for writers and artists in many 
fields. Like the annual Writer's Market, the 1985 Programmer's 
Market is a gold mine of information. Freelance program- 
mers and technical writers could benefit from the data and 
advice on selling software creations in the competitive 
microcomputer marketplace. 

Edited by Brad M. McGehee, author of The Complete Guide 
to Writing Software User Manuals (Cincinnati, OH: Writer's 
Digest Books, 1984), this book is patterned after the other 
publications in the "market" series. 

Under one cover you will find a comprehensive listing 
of more than 700 software publishers from across the 
country that are looking to buy commercially marketable 
programs. McGehee includes with each publisher's entry: 
a name to contact (very important); hardware specifics and 
operating systems: the publisher's software needs: pro- 
cedures for submitting your software idea; payment 
schedules; types of contract work; examples of the com- 
pany's published programs; need for technical writers; and 
tips on how to break into the market. 

Good News and Bad News 

The 1985 Programmer's Market reads like a "Who's Who" in 
the software industry. It purports to list those microcom- 
puter software publishers (from the famous to the obscure) 
that claim to be actively seeking freelance software and 
technical writing expertise. That's the good news. 

Here's the bad news. 1 sent query letters to four well- 
known software houses and four I'd never heard of. In 
choosing these companies. 1 tried to match my expertise 
with their needs (as described in Programmer's Market). I 
included stamped self-addressed envelopes. Well, more 
than six months has passed and I've heard not a word. 
I'm not encouraged. 

Obviously, polling 8 out of 700-plus entries cannot be 
considered a representative sampling of software pub- 
lishers. Certainly 1 recognize the possibility that my 
qualifications did not interest those that 1 queried. At 
minimum, 1 expected to get back my stamped envelopes. 

In the 1985 Programmer's Market, McGehee paints an op- 
timistic, albeit cautious, picture of the current state of free- 
lance programming and technical writing. Given his en- 
couragement, to say that 1 was disappointed in the 
response to my query letters is an understatement. Never- 
theless, experience in the world of publishing tells me to 
give it another try. ■ 

E. Francis Avila (POB 4401, Auburn, CA 95604) is a freelance 
writer! programmer working on a degree in mathematics. 



SuperSoft 
Diagnostics 

When Reliability 
Counts 



Protect yourself from time-robbing system failure. 
Pinpoint costly hardware problems before they 
cause serious trouble. Diagnostics 11 from Super- 
Soft can help you eliminate hardware problems, 
service calls, and data loss due to system failure. 

End Users 

Diagnostics 11 is the finest set of system diag- 
nostics available for microcomputers. It thoroughly 
checks memory, CPU, terminal, printer, and disk 
drives - isolating many problems to the chip 
level. It checks both standard and non-standard 
components, including non-IBM add-ons. The 
memory test is particularly powerful; incorpo- 
rating a quick test, walking bit test, bum-in test, 
and speed test to make sure every bit of memory 
is completely reliable. 

Manufacturers 

Hardware manufacturers, systems houses, and 
service organizations - we can tailor our diag- 
nostics software to your specific needs. We have 
developed custom diagnostics for companies 
such as NCR, XEROX, MORROW DESIGNS, and 
SONY From easy to operate user level diagnostics 
to exhaustive service level tests, we can provide 
the expertise you need. 

So whether you're an end user, service technician, 
or system manufacturer, get SuperSofts Diag- 
nostics 11 for yourself and keep your system 
in great shape. 

Diagnostics II 

(for all PC DOS, MS DOS, CP/M-86, and 

CP/M-80 systems): $125 

Call for pricing on customized versions. 

TO ORDER CALL 
800-762-6629 

(in Illinois call 217-359-21 12) 

or SEND YOUR CHECK OR CREDIT CARD 
INFORMATION TO THE ADDRESS BELOW. 
Add $3 shipping U.S., $6 Canada, $20 all other 
areas. Please specify your computer and operating 
system. (C.O.D. orders also accepted) 

SuperS ft 

SuperSoft, Inc. P.O. Box 1628, 
Champaign, 1L 61820 
Telex: 270365 SCJP AC1 CHM 



Inquiry 346 



JULY 1985 • BYTE 83 



THE FORTH SOURCE 1 



MVP-FORTH 

Stable - Transportable - Public Domain - Tools 

You need two primary features in a software development package ... a stable operating 
system and the ability to move programs easily and quickly to a variety of computers. 
MVP-FORTH gives you both these features and many extras. This public domain product 
includes an editor, FORTH assembler, tools, utilities and the vocabulary for the best selling 
book "Starting FORTH". The Programmer's Kit provides a complete FORTH for a variety of 
computers. Other MVP-FORTH products will simplify the development of your applications. 

MVP Books A Series 

□ Vol. 1, All about FORTH by Haydon. MVP-FORTH glossary with cross references 



to fig-FORTH. Starting FORTH, and FORTH-79 Standard. 2nd Ed. 

□ Vol. 2, MVP-FORTH Assembly Source Code. Includes IBM-PC®. 
CP/M© , and APPLE© listing for kernel 

□ Vol. 3, Floating Point Glossary by Springer 

□ Vol. 4, Expert System with source code by Park 

□ Vol. 5, File Management System with interrupt security by Moreton. 

□ Vol. 6, Expert Tutorial for Volume 4 by M & L Denck 



.$25 

S20 
S10 
S15 
S25 
S15 
S20 



FORTH DISKS 

□ APPLE by MM $100 

□ APPLE by MM.F, & G $180 

□ ATARI® valFORTH $60 

□ ATARI by PNS, F.G, & X S90 

□ C64 by HES Commodore 

64 cartridge $40 

^D C64 with EXPERT-2 by PS. 

MVP.G.F & X $99 

□ CP/M by MM $100 

□ CP/M by MM, F $140 

□ HP-75 by Cassady $150 

□ HP-85 by Lange $90 

□ IBM-PC by LM $100 
^D IBM-PC by MM $125 

□ Macintosh by MM $125 



□ ^Vol. 7, FORTH GUIDE, to MVP-FORTH by Haydon 

MVP-FORTH Software A Transportable FORTH 

□ MVP-FORTH Programmer's Kit including disk, documentation, Volumes 1, 2 & 7 
of MVP Series, and Starting FORTH. DCP/M, DCP/M 86. DZ100, DApple, 
DSTM PC. DIBM PC/XT/AT & compatibles, DPC/MS-DOS, DOsborne, 

□ Kaypro. DMicroDecisions. DDEC Rainbow, DNEC 8201. DTRS-80/100 
DHP150 ^ MACINTOSH MVP-FORTH $175 

^ □ MVP-FORTH Enhancement Package for IBM-PC/XT/AT Programmers Kit. 
Includes full screen editor, MS-DOS file interface, disk, display and 
assembler operators. $110 

□ MVP-FORTH Floating Point and Matrix Math for IBM PC/XT/AT with 
8087 or Apple with Applesoft $85 

□ MVP-FORTH Graphics Extension for IBM PC/XT/AT or Apple $65 

□ MVP-FORTH Programming Aids for CP/M, IBM or APPLE Programmer's 
Kit. Extremely useful tool for decompiling, callfinding, translating, and 
debugging. $200 

□ MVP-FORTH Cross Compiler for CP/M Programmer's Kit. Generates 
headerless code for ROM or target CPU. $300 

□ MVP-FORTH Meta Compiler for CP/M Programmer's kit. Use for 
applications on CP/M based computer. 

Includes public domain source. $150 

□ MVP-FORTH PADS (Professional Application Development System) for IBM 
PC/XT/AT or PCjr or Apple II, I IB or He. An integrated system for customizing 
your FORTH programs and applications. The editor includes a bi-directional string 
search and is a word processor specially designed for fast development. PADS 
has almost triple the compile speed of most FORTH's and provides fast debugging 
techniques. Minimum size target systems are easy with or without heads. Virtual 
overlays can be compiled in object code. PADS is a true professional development 
system. Specify Computer, $500 

□ MVP-FORTH MS-DOS file interface for IBM PC PADS $80 

□ MVP-FORTH Floating Point & Matrix Math see above $85 

□ MVP-FORTH Graphics Extension see above $65 

□ MVP-FORTH EXPERT-2 System for learning and developing knowledge based 
programs. Both IF-THEN procedures and analytical subroutines are available. 
Source code is provided. Specify DApple, DIBM, or DCP/M. Includes MVP 
Books, Vol. 4 & 6. $100 

D ^ FORTH-Writer, A Word Processor for the IBM PC/XT/AT with 256K. MVP- FORTH 
<^ compatible kernel with Files. Edit and Print systems. Includes Disk and Calculator 
systems and ability to compile additional FORTH words. 



Key to Vendors: 

HW Hawg Wild Software 
LM Laboratory Microsystems 
MM MicroMotion 
PNS Pink Noise Studio 
PS ParSec 



D Timexby HW. cassette 

D T/S 1000/ZX-81 $25 

D 2068 $30 

D Z80 by LM $100 

D 8086/88 by LM $100 

D 68000 by LM $250 
D VIC FORTH by HES, VIC20 

Cartridge $40 
D Extensions for LM Specify IBM, Z80. or 
8086 

□ Software Floating Point $100 
D 8087 Support (IBM-PC or 8086) $100 

D 951 1 Support (Z80 or 8086) $100 

D Color Graphics (Z80 or 8086} $100 

D Data Base Management $200 



Codes: 

F - Floating Point 
G - Graphics 
T - Tutorial 
X - Other Extras 



FORTH MANUALS, GUIDES & DOCUMENTS 

D Thinking FORTH by Leo Brodie, author 

of best selling "Starting FORTH" 
D ALL ABOUT FORTH by Haydon. 

MVP Glossary 
D FORTH Encyclopedia 

by Derick & Baker 
^D FYS FORTH from the Netherlands 

* D User Manual 
D Source Listing 

^jiD FORTH Tools and Applic. 
by Feierbach 
D The Complete FORTH by Winfield 
^>jlD Learning FORTH by Armstrong 
D Understanding FORTH by Reymann 
^D FORTH, An Applications Approach 

* by Toppen 
^Q FORTH Applications by Weber 

D Mastering FORTH 

by Anderson & 

Tracy 
D Beginning FORTH by Chirlian 
D FORTH Encycl. Pocket Guide 
D And So FORTH by Huang. 

A college level text. 
D FORTH Programming by Scanlon 
D STARTING FORTH by Brodie. Best 

instructional manual available. 

(soft cover) 



or 


D 68000 fig-Forth with assemble 


$25 


$16 


D F0RML Proceedings 

D 1980 D1981 Vol 1 




$25 


D 1981 Vol 2 D1982 






tf&n 1983 D1984 


each $25 


$25 


D 1981 Rochester Proceedings 

D 1981 D1982 D1983 




$25 


D 1984 


each $25 


$25 


D Bibliography of FORTH 
D The Journal of FORTH 


$17 


$19 


Application & Research 




S16 


D Vol 1/1 DVol 1/2 




$17 


D Vol 2/1 DVol 2/2 




$3 


^SJHD Vol 2/3 


each $15 




D METAF0RTH by Cassady 


$30 


$20 


D Threaded Interpretive Languages $25 


$13 


D Systems Guide to fig-FORTH 






by Ting 


$25 


$18* 


jjflD Inside F83 Manual by Ting 


$25 


D FORTH Notebook by Ting 


$25 


b1/ 


D Invitation to FORTH 


$20 


$/ 


D PDP-11 User Man. 
D 6502 User's Manual by 


$20 


Wb 


Rockwell Intl. 


$10 


81/ 


D FORTH-83 Standard 
D F0RTH-79 Standard 


$15 
$15 



$20 



D Installation Manual for fig-FORTH 

D Source Listings of fig-FORTH, Specify CPU or Computer 



$15 
$15 



Ordering Information: Check. Money Order (payable to MOUNTAIN VIEW PRESS, INC.}. 
VISA. MasterCard, American Express. COD's $5 extra. Minimum order $15. No billing or 
unpaid PO's. California residents add safes tax. Shipping costs in US included in price. 
Foreign orders, pay in US funds on US bank, include for handling and shipping by Air S5 



for each item under $25, $10 for each item between $25 and $99 and $20 for each item 
over $100. All prices and products subject to change or withdrawal without notice. Single 
system and/or single user license agreement required on some products. 



MOUNTAIN VIEW PRESS, INC. 



PO BOX 4656 



MOUNTAIN VIEW, CA 94040 



(415)961-4103 



84 B YTE • IULY 1985 



Inquiry 253 



EVENT QUEUE 



July 1985 



• GOVERNMENTAL 
COMPUTING-Managing 
Microcomputers in Govern- 
ment, various sites through- 
out the U.S. Two seminars. 
"Managing Microcomputer 
Usage in Government" and 
"Using Micros for Govern- 
ment Management." are of- 
fered. Fees range from $415 
to $795. depending upon 
duration and governmental 
or nongovernmental affilia- 
tion. Contact U.S. Profes- 
sional Development Institute. 
1620 Elton Rd.. Silver Spring. 
MD 20903, (301) 445-4400. 
\u\y 

• PBX SEMINAR 

New Generation PBX: The 
Path to Voice/Data Integra- 
tion, various sites 
throughout the U.S. This 
three-day seminar covers 
computer to PBX interfaces, 
signaling, new products, PBX 
selection and economics, 
and a comparison of 
selected vendors. The full 
registration fee is $745. Con- 
tact Data-Tech Institute. 
Lakeview Plaza, POB 2429, 
Clifton. Nl 07015. (201) 
478-5400. )uly 

• LOTUS, SYMPHONY 
SEMINAR— Seminars on 
Lotus 1-2-3 and Symphony, 
various sites throughout the 
U.S. A focus on the con- 
cepts and features of these 
programs. Contact Data-Tech 
Institute, Lakeview Plaza. 
POB 2429, Clifton, NJ 07015. 
(201) 478-5400. )uly 

• CAD COURSE 

Computer-Aided Design. Col- 
orado State University. Fort 
Collins. Three-week courses 
with participants using a 
high-performance dynamic 
graphics machine. The fee is 
$800. Contact Professor 



Gearold Johnson. Center for 
Computer Assisted Engineer- 
ing, Colorado State Universi- 
ty. Fort Collins. CO 80523. 
(303) 491-5 543. )uly-August 

• ENGINEERING 
CONFERENCES-Engineer- 
ing Summer Conferences, 
Chrysler Center for Con- 
tinuing Engineering Educa- 
tion. University of Michigan. 
Ann Arbor. Conferences in 
such areas as biomedical, 
chemical, civil, computer, 
electrical, and environmental 
engineering. Contact 
Engineering Summer Con- 
ferences. 200 Chrysler 
Center, North Campus, Uni- 
versity of Michigan, Ann Ar- 
bor. Ml 48109. (313) 
764-8490. July-August 

• COMPUTER SHORT 
COURSES-The Fifteenth 
Annual Institute in Computer 
Science, University of 
California, Santa Cruz. 
Among the offerings are 
"Relational Database Man- 
agement," "Data Storage," 
and "Computer-Aided Geo- 
metric Design." Contact Sally 
Thomas. University of 
California Extension, Santa 
Cruz. CA 95064. (408) 
429-4534. ]uly-August 

• SOFTWARE COURSES 
Software Short Courses, 
various sites throughout the 
U.S. Among the courses are 
"UNIX: A Hands-on Intro- 
duction." "Programming in 
C: A Hands-on Workshop," 
and "Software Requirements. 
Specifications, and Tests." 
Contact Integrated Computer 
Systems. 6305 Arizona 



Place. POB 45405, Los 
Angeles. CA 90045. (800) 
421-8166; in California. (800) 
352-8251 or (2*13) 417-8888: 
in Canada. (800) 228-6799. 
July-August 

• COMPUTER TRAINING 
Computer Training Programs, 
Wintergreen Learning In- 
stitute, Wintergreen. VA. 
Hands-on training in word 
processing, information 
management, spreadsheets, 
and graphics. Contact Dr. 

M. D Corcoran. Wintergreen 
Learning Institute. POB 7. 
Wintergreen, VA 22958, 
(804) 325-1107. 
\uly-September 

• DEVELOPMENT 
SEMINARS-Professional 
Development Seminars, 
various sites around Boston. 
MA. A brochure describing 
one- and two-day seminars 
on computer competence, 
management, sales, and 
finance is available. Contact 
Boston University Metro- 
politan College. 755 
Commonwealth Ave., Boston, 
MA 02215. (800) 255-1080; 
in Massachusetts, (617) 
738-5020. 

July-September 

• SME CONFERENCES, 
EXPOS— Conferences and 
Expositions from the Society 
of Manufacturing Engineers, 
various sites throughout the 
U.S. For a calendar, contact 
the Society of Manufacturing 
Engineers. Public Relations 
Department. One SME Dr.. 
POB 930. Dearborn. Ml 
48121. (313) 271-0777. 
July-November 



IF YOU WANT your organization's public activities listed in BYTE's Event 
Queue, we need to know about them at least four months 'in advance. Send 
information about computer conferences, seminars, workshops, and courses 
to BYTE. Event Queue. POB 372. Hancock. NH 03449. 



• SNA SEMINAR 

IBM's Systems Network Ar- 
chitecture (SNA) Seminar, 
various sites throughout the 
U.S. Covers such topics as 
local-area networks. SNA 
distribution services, and 
personal computer connec- 
tions. Contact Communica- 
tions Solutions Inc., 992 
South Saratoga-Sunnyvale 
Rd.. San Jose. CA 95129, 
(408) 72 5-1568. 
]uly-December 

• PICK EDUCATION 
Pick System Educational 
Series, various sites through- 
out the U.S. and Europe. 
Seminars and workshops on 
the Pick operating system. 
Contact JES & Associates 
Inc.. POB 19274. Irvine. CA 
92713. (714) 786-2211. 
July-December 

• PERSONAL COMPUTER 
COMMUNICATIONS-Data 
Communications and Net- 
working for the IBM PC and 
Other Personal Computers, 
Atlanta. GA. Topics to be 
addressed include asyn- 
chronous connections, syn- 
chronous mainframe connec- 
tions, data integrity, and per- 
sonal computer networking. 
The fee is $695. Group dis- 
counts are offered. Contact 
Software Institute of 
America Inc.. 8 Windsor St., 
Andover. MA 01810. (617) 
470-3880. )uly 8-9 

• ADVANCED 
AUTOMATION-Robot 
Manipulators. Computer Vi- 
sion, and Automated 
Assembly. Cambridge, MA. 
Contact Director of the Sum- 
mer Session, Room El 9-3 56, 
Massachusetts Institute of 
Technology, Cambridge, MA 
02139. )uly 8-12 

[continued] 



IULY 1985 'BYTE 85 



Inquiry 306 



DISK DRIV€ SUBSYSTEMS 

\\l PC-INSIDCR OR PC-OUTSIDCR \\\ 
III HRRD DISK S€RI€S FOR IBM III 

1 TO 1 1 6 Mb FORMATTED Ul/ Controller 

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TRP€ DRIVC OPTION For IBM-PC $1^525 

"" 26Mb CiPHCR'sTD 'hts V/rCMTRDM"" 

DRIVC UJ/ Cabinet,_Cables_& Software $775 

"^du'roRbcRiVR'mbToR - ^"' 

OURNITV PRICING ON HRRD DISKS: 
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MITSUBISHI MICROPflLISRODIME landan 
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""nMPlWV^biSKT/6"BV"lOTIM€S" " 

Over The Fastest 5 1/4" Drives Ullth The 

50Mb RMCODVNC SUBSVSTCM 

Available For COMPUPRO CONCURRENT 

DOS 8-1 6JURBODOS, find MS-DOS 

Ul/ 25Mb Removable Cartridge For 5 Min. Back-Up, 

Ultimate Data Securlty/flrchlval And A Very 

efficient Networking Solution From $4,795 

£?=*£*£* (800) SEE PAGE 431 
mm—mmSwS*. 528-3138 FOR OTHER MDSE 



The 



Data Switch 



\W!£ : ifflSSS- 








A 


B 


^WPlk 


• 


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DATA SPEC presents the affordable data switch. At $59.95* you 
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Full metal construction 

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requirements) 

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operation 

• One year warranty 



Isn't it about time you benefit from high performance at affordable 
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mutism* 



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'Manufacturer's suggested retail price for model AB-25. A/B switch. A/B/C (25 or 36 pin 
configurations) and cross matrix data switches are also available. 

©Copyright 1985 Alliance Research Corporation 

Inquiry 395 for End-Users. 
Inquiry 396 for DEALERS ONLY 



EVENT QUEUE 



• COMPUTATIONAL 
LINGUISTICS-The Twenty- 
Third Annual Meeting of the 
Association for Computa- 
tional Linguistics, University 
of Chicago, IL. Papers, dem- 
onstrations, and tutorials. 
Contact Don Walker (ACL). 
Bell Communications Re- 
search, 44 5 South St.. Mor- 
ristown, NJ 07960, (201) 
829-4312. July 8-12 

• SYMPHONY TIPS 
Advanced Symphony, 
Georgia Institute of Tech- 
nology. Atlanta. Areas 
covered include auto-dialing 
to remote computers and 
"smart" spreadsheets using 
artificial-intelligence con- 
cepts to preanalyze numeric 
outputs. The fee is $390. 
Contact 'Irish Stolton. De- 
partment of Continuing 
Education. Georgia Institute 
of Technology, Atlanta, GA 
30332. (404) 894-2547. 

luly 9-10 

• CONSULTANT TRAINING 
Learn How to Be a Suc- 
cessful Independent Com- 
puter Consultant. Honolulu, 
HI. The risks and rewards of 
consulting, planning and 
marketing, legal considera- 
tions, and resources are 
covered. Contact Education 
Technology Center Inc.. Suite 
1042. 485 Fifth Ave.. New 
York. NY 10017, (212) 
505-6148. July 13 

• AWC CONFERENCE 

The Fourth Annual National 
Conference of the Associa- 
tion for Women in Comput- 
ing. Allerton Hotel. Chicago. 
IL. Workshops and sessions 
on technical and career- 
enhancement topics. For 
more information, contact 
loan Wallbaum. AWCC '85. 
407 Hillmore Dr.. Silver 
Spring, MD 20901. 
]uly 13-14 

• THE NCC 

The 1985 National Com- 
puter Conference: NCC '85. 
McCormick Place, Chicago, 
IL. Exhibits, technical ses- 



sions, and development 
seminars. This year's theme 
is "Technology's Expanding 
Horizons." Contact Helen 
Mugnier. AFIPS. 1899 
Preston White Dr.. Reston. 
VA 22091. (703) 620-8926. 
luly 15-18 

• iRMX USERS MEET 

The iRUG Annual Interna- 
tional Conference. Palmer 
House. Chicago. IL. The 
theme is "The Future Direc- 
tion of Real-Time Software 
Applications." iRUG is a non- 
profit organization made up 
of Intel iRMX operating sys- 
tem users. Contact Catherine 
Moon, MS/HF2-57, Intel 
Corp.. 5200 Northeast Elam 
Young Parkway, Hillsboro. 
OR 97123. (503) 640-7038. 
luly 17 

• DATA SWITCHING 
Distributed Data Switching 
Seminar. Washington. DC. A 
one-day seminar on the 
technology and application 
of distributed data switching 
in telecommunications. The 
fee is $395. Contact Time- 
plex Seminars. 400 Chestnut 
Ridge Rd.. Woodcliff Lake. 

Nj 07675. (201) 930-4600. 
luly 18 

• PERSONAL COMPUTER 
COMMUNICATIONS-Data 
Communications and Net- 
working for the IBM PC and 
Other Personal Computers. 
New York. NY. See July 8-9 
for details, lulu 22-23 

• SIMULATION 

The 1985 Summer Computer 
Simulation Conference: 
SCSC '85. Westin Hotel. 
Chicago. IL. Contact Charles 
Pratt. Society for Computer 
Simulation, POB 2228. La 
jolla. CA 92038. (619) 
4 59-3888. luly 22-26 

• COMPUTER 
WORKSHOPS-Personal 
Computer Workshops. Aspen 
and Colorado Springs, CO. 
Tutorials, including an intro- 
duction to personal com- 

{continued) 



86 BYTE • IULY 1985 



THE PROFESSIONAL'S CHOICE 



Lotus 
1-2-3 

Call 



Lotus 
Symphony 

Call 



dBase III I FrameWork MultiMate 

$349 *349 *849 



Word 
Perfect 

*809 



Software 



Word Processing Editors 

FANCY FONT $139 

FINAL WORD $189 

MICROSOFT WORD $229 

MULTIMATE $249 
OFFICE WRITER/ 

SPELLER $279 

PFS: WRITE $ 95 

SAMNA WORD III $279 
VOLKSWRITER 

DELUXE $159 
VOLKSWRITER 

SCIENTIFIC $279 
THE WORD PLUS 

(OASIS) $105 

WORD PERFECT $209 

WORDSTAR $199 

WORDSTAR 2000 $269 

WORDSTAR 20004 $309 

WORDSTAR PRO $259 

XYWRITE II+ $199 



Spreadsheets/ 

Integrated Packages 

ELECTRIC DESK $209 

ENABLE $359 

FRAMEWORK $349 

LOTUS 1-2-3 SCaii 

MULTIPLAN $135 

OPEN ACCESS $359 

SAMNA PLUS $379 

SMART SYSTEM $559 
SPREADSHEET 

AUDITOR $ 79 

SUPERCALC 3 $179 

SYMPHONY $Ca)l 

TK! SOLVER $269 

Languages/Utilities 

CONCURRENTDOS $189 

C86C COMPILER $299 
DIGITAL RESEARCH 

C COMPILER $219 

DR FORTRAN 77 $219 

LATTICE C COMPILER $299 
MICROSOFT C 

COMPILER $249 

MS BASIC COMPILER $249 

MS FORTRAN $239 

NORTON UTILITIES $ 69 

TURBO PASCAL $ 59 



Database Systems 

ALPHA DATA BASE 

MANAGER II $179 

CLIPPER $CaJI 

CLOUT V 2.0 $139 

CONDOR III $299 

CORNERSTONE $329 

DBASE II $299 

DBASE III $349 

INFOSTAR+ $319 

KNOWLEDGEMAN $269 
PFS: FILE/PFS: 

REPORT $169 

POWERBASE $319 

QUICKCODE III $169 

QUICKREPORT $169 

R BASE 4000 $249 

Project Management 
HARVARD PROJECT 

MANAGER $209 
HARVARD TOTAL 

PROJECT MANAGER $269 
MICROSOFT 

PROJECT $159 

PERTMASTER $549 
SCITOR PROJECT 

5000W/GRAPHICS $259 

SUPERPROJECT $199 

TIME LINE $259 

Desktop Environments 

DESK ORGANIZER $129 

SIDEKICK $ 45 

SPOTLIGHT $109 

Accounting 

BPI $329 

GREAT PLAINS $479 

IUS EASYBUSINESS $279 

ONE WRITE PLUS $199 

OPEN SYSTEMS $379 

PEACHTREE $299 

REAL WORLD $469 

STATE OF THE ART $389 
STAR ACCOUNTING 

PARTNER $249 
STAR ACCOUNTING 

PARTNER II $549 

Personal Finance 
DOLLARS AND 

SENSE $119 
HOWARD TAX 

PREPARER 85 $195 
MANAGING YOUR 

MONEY $129 



Graphics/Statistics 
ABSTAT 
AUTOCAD 
BPS BUSINESS 

GRAPHICS 
CHARTMASTER 
CHARTSTAR 
DR DRAW 
ENERGRAPHICS W/ 

PLOTTER 
EXECUVISION 
GRAPHWRITER 

COMBO 
MS CHART 
OVERHEAD 

EXPRESS 
PC DRAW 
PC PAINTBRUSH 
PFSrGRAPH 
SIGNMASTER 
STATPAK-NWA 
STATPAC- 

WALONICK 
SYSTAT 



$279 
$1475 

$229 
$239 
$209 
$199 

$279 
$259 

$359 
$159 

$139 
$259 
$ 89 
$ 95 
$179 
$329 

$349 
$419 



Professional Development 


EXPERTEASE 


$CaH 


MANAGEMENT EDGE 


$159 


SALES EDGE 


$159 


THINK TANK 


$119 


Communications/ 




Productivity Tools 




CROSSTALK 


$105 


PROKEY 


$ 89 


RELAY 


$ 99 


SMARTCOM II 


$109 



Display Boards 
EVEREX GRAPHICS 

EDGE $329 

HERCULES GRAPHICS 

CARD $299 

HERCULES COLOR 

CARD $169 

PARADISE MODULAR 

GRAPHICS $275 

PARADISE 

MULTIDISRLAY CARD $295 
PERSYST BOB $449 

PRINCETON SCAN 

DOUBLER $Call 

SIGMA COLOR 400 $559 

STB GRAPHICS 

PLUS II $309 

TECMAR GRAPHICS 

MASTER $479 

TSENG ULTRA PAK $399 

TSENG ULTRA PAK-S $349 



Networks 

AST PC NET $Call 

CORVUS NET $Cail 

ORCHID PC NET $Call 

3 COM $Call 



Mass Storage/Backup 
IOMEGA BERNOULLI 

BOX $2695 

MT25 TAPE BACKUP $885 

TALLGARSSTG5025 $2945 

SYSGEN IMAGE $850 

SYSGEN QICFILE $Cail 



Input Devices 

KEYTRONIC 5151 $179 

KOALA SCall 

MICROSOFT MOUSE $139 

PC MOUSE W PAINT $159 



Hardware 4 



Displays 
AMDEK310A 
PRINCETON HX-12 
PRINCETON MAX-12 
PRINCETON SR-12 
QUADRAM 

AMBERCHROME 
TAXAN 122 AMBER 
TAXAN 420/440 
ZENITH 124 AMBER 
ZENITH 135 COLOR 



$169 
$459 
$179 
$599 

$179 
$159 
$399/599 
$145 
$Call 



Printers/Plotters 
C. ITOH 

DIABLO 620/630 
EPSON FX-80+ 
EPSON FX-100+ 
EPSON LQ-1500 
HP 7475A PLOTTER 
JUKI 6100 
NEC P3 COLOR 
NECP3 
NEC 2050 
NEC 3550 
OKIDATA 84P/93P 
PANASONIC 
QUME SPRINT 1155 
STAR SG/SR/SD 
TOSHIBA PI340 
TOSHIBA P351 



$Cail 
$Call 
$349 
$499 
$999 
$Call 
$419 

$1099 
$799 
$769 

$1139 

$729/619 

$Call 

$1569 
$Call 
$779 

$1279 



Emulation Boards 




AST 


$Calt 


CXI 3278/9 


$950 


IRMA 


$799 
$999 


IRMALINE 


IRMAPRINT 


$Call 


QUAD 3278 


$949 


Modems 




AST REACH 1200 


$Call 


HAYES 1200 


$389 


HAYES 1200B 


$385 


HAYES 2400 


$609 


VENTEL1200 




HALF CARD 


$379 



Multifunction Boards 

AST ADVANTAGE $375 

AST 6 PAK PLUS (64K) $259 

AST 6 PAK PLUS (384K) $339 
ORCHID BLOSSOM 

(64K) 4289 

ORCHID PC TURBO $739 
PERSYST TIME SPECTRUM 

(64K) $259 

QUADBOARD (OK) $229 

QUADBOARD (384K) $329 
TECMAR CAPTAIN 

(64K) 
TECMAR JR CAPTAIN 

(128K) 

TECMAR JR WAVE (64K) $249 

TECMAR MAESTRO $429 

TECMAR WAVE (64K) $209 

Accessories 
CURTIS SURGE 

PROTECTORS $Call 

DATASHIELD BACKUP 

POWER $CaJJ 

GILTRONIX A/B SWITCH $Call 
MICROBUFFER INLINE 

(64K) $264 

MICROFAZER INLINE 

(64K) $219 

64K RAM SET $25 



$Cafl 
$329 



I SET 
256KRAMSET 
8087 MATH CHIP 



$ 79 
$150 



'CALL FOR SHIPPING COSTS 




Smartmodem I Smartmodem 
1200B 2400 




LOWEST PRICE 
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We will match current 

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Call and compare. 



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free' 

Diskette 
Library 
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$609 




1-S00-221-1260 



TERMS: 

Checks— allow 14 days to clear. Credit processing— add 3%. COD orders—cash, 
M.O or certified check— add $3.00. Shipping and handling UPS surface— add $3.00 
per item {UPS Blue $6.00 per item). NY State Residents— add applicable sales tax. 
All prices subject to change. 



In New York State call (718) 438-6057 






pssM 



MON.-THURS. 9:00AM-8:00PM 
SUN. & FRI. 9:00AM-4:00PM 





Softline Corporation 
P.O. Box 729, Brooklyn, N.Y. 11230 
TELEX: 421 047 ATLN Ul 



JULY 1985 -BYTE 87 




Finally A Video Board That Leaves The Confusion Behind. 



On an IBM™ monochrome monitor 
(or equivalent), STB's Chauffeur 
displays color/graphics software in 
full-screen format and no software 
modifications are necessary. 
Of course, we built the Chauffeur . 
to work with the family of IBM PCs 
and compatibles. Our new video 
board is software compatible 
with the IBM Color/Graphics 
Adapter, as well as hardware and 
software compatible with the IBM 
Monochrome/Printer Adapter. 

No More Confusion 

No more mixing and matching 
hardware with software. The 



Chauffeur converts graphics 
display into a format compatible 
with the IBM monochrome monitor. 
For you, that means no more 
worries about preboot software. 
Best of all, you don't have to deal 
with those drivers anymore. 

Follow The Leader 

STB's Chauffeur is clearly the 
leader in video boards. It converts 
colors to a 16 level grey scale, and 
gives you a graphics display that 
fills a monochrome screen. 
For graphics, the Chauffeur 
supports the same resolutions as 
the IBM Color/Graphics Adapter. 



For text, our board produces 
a high quality monochrome 
character set. 

STB's Chauffeur includes a 
parallel port, an optional clock/ 
calendar and our exclusive PC 
Accelerator™, for print spooling 
and high speed disk emulation. 
You also get our one year warranty 
and an illustrated manual with 
thorough instructions. 

Relax And Enjoy The View 

Buy the Chauffeur now. Put it in 
your system and enjoy watching 
graphics on your monochrome 
monitor. 




STB Systems, Inc. 



© 1985 STB Systems, Inc: 



IBM registered trademark of International Business 
Machines Corp. PC Accelerator trademark of ResiCorp. 
Flight Simulator trademark of Microsoft. PC Paintbrush 
trademark of Z-Soft. The Chauffeur trademark of STB 
Systems, Inc. 









Avoid The Crazy Drivers 
In The Graphics Jam 
With STB's Chauffeur 




Flight Simulator™ 



Finally you can buy the most popular IBM color/graphics 
software with no worries about hardware compatibility. 
STB's Chauffeur video board produces monochrome display 
without preboot software or those crazy drivers. 




PC Paintbrush 1 



Write For A Free Info Pack Today. i nquiry 34 , 

STB Systems, Inc., 601 North Glenville, Richardson, Texas 75081 



STB Systems, Inc. 






Now Showing 
In Black And White 



If you own an IBM-PC 
or PC work-alike, 
Roland's new MB-142 
monitor lets you show off 
your text and graphics in 
today's hottest colors- 
black and white. That's 
right! The MB-142 gives 
you black characters on a 
paper-white background- 
just like people have been 
reading for centuries. You 
can also have white char- 
acters on a black back- 
ground with just the touch 
of a button. 

Both of these black and 
white display formats are 
easier on the eyes and 
less fatiguing than the green 
or amber phosphor used in 
standard monochrome 
monitors. The MB-142's 
large 14-inch screen, com- 
bined with its ultra-high 
720 x 350 resolution, 
can display characters 
that are larger and 
more legible than what 
you can get with ordi- 
nary monochrome 
monitors. Another 
great plus is that the 
MB-142 plugs directly 
into the monochrome 
board of your IBM or com- 
patible—just like your pres- 
ent monochrome monitor, 
with nothing more to buy. 

Because of the MB-142's 
advanced electronic cir- 
cuitry, you even have the 
ability to mix graphics and 
text on the same display 
when using graphics and text 
boards from leading manu- 
facturers such as Persyst, 
STB, Paradise, Hercules, AST 
and many others. What makes 
it all possible? The same 
sophisticated technology 
used in color monitors. 




the MB-142 
supports 
all the 
winning 
cards 



1 usha 
button for 
instant reverse 
screen 





for business, 
black and 
white makes 
more sense 
than green 
and black 



the big difference is 
1 that the MB-142 
monitor does the job for 
significantly less money. 
The MB-142 is designed 
to interface economically, 
too. Imagine seeing your 
favorite business graphics 
or CAD/CAM packages, 
such as Lotus 1-2-3, Ener- 
graphics, Chart-Master, 
AutoCAD, CADDraft and 
VersaCAD, in ultra-high 
resolution black and 
white. Also, take full 
advantage of your pro- 
gram's windowing 
capability using the large 
14-inch screen. 
Thke a good look at the 
differences that set the 
MB-142 apart from the rest. 
No other monochrome 
monitor gives you the 
fatigue-free black and 
white viewing, text and 
graphics capabilities 
and easy interface. 
Naturally enough, 
the MB-142 is from 
Roland DG-the 
new computer 
peripherals company 
that's pointing the way 
to the future. Look for 
this and other Roland 
products at fine com- 
puter dealers 
everywhere. 
For more information, 
contact: Roland DG, 
7200 Dominion Circle, Los 
Angeles, CA 90040. 
(213) 685-5141. 



The softwareprograms listed are trademarks 
of the following companies: AutoCAD, 
AUTODESK, Inc.; CADDraft, Personal CAD 
Systems, Inc.; Chart-Master, Decision 
Resources, Inc.; Energraphics, Enertronic 
Research, Inc.; Lotus 1-2-3, Lotus Develop- 
ment Corp.; VersaCAD, T&W Systems, Inc. 



Roland DG 



90 BYTE • JULY 1985 



Inquiry 305 



EVENT QUEUE 



puters, word processing, 
spreadsheets, and database 
management. Contact Rocky 
Mountain Institute of Soft- 
ware Engineering, 1670 Bear 
Mountain Dr., POB 3521. 
Boulder, CO 80303. (303) 
499-4782. ]uly 22-26 

• S1GGRAPH 

SIGGRAPH '85: The Twelfth 
Annual Conference on Com- 
puter Graphics and Inter- 
active Techniques, Moscone 
Center, San Francisco, CA. 
Contact SIGGRAPH '85, 
Conference Services Office, 
Smith, Bucklin and Asso- 
ciates Inc., 1 1 1 East Wacker 
Dr., Chicago, IL 60601, (312) 
644-6610. \u\y 22-26 

• AIRBORNE COMPUTING 
SAFETY-Meeting of the 
Radio Technical Commission 
for Aeronautics, Washington, 
DC. Special Committee 1 56 
convenes at 9:30 a.m. to 
discuss the possible hazards 
posed by the use of lap-top 
computers in airplanes. Con- 
tact Radio Technical Com- 
mission for Aeronautics, 
Suite 500, 1425 K St.. 
Washington, DC 20005. (202) 
682-0266. ]uly 23-24 

• INTELLIGENT MACHINES 
Logic Programming & Expert 
Systems, The TUring Institute, 
Edinburgh. Scotland. Lec- 
tures, demonstrations, and 
sessions on programming 
techniques, system structure, 
and Prolog. Contact The Hir- 
ing Institute. 2 Hope Park 
Square. Edinburgh EH8 
9NW, Scotland: tel: 
031-668-1737. }uly 24-25 

• TECH CONFERENCE 

Semi-Official Get-together: 
SOG IV. Central Oregon 
Community College, Bend, 
OR. Sponsored by Micro 
Cornucopia, this conference 
features forums on commu- 
nications and single-board 
systems design. Admission is 
free. Contact Micro 
Cornucopia Inc.. POB 223, 
Bend. OR 97709. (503) 
382-8048. ]uly 25-28 



• CHEMICAL 
ENGINEERING-The 
Seventh C.C.C.E. National 
Computer Workshops-East. 
Clarkson University. 
Potsdam. NY. Sponsored by 
the American Chemical 
Society Division of Chemical 
Education's Committee on 
Computers in Chemical 
Education and Project 
SERAPHIM. Advanced regis- 
tration is $100. Contact Dr. 
Donald Rosenthal. Depart- 
ment of Chemistry. Clarkson 
University, Potsdam. NY 
13676. (315) 268-6647. 

]uly 28-August I 

• PUBLIC COMPUTING 
The Twenty-Third Annual 
Conference of the Urban 
and Regional Information 
Systems Association. Westin 
Hotel. Ottawa. Ontario. 
Canada. The conference 
theme is "Computers in 
Public Agencies, Sharing 
Solutions." Contact URISA 
Secretariat, Suite 300, 1340 
Old Chain Bridge Rd., 
McLean. VA 22101. (703) 
790-174 5. )uly 28-August I 

• AI. EXPERT SYSTEMS 
BRIEFING-Artificial In- 
telligence and Expert Sys- 
tems: What Users and Sup- 
pliers Must Know Today to 
Deploy These Technologies 
as Profitable Strategic Cor- 
porate Resources Tomorrow, 
Park Plaza. Boston, MA. A 
one-day executive briefing. 
The fee is $790. Contact Ms 
Lee Burgess, Professional 
Development Programs, 
Rensselaer Polytechnic In- 
stitute, TVoy Building, Troy, 
NY 12180-3590. (518) 
266-6589. ]uly 29 

• COMPUTERS AND 
EDUCATION-The 1985 
World Conference on Com- 
puters in Education, SCOPE 
Convention Center, Norfolk, 
VA. Exhibits, papers, panel 
sessions, tutorials, and 
preconference workshops. 
Contact WCCE/85. AFIPS. 
1899 Preston White Dr.. 

[continued) 



"i 



Switch boxes are sold by many 
suppliers, but by far the two best 
value s are from MFJ Enterprises." 




a* 



The MFJ RS-232 Transfer 
Switch. Buy it before the manu- 
facturer conies to his senses!" 




p«rt expansion. Don't keep plugging 

your computer to your high -speed printer, 

RS-232 peripheral device. MFJ's range of 

your needs at a price you can afford. 

these prices. Compare others at 

their reviews. When they won't 




J ( x: Campbell, The RS-232 Solution 
Syfoex Computer Books 

Now you can have reliable and affordable 
and unplugging cables. You can easily switc 
letter-quality printer, modem, terminal - any 
Transfer Switches includes one to fit 
Look at these choices; then look at 
any price! Then ask them for 
show you, call MFJ . . . 

When you need to switch between two peripherals ... or you need to have two 
computers sharing the same peripheral . . . Model 1240/$79.95 

Never unplug a cable again. Now, with the push of a button you can go from dot matrix to letter- 
quality printing, or go from your printer 
to your modem. MFJ's Model 1240 ^ 

Transfer Switch features a built-in 
transmit/receive switch allowing you 
two-way information flow LEDs moni- 
tor important data lineswhile a built-in 
surge protector guards them. The 1240 
also acts as a null modem. All this for 
just l79.95.No wonder its MFJ's No. I seller! 

When you need l-to-4 computers to share one peripheral or l-to-4 peripherals 
to share a common computer . . . Model 1243/ $ 1 19.95 

l"he perfect office Transfer Switch. Don't buy multiple printers 
or modems. Just buy MFJ's Model 1243. Then you can connect 
one or all your computers to a single 
printer or modem. Or let your one 
computer share up to four peri- 
pherals. Think of the money you'll 
save. LEDs monitor important data lines while a built-in surge 
protector guards them. Two-way communication is allowed with 
no complicated software to learn: just push a button! 

Seven additional models to choose from. Each unit's casing 
is constructed from high-quality aluminum. Printed circuit boards 
assure maximum reliability by eliminating crosstalk, line interference and any need for wiring. 
All MFJ switches have LEDs to monitor data lines anct MOV surge protectors. Enhance the 
investment you've already made in your computer by choosing from the finest line of Transfer 
Switches on the market, including MFJ's IBM & Centmnics Parallel Sivitches. 

You've got a lot of money tied up in your computer. Don*t blow it! 

Your valuable computer and peripheral equipment can be damaged by electrical surges 
much smaller than you've been led to believe. Far more likely to happen is having your impor- 
tant data wiped out These disasters, and others, can be prevented with MFJ** Power Centers 
Relay latches power off during power dropouts (Model 1 108). Multi-filters isolate equipment, 
eliminate interaction, noise and hash. MOVs suppress spikes and surges. MFJ's Power 
Centers a 1st) have 3 isolated, switched socketpairs, with at least one unswitched socket (so 
you can add a clock, etc.), lighted power switch, fast-acting fuse, 3- wire, 6-foot cords; 15A, 
125V, and 1875 watts. Although each model is attractively 
housed in a protective aluminum casing, these are 
heavy-duty, commercial-quality power centers. 
Watch out for fancy names that cost twice 
^j^j^v^ ^^^k. ^^tf*^fc^\ as mucn i ' ast na lf as long, and have 

half the features of MFJ's 
Centers. 





Model 1107 8 sockets, 
2 unswitched; $79-95 
Model 1108 7 sockets, I unswitched; 
with dropout relay; $99.95 
Model 1109 is like 1 107 but intelligent (switch 
on the device that's plugged into the control socket 
and every thing else comes on). $129.95 

There are other RS-232 Switches, Power Centers, and Computer Peripheral Pro- 
ducts available from MFJ. Call and talk with us about all your computing needs, and when 
you do, ask for out latest catalog. Both the call and the catalog are free. 

1 -800-647-1800 

For technical/repair information, or in Mississippi, or outside the Continental United States, 



please telephone 

l-(601)323-5869 



or telex 



53-4590 MFJSTKV 



All MFJ products come with a double guarantee we think is unmatched. Order from MFJ 
and try any product for 30 da>'s. If it doesn't satisfy your needs, just return it for a Jull refund, 
less shipping. If you keep it you can be assured of continued service with our One Year 
Unconditional Guarantee. 

Call toll-free 1-800-647-1800 and charge the products you need to your VISA or Master- 
Card, or send a check or money order, plus $5.00 shipping, and our shipping department will 
promptly have your computer peripheral on its way to you. 

MFJ Enterprises Inc. 
92 1 Louisville Road 
Starkville, MS 39759 




Inquiry 231 



JULY 1985 -BYTE 91 



High performance to cost ratio... 

Programming Chips? 



Projects develop profitably with development hardware /software from GTEK. 




MODEL 7228 - $599 
This model has all the features 
of Model 7128, plus Intelligent 
Programming Algorithims. It 
supports the newest devices 
available through 512Kbits; pro- 
grams 6x as fast as standard 
algorithims.. Programs the 2764 in 
one minute! Supports Intel 2764A 
& 27128A chips. Supports 
Tektronics, Intel, Motorola and 
other formats. 



MODEL 7956 

(with RS232 option) .... $1099. 
MODEL 7956 (stand alone) $ 979. 

GTEK's outstanding Gang Pro- 
grammer with intelligent 
algorithm can copy 8 EPROMSat 
a time! This unit is used in a pro- 
duction environment when pro- 
gramming a large number of chips 
is required. It will program all 
popular chips on the market 
through the 27512 EPROMS. It 
also supports the Intel 2764A & 
27128A chips. It will also program 
single chip processors. 

EPROM & PAL 

PROGRAMMERS 

— These features are standard from GTEK— 
Conpatible with all RS232 saial interfere pcrta • Auto select baud rate • With or without hand- 
shaking • Bidirectional XoiVXoff • CISOTR supported • Read pin oouipatihfe ROMS • Noper- 
sanatity moduks • Intel Motorola, MCS86 Hex formats • Split faribty for 16 bit data paths • 
Read, program, formatted list annmands • Interrupt drivoi — program and verify real time while 
smdingdata • Program single byte, block, or whole EPROM • Intelligent diagnostics discHn bad 
and/or erasable EPROM • Vaify assure and compare cummands • Busy light • Complete with 
Textool zero insation force socket and integral 120 VAC power (240 VAC/50Hz available) • 





MODEL 7324 - $1499 

This unit has a built-in compiler. 
The Model 7324 programs all MMI, 
National and TI 20 and 24 pin PALs. 
Has non-volatile memory. It operates 
stand alone or via RS232. Model 7322 
PAL Programmer $1249 

MODEL 7316 Pal Programmer $ 749 

Programs Series 20 PALs. Built-in PALASM compiler. 




MODEL 7128 - $429 
This model has the highest 
performance-to-price-ratio of any 
unit. This is GTEK's most popular 
unit! It supports the newest 
devices available through 
256Kbits. 



DEVICES SUPPORTED 

by GTEK's EPROM Programmers 



NMOS 


NM 


OS 


CMOS 

27C16 


EEPROM 

5213 I2816A 


MPU'S 


2758 2764A 


2508 


68764 


8748 8.7 41 H 


2716 27128 


2516 


8755 


27C16H 


5213H I2817A 


8748H 8744 


2732 27128A 


2532 


5133 


27C32H 


52B13 


8749H 8751 


2732A 27256 


2564 


5143 


27C64 


X2816 


8741 68705 


2764 27512 


68766 




27C256 


48016 


8742H 



UTILITY PACKAGES 

GTEK's PGX Utility Packages will allow you to specify a range of addresses to 
send to the programmer, verify erasure and/or set the EPROM type. The PGX Utili- 
ty Package includes GHEX, a utility used to generate an Intel HEX file. 

PALX Utility Package — for use with GTEK's Pal Programmers — allows 
transfer of PALASM® source file or ASCII HEX object code file. 

Both utility packages are available for CPM,® MSDOS,® PCDOS,® ISIS 5 and 
TRSDOS® operating systems. Call for pricing. 

CROSS ASSEMBLERS 

These assemblers are available to handle the 8748, 8751, Z8, 6502, 68X and other 
microprocessors. They are available for CPM and MSDOS computers. When order- 
ing, please specify processor and computer types. 

ACCESSORIES 



Model 7128-L1, L2, L2A 

(OEM Quantity) $259. 

Model 7128-24 $329. 

Cross Assemblers $200. 

PGX Utilities Call for pricing 

PALX Call for pricing 

Qtek 



XASM (for MSDOS) $250. 

U/V Eraser DE-4 $ 80. 

RS232 Cables $ 30. 

8751 Adapter $174. 

8755 Adapter $135. 

48 Family Adapter $ 98. 

68705 Programmer $299. 

Development Hardware/Software 
P.O. Box 289, Waveland, MS 39576 
601/467-8048 
,INC. 



GTEK. PALASM. CPM, MSDOS, PCDOS, ISIS, and TRSDOS 
are all registered trademarks. 



EVENT QUEUE 



Reston, VA 22091. (800) 
522-1985; in Virginia. (703) 
620-8900. ]uly 29-August 2 



August 1985 



• PROFESSIONAL EDUCA- 
TION SEMINARS-Advanced 
Professional Education 
Seminars, various sites 
throughout the U.S. and 
Canada. Among the titles on 
the agenda are 'UNIX/ 
XENIX: 'The IBM Persona] 
Computer," "Networking the 
IBM Personal Computer," 
and "SNA and Telecon- 
cepts." Contact the Center 
for Advanced Professional 
Education, Suite 110, 1820 
East Garry St., Santa Ana, 
CA 92705. (714) 261-0240. 
August 

• IBM PC SEMINAR 
IBM PC Seminar, various 
sites throughput the U.S. A 
three-day seminar covering 
PC hardware, PC-DOS. IBM 
PC work-alikes, and software 
selection. Contact Data-Tech 
Institute, Lakeview Plaza. 
POB 2429. Clifton. NJ 07015. 
(201) 478-5400. August 

• ENGINEERING CON- 
FERENCE, EXPO-The 1985 
ASME International Com- 
puters in Engineering Con- 
ference and Exhibition. 
Sheraton Boston Hotel, 
Boston, MA. The theme is 
"Expert Systems: A New 
Dimension in Computer 
Engineering." Contact The 
American Society of 
Mechanical Engineers, 345 
East 47th St.. New York, NY 
10017. (212) 705-7100. 
August 4-8 

• COMPUTERS IN 
BIOLOGY-Computers in 
Biology, University of Notre 
Dame. Notre Dame, IN. Con- 
current, one-week courses 
on computers in bioeduca- 
tion, the classroom and 
laboratory, research, and 
biological modeling and 
simulation. Tuition is $595 



($495 for educators). Con- 
tact Professor Theodore I. 
Crovello. Biocomputing 
Short Courses. Department 
of Biology. University of 
Notre Dame, Notre Dame. 
IN 46556. (219) 239-7031. 
August 4-9 

• PREPARE FOR FACTORY 

automation-how to Plan 

for Factory Automation. 
Center for Continuing 
Engineering Education. 
University of Wisconsin- 
Extension, Milwaukee. The 
strategy, technology, 
systems, and control implica- 
tions are explored. A work- 
ing knowledge of computer 
systems, group technology. 
CAD/CAM. and manufactur- 
ing management is recom- 
mended. The fee is $890. 
Contact Center for Continu- 
ing Engineering Education, 
University of Wisconsin- 
Extension, Civic Center 
Campus, 929 North Sixth 
St.. Milwaukee, WI 53203. 
(414) 224-4191. August 5-9 

• MACROS AND 
SYMPHONY-Advanced Ap- 
plication Techniques: Using 
Symphony Macros, Dallas, 
TX. A workshop emphasiz- 
ing a building-block ap- 
proach to learning the se- 
quence of macro instruc- 
tions and how they can be 
used to solve everyday ap- 
plication needs. Contact 
Data-Tech Institute, Lakeview 
Plaza. POB 2429, Clifton. NJ 
07015. (201) 478-5400. 
August 7-8 

• EVENT FOR TRAINERS 

COMTRED '85: The National 
Computer Training and 
Education Conference and 
Exhibition, Civic Center, 
Philadelphia, PA. Seminars 
and conferences for edu- 
cators, computer trainers, 
retailers, and distributors. 
More than 50 exhibits. Pre- 
conference workshops on 
August 6. Contact National 
Computer Education Exposi- 
tions Inc.. Suite 200. 1411 

[continued) 



92 BYTE • IULY 1985 



Inquiry 163 




NEW 

A powerful multifile 
database with a 
programming language 
for only 



1 f ersaform's new XL database isn't just promises— it's here now! 
If And it offers- YES, FOR ONLY $99— all the features you'd expect in 
V a database costing 4 times as much. 
Accounting applications are XL's strength. Invoicing, purchasing, receiv- 
ables, and shipping almost create themselves as you design the forms— 
and XL transfers data between them. There's an Invoicing, A/R and Inven- 
tory application— source code included— in the package that shows how 
it's done. The power's there. And unlike packaged accounting programs, 
you can do them YOUR way. 





VersaFormXL dBASE 111* 


R-BASE4000' 


PRICE 


99 


695 


495 


STRUCTURED 








LANGUAGE 


Y 


Y " 


Y 


MULTI-FILE 


Y 


Y 


Y 


COLUMNS WITHIN 




P 


8 


DATA RECORD 


Y 


N 


N 


DATA ENTRY CHECKING 


BUILT-IN 


MUST WRITE PROGRAM 


BUILT-IN 


ONSCREEN CALC 


BUILT-IN 


MUST WRITE PROGRAM MUST WRITE PROGRAM 


FORMS OUTPUT 


BUILT-IN 


MUST WRITE PROGRAM MUST WRITE PROGRAM 


DATE ARITHMETIC 


Y 


Y 


N 


DATATYPES 


DYNAMIC 


FIXED 


FIXED 


COLUMN TOTAL OPERATOR Y 


N 


N 


QUERY BY EXAMPLE 


Y 


N <r 


EXTRA 


MAX FILE SIZE 


4MB 


OPEN 


OPEN 


MAX RECORD SIZE 


4000 


4000 


1530 


*dBASE III is a registered trademark of AshtonTate. RrBASE 4000 is a trademark of Microrim, Inc. 



XL's structured language can access multiple files. 48 built-in 
functions give control of file access, printing, and user dialogues. You'll 
develop transaction-based applications with an ease you've never 
experienced before. And all at this unheard-of low price. 
VersaForm XL's unique form-oriented data structures let you easily set 
up forms and ledgers— even those with columns! Application develop- 
ment is FAST, FAST, FAST. And since forms are the way that businesses 
already store their data, the transition is smooth. That's why VersaForm 
XL is so easy to operate even for high-turnover clerical people— it starts 
from where they are now. 

• Automatic data entry checking and on-screen calculation make trans- 
actions error-free. Stored print formats make output formatting a 
snap— you can quickly match existing paper forms. VersaForm XL's 
report generator is clear and intuitive. Designers can pre-install reports, 

Inquiry 37 



users can set up their own. 
• Query-by-forms (at no extra cost) lets users go right to the data they 
need. No query language to learn— forms are the natural language of 
business. 

Ironclad Money-Back Guarantee 

Try VersaForm XL for 30 days. If you're not fully satisfied, return it. We'll 

gladly refund your money. 

Order now, and have the pleasure of using the right tool at the right price. 

You can't lose! 

VersaForm XL runs on IBM PC, XT, AT and compatibles. Requires 192K, 

two 360KB drives, DOS 2.0 or later. Hard disk recommended. 

Standard VersaForm (single file, no language) available for 64K, 2-drive 

Apple II or 128K IBM PC. $69. 



VersaForm al 

Applied Software Technology, Dept 785, 1350 Dell Ave., Suite 206, Campbell, CA 95008 
(408) 370-2662 

Yes! Rush me Versaform XL for the IBM PC ($99) 

Standard Versaform (Single file, no language) for the IBM PC ($69) 

Apple ll(+,E,C) ($69) 

Credit card members can order by phone. 23 Sffi 

Toll-Free: 1-800-824-8145 

In California 

Toll-Free: 1-800-854-4448 

Enclose check or money order with coupon. Include $4.50 for U.S. Shipping and 
handling. $7.00 for C.O.D. California residents add 6.5% tax. 

My check or money order is enclosed Send C.O.D. 

Charge my MasterCard Visa 

Account No Expires 



PLEASE PRINT CLEARLY 

Name 

Address 

City 

Phone 



785 



_State_ 



-Zip- 



Signature. 



JULY 1985 • BYTE 93 



LOTUS USES 
FRAMEWORK 



John Spiech, President 
Lotus Performance Cars, L.P. 






Ill 

I 





Q 
Z 
< 

K 

a 

iii 



OVERNIGHT 
DELIVERY! 



•tt.^1 



Uo x- 



Purolator 
courier 



w, 



■'//, 



%, 



'(-,/ ; 



Any Price Si 
By... 



Orders Totalling 
ir 5100... Ship pad 



THAT'S BIGHT! OUR LOWEST PRICE GUARANTE. I IS « ST.U MT1VE. 

Tell us the advertiser and price ol an ^°»»«'« e ?* licatlon and we'll beat 
Z e pre ,, b\ n ^0^;Me:V O 7s P n°orrPW^o P |,en 1 s P unde, S,00 * where ,r,e 
price is not lower than Logicsott s 



DATA BASE MANAGEMENT 
KNOWLEDGEMAN $259 

Clout 2 145 

Tim IV 279 

265 



^.lai'»7.1 g |=lfflaH>'JsI»l. 



R:Base4000 

RrBate 5000 

DB Master 

dBASEIH 

Quickode III 

d Base II (New Release) 

Condor III 



Lowest Price 

475 

365 

159 

269 

349 

Data Base Mgr. II (alpha) 175 

Extended Report Writer 119 

Friday 169 

pts: file &pfs: report 165 

REVELATION 745 

Powerbase 309 

Easyfiler 235 

FINANCIAL 

DOLLARS AND SENSE $115 

Market Mgr. Plus (0ow Jones) 179 

MANAGING YOUR MONEY 119 

GRAPHICS 
CHARTMASTER $275 



GRAPHICS (com.) 
BPS Graphics. 
SIGNMASTER 

pts: graph 

Graphwriter _ 



Graphwriter Extension _ 
Graphwriter Combo Pak 

Microsoft Chart 

ENERGRAPHICS 



$289 
_195 
_85 
_319 
_319 



_485 
_175 
_259 

Energraphics (w/plotter opt.) 325 

PC Draw 295 

LANGUAGES/UTILITIES 
CONCURRENT PC DOS ,«,„«$ 175 

Pascal MT + (PC DOS) 349 

PU1 -(DR) 489 

_359 
_269 
_305 
_119 
_479 
_245 
C Compiler (MS) (New Release* 305 

Microsoft Sort 159 

Cobol Compiler (MS) 479 



LANGUAGES/UTILITIES (com.) 

Business Basic (MS) $299 

FORTRAN COMPILER (MS) _229 
C86 C Compiler 

(Computer Innovations) 329 

INThURATED/SPREADSHEETS 
LOTUS 1-2-3 $305 



Display Manager-(DR) 
Access Manager-(DR) 
LATTICE C COMPILER 
C-Food Smorgasbord 

CIS Cobol 86 (DR) 

Pascal Compiler (MS) 



Enable 

Smart Series 
FRAMEWORK 
Open Access 
Electric Desk 
SYMPHONY __ 
Supercalc 3_ 
Multiplan _ 



_305 
_579 
_355 
_395 
_229 
_429 
_175 
_129 
_279 
_85 



WORD PROCESSING (com.) 

Wordstar Pro Pac $265 

Wordstar Pro Plus 345 

WORDPERFECT (New Release,_245 

Microsoft Word 245 

MULTIMATE 249 

Volkswriter Deluxe 165 

Peachtext 5000 199 

Easywriter ll/Speller/Mailer 199 



TK! Solver 

pfs: plan 

PROJECT SCHEDULERS 
MICROSOFT PROJECT $165 

SuperProject(IUS) 245 

HARVARD TOTAL PROJECT MGR. 285 

WORD PROCESSING 

Wordstar 2000 $259 

WORDSTAR 2000 PLUS 309 



Edix & Wordix. 

Finalword 

Samna III 

Xy Write II Plus 
Think Tank _ 
pfs: write 



_255 
_225 
_325 
_255 
_125 
_85 



MISCELLANEOUS UTILITIES 
PROKEY 3.0 $89 

Norton Utilities (New Release) 65 

SIDEKICK (unprotected) 65 



CrOSStalk XVI (New Release;. 

Sideways 

Copy II PC 



DESK ORGANIZER 



_115 
_45 
_39 
_129 



m 3E 




SEE REV 
TOSHS 
RAL HA 


-• _ 


TTtaS 








CA 

m 

t/I 


t ik 


ij 



HARDWARE for IBM PC 



GRAPHICS BOARDS 
AST 

Preview 
EVEREX 



Graphics Edge 
HERCULES 

Graphics Card 
Color Card 



GRAPHICS BOARDS (com.) 
PARADISE SYSTEMS 

.Loweit Price Multi-Display Card $279 

Modular Graphics Card 289 



PLANTRONICS/FREDERICK 

Colorplus 

STB 

Graphics Plus II 

TECMAR 

Graphics Master. 



_Loweit Price Options A&B Loweit Price 

MODEMS (INTERNAL) 

$325 PROMETHEUS 

169 Pro-modem 1 200B $319 

QUADRAM 

_$385 Asher $395 

HAYES 
_$315 Smartmodem 1 200B l .a.,., KO m.)$3B5 



TSENG LABORATORIES 

Ultra Pak 



NOVATION 
_$459 Smart-Cat Plus _ 

RACALVAWC 
_$545 Maxwell 1200PC 



MODEMS (INTERNAL) (com.) 
VEN-TEL 

PC Modem Half Card $439 

COMMUNICATIONS BOARDS 
AST 

AST 5251-11 or 12 $629 

AST-3780 749 

I/O Plus II 135 

DCA 

IRMA Board 
QUADRAM 
Quadlink 



MULTI-FUNCTION BOARDS (com" 
AST RESEARCH (cont.) 

Advantage (1 28k) $429 

QUADRAM 

Quadboard (64k) $259 

STB 

Rio-Plus II (64k; $259 

Rio Grande Lowest Price 



_$949 
_$449 



Grande Byte 
TECMAR 

Captain . 



.Lowest Price 



_$355 
_$395 



MULTI-FUNCTION BOARDS 
AST RESEARCH 

Six Pak Plus (64k) $259 

Mega Plus II (64k) 275 



KEYBOARDS 

KEYTRONIC 

5150 

5151 (Deluxe) 

51 52 B or L Low 



_$235 



_$159 
179 



Prices subject to change without notice. 



NO SURCHARGE for VISA or MasterCard * No Sal 

■Jclcomed from Qualified InstrtutJons NO SURCHAR 

mq and insurance lint I otders add I I * Payment M 



Immediate Replacement on any Defective Product. 



side N Y State * Purchase Orders 
nee verification! * Please add 1\ 

urtcan Eip COO Mp'iey Order or Check 



National Sales \ _finn_fi/lR_^/lf|1 

Hot Line 1 UUU UTriJ wIJI the logical choice / 



CUStOmer SerViCe 1-800-431-9037 HO Bi -County Blvd.. Farmingdale, IS 

New York State„516-249-8440 Canada 416-283-2354 Domestic/International Telex. ,286905 Soft UR 



THE LOGICAL CHOICE /_ 

A Member of The Logic Group ■ *• 

110 Bi-County Blvd.. Farmingdale, N.Y. 11735 



/ NEW! Expanded Special Order Depf. ^ 

U We know there are many products that simply cannot be found ^ 
%? through mail order. We've solved that problem...just ask for our Jj 



'we Ml BERT 
ANY PRICE BY 

$10 

See Other Side lor Details 

/^/ UiNK^^^^MfsOFTWARE for Macintosh 



SPECIAL ORDER department...We've got the suppliers...still at 
low mail order prices! 



DATABASE 

DB Master $125 

Filevision 105 

1st Base 105 

Habadex 115 

Bala 249 



"GHIFfficT 



.mfivfWr&M 

WEE. 



Davinci Commercial Int. . 
Davinci Building Blocks 
McPic 



Mainstreet Filer. 

Megafiler 

Microsoft File _ 

Qmnis 2 

Omnis 3 , 

Overview 



pfs: File & Report . 

MacLion 

Factfinder 



GRAPHICS 

Animation Tool Kit 

Davinci Series 

(Buildings, Interiors, Landscapes) 



_155 
_135 
J40 
_169 
_275 
J79 
_105 
_245 
_95 



_$39 



Microsoft Chart 

Click Art Series 

(Pers. Graphics, Pub's, Letters) 

LANGUAGES/UTILITIES 

Basic Interpreter (MS) 

Mac Forth (Level 1) 

MacForth (Level 2) 

Smoothtalker 

Softmakerll 

Sottworks "C" 

PCtoMac&Back 

Hippo C (Level 1) . 



MANAGEMENT/FINANCE 

_149 Home Accountant Plus $89 

45 MacManager 35 

_35 MacProject Lowest Price 

125 

.Lowest Price 
119 



MANAGEMENT/FINANCE 

General Financial Analysis $70 



Real Estate Dev. (Comm. or Res.)_ 



_70 



_85 Management Edge_ 
Market Analyzer . 



.100 Market Manager (Dow Jones) 

Peachtree Back To 

.$95 Basics Accounting Lowest Price 

_95 Sales Edge 165 

.149 Straight Talk 369 

.115 Financial Planning (Apropos) 60 

.119 Investment Planning (Apropos) 80 



SPREADSHEETS/INTEGRATED 

Jazz Lowest Price 

Multiplan $125 



Microplanner 

TK! Solver 

Ensemble _ 



.Lowest Price 

169 

_185 



MANAGEMENT/FINANCE 

Dollars & Sense 

Front Desk 



.275 Communications Edge 

.85 Negotiation Edge 

.115 Tax Manager (Microlab) _ 
Forecast 



$79 Electric Checkbook _ 
.85 MacCalendar 



_110 

175 

_110 

45 

50 

_50 



WORD PROCESSING 

Bank S t . Writer Lowest Price 

Microsoft Word $149 

Think Tank (128k) 85 

Mac«Spell«Right 55 

MacSpell + 60 

Hayden: Speller 45 



Think Tank (51 2k)_ 
TECH (Linquist) _ 
Megafonn 



_135 
70 



ASSIMILATION PROCESS 

Mac Daisywheel Connection $75 

Mac Turbo Touch 85 

CURTIS SURGE PROTECTOR 

Diamond $39 

Emerald 49 

Sapphire 59 

.Ruby 69 



-HTST 



ORE for Macintosh 

mCRfJEBffi 



OPTIMUM 



Smartmodem 300 
Smai1modem1200_ 



_$195 
_$425 



INTERMATRIX 

Macphone $159 

KENSINGTON 

300 Baud Modem $95 

Surge Supressor 39 



MICRON TECHNOLOGY 

Micron Eye $325 



_$450 MacTote 



MICROSOFT 
NOVATION 



PROMETHIUS 

Promodem 1 200 _ 



_$65 



Cat_ 



_$170 



_$375 



DISKS 

Maxell 3 1 /2" (Box of 10) 

Memorex 3V2" (Box of 1 0) _ 
3M3W(Boxof10) 



_$375 
_$35 



_39 
-39, 



GENERAL HARDWARE 



PRINTERS* 



DIABLO 

36** 

D25** 

630-API 

630-ECS** 

EPSON 

LQ1500 

Parallel Interface 

JX-80 

RX-80 

LX-80** 

RX-100 

FX-80** 

FX-100** 

C. IT0H 

Prowriter 8510 BPI _ 

Starwriter A1 OP 

StarwriterF10-40P _ 
Printmaster F10-55P 
JUKI 

6100 

6300 



_$1229 

619 

1529 

1799 



$1199 

.Lowest Price 

599 

239 

265 

399 

379 

599 



PRINTERS* (cent.) 
SILVER REED (Cant.) 

550 $449 

770 795 

TOSHIBA 
1351 Tractor . 

P351 

1340 

CITIZEN 



_$159 
_1375 
779 



Lowest Price 

PRINTER/ PLOTTERS* 

HEWLETT PACKARD 

HP-7470A $945 

HP-7475 1595 

HOUSTON INSTRUMENT 

PC Plotter 



MONITORS* 



_$475 



_$375 
529 



_969 



_$439 



_799 



MANNESMANN TALLY 

Spirit 

160 

180 

NEC 

2030** 

8027** 

2050** 

3530 

3550 

8850** 

PinwriterP2** 

Pinwriter P3-" 

0KIDATA 

182 IBM 

84IBM 

192 IBM 

93 IBM 

2410P 

QUA0RAM 

Quadjet 

QUME 

Sprint 11/40** 

Sprint 11/55"* 

Sprint 11/90** 

SILVER REED 

400 

^500 



_$279 
_579 
_849 



_$719 

349 

695 

_1329 
_1395 
_1785 
_675 
_895 



AM0EK 

Color 300 

Color 500 

Color 600 

Color 710 

12" Green 300G . 
12" Amber 300A . 
12"Amber310A_ 
NEC 

JB1201 

JB1205 

JC1215 

JC 1216 



_$255 



_389 
_479 
_579 
_135 
_145 



_159 



_$159 

149 

239 

_399 



VIDEO TERMINALS 1 " 

ALTOS 

Smart II 

QUME 

QVT102-Green 

QVT102-Amber 

Q VT 1 03-Green 

QVT103-Amber 

QVT 1 08-Green 

QVT108-Amber 

TELEVIOE0 

800 

800A 

910 

910 + 

921 

922 

924 

925 

925E 

WYSE 

50 

75 

ZENITH 

Z-22 

Z-29 

Z-49 



(coin.) 



_$695 

_$395 

415 

810 

845 

_445 
515 



_$1220 

975 

420 

555 



_445 



_750 
_635 



_695 
_595 



MODEMS (External) 

PROMETHEUS 

Pro-modem 1200 

QUADRAM 

Quadmodem 1 1 00 

HAYES 

Smartmodem 300 

Smartmodem 1 200 

Smartmodem 2400 

NOVATION 

Access 1-2-3 

Professional 2400 

PRENTICE 

Popcorn X100 

Popcorn C1 00 

RACAL-VADK 

Maxwell 1 200 V 

2400 PC 

VEN-TEL 

PC Modem 1 200 

1200 Plus. 



A 



$395 



.$555 



.$205 
_445 



_719 



.$475 
_635 



_$379 
_355 



_$439 



_635 



_$399 



_399 



_$485 



_$465 



_595 
.Lowest Price 



PRINCETON 6RAPHICS 

RGB HX-1 2 

RGBSR-12 



_$489 



_$239 

799 

409 

_639 
_2295 



_$789 



_$1299 

1595 

2295 



Scan Doubler Board (for SR-12) . 

Amber Max 1 2 

QUADRAM 

Quadchrome 1 2" 

Quadscreen 1 7" 

Quadchrome I1 14" 

Amberchrome 1 2" 

TAXAN 

100G 

105A 

121 

122 

210 

420 

440 . 



_599 
_185 
_185 



MULTI-FUNCTION BOARDS 

AST RESEARCH 

Mega Pak (256k) $369 

IDEA 

IDEAmax 384 (64k) _ 
ORCHID 

Blossom (Ok) 

STB 



_$259 
_$235 



_$465 Super Rio (64k) 



_$329 



_1595 
_465 
_165 



VIDEO TERMINALS* 



_$125 

135 

149 

_149 

259 

409 

699 



COMMUNICATIONS BOARDS 

AST 

ASTSNA $899 

AST BSC 899 

GRAPHICS BOARDS 

AST 

Monograph plus 

MA SYSTEMS 



_$279 
^349 



ADDS 

A-2 Green 
A-3 



_$465 
_$465 



Peacock Color Board 
PERSYST 

Monochrome Card _ 
QUADRAM 

Quadcolor I 

Quadcolorll 



_$425 
_$245 



BACK-UP DEVICES 

ALLOY 

Tape Backup Lowest Price 

SYS6EN 

Tape Backup Lowest Price 

MOUSE INPUT DEVICES 

MOUSE SYSTEMS 

PC Mouse w/paint $139 

MICROSOFT 

Microsoft Mouse (Serial) 149 

Microsoft Mouse (Buss) 149 

SURGE PROTECTORS 

KENSINGTON MCR0WARE 

Masterpiece $115 

CURTIS 

Diamond $39 

Emerald 49 

Sapphire 59 

Ruby 69 

MEMORY CHIPS 

(200ns) 64k $35 



_$199 



_$195 
465 



DISKETTES 

LOBICTRAK 5%" 
100% Burantted, 
Double side, double density 
10 per box 

20 + boxes 

10-1 9 boxes 

2-9 boxes 

1box 



_per disk $2.35 
_per disk $2.50 
_per disk $2.99 
_par disk $3.99, 



*Due to weight restrictions, Printers and Monitors are shipped UPS., 



* NO SURCHARGE for VISA or MasterCard * No Sales Tax on Orders Outside N Y State * Purchase Orders 
Welcomed From Qualified Institutions NO SURCHARGE! (Please call tor price verification) * Please add 2% 
(or handling and insurance (Int'l orders adrj'i I * Payment MasterCard. VISA American Exp .COD 



"Parallel interface req...Ask sales agent 



Hot Line I "iJUlJ"D4u"u43 I the logical choice J 



CllStOmer SerViCe 1-800-431-9037 HO Bi-County Blvd., Farmingdale. r 

New York State„51 6-249-8440 Canada_.„41 6-283-2354 Domestic/International Telex .286905 Soft UR 



THE LOGICAL CHOICE 7 

A Member of The Logic Group ^^^^— ^v 

110 Bi-County Blvd., Farmingdale, N.Y. 11735 



HERE'S HOW: 



Lotus® travels in the fast lane.They 
can't settle for second best in business 
software. That's exactly why they went out 
and bought Framework™ software. 

Framework's a winner. In their "Over- 
all Evaluation"category, Software Digest, 
December, 1984, rated Framework the 
best integrated package. And when 10 
teams of Wharton MBA candidates 
squared off against each other with dif- 
ferent business software, the Framework 
team won hands down. Lotus likes a 
winner. 

The future of Lotus is mapped out on 
Framework where a powerful spread- 



sheet works with a critically-acclaimed 
word processor. It's a combination that 
only Framework has. The Framework out- 
line function— built in, not added on— 
lets Lotus see what's up the road ahead. 
And a data management function helps 
Lotus keep track of their fast- moving 
products. 

Lotus came to two conclusions after 
looking for software. One: a symphony is 
something you listen to on the highway 
with the radio turned up loud. And two : 
Framework may well be all the business 
software a fast-moving company needs. 

For a dealer near you call (800) 
437-4329, ext. 222. In Colorado 
(303)799-4900, 
ext 222. 



KJKJ) 




Software from 



ASHTON -WE 

Well put you in control. 



Inquiry 41 



Inquiry 88 



COMPETITIVE EDGE 

P.O. Box 556 — Plymouth, Ml 48170 — 313^151-0665 
Compupro®, LOMAS, EARTH, TELETEK, Macrotech 

S-100 CIRCUIT BOARDS 



CompuPro286CPlT 
CompuProSPUZ"8MHZ 
CompuPro 8085/88'" 
CompuPro Disk 1 A"* 
CompuPro Disk 3'" 
CompuPro Ram 22 ,M 
CompuPro Ram 23 rM 
CompuPro Ram23 1 28 
CompuProCPU Z'" 
CompuPro CCP/M®816® 
System Support One™ 
TeletekHD/ 
Teletek Systemaster* 



$750. Lomas286 $821. 

261. Lomas8086 420. 

245. LomasOctaport'" BSerial 320. 

347. Lomas LDP" 72 206. 

417. Lomas256KDram 556. 

850. Lomas512KDram 821. 

277. Lomas Ram 67'" 725. 

487. LomasHazitair 244. 

189. Thunder 18 6'" 1095. 

250. LomasCCP/M®86 T,< 280. 

245. CompuPro I/04 245, 

375. TeletekSBCl 525. 

557. Systemaster II® 899. 
Lomas 2 Megabyte Ram-(2048K) just 



Macrotech 286/Z80H 
Lomas 1 0MHz8086 
• Lomas 4 serial 
Macrotech 256KDram 
Macrotech 512K Dram 
Macrotech 51 2 K static 
Macrotech 256Kstatic 
LomasColorMagic'" 16K 
LomasMSDOS™2.11 



$795. 

520. 

200. 

499. 

799. 
1595. 

795. 

476. 

200. 



CompuPro MDriveH»512K 495. 



CompuPro I/O 3 8 port 
TeletekSBC 1 6MHz 128 
Turbodos»f or Teletek 
$1595. 



459. 
699. 
650. 



Earth Computer TURBO SLAVE 1 8MHz 1 28K$395. 

Turbo Slave I runs with Teletek, North Star Horizon. Advanced Digital and Others under Turbodos™ 

SYSTEMS 



CompuPro 85/88.256K.CDOS, SS1.I/0 4.2-96TPI DRS. 10 Slot 
CompuPro 85/88.256K.CDOS, SS1.I/0 4,1-96TPI,20MB, 10 Slot 
286/Z80H.1024K Static, CDOS, SS1.I/0 4,1-96TPI,40MB, 10 Slot 
286. 1024K, 20MB. AutoCad 2 System — Ready to Run 
Lomas 286.1 024K.20MB HD.I-S-.CDOS, 6 SERIAL, 2 Par, 10 Slot 
Lomas Thunder 186, 256K. 20 MB HD. 1 -5". CDOS. 4 Slot 
Teletek 8MHz Master. 4-8MHz 128K SLVS, 1-5". 20 MB HD. TDOS 



UPGRADE YOUR IBM® PC™!! 



MONITORS 

Amdex3lOA 
Taxan Color 440 
Princeton Color HR-12 
PrincetonColorSH-12 



$159 
$549 
$459 
$649 



GRAPHIC BOARDS 

Hercules Monochrome 
Hercules Color Card 
TecmarGraphicsMasler 
Paradise Graphics 
STBGraphix.,.11 



$299 
$159 
$449 
$279 
S279 



MULTI-FUNCTION BOARDS 

AST6Pak64K 

Quad am Expanded Quadboard OK 

TecmarCaptain64K 



HARD DRIVE KITS 

PC10MBPC 
PC21MBPC 
AT21MBAT 
AT36MBAT 
AT70MBAT 
AT80MBAT 
AT119MBAT 



$3095 
$4295 
$7495 
$8395. 
$4995 
$2895 
$4495 



$695 
$395 
$795 
$1295 
$2295 
$3295 
$3595 



FLOPPY DRIVES 

$245 TEAC1/2HTFD55B $119 

$219 Mitsubishi 96TPI $125 

$199 5"DSDD Color Diskettes $ 21 

ALL PRICES SUBJECT TO CHANGE AND STOCK ON HAND 

CompuPro is a Registered Trademark of Viasyn, CPU 2, Disk 1A, Disk 3. Interfacer 3, Interlacer 4.. CPU 286, CPU 6085/88, 
System Support 1. MDRIVE-H. Ram 22, Ram 23 are trademarks or registered trademarks ol Viasyn. CP/M 2.2, CCP/M, are 
registered trademarks ol Digital Research Inc. MSDOS is a registered trademark ol Microsoft, Systemaster & Systemaster II are 
registered trademarks of Teletek Enterprises. Turbodos is registered trademark ol Software 2000. IBM is a registered trademark 
of International Business Machines. AutoCad 2 is a registered trademark of AutoDesk, Inc. 



The Ultimate Cable A ssembly/ 

':" ~~™~ ■..■"■■■ " " " ■.;:■:■■'■.: I if 




Inside and Out 



You've never seen a cable that looks or works quite like this. The 
result of extensive research into functional design, the DATA SPEC 
cable assembly not only visually enhances your computer equip- 
ment, but provides superior quality with the following features: 



Full shielding (Exceeds F.C.C. 
EMI/RFI emission requirements] 
Positive strain relief 
Large convenient thumbscrews 



Gold plated pins 
Exclusive P.D.T. underhood 
for maximum integrity 
Lifetime warranty 



DATA SPEC makes cable assemblies for all your interface needs: 
printers, modems, disk drives and monitors. For your IBM, Apple, 
AT&T and other popular PC's. Ask for DATA SPEC cables at your 
nearest authorized DATA SPEC dealer. 

FROM ALLIANCE RESEARCH CORPORATION 

20120 Plummer Street • Chatsworth, CA 91311 



18 M. Apple and AT&T are regis t, 

Patent PND. 



96 B YTE • JULY 1985 



1-818-993-1202 

alional Business Machines Corp. Apple Computer Inc. and ATS. T Information Systems. 

©Copyright 1985 Alliance Research Corporation 

Inquiry 397 for End-Users. 
Inquiry 398 for DEALERS ONLY 



EVENT QUEUE 



Walnut St., Philadelphia, PA 
19102, (2.15) 972-8792. 
August 7-9 

• COMPUTER, ELEC- 
TRONIC EVENT-Computer- 
fest '85, Building 7, Sinclair 
Community College, Dayton. 
OH. Seminars, flea-market 
areas, speakers, users-group 
meetings, and club booths 
and displays are some of 
the highlights. Admission 

is $1.50. Contact Mark 
Hanslip, Computerfest '85, 
143 Schloss Lane, Dayton. 
OH 45418-2931, (513) 
268-7225. 
August 10-11 

• TOMORROW'S 
COMPUTERS-International 
Symposium on New Direc- 
tions in Computing. 
Norwegian Institute of 
Technology, Ttondheim. Nor- 
way. Contact New Directions 
in Computing, IEEE Com- 
puter Society. POB 639, 
Silver Spring, MD 20901. 
August 12-14 

• GRAPHICS 
Ausgraph '85, Brisbane, 
Queensland, Australia. 
Australia's first international 
conference and exhibition 
on computer graphics. Con- 
tact Conference Secretariat, 
Ausgraph '85, POB 29, 
Parkville, Victoria 3052, 
Australia; tel: (03) 387 9955; 
Telex: AA 33761. 

August 12-16 

• MACROS AND 
SYMPHONY-Advanced Ap- 
plication Techniques: Using 
Symphony Macros, Chicago. 
IL. See August 7-8 for 
details. August 14-15 

• COMPUTER SWAP 

Northwest Computer Swap 
Number 9. Fiesta Exhibit 
Hall, San Mateo County Fair- 
grounds. San Mateo. CA. 
Admission is $5. Contact 
Northwest Computer Swap, 
4883 Tonino Dr., San Jose, 
CA 95136, or call Robert 
Kushner, (408) 978-7927. 
August 17 



• Al INVESTIGATED 
IJCAI-85: The International 
Joint Conferences on Arti- 
ficial Intelligence. University 
of California, Los Angeles. 
Topics include AI architec- 
tures and languages, intel- 
ligent CAI, automated rea- 
soning, and expert systems. 
Tutorials. Contact IJCAI-85. 
American Association for 
Artificial Intelligence, 44 5 
Burgess Dr., Menlo Park, CA 
94025. (415) 321-1118. 
August 18-24 

• FOR EDUCATORS 

Innovative Applications of 
Microcomputer Technology 
in Vocational Education. 
University of Wisconsin. 
Madison. The emphasis will 
be on interactive video, net- 
working, hard-disk systems 
and storage backup devices, 
and telecommunications for 
agriculture, education, and 
health applications. Contact 
Dr. Judith Rodenstein, Voca- 
tional Studies Center, 964 
Educational Sciences 
Building. University of 
Wisconsin-Madison. 102 5 
' West Johnson St.. Madison. 
WI 53706. (608) 263-4367. 
August 19-21 

• MACROS AND 
SYMPHONY-Advanced Ap- 
plication 'lechniques; Using 
Symphony Macros, Philadel- 
phia, PA. See August 7-8 for 
details. August 21-22 

• INTERFACING 
WORKSHOP-Personal Com- 
puter and STD Computer 
Interfacing for Scientific In- 
strument Automation, 
Washington. DC, area. A 
hands-on workshop with 
participants wiring and 
testing interfaces. The fee is 
$450. Contact Dr. Linda 
Leffel, C.E.C., Virginia 
Polytechnic Institute and 
State University, Blacksburg, 
VA 24061. (703) 961-4848. 
August 22-24 

• EUROPEAN MEDICAL 
INFORMATTCS-The Sixth 
International Congress of 



EVENT QUEUE 



the European Federation for 
Medical Informatics, Hel- 
sinki, Finland. Topics include 
medical-record management 
and classification problems, 
expert systems, medical and 
clinical research and evalua- 
tion, and personal com- 
puters. Contact M1E-85 
Secretary General. Raija 
Trevo-Pellikka. The Finnish 
Hospital League. Toinen Lin- 
ja 14, SF-00530 Helsinki. 
Finland; tel: 358-0-7712640. 
August 25-29 

• INFORMATION TECH- 
NOLOGY CONFERENCE- 
The Integrated Information 
Technology Conference and 
Exposition: INTECH '85. 
Moscone Center, San Fran- 
cisco. CA. Topics to be ad- 
dressed include integrating 
personal computers, net- 
works, information security, 
integrated voice and data, 
and managing information 
technology. An Applications 
Center will provide at- 
tendees the opportunity to 
observe applications in ac- 
tion. Contact INTECH '85. 
National Trade Productions 
Inc.. Suite 400, 2111 Eisen- 
hower Ave.. Alexandria. VA 
22314, (800) 638-8510; in 
the metropolitan Washing- 
ton, DC, area, call (703) 
683-8500. August 26-29 

• VIDEODISC 
CONFERENCE-The Fifth 
Annual Nebraska Videodisc 
Symposium, University of 
Nebraska, Lincoln. The 
theme is "Videodisc— The In- 
dustry Comes of Age." Panel 
discussions, presentations, 
and exhibits. Registration is 
$375. Contact Videodisc 
Design/Production Group, 
KUON-TV/University of 
Nebraska-Lincoln, POB 
83111. Lincoln. NE 68501. 
(402) 472-3611. 

August 27-30 

• NEW ZEALAND ERS 
CONVENE-The Ninth New 
Zealand National Computer 
Conference, Sheraton. 
Auckland, New Zealand. 



Speakers, panel sessions, 
and exhibits. For details, 
contact Conference Com- 
mittee, POB 3839. Auckland, 
New Zealand. August 27-31 



September 1984 

• TRADE CONFERENCE 
SERIES-The Fifteenth 
United States Invitational 
Computer Conference, 
various sites throughout the 
U.S. A series of one-day, 
regional conferences de- 
signed to bring original 
equipment manufacturers 
together with systems in- 
tegrators and quantity end- 
users. Exhibits and technical 
seminars. Fees begin at 
$1600 each for one to four 
conferences. Contact B. I. 
Johnson & Associates Inc., 
3151 Airway Ave. #C-2, 
Costa Mesa. CA 92626. (714) 
957-0171. September-^ ovember 

• INFO MANAGEMENT 
SEM1NARS-NYU Seminars 
on Information Manage- 
ment, various sites through- 
out the U.S. On the agenda 
are "Legal Issues in Acquir- 
ing and Using Computers" 
and "Networking Personal 
Computers." Contact School 
of Continuing Education. 
Seminar Center. New York 
University. 575 Madison 
Ave., New York. NY 10022, 
(212) 580-5200. 
September-November 

• COMMUNICATIONS 
WORKSHOPS-Data Com- 
munications Workshops, vari- 
ous sites throughout the U.S. 
and Canada. For a catalog, 
contact Rhonda Carney. Intel 
Corp., Westford Corporate 
Center. Three Carlisle Rd.. 
Westford, MA 01880, (617) 
256-1374. September-December 

• IBM SHOW 

IBM System User Show. 
Olympia 2, London. 
England. A series of ses- 
sions focusing on all aspects 
(continued) 



. 



Inquiry 386 for End-Users. 
Inquiry 387 for DEALERS ONLY. 



Il'hiil 



$995 



MAX. IBM® AT/PC 
COMPATIBILITY pc-2001* 

Made In USA COMPLETE SYSTEM 

*OEM BASIC System $555 (Minimum Order 10 Units) 

♦PC-2001 Complete System $995 (Dealers at Quantity 2) 

*XT-2001 10 MB Complete System $1695 (Dealers at Quantity 2) 
*AT-7000 Call For Evaluation Unit $ (Approx. $2000 Off IBM Pricing) 

PC-2001 Partial Features: (Dealers Please Call For Details) 

• Mother Board • RAM Memory Upgradable to 640K • K-8400 or K-9600 
Keyboard • TEAC Drive & Controller • Parallel Port • Runs Lotus 1-2-3, 
Symphony, Flight Simulator and thousands more 

*DEALER INQUIRIES 
INVITED 

PLEASE CALL FOR 
DEALERS NEAREST 
YOU 




IBM is a 



!S \ ^HP£ J. CORPORATION (™) 5 ^-° 680 - HWK91 
imark of lelw Corporation vynrwnru.iw je^EX 753197 



COVER STORY 




Touchdown'" Key Overlays provide new or additional PC keyboard commands for compati- 
bility with your soltware programs. Made ol heavy, non-glare malerial similar to Ihe original 
keytops, with commands printed on the underside tor durability . . . Jhese are not ordinary 
stick-on labels! Hooleon also makes custom overlays to your exact specs, including toreign 
language and special symbols. Touchdown"' Keylop Expanders enlarge small keys (Return, 
Shift, etc.) on the IBM PC and mosl look-alikes. They tasten securely over exisling keys with 
a special adhesive provided, yet are easily removed without damage to the keyboard. 

P. 0. Box 201, Dept. B, Cornville, AZ 86325 

CUSTOM KEY OVERLAYS can be made to your exact specs, at a much lower cost than engraving (he keys 



□ Blk. 



Qty 



Price' 



Qty. 

IBM PC, PC/XT, PC Port. (12 keys) 

IBM 5291 Display Stalion (13 keys) 

Compaq. Columbia (10 keys) 


Price* 

$21.95 

21.95 

21.95 


Corona, Eagle Spirit, Qubie, 

Keytronic (10 keys) 

IBM 3270 PC '•Enter" (1 keytop) 

Individual Expanders (blank) 


$21.95 
3.95 
2.75 


KEY OVERLAYS 

5250/5251 (48 keytops/fronls) 

5520(101 keytops) 

3270 (32 key fronts) 

DisplayWrite 2 (36 keytops) 

DisplayWrile 3 (38 keytops) 

Dvorak (43 keytops) 

Wordstar (29 keylops) 

□ Visa □ MasterCard Exp. Date 


$21.95 
29.95 
21.95 
21.95 
21.95 
26.95 
26.95 


Conlrol Key English (5 keytops) 6.95 

Blank Overlays (99 keytops) 21.95 

Do-it-yoursell Kit (200 + pieces) 29.95 

MultiMate (44 keytops) 29.95 

EasyWriler II (29 kytp/tronts/ Handy Card) 29.95 

Lotus 1-2-3 (24 keylops/Handy Card) 29.95 

WordPerlect (32 keylops/Handy Card) 29.95 

TOTAL (Min. order $10.00) $ 


Card # 

Visa or MC orders phone 602-634-75) 


7 

for inform 


All prices include first class postage. 
(All orders shipped within 24 hours.) 
Arizona residents add 5% tax 




Custom Overlay, Other Software Kits. Write 


ation. T0TAI FNCI 0SFD $ 





Inquiry I72 for End-Users. 
Inquiry 17 3 for DEALERS ONLY. 



JULY 1985 • BYTE 97 



Inquiry 327 




UNLOCK THE SECRETS 
OF MACHINE LANGUAGE. 

Our Visible Computer teaching systems do more than tell 
you about machine language, they show you -by turning 
your computer into an animated simulation of its micro- 
processor chip. You'll actually see the registers change as 
the processor executes instructions; you'll see how 
instructions are executed, not just the result. 

The extensive manual may just be the clearest tutorial on 
machine language ever written. You'll work "hands-on- 
keyboard," at your own pace, as you progress through 30 
demonstration programs stored on disk. 

Apple II version: $49.95. Commodore 64 version: $39.95. a Cm 

NEW! The Visible Computer: 8088 (IBM PC): $69.95. At jjQll HJ Ql*^? 

better software dealers or direct from Software Masters, 3330 _ _ * 

Hillcroft, Suite BB, Houston, Texas 77057. (713) 266-5771. Jfw£M €■/>!*€ ™ 

MC/Visa accepted. Mail orders enclose $3.00 shipping. A *••"* ■" w* •» 



Mr 



w ■ - - - 

Seventh Annual Conference on ! % ! ji 

'Interactive!) 
videodisc 

In Education and Training 

August 21-23, 1985 
J. W.Marriott Hotel 
Washington, D. C. 



Presentations Cover 

• Current Applications 

• Emerging Technology 

• Methodology Implementation 

Pre-conference tutorials are scheduled for August 1 9 and 20. 

Included among exhibitors are: 

3M U.S. Video 

DEC GWF Associates 

NCR OnLine Computer Systems 

WICAT MetaMedia Systems, Inc. 

Sony Digital Controls, Inc. 

JVC Applied Science Associates 

Pioneer 



L 



# 



For further information contact: 

Society for Applied Learning Technology 

50 Culpeper St. Dept. B 

Warrenton, VA 22186 (703) 347-0055 



EVENT QUEUE 



of the IBM computer 
market. Exhibits. Contact 
Julian Taylor, Peter Walker 
Associates. 32 Fitzroy 
Square. London WIP 5HH. 
England; tel: 01-388-9871. 
September 3-5 

• EUROMICRO 
Euromicro '85. Brussels. 
Belgium. Addresses, 
tutorials, and exhibitions. An 
electronic mouse race and a 
robot ping-pong tournament 
will be held. Contact 
Euromicro Office, p/a TH 
Twente. Dept. Inf., Room A 
306. POB 217. 7500 AE 
Enschede. The Netherlands. 
Attn: Mrs. C. Snippe-Marlisa. 
September 3-6 

• OFFICE AUTOMATION 
Third Annual Conference of 
the Office Automation 
Society International. 
Radisson South Hotel, 
Bloomington. MN. The 
theme is "The Integrated 
Office— How Soon?" Contact 
Office Automation Society 
International. 2108 C 
Gallows Rd„ Vienna, VA 
22180. (703) 790-0490. 
September 3-6 

• PERSONAL COMPUTER 
FAIRE— The Third Personal 
Computer Faire. Civic Audi- 
torium and Brooks Hall, San 
Francisco. CA. Conference 
program and exhibitions of 
hardware, software, and 
microcomputer services. 
Contact Computer Faire Inc.. 
181 Wells Ave.. Newton. MA 
02159, (617) 965-8350. 
September 5-7 

• ROBOTICS CONGRESS 

The Second International 
Personal Robot Congress 
and Exposition (IPRC). 
Moscone Center, San Fran- 
cisco. CA. Seminars on per- 
sonal robot software, hard- 
ware, human services, robots 
in space, education, and 
business. Exhibits and dis- 
plays. Contact Robotic In- 
dustries Association, POB 
1366. Dearborn, Ml 48121. 
(313) 271-7800. September 6-8 



• COMPUTER-AIDED 
TECHNOLOGIES-COMP1NT 
'85: The First International 
Conference on Computer- 
Aided Technologies. Palais 
de Congres. Montreal. 
Quebec, Canada. The 
theory, design, and imple- 
mentation of com- 
puter-aided technologies. 
Contact Stephen G. Leahey, 
POB 577. Desjardins Postal 
Station. Montreal. Quebec 
H5B 1B7. Canada. (514) 
870-3526. September 9-12 

• AUTOFACT EUROPE 
AUTOFACT Europe '85. 
Swiss Industries Fair. Basel. 
Switzerland. Workshops on 
computer-integrated manu- 
facturing and factory auto- 
mation. Held in conjunction 
with SwissData '85/Ineltec 
'85 Exhibits. Contact Susan 
Gretchko, AUTOFACT Europe 
'85 Administrator, Society of 
Manufacturing Engineers, 
One SME Dr., POB 930. 
Dearborn. Ml 48121. (313) 
271-1500. ext. 373. 
September 10-13 

• DOCUMENTATION 
CONFERENCE-The 43rd 
Conference and Congress of 
the International Federa- 
tion for Documentation, 
Montreal, Quebec. Canada. 
The theme is "Information. 
Communications, and Tech- 
nology Transfer." Contact Mr. 
E. V. Smith, Canada Institute 
for Scientific and Technical 
Information, National 
Research Council of Canada, 
Ottawa, Ontario KIA 0S2. 
Canada. September 14-18 

• C SEMINAR/WORKSHOP 
C Language Seminar and 
Workshop. Sheraton-Com- 
mander Hotel. Cambridge, 
MA. The fee is $695. Con- 
tact Beatrice Blatteis. CL 
Publications. 131 Townsend 
St.. San Francisco. CA 
94107, (415) 957-9353. 
Sept ember 16- 18 

• DATA STORAGE 

The Fourth Annual DataStor- 
[continued) 



98 BYTE • JULY 1985 



Inquiry 320 



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Inquiry 282 



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Data-storage issues and ap- 
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Cartlidge & Associates Inc.. 
Suite M-2 59. 1 101 South 
Winchester Blvd.. San lose. 
CA 95128. (408) 554-6644. 
September 16-18 

• SOFTWARE CONGRESS 

The Sixteenth Convention 
Informatique. Palais des 
Congres. Paris. France. Said 
to be the largest European 
software congress. The 
theme is "Data Processing: 
Opportunities and Draw- 
backs." Contact Convention 
Informatique. 4 Place de 
Valois, 75001 Paris, France; 
tel: (I) 261 52 42; lelex: 212 
597 F. September 16-20 

• SOFTWARE EXPO 

The Sixth Annual Soft- 
ware/Expo. Infomart. Dallas. 
TX. A trade show for 
MIS/DP managers and cor- 
porate executives. Contact 
Professional Exposition 
Management Co. Inc.. Suite 
205. 2400 East Devon Ave., 
Des Plaines. IL 60018. (800) 
323-5155; in Illinois. (312) 
299-3131. September 17-19 

• UNIX EXPO 

UNIX Expo: The UNIX 
Operating System Exposition 
and Conference. New York 
Hilton and Sheraton Centre 
Hotels. New York City. More 
than 400 exhibitors comple- 
ment the conference. Con- 
tact Robert Birkfeld. Na- 
tional Expositions Co. Inc., 
14 West 40th St.. New York. 
NY 10018. (212) 391-9111. 
September 18-20 

• MANUFACTURING EXPO 

Eastern Computer Manufac- 
turing Expo, Charlotte, NC. 
Contact Great Southern 
Shows. POB 655. Jackson- 
ville. FL 32201. (904) 
743-8000. September 19-21 

• INTERFACING WORK- 
SHOP— Personal Computer 
and STD Computer Interfac- 



ing for Scientific Instrument 
Automation. Greensboro. 
NC. A hands-on workshop 
with participants wiring and 
testing interfaces. The fee is 
$450. Contact Dr. Linda Lef- 
fel. C.E.C.. Virginia Polytech- 
nic Institute and State Uni- 
versity. Blacksburg, VA 
24061. (703) 961-4848. 
September 19-21 

• TIDEWATER FAIR 

The Tidewater 'Ienth Annual 
Computer Fair. Radio 
Amateur Hamfest— Electronic 
Flea Market. Virginia Beach 
Pavilion. VA. Displays, 
forums, and flea market. Ad- 
vance tickets are $5 for both 
days or $6 at the door. Con- 
tact lim Harrison. Tidewater 
Radio Conventions Inc.. 1234 
Little Bay Ave.. Norfolk. VA 
23503. (804) 587-1695. 
September 21-22 

• NEW FRONTIER 
Space lech '85 Conference 
and Exposition. Disneyland 
Hotel. Anaheim. CA. A focus 
on engineering solutions re- 
quired to make the use of 
outer space practical and 
economical. Contact Society 
of Manufacturing Engineers. 
One SME Dr.. POB 930. 
Dearborn. MI 48121. (313) 
271-1500. September 23-25 

• AI, FIFTH GENERATION 

The Artificial Intelligence 
and Fifth Generation Com- 
puter Technology Con- 
ference and Exhibition: 
Al/Europa,- Rhein-Main-Halle. 
Wiesbaden, West Germany. 
Contact lim Hay. Tower Con- 
ference Management Co.. 
331 West Wesley St., 
Wheaton, IL 60187. (312) 
668-8100. September 24-26 

• BOSTON COMPUTING 

The Eighth Northeast Com- 
puter Faire. Bayside Exposi- 
tion Center. Boston. MA. 
Product displays and con- 
ference program. Contact 
Computer Faire Inc.. 181 
Wells Ave. Newton, MA 
02159. (617) 965-8350. 
September 26-29 ■ 



100 BYTE • JULY 1985 



Inquiry 359 




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Inquiry 373 



JULY 1985 -BYTE 



101 



IBM's 

best efforts aie 

now going into 

Macintosh. 



Macintosh and IBM PC 
software. Compatible at last, 
thanks to MacCharlie, a rather 
innovative coprocessing system. 

And imagine the consequences. 

Nearly 10,000 IBM PC software 
programs designed for general 
business and specific applications 
in real estate, insurance, law, 
medicine, banking, etcetera, can 
now join forces with Macintosh's 
own popular programs. 

And, the myriad of IBM PC- 
compatible software adopts 
Macintosh's many beloved 
features, including desktop 
utilities such as the clipboard and 
the calculator. 

In addition, MacCharlie allows 



IBM PC and Macintosh data files to 
be exchanged. Talk about flexibility. 

But the good news gets better. 

You see, MacCharlie delivers 
hardware compatibility, as well. 
For example, IBM letter-quality 
printers can be easily used 
with Macintosh. 

Furthermore, 
MacCharlie 



now allows Macintosh to perform 
virtually any networking an IBM 
PC can perform. Even to the extent 
of tying in with IBM mainframes. 

In other words, your 
networking capability goes beyond 
the Apple family. 





The Macintosh keyboard slides 
right into MacCharlie's keyboard. 
About as easy as slipping a letter 
in an envelope. 



Macintosh sets snugly 
beside MacCharlie, on 
a custom-fit pedestal. 



Once you plug in MacCharlie's 
power and keyboard cords, 
you're ready to enjoy a very 
happy marriage. 



How does it happen? As easily 
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In mere moments, MacCharlie 
combines the best features of the 
world's premier personal 
computers. 

And despite the fact that it 
turns one computer into two, 



MacCharlie adds but a handful of 
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In short, one of life's most 
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Inquiry 120 

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BUTE 



Features 



Programming Project: IN THIS MONTH'S Features section BYTE presents the first Programming Proj- 

New Perspectives on Nearby Stars e ct, a new monthly column that will be written by various software experts. 

by Bruce Webster 106 Bruce Webster designed the first project in keeping with the Computers and 

Liquid-Crystal Displays Space theme. He describes StarMap, a Pascal program for the Macintosh, 

for Portables which takes a list of stars with Cartesian or astronomical coordinates and shows 

by Glenn ). Adler 119 yQU where they afe jn re i atjon tQ one anot h er . 

Product Descripi-ion: "Liquid-Crystal Displays for Portables" by Glenn Adler takes a look at the 

£> H R' ft m // ASE 129 tec hnology behind twisted-nematic liquid-crystal displays, which enable com- 

" " puters to be battery-operated, lightweight, and affordable. 

Oarcia's Circuit Cellar: Rich Ma ]] oy present s a product description of the GRiDCase family of por- 

Living in a Sensible Environment .. <■ ^ J;^ ^ - ^ -mi ^r..^^ ■ ^..^^ 

by Steve Garcia 141 ta ' D ' e computers from GRiD Systems Corporation. The GRiDCase is IBM PC- 

„ . compatible and offers a range of display options; one version even has a high- 

Programming Insight. ^ i i. i 

Travesty Revisited contrast gas-plasma display. 

by Murray lesser 163 This month's Circuit Cellar presents a number of devices that can be used 

Programming Insight. w ^ the Home Run Control System. Steve has included interrupted-beam 

Real-Number Formatting detectors, various environmental sensors, and alarm signaling devices— all from 

on Your Apple his junk box.' 

by Brent Daviduck 171 As a follow-up to "A TYavesty Generator for Micros" by Hugh Kenner and 

^^^^^^^^_^^^^^^^^_ Joseph O'Rourke in last November's BYTE, 'TYavesty Revisited" by Murray 

Lesser redoes this lexical processor in compiled BASIC. The author believes 
this language is a better choice for handling a task consisting mostly of string 
manipulation. 

In "Real-Number Formatting on Your Apple," Brent Daviduck has written 
a program that lets you specify the decimal length of any real number. This 
machine-language subroutine uses only a small amount of memory- 



JULY 1985 -BYTE 105 




106 BYTE • JULY 1985 



ILLUSTRATED BY FRANK BOZZO 



PROGRAMMING PROJECT 



New Perspectives 
on Nearby Stars 



by Bruce Webster 



A Macintosh programming 
project in Pascal 




To use an already over- 
used cliche, a picture is 
worth a thousand words 
__ (at least). This is especial- 
I ly true when the words 
BB S I are being employed to 
«HHBw_^HB describe the real world. 
Let's say you wanted to describe the 
physical layout of Europe. You could talk 
about figures and angles, explaining the size 
and shape of each country and where each 
country is in relation to all the others. Or 
you could use a map. Which one would 
convey that information more quickly and 
clearly? The map, of course. We perceive 
the universe primarily through our eyes, and 
we are comfortable processing information 
visually. In fact, if you tried to describe 
Europe using the figures-and-words ap- 
proach, your listener would probably try to 
mentally "draw" a map to understand your 
description. 

This problem— the difficulty of compre- 
hending alphanumeric data— is common in 
scientific work. For example, look at table 
1 . This is a list of the 75 stars nearest the 
earth, along with their right ascension, 
declination, parallax, and stellar (star) 
classification (see 'An Astronomy Glossary" 
on page 245 for definitions of these and 
other terms). TYy to picture all those stars 
hanging in space, each in its correct posi- 
tion relative to all the others. In many 



respects, this is more difficult than the "map 
of Europe" problem because the coor- 
dinate system is not an easy one to 
decipher and because you have to deal with 
three dimensions, not just two. 

Now look at figure 1 . It presents a subset 
of the information in table 1 in a graphical 
form. The arrow is pointing at our own sun, 
Sol. Around it hang the nearby stars, each 
in its proper position, each shaded accord- 
ing to its stellar classification. Multistar 
systems are indicated by lines dividing the 
circles into two or three sections, each sec- 
tion representing a star. Figure 2 relates this 
cluster of stars to its approximate position 
in our galaxy. 

Even though you don't know the names 
of those stars, their classes, or even their 
distances from Sol, you now have a much 
better idea of how this region of space 
looks than you got from reading table 1 . 
And that's from two static figures. Now, 
what if you could rotate the angle of view, 
change the scale of the display, or make any 
star the center? What if you could filter out 
stars of a certain class, or distance from Sol, 
or number? What if you could point at any 
star and get more information about it? 

In this article, I'll describe StarMap, a pro- 
gram for the Macintosh that lets you do just 

{continued) 
Bruce Webster (6215 Thorn St., San Diego, CA 
921 15) is a contributing editor for BYTE. 



JULY 1985 -BYTE 107 



PERSPECTIVES ON STARS 



that. StarMap takes a list of stars, with 
either Cartesian (x.y.z) or astronomical 
(RA, Dec Par) coordinates and shows 
you where they are with respect to 
one another. You can perform all the 
manipulations described above: 
limited rotation, scaling, and transla- 
tion, as well as filtering. I'll first look 
at the basic concepts behind the Star- 
Map program and then at some of the 
specific techniques it uses. I'll discuss 
the program itself and finish by talk- 
ing about possible applications and 
improvements. 

StarMap was developed on a Mac- 
intosh using MacAdvantage:UCSD 
Pascal, a Pascal development system 
that runs under the Finder and gives 
you access to most of the Toolbox 
routines (see the text box entitled 
"Development Using MacAdvantage: 
UCSD Pascal" on page 1 14). Informa- 
tion on how to obtain the source code 
for StarMap appears at the end of this 
article. 

Basic Concepts 

StarMap reads in and displays a. list 
of stars; you view them as if from a 
point beyond any of them. The stars 
then appear to form a cluster. Each 
star is shown as a circle filled with a 
pattern that indicates its stellar 
classification (O.BAF'.G.K.M). Since 
the computer's display is only two- 
dimensional, the circle's diameter in- 
dicates the third dimension (depth): 
the smaller the circle, the farther away 
the star is; the larger the circle, the 
closer it is. StarMap displays multistar 
systems by subdividing the circle into 
two (binary) or three (ternary) sec- 
tions. Each section contains the pat- 
tern corresponding to that compo- 
nent's stellar classification. You can 
select any star (by pointing and click- 
ing with a mouse) and get a pop-up 
window with the star's name, its 
distance from Sol (or the current 
origin), and the class of each of its 
components. 

You can manipulate this display by 
rotating it, translating the coordinates, 
and scaling it up. You can rotate it by 
choosing to look along any of the 
three axes (x, y, or z), either from the 
positive end or the negative end. 



(Figure 3 depicts these axes relative 
to the Macintosh screen.) Admitted- 
ly, this is limited rotation; I chose this 
method because of its speed and 
simplicity, especially since it makes 
the detection of a click on a star easy. 
You can choose any star on the dis- 
play as the origin (translation): Fur- 
thermore, you can then add an offset 
(plus or minus) to any one (but only 
one) of the three axes. Scaling lets you 
decide how much of the display is on 
the screen; it's as if you were sitting 
somewhere out in space with a high- 



powered telescope and you cranked 
up the magnification. Stars get bigger; 
the screen covers a smaller area, so 
fewer stars show up. 

You can also filter out stars so that 
not all of them appear. For example, 
you can set which classes of stars will 
(or won't) be shown. I often choose 
to get rid of all the M-class stars 
because they tend to clutter the dis- 
play. You can even eliminate all 
classes but one, restricting your view 
to, say, all G-class stars, which includes 
Sol. Finally, you can screen stars 



T^ble 1: The 75 stars closest to the earth. As the text file RawStars, this list is 




converted by the program ReadStar into a binary file that 


can be used by 






StarMap. (This list is 


taken from, among other 


sources, Astrophysical 






Quantities, 3rd ed.. 


by C. W. Allen, 


\mdon: 


TheAthlone Press. 1973.) 




Name of System 




Right 


Declination 


Parallax 


Stellar 






Ascension 






Class(es) 




hours 


minutes 


degrees 


minutes 


microseconds 






Sol 

















G2 




Proxima Centauri 


14 


26 


-62 


28 


762 


M5 




Alpha Centauri 


14 


36 


-60 


38 


745 


G2 


K5 


Barnard's Star 


17 


55 


4 


33 


552 


M5 




Wolf 359 


10 


54 


7 


19 , 


429 


M8 




Lalande 21185 


11 


1 


36 


18 


401 


M2 




Sirius 


6 


43 


-16 


39 


377 


A1 


dA5 


UV Ceti 


1 


36 


-18 


13 


367 


M5 


M6 


Ross 154 


18 


47 


-23 


53 


345 


M4 




Ross 248 


23 


39 


43 


55 


317 


M6 




L789-6 


22 


36 


-15 


36 


303 


M7 




Epsilon Eridani 


3 


31 


-9 


38 


303 


K2 




Ross 1 28 


11 


45 


1 


6 


301 


M5 




61 Cygni 


21 


5 


38 


30 


294 


K5 


K7 


Epsilon Indi 


22 





-47 





291 


K5 




Procyon 


7 


37 


5 


21 


286 


F5 


dFO 


7 2398 


18 


42 


59 


33 


283 


M4 


M5 


Groombridge 34 





15 


43 


44 


282 


M1 


M6 


Lacaille 9352 


23 


3 


-36 


8 


279 


M2 




Tau Ceti 


1 


41 


-16 


12 


276 


G8 




BD +5° 1668 


7 


25 


5 


23 


268 


M5 




Cordoba 29191 


21 


14 


-39 


4 


260 


M0 




Kapteyn's Star 


5 


10 


-45 





256 


M0 




Kruger 60 


22 


26 


57 


27 


253 


M3 


M4 


Ross 614 


6 


27 


-2 


46 


250 


M7 


M0 


BD -12° 4523 


16 


28 


-12 


32 


249 


M5 




van Maanen's Star 





46 


5 


9 


236 


dG5 




Wolf 424 


12 


31 


9 


18 


230 


M6 


M7 


BD -37° 





2 


-37 


36 


225 


M4 




BD +50° 


10 


8 


49 


42 


219 


K7 




CD -46° 11540 


17 


25 


-46 


51 


216 


M4 




CD -49° 


21 


30 


-49 


13 


214 


M1 




CD -44° 11909 


17 


33 


-44 


17 


213 


M5 




AD Leonis 


1 


57 


12 


50 


212 


M8 




BD +68° 


17 


37 


68 


28 


209 


M4 




Ross 780 


22 


51 


-14 


31 


207 


M5 




CC658 


11 


43 


-64 


33 


206 


dA5 





108 BYTE • JULY 1985 



PERSPECTIVES ON STARS 



based on the number of components 
in a system (one, two. or three). If you 
just want to see single-star systems or 
if you just want to see binary systems, 
etc.. you can do so. 

Coordinate Conversion 

A number of minor hurdles have to 
be overcome to get StarMap working. 
First, most star catalogs give stellar 
coordinates as right ascension, de- 
clination, and parallax. This is just a 
disguised polar-coordinate system. 
Right ascension is equivalent to theta, 



the equatorial or longitudinal angle. 
It starts in the constellation Aries and 
runs eastward through the 1 2 signs of 
the zodiac. Right ascension is usually 
expressed as hours, minutes, and sec- 
onds (rather than degrees), ranging 
from 00 h OCT. 00 to 23 h 59 m .59. 

Declination is equivalent to phi, the 
latitudinal angle; it's simply the angle 
up or down from the equator, going 
from 90 degrees (the north pole), 
through (the equator), and down to 
-90 degrees (the south pole). 

Parallax is an indirect measure of 





Name of System 




Right 


Declination 


Parallax 




Stellar 






Ascension 










Class(es) 






hours 


minutes 


degrees 


minutes 


microseconds 






Lalande 25372 


13 


43 


15 


10 


205 


M4 






Keid 


4 


13 


-7 


44 


205 


K1 


dAO M4 




BD +20° 


10 


17 


20 


7 


203 


M4 






Altair 


19 


48 


8 


44 


197 


A7 






70 Ophiuchi 


18 


3 


2 


31 


195 


K0 


K5 




AC +79° 


11 


45 


78 


58 


195 


M4 






EV Lacertae 


22 


45 


44 


5 


194 


M4 






AC +58° 


4 


26 


58 


53 


192 


M4 


M4 




WX Ursae Major is 


11 


3 


43 


47 


186 


M2 


M8 




36 Ophiuchi 


17 


12 


-26 


32 


184 


K1 


K1 K5 




CD -20° 4125/4123 


14 


55 


-21 


12 


180 


K5 


M2 




CD -36° 


20 


8 


-36 


14 


177 


K3 


M5 




Sigma Draconis 


19 


32 


69 


35 


176 


K0 






Lalande 46650 


23 


47 


2 


8 


175 


M2 






Delta Pavonis 


20 


4 


-66 


19 


175 


G6 






L374-14 


19 


17 


-45 


37 


175 


M7 






CD -21° 


6 


8 


-21 


51 


174 


M1 






BD +4° 4048 


19 


14 


5 


6 


173 


M4 


M5 




Luyten 97-12 


7 


53 


-67 


38 


173 


dM5 






Luyten 674-15 


8 


10 


-21 


24 


171 


M5 






UC48 


17 


42 


-57 


17 


170 


M5 






CD -3° 


5 


29 


-3 


41 


170 


M1 






Eta Cassiopeiae 





46 


57 


33 


170 


GO 


M0 




CD -40° 9712 


15 


29 


-41 


6 


169 


M4 






Ross 986 


7 


7 


38 


38 


169 


M5 






Wolf 294 


6 


52 


33 


20 


168 


M4 






Ross 47 


5 


39 


12 


29 


168 


M6 






BD +53° 1320/1321 


9 


11 


52 


54 


166 


M0 


M0 




LP 658-2 


5 


53 


-4 


8 


166 


dK5 






Ross 882 


7 


42 


3 


41 


165 


M4 






CD -45° 


20 


10 


-45 


19 


164 


M0 






Wolf 629/630 


16 


53 


-8 


15 


161 


M4 


M4 M5 




82 Eridani 


3 


17 


-43 


16 


161 


G5 






CD -11° 


14 


32 


-12 


19 


160 


M4 






Beta Hydri 





23 


-11 


32 


159 


G1 






BD +19° 


23 


20 


19 


40 


155 


M4 


M6 




BD +45° 2505 


17 


11 


45 


45 


155 


M3 





distance; it's the apparent shift (in 
fractions of a second) of a star's posi- 
tion as the earth travels around the 
sun. If you divide l by the parallax, 
you get the distance of the star in 
parsecs (where l parsec equals 
3.26161 light-years). Note that in table 
I, the parallax value 762 represents 
0.762 second. 

For display purposes, I chose to 
convert the stars' coordinates to the 
rectangular (or Cartesian) coordinates 
x, y, and z. lb allow separation of close 
systems (such as Alpha Centauri and 
Proxima Centauri), I used 0.1 light-year 
as the grid-unit size. Thus, a star at 
(10,0.0) would be exactly 1 light-year 
(10 x 0.1) away from Sol. The positive 
x-axis goes out through a right ascen- 
sion of 00 h 00 m 00; the positive y- 
axis, through 06 h 00 m .00. The 
positive z-axis goes up through a 
declination of 90 degrees. I used a 
two-step conversion process— from 
astronomical to true polar, then from 
polar to rectangular. Figure 4 illus- 
trates the relationship between the 
different coordinate systems. 

For both right ascension and dec- 
lination, we have two values: hours 
and minutes, and degrees and 
minutes. Our very first step is to con- 
vert both into real values, for exam- 
ple, converting 05 h 30 m 00 to 5.5 
hours. Assuming that the two values 
are read in as integers, the function 
shown in listing I will do theconver- 
sion. Note that the sign must be prop- 
agated to the minutes, because in 
table 1 only the degrees have nega- 
tive signs. 

Having done this, you then need to 
multiply the right ascension by 1 5. to 
convert it from hours (0 to 23) to 
degrees (0 to 359). Furthermore, since 
the Pascal used for this program ex- 
pects radians (as do most Pascal im- 
plementations), you must convert 
from degrees to radians by multiply- 
ing both by the value (2xpi)/360.0, 
which is equal to 0.01745329. You 
have now converted right ascension 
and declination to theta and phi. To 
convert parallax to distance, you need 
to divide the value into 1000 (remem- 
ber that the table values are in 

(continued) 



JULY 1985 • BYTE 109 



PERSPECTIVES ON STARS 



File Origin finis Scale flange Class Type 



Star Map — Copyright © 1985 by Bruce F, Webster 




Figure I : The stars closest to the earth, as presented by StarMap. 











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^^^^M 






























W^^/'Ul'-^^M 








SHEK&£r * : i *'*'<^^Si 








Hnpi^^fll 








^^^^X^&'Oiafc^^CTW 
















V'^i3 *.^3^>n«wMOjjB 






* 
® 




e 


• 






m 






o 






9 


*» 


© 


® ® 






® 


o 


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• 

















Figure 2: Tfe approximate location of the star cluster from figure 1 in the galaxy. 



thousandths of a second), then multi- 
ply it by 3.261 6 1 (ParToLY, the number 
of light-years in a parsec). Assuming 
that the right-ascension values are 
RAH (right-ascension hours) and RAM 
(right-ascension minutes), the declina- 
tion values are DecD (declination 
degrees) and DecM (declination 
minutes), Par is the parallax, and the 
constant DegToRad equals 
O.OI745329, then the statements in 
listing 2 complete the conversion to 
polar coordinates, with the unit 
distance being 0.1 light-year. Note that 
if we change ParToLY to 32616.1, you 
can rewrite the third statement as 

Dist : = ParToLY/Par: 

The more drawn-out version is just for 
clarity's sake. 

Conversion from polar to rec- 
tangular coordinates is well defined. 
Assuming the integer variables x, y, 
and z, the statements in listing 3 con- 
vert from polar to rectangular form, 
where the function Round takes a real 
value and rounds it to the nearest in- 
teger. This lets you do your calcula- 
tions with real numbers and convert 
at the end, maximizing precision. 

Stellar Data Structure 

The conversion from astronomical to 
rectangular coordinates just described 
is performed by a program called 
ReadStar. ReadStar also converts the 
data file RawStars (containing the list 
of stars) from a text file to a binary file 
called Stars. That way, StarMap can 
read in the data faster, avoiding any 
sort of text-to-numbers conversion. 
The data types used by StarMap and 
ReadStar are given in listing 4. 

Note that StarClass is an enumer- 
ated data type (EDT), not a character 
data type. Each star system can have 
up to three components, or three dif- 
ferent stars. For example, the star 
system Keid actually contains three 
stars, with stellar classes KI, dAO, and 
M4. Keid's data structure would then 
have the values shown in figure 5. 

Note that the record type Compo- 
nent is declared as being "packed." 
This is to make it as small as possible. 
Since each of the three fields— Dwarf, 
Class, and SubClass— have very small 



110 BYTE • )ULY 1985 



PERSPECTIVES ON STARS 



ranges of values, the MacAdvantage 
compiler can pack all three into just 
2 bytes, the smallest possible size of 
a UCSD Pascal record. This keeps the 
size of the Stars record down to 38 
bytes. If the program didn't declare 
Component to be packed, it would 
use 2 bytes for each field, for a total 
size of 6 bytes, and the array Comp 
would go from 6 to 18 bytes, kicking 
Stars up to 50 bytes per record. In a 
list of 200 stars, that's a difference of 
more than 2K bytes. 

Organizing the Stars 

After you've created the data file with 
ReadStar, you can now run StarMap 
to display and manipulate it. A few. 
subtly related questions arise. First, in 
what data structure will the stars be 
stored? The program could just read 
them into an array[1 . . n] of Stars, but 
n has to be fixed when the program 
is compiled. This limits the number of 
stars that can be read in and also 
forces the program to use more 
memory than it might otherwise need. 

Second, having read in the stars, in 
what order should you have the pro- 
gram draw them? Since stars will over- 
lap on the display, this becomes an 
important question. The program 
should draw from the farthest star to 
the nearest, so that those closer to 
your viewpoint will cover up (when 
necessary) those farther away. One 
solution, of course, is to sort the ar- 
ray (if that's what you're using) along 
the axis being viewed. But that means 
the program would have to sort the 
list again every time you change the 
viewing axis, which would add a fair 
amount of time and overhead. 

Third, if you point at a star and click 
the mouse, the program must detect 
the closest star and not any that are 
hidden behind it. This is similar to the 
second problem; again, a sorted list 
of stars will solve the problem. The 
challenge is to avoid constantly 
resorting. 

Many solutions are possible; each 
has good and bad points. The ap- 
proach I've chosen provides a large 
degree of flexibility while reducing the 
storage of redundant information. 

{continued) 



Z- 




X- 





x+ 



Figure 3 : The x~, y-. and i-axes for StarMap, as related to the Macintosh screen. 




9 



THETA= RIGHT ASCENSION 
PHI = DECLINATION 
DIST= 1/PARALLAX 
TDIST= r *cos(<J>) 



s * cos(0) 
s *sin(0) 
r * sin((t>) 






Figure 4: The relationship between the three coordinate systems discussed in 
the article: stellar (right ascension, declination, and parallax), polar (theta and 
phi), and Cartesian (x. y. and z). 



JULY 1985 -BYTE 111 



PERSPECTIVES ON STARS 



Listing I : The code for converting hours, degrees, and minutes into real values. 

function MinTcfrac(Degrees, Minutes : Integer) : Real; 

{ 
purpose converts dd mm to dd.xx 

} 

var 

Sign : Real; 

begin 
if Degrees 0.0 
then Sign := -1.0 
else Sign := 1.0; 
MinToFrac:= Degrees + Sign*(Minutes/60.0) 
end; { of tunc MinToFrac } 



Listing 2: The code for converting right ascension, declination, and parallax 
into polar coordinates. 

Theta := DegToRad * MinToFrac(RAH,RAM) * 15.0; 
Phi := DegToRad * MinToFrac(DecD,DecM); 
Dist := ParToLY * (1000.0/Par) * 10.0; 



Listing 

Z : = 

TDist : = 
Y : = 
X : = 


3: The code for converting polar 

Round(Dist * Sin(Phi)); 
= TDist * Cos(Phi); 
Round(TDist * Sin(Theta)); 
Round(TDist * Cos(Theta)); 


coordinates into Cartesian coordinates. 



Each star occupies a location in a 
large three-dimensional grid, speci- 
fied by its coordinates (x.y.z). Since 
you want to sort the stars along each 
axis, start by linking together all stars 
with the same x-coordinate, the same 
^-coordinate, and the same z- 
coordinate. To do this, define the data 
types as shown in listing 5. 

Each star that is read in will have its 
own node; that is, the data will go into 
the field Star. The three pointers— 
Node[AX], NodefAY], and Node[AZ]- 
will each point at the next star shar- 
ing the same x-, y~, or z-coordinate, re- 
spectively. Of course, if there are no 
more stars with the same given coor- 
dinate, the respective pointer will con- 
tain the null pointer value, nil. 

With this method, the program can 
read in as many stars as there is mem- 
ory for; likewise, you allocate only as 
much memory as is needed. There is 
an additional overhead of 6 bytes per 
node (for the three pointers), which 
brings the size of each node up to 44 
bytes, but we've gained a lot of flex- 
ibility with those pointers. 

Now that all these stars are linked 
together, how do you get to the first 
star of each list? Use a header list. The 
data structures for the headers are 
shown in listing 6. 

The array Next points to lists of stars 
sharing the same x- y-, or z-coor- 
dinate. AVal tells what that coordinate 



Listing 4: The data types used by StarMap and ReadStar. 


StarClass 


= (O.B.A.F.G.K.M); 


SubRange 


= 0..9; 


Component 


= 


packed record 


Dwarf 


: Boolean; 


Class 


: StarClass; 


SubClass 


: SubRange 


end; 




Stars 


= 


record 




Name 


: string[23]; 


X.Y.Z 


: Integer; 


NumComp 


: 0. .3; 


Comp 


: array[1 . .3] of Component 


end; 




- 





Name 


Keid 


X 


71 


Y 


141 


Z 


-21 


NumComp 


3 


Comp[1] 




Dwarf 


False 


Class 


K 


SubClass 


1 


Comp[2] 




Dwarf 


True 


Class 


A 


SubClass 





Comp[3] 




Dwarf 


False 


Class 


M 


SubClass 


4 



Figure 5 : The data structure for the star 
system Keid, which consists of three stars. 



112 BYTE • IULY 1985 



PERSPECTIVES ON STARS 



is. Note that there is one header for 
a given value along all three axes. For 
example, if AVal were 71. then 
Next[AX] would point to all stars with 
an x-coordinate of 71. Next[AY] would 
point to those with a ^-coordinate of 
71. and Next[AZ], to those with a z- 
coordinate of 71. 

As I mentioned, you want the stars 
sorted along each axis. You can ac- 
complish this by simply maintaining 
a sorted linked list of headers. The 
pointer Link[Front] points to the 
header with the next highest AVal; 
Link[Back] points to the next lowest 
header. Both ends of the list point to 
a special header called Head (and 
vice versa). To traverse the list, the 
program starts at one end and follows 
Link until it runs into Head. The pro- 
cedure in listing 7. when given an axis 
and a direction, traverses the entire 
list of stars in the order you requested 
and writes out the name of each star. 
You won't find this procedure in Star- 
Map, but the routines to draw the 
map and to find which star has been 
selected use code that is similar to 
StarMap's. 

HPtr moves through the list of 
headers until it runs into Head. TPtr 
checks all the stars at each header for 
the given axis. For example, if 
HPtr.Aval = 15andAxis = AY, then 
TPtr will point at all the stars (if any) 
with a ^-coordinate of 15. 

Transforming the Display 

StarMap lets you transform the dis- 
play by rotating it. translating the 
coordinates, and scaling it up. Rota- 
tion is limited to your fixing the posi- 
tion of the axis (x,y, or z) you're look- 
ing along and choosing to look from 
the positive or negative end. The pro- 
gram simply changes the values of 
Axis and Direction (global variables 
with the same data types shown in list- 
ing 7, WriteNames). The list of stars is 
now automatically "sorted" along that 
axis, while Direction fixes the direction. 
Translation takes a couple of forms. 
First, you can change the map's origin 
to any star; it doesn't have to be Sol. 
This is done by clicking the star and 
then pulling down the Origin menu. 
The name of that star will appear in 



the menu; just select it to move. Sol 
always appears in the menu, so you 
can easily recenter the display. You 
also can add an offset of plus or 
minus 15 light-years to the origin 
along any axis. The name of the cur- 



rent origin always appears at the top 
so that you can remove the offset. It 
also reminds you what the current 
origin is. One more effect: When you 
click a star to get information, the 

[continued) 



Listing 5: Definition of the data types for linking together stars with the same 
x-. y-, or coordinates. 



AxisType 


= (AX.AY.AZ); 


NodePtr 


= 'Node; 


NodeList 


= array[AxisType] of NodePtr; 


Node 


= 


record 




Next 


: NodeList; 


Star 


: Stars 


end; 





Listing 6: 


Data sructures for the header list. 


DirecType 


= (Front.Back); 


HeadPtr 


= 'Header; 


Header 


= 


record 




AVal 


: Integer; 


Link 


: array[DirecType] of HeadPtr; 


Next 


: NodeList 


end; 





Listing 7: The procedure that traverses the entire list of stars in the order 
requested and writes out the name of each star. 



AxisType; Direction : DirecType); 



procedure WriteNames(Axis 

{ 
purpose traverses all stars 
last update 09 Mar 85 

} 

var 
TPtr : NodePtr; 

HPtr ; HeadPtr; 

begin 
HPtr:= Head\Link[Direction]; 
while HPtr< >Head do begin 
TPtr := HPtr".Next[Axis]; { check specific axis } 
while TPtr< >nil do begin { look at all stars } 
WriteLn(TPtr .Star. Name); { at that coordinate } 
TPtr := TPtr\Next[Axis] 
end; 

HPtr := HPtr.Link[Direction] 
end 
end; { of proc WriteNames } 



{ start at one end } 



JULY 1985 • BYTE 113 



PERSPECTIVES ON STARS 



distance given is always with respect 
to the current origin. If you select 
Groombridge 34 as your origin, then 
look at Beta Hydri; the distance 
shown is that from Groombridge 34. 
Scaling is basically a zoom function. 
You are not moving "into" the cluster; 
you are just increasing the magnifica- 
tion of your mythical telescope. Each 



level of scaling represents a twofold 
increase over the previous level. 

Filtering Stars 

You have three filtering functions at 
your disposal. First you can screen 
stars according to their stellar class 
(O.B.A.F.G.K.M). The program main- 
tains a set (DisplaySet) containing the 



currently allowed classes. For multiple 
stars, if any component is in Display- 
Set, then all components are dis- 
played. 

The second filter is distance. Note 
that this is the distance from the current 
origin. If you set Groombridge 34 to be 
the origin, then limit the range to 8 
light-years, you will see all stars within 



Development Using 
MacAdvantage:UCSD Pascal 



MacAdvantage:UCSD Pascal rep- 
resents something of a first for 
Sof'fech Microsystems Inc.; it's a UCSD 
Pascal compiler running under some- 
thing other than the UCSD p-System 
operating system. Ifue, SofTech had 
released an MS-DOS hosted version of 
the p-System. but that isn't quite the 
same as this. 

MacAdvantage is simply a UCSD 
Pascal compiler (and assorted tools) 
running under the Macintosh Finder. 
The editor is a standard Macintosh- 
style editor, developed by Bill Duvall 
at Consulair and found in other soft- 
ware-development packages (MDS. 
MacModula-2, Megamax C etc.). The 
resource maker is Apple's standard 
resource compiler, again found in 
many of the other systems. The com- 
piler produces applications that you 
can start by double-clicking an icon. 
However, those applications don't 
stand alone: you have to have the Mac- 
Advantage P-machine and run-time 
files somewhere on the disk. The ap- 
plication loads these in before 
executing. 

Program development under MacAd- 
vantage is a pleasure. The package 
comes with a little executive program 
that takes you out of the Finder and 
gives you a Macintosh-like menu bar 
across the top. The menu bar contains 
selections to let you compile, run the 
resource maker, edit a file, run the 
library or set-options utilities, or exit to 
the Finder. When you go from the 
editor or the compiler into the ex- 
ecutive program, it only takes a second 
or two to bring the display up. a great 



improvement over the 15 to 2 5 sec- 
onds it can take to return to the Macin- 
tosh Finder. And the Set menu lets you 
define where (and what) the different 
utility files are. 

Since UCSD Pascal is basically a 
16-bit language and the Macintosh is 
a 32-bit environment, SofTech had to 
make a number of changes and en- 
hancements to fit the two together. 
MacAdvantage has a 3 2 -bit integer 
data type (lnteger2), which is heavily 
used in the Toolbox units, usually to 
represent 3 2 -bit addresses. A new 
function. Locate, returns the 32-bit ad- 
dress of a given variable or procedure. 
Other functions help conversion be- 
tween the 16-bit p-code pointers and 
the Macintosh's 32-bit addresses. 
Other bridges include functions to con- 
vert between the two Macintosh 
Boolean types and the UCSD Pascal 
Boolean type. 

The Toolbox implementation is fair- 
ly complete. One library (with a large 
number of units) lets you use just the 
routines and definitions that you want. 
Most are identical or almost identical 
to those defined in \nside Macintosh 
(Cupertino, CA: Apple Computer Inc.. 
1985). although, again, some modifica- 
tions have been made to bridge the dif- 
ferent environments. 

If MacAdvantage has one major 
drawback, it is its lack of speed. Like 
MacModula-2 and the Mac p-System, 
MacAdvantage uses pseudo-machine 
code running on a p-code interpreter. 
This makes it anywhere from 20 to 40 
times slower than assembly language, 
although heavy use of Toolbox rou- 



tines can significantly close that gap. 
A minor drawback is that it is neces- 
sary to copy both the application and 
the support files (P-machine. run-time 
file) in order for the application to run. 

With the recent announcements of 
Sof'fech. MacAdvantage now has some 
strong points to balance against prob- 
lems. First and foremost is price: at 
$119. MacAdvantage is a real bargain. 
On top of that, of course, is word that 
Sof'fech has completely dropped all 
licensing fees for MacAdvantage. This 
means that programmers can freely 
give away or sell any products devel- 
oped with MacAdvantage. including 
the two support files needed to run 
them. 

Even if developers don't want to 
release a final product in MacAdvan- 
tage form, they can still make use of 
the package. MacAdvantage and Lisa 
Pascal are similar enough that conver- 
sion from one to the other is fairly 
straightforward. This means that pro- 
grammers could experiment and devel- 
op new programs on the Macintosh 
(using MacAdvantage). then produce a 
final version using Lisa Pascal. 

Finally, MacAdvantage represents the 
next step after MacPascal (from Apple). 
MacPascal has a nice environment for 
beginning programs, but its speed 
(over 1 5 times slower than MacAdvan- 
tage). its copy protection, and its lack 
of full, direct Toolbox support severe- 
ly limit it as a serious development 
tool. Educational institutions in par- 
ticular might be interested in switching 
to MacAdvantage after a semester of 
MacPascal. 



114 BYTE • JULY 1985 



PERSPECTIVES ON STARS 



The obvious 



application of 



8 light-years of Groombridge 34. 

The third filter is number of components: 
one, two, or three stars, or any com- 
bination of these. As with the stellar 
class filter, the program uses a set . 

(CountSet) to keep track of the StflfNiCtp IS 
allowed values. 

All three filters are cumulative. If 
you only want to see all binary K-class 
stars within 8 light-years of Groom- 
bridge 34, you can. As it turns out. 
there is one such system: 61 Cygni j 
(6.9 light-years away; components are Wlm OS WCll 
K5 and K7). - 



educational although 
it can be fun to play 



Selecting Stars 

To get more information about a star, 
you point at it with the mouse and 
click. The program must then deter- 
mine which (if any) star you selected. 
Remember that StarMap draws the 
stars from the farthest away to the 
closest. StarMap detects stars in the 
opposite direction, so that you select 
what you see and not some star hid- 
den behind it. For each star that 
meets your selection criteria (i.e.. 
passes through all your filters), Star- 
Map generates its enclosing rectangle, 
then checks to see if the mouse was 
clicked within that area. If it was. the 
rectangle is momentarily inverted to 
indicate which star was selected, and 
then the information window is up- 
dated. The information window, which 
gives the name, distance from current 
origin, and class of components, is 
shown in figure I. If another star is 
selected, the information window is 
changed accordingly. 

Applications and 
Enhancements 

The obvious application of StarMap 
is educational, although it can be fun 
to play with as well. Most important, 
it displays the data in a more interest- 
ing and memorable manner than 
table 1 . This program is sure to liven 
up any astronomy (or general science) 
class. 

Numerous changes and enhance- 
ments are obvious. Since you can 
substitute your own star list, you can 
create a larger star map. For example, 
proper motion information could be 
added to the star list (in table 1) as 



well as to the Stars data structure (in 
listing 4). A time menu could then be 
used to track the stars in relation to 
one another. Other information, such 
as the absolute magnitude of the 
components, could be added and dis- 
played. My own plans include a "uni- 
verse construction set." which will let 
me create planets in each of those 
systems. 

You can obtain the StarMap listings 
from BYTEnet Listings at (617) 
861-9774. You will also need BinHex, 
a public-domain program available on 
BYTEnet Listings, which changes the 
binary files into executable applica- 
tions. The listings are STARMAP.HQX, 
the actual program; STARS.HQX, the 
data file of stars; READSTAR.HQX, 
only necessary if you want to create 
a new data file; and PRUNTIME.HQX 
and PMACHINE.HQX, the run-time 
files needed to run the program. If you 
have the MacAdvantage development 
system and want to make adaptations 
to the program, the necessary files 
are STARMAP.PAS, SMAP.R, RAW- 
STARS.DOC, and READSTAR.PAS. ■ 

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS 
A number of people went to some trou- 
ble to help me locate a decent star list. 
Among those are Linda Hume at San 
Diego State University; Dr. Barbara Jones, 
UCSD; Mike Caplinger, Rice University; 
David Gehrt, NASA/Ames; Michael Hart- 
sough. USG Edward Olson. JPL; Josh 
Knight, IBM Watson Research Labs; Dick 
Munro. High Altitude Observatory; Ted 
Anderson, moderator of the Info-Space 
discussion on ARPANET/uucp; and the 
rest of the Info-Space contributors. My 
thanks to all. 



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OurNewCPZ-186 
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ports, 2K> parallel I/O ports, Mem- 
ory Management Unit, Interrupt Con- 
troller, up to 1 Megabyte of Dynamic 
RAM, and up to 8K EPROM, all on a 
single IEEE S-l 00 Bus Board. 

Talk about speed and flexibility. 
The CPZ-186 runs at 8 MHz and can 
be used for single user systems or 
in powerful multi-user applications. 
As a Network Master (File Server), 
the CPZ-186 can network 8-bit and 
1 6-bit S-100 Bus Slaves as well as 
PC's using Intercontinental^ com- 
plete line of hardware and software 
networking products. 

Find out what support really is. 
Everyone talks about support, but at 
Intercontinental you deal directly 
with our hardware and software 
design team. Who else could know 
more about solving your problems? 

Best ot all, we're delivering now, 
and our price allows building cost 
effective systems and networks. 

Circle the bingo number below or 
contact us directly, and ask about 
our complete line of S-100 Bus and 
Local Area Networking Boards. 



Intercontinental 
Micro Systems 



4015 Leaverfon CLAnaheim, Ca 92807, 
(714) 630-0964JEL£X: 821375 SUPPORT UD 

Inquiry 189 for End-Users. 
Inquiry 190 for DEALERS ONLY. 

JULY 1985 • BYTE 



115 



THE WORLD'S LARGEST COMPUTER MAIL ORDER FIRM 



#B2I 






TELEX 970 380 3980 



MACINTOSH 




( ALL MAIL: 12060 SW Garden Place, Portland, OR 97223 ) 

foITtoob apple 



COMPUTERS 



flpppta 



BUSINESS SOFTWARE UTILITIES SOFTWARE 



lie. lie. Mac, Mac XL 



IN STOCK, CALL 



list CONROY 
ASSIMILATION, Turbo Touch $ 129 $ 

BLUECHIP, Millionaire, Barron, Tycoon, ea. $ 60 $ 37 
CENTRAL POINT, Copy II Mac or MxToote, ea. $ 40 $ 24 
CONROY-LA POINTE, Diskettes, 

10 pak, SS/DD, w/Flip-Pak $ 60 $ 25 

CONTINENTAL, Home Accountant $ 100 $ 65 
CREATIVE SOLUTIONS, Macf orth Level I $ 149 $ 95 
CREIGHTON, HomePakor Mac Office, ea. $ 39$ 26 

Mac Spell + $ 99 $ 60 

CSD, MacLion $ 379 $ 239 

DOW JONES, Market Manager Plus $ 249 S 159 
EXPERTELLIGENCE, ExperLogo $ 150 $ 95 
FIRST BYTE, Smooth Talker $ 150 $ 95 

FORETHOUGHT, Fact Finder $ 150 $ 95 

HABA, DS/DD Ext. Disk Drive, 800K $ 550 $ 479 
HAYDEN, Sargon III $ 50 $ 31 

HUMAN EDGE, Mind Prober $50$ 29 

INFOCOM, Hitchhiker's Guide $ 40 $ 25 

INNOVATIVE, Flip-n-File, 40 $ 30 $ 19 

KOALA, Mac Vision $ 400 $ 229 

LIVING VIDEOTEXT, Think Tank $ 145 $ 83 
LOTUS, Jazz $ 595 $ 395 

MEGAHAUS, Megafiler $ 195 $ 125 

Megamerge $ 125 $ B0 

MICROSOFT, Business Pak $ 595 $ 395 

Multiplan, Word, or File, each $ 195 $ 125 

MILES, Macthe Knife, v. 1 $ 39 $ 25 

MONOGRAM, Dollars & Sense $ 150 $ B9 

NOVATION, Smartcat Plus Modem w/Software $ 499 $ 349 
ODESTA, Helix $ 395 $ 259 

PENGUIN, Graphics Magician $ 50 $ 32 

PROVUE, Overvue $ 295 $ 185 

SIMON & SCHUSTER, Typing Tutor III $ 60 $ 37 
SOFTW.PUBL.PFS: File & Report Combo $ 175 $ 105 
SOFTWARE ARTS, T/K Solver $ 249 $ 159 

STATE OFTHE ART, Electronic Checkbook $ 8 $ 50 
STONEWARE, DB Master $ 195 $ 125 

TELOS, File Vision $ 195 $ 115 

WARNER, Desk Organizer $ 149 $ 99 



FLOPPY DISK DRIVES 



LIST CONROY 

MICRO-SCI, A2 Disk Drive, 143K $ 345 $ 169 

A2 Controller Card $ 100 $ 60 

Half Height Drive for lie $ 269 $ 169 

Half Height Drive for lie $ 299 $ 189 

RANA, Elite I, 163K, 40 Track $ 299 $ 189 

Elite Controller $ 145 $ 79 

TEAC, T40 Half Ht, 163K, Direct $ 249 $ 169 

Controller Card for T40 by ComX $ 79 $ 45 



HARD DISKS 



QUARK, QC10 for llc/lle/lll/MAC 



OTHER HARDWARE 



115 $ 85 

140 $ 79 

119 $ 29 

CALL 

90 $ 65 

298 $ 179 

80 $ 44 

130 $ 75 

50 $ 35 

199 $ 89 
395 $ 275 
209 $ 159 

99 $ 59 

375 $ 250 

89 $ 59 

319 $ 219 

269 $ 189 

100 $ 50 

40 $ 26 

150 $ 99 

200 $ 139 
250 $ 169 
379 $ 229 
279 $ 175 
199 $ 159 



ALS, Word or List Handler, ea. $ 

Handler Pak (Word/List/Speil) $ 

APPLE, Appleworks $ 

ASHTON-TATE, dBase II (Req CP/M 80) $ 

BPI, AR, AP, PR or INV, each $ 

BRODERBUND, Print Shop $ 

Print Shop Graphics Library S 

Bank St. Writer or Speller, ea $ 

Bank St. Combo (Writer & Speller) $ 

DOW JONES, Market Manager $ 

Market Analyzer or Microscope, ea. $ 

HOWARD SOFT, Tax Preparer '85 $ 

HUMAN EDGE, Sales or Mgmt Edge, ea. $ 



CCS, 7711 or 7710-A Interface, ea. $ 
CPS/EASTSIDE, Wild Card II (copier, +/e) $ 
COMX, 16KRAMCard(ll+),1yr ltd wty $ 
HAYES, Mach II, III Joysticks (ll+/lle) 
KENSINGTON, System Saver Fan $ 
KEY TRONIC, KB200 Keyboard ( + ) $ 
KOALA, Muppet Keys $ 

Touch Tablet w/Micro lllustrator(+/e) $ 
KRAFT, Joystick (ll/ll + /lle) $ 

MICRO-SCI, 80 Col. Card + 64K RAM Card (lie) $ 
MICROSOFT, Premium Softcard (He) $ 
ORANGE MICRO, Buffered Grader Plus, 16K $ 

16K Buffer Board for Grappler Plus $ 
PCPI, Applicard, 6 MHz, 14 features $ 
RH ELECT., Super Fan II w/surge protector $ 
TITAN, Accelerator He $ 

128KRAMCard(ll + ) $ 

TRACKHOUSE, Numeric Key Pad (lie) $ 
TG, Select-a-Port $ 

VIDEO 7, V Color 7 RGB Card $ 

V Color lie $ 

V Color lie $ 
VIDEX, UltraTerm(ll + /lle) $ 

Video Term 80 Col. Card (ll+/lle) $ 
WICO, Smaricard (spec. Il/ll + /lie) $ 



80 $ 36 

170 $ 73 

250 $ 215 

495 $ 289 

395 $ 240 

50 $ 29 

25 $ 18 

70 $ 45 

140 $ 85 

249 $ 159 

349 $ 219 

250 $ 165 
250 $ 165 
145 $ 89 
199 $ 125 
125 $ 80 

350 $ 189 
495 $ 265 
495 $ 265 

99 $ 54 

595 $ 295 

95 $ 62 



PRICE 

EPSON, Graphics Dump $ 15 

FUNK, Sideways $ 60 

HAYES, Terminal Prog, for Smartmodem $ 99 
MICROSOFT, Full Line in Stock 

OMEGA, Locksmith $ 100 

PENGUIN, Complete Graphics System II $ 80 

Graphics Magician $ 60 

QUALITY, Bag of Tricks $ 40 

UNITED SWI, ASCII Express-The Pro $ 130 

UTILICO, Essential Data Duplicator III $ 80 



CUNHUT 

PRICE 
$ 7 
$ 37 
$ 65 
CALL 



LIVING VIDEOTEXT, Think Tank $ 

MECA, Managing Your Money $ 

MEGAHAUS, Megaworks $ 

MICRO PRO, WordStar $ 

WordStar w/ Starcard $ 

WordStar Professional, 4 Pak $ 

MaiiMerge, SpellStar, or Starlndex, ea $ 

InfoStar and StarCard Combo $ 

MICROSOFT, Multi-Plan (Ap DOS) $ 

QUARK, Word Juggler & Lexicheck (lle/llc) $ 189 $ 1 29 

SENSIBLE, Sensible Speller $ 125 $ 79 

SIERRA/ON-LINE, Screen Writer II $ 130 $ 79 

SOFTWARE PUBL, PFS:File or Write, each $ 125 $ 79 

PFSiGraph or Report, each $ 125 $ 79 

SPRINGBOARD, Newsroom $ 50 $ 32 

STONEWARE, DB Master, v. 4+ $ 350 $ 225 



UTILITIES SOFTWARE 



BEAGLE, GPLE or Alpha Plot, ea $ 50 $ 27 

Pronto DOS, Disk Quick, Ap.Mech. or 1.0. Silver, ea $ 30$ 19 
Full line IN STOCK CALL 

BORLAND, Turbo Pascal $ 55 $ 33 

3 Pak (Pasc, Turbo Tut, Toolbox) NEW $ 105 $ 59 

CENTRAL POINT Copy II Plus (bit copier) $ 40 $ 23 



HOME & EDUCATIONAL 



BEAGLE BROS., Full line IN STOCK CALL 

BRODERBUND, Print Shop $ 50 $ 29 

CONTINENTAL, Home Accountant $ 75 $ 43 

KOALA, Full line IN STOCK CALL 

MICROSOFT, Typing Tutor II $25$ 17 

MONOGRAM, Dollars & Sense (lie) $ 100 $ 59 

Dollars & Sense (He) $ 120 $ 69 

Forecast $ 60 $ 38 

SCARBOROUGH, Mastertype $ 40 $ 25 

Build-A-Book $ 40 $ 25 

Your Personal Net Worth $ 80 $ 50 

SIERRA/ON-LINE, Homeword $ 70 $ 45 

SIMON & SCHUSTER, Typing Tutor III $ 60 $ 37 

PLUS: BARRONS, CBS, DAVIDSON, EDU-WARE, 

HARCOURT, LEARNING CO., TERRAPIN 



RECREATIONAL SOFTWARE 



BLUECHIP, Millionaire or Barron, ea. $ 50 $ 32 

DATASOFT, Aztec or Zaxxon, each $ 40 $ 27 

ELECTRON. ARTS, Sky Fox & others, ea. $ 40 $ 29 

HAYDEN, Sargon III (Chess) $ 50 $ 30 

INFOCOM, Zork I, II, or III, ea $ 40 $ 25 

ORIGIN, Ultima 111 $ 60 $ 37 

PENGUIN, Transylvania $ 35 $ 24 

SPECTRUM HOLOBYTE, Gato $ 40 $ 25 
SPINNAKER, FULL LINE IN STOCK CALL 

SUB LOGIC, Flight Simulator II $ 50 $ 30 
PLUS: BRODERBUND, DATAMOST, MUSE, 
SIR-TECH 



DISKETTES 



• CONROY-LAPOINTE™ DISKETTES • 

We guarantee these top quality products with our name. 
5 YEAR LIMITED WARRANTY. 

10 ea.SS/SD, (Apple, etc) 35Trk,W/FUP BOX $ 12 

1 00 ea. SS/SD, (Apple, etc) 3 5 Trk $ 99 

1000 ea. SS/SD, (Apple, etc.) 35 Trk $ 840 

10ea.DS/DD,(IBM,H/P)48Trk,W/FLIPBOX $ 15 

100 ea. DS/OD, (IBM, H/P) 48 Trk $ 119 

1000 ea. DS/DD, (IBM, H/P) 48 Trk $ 859 

10 ea. SS/DD, 3W (MAC, H/P), W/FLIP BOX $ 25 

50 ea. SS/DD, 3W (MAC. H/P) $ 115 

100 ea. SS/DD, 3W (MAC, H/P) $ 229 

CONROY-LAPOINTE" IBM PRE-FORMATTED 

10 ea, DS/DD, 48 Trk W/FUP BOX $ 19 

100 ea, DS/DD, 48 Trk $ 149 

1000 ea. DS/DD, 48 Trk $ 959 

SINGLE-SIDED, DOUBLE DENSITY 

LIST CONROY 
CDC, 1 ea, SS/DD, 40 Trk (Apple, etc) $ 45 $ 19 
DYSAN, 10 ea, SS/DD, (Apple, etc.) $ 40 $ 27 
MAXELL, 10 ea, SS/DD, MD1 (Apple) $ 47 $ 19 
VERBATIM, 1 ea, SS/DD, MD51M1, (Apple) $ 4 9 $ 19 

DOUBLE-SIDED, DOUBLE DENSITY 
CDC, 1 0ea, DS/DD, 40 Trk (IBM, H/P) $ 59$ 23 
DYSAN, 10 ea, DS/DD, (IBM, H/P) $ 69 $ 35 
MAXELL, 10 ea, DS/DD, MD2 (IBM) $ 71 $ 26 
VERBATIM, 10 ea, DS/DD, MD34 (IBM) $ 75 $ 24 

ZW MICRO DISKETTES 
CONROY-LAPOINTE, 10 ea, DS/DD, w/Flip Box $ 29 

MAXELL, 10 ea. SS/DD (MAC, H/P) $ 60 $ 35 
MEMOREX, 10 ea. SS/DD (MAC, H/P) $ 60 $ 33 
VERBATIM, 10 ea, SS/DD (MAC, H/P) $ 65 $ 32 
HIGH DENSITY DISKETTES FOR IBM-AT 
MAXELL, 10 ea. DS/QD (IBM-AT) $ 77 $ 49 
MEMOREX, 10 ea. DS/QD (IBM-AT) $ 77 $ 49 
• GENERIK DISKETTES • 

Top quality, w/jackets no labels. Quantity discounts. 
90 day "No hassle, money back guarantee." 

100 ea. SS/SD, 35 Track (Apple, etc) $ 60 

100 ea. DS/DD, 48 Track, (IBM, H/P) $ 95 



MODEMS 



LIST 

$399 
$ 899 
$ 549 
$ 149 
$ 599 
$ 329 



ANCHOR, Signalman Mark XII 

HAYES, 2400B External Modem 
Smartmodem 1200B (IBM) 
Smartcom II Software (IBM/MAC) 
Smartmodem 1200 (External) 
Micromodem lie w/Smartcom (AP) 

NOVATION, Apple Cat II 300 Baud (AP) $ 389 
212 Apple Cat, 1200 Baud (AP) $ 595 
SmartCat P I u s w/sof tware (MAC) $ 4 9 9 
ACCESS 1-2-3 1200B Modem+ Crosstalk (IBM) $ 595 

PROMETHEUS, 1200 Standalone Modem $ 495 
ProModem 1200 w/software (MAC) $ 549 
ProModem 1200A (AP) $ 449 

ProModem 1200B (IBM) $ 399 

QUADRAM, Quadmodem, Internal (IBM) $ 595 
Quadmodem, External, (IBM) $ 695 



$ 259 
$ 699 
$ 379 
$ 107 
$ 419 
$ 239 
$ 219 
$ 419 
$ 349 
$ 369 
$ 345 
$ 429 
$ 349 
$ 289 
$ 425 
$ 495 



MONITORS 



AMDEK, Color 300 - Comp/Audio 

Color 500 - CompA/CR/RGB/Audio 

Color 600 - Hi Res/RGB/ Audio 

300A - 12" Amber 

300G, 12" Green 

310 A, 12" Amber/Comp (IBM) 
PRINCETON, HX-12 - Hi Res/RGB 

SR-12 - Hi Res/RGB 

MAX-12 - Amber (IBM) 
QUADRAM, Amberchrome, 12" 
ZENITH, ZVM122 - 12" Amber 

ZVM123 - 12" Green 

ZVM124&ZVM 135 



CABLES 



ARBO, IBM-PC to Modem Cable $ 
ASTAR, RF Modulator for T.V. (Apple) $ 
COMPUCABLE, Mac/Hayes Smartmodem Cable $ 
CURTIS, Monitor Extension Cable (IBM) $ 
3'-9' Keyboard Extens. Cable (IBM) $ 
RCA, Monitor Cable $ 



$ 349 $ 249 
$ 525 $ 375 
$ 599 $ 399 
$ 199 $ 135 
$ 179 $ 119 
$ 230 $ 159 
$ 795 $ 469 
$ 799 $ 599 
$ 249 $ 179 
$ 250 $ 159 
$ 159 $ 95 
$ 149 $ 69 
20-30% OFF 



31 $ 
35 $ 

32 $ 
50 $ 
40 $ 
15 $ 



PRINTERS 



DOT MATRIX: 

LIST CONROY 

APPLE, Imagewriter CALL 

LaserWriter $6995 $6500 

EPSON, RX / FX Series - In Stock CALL 

LX80 - 100 cps DQ/16 cps NLQ $ 299 CALL 
JX80 - Color Printer, 160 cps. $ 699 CALL 
LQ1500 - 200 cps DQ/67 cps LQ $1295 CALL 

OKIDATA, Okimate 20 - Color, Hi Res $ 268 $ 208 
182 - 120 cps/80 col $ 299 $ 239 

92 - 160 cps/80 col/para. $ 499 $ 399 

93-160 cps/136 col/para. $ 799 $ 639 

2410 Pacemark - 350 cps/para. $2995 $1975 

PANASONIC, P1090 - 80 cps/tO" $ 349 $ 249 
Pt092 - 180 cps/10" $ 599 $ 459 

QUADRAM, Quadjet- Inkjet Color $ 895 $ 395 

STAR MICRO, SG10 - 120 cps DQ/30 cps NIQ $ 299 $ 249 
SG15 - 120 cps DQ, 30 cps NLQ, 16K $ 499 $ 419 
SD10 - 160 cps DQ, 40 cps NLQ $ 449 $ 379 
SD15 - 160 cps DQ, 40 cps NLQ, 16K $ 599 $ 509 
SR10 - 200 cps DQ, 50 cps NLQ $ 649 $ 549 
SR15 - 200 cps DQ, 50 cps NLQ, 16K $ 799 $ 679 

TOSHIBA, 351 - 288 cps $1895 $1369 

LETTER-QUALITY: 

JUKI, 6300 - 40cps/para. $ 995 $ 795 

6100 - 18 cps/para/3 pitch $ 599 $ 439 

Sheet Feeder for 6300 (single) $ 275 $ 225 
PANASONIC, P3151 - 22 cps/151/2" $ 699 $ 539 
TOSHIBA, Prop, spacing & hi-res graphics: 
1351 - 192 cps DQ & 100 cps LQ $1895 $1369 
1340 - 144 cps DQ & 54 cps LQ $ 799 $ 619 
Bi-direction Tractor Feed $ 195 $ 175 

PLOTTERS: 

EPSON, 4 Pen Plotter $ 599 CALL 

PRINTER SUPPLIES: 

PAPER: White, Colored, Laser Cut, etc. 
RIBBONS, DAISYWHEELS CALL 



PRINTER INTERFACES 
AND BUFFERS 



ARBO, IBM-PC to Para Printer Cable $ 60 $ 30 
ASSIMILATION, Mac to Epson Conn l/F $ 89 $ 69 

Daisywheel Connection % 99 $ 79 

EPSON, Parallel Interface for LQ1500 $ 100 $ 79 

Serial Interface Board $ 130 $ 110 

MPC, Apple II l/F & Cable for Epson & Gemini $ 90 $ 49 
OKIDATA Plug 'n Play, Tractors, Okkjtaph, ea CALL 

ORANGE MICRO, Grappler Plus for Apple $ 1 45 $ 99 

Serial Grappler $ 119 $ 79 

Buffered Grappler Plus, 16K $ 209 $ 159 

QUADRAM, Microfazers, full line IN STOCK CALL 

Microfazers 8K, P-P, w/copy $ 189 $ 139 

STAR MICRO, Serial l/F & Cable $ 144 $ 119 

Mac/Star Interface $ 100 $ 89 



ACCESSORIES 



CURTIS, Diamond, 6 outlets, switched $ 



Emerald , 6 outlets, 6' cord $ 

Ruby, 6 outlets, 6' cord, filter $ 

Sapphire, 3 outlets, w/filter $ 

EPD, Lemon, 6 outlets/wall $ 

Lime, 6 outlets/cord $ 

Orange, 6 outlets/cord $ 

Peach, 3 outlets/wall $ 

INNOVATIVE, Flip-n-File 50(disk holder) $ 

KENSINGTON, Printer Stand $ 

NETWORX, Wiretree, 4 outlet, w/filt & surge $ 

Wiretree Plus $ 100 $ 

PROD TECH INTL, Uninterruptable Power Supply 
200 Watts, PC200 for IBM-PC $ 359 $ 229 

300 Watts, XT300 for IBM-XT $ 499 $ 379 

BOO Watts, ATBOO for IBM-AT, 72 lbs. CALL 



50 S 
SO $ 
90 $ 
80 $ 
45 $ 
70 $ 
100 $ 
60 $ 
22 $ 
30 $ 
70$ 



CONROY- 
LAPOINTE 
CREDIT CARD w 

I Send me a Conroy-LaPomte 5! 

I credit application form, so I 
can get cash discount prices 
wilh ci edit card 
L convenience. 5400 
Minimum initial purchase 



CITY STATE ZIP 

MAIL TO: 12060 SW Garden Place. Portland. OR 97223 



HDnCDIMP I MCA O TCDMC- MAIL TO: 12060 SW Garden Place, Portland, OR 97223 -Include telephone number. Check 
VjnUQrillNVJIIINrvJOC I U niVIO. your figures for Shipping. Insurance and Handling (SIH) All items usually in stock. NO C.O.D. 
Cashiers checks, money orders, Foitune 1000 checks and government checks honored immediately. Personal and other company checks-allow 20 days to clear. Prices reflect 
3% cash & Conroy-UPointe Credit Card discount, so ADD 3% to above prices for VlSA/MasterCard/American Express. Your cards NOT cftarged til we ship. Add SIH CHARGES: 
U.S. Mainland, 3% ($5 minimum) for standard UPS ground; UPS Blue, 6% ($10 min); for U.S. Postal APO or FPO or Alaska, 6% ($10 min). Canada, 12% ($15 min). Foreign 
orders except Canada, 18% {$25 min). Monitors by Postal or to foreign countries, 30% ($50 min). Orders received with insufficient SIH will be refunded. All prices, availability 
and specifications subject to errors or change without notice, so call to verify. All goods are new, include warranty and are guaranteed to work. Due to our low prices and 
our assurance that you will get new, unused products -ALL SALES ARE FINAL. We do not guarantee compatibility. Call before returning goods for repair or replacement. 
ORDER DESK HOURS -SAM to 6PM PST, Monday through Friday, Saturday 10 to 4. EconoRAM™, Fastrak", and Generik" are trademarks of ComX Corporation. 



Inquiry 106 for Apple. Inquiry 107 for IBM Peripherals. Inquiry 108 for all others. 




* 1 984 by Cor»roy> LaPolntaJ nc: All Rights Reserved 

LOW PRICES TO PROFESSIONALS WHO >KNOW WHAT THEY WANT AND KNOW HOW TO USE IT! 

(TO ORDER, CALL (800) 547-1289) 



FOR YOUR IIM -PC, XT, AT or JR 



COMPUTER SYSTEMS OTHER HARDWARE OTHER HARDWARE 



— Call for Details — 

256K 
[BM-PC 

360K 

Disk Drives 
by CDC 

90 Day 

Limited Warranty 

By Us 




maamay p ft 



COMPAQ. Portable, 

256K, 2 360K Disk Drives 

^' Z150, 

256K. 2 320K Disk Drives. 

MSD0S2.1.8088Chip,2S/P 



HARD DISKS & 
TAPE BACKUP 



CDC, Internal 20 meg for AT 

KAMERMAN, Internal 10 meg kit $ 895 
External 10 meg kit w/power $1295 

MF-10/10, H Disk, tape back, cont, power $2690 

MICRO SCIENCE, 10 meg w/controller $ 795 

RANA, External 10 meg w/controller $1495 
Internal 10 meg w/controller $ 995 

TALLGRASS, 25 meg disk, 55 meg tape, inti. $3660 



LIST CONflOY 
PRICE PRICE 

$259 

$ 695 $ 295 
$ 895 $ 329 
$ 399 $ 299 
$ 595 $ 445 
$ 215 $ 199 
$ 265 $ 185 
$ 315 $ 215 
$ 50 $ 35 
$ 495 $ 345 



C0NR0Y 
CALL 
$ 729 
$1049 
$2090 
$ 625 
$1095 
$ 689 
$3160 



FLOPPY DISK DRIVES 



CDC, Limited 30 day warranty; Call for quantity prices 



^ v 



<!> 




Full Height \lEs3P^$109 
Half Height ^(^^ $ 89 



AST, 

SixPak Plus, 64K 

SixPak Plus, 256K, S/P/CC+ S/W 
SixPak Plus, 384K, S/P/CC + S/W 
Preview" Graphics Card w/para, 64K 
Advantage™ Multif. Bd. for AT, 128K 
I/O Plus II, S/P/CC 
I/O Plus II, S/P/CC/G 
I/O Plus II, 2S/P/CC/G 
Port Kits - ser, para, or game, ea. 
MonoGraphPlus" P/CC (for Lotus) 

COMX, NEW 

EconoRAM™ Plus, 384k 

board, S/P/CC/G Fastrak & Spooler $265 

EconoRAM", full 384K board $ 295 $ 195 

HAUPPAGE (HCW), 8087 Chip $ 175 $ 125 

8087 Math Pak (Chip & softw.) $ 295 $ 235 

HAYES, Mach II Joystick $ 45 $ 29 

Mach III (PC or Jr.) $ 55 $ 35 

HERCULES, Color Card w/para. $ 245 $ 159 

Mono Graphics Card $ 499 $ 305 

KENSINGTON, Masterpiece" $ 140 $ 99 

KEY TRONIC, KB5151, Std. Keyboard $ 255 $ 195 

KOALA, Speed Key System $ 100 $ 63 

Speed Key Tablet w/software $ 200 $ 115 

Koala Pad w/PC Design $ 150 $ 85 

MAYNARD, SAND STAR SERIES 

Multifunction (6) Card $ 89 $ 79 

Memory Card no RAM $ 122 $ 89 

Memory Card 256K $ 495 $ 309 

Floppy Cont. Card (accepts 3 modules) $ 265 $ 195 

Hard Disk l/F Module $ 499 $ 359 

Hard Disk Cable $ 30 $ 27 

Serial Port Module $ 95 $ 79 

Para or Clock Cal. Module, ea. $ 59 $ 49 

Game Adapter Module $ 49 $ 39 

Memory Module, OK $ 122 $ 99 

Memory Module 256K $ 422 $ 357 



LIST CONROY 
PRICE PRICE 

MICROSOFT, Mouse (for PC) $ 195 $ 135 

Serial Mouse $ 195 $ 135 

MOUSE SYSTEMS, PC Mouse & Paint $ 220 $ 140 

PARADISE, Modular Graphics Card $ 395 $ 285 
Parallel or Serial Port, ea. $ 95 $ 65 

PERSYST, NEW 
PC/Mono Board, w/para port $ 250 $ 195 

PC/Color Graphics Bd w/light pen & l/F $ 244 $ 176 

QUADRAM, 

Quadboard 64K, to 384K, s/p/cc/g $239 

Quadboard, no RAM, expand to 384K $ 295 $ 225 
Quadboard 256K, to 384K, S/P/CC $ 675 $ 269 
Quadboard, 384K (full), S/P/CC/G $ 795 $ 295 
Quadboard II, no RAM, to 256K $ 295 $ 215 
Quadboard II, 64K, to 256K, 2S/CC $ 395 $ 265 
Quadboard II, 256K, 2S/CC $ 595 $ 395 

Quad 512 + 64K w/serial port $ 325 $ 245 
Quadcolor I, board, 4 colors $ 295 $ 195 

Upgrade Quadcolor I to II kit $ 275 $ 199 

Quadvue, board, Mono, S/P/CC $ 345 $ 269 
Quad 3278 $1195 $1050 

Quadnet VI $1995 $1545 

Quadnet IX $2295 $1745 

Quadlink $ 495 $ 385 

Quadsprint $ 645 $ 495 



TG PRODUCTS, Joystick 
WICO, Smartboard Keyboard 



$ 30 $ 22 
$ 400 $ 279 



• 256K • 
CHIP KIT 

$67 

9 each, 4256 chips 
150 ns 



* 64K * 
CHIP KIT 

$10 

9 each, 4164 chips 
90 Day Warranty by us 



* 128K * 
CHIP KIT 

$79 

9 each, 4128 chips 
Piggyback for AT 




CALL FOR 

QUANTITY 

PRICES 



* * FOR YOUR PC- JR* * 



HAYES, Mach III Joystick $ 55 $ 35 

KEY TRONIC, KB5151 Jr. Keyboard $ 255 $ 195 

Numeric Keypad $ 100 $ 77 

KOALA, Touch Tablet for Jr. $ 125 $ 75 

MICROSOFT, Booster 128K w/Mouse $ 495 $ 329 
MOUSE SYSTEMS, Mouse w/software $ 195 $ 125 
QUADRAM, Expansion Chassis $ 695 $ 540 

Memory Expansion Board 128K $ 275 $ 215 
RACORE, Expansion Chassis $ 695 $ 449 

128K Expansion Board $ 275 $ 189 

TECMAR, Jr. Captain $ 395 $ 295 



* ComX * 
EconoRAM Plus™ 

$265 

384K Multifunction RAM Board 

Works like AST SlxPakPius™ with game port 

Fastrak™ RAM Disk and Spooler Software 

(Fastrak for up to 384K). 

EconoRAM™ 384K 
Single Fuctlon Board 

$195 

With Fastrak™ and Spooler 
Fully Compatible, 1 Year Limited Warranty. 

Works on DOS 1.1, 2.0 or 2.1 
Prices and availability subject to change. Call. 



SOFTWARE FOR YOUR IBM-PC, XT, AT or JR 



BUSINESS 



BUSINESS 



BUSINESS 



LIST CONROY 
PRICE PRICE 

ASHTON-TATE, Framework $ 695 $ 359 

dBase III $ 695 $ 359 

dBase II, (req. PC-DOS & 128K) $ 495 $ 279 

ATI, Training Programs- Large Inventory $ 75 $ 48 

BPI, General Acctg.AR, AP, orPR.ea. $ 595 $ 365 

BRODERBUND,BankSt.Writer(PCofJr.)$ 80$ 49 

CDEX, Training Programs-Large Inventory $ 70 $ 45 

CONTINENTAL, Ultrafile $ 195 $ 115 

Tax Advantage $ 70 $ 40 

Property Management $ 495 $ 295 

DATA TRANS., Fontrix $ 125 $ 79 

DOW JONES, Investment Evaluator $ 149 $ 97 

Market Manager Plus $ 249 $ 159 

Market Analyzer or Market Microscope $ 349 $ 219 

Spread Sheet Link $ 249 $ 159 

FOX & GELLER, Quickcode III $ 295 $ 185 

HARVARD, Total Project Manager $ 495 $ 295 

HOWARDSOFT, Tax Preparer '85 $ 295 $ 195 

HUMAN EDGE, Mind Prober (PC or Jr.) $ 50$ 29 

SalesEdgeorManagementEdge.ea. $ 250 $ 159 

Negotiation Edge $ 295 $ 185 

INFOCOM, Cornerstone $ 495 $ 319 

KENSINGTON, Easy Link Mail Manager $ 95 $ 59 

LIFETREE, Volkswriter Deluxe $ 295 $ 159 

LIVING VIDEOTEXT, Think Tank $195$ 95 

LOTUS, 1-2-3 $ 495 $ 309 

Symphony $ 695 $ 449 

MDBS, Knowledgeman $ 500 $ 275 

MECA, Managing Your Money (PC) $ 199 $ 125 

Managing Your Money Cartridge (Jr)$ 199 $ 179 



MICROPRO, WordStar (PC) 

WordStar (Jr) 

WordStar 2000 (cop i able) 

WordStar 2000 Plus (copiable) 

WordStar Professional Plus 

WordStar Professional, 4 Pak 

Mail Merge, SpellStar or Start ndex, ea. 

Info Star Plus ( + Starburst) 

Correct Star 
MICRORIM, R:Base Series 5000 NEW 

Upgrade 4000 to 5000 NEW 

R:Base 4000 

R:Base Clout 

Extended Report Writer 
MICROSOFT, Spell 

Multiplan (PC or Jr) 

Chart or Project, each 

Word 
MULTIMATE, Multimate Ver. 3.3 
PEACHTREE, Back to Basics 

Peach Pak (GL/AR/AP) 
QUE, Using 1-2-3 

1-2-3 for Business 

Using Symphony 
SAMNA, Word Plus 

Word III 
SATELLITE, WordPerfect (PC) 

WordPerfect (Jr) 
SOFTW. ARTS, Spotlight 

T/K Solver (specify DOS) 
SOFTWARE GROUP, Enable 



LIST CONROY 
PRICE PRICE 

$ 350 $ 189 
$ 195 $ 109 
$ 495 $ 265 
$ 595 $ 295 
$ 695 $ 395 
$ 495 $ 265 
$ 99 $ 54 
$ 595 $ 315 
$ 145 $ 77 
$ 695 % 395 
$ 245 $ 145 
$ 495 $ 255 
$ 249 $ 129 
$ 150 $ 85 
$ 50 $ 32 
$ 195 $ 125 
$ 250 $ 159 
$ 375 $ 235 
$ 495 $ 245 
$ 395 $ 239 
$ 395 $ 219 
$ 18 $ 14 
$ 17 $ 13 
$ 20 $ 15 
$ 695 $ 439 
$ 550 $ 279 
$ 495 $ 209 
$ 69 $ 39 
% 150 $ 95 
$ 399 $ 269 
$ 695 $ 459 



LIST 
PRICE 

SOFTWARE PUBL. PFS:Report $ 125 

PFS:Write, File or Graph, each $ 140 

PFS:Plan or Access, each $ 140 

PFS:Proof $ 95 

SORCIM, SuperCalc III $ 395 

STONEWARE, Advanced DB Master $ 595 

THORN EMI, Perfect Pak (Jr) (Writarepefl/Thesaurus) $ 139 

UNISON, Print Master $ 60 

WARNER, Desk Organizer (PC or Jr) $ 195 

XANARO, Ability $ 495 



CONROY 
PRICE 



$ 245 
$ 375 
$ 89 
$ 35 
$ 125 
$ 309 



UTILITIES 



BORLAND, Sidekick or Toolbox, ea. $ 55 

Sidekick Copiable (PC or Jr) $ 85 

Super Keys or Turbo Pascal, ea, $ 70 

Turbo Pascal w/8087 Support $110 

3 Pak (Pascal, Toolbox, Turbo Tutor) $ 105 

CENTRAL POINT, Copy II PC $ 40 

COMX, Fastrak", RAM/Disk emul & spooler. $ 100 

DIGITAL RES., Gem Draw NEW $ 150 

CP/M-86" (PC/XT) $ 100 

DR LOGO-86 (CP/M-86) $ 150 

FUNK SOFTWARE, Sideways $ 60 

LIFEBOAT, Lattice C $ 500 

Dr. Halo $ 100 

MICROSOFT, Macro Assembler $ 150 

BASIC Compiler or C Compiler, ea $ 395 

Business BASIC Compiler $ 450 

COBOL Compiler $ 700 

FORTRAN Compiler $ 350 

PASCAL Compiler $ 300 



UTILITIES 



LIST CONROY 
PRICE PRICE 

MICROSTUF, Crosstalk XVI (PC or Jr) $ 195 $ 109 

MOUSE SYSTEMS, PC Paint $ 99 $ 69 

NORTON, Utilities (14 prgms) v 3.0 $ 100 $ 59 

ROSESOFT, Prokey $ 130 $ 79 

WESTERN UNION, Easy Link Mail Mngr $ 95 $ 59 



HOME & EDUCATIONAL 



$ 279 
$ 50 
$ 99 
$ 259 
$ 295 
$ 459 
$ 229 
$ 199 



BPI, Personal Accounting $ 99 $ 

CONTINENTAL, Home Accountant (Jr) $ 75 $ 

Home Accountant Plus (PC) $ 150 $ 

DOW JONES, Home Budget $ 139 $ 

ELECTRONIC ARTS, Get Organized $ 95 $ 

MONOGRAM, Dollars & Sense w/forecast $ 180 $ 

SCARBOROUGH, MasterType (PC or Jr) $ 40 $ 

Your Personal Net Worth $ 100 $ 

SIMON & SCHUSTER, Typing Tutor III $ 50 $ 



RECREATIONAL 



BLUECHIP, Millionaire, Barron, Tycoon, ea. $ 60 $ 39 

BRODERBUND, Large Inventory In Stock CALL 

ELECTRONIC ARTS, Large Inventory In Slock CALL 

HAYDEN, Sargon III (Chess) $ 50 $ 34 

INFOCOM, Large Inventory In Stock CALL 

Hitchhiker's, Zork I, II, or III, each $ 40 $ 25 

MICROSOFT, Right Simulator (PC or Jr)$ 50 $ 33 

ORIGIN, Ultima 111 (PC or Jr) $ 60 $ 39 

SIERRA/ON-LINE, Ultima II (PC or Jr.) $ 60 $ 40 

SPECTRUM HOLOBYTE, Gato $ 40 $ 25 
SPINNAKER, President's Choice, Amazon 

Fahrenheit, Rendezvous, Dragon, each $ 40 $ 25 



CASH-n-CARRY COMPUTER STORES, INC. 

Retail Sales only. Store prices may vary. 
SAN FRANCISCO . — 550 Washington Street (at Mont- 
gomery, opposite the Pyramid). Interstate 80, to Highway 
480; take Washington Street Exit. CALL (415) 982-6212. 
PORTLAND, OREGON — At Park 217, Tigard at intersec- 
tion of Highways 217 and 99W. CALL (503) 620-5595. 
SEATTLE, WASH. — 3540 128th Ave. SE, Bellevue 98006. 
In Loehmann's Plaza near Factoria Square, SE of Highway 
405 & 90 and at SE 36th and Richards. CALL 641-4736. 



Ml 



OUR REFERENCES: 

We have been in computers and electronics 
since 1958, a computer dealer since 1978 and in 
computer mail order since 1980. Banks: 1st Inter- 
state Bank, (503) 643-4678. We belong to the 
Chamber of Commerce (503) 228-9411, and Direct 
Marketing Association; call Dun and Bradstreet 
if you are a subscriber. Recipient of OREGON 
BUSINESS MAGAZINE'S 1984 Enterprise Award. 



(MotlofCord J V7S4 



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ORDER DESK HOURS 

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Saturday 10am to 4pm (PST) 

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BASF Quali 'metric Flexy Disks feature a unique lifetime warranty* firm 
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will be secure and unchanged tomorrow. Key to this extraordinary 
warranted performance is the BASF Qualimetric standard... 
a totally new set of criteria against which all other 
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You can count on BASF Flexy Disks because the Qualimetric 
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MT&ASf^ 



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* Contact BASF for warranty details. 

Inquiry 47 




*% 



ENTER TOMORROW ON BASF TODAY 



1983 BASF Syster 



: Cnrn Re 



ford, MA 



by Glenn J. Adler 



Inside the display 
technology that 
has made portable 
computers portable 



Several months ago I got in- 
to a discussion with a com- 
puter enthusiast about 
which portable computer 
to buy. I quickly whipped out my por- 
table and began preaching its merits 
and demonstrating how powerful it is. 
I could see the display perfectly but 
the fellow standing next to me was 
having difficulty reading what I had 
typed. Poor display quality is a com- 
mon limitation in portable computers. 
Most portables (not to be confused 
with transportables) have twisted- 
nematic liquid-crystal displays (TN- 
LCDs), with restricted viewing angles 
and limited contrast. They must be 
operated under proper ambient light- 
ing conditions. 

In mid-1982, there were only a few 
low-profile displays on the market. Of 
the available technologies. TN-LCD 
was the only one that had acceptable 
power requirements for battery oper- 
ation. A typical 16-line LCD module 
dissipates approximately ^ watt (W). 
Other available flat-panel technolo- 

[continued) 
Glenn Adler has a B.S. in electrical engineer- 
ing and does VLSI design work for Hewlett- 
Packard's portable computer division. He can 
be contacted do Hewlett-Packard, 1000 
Northeast Circle Blvd., Corvallis, OR 
97330. 



Liquid-Crystal 
Displays 
for Portables 




ILLUSTRATED BY ELLEN HARRIS 



JULY 1985 'BYTE 119 



LCDS FOR PORTABLES 



gies use too much power for battery 
operation (see "TVo Flat-Display Tfech- 
nologies"by Richard Shuford. March 
BYTE, page 130). Electroluminescent 
(EL), gas-plasma (GP), and flat-panel 
CRT (cathode-ray tube) displays with 
25 lines dissipate 30 to 200 times the 
power of LCDs. 

Portable computers must be light- 
weight, compact, and battery-oper- 
ated. This necessitates a flat-panel dis- 
play that uses low power. Since these 
microcomputers compete directly 
with desktops, they need to handle 
applications that run on the leading 
personal computers. Their screens 
must have features equivalent to stan- 
dard monochrome displays: 80-char- 
acter, multiple-line alphanumeric dis- 
plays with full graphics capability. 

Limited contrast, brightness, and 
viewing angle are the drawbacks as- 
sociated with multiple-line TN-LCDs. 
These disadvantages are attributable 
to the fundamental electro-optical 
characteristics of these panels. The 



use of TN-LCDs requires different cir- 
cuit architecture than a standard 
video interface and requires some 
unique mechanical designs to over- 
come their physical limitations. 

Visual Perception 

Your eyes and visual cortex are 
stimulated to a great extent by the 
edges of objects. Edge detection oc- 
curs where there is a step difference 
in brightness (also termed luminance 
in the case of a monochrome image) 
between adjacent objects in the visual 
field. For the purpose' of measure- 
ment, you can define contrast ratio 
(CR) as the quotient of luminance of 
a light picture element (pixel) to a 
dark pixel's luminance. (Luminance is 
measured in foot-lamberts.) 

CR = Li /L 2 

L| = luminance of light pixel 

L 2 = luminance of dark pixel 

Contrast ratios of 2 to 1 form what 
you can easily detect as an edge. This 



(la) 



<v 



y 



y 
4^ 



PLANE 
POLARIZED 
LIGHT 
TRANSMITTED 



(lb) 



y 
4^ 



<V' 



y 




LIGHT 
ABSORBED 



Figure 1: This figure depicts the effects of two polarizers on noncoherent light, 
(a) Light passing through the first polarizer is polarized in the Y and X plane. 
Since the polarizer's passing axes are aligned, the light continues through the 
second polarizer, (b) Here, the polarizer's passing axes are oriented orthogonally, 
and the plane polarized light that has passed through the first polarizer is 
absorbed by the second. 



CR is about the minimum acceptable 
for easy reading of LCDs. Typical CRT 
displays have CRs ranging up to 20 to 
I. but once the ratio approaches 10 
to 1 your eye saturates and can no 
longer differentiate changes in relative 
brightness. 

Your eye samples the visual field at 
roughly 30 Hz and your brain inte- 
grates the information to form a con- 
tinuous picture. The perception of 
flicker in a display is a function of this 
phenomenon, the persistence of the 
display material, and the rate at which 
information is refreshed. Aside from 
this temporal integration of informa- 
tion, your eye also performs a spatial 
integration. You can see an example 
of this by looking closely at the char- 
acters displayed on a CRT screen. The 
characters are made up of discrete- 
pixels, but seen from a distance they 
appear to form a continuous item. 
Your brain fills in the gaps, but the 
perceived object has lower brightness 
overall than each individual dot. 
Furthermore, if the separation be- 
tween dots increases beyond the eye's 
limit of resolution at a typical viewing 
distance (1 Vi to 2 feet), your brain will 
interpret adjacent dots as belonging 
to separate objects. This constraint 
physically limits the useful pixel- 
separation distance for displays such 
as LCDs. 

Twisted-Nematic LCDs 

Today's LCDs use the properties of 
plane polarizers and ordered nematic 
liquid crystals to modulate light. Polar- 
izers are light filters that selectively 
allow incident light through their 
"passing axis." Light oriented in any 
other direction is absorbed (see figure 

1). 

Some organic compounds exist in 
a phase called the mesophase, which 
is stable at temperatures between the 
liquid and solid phases. Liquid 
crystals (LCs) exhibit three such 
phases: smectic, nematic, and choles- 
teric. In the nematic phase, the long 
axes of the LC molecules align in 
parallel orientation. The alignment of 
LCs in this phase is sensitive to several 
stimuli, including temperature, surface 

[continued] 



120 BYTE • JULY 1985 



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PC Paintbrush supports a host of graphics cards (in- 
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Microsoft and Multiplan are registered trademarks and The High Performance 
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Inquiry 69 

GET SERIOUS! 

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* TOP TEN SOFTWARE * 

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Print Shop APPLE 34.95 

Bankstreet Writer IBM/APPLE 49.95 

Managing Your Money IBM/APPLE 115.95 

Dollars & Sense IBM 113.95 

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PFS Write/File/Report 85.95 

Sideways IBM/APPLE 39.95 

Multimate IBM 269.95 

Crosstalk IBM 104.95 

Microsoft Word IBM/MAC 249.95/119.95 

* HARDWARE * 

AST Six Pack Plus 64K $259.95 

STB Rio Plus II 64K 249.95 

PARADISE 5-Pack 64K 179.95 

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* MODEMS * 

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HAYES Micromodem lie 169.95 

HAYES 2400 649.95 

ANCHOR Volksmodem 300 54.95 

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80 COLUMN Card II* Only 58.95 

VIDEX Ultraterm 178.95 

ASCII Express 79.95 

Z-80 Card 49.95 

APRICORN Serial Card 59.95 

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THOUSANDS OF ITEMS AVAILABLE. 
CALL FOR COMPLETE PRICING. 

mm 714/840-2406 mm 

i^^B Se Habla Eipanol I^^HJ 

CALIFORNIA 
MICRO HOUSE 

16835 Algonquin St., Huntington Beach, CA 92649 

Corporate account* welcomed, purchase orders eccepled with net 30 day 
terms, subject lo credit approval. All prices represent cash prices. All Hems 
■hipped next day In factory sealed packages. We guarantee all Hems tor 30 
days. Gelllomla residents please add 6% sales Isi. Prices subject to change 
without notice. 



LCDS FOR PORTABLES 



tension, pressure, and electric and 
magnetic fields. These stimuli also af- 
fect the optical properties of the 
material. 

The optical properties of twisted- 
nematic LCs were first demonstrated 
by Schadt and Helfrich in 1970. (See 
Voltage Dependent Optical Activity of a 
listed Nematic Crystal by S. M. Schadt 
and W. Helfrich. Applied Physics Let- 
ters, number 18. 1971, page 127.) By 
now, several firms have developed an 
efficient process for fabricating 
displays. The key in producing this 
display is to create a twisted nematic 
by sandwiching an LC material be- 
tween two plates whose surfaces are 
grooved, the top plate in one direc- 
tion and the bottom in a perpen- 
dicular orientation. Layers of LC ad- 
jacent to each surface align in parallel 
with the texturing. Layers between 
form a helix that twists the plane 
polarized light. A twisted nematic can 
be visualized as a polarizer with a 
90-degree rotation. Next, this sand- 
wich is placed between two polar- 



izers, each with its passing axis in 
parallel with the grooves on the adja- 
cent glass (see figure 2). Thus, a light 
valve can be created by applying a 
voltage across the LC. With voltage 
applied, the nematic LC molecules no 
longer twist the incident light but 
rather pass it parallel to their long 
axis. The planerized light entering 
through the top polarizer is absorbed 
by the lower, thus making the pixel 
appear dark. In the inactive state the 
LC is relaxed and light is passed 
through the helix. The panel can be 
used in transmissive mode (similar to 
a transparency) by adding a backlight 
source. Or the manufacturer can cre- 
ate a low-power, nonemissive (having 
no light source) LCD by adding a re- 
flective layer. 

The conductors deposited on the 
LCD glass are usually composed of 
indium-tin-oxide (1TO). Since the index 
of refraction of 1TO is different from 
that of glass, this would ordinarily re- 
sult in an aberrant image. Therefore 

[continued] 



^'OFF" PIXEL 
ON" PIXEL 




REFLECTOR 



TWISTED NEMAfcLC 
STRUCTURE OF LIQUID 
CRYSTAL FOR AN "OFF" 
PIXEL 



ALIGNMENT OF LIQUID 
CRYSTAL MOLECULES 
OF AN "ON" PIXEL 



Figure 2: A cross section of a reflective liquid-crystal panel is shown. 

\n the "off" state the LC molecules form a helix. \n the "on" state (potential applied) 

the molecules align in the direction of the electric field. 



122 BYTE • JULY 1985 



Introducing the Most Powerful 
Business Software Ever! 

TRS-80 T " (Model I, II, III, or 16) • APPLE™ • IBM™ • OSBORNE™ • CP/M™ • XEROX 1 " 










The VersaBusiness" Series 

Each VERSABUSINESS module can be purchased and used independently, 
or can be linked in any combination to form a complete, coordinated business system. 



VERSARECEIVABLES™ $99,95 

Versa RECEIVABLES"' is a complete menu-driven accounts receivable, invoicing, and 
monthly statement-generating system. It keeps track of all information related to who 
owes you or your company money, and can provide automatic billing for past due ac- 
counts. VERSARECEJVABLES™ prints all necessary statements, invoices, and summary 
reports and can be linked with VERSALEDGER 11™ and VERSA INVENTORY 1 ". 

VERSAPAYABLES™ $99.95 

VERSAPAYABLES™ is designed to keep track of current and aged payables, keeping you 
in touch with all information regarding how much money your company owes, and to 
whom. VERSA PAYABLES™ maintains a complete record on each vendor, prints checks, 
check registers, vouchers, transaction reports, aged payables reports, vendor reports, 
and more. With VERSAPAYABLES™ you can even let your computer automatically select 
which vouchers are to be paid. 

VERSAPAYROLL™ $99.95 

VersaPayroLL™ is a powerful and sophisticated, but easy to use payroll system that 
keeps track of all government-required payroll information. Complete employee records 
are maintained, and all necessary payroll calculations are performed automatically, with 
totals displayed on screen for operator approval. A payroll can be run totally, automati- 
cally, or the operator can intervene to prevent a check from being printed, or to alter 
information on it. If desired, totals may be posted to the VERSALEDGER IT" system. 

VERSAlNVENTORY™ $99.95 

VersaNventorY'" is a complete inventory control system that gives you instant access 
to data on any item. VERSA INVENTORY™ keeps track of all information related to what 
items are in stock, out of stock, on backorder, etc., stores sales and pricing data, alerts 
you when an item falls below a preset reorder point, and allows you to enter and print 
invoices directly or to link with the Versa RECEIVABLES™ system. VersaInventory™ prints 
all needed inventory listings, reports of items below reorder point, inventory value re- 
ports, period and year-to-date sales reports, price lists, inventory checklists, etc. 

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50 N. PASCACK ROAD, SPRING VALLEY, N.Y. 10977 



VERSALEDGER II™ $149.95 

VersaLedger II™ is a complete accounting system that grows as your business 
grows. VersaLedger II™ can be used as a simple personal checkbook register, 
expanded to a small business bookkeeping system or developed into a large 
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• VersaLedger 11™ gives you almost unlimited storage capacity 

(300 to 10,000 entries per month, depending on the system), 

• stores all check and general ledger information forever, 

• prints tractor-feed checks, 

• handles multiple checkbooks and general ledgers, 

• prints 17 customized accounting reports including check registers, 
balance sheets, income statements, transaction reports, account 
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VersaLedger II™ comes with a professionally-written 160 page manual de- 
signed for first-time users. The VersaLedger if"* manual will help you become 
quickly familiar with VersaLedger IP", using complete sample data files 
supplied on diskette and more than 50 pages of sample printouts. 



SATISFACTION GUARANTEED! 



Every VERSABUSINESS™ module is guaranteed to outperform all other competitive systems, 
and at a fraction of their cost. If you are not satisfied with any VERSABUSINESS'" module, you 
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purchased for $25 each, credited toward a later purchase of that module. 



To Order: 

Write or call Toll-f ree (800) 43 1-28 18 

(N.Y.S. residents call 914-425-1535) 

* add $3 for shipping in UPS areas * add $5 to CANADA or MEXICO 

* add $4 for C.O.D. or non-UPS areas * add proper postage elsewhere 
Inquiry 164 jg^ 
DEALER INQUIRIES WELCOME 
All prices and specifications subject to change / Delivery subject to availability. 



♦ HiRS'tSOSs a* trademark of the RadibShack Division of Tandy Corp. - *APPUE is a trademark of- Apple Corp. - *IBM is a trademark of IBM Corp. 

*C_p7M is a trademark of Digital Research - *XEROX is a trademark of Xerox Corp. 



♦OSBORNE is a trademark of ©sbome Corp. 



LCDS FOR PORTABLES 



a passivation layer (coating) is de- 
posited after the conductor to match 
the indices of refraction. For dot- 
matrix LCDs, isolated rows of conduc- 
tor are formed on one glass surface, 
and orthogonal columns are pro- 
duced on the other by selectively 
etching ITO. The row and column con- 
ductors form the plates of a capacitor 
whose dielectric is the LC media. 
These capacitive elements are the 
discrete pixels. 

When the reflective LCD panel is in 
the "off" state, pixels that appear 
bright consist of light that is polarized 
in one plane, although it passes 
through both filters twice. The inten- 
sity of light reflected off the screen is 
reduced by approximately 60 percent 
from incident light (50 percent due to 
the filtering effect, 10 percent due to 
losses in the remainder of the system). 
This makes the "off" pixels appear 
gray rather than white. 

INDIVIDUAL PIXEL 
CONSIDERATIONS 

As TN-LCDs get larger, several con- 
siderations come into play regarding 
the quality of the image. To examine 
these, you need to understand the ef- 
fects of applying potential to in- 
dividual picture elements. 

Each pixel can be modeled as a 
capacitor (C p ) with a parasitic 
resistance (R p ) in parallel (see figure 
3). The row and column lines have 
sheet resistances R sr and R SCI respec- 
tively. In order to ensure consistent 
contrast throughout the screen, it is 
necessary that all pixels see nearly 
the same voltages. The voltage 
needed to turn a pixel on to an ac- 
ceptable contrast level is a function of 
the electrical properties of the par- 
ticular LC used and the distance be- 
tween glass plates. The typical cell 
gap (plate separation distance) is be- 
tween 5 and 10 microns. Variances in 
the glass cause variance in the LC 
thicknesses, which results in "rainbow- 
ing." Larger cell gaps require higher 
threshold potentials and reduce the 
viewing angle of the LC media. 

The magnitude of local voltage a 
pixel sees is highly dependent on 
voltage drops due to sheet resistance. 




Figure 3: C p and R p represent the 
capacitance and resistance, respectively, of 
a pixel, typical values are 2nFlcm 2 for C p 
and 1 2 Mohmlcm 2 for R p . R sc and R 3r 
are sheet resistances of the row and 
column conductors. For indium-tin-oxide 
their value lies between 10 and 300 
ohms per square. 



o 

UJ 
CD 
(£ 
O 

tn 

CD 

< 


i 

100 
90 


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_J 


50 


/ 1 


i 
i 
i 
i 




# 


10 


y * 


i 
i 






V TH V c 


V SAT 






V RMS 







Figure 4: Ihe threshold voltage is the 
rms voltage at which 1 percent 
absorption of incident light occurs. V c is 
the voltage at which "on" pixels reach 
acceptable contrast (usually 2:1) to "off" 
pixels (those at V th ) occurs. V sat 
(saturation voltage) is the potential at 
which 90 percent of the light is absorbed. 

The value of this resistance depends 
on the physical distance of the pixel 
from the drive circuit and the prop- 
erties of conductor deposition. 
Because of the tight gap requirement 
between the plates and sheet re- 
sistance effects, it is essential that 
LCDs use glass that is very flat. 
Presently there are only a few sup- 
pliers producing glass acceptable for 
large display applications. 

A typical response curve for an LC 
is shown in figure 4. LCDs with fewer 
pixels (specifically fewer dot rows) can 



use materials that exhibit shallow 
slope in their response curves and 
have threshold voltages (V th ) near 1.2 
volts (V) rms (root mean square). The 
use of multiplexing (described later) 
in the larger LCDs used today requires 
less voltage margin between con- 
trasting pixels. Materials currently 
used do have steeply sloped re- 
sponse curves but consequently have 
higher threshold potential due to their 
chemical properties. 

MULTIPLEXING AND BIAS 

For a multiple-line LCD, turning dots 
on and off is not simply a matter of 
applying a constant potential to each 
pixel. An 80-character by 16-line dis- 
play (480 by 128 dots) would require 
more than 61,000 separate conduc- 
tors to form a static drive scheme in 
which each dot is electrically isolated. 
The current photolithographic tech- 
nique used to reliably etch ITO is 
limited to a minimum conductor spac- 
ing of 50 microns for good produc- 
tion yields. The actual conductor 
width itself is limited by the resistance 
per square of ITO. Ignoring the con- 
ductors altogether, the spacing con- 
straint alone would necessitate a 
panel perimeter of greater than 3 
meters to bring in all the connections. 
Also, producing some 61,000 minute 
connections reliably is no trivial prob- 
lem. LCDs that use narrow conductors 
and spacings are under investigation. 
Presently the application of this tech- 
nology to large pieces of glass in 
volume production is impractical be- 
cause of processing defect problems 
and sheet resistance effects. 

lb overcome the interconnect prob- 
lem, large TN-LCDs use a multiplex- 
ing scheme that is similar to a key- 
board scan. In a multiplexed panel 
with n rows (duty panel), each "on" 
pixel only experiences peak voltage, 
V p , for 1/nth of the time. Along with 
duty cycle, the other electrical param- 
eter that affects contrast is bias (B). 
The number of bias levels is the 
amount of discrete, uniform steps of 
voltage into which the LCD's supply 
is divided. B is usually expressed as 
the reciprocal of this number of levels. 

[continued) 



124 BYTE • JULY 1985 




Why people choose an IBM PC in the first place 
is why people want IBM service... in the first place. 



After all, who knows your IBM Personal 
Computer better than we do? 

That's why we offer an IBM maintenance 
agreement for every member of the Personal 
Computer family. It's just another example 
of blue chip service from IBM. 

An IBM maintenance agreement for your 
PC components comes with the choice of service 
plan that's best for you— at the price that's 
best for you. 

Many customers enjoy the convenience and 
low cost of our carry -in service. That's where 
we exchange a PC display, for example, at any 
of our Service/ Exchange Centers. 



And for those customers who prefer it, we 
offer IBM on-site service, where a service repre- 
sentative comes when you call. 

No matter which you choose for your PC, 
an IBM maintenance agreement offers you fast, 
effective service. 

Quality. Speed. Commitment. That's why 
an IBM maintenance agreement means blue 
chip service. To find out more about the 
specif ic service of ferings available for your PC, 
call 1 800 IBM-2468, Ext. 104 
and ask for PC Maintenance. _^_ _ _ B 



Inquiry 175 



Blue chip service from 



LCDS FOR PORTABLES 



ELDS OF VIEW 
1 CONTRAST 




TWISTED NEMAT1C LIQUID CRYSTAL DISPLAY 



Figure 5: Multiplexing as it relates to contrast and viewing angle for a transmission 
mode LCD. Concentric rings represent measured contrast ratio (CR) of "off" to 
"on" pixels. Tfieta, 6. is the displacement of viewing angle from the normal 
direction, N. The response of a liquid-crystal medium for three different 
levels of multiplexing, N, is shown. 



SERIAL BIT STREAM - 



-DOT 
CLOCK 



SHIFT REGISTER 



/n 



N-BIT LATCH 



ROW 
CLOCK 



BIAS 
VOLTAGES 



>'« 



COL. DRIVERS 



BIAS TOGGLE 



n ROWS 



/ n COLUMN LINES 



LCD 



FRAME 
CLOCK" 



Figure 6: Circuit schematic for an LCD quadrant. Dots are shifted on the fall 
of dot clock. Values are moved from the serial shifter to the n-bit latch and a 
new row is selected by the fall of row clock. Frame clock resets the row sequencer 
and initiates the next frame. The bias toggle along with the dot value determines 
the voltages driven on the row and column lines. 



(For example, if the peak voltage de- 
livered to the panel is 18 V and it is 
divided into 2-V steps for use by the 
drive circuitry, then 5=1/9.) 

The time-averaged DC voltage ap- 
plied to each dot is resolved by cal- 
culating the rms voltage applied to it 
over the course of a single refresh 
period. This value reflects the energy 
delivered to each capacitive pixel by 
the applied AC waveform. 

For simplicity let's assume you turn 
on a pixel in the first dot row of an 
n row display to V p . During the next 
n rows of refresh, this dot experiences 
the "off" voltage (= B*V P ). The rms 
voltage seen by a selected pixel (VJ 
is given by 

V s = (V p ) (((1) ^ +(h-1)(BP)/") 1/2 

On the other hand, nonselected pixels 
experience "off" voltage constantly 
throughout the refresh period. The 
voltage they experience is 



V m 



B*V D 



By plugging through the mathe- 
matics you will find that, given a fixed 
value of B, the ratio of V 5 IV ns , which 
is related to CR (see figure 4), de- 
creases as n, the number of rows, in- 
creases. Contrast gets worse as more 
rows are multiplexed. Conversely, as 
the number of bias levels increases 
(up to a theoretical limit) for a fixed 
number of rows, the CR improves for 
a fixed viewing angle. 

In the case of muliplexed LCDs, the 
best number of bias levels is given by 
B= l/(w) 1/2 + 1. This rule optimizes the 
contrast for a given value of n. For a 
64-dot row display, the bias value 
chosen would be 1/9. In practical ap- 
plications this number is not always 
used, but a convenient bias value is 
chosen. 

The Effects 

of Viewing Angle 

Application of an electric field to LC 
media causes alignment of the long 
axis of the molecules in the direction 
of the field lines. When a pixel is acti- 
vated in a multiplexed display, the rms 
value of selected voltage is of lesser 
magnitude than the saturation value 
(V 5at ) (see figure 4) for the material. 



126 BYTE • JULY 1985 



LCDS FOR PORTABLES 



The closer the value of V s is to the 
V sat , the greater the rotation the LC 
dipoles in the direction of applied 
field. (Perpendicular to the surface of 
the glass.) Maximum contrast is 
achieved when the viewing direction 
is coincident with the alignment of the 
long axis of the molecules. Thus, as 
duty cycle decreases (V s decreases) 
the optimal viewing angle moves away 
from the normal. 

An increase in multiplexing also im- 
plies a lower voltage margin between 
selected and nonselected pixels. With 
a small voltage margin the orientation 
of molecules in an "on" pixel relative 
to an "off" pixel is only slightly dif- 
ferent angularly. Thus, acceptable con- 
trast is only perceivable over a narrow 
field of view for LCD panels with mul- 
tiple lines (see figure 5). 

As Displays Get Larger 

In early 1982 the practical limit for 
multiplexing was 32 rows, and now, 
because of improvements in LC ma- 
terials, this number has been raised 
to 128. 

Due to the matrix design used in 
TN-LCDs (shared rows and columns), 
crosstalk between selected and non- 
selected pixels can occur. The visual 
implications of crosstalk are reduced 
contrast and dark streaking called 
"shadowing." To minimize shadowing, 
a design using three different biases 
is implemented. For a 64-row display, 
dots on rows that are not undergoing 
refresh experience a potential of 
\I9(V P ). During a given row's refresh, 
the "on" and "off" dots are driven to 
V p and 1I9(V P ), respectively. Calculat- 
ing Vrms for these conditions using a 
value of V p = 18V yields V s = 3V and 
V„, = 2.65V. (This is a simplified ex- 
ample. Actual biases chosen depend 
on the ease of design.) Although the 
voltage margin in this biasing scheme 
is smaller than the voltages resolved 
using the equations that were previ- 
ously explained, crosstalk effects are 
reduced by decreasing potential dif- 
ferences between neighboring pixels. 

The rms voltage experienced by an 
"on" pixel (for a fixed multiplexing 
value) is directly affected by the 
magnitude of peak voltage applied to 



it. Presently the CMOS (complemen- 
tary metal-oxide semiconductor) cir- 
cuitry used to drive the row and col- 
umn lines is only capable of 18 to 20 
volt swings. Low-power drivers are be- 
ing developed that are capable of 
tolerating up to 30 V. These drivers 
will improve the optical qualities of 
the panels and allow for a greater 
number of dot rows. 

Mechanical Designs 

To compensate for the viewing angle 
restrictions and the glare of overhead 
lighting, the display assembly of most 
portables offers variable tilt. Pressure 
sensitivity of the LCD and ruggedness 
requirements make it necessary for 
the panel to have a protective cover. 
By texturing the plastic, glare can be 
minimized but some image sharpness 
is lost. 

Portables must endure harsh treat- 
ment: being carried to and from work, 
dropped on the floor, and often mis- 
taken for outlets of aggression; their 
fragile displays must be protected 
when not in use. Many portables use 
a display assembly that pivots into a 
closed position above the keyboard. 
This design, along with proper mount- 
ing and cushioning, protects the panel 
from direct contact with the environ- 
ment when being transported and 
forms a compact portable package. 

Limitations of TN-LCDs 

No matter how adjustable the display 
assembly is, in low lighting situations 
reflective TN-LCDs become illegible. 
Adding a backlight source to these 
normally nonemissive displays is cost- 
ly in terms of power (an additional 1 
to 2 W is needed), but the range of 
acceptable lighting for readability is 
improved. 

LCDs also limit the temperature 
range in which a portable can be 
used. Below 0° and above 50° Cel- 
sius, typical l£ media undergo phase 
changes and the displays become un- 
usable (although they are not perma- 
nently damaged). The LC's response 
time and threshold characteristics 
also vary with temperature. Some por- 
tables use a compensation circuit that 
adjusts bias voltages according to 



operating temperature. In purchasing 
TN-LCDs for portable systems it is 
necessary to specify the interreaction 
of viewing angle and temperature be- 
fore they affect contrast and. there- 
fore, readability. 

Circuit Architecture 

To overcome limitations of the multi- 
plexed technology, some manufac- 
turers play tricks in the fabrication of 
LCD modules. For character fonts that 
are 8 pixels tall the existent 64-dot 
row limit originally allowed for only 8 
lines of alphanumeric display. To over- 
come this and produce a 16-line 
panel, two 64-way multiplexed sys- 
tems are adjoined. Separate column 
lines enter the glass from both the top 
and bottom. The need for 80 charac- 
ters per line causes further complica- 
tions in designing LCD panels. Early 
in the the development of LCDs, 
CMOS shifters with limited clock 
speeds were used. Their low fre- 
quency led to flicker problems in wide 
displays. To alleviate this, the top and 
bottom halves were again divided, 
forming a total of four quadrants, each 
requiring its own serial bit stream. 

Time multiplexing is handled by the 
digital circuitry incorporated in the 
drive circuits. An approach is to save 
a series of digital pixel states that rep- 
resents the pattern for a given row. 
Once the potentials corresponding to 
these states are set up at the column 
lines, the row line is scanned by alter- 
ing its drive voltage. During the selec- 
tion of one row, the upcoming row's 
values are being shifted and saved for 
its refresh cycle. The analog voltages 
used to bias the display are derived 
by dividing the voltage supplied to 
the module through a resistor ladder. 
By periodically toggling a control line 
that ties to both the row and column 
drivers, the polarity of signals applied 
across the pixels is reversed, elimi- 
nating any net DC bias. The applica- 
tion of a net DC bias to the LC media 
will cause long-term damage to the 
display. A schematic representation of 
the digital circuitry is depicted in 
figure 6. 

Portability dictates the need for a 

{continued) 



JULY 1985 -BYTE 127 



LCDS FOR PORTABLES 



Without TN-LCDs, 
powerful affordable, 
portable computers 
would not be 
available today. 



low-power and highly integrated cir- 
cuit to interface the LCD with a micro- 
processor bus. For example, the cus- 
tom controller that handles both re- 
fresh and update in the HP 110 was 
designed for lack of an industry stan- 
dard part. To avoid wiring the system 
bus to the display assembly, the con- 
troller integrated circuit (IC) and 
display RAM (random-access read/ 
write memory) are positioned inside 
the main case and the LCD interface 



signals (four data lines, dot clock, row 
clock, frame clock, and bias toggle |M- 
clock|) and power lines are connected 
to the controller via a cable hidden 
in the display arm. 

The magnitude of the supply sent 
to the panel can be regulated under 
software control. Changing this volt- 
age affects the magnitude of each 
bias level and thus regulates display 
contrast. 

The Future 

Although twisted nematics currently 
offer the only practical, low-power 
solution for portable displays, several 
new technologies are on the forefront. 
Guest-host displays that use a liquid 
crystal doped with a dye offer brilliant 
contrast and do not require the use 
of polarizers. These panels have been 
demonstrated but are not yet pro- 
duced with high multiplexing. Active 
matrix technologies have also been 



demonstrated, but due to cost and 
yield considerations their use for large 
panels is several years in the future. 

With improvement in LC materials 
and the CMOS drivers used to run 
multiplexed displays, the visual 
aspects of large TN-LCDs will un- 
doubtedly improve. Now that the age 
of the backlit LCD is upon us, the work 
environment in which a portable will 
be useful will be greatly expanded. 
Another advance being made is in the 
use of plastic rather than glass for the 
panel's plates. Using plastic makes the 
display lightweight, rugged, and thin- 
ner than what is currently available, 
although controlling the cell gap is dif- 
ficult because of plastic's flexibility 

Even though TN-LCDs may be dif- 
ficult for your neighbor to read, they 
offer a perfectly adequate solution for 
a single user. Without them, power- 
ful, affordable, portable computers 
would not be available today. ■ 



STEAL AN 

INDUSTRIAL 

SECRET. 



American companies trust their most important computer 
information to special premium grade unbranded "industrial 
quality" diskettes. These diskettes, manufactured by select 
American and Japanese firms, must meet or surpass stringent 
specifications. 

You can now purchase these 5V^ f diskettes from Holmes & 
Company. Even better, you can buy them at the low price paid by the big 
corporations ... as low as $.80 each (SS/DD, with reinforced hub ring, 
TYVEC sleeve, write protects, labels). Each diskette has been tested prior to 
shipment and carries a lifetime replacement warranty. 

To order today, call toll-free 1-800-4-HOLMES (In California 408-241- 
1505). Ask about quantity discounts and special prices on hardware and supplies. 
Holmes <& Co., 900 Lafayette Street, Suite 605, Santa Clara, California 95050 
Quanl. 



Description Price Total 
SS/DD $1.00 
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Subtotal: 

CA Res. Add 7% Tax: 

Handling Charge: $2.50 
Total: 



Nairn; 

Address _ 
Citv 



Phone ( 

Signature 

MC VISA 




.Card # 



128 BYTE • JULY 1985 



Inquiry 171 



Introducing 

the new 
and improved 

IBM PC 



Introducing 




H 



GEM 




Congratulations. 

You just found the perfect way to get 
a brand new and improved IBM® PC 
without buying one. 

Get GEM™* software from Digital 
Research instead. 

And voila, your IBM PC, PC/XT AT 
or compatible will become something 
it's never been before. 

Easy to use. 

Now instead of getting lost in PC 
DOS, you can actually use your PC to 
get something done. (An astonishing 
idea, if ever there was one.) 

Just slip a GEM diskette into your 
disk drive. And the rigmarole of PC 
DOS is replaced by a way of working 
that's easy, effortless and altogether 
personable. 

You see, GEM lets you work with a 
simple descriptive header menu, icons, 
drop-down menus, windows and a 
pointer. 

Which means you can now use your 
computer to write, figure, draw and 
even think the way you used to. Before 
less-than-friendly computers made you 
change your way of thinking. 

In other words, your tool for modern 
times has finally become a tool for 
modern times. 

lll 




To see how easy 

it is to use GEM, 

take this simple 

screen test. 



Odir a: A* 

Uolune in drive A has no label 
Directory of A A 



COHHAHB COM ANSI 
ATTRIB EXE HORE 



SYS SORT 



EXE SHARE EXE FIHD 



con assign con print con 



SELECT COn 



CHXDSX COn FORHAT COH UDISK S¥S BASIC C0H BASICA COn 

fdisk con conp con tree con backup con restore con 

LABEL COn BISKCOPY C0H DISKCOHP COH KEYBSP CON KEVBIT CON 

KEVBGR CO« KEYBUX COH KEYBFB COrt HODE COH SELECT COH 

GRAPHICS COH RECOVER COH EBLIN COH GRAFTABL COH 
34 File(s) 163424 bytes free 

Opath Mevell;Mevel2Alevel3; 

Oren ny prog 1. con M9prog3.coM 

Ocopy \nyprog2.con Mevell\nyprog2.con 
1 File(s) copied 

Onode conl:l2jiij8iljp_ 










OK. Take a close look at these two 
screens. 

One is an IBM PC with PC DOS. 
The other is an IBM PC with GEM. 

You get to figure out which is which. 

The PC DOS screen is the one that 
seems to be designed for an engineer. Or 
someone with a photographic memory. 

It requires you to type and memorize 
nonsensical terminology like ocopy\ 
myprog2.com\level Wmyprog2.com. All 
just to copy a file. 

But most people think in ideas. 
Words. And pictures. 

Which brings us to the GEM screen. 

It's the one with pictures of the things 
you use in your office. Like file folders. 



Diskettes. And a wastebasket. 

Plus words describing the kinds of 
things you do in your office. Like 
OPEN FOLDER. SAVE FOLDER. 
And QUIT. 

Copying a file is as easy as pointing 
with a mouse (or cursor key -if mice 
make you uneasy) to the file you want 
to copy. Then you just slide the file 
across the screen to the diskette you 
want to put it on. 

Well, by now we've probably given 
it away. 

If you guessed that GEM is on the 
right-hand screen, you're absolutely 
right. And if you think GEM looks easy 
to use, you're right again. 






i 





/ 



Now, given 

a few pointers, 
anyone can use 

an IBM PC. 



/ 




Have you ever noticed how people 
in your company get up from their PCs 
looking rather dazed? 

That's called PC DOS anxiety. 

And it goes away when GEM enters 
the picture. 

Because with GEM everybody 
already knows everything they need to 
know to run a PC. 



Like how to point. 

Click. 

Read a menu. 

Open a file folder. 

Or pitch a bad idea in the wastebasket. 

Who knows, GEM software could 
even turn people with deep-rooted PC- 
phobia into absolute PC-enthusiasts. 




With GEM software you 
don't have to switch gears to 
switch drives. You can just point 
and click your way from drive to 
drive. No matter how many 
drives or diskettes you're using. 




GEM file folders hold 
whatever you put on a diskette. 
From entire software programs 
to reports, pictures and presen- 
tations. 

In fact, GEM file folders 
can even hold other file folders. 
And so on. 




GEM software even 
includes "generic" file folders, 
places to hold random ideas, 
memos, numbers and the like 
until you're ready to file them 
in a GEM folder. Or in the 
wastebasket. 




Part of getting organized is 
knowing when to let go of out- 
datedfiles. 

GEM can't tell you which 
files to get rid of. But it can help 
get rid of them. 

And should you toss a file 
before its time, you even get a 
chance to change your mind. 




If you're clever enough to 
read these words, you've no 
doubt jigured out what the 
GEM clock is for. Staying on 
schedule, for instance. Keeping 
track of the time it takes to do 
specific projects. Or getting to 
your airplane on time. 









Calculator 


' 




. .; 


1 al 




BEE0 




EHES0 




KBSSH 




GElEIIIiaH 




ESQHS 


i ; ;:;; 






GEM even includes a cal- 
culator, so you can tally up all 
kinds of important things. 

hike the time and keystrokes 
you save by working with 
GEM software. 



GEM already 

works with most 

of the software you 

already have. 






We know what you're wondering. 

If GEM software is going to change 
the way you work with your IBM PC, 
will you still be able to work with your 
existing software? 

Of course. 

GEM works with most important 
programs that work with the IBM PC. 

Like Lotus l-2-3I M Symphony 1 " 



MultiplanMBASE III.™ Framework? 1 
And thousands more. 

Technically you see, GEM software 
doesn't actually change PC DOS. It just 
hides it. 

So your software works just the way 
it always has. But without the long and 
cryptic PC DOS start-up procedures. 



MICROSOFT 
MULTIPLAN. 




MultiMate 

Professional Word Processor 
designed for the IBM PC 









jjfsifih 




But the best 
software for GEM 
is GEM software. 



])e& file Ed it /Font Page Graphics | ^ JJ 

GEM tirite Key Coruianrfs, . 
Short Cuts , . . 

■fifflHffifH 




THE 
COLLECT I0H 



The GEM COLLECTION provides painting and graphic uord processing 
for the IBh PC ouner. The BEM COLLECTION includes the GEH DESKTOP . 
GEM PfllHT . and GEH WRITE 1. 

Uith GEH POINT, you can easily sketch out your idea?, in full 
color, and incorporate then into docunents you have created ulth 
GEH if RITE 1 . OEM WRITE is a powerful word processor, based on 
lifetree Software's popular Volkswitm* Jteluxa. Mhether you 
prefer to Mrite doun your ideas or sketch then out, the GEM 
COLLECTION lets you express then quickly &vt easily. 



I.MTT-7 



4 t 




The GEM COLLECTION 

Now yon can work with words and pictures together. 



The GEM COLLECTION™ is a 
bundle of three programs, GEM DESK- 
TOP,™ GEM WRITEr and GEM 
PAINT™ 

A part of all GEM software, GEM 
DESKTOP* is the mask that hides PC 
DOS. It includes the GEM pointer, 
menu headings, icons and drop-down 
menus. 

So you can point and click your way 
through anything you'll ever want to 
use a computer for. 

GEM WRITE, by Lifetree Software, 
Inc., is a word processing program featur- 
ing fast, clear and comprehensive editing. 
It lets you cut and paste, make multiple 
block moves or even create columns. All 
without memorizing a single command. 

And when words alone won't express 
what you have to say, GEM PAINT 
gives you the tools to turn your ideas 
into pictures. Up to sixteen colors. Paint- 
brushes, pencils and a straightedge. Plus 
dozens of shapes and patterns. 

Best of all, GEM WRITE and GEM 
PAINT work together. So you can work 



*GEM DESKTOP is also available as a stand-alone product. 




GEM DRAW 

A perfect illustration of the power of GEM software, 




GEM WORDCHART 

Present it with style. 




GEM GRAPH 

Let's look at the numbers. 



with words and pictures on the same 
page. 

You can also create anything from 
fine art to line art, whether you can 
draw or not. 

Just put your hand on your mouse 
and point. 

GEM DRAW™ gives you all the tools 
you need. 

Like pencils, geometric patterns, a 
full palette of colors and an extensive 
gallery of art to use as you like. 

And once you've created a GEM 
DRAW image, you can stretch it. 
Shrink it. Duplicate it. Or add text to 
explain it. 

GEM WORDCHART™ is the 
perfect way to make your point in a 
big way. 

With a choice of several type styles 
and sizes, plus up to sixteen colors, you 
can build charts that can be read from 
across your desk or from the far end 
of the conference room. 

And to really drive your point home, 
your words can be combined with 
pictures from GEM DRAW. 

The business of creating business 
graphics just got a whole lot easier. 

GEM GRAPH lets you turn 
numbers into something more tangible. 
Like pie charts. Bar graphs. Line plots. 
Even maps. All through the use of 
simple, well-designed templates. 

Where do you get the numbers? 

Directly from the business programs 
you're already using, like Lotus 1-2-3, 
Symphony, dBASE III or what have you. 



Where to find 
aGEM. 



W-^ GEIV^-^'^^ 54 "*^ 




In the months ahead you'll be seeing 
GEM software on a lot of familiar faces. 
And not just IBM PCs or compatibles. 

Several leading computer manufac- 
turers are building GEM software right 
into their hardware. 

And with so many systems working 
with GEM, you'll soon see important 
GEM programs coming from a host of 
other major software houses. 

GEM. From Digital Research. 

It's not just software. It's a movement. 

And it's as easy to find as it is to use. 
Just call our GEMLINE. (800) 443-4200. 
Ask for our GEM brochure. The name 



of your GEM software dealer. Or simply 
place an order. 

Because with GEM, the best new com- 
puter on the market isn't a computer at all. 



GEM PRICE LIST 



GEM DESKTOP $ 49.95 Available April 

GEM DRAW 149.00* Available April 

GEM COLLECTION 199.00 Available June 

(includes GEM DESKTOP, GEM PAINT, GEM WRITE) 

GEM WORDCHART 149.00 Available August 

GEM GRAPH 199.00 Available August 

Also available: 

HERCULES GRAPHICS CARD™ $499.00 

PC MOUSE™BY MOUSE SYSTEMS™ $195.00 

Sales oruse tax where applicable will be added. 

Suggested retail prices subject to change without notice. 'Introductory price. 



^CEM 



FROM DIGITAL RESEARCH 



*GEM requires that your computer have appropriate graphics capability and that the pointing device be compatible. Call for exact requirements. GEM, 
GEM COLLECTION, GEMDESKTOP, GEM WRITE, GEM PAINT, GEM DRAW, GEM GRAPH and GEM WORDCHART are 
trademarks and Digital Research is a registered trademark of Digital Research Inc. Other computer and software names are tradenames and/or trade- 
marks of their respective manufacturers. Copyright 1985, Digital Research Inc. All rights reserved. 



by Rich Malloy 



PRODUCT DESCRIPTION 

The GRiDCase 



These new portables 
are IBM PC-compatible 
and one version has 
a gas-plasma display 



Editor's note: The following is a BYTE prod- 
uct description. \t is not a review. We pro- 
vide an advance look at this new product 
because we feel it is significant. A complete 
review will follow in a subsequent issue. 

Recently, GRiD Systems 
Corporation brought its 
portable systems into the 
mainstream of microcom- 
puters. The new GRiDCase computers 
are about the same size (briefcase- 
size) and feature the same magne- 
sium case as GRiD's Compass com- 
puter, but they forgo the Compass's 
expensive and power-hungry elec- 
troluminescent display and bubble 
memory. Instead, the GRiDCase com- 
puters offer a range of display op- 
tions. The GRiDCase I features a utili- 
tarian and affordable liquid-crystal dis- 
play (LCD). The GRiDCase II has an 
"enhanced" LCD. And, in keeping with 
GRiD's emphasis on what its repre- 
sentatives call "portable displays that 
more than one person can read," the 
GRiDCase III offers a high-contrast 
gas-plasma display (see photo I). For 
users who like the more traditional 
cathode-ray tube displays, GRiD has 
provided an optional interface to con- 
nect an IBM Personal Computer (PQ- 
compatible RGB (red-green-blue) 
monitor (see photo 2) to the GRiD- 



Case computers. 

Other evidence of the GRiDCase 
family's new mainstream character in- 
clude its compatibility with IBM PC 
software and its price. Although the 
GRiDCase III with the gas-plasma dis- 
play sells for a hefty $43 50, the LCD- 
based GRiDCase I has a list price of 
$2975, which is fairly competitive with 
that of the Data General/One. The 
GRiDCase II sells for $3 1 50. 

The Display 

All three GRiDCases are almost iden- 
tical except for their displays. Despite 
its high cost, GRiD Systems is most 
proud of the gas-plasma display. The 
company had investigated using an 



electroluminescent display as it had 
in the Compass, but all such displays 
were designed using a 512- by 2 56- 
pixel matrix, which would make com- 
patibility with the 640- by 200-pixel 
screen of the IBM PC's graphics 
adapter impossible. GRiD therefore 
decided in favor of the gas-plasma 
display. The GRiDCase Ill's display 
presents a stable, sharp, high-contrast 
image. GRiD expects that many peo- 
ple will prefer it over a high-contrast 
cathode-ray tube screen. The display 

[continued] 
Rich Malloy is the New York editor for BYTE. 
He can be reached at BYTE, 43rd floor, 
1221 Avenue of the Americas, New York, 
NY 10020. 




Photo I: The GRiDCase III with the gas-plasma display. GRiDPlot, GRiD's 
proprietary graphics package, is shown on the screen. 



JULY 1985 -BYTE 129 



THE GRIDCASE 



IN BRIEF 



Computer 

GRiDCase I 



and 



Manufacturer 

GRiD Systems Corp. 
2535 Garcia Ave. 
Mountain View, CA 94043 
(415) 961-4800 

Physical Characteristics 

2V4 by 11 1 /2 by 15 inches; weighs under 12 
pounds 

Microprocessor 

80C86, 16-bit at 4.77 MHz; optional 8087 
80-bit arithmetic coprocessor 

Features 

Options for 128K-byte, 256K-byte, and 
512K-byte CMOS RAM; up to 512K bytes of 
user-installable ROM sockets; 3 1 /2-inch 
720K-byte floppy-disk drive; built-in speaker 

Display 

LCD or gas-plasma; 80 characters by 25 
lines; 640- by 200-pixel bit-mapped display 
(IBM PC-compatible) 

Keyboard 

57-key IBM PCjr-compatible with tactile 
feedback 

Interfaces 

RS-232C serial port; Centronics-type 
parallel port; 50-pin external expansion bus; 
RGB video-out option; 5-pin DIN plug for 
external IBM PC keyboard; RJ11 phone 
jack 

Options 

Internal Hayes Smartmodem-compatible 
1200-bps modem 

Power Source 

External AC supply; optional internal 
rechargeable battery pack 



Software 

MS-DOS v. 2.11, 



GW-BASIC 



Compatibility 

Runs all tested popular IBM PC software 

Price 

GRiDCase I with LCD $2975 

GRiDCase II with enhanced LCD $3150 
GRiDCase III with gas-plasma 
display $4350 



is also fairly fast. I did not do any 
scroll tests on it, but it seemed to run 
Microsoft's Flight Simulator as fast as 
I've seen it run on any other system. 
Of course, the screen cannot display 
colors or shades of gray. It displays 
gray as a texture of vertical lines. 

The gas-plasma screen eats up a 
large amount of power. The battery 
module can power the GRiDCase III 
for only about one hour. Nonetheless, 
for certain applications this screen 
may well be worth the extra cost. 

For users who can forgo the extra 
clarity of the gas-plasma display and 
who may spend appreciable amounts 
of time away from electrical power 
outlets, the GRiDCase l's LCD screen 
could be a reasonable alternative. Al- 
though this screen does not have the 
speed or contrast of the gas-plasma 
display, it is readable. Based on my 
brief experience with it. I would judge 
it to have slightly better contrast than 
the LCD screen on the original Data 
General/One. And when you are not 
traveling, you can connect the GRiD- 
Case I to an IBM PC-compatible RGB 
monitor. The GRiDCase II is said to 
have an enhanced LCD, but I did not 
get a chance to test it. The GRiDCase 
computers do not have a jack for a 
composite monitor, but GRiD repre- 



sentatives said they were investigating 
the possibility of producing an op- 
tional RGB/composite adapter that 
would allow you to connect a com- 
posite monitor to the RGB port. 

Keyboard 

The GRiDCase computers have the 
dubious distinction of being among 
the first computers to be compatible 
with the IBM PCjr keyboard. The main 
reason for this is the small size of the 
GRiDCase. Because some keys were 
going to have to double as function 
keys, GRiD decided to follow the ex- 
ample IBM set with its small home 
computer. The result is acceptable but 
confusing for those whose are used 
to the large IBM PC keyboard. Some 
users may take exception to the loca- 
tion of the backspace key (in the lower 
right-hand corner). Of course, key- 
board replacement programs like Pro- 
Key and SmartKey may let you re- 
arrange the keyboard as you like. The 
keyboard felt reasonably good. The 
typewriter keys were in their standard 
places, and key action seemed accept- 
able. Tactile feedback was provided by 
a key click similar to that on the IBM 
PC. IBM PC owners may appreciate 
the fact that they are not tied in to the 

[continued) 




Photo 2: The GRiDCase III with the video-out option hooked up to an IBM color 
monitor. AshtonTate's Framework package is displayed on the screens. PC MasterlSlave 
software allows easy cable connection from the GRiDCase to the IBM PC. 



130 BYTE • JULY 1985 




H|: ; 



1 ^affi» 1 




WAITING FORT 



**§.&> 



OUTPUT BINS 





SYSTATON YOUR MICRO NOW OUTPERFORMS 
THE MAINFRAME STATISTICS PACKAGES. 



SYSTAT computes regressions more accu- 
rately than SAS! M It tabulates faster than SPSS™ 
It has more statistical routines than BMDP™ And 
SYSTAT includes a full-screen spreadsheet data 
editor, online help and simple commands. 

Compared to other micro statistics packages, 
SYSTAT's scope is unrivaled. In every published 
review, SYSTAT has been at the top of the list. 

IBM-PC/XT/ AT IM APPLE MACINTOSH™ MS-DOS™ 

Inquiry 347 



Need proof? If you don't believe a micro 
statistics package can solve your mainframe prob- 
lems, call or write us today. 

Or wait in line. ^^^H^ran 
SYSTAT™ Inc, 
603 Main Street 
Evanston, IL60202 
(312)864-5670 

CP/M™ UNIX™ 



SYSTAT 



THE SYSTEM FOR STATISTICS 

JULY 1985 -BYTE 131 



THE GRIDCASE 




Photo 3: The GRiDCase back panel (left to right): the DIN connector for the 
IBM PC keyboard or \0-key keypad, the built-in 300/1 200-bps modem (Hayes 
Smartmodem-compatible), RS-232C serial interface, external bus connector for external 
GRiD peripherals and access to the IBM PC expansion chassis, Centronics parallel 
interface, color (RGB) video-out for external monitors, built-in rechargeable/exchangeable 
battery pack. 




Photo 4: The GRiDCase stackable portable peripherals (from top to bottom): 
VA-inch floppy-disk drive, 5 ] A-inch floppy-disk drive, \0-megabyte hard-disk system, 
base station battery charger/power source. 



GRiD keyboard if they don't want to 
be. Each GRiDCase lets you plug in an 
IBM PC keyboard and use that 
instead. 

Power 

All GRiDCase models have two power 
modules available— a rechargeable 
battery pack and an AC (alternating 
current) transformer. Both are the 
same size (about the size of a box of 
ten 5!4-inch floppy disks cut in half), 
and both fit in the large socket on the 
rear panel of the machine. When 
traveling, you can carry several bat- 
tery packs and insert them as you 
need to. Each battery pack lasts four 
to five hours for the LCD models, and 
one hour with the plasma model. The 
batteries can be recharged in about 
eight hours. For now, the batteries will 
sell for about $60. GRiD claims that 
it went to considerable trouble to en- 
sure that its power supply could work 
with two displays having vastly dif- 
ferent power-consumption rates. 

Silicon 

The GRiDCase family of computers 
uses a low-power version of the 8086 
microprocessor with a clock speed 
of 4.77 MHz. As in many portables, 
GRiD achieved the low-power capa- 
bility by using CMOS (complementary 
metal-oxide semiconductor) tech- 
nology. An 8087 numeric processor 
option is also available. A standard 
GRiDCase system comes with 128K 
bytes of CMOS memory chips. Mem- 
ory configurations of 2 56K bytes and 
512K bytes are also available for ap- 
proximately $600 and $1200, respec- 
tively 

The GRiDCase computers also 
come with eight sockets for ROM 
(read-only memory), although only 
four of these sockets can be accessed 
by the user. GRiD will offer programs 
such as MS-DOS 2.11, GW-BAS1C, and 
Lotus's 1-2-3 on ROM chips. 

Interfaces 

Each GRiDCase computer comes with 
a serial RS-232C port with a standard 
DB-2 5 connector and a Centronics- 
type parallel printer port (see photo 

[continued) 



132 BYTE • JULY 1985 



MICRO CAP and MICRO LOGIC 
put your engineers on line- 
not in line. ^ ie 



J^ 



~Ljl ' *'• L - < inTwrtm 



^ 



sail 



~mmim 



[AyOhir* WORKSTATION 




How many long unproductive hours 
have you spent "in line" for your simula- 
tion? Well, no more. MICROCAP and 
MICROLOGIC can put you on line by 
turning your PC into a productive and 
cost-effecti ve engineering workstation. 

Both of these sophisticated engineering 
tools provide you with quick and efficient 
solutions to your simulation problems. 
And here's how. 

MICROCAP: 

Your Analog Solution 

MICROCAP is an interactive analog 
circuit drawing and simulation system. 
It allows you to sketch a circuit diagram 
right on the CRT screen, then run an AC, 
DC, or Transient analysis. While pro- 
viding you with libraries for defined 
models of bipolar and MOS devices, 
Opamps, transformers, diodes, and much 
more, MICROCAP also includes features 
not even found in SPICE. 

MICROCAP II lets you be even more 
productive. As an advanced version, it 
employs sparse matrix techniques for 
faster simulation speed and larger net- 




"Typical MICROCAP Transient Analysis" 

works. In addition, you get even more 
advanced device models, worst case capa- 
bilities, temperature stepping, Fourier 
analysis, and macro capability. 



MICROLOGIC: 
Your Digital Solution 

MICROLOGIC provides you with a 
similar interactive drawing and analysis 
environment for digital work. Using 
standard PC hardware, you can create 
logic diagrams of up to 9 pages with each 
containing up to 200 gates. The system 
automatically creates the netlist required 
for a timing simulation and will handle 
networks of up to 1800 gates. It provides 
you with libraries for 36 user-defined 
basic gate types, 36 data channels of 256 
bits each, 10 user-defined clock wave- 
forms, and up to 50 macros in each net- 
work. MICROLOGIC produces 
high-resolution timing diagrams showing 
selected waveforms and associated 
delays, glitches, and spikes — just like the 
real thing. 






d 



/VfcfXT/ 



r 



h 



\(& 



\A 



c^ 




"Typical MICROLOGIC Diagram 



Reviewers Love 
These Solutions 

Regarding MICROCAP ... "A highly 
recommended analog design program" 
(PC Tech Journal 3/84). "A valuable tool 
for circuit designers" (Personal Software 
Magazine 11/83). 

Regarding MICROLOGIC . . . "An effi- 
cient design system that does what it is 
supposed to do at a reasonable price" 
(Byte 4/84). 

MICROCAP and MICROLOGIC are 
available for the Apple II (64k), IBM PC 
(128k), and HP-150 computers and priced 
at S475 and S450 respectively. Demo 
versions are available for S75. 

MICROCAP II is available for the 
Macintosh, IBM PC (256k), and HP-150 
systems and is priced at S895. Demo 
versions are available for S100. 

Demo prices are credited to the 
purchase price of the actual system. 

Now, to get on line, call or write today! 

Spectrum Software 

1021 S. Wolfe Road, Dept. B 
Sunnyvale, CA 94087 
(408) 738-4387 

Inquiry 33 7 



THE GRIDCASE 



3). An optional 1200-bps (bits per sec- 
ond) modem is also available for 
$795. GRiD claims that it purposely 
avoided using low-power CMOS chips 
in the serial por and modem because 
these chips were not 100 percent 
compatible with the IBM PC. Also, the 
need for CMOS chips did not seem 
a high priority because most phone 



lines and serial devices are near elec- 
trical outlets. 

The Disk Drive 

The GRiDCase comes with one Sony- 
type 3 /2-inch floppy-disk drive. Each 
disk can hold 720K bytes of data, or 
about the same amount as a two- 
drive IBM PC. GRiD claims that the 



ZeroDisk 
ZeroDisk 

Run 

Protected 
Software 
from a 
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ZeroDisk lets you run dozens 
of popular business software 
packages without floppies. 
Call us for the latest list of 
software it handles. ZeroDisk 
needs an IBM PC or XT or AT 
or compatible, running under 
DOS version 2.0 or higher. It 



memory. ZeroDisk is not 
copy-protected. 

ZeroDisk is revised monthly. 
You may get revisions for an 
$18 US trade-in fee. 

To order ZeroDisk, send a 
check for $75 US, or call us 
with your credit card. We 
will ship the software within 
a day. 




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45 Charles Street East 

Third Floor 

Toronto, Ontario M4Y 1S2 

(416)961-8243 



disks use Microsoft's standard 
3 '/2-inch MS-DOS format, but they 
would not confirm that the GRiDCase 
could read disks used by the Data 
General/One. GRiD representatives 
claim that most major software pub- 
lishers will soon begin distributing 
3 /2-inch versions of their top-selling 
software products. 

lust in case, however, GRiD will be 
offering an external 5 !4-inch drive for 
$895. The drive can be set up as the 
primary drive, allowing you to run 
copy-protected software like the 
5!4-inch version of Lotus's 1-2-3 and 
Microsoft's Flight Simulator. The unit 
is about the size of a box of ten 8-inch 
disks, and it is connected to the main 
unit by a short thick cable that at- 
taches to the machine's expansion 
port. f IWo connectors are available on 
the drive, allowing you to "daisy- 
chain" the computer to yet another 
drive or another expansion periph- 
eral. 

f IWo other peripherals are available. 
One is a base station battery charger/ 
power source ($450), which can hold 
certain GRiD expansion cards, keep 
the portable unit powered, and, ac- 
cording to GRiD, recharge the por- 
table's batteries in about four hours. 
GRiD is also making available a 
10-megabyte hard-disk drive (for 
$22 50) that is approximately the 
same size as the 5J4-inch floppy-disk 
drive (see photo 4). 

GRiD representatives say that they 
plan to supply a second 3 /2-inch drive 
and a cable and adapter card that will 
let you connect a GRiDCase to IBM's 
expansion chassis for the IBM PC. The 
card apparently would let you con- 
nect a GRiDCase to any IBM expan- 
sion board. As yet there is no price 
information available for this option. 

Since the plasma and LCD models 
are practically identical, owners of the 
LCD model have the option of up- 
grading their units to a plasma model 
by sending the unit back to GRiD to 
have the display replaced. 

Software 

Like the Compass, a GRiDCase has 
the option of running two operating 

[continued) 
Inquiry 39 — ► 



~— THE ARK 24KT--2 
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THE ARK 24K HAS IT ALL! 



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■ MNP is a proprietary product of MICROCOM. Inc t Offer expires July 31 1985 



MULTIPLE MODEMS IN ONE 



Inquiry 259 




IEEE-488 Interfaces and 
Bus Extenders For: 

IBM PC, PCjr 
& COMPATIBLES 

DEC UNIBUS, Q-BUS 
& RAINBOW 100 

MULTIBUS, VMEbus 
STD & S-100 

Full IEEE-488 functionality, with the most com- 
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Telex: 758737 NAT INSTAUS 



IBM and PCjr are trademarks of International Business Machines, MULTI- 
BUS is a trademark' of totel, DEC. UNIBUS, 0-BUS, and Rainbow 100 are 
trademarks of Digital Equipment Corporation 



THE GRIDCASE 



THE GRiD Server 



When GRiD first came out with 
the Compass, it instituted a 
novel but controversial software- 
distribution scheme. All software 
would be sent out over the phone lines 
from GRiD Central, the company's cen- 
tral computer, which GRiD has now 
made available to customers. These 
systems, called GRiD Servers, are 
based around two 80186 processor 
chips and can directly connect up to 
48 computers in the office and access 
up to 320 megabytes of hard-disk 
space. It can also support up to 10 
modems and a number of printers. A 
small system with about 40 megabytes 
of disk space and the ability to connect 
to about 8 computers and 2 modems 
costs about $16,500. 

In the office, the GRiD Server func- 
tions as a regular local-area network 
(LAN) using twisted-pair cables with a 
data-transfer rate of 2 50K bits per sec- 
ond. Each GRiD computer has a util- 
ity program that allows it to connect 
to the central server and use the hard 
disk as if it were its own. Programs and 
adapter cards are also available for the 
IBM PC that will allow it to connect with 
this network. 



When you take your portable out into 
the field, the GRiD Server becomes 
what GRiD calls a RAN. a remote- 
access network. All you have to do is 
connect your modem-equipped system 
to a phone line. Then, just as in the of- 
fice, your machine can directly access 
the central server's hard-drive disk. 
Whenever you access the hard drive, 
your system automatically calls up the 
central computer and begins commu- 
nicating with it. The system includes its 
own error-checking protocol to protect 
against telephone-line noise. Text files 
and machine-language programs sup- 
posedly can be transmitted very easi- 
ly. The problem is speed. The phone- 
line limit of 1 200 bps (bits per second) 
is much slower than the usual disk- 
access time. 

One advantage of this system is that 
application programs such as spread- 
sheets running on the remote systems 
can directly use data files on the 
central hard disk. This seems to be an 
ideal way to ensure that everyone in 
a small, scattered work force is using 
the same data, but the transfer times 
for large data files may be uncomfort- 
ably slow. 



systems. One is MS-DOS. which has 
been made highly IBM PC-compati- 
ble. The other is a proprietary system 
called GRiD-OS, which GRiD claims is 
multitasking. They have developed a 
number of business-productivity soft- 
ware packages for this system. 

The GRiDCase comes bundled with 
only MS-DOS version 2.11 and GW- 
BASIC As of this writing, it is unclear 
whether this software will be provided 
on disk or on ROM chips. GRiD's ver- 
sion of MS-DOS includes a special 
utility that lets you connect easily to 
one of GRiD's RANs (remote-access 
networks) (see the text box 'The GRiD 
Server" on this page). 

Service 

GRiD is apparently taking advantage 
of the GRiDCase computers' small 
size by instituting a novel service ar- 
rangement. For an additional fee. be- 
tween $540 and $720, depending on 



your configuration, you can arrange 
to have next-day replacement service. 
Under this policy, if your machine 
breaks down, GRiD claims that it will 
send you a new machine by Federal 
Express to keep until the company 
repairs your machine. 

Summary 

The GRiDCase computer seems to be 
a potent competitor in the briefcase 
computer market. I only had a brief 
chance to look at the machines, but 
I was impressed. Some questions re- 
main, however: Do the machines 
really run all IBM PC software? How 
comfortable is the LCD screen after 
long hours of use? Are the serial and 
printer ports compatible with most 
peripherals? BYTE will try to answer 
these questions in a full system review 
in a later issue. For now, I look forward 
to seeing gas-plasma displays on 
more machines. ■ 



136 BYTE • JULY 1985 





THE FORTIS DH45, THE START OF A NEW BUSINESS GENERATION 

DAISY OR DOTS . . . Have it your way. Don't settle for one or the other.. . get both. 

The revolutionary FORTIS DH45 dual head printer combines the speed and bit 
image graphics of a dot matrix with a high quality daisy wheel for crisp letters. All 
this in one compact unit that saves desk space and at a price that is less than you 
would pay for one printer. It is also compatible with IBM* PC and most other 
personal computers. 

Imagine the advantage of having two heads in one printer. Need graphics or 
condensed print spreadsheets or a rough draft of a long letter, just touch the 
control panel. Ho w about important correspondence to impress a potential client, 
again, just touch the control panel to switch to the letter quality daisy wheel. 

Indeed, 

the old saying TWO HEADS ARE BETTER THAN ONE, really holds true in the DH45. 

"IBM is a registered trademark of IBM Corp. 




with its two heads, produces crisp let 
graphics with a dot matrix print head 



ng /Laundry 



n 



FDRTIS 




.FORTIS 



m 



Dynax,lnc. 



DYNAX, INC. OFFICES w 

■ HEADQUARTERS 6070 Rickenbacker Rd., Commerce, C A 90040 • (213) 727-1227 

■ NEW JERSEY One Madison St., East Rutherford, NJ 07073 • (201) 471-0100 ■ 

■ TEXAS 6012 Campus Circle, Suite 250, Irving, TX 75062 • (214) 257-1700 I 

■ ILLINOIS 533 West Golf Rd., Arlington Heights, IL 60005 • (312) 228-0707 

■ MASSACHUSETTS 400 W. Cummings Park, Suite 5300, Woburn, MA 01801 • (617) 933-8162 I 

■ N. CALIFORNIA 1255 Oak mead Parkway, Sunnyvale, CA 94086 • (408) 730-1712 

Inquiry I35 



YESI Please send me more information on the FORTIS DH45 Dual Head Printer 
Name Title 



Company 



City 



Zip 



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Mail to: DYNAX, INC. Customer Se vice / FORTIS DH45 

6070 Rickenbacker Road, Commerce, CA 90040 



<$* 



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e e 





Avocet turns an ordinary PC 
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Inquiry 43 



to use. We provide you with 
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ment, without additional hardware. 
Your PC's screen becomes a "win- 
dow" into the simulated target 
CPU. Extensive break point, I/O, 
and interrupt facilities make AVSIM 
a truly useful development tool. 
Price $299. 

New TRICE 
in-circuit emulator. 

At last, an affordable in-circuit 
emulator! With the self-powered 
TRICE, you can examine target 
memory and register, set break 
points, single-step, trace and 
more; TRICE recognizes 34 differ- 
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lets you control emulation and 
download code from your terminal 
or PC. Priced from $498. 

AVPROM programmer 
works with any PC. 

The AVPROM programs over 37 
different devices, including 
EPROMS through 27512, CMOS 
and E 2 PROMS, and MPU/EPROM 
combos, using fast "adaptive" 
algorithms. Intelligent, self-con- 
tained units work with any per- 
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GDX driver software... from $429. 
Gang programmers from $979. 
To find out more about Avocet 
software development tools and 
accessories, call us toll-free: 

1-800-448-8500 

(In the U.S. except Alaska 
and Hawaii.) 

VISA and Mastercard accepted. 
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not include shipping and han- 
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tems Inc., PO. Box 490 B, Rockport, 
Maine 04856, (207) 236-9055. 
Telex: 467210 AVOCET CI. 

AVOCET yT^ 
SYSTEMS INC* 

JULY 1985 -BYTE 139 




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140 BYTE • IULY 1985 Inquiry \31 



CIARCIA'S CIRCUIT CELLAR 



Living in a 
Sensible Environment 



by Steve Ciarcia 



A collection of alarm and 
environmental monitoring circuits 




Generally speaking, I try 
to present projects that 
are commercial-quality 
designs. Occasionally, 
they get a bit grandiose 
when the former aero- 
space engineering men- 
tality in me says, "Damn the expense" and 
"Who cares about chip count?" 

For the most part. I work on the basis of 
cost-effectiveness rather than absolute ex- 
pense. Since I was on a very tight schedule 
and the Home Run Control System (HCS) 
of the past three months itself was the main 
emphasis of my efforts, I neglected user- 
constructed sensors and opted entirely for 
commercially available units (motion detec- 
tors, contact switches, etc.). Testing the HCS 
was hard enough without debugging 
perimeter sensors and motion sensors and 
wasting a lot of time by stringing wire. I 
bought off-the-shelf detectors and had them 
professionally installed. This raised overall 
design cost but reduced the installation and 
checkout time considerably. 

While this technique was expedient, it 
neglected a very important contingent of 
the BYTE readership. The hundreds of let- 
ters and pictures I receive each month in- 
dicate that many readers roll their own. 
even on complicated projects like the HCS. 
Deep down, behind the aerospace engi- 
neer, I am a computer hacker at heart and 



empathize with experimenters who want to 
know how to build the environmental sen- 
sors, alarm horns, and signaling devices for 
use with the HCS. 

As an addendum to the previous articles 
on building the HCS, this month I've dug 
through the junk box for a bunch of circuits 
that sense, immobilize, and anesthetize a 
perpetrator. The same sensors can be used 
to provide convenience features like auto- 
matic lighting and environmental control if 
you are less paranoid. Among the circuits 
I've included are infrared and ultrasonic 
interrupted-beam detectors; water, tem- 
perature, voltage, and light sensors; and a 
variety of alarm signaling devices. 

These circuits are presented for experi- 
menters who revel in the pleasure and 
agony of homebrew projects. If you don't 
want to spend the time building these cir- 
cuits, order the necessary components from 
the local alarm installer instead. 

A Contact-Closure World 

The HCS and alarm systems in general are 
designed to perform designated control 

(continued) 

Steve Ciarcia (pronounced "see-ARE-see-ah") is an 
electronics engineer and computer consultant with ex- 
perience in process control, digital design, nuclear in- 
strumentation, and product development. He is the 
author of several books about electronics. You can 
write to him at POB 582. Glastonbury, CT 06033. 



COPYRIGHT © 1985 STEVEN A. CIARCIA. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED. 



JULY 1985 -BYTE 141 



CIRCUIT CELLAR 



+ 12V 



+ 12V 



►1.5K 



10K 

VDC 1<y ° 

o <wv- 



IN 



10K 

1% 



ffi 7^;o.i m f 



n 



IK 




I " 

<1.5K 



€ 



2N2907 



m 



N.O. 



/77 



/?7 

Zl 1N962B TEMPERATURE 
COMPENSATED 
1N753 GENERAL USE 

RANGE SET BY R x 2Kft / VOLT -10K& 
0-10 VOLTS = 10K 



ft? 



10K 

TRIGGER 

SET 



>| RELAY 
1N4002 \\ 200ft 



m 










CONTACT 
CLOSURE TO 

COMPUTER 



Figure 1: An overvoltage sensor. Undervoltage can be detected by reversing the connections of IC1 pins 2 and 3. 



functions as the result of specific in- 
put activities. They rely upon contact 
closures to communicate these ac- 
tivities. Rather than monitor the 
physical surroundings in absolute 
terms, contact-closure-type alarm and 
control systems respond by sensing 
"limits." 

A limit sensor is just that. If an event 
is to occur when the temperature in 
a room exceeds 85° (perhaps turning 
on the air conditioner), we could 
employ a temperature limit switch set 
at 85°. Knowing that it is presently 
71.4 5° in the room is unnecessary in- 
formation. Only when the tempera- 
ture is at or above 85° will it indicate 
that the set-point limit has been 
reached. This simple limit switch is 
called a thermostat and functions 
much like the one you probably have 
on your wall. Below 85° it is open, 
and above 85° it is closed (neglecting 
hysteresis). In situations involving a 
temperature span, two devices are 
employed, one sensing high limit and 
the other sensing low limit. The 

[continued) 



+ 15V 

A 



4.7 K 
-Wr- 



50K 
Vhigh 



m 



SET POINT 



0V TO 12V 



1 



10K 
-wv- 



O.l^F 



+ 15V 
t 
< cLnu 



4.7K 

-Wr 



50K 
Vlow 
/^SET POINT 



+ 15V 




+ 15V 




-15V 



1N914 



2,2K 
* — vw— 



1N914 





Vhigh* v in >v low 

2N2222 



Figure 2: A window-comparator voltage monitor. 



142 BYTE • IULY 1985 



CIRCUIT CELLAR 



+ 12V 
IOjuF £ 



+ 12V 






N/C- 



O 



°" 5V ;£).01 

INPUT 



"1 



/qxO.ui^i 



1.2K 



3.9K | 



m 



___1J 



+ 5V 






V+ 

MODE 

SIG IN 

LM3914 

RH1 
REF 0UT 

REFadj 

GND 
RLO 



18 



r 

-| #1 OPTOISOLATOR |— OOUT #1 
I n— J +12V 

1 2\ " 



#3 



16 



15 



-w— #4 

m # 5 



inO 



14 



13 



12 



11 



£ *' 

® * 8 
IB *9 I 



+ 5V 
A 



4.7K 



-c 



i 

i 
-i i 



TIL111 



I 



+ 12V 
A 



O 
OUT 



T_ 



I 



LED ON TO 

TTL- LEVEL "* 

INTERFACE 



_1 



10 



#10 OPTOISOLATOR j—O OUT #10 

TTL OUTPUT TO 
I I COMPUTER OR HCS 

rh 



Figure 3: A dot! bar-graph generator used as a multiple window comparator for analog inputs. 



O 



115 VAC 



<o 



BLOWN-FUSE 
DETECTOR 



FUSE 
-Aa- 



FUSE 



20^F 
200VDC 



■3h 



2.5 K 

5W 

— vw- 



COMPUTER 
POWER SUPPLY 



ALARM SYSTEM 
POWER SUPPLY 



AUXILIARY SYSTEMS 
POWER SUPPLY 



1N4004 (3) 



"TRANSFORMER PRIMARIES 



24V RELAY 



In.o. 



■o 



CONTACT CLOSURE 
TO COMPUTER 






Figure 4: A blown- fuse detector. 



JULY 1985 • BYTE 143 



CIRCUIT CELLAR 



operating range is the area between 
the two sensor trip points. 

Thermostats are bimetallic contacts 
that open or close depending upon 
temperature. The key word is contacts. 
Virtually all alarm sensors are contact- 
closure output. The magnetic reed 
switches on your doorways or the mo- 
tion detectors in the hall all utilize 
open- or closed-contact connection to 
the alarm system to indicate logic 1 
or levels. When the monitoring sen- 
sor's output contacts are wired be- 
tween an HCS input pin and ground, 
the HCS "sees" open contacts as logic 
1 inputs. A pull-up resistor at the in- 
put provides sufficient current so that 
inputs don't float but are connected 



to a voltage source that makes it a 
logic 1. When the external contacts 
are closed, the current supplied 
through the pull-up resistor is shunted 
to ground, and the input "sees" a 
logic 0. 

Contact-closure-type sensors are 
frequently confused with discrete- 
level output sensors. The former 
designate physical contacts that make 
or break (close or open) at the limit 
set point, while the latter have 
discrete voltage-level changes (-12 
volts |V| for off and + 12 V for on, for 
example) to indicate the two logic 
states. The confusion comes about 
because both types have discrete 
logic-level changes as outputs and 



most control systems accept either 
type. By using actual relay contacts, 
however, the sensor is electrically 
isolated from the control system. 
Hazardous conditions that may be 
present in the environment are thus 
not passed back to the control 
system. , 

Application is the primary dif- 
ference between discrete-level/ 
contact-closure output sensors (like 
thermostatic switches) and con- 
tinuously variable-analog or multi bit- 
digital sensing systems. A varistor is 
a continuously variable temperature 
sensor that can be used in a circuit 
to produce an output voltage that is 
proportional to temperature (perhaps 



110V/AC 



LINE 3 



R SHUNT 

o.oni 



LINE 2 



"<SHUNT 

o.om 



LINE 1 
















r-^ DC OUT 
~L— ? LINE 2 



J— ^ DC OUT 
"L-"^ LINE 1 



Figure 5: An isolated current monitor for a high-current load. The circuit as shown monitors 220 V AC from 25 
to 1 00 amperes. Us output is DC 



144 BYTE • JULY 1985 



CIRCUIT CELLAR 



0-21.2 V to indicate 0-212°). If, by 
using a voltage comparator, we com- 
pare and switch logic states when the 
varistor-circuit output is equal to or 
exceeds 8.5 V, we have produced an 
85° limit switch. The control system 
knows only that it is above or below 
this limit but not how much. If the 
control system's action is also a sim- 
ple contact-closure output (light 
on/off, fan on/off, alarm dialer and 
horn on/off, etc.), perhaps how much 
is unimportant. 

When the application dictates that 
we continuously modify the control 
decision as a function of how much, 
we must use something other than the 
discrete limit sensor. If the air- 
conditioning fans can be run slowly 
at 80° and increasingly faster at 
higher temperatures, a proportional 
control loop using a high-resolution 
analog-to-digital (A/D) converter could 
be used to monitor the thermistor's 
absolute value and control the fans. 

Resolution is the bottom line. 
Contact-closure output devices are 
single-bit low-resolution items. 
Reading the thermistor through an 
A/D converter merely designates 
more discrete points of knowledge 
where control actions may be trig- 
gered. If you are making simple con- 
trol decisions based on a few set 
points that are not continuously 
changing, however, it hardly makes 



sense to read a thermistor through a 
12-bit A/D converter and compare the 
readings to a few limit values. It makes 
sense to compare an analog output 
value with an analog set-point level in 
the hardware of the monitoring 
device. In an age of computer overkill, 
not everything needs to be digitized. 

WINDOW COMPARATORS 

The majority of the circuits I've in- 
cluded in this article are of this type. 
Some are designed to continuously 



monitor conditions in the environ- 
ment (heat, light, moisture, etc.) and 
close or open contacts at presettable 
limits. A number of the sensing cir- 
cuits are simply analog monitors that 
have output voltages proportional to 
the input stimulus. To acquire these 
signals with a discrete input-level con- 
troller like the HCS, they are con- 
nected to a separate voltage com- 
parator, which compares the output 
with a preset limit. 

[continued] 



+ 12V 



?10K 



LIGHT 



A1N4002 



CdS 



RELAY 
200& 



HZ> CONTACT 

CLOSURE TO 
.COMPUTER 



/K\2N2222 



^SENSITIVITY 
ADJUST 



I 



Figure 6: A light sensor. 






+ 12V 



+ 12V 






f 200K 
LEVEL 
ADJUST 



U2V 



►10K 



J_ T 

jfclN4002 i 



LIGHT- 



LENS 




CdS 



+ 5V 



N.O. f __^ 

~^— > CONTACT 
— °— | CLOSURE TO 

I 1 | — ^ COMPUTER 

RELAY 
200& 



►10K 



ft? 




Figure 7: A high-sensitivity light detector. 



JULY 1985 • BYTE 145 



CIRCUIT CELLAR 



H2V 
A 



m 



LAMP 



g| 



+ 12V 



<*100K 
^ SENSITP 




CONTACT 
CLOSURE TO 
COMPUTER 



-BEAM- 



TIVITY 
ADJUST 2N2222 



IN) 



(_ ] ^-J 2N2222 



RELAY 
200.fi, 



CdS 



\— [ FISISFS-/ 



^ 



Figure 8: A simple light-beam alarm for doorways. 



+ 12V 
A 



+ 12V 



470& 



LIGHT 




ilN4002 1 



N.O. 

* ° O CONTACT 

-J— H °— | CLOSURE TO 

I L__T-\ COMPUTER 



RELAY 
200ft 



r 




Figure 9: A day/night sensor. 



The least complicated comparator 
is shown in figure I . Configured as an 
overvoltage detector (or undervoltage 
if you reverse a few wires), the circuit 
closes the output contacts when the 
input exceeds the trigger set point. 
The next more sophisticated com- 
parator is the window comparator. 
Shown in figure 2, the window com- 
parator has both an upper and lower 
limit. An input voltage between these 
limits activates the output LED (light- 
emitting diode). A relay or opto- 
isolator can be substituted in place of 
the LED to provide a contact-closure 



or discrete-level-shifted input to the 
control system. 

If more than one window is required 
(perhaps different things occur at 50°, 
85°, and 120°). additional com- 
parators are needed. A conveniently 
packaged source of 10 linearly spaced 
comparators is an LM3914 dot/bar- 
graph generator. Shown in figure 3, 
the LM3914 is configured as a 0- to 
5-V 10-stage window comparator. 
Each LED represents a 0.5-V increase 
in input. If the desired set-point limit 
is 3. 5 V from a temperature monitor 
(shown later in figure 18), the HCS 



would be connected to LED #7, which 
comes on at 3.5 V (an optoisolator in 
series with the indicating LED level 
shifts the output so that it is compati- 
ble with the HCS). 

Whatever the source of the analog 
signal in the remaining circuits, you 
now have the means to convert it to 
a contact-closure or discrete-level in- 
put required by the HCS and other 
alarm/control systems. 

POWER MONITORING 

An important consideration in 
industrial-control applications is 
power monitoring. At the very mini- 
mum, it is often necessary to know 
whether a piece of equipment is out 
of service due to a blown fuse or if 
power demand exceeds a desirable 
limit. A blown-fuse detector can notify 
an operator, while limit switches trig- 
gered by AC line current can be used 
for load shedding. 

Figure 4 is a blown-fuse detector 
that can be built into a power strip for 
convenience. If any fuse opens, the 
relay contacts close. Figure 5 is an 
isolated AC monitor. The output of 
the 2 84) will be an AC voltage propor- 
tional to the current flowing through 
the shunt resistor. The circuitry at- 
tached to the 284J's output is an AC- 
to-DC converter, which allows this cir- 
cuit to be connected to one of the 

[continued] 



146 BYTE • IULY 1985 



CIRCUIT CELLAR 



+ 3V 






RESISTORS: 1/2W. 5% 



ztsx 



330K 
| — vw *■ 



100& 

2N2905 



TTL 
OUTPUT 



0.47 M F 
25V 



€> 



+ 5V 



4f 



10ft 



. , 2N2219 



_500/xF 
10V 



INFRARED 

LED 

GE-TYPE 

LED 56 



4.7K 
-AAA + 



■o 



2N2222 




GENERAL 
ELECTRIC 
L14F2 




0.33/xF 



FOCUSING 
LENS 



>2.2K 



47K 
-VW- 



/77 



rh 



Figure 10: An infrared intrusion alarm. The system can be used over a range of 10 to 50 feet. 






9V 
4 



' . 



22K 



ULTRASONIC 
TRANSMITTER 



W> 






IK 
-wv- 



;i80pF 



0.01 M F 



|47K 



;330pF 




2N2222 



100ft 



10/iF 

; iov 



Tl AND T2 
ADJUSTABLE 1-3 mH 



NOTE: THE ULTRASONIC TRANSDUCER 
USED IN THE TRANSMITTER AND 
RECEIVER MUST HAVE IDENTICAL f 



m 



SWITCH CLOSURE 
TO ALARM 



+9 TO 12V 

6 



6 



J2.2K 



0.001 pF 



220K 



ULTRASONIC 
RECEIVER 

f =40kHz 




2.2K 




2N3906 
OR 

2N4917 



0.0047 M F 

-)l 



2N3904 



2.7K 5 



10K 
' CENTER 
FREQUENCY 
ADJUST 



RELAY 



> 330ft 



LED 



IN +V OUT 

I NE567 

TONE DECODER 

R1.C1 GND C2 



-*- 10 M F 
^ 10V 



R1.C1 GND C2 C3_ 

-4 ^pO.i^F i- 



^U.uua/ M i- sj^ 



2.7K 



;0.02^F 



;0.01/xF 



10VDC 



Figure 1 1 : An ultrasonic transmitter and receiver. 



JULY 1985 • B YTE 147 



CIRCUIT CELLAR 



three DC-input window comparators 
already discussed. 

Interrupted-Beam Detectors 

Whether they are used for alarm 
monitoring or convenience control 
interrupted-beam detectors are the 
most reliable sensors for perceiving 
objects or people moving through a 
specific line of sight. These devices 
consist of two components: a trans- 
mitter and a receiver. The transmitter 
and receiver are located within line of 
sight of each other on opposite sides 
of the protected area. An infrared or 



ultrasonic beam is then directed from 
the transmitter to the receiver. Pro- 
vided that the receiver always 
receives this beam, its alarm output 
remains unenergized. If the beam is 
interrupted by something or someone 
passing between the transmitter and 
receiver, the output contacts close 
and a control action may be 
generated. 

Interrupted-beam detectors are 
most often infrared or ultrasonic (mo- 
tion detectors, which 1 am not ad- 
dressing, use infrared, ultrasonic, and 
microwave technologies). The applica- 



tion generally dictates which type of 
sensor is used, with ambient-light 
levels, acoustic pollution, and cost the 
determining factors. A low-cost in- 
frared unit can be mounted across a 
doorway, for example, but would be 
saturated by sunlight if used across a 
driveway to sense incoming cars. 
Depending upon the distance be- 
tween the transmitter and receiver 
and the ambient-light levels, you can 
choose from items like simple re- 
sistive photo cells, phototransistors, 
photodiodes, lenses, and LED or in- 

[continued) 



a ) TRANSMITTER 



Rl 
820K 



PB1 



"1" 



PE> 



IC1 
CD4011 



R2 
390K 



PB2 



"2" 



R3 
200K 



PB3 



"4" 




R12 

10K 

FREQUENCY 

ADJUST 



Dl 
1N4148 



-*y/(— 



+ 9V 
R7 A 
100K 
HA/W- 



C4 

O.lyuF 



1 



RST 

IC2 
NE555 



TRG 
THR 



vcc 

OUT 
CTLV 



DIS GND 



R8 
8.2K 



■C7 

k 0.0022 M F 
MYLAR 



/77 



-)h 



C5 
0.01/iF 



m 



JPl -INTERNAL CODE 
JP2 -EXTERNAL DATA 



+ 9V C3 
4 0.1 /iF 

-31 




1 



14 



7 IC1 

CD4011 



R9 
IK 



+ 9V 
A 



C6 
33 0>xF 






2 



TIL39 

/ 

\LED 3 
^J T1L220 

LED 2 
TIL39 



RIO ^Rll 

47tt S 220ft 

1/2W j 



T 












*NOTE:THESE INFRARED TRANSMITTER AND RECEIVER CIRCUITS WERE DESCRIBED IN THE APRIL 1982 CIRCUIT CELLAR. 
THEY ARE REFERED TO AS THE IR01 INFRARED TRANSMITTER/RECEIVER KIT. 



Figure 12: The 1R01 \nfrared TYansrnitter/Receiver. 



148 BYTE • IULY 1985 



CIRCUIT CELLAR 



b) RECEIVER* 



+v 



EXTERNAL 
OUTPUT 
+v ENABLE 



CI 
10^F 



X 



-)hr 



k«. 



lR3 
?4.7K 



9 



Dl 

TIL413 

PHOTODIODE 



11 



R5 
10K 



CENTER 

FREQUENCY 

ADJUST 

;R2 
' 4.7K 



+V 



>R4 
I 22K 



10 



C12 
10 M F 



"^1 



16 



ASD VCOt 



OE 



IC1 
SN76832 



Vcc 



DATA OUT 



Al IN 

A10 Al OUT A2 IN A2D A2D 



•C2 
'lOOpF 



13 



C4 



12 



WH 



. ( 0.047 M F 



■ C3 
'lO^F 



•C5 
'0.01/xF 



VCO TC 



LOOP FILTER 
LOCK 
Fl LTER 



-C6 
"0.1 /t F 



-C7 
V 0.047^F 



ft? 



■C8 
v 470pF 



R7 
10K 



■C9 
k 0.1 M F 



[R9 IR11 

>220& >4.7& 



LED 1 

TIL 2 20 



*■ Ql ^^r 

2N2222(2) 



Q2 



TTL OUT TO 
COMPUTER 
OR HCS 

t — O 




Zl 

1N4733 



TlO, t F 

-irCio |r6 

k 0.033^F T IK 



SEE NOTE ON FIGURE 12a 






c) ALTERNATE 
TRANSMITTER 
CIRCUIT 




10K 

FREQUENCY +j 

ADJUST ' 


1 


2N2907 

f\ TIL39 
t) TIL39 
;47ft 






< 
n 






4 


8 


tL 

^rslO/iF 
3 180ft /p^ 


r 7 


RST V cc 
DIS 

OUT 
NE555 
(SET FOR 
40 kHz) 
TRG 

THR 

6ND CTLV 


1.8K 
, 2 




j 6 




^0.0022 M F 
7 


n 


5 
^0.0 

7 


tj*F j 



JULY 1985 • BYTE 149 



CIRCUIT CELLAR 




+ 5V 



r ___L ( 

..I 






•0- 



^>s 



I 



D>Hn 



ICl 
74LS14 



IC2 ICl 

74LS00 74LS14 JC2 

1. v IS. 74LS00 



O^ 



+ 5V 



-;p- J 



IC2 
b | 74LS00 



+ 5V 



t 



100 pF 



+ 5V 
>2.2K 



10 



11 



Vcc Cext B E xt/Cext 

IC4 Q 

74121 

Al A 2 GND 



V CC CLR 
K Q 

r IC3 
% 7473 



CND 



X 



13 




TTL LOGIC-LEVEL 
OUTPUTS TO 
CONTROL SYSTEM 






Figure 13: A direction indicator. QI and Q2 are mounted a distance from each other along a hallway. The LEDs are mounted 
on the opposite wall. 



candescent modulated or unmodu- 
lated transmitters. 

An entire book could be written ex- 
plaining the design rules and the ex- 
ceptions to the rules. The circuits I've 
included are general in nature. In- 
candescent sources with cadmium- 
sulfide light-sensing units (see figures 
6, 7, 8. and 9) are short-distance low- 
ambient-light devices (which need 
shielding of the transmitter and 
receiver in opaque tubes) intended 
for doorways. Improved performance 
is obtained by switching to LEDs and 
phototransistors (figure 10). 

Long distances (10 to 50 feet) can 
be accommodated only by modulat- 
ing the transmitted beam so that it is 



distinctly different from the surround- 
ing noise. Figures 1 1 and 1 2 demon- 
strate two modulated-beam systems. 
The infrared unit in figure 12 is the 
IR01 Infrared Transmitter/Receiver 
from the April 1982 Circuit Cellar. 
While designed primarily for remote 
control and 300-bps (bits per second) 
wireless data transmission, simply in- 
serting JP2 and leaving the external 
data input open causes it to transmit 
continuously. The output of the 
receiver can then be connected to the 
control system's input. 

One variation on a theme for the 
doorway sensor is the circuit in figure 
13. In this application, two phototran- 
sistors (with separate light sources 



across from them) are mounted in the 
doorway. As someone passes through 
the doorway, one beam is always in- 
terrupted before the other. The addi- 
tional circuitry determines the order 
of interruption and indicates the 
direction a person was passing 
through the doorway. Treating this 
output as two different discrete-level 
inputs, the control system could ini- 
tiate different actions depending 
upon the direction of travel. 

We can determine whether the ob- 
ject passing through the doorway was 
a dog, a child, or an adult if we modify 
another previous Circuit Cellar proj- 
ect. In October 1984 I presented the 

[continued) 



150 BYTE • JULY 1985 



CIRCUIT CELLAR 



2.2K 
-a/W — 



IC1 
74LS02 



:^H> 



"1 



cO 



j «10H2 
^f 



I 1 

-fc 



20 M F 



50kHz 
POLAROID 
ULTRASONIC 
TRANSDUCER 







470/^F 



Tl 

SONAR -RANGING 

MODULE 



7 



1 



* TRANSDUCER AND RANGING MODULE 
WERE EXPLAINED IN THE OCTOBER 
1984 CIRCUIT CELLAR. THESE TWO 
PIECES ARE REFERRED TO AS THE 
TI01 ULTRASONIC RANGER KIT. 



25K 

SHORT- 
DISTANCE 
10,,F SET 

14 



+ 5V 



I 



IC2a 
74LS123 



10^F 



n 



25K +5V 

LONG- * 
DISTANCE T 

set y\ 




10 5 



CLEAR 

B 

A 



IC2b 
74LS123 



+ 5V 



CLEAR 
ID 



10 



I C3 
74LS175 



2Q 



3Q 



3Q 



&6.8K 



1 



OUTPUTS TO 
COMPUTER OR HCS 

DIST<SHORT LIMIT 

E> 



-#- 



220^, 



LONG >DIST>SHORT 

O 



-®-^ 



10 



DIST>L0NG 

o 



m 



220& 



;o.i m f 



GREEN = DISTANCE < SHORT 
YELLOW = LONG > DISTANCE > SHORT 
RED = DISTANCE >LONG 



Figure 14a: The T101 Ultrasonic Ranger. 




Photo la: The Ultrasonic Ranger project with added components Photo lb: The circuit in photo \a enclosed in a box over a 
in figure 14 is configured as a discrete-level distance detector. doorway to detect people or small animals walking through it. 



JULY 1985 -BYTE 151 



CIRCUIT CELLAR 



Using the Ultrasonic 
Ranger with some 
timing windows added, 
we can ascertain 
specific distances 
from 1.5 to 35 feet. 



TIOI Ultrasonic Ranger, which is based 
on a Ifexas Instruments sonar-ranging 
module. Using these basic com- 
ponents and adding timing windows 
to sense limit points, we can ascertain 
and indicate specific distances (the 
ranging module can detect distances 
from 1.5 to 35 feet). 

Shown in figure 14a, the circuit is 
relatively uncomplicated. A IO-hertz 
oscillator (ICI) initializes the ultrasonic 
transmission and triggers the two one- 
shots. IC2a has its period set to the 
short-distance limit, and IC2b is set to 
the long-distance limit (1.8 millisec- 
onds per foot). When the echo is 
received, its leading edge clocks the 
outputs of the one-shots into register 
IC3. If the distance out and back to 
the object is farther than the period 
of the one-shots, they time out and in- 
dicate a zero. This timing is shown in 
figure 14b. The three resulting outputs 
are distance < short limit, distance > 
long limit, and long limit > distance 
> short limit. 

If the circuit is mounted in the top 
of a 7-foot doorway, with the short 
limit set for 2 feet (5 feet from the 
floor) and the long limit set for 4!/2 feet 
(2 Vi feet from the floor), we can ob- 
tain significant information about the 
movement through the doorway (see 
photos la and lb). If a person taller 
than 5 feet passes through the sen- 
sor, we will get an indication of 
distance < short limit since the per- 
son's head will be less than 2 feet 
from the 7-foot-high sensor. If a 4-foot 
child walks through the doorway, the 
long limit > distance > short limit 

{continued) 



SHORT 

MIDDLE 

LONG 

"GREEN" 

"YELLOW" 

"RED" 


INIT 

IC2Q 

ICI 

IC2b 

ECHO 

IC3 

IC3 

IC3 


Q 
10 
Q 

1Q 
2Q 
30 








_l 


i i 


i 




1 1 


i i 




m 




1 1 








1 


i i 


i 








r 


i i 


i 














i 


i i 


i 















Figure 14b: Highllow-limit ranging-sensor timing diagram. 



+ 12V 
A 



+ 12V 
A 



& 



10K 




Tr 

THERMISTOR 

10K NOMINAL 

25°C 



10K 



A1N4002 \ 



N.O. p ^ 

*~~° L- > CONTACT 

CLOSURE TO 
COMPUTER 



+ 5V 



RELAY 

COIL 

200& 




2N2222 



Figure 15: An over-temperature detector. 



+ 12V 



+ 12V 
A 



;10K 



10K 

SET POINT 

ADJUST 



+ 5V 




+ 12V 
A 



1.8K 



1.8K 



© 



2N2907 



N.O. 
1» * (Z> CONTACT 

CLOSURE TO 
COMPUTER 



(THERMISTOR $ 10K 
10K NOMINAL 
I 25°C 

m 




m 



Figure 16: An under-temperature alarm. 



152 BYTE • JULY 1985 



CIRCUIT CELLAR 







. 






2N2907 



^ 1N4148 

DIODE JUNCTION 
TEMPERATURE 
DETECTORS (2) 



J3.3K 




O CONTACT 

CLOSURE TO 
COMPUTER 



Figure 17: A differential-input temperature detector. 



+ 15V 



;ik 



3.3K- 




100K 
-^wv — 



20K 
LINEARITY 



-*pt- 



551K 



2K 



k 



25K 



51K 



>75K 



>51K 




Ov 



OUT 

0-5V 

FOR 

0-100°C 



1N825 
■ 6.2V 
REFERENCE ZENER 
T c = 0.002% /°C 



SENSITIVITY 



ft? 



Figure 1 8: A so\\dstate temperature sensor. 



JULY 1985 • BYTE 153 



CIRCUIT CELLAR 



will go high since the child's height of 
4 feet is greater than the short- 
distance limit yet less than the long- 
distance limit. When a 2-foot dog 
walks through (indicated by the inter- 



rupted-beam sensors at the 2 -foot 
level), the output will indicate distance 
> long limit. 

While this is a cute application for 
the ranging sensor, I anticipate that 



this limit-switch modification would 
find greater application as a level in- 
dicator in grain storage bins or oil 
tanks. Few people are motivated to in- 

[continued) 



115VAC 

99 



TO COMPUTER 
NORMALLY CLOSED 
ALARM INPUT 



HONEYWELL-TYPE 
TC49A SMOKE 
DETECTOR 



WHT 



00 



BLUE 



YELLOW 



+ *: 35 VOLTS 




IJ 




, NORMALLY CLOSED 

NORMALLY OPEN 
(SHOWN IN ENER- 
GIZED STATE) 



RELAY 48VDC 2500ft 

TYPE-. ALLIED CONTROLS 
T154-C-C 
OR EQUIVALENT 



180° 

NORMALLY OPEN 
TEMPERATURE 
SENSOR 



140° 

NORMALLY OPEN 

TEMPERATURE 

SENSOR 



Figure 19: A srnoke-and-heat detector. Additional sensors can be added in parallel 



< SENSITIVITY 
• — vw- 



5.6K 



PROBES 









H-,0 




""C> CONTACT 

CLOSURE TO 
COMPUTER 



Figure 20: A water-activated sensor. 



154 BYTE • JULY 1985 



CIRCUIT CELLAR 



+9 TO 12V 






-J-O.OOViF 

T i 



COM 



2K 



: ■ 470 



LM1830 

FLUID DETECTOR 



13 



-)h 



0.05/xF 



U_ 20^F 

"~ 15V 






| v/////////////////xffl . 



s 



§^^^^^^^ I 






12 



N.O. 



^Z>. 



TO ALARM 

INPUT 



1N9H 



CLOSED CONTACTS 
INDICATE WATER 
PRESENCE 



n 

10 m 




1H111Z 



WATER SENSOR 
l/16in. 



k 



D, 



■■ ^\\\\\\\\\\y\\\^^ fc 



V/. 



ra _ — _J 



| V//////////////////M 



1 ^\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\^ 



Figure 21: Tfc fluid-level sensor uses an LM1830 fluid-level detector chip. The detector grid can be cut from a sheet of copper. 



IK 

10W 



40/*F 
250V 



-)\t 



■ 115VAC 



1N4004 

— W- 



I 



BOOK 
FLASH RATE 



. 40 M F 
'250V 



FT-1 
XENON 
FLASH 

LAMP 



Jk 



TRIGGER 
TRANSFORMER 



I56K 



(J) NE2 A^ 

N^ G / 200PI 



-1 M F 
MOOV 



'SECONDARY 
■ 4KV 



"srJ 



2A 



Figure 22: A 115-V AC xenon strobe light. 



JULY 1985 -BYTE 155 



CIRCUIT CELLAR 



+ 12V 



t 



1N4002 



2N2222 



> 470ft 








TTL INPUT 



LOGIC = OFF 
LOGIC 1 =ON 



SW1 

MANUAL 

ON 



3A 
FUSE 



J 



3K 
5W 



150ft SK3004 

1/2 W 



SK3016{4) 




Aj 



W 



120VAC 



680 
1W 



2.2K 
1/2W 



-50 M F 
k 35V 




-50/xF 
"150V 



NE83 

r@- 



4.7K 

1/2W 

— wv — 



47K 

1/2W 

-vw — 



150-300W 
FLOOD LAMP 



KD2100 



22K 

1/2W 

-WV — 



10K 
2W 



-yA- 



LINEAR POT 
FLASH-RATE 
ADJUST 



Figure 23: A 115-V AC incandescent lamp flasher. 



470K 



ALARM r— s. 
ENABLE UP* 



JjJT> 



LOGIC 1 =ON 
LOGIC = OFF 



I 



> 470K 



1C1 
CD4011 



0.001 M F 



3t \ O.OOJ 

-gE)4-» 



I 



1M 



+ 5V 



tu 



IC2 

CD4016 
INPUT OUTPUT 

CONTROL 



^J 



+V BATTERY (6-12V) 



iQ 8ft 



4.7K 



€1 



SPEAKER 




MJE1103 
DARLINGTON 




470K 



0.4 7 h F 



-31- 






Figure 24: A highllow-frequency beeper. 



156 BYTE • JULY 1985 



CIRCUIT CELLAR 



100K 









<;^ 






FROM 
COMPUTER °~ 

GROUND = ON 
OPEN=OFF 










► 22K 



820K 
<» vw — 



-3h 




M2V 
A 



jr~i 

\ \ u | WARBLf 

d ^O • » OUTPUT 
/ ^ I AMPLIF 



TO 
IER 






1^1 



Figure 25: A warble tone generator. 



I WATT 



+ 12V 






10 WATT 






20 WATT 



12V 



2N2222 



<**€) 



m 



+ 12V 
A 



1N4002 



^o 



W8& 
SPE 



_ r /1100^ 
~j| SPEA 
^-\|<1W 



100ft 
SPEAKER 



?100ft 



rh 



SPEAKER 



2N2907 



nn 



o-SMf) 



-Li SPE 



22.fi, 




TIP31 V S / 

OR 

2N3054 



TIP31 

OR 

2N3054 




SPEAKER 



: o 



2N3055 



i 






C1K 



*HEATSINK REQUIRED 



/77 



Figure 26: Power output stages /or tfie design in figure 2 5. 



)ULY 1985 -BYTE 157 



CIRCUIT CELLAR 



stall automatic control systems for 
their dogs. 

Temperature Measurement 

An important ingredient in any en- 
vironmental control system is tem- 
perature monitoring. While you can 
always use bimetallic thermostats, 
they are gross-measurement devices 
that exhibit a lot of hysteresis. An 
alternative to bimetallic switches is a 
thermistor that triggers a relay closure 
when a temperature is above or 
below a precisely selected limit (see 
figures 15. 16, and 17). 

Thermistors and bimetallic junctions 
are not the only materials that exhibit 
predictable effects due to tempera- 
ture. Diode and transistor junction 
voltages (typically 0.7 V) vary with 
temperature. Using two diodes (figure 
17), we can create a differential- 
temperature switch. When the tem- 
perature applied to one diode 
becomes greater (by the amount 
determined in the balance adjust- 
ment) than the other, the output relay 
closes. A typical application is a win- 
dow fan that automatically turns on 
when the temperature inside be- 
comes greater than that outside. 

This technique can be expanded 
even more to produce an accurate 
solid-state measuring instrument. As 



shown in figure 18, the circuit pro- 
duces a 0-5-V output for 0-100° 
Celsius. Connecting this circuit to the 
window detector in figure 3 allows the 
control system to take a variety of 
control actions depending upon the 
temperature. 

While on the subject of temperature 
measurement, we shouldn't forget 
fires, since they produce high tem- 
peratures and are definitely cause for 
a control system to take action. Figure 

19 illustrates a combined smoke-and- 
heat detector. 

Water Detectors 

If you live in New England, springtime 
is synonymous with water. While a 
worst-case water-sensing technique is 
to step into it, one variation is a water- 
detector circuit. 
The simple circuit shown in figure 

20 senses lowered resistance between 
the probes when immersed in water. 
A better circuit, figure 21, uses a 
special LM1830 fluid-level detector 
chip. 

Bells and Whistles 

If you are using your HCS primarily as 
an alarm system, getting the proper 
attention when it triggers is a neces- 
sity. After triggering the silent alarm, 
you may decide not to be so silent. 



12V 

A 






>10K 



100 M F 
,15V 



56K 



-i-100 M F 
^15V 



;0.033/iF 






68-100mH 



m 



- J -0.22/^F 



>180K 



€ 



2N2222 



8.0. SPEAKER 
6 WATTS 



__ 2N3055 



M70& 



m 



* HEATS1NK REQUIRED 



Figures 22 through 27 will definitely 
liven up the neighborhood. 

In Conclusion 

Thank you for helping me clean out 
my junk box. Now you have the 
means to bend, fold, spindle, and 
mutilate anything exceeding 5 ] /2 feet 
high and 98.6° passing from east to 
west through a doorway. Alternative- 
ly anything shorter than 2 feet at 101 ° 
should trigger the automatic dog- 
biscuit dispenser. I say this somewhat 
tongue in cheek, but you don't get the 
mail I get. 

Circuit Cellar Feedback 

This month's feedback is on page 391. 

Next Month 

I'll show you how to construct the Cir- 
cuit Cellar BASIC-52 computer/con- 
troller board. ■ 

The following items are available from 

The Micromint Inc. 
561 Willow Ave. 
Cedarhurst. NY 11516 
(800) 645-3479 for orders 
(516) 374-6793 for information 

1. infrared remote-control transmitter/re- 
ceiver kit IR01. $49 

2. Ultrasonic-ranging system experimenter's 
kit, including SN28827 ranging module, 
50-kHz Polaroid electrostatic transducer, and 
data manual .T101. $60 

3. A 40-kHz ultrasonic transducer 

XDR0I. $6 each 

All the above items are shipped postpaid in 
the continental United States. Add $6 for 
overseas. New York residents please include 
8 percent sales tax. Connecticut residents 
please include 7.5 percent sales tax. 

Editor's Note: Steve often refers to previous 
Circuit Cellar articles. Most of these past ar- 
ticles are available in book form from BYTE 
Books, McGraw-Hill Book Company, POB 
400, Hightstown, Nj 082 50. 

Ciarcia's Circuit Cellar, Volume I covers articles 
in BYTE from September 1977 through 
November 1978. Volume II covers December 
1978 through June 1980. Volume III covers July 
1980 through December 1981. Volume IV 
covers January 1982 through June 1983. 



Figure 27: A siren. 



To receive a complete list of Ciarcia's Cir- 
cuit Cellar project kits, circle 100 on the 
reader-service inquiry card at the back of 
the magazine. 



158 BYTE • IULY 1985 



AMAZING D\LSY 



NOW! FULL SIZE, FULL FEATURE, LETTER QUALITY AT ONLY $353 



If you have been searching for a letter 
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We found the printer which has all the 
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FEATURES GALORE 

This printer has it all. To start with, it 
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Proportional Spacing. There is a Select 
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In this manner, each page can have iden- 
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Daisy 1120 is 



printing. The built in 2K buffer frees up 
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At 15 CPI you can print 165 
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The Daisy 1120 uses the Diablo 
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Not only is the hardware completely 
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The printer has a set of rear switches 
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What's a database syste 

doing with a 




1. Relational capabilities. 



2. Variable-length fields. 



3. Multi- valued fields. 





4. Subrecords. 



5. Interactive report writer. 



6. Calculations. 





7. Sophisticated data features. 8. Options key. 



9. File conversion. 





Cornerstone is a trademark of Infocom, Inc. IBM is a registered trademark of International Business Machines Corporation. 1-2-3 is a registered 
trademark of Lotus Development Corporation. Tandy is a registered trademark of Tandy Corporation. dBASE II is a registered trademark of Ashton-Tate. 
Micro/Answer is a trademark of Informatics General Corporation. PFS is a registered trademark of Software Publishing Company. 

160 BYTE • ]ULY 1985 



m for non-programmers 
U this power? 



Cornerstone makes it easy 

to build sophisticated 

applications. 

Whether you program or not, you 
expect your personal computer to 
handle a wide variety of complex 
jobs. Simply and easily. That's why 
we designed Cornerstone™ to deliver 
all the power of a high-end relational 
CO database system into the hands of 
professionals who don't want to 
spend needless time programming. 

The key is flexibility. 

To begin with, Cornerstone will grow 
with you as your needs change. 
Which means you don't have to plan 
every last detail of your database in 
advance. Instead, you can quickly 
and easily make changes anywhere 
and at any time— even with data 
already in the database. You can add 
a file, field or index, change a report 
or relationship, or do countless other 
things. 

And Cornerstone's remarkable 
flexibility also applies to data han- 
dling. For instance, variable-length 
fields (2) let you add notes of any 
length anywhere in the database— 
without determining the length of the 
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makes room as you need it. Which 
means efficient storage, too. 

In addition, any Cornerstone field 
can be multi- valued (3). So you can 
type in distinct, multiple entries in 
the same field. Whether five different 
phone numbers or 200 different 
notes. You can even have repeating 
groups of information, like line items 
in an order form (4). 

The flexibility extends to reporting, 
too. There's no limit to the number 
or kind of reports you can create with 
Cornerstone's interactive report 



writer (5) . You can design complex 
reports with titles, headers, subto- 
tals and totals, and instantly 
see what your report will 
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ports can be saved for every 
file and modified at any time. 

And Cornerstone has no 
artificial constraints. You can 
sort on any field, search on any field. 

The calculating power 
is built in. 

Cornerstone has impressive calculat- 
ing power (6). Mathematical, scien- 
tific, statistical, financial, date, time 
and string functions are built right 
in. And because it's a full-featured 
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perform sophisticated data valida- 
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Easy access for all 

Cornerstone's power is designed to 
be easily accessible. On-line support, 
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What's more, Cornerstone's 
exclusive Options key (8) 
always shows you what 
can be entered next- 
even if it's a restricted 
data value from a related 
field. 

You can also use Cor- 
nerstone with other 
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can easily convert files 




from 1-2-3; PFS; dBASE® II and 
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Cornerstone is a different kind 
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Inquiry 233 




PROGRAMMING INSIGHT 



TRAVESTY 
REVISITED 



by Murray Lesser 



The Travesty generator is recast 
in compiled BASIC 



ASA WRITER, I was intrigued by the 
possibilities in Hugh Kenner and 
Joseph O'Rourke's lexical processor 
(described in 'A Itavesty Generator 
for Micros," November 1984 BYTE, 
page 1 29). While the procedure can't 
quite produce an adequate first draft 
of a new manuscript, it is a small step 
on the way to the complete automa- 
tion of the writer's craft. 

Unfortunately, Kenner and O'Rourke 
picked the wrong programming lan- 
guage to illustrate their point. Pascal 



just isn't the proper tool for handling 
a task consisting mostly of string 
manipulation. One of the Microsoft 
16-bit BASIC compilers is a much bet- 
ter choice. They permit strings of 
more than 30,000 bytes (if you have 
enough string space) and allow all the 
usual Microsoft string operations to 
be performed on long string variables. 
Listing I shows Itavesty rewritten 
for the IBM PC version of the BASIC 
compiler. | Editor's note: The source code for 
this program, TRAVPCI.BAS, is available 



Twas in that bird, and thought head, and hand: 
Long 

back! 
He while in his joy. 

"And the boy! 

frabe. 

Twas brillig, and withy the Jabberwock, my son! 

The Jabberwock? 

Come that bite, the frumious day!" 

He claws the son! 

The sough 

The stood awhiffling 

time raths outgrabe: 
All mimsy went snicker-snatch! 
Beware 



Figure 1: Ah order- A verse scan of the poem "]abberwocky" 



for downloading via BY.TEnet Listings. The 
telephone number is (617) 861-9774. | I 
have followed the structure of the 
original TYavesty (leaving out those 
parts made unnecessary by BASIC'S 
string-handling capabilities). Since no 
programmer likes to leave well 
enough alone, I have added a couple 
of extra goodies. The result is a fast 
program that is slightly more user- 
friendly than the original, requiring 
only about half the number of lines 
of code. 

I added the line numbers followed 
by colons to the listing for discussion 
purposes, and they are not part of the 
source code. 

The compiler /N switch (line 9) 
serves two purposes: It tells the com- 
piler not to check for monotonic in- 
creasing line numbers and allows the 
underscore to be used as a logical-line 
continuation symbol. (Incidentally, 
programs containing unnecessary line 
numbers run slower due to a lower 
level of compiler optimization.) The 
compiler /E switch is necessary 

[continued] 
Murray \£sser received his B.S. degree in 
engineering from Caltech in 1942. He can 
be reached at 2474 Hunter Brook Rd., 
Yorktown Heights, NY 10598. 



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Inquiry 1 1 



Inquiry 12 



TRAVESTY REVISITED 



Listing 1: 'Travesty written for the IBM PC version of the BASIC compiler. 



1 

2 

3 

4 

5 

6 

7; 

8: 

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TRAVPC1.BAS 



1 Based on the article and Pascal program Travesty by Hugh Kenner 
' and Joseph O'Rourke, in BYTE for November 1984. 

Written by M. L. Lesser; November 26, 1984 
Compiled with IBM PC BASIC Compiler, v 1.00, switches /N/E/O 
(patches to May 1984 have been installed) 

TRAVESTY scans a standard ASCII text file and generates an n-order 
simulation of its letter combinations. For order n, the relation of 
output to input is: "Any pattern n characters long in the output has 
occurred somewhere in the input and at about the same frequency." 
If the verse flag is set, line-end symbols will be replaced by "|" t 
which will generate line ends when they occur in the output text. 
' Otherwise, output lines will average 50 characters in length. 
The output will be displayed during operation and will be filed in 
' the standard ASCII file TRAVESTY.DOC. 



DEFINT F.l-N 



DEFSTRO-Z 

DIM LETTER(124) 

ON ERROR GOTO 5000 



Default values: 
LET MAX. IN = 
LET MAX.PAT 



30000 
= 9 



'FLAG.B, FLAG.E, FLAGV, I, K, L, 

'LETTER0, MAX.IN, MAX.OUi; MAX.PAT; 

'N.OUT, N.PAT 

'PASS, PATTERN, SOURCE, STRING, 

'OUTCHAR 



'Maximum input-string length 
'Maximum scan-order length 



1 User input data: 

RANDOMIZE 

INPUT "Number of characters to be output 
0100 PRINT "Scan order ( 2 - " MAX.PAT ")"; 
INPUT N.PAT 

IF N.PAT < 2 OR N.PAT > 9 THEN GOTO 100 



'Get randomizing seed 
MAX.OUT 
'Simulated repeat 



'until 



LET N.PAT = N.PAT -1 
0200 INPUT "Name of input file"; SOURCE 
OPEN SOURCE FOR INPUT AS #1 
INPUT "Prose or verse"; PASS 
IF LEFT$(PASS,1) = "V" OR LEFTS(PASS,1) 
THEN LET FLAG.V = -1 
' Scan input text, deleting unwanted symbols: 
' (NOTE: If in verse mode, <SP>'s following line end will be deleted) 
PRINT 
WHILE NOT EOF(1) 

LET PASS = INPUT$(1,#1) 
IF PASS < > CHR$(13)_ 

THEN PRINT PASS; 
IF PASS = CHR$(13)_ 

THEN LET PASS = " " 
IF PASS = CHR$(10)_ 

THEN LET PASS = " ":_ 
IF FLAG.V_ 

THEN LET PASS = "|" 
IF PASS = CHR$(9)_ 
THEN LET PASS = " " 



'Convenience correction 
'Error RESUME point 
'Trap if no file 



'Set verse flag 



Read input file one 
1 character at a time 
'Bug trap while 
1 displaying input 
'Change any <CR> 
' to <NUL> 
'Change any <LF> 
' to <SP> 
' or (if verse) 
' to special line end 
'Change any <HT> 
' to <SP> 



[continued) 



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Inquiry 232 




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TRAVESTY REVISITED 



61: 


IF PASS <> " " AND PASS < > " "_ 


'Unless <SP> or <NUL> 


62: 


THEN LET FLAG.B = 


' reset blank flag 


63: 


IF NOT FLAG.B_ 


If "blank" flag clear 


64: 


THEN LET STRING = STRING + PASS * add to string 


65: 


IF (FLAG.V AND PASS = "|")_ 


'Set blank flag to 


66: 


OR (PASS = " ")_ 


' delete following 


67: 


THEN LET FLAG.B = -1 


' <SP> characters 


68: 


IF LEN(STRING) >= MAX.IN_ 


'If full string: 


69: 


THEN GOTO 300 


' break out of loop 


70: 


WEND 


'End of input loop 


71: 


0300 LET STRING = STRING + LEFTS(STRING, 


M.PAT) 'End around 


72: 


' Report string space usage and force garbage collection: 


73: 


PRINT: PRINT 




74: 


PRINT "Input string contains" LEN(STRING) 


"bytes" 


75: 


PRINT "There are" FRE(" ") "bytes remaining 


in string space" 


76: 


CLOSE #1 




77: 


PRINT: PRINT 




78: 


' Open output file: 




79: 


OPEN "TRAVESTY.DOC" FOR OUTPUT AS #2 


80: 


' Initial pattern: 




81: 


LET PATTERN = LEFTS(STRING.N.PAT) 




82: 


PRINT PATTERN; 




83: 


PRINT #2, PATTERN; 




84: 


LET N.OUT = N.PAT 




85: 


0400 'Start of 


major "repeat until" loop 


86: 


' Clear letter array (this compiler doesn't have ERASE): 


87: 


FOR K = TO 124 




88: 


LET LETTER(K) = 




89: 


NEXTK 




90: 


' Match current pattern: 




91: 


LET I = INSTR(STRING.PATTERN) 




92: 


WHILE I > AND I < = LEN(STRING) - N.PAT 'Don't run off end 


93: 


LET PASS = MID$(STRING,I + N.PAT,1) 


'Next character 


94: 


LET LETTER(O) = LETTER(O) + 1 


'Update total count 


95: 


LET K = ASC(PASS) 




96: 


LET LETTER(K) = LETTER(K) + 1 


'Update character count 


97: 


LET I = INSTR(I + 1,STRING,PATTERN) 


'For next match 


98: 


WEND 


And around again 


99: 


' Choose next output letter based on use frequency: 


100: 


LET L = INT(1 + LETTER(O) * RND) 


'Random-choice index 


101: 


FOR K = 32 TO 124 


'Scan the letter array 


102: 


LET L = L - LETTER(K) 




103: 


IF L < = 


'This is it 


104: 


THEN LET OUT.CHAR = CHR$(K):_ 


105: 


GOTO 500 


'Break out of loop 


106: 


NEXTK 




107: 


0500 'Housekeeping for output character: 




108: 


LET N.OUT = N.OUT + 1 


'Increment count 


109: 


IF N.OUT MOD 50 = 0_ 


'If average line length 


110: 


THEN LET FLAG. E = -1 


' set "line-end" flag 


111: 


' Establish next pattern: 




112: 


LET PATTERN = MID$(PATTERN,2) + 


OUT.CHAR 


113: 


' Display and store character found: 




114: 


IF NOT (FLAG.V AND OUT.CHAR = "|' 


)- 


115: 


THEN PRINT OUTCHAR;:_ 




116: 


PRINT #2, OUT.CHAR; 




117: 


' Check for line break: 




118: 


IF (FLAG.V AND OUT.CHAR = "|")_ 


Verse line end 


119: 


OR (FLAG.E AND OUT.CHAR = " ")_ 


'Force line end 


120: 


THEN PRINT:_ 


' Display <EOL> 


121: 


PRINT #2,:_ 


• File <EOL> 


122: 


LET FLAG.E = 0:_ 


'Reset forced-end flag 

[continued) 



166 BYTE • IULY 1985 





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MOTOROLA 



JULY 1985 -BYTE 167 



TRAVESTY REVISITED 



123: 


IF FLAG.V AND OUT.CHAR = " "_ 'Forced verse break 


124: 


THEN PRINT SPACE$(5);:_ ' indents next line 


125: 


PRINT #2, SPACE$(5); 


126: 


IF INKEY$ = CHR$(3) THEN END 'Emergency exit 


127: 


' Check for end of output: 


128: 


IF N.OUT < MAX.OUT OR OUT.CHAR < > " "_ 


129: 


THEN GOTO 400 'End of major loop 


130: 


END 


131: 




132: 


5000 'Error trap (on "File not found" or "Bad filename"): 


133: 


IF ERR = 53 OR ERR = 64_ 


134: 


THEN PRINT CHR$(34) SOURCE CHR$(34) " does not exist. ";:_ 


135: 


PRINT "Try again":_ 


136: 


RESUME 200 


137: 


ON ERROR GOTO 


138: 


' End of source code 



because I included error trapping, 
and the /O switch causes linking to the 
stand-alone support library— resulting 
in a smaller run-time program with 
more string space. 

If you select the verse option (lines 
44-45), the input parsing routine 



(lines 46-71) will substitute the verti- 
cal-line separator for the DOS (disk 
operating system) ASCII (American 
Standard Code for Information Inter- 
change) text EOL (end of line) symbol, 
|CRLF|. Consequently, you can run 
either a verse or prose travesty from 



the same input file. 

Each character of the input file is 
displayed as it is scanned. Then, if it 
is valid, it is concatenated to the end 
of STRING, the string variable. A two- 
line subterfuge in lines 51-52 is in- 
cluded to get around a bug in the IBM 
PC BASIC that treats either CHR$(13) 
or CHR$(10) as an EOL symbol when 
printing. Without it, the program 
would display an extra blank row after 
the end of every input line. 

I have somewhat arbitrarily set the 
maximum input-string length (after 
compression) at 30,000 bytes. Both 
the string length and the remaining 
string space are displayed as part of 
the run (lines 74-75), so you can ad- 
just MAX. IN for your system size. 
Because of the way STRING is built, 
the total string space must be slight- 
ly greater than twice the length of 
STRING. If you have enough memory, 
the full 64K-byte data segment will 



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168 BYTE • JULY 1985 



TRAVESTY REVISITED 



allow about 62,000 bytes of string 
space. Since the code segment is just 
under 18 K bytes, you will have a full 
data segment if you have at least 82 K 
bytes of available memory. 

Output is quite fast, almost as fast 
as input. The scan loop (lines 92-98) 
uses BASIC'S built-in INSTRQ function 
to find all the occurrences of the 
desired pattern in the input STRING. 
Each "next character" is both dis- 
played and written to the file TRAVES- 
TY. DOC on the disk in the default 
drive. 

While playing with my program, I 
found that an order-4 scan was the 
most interesting to use. Shorter pat- 
terns produced mostly nonsense; 
longer patterns repeated large chunks 
of the original input. 

The whole mood of a piece can be 
modified by changing the randomizer 
seed. For example, the heroic joy of 
Lewis Carroll's "Jabberwocky" can be 



' Initial line-end at a time 
INPUT 

") 'Rand arountil" long input of loop 

END And 

one 
LET PASS, PASS = " " "_ 
THEN PRINT STRINT PASS.1) 

'Next patterse break output character next major 

"Bad index 
FOR (PAT, 
'OUT.CHAR;:_ 
GOTO 124 
LET 

N.OUTPUT AS ********** 
' or <NUL> 
IF L = " 

'LET 



Figure 2: An order-4 verse scan of the programs own source code. 

converted to tragedy (see figure 1). the computer. Figure 2 shows a traves- 
As one might expect, Itavesty is at ty (in verse form) of its own source 
its best when dealing with the soul of code. ■ 



ft 



w 



Imagine what they will say 
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JULY 1985 -BYTE 169 



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PROGRAMMING INSIGHT 



REAL-NUMBER 

FORMATTING ON 

YOUR APPLE 



by Brent Daviduck 



This subroutine lets you specify the decimal 
length of any real number 



IF YOU HAVE EVER written a BASIC 
program to format real numbers, you 
probably know your program can 
become cumbersome and its run time 
intolerably slow. (A real number may 
include a fractional portion, such as 
3.14.) The machine-language subrou- 
tine described here uses only 116 
bytes of memory and allows you to 
specify the decimal length of any real 
number. 

If you have worked with FORTRAN, 
you may have used a statement that 
looked something like 100 FOR- 
MAT(F5.2). This statement formats a 
real number with a total length of five 
characters: two digits before the 
decimal, the decimal point, and two 
digits following the decimal. The 
BASIC program in listing I uses a 
similar syntax in line 90. The total 
length of the number is in the variable 
L; the number of decimal places is in 
the variable D. These parameters are 
then passed to the Format subroutine, 
listing 3, by line 10 of listing 1. (Note: 
The POKE statements must be pres- 
ent if you intend to use the amper- 
sand, "&".) 

To begin, you must determine the 

Inquiry 389 for End-Users. 
'•—Inquiry 390 for DEALERS ONLY. 



maximum length of any number that 
the program will handle. Let's say the 
subroutine must handle numbers as 
large as 9999.99. You will want L to 
equal 7 and D to equal 2. As an ex- 
ample, the number to be formatted 
(A/) will be 123.8765. Once the param- 
eters have been passed to the subrou- 
tine, here's what takes place. | Editor's 
note: Unless otherwise specified, all addresses 
are in hexadecimal] 

1 . The number in N is converted to an 
ASCII (American Standard Code for 
Information Interchange) string: 31 32 
33 2E 38 37 36 35 00. 

2. The number of digits before and 
after the decimal point are counted, 
including the decimal place, and they 
are subtracted from the number's 
total allowable length. The result is the 
number of leading spaces to be left 
blank preceding the number. 

3. For the above example, a single 
space is followed by the numbers 
before the decimal point, the decimal 
point, and the number of places after 
the decimal point, giving the number 
1 23.87. If in this example you want to 
produce rounded results, add a 



rounding constant to the number you 
are passing: L.D.N + 0.005. 

Since Applesoft BASIC cannot print 
a number with a length greater than 
1 5, the subroutine in listing 1 will give 
you an 7ILLEGAL QUANTITY ER- 
ROR if you pass a length greater than 
this. The same error message is given 
if the number of places following the 
decimal point is less than I or greater 
than 8. Also, trying to print a number 
that contains a length greater than the 
length parameter passed will cause an 
7ILLEGAL QUANTITY ERROR. 

Other Notes 

l^ble 1 lists all the ROM (read-only 
memory) routines used in the pro- 
gram and their function. You can 
either use the monitor to enter the 
machine-language routine at location 
300 from the dump of the Format 
subroutine in listing 2 or assemble 
and load the assembly-language rou- 

[continued) 
Brent Daviduck (311 Silver thorn Way NW. 
Calgary. Alberta T3B 4E8, Canada) is a 
student at the Southern Alberta Institute of 
Technology. 

JULY 1985 • BYTE 171 



Inquiry 404 




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FORMATTING 



Listing I: This BASIC program will let you test the Format subroutine. You 
must specify the length of your number and the number of decimal places to be 
used. 

10 HOME : POKE 1014,0 : POKE 1015,3 
20 INPUT "Number of loops: ";E 
30 INPUT "Format length: ";L 
40 INPUT "Decimal places: "D 
50 PRINTPRINT 

60 PRINT "Unformatted: "; TAB(25); "Formatted:" 
70 FOR X = 1 TOE 
80 N = RND(1) * (RND(1)*500) 
90 PRINT N; TAB(24);: & LAN : PRINT 
100 NEXT 



Table I: A list of the ROM routines used in the Format subroutine. 

SDD67— Converts an expression to a floating-point number stored in locations 9D to 
A3. This routine lets you pass a variable, variable expression, or simple number to 
your machine-language subroutine: & 7,2,123.8765. 

SE6FD— Converts the number stored in locations 9D to A3 to a single-byte number 
in the X register. If the number is less than or greater than 2 55. an 7ILLEGAL 
QUANTITY ERROR is printed. The routine will then return to the Applesoft BASIC 
prompt. 

SDEBE-Checks for a comma. If one is not found. 7SYNTAX ERROR is printed, 
followed by a return to the Applesoft BASIC prompt. 

SED34— Converts the number stored in locations 9D to A3 to an ASCII string that is 
stored starting at location 0100 on, 

SE199— This routine will print 7ILLEGAL QUANTITY ERROR and return to the 
Applesoft BASIC prompt. 

$F94a— Prints the number of spaces in the X register. 

$DB5C— Prints the character in the A register. 



Listing 2 


A dump o 


f the Format subroutine will let you 


check the values you 


have storeo 


in 


memory 












]CALL 


-151 


















'300.373 


















0300- 


20 


67 


DD20 


FB 


E6 


E0 


10 




0308- 


90 


03 


20 


99 


E1 


86 


06 


20 




0310- 


BE 


DE 20 


67 


DD20 


FB 


E6 




0318- 


E0 


09 


B0 


EE 


E0 


00 


F0 


EA 




0320- 


86 


07 


20 


BE 


DE 20 


67 


DD 




0328- 


20 


34 


ED A2 


FF 


E8 


BD 00 




0330- 


01 


F0 


04 


C9 


2E 


DO 


F6 


86 




0338- 


08 


A5 06 


38 


E5 


07 


E5 


08 




0340- 


AA CA F0 


05 


30 


C4 


20 


4A 




0348- 


F9 


A4 07 


A2 00 


BD 00 


01 




0350- 


F0 


0A C9 2E 


F0 


11 


20 


5C 




0358- 


DB E8 


DO 


F1 


A9 


2E 


20 


5C 




0360- 


DB A9 


30 


88 


10 


F8 


60 


20 




0368- 


5C 


DB 


E8 


BD 00 


01 


F0 


F1 




0370- 

* 


88 


10 


F4 


60 













172 BYTE • JULY 1985 



Inquiry 32 



FORMATTING 



Listing 3: The Format subroutine rounds any real number to a specified decimal 


place. All you have to do is supply the parameters. 


ORG $300 




JSR $DD67 


Get the format length 


JSR $E6FB 


Convert format length to single byte in X register 


CPX #$10 


Is the length greater than or equal to 16? 


BCC $030D 


No... continue on 


JSR $E199 


Print 7ILLEGAL QUANTITY ERROR, go to Applesoft 


STX $06 


Store the format length 


JSR $DEBE 


Check for a comma (,) 


JSR $DD67 


Get the number of places following the decimal 


JSR $E6FB 


Convert to a single byte in the X register 


CPX #$09 


Is the number of decimal places greater than 8? 


BCS $030A 


Yes... go print error 


CPX #$00 


Is the number of decimal places equal to 0? 


BEQ $030A 


Yes... go print error 


STX $07 


Store number of decimal places 


JSR $DEBE 


Check for comma (,) 


JSR $DD67 


Get the number to be formatted, store at $9D to $A3 


JSR $ED34 


Convert number to an ASCII string starting at $0100 


LDX #$FF 


Initialize X as index 


INX 


Increment index 


LDA $0100,X 


Get an ASCII character 


BEQ $0337 


End of string? Yes... go calculate leading spaces 


CMP #$2E 


Found a decimal point? 


BNE $032D 


No... continue counting 


STX $08 


Store number of characters before decimal point 


LDA $06 


Get the format length 


SEC 


Subtract from the length, the number of 


SBC $07 


places after the decimal and the number of 


SBC $08 


characters in front of the decimal 


TAX 


Store the result in X and decrement to 


DEX 


allow for the decimal point 


BEQ $0349 


If equal to continue on... 


BMI $030 A 


If less than go print error 


JSR $F94A 


Print number of spaces in the X register 


LDY $07 


Get back number of decimal places in the Y register 


LDX #$00 


Initialize X as index 


LDA $0100,X 


Get an ASCII character 


BEQ $035C 


If end of string go print the decimal point 


CMP #$2E 


Is character a decimal point? 


BEQ $0367 


Yes... go print number of places after decimal 


JSR $DB5C 


Print the character in the A register 


INX 


Increment index to point to next ASCII character 


BNE $034D 


Go get next character 


LDA #$2E 


Load A register with ASCII value for decimal point 


JSR $DB5C 


Print the decimal point 


LDA #$30 


Load A register with ASCII value for a zero (0) 


DEY 


Decrement number of decimal places to be printed 


BPL $035E 


Continue printing decimal places until done 


RTS 


Return to calling routine 


JSR $DB5C 


Print the decimal point 


INX 


Increment index to point to next ASCII character 


LDA $0100,X 


Get an ASCII character 


BEQ $0361 


If end of string go finish printing 


DEY 


Decrement number of decimal places to be printed 


BPL $0367 


Continue printing decimal places until done 


RTS 


Return to calling routine 



tine of listing 3. If you don't feel like 
typing them in, the assembly-lan- 
guage routine and the BASIC program 



can be downloaded from BYTEnet 
Listings at (617) 861-9774 as For- 
mat.bas and Format.asm. ■ 



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IULY 1985 'BYTE 173 



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174 BYTE • JULY 1985 



Inquiry 177 




personal computer IBM has ever made. 




Little Tramp character licensed by Bubbles Inc.. s.a. 

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licensed to IBM by AT&T Technologies, Inc. Developed for IBM by INTERACTIVE Systems Corp. 



JULY 1985 • BYTE 175 



ObARNACXlA 85 



1/ 



BOTE 



Computers 
and Space 



Updating the Oldest Science 

by Russell M. Genet 179 

Microcomputers in NASA's SIR-B 

by Richard Wilton 192 

Comet Lines in FORTRAN 

by David S. Dixon 203 

Tracking Earth Satellites 

by E. H. Weiss 215 

Automating a Telescope 

by Louis J. Boyd 227 

Astronomical Computing with Micros 

by Richard Bochonko and Wham T Peters . 239 

Astronomy Sources 244 

An Astronomy Glossary 245 



ASTRONOMY IS UNIQUE among the physical sciences in that it continues 
to benefit from the discoveries and observations of serious amateurs. The 
cost of instrumentation necessary to participate in astronomy is still relative- 
ly modest, so you don't need the support of a major research institute to 
come aboard. Of course, huge reflector telescopes and phased-array radio 
telescopes are beyond the reach of individuals. But a lot of scientifically signifi- 
cant original research can be performed on equipment that is within the price 
range of serious amateurs. And the microcomputer revolution is expanding 
the reach of this low-end equipment. 

In this issue, we take a look at some of the ways that microcomputers are 
used in astronomy and space exploration. We begin with a "Who's who" of 
astronomy by Russell Genet, codirector of the Fairborn Observatory. He seems 
to know everyone involved in astronomy and was instrumental in putting this 
issue together. He mentions a number of professional astronomers who are 
looking for assistance in their research. For example, Fred Franklin of the Har- 
vard Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics is seeking amateur astronomers from 
all over the world to aid in his study of Jupiter's moons. If you are looking 
for ways to use your telescope to advance the science, this article is a very 
good place to start your search. 

In part, we decided to do an astronomy issue because of the impending 
return of Halley's comet. So. of course, we have articles on tracking the comet. 
David Dixon's article discusses the Encke method of calculating ephemerides. 
He includes a FORTRAN program that can be used for comets, including 
Halley's (for which he gives the necessary orbital elements), and for asteroids. 
E. H. Weiss discusses refinements to the Encke method that improve the level 
of precision substantially. His sample BASIC program tracks space vehicles 
in earth orbit, but his discussion of the methodology will allow you to switch 
coordinate systems to solar orbits if you are so inclined. 

We couldn't have an issue on astronomy without including a FORTH article. 
Richard Wilton, from Laboratory Microsystems Inc. (the PC/FORTH people), 
discusses his company's work designing a local-area network for the let Pro- 
pulsion Laboratory. The LAN was used for real-time analysis of imaging radar 
data from the space shuttle. Be sure to read the captions to the imaging radar 
pictures; they'll give you a good idea of the uses of such technology. 

Louis Boyd is the other codirector of Fairborn Observatory. He writes about 
automating an observatory, from telescope control to opening the observatory 
at night and selecting what to observe. He also reports on some of the original 
research performed at the Fairborn Observatory with its automated telescope. 

Astronomy covers a lot of territory. T\vo things that will come in handy when 
you're exploring the universe are a portable computer and a good library- 
An article by Richard Bochonko and William Peters suggests some of the bet- 
ter books available in astronomy. You'll find three articles elsewhere in the 
issue that discuss subjects related to portable computers— a review of the TI 
Pro-Lite, a preview of the GRiDCase, and a feature on LCD technology- 



JULY 1985 -BYTE 177 




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COMPUTERS AND SPACE 



UPDATING THE 
OLDEST SCIENCE 



by Russell M. Genet 



Astronomers are using microcomputers 
in a variety of applications 



IN THE PAST FIVE YEARS, microcom- 
puters have had a revolutionary im- 
pact on astronomy, the oldest of the 
sciences. The revolution has, perhaps, 
been most visible in the area of op- 
tical astronomy at smaller observator- 
ies. This is not surprising, since it is 
the young hackers at small colleges 
and amateur observatories who have 
most quickly embraced microcom- 
puters with the greatest effect. We 
begin with that most traditional task 
in astronomy, computations. 

Astronomical Computations 

At the very beginnings of civilization, 
astronomical calculations were made 
to predict the lunar cycles and 
seasons and— somewhat crudely— 
eclipses of the sun. The positions of 
the planets, appropriately called "the 
wanderers" by the Greeks, were some- 
what more difficult to predict, al- 
though Claudius Ptolemaeus 
(Ptolemy), a Greek living in Alexan- 
dria, had by A.D. 140 devised a rather 
complex but fairly accurate method 
of mathematical prediction. Nicolaus 
Copernicus (1473-1543) devised a 
sun-centered model that, while no 
more accurate, was conceptually 
more appealing. Based on unusually 



accurate observations of Mars made 
by the Danish nobleman T/cho Brahe 
(1546-1601). lohannes Kepler (1571- 
1630) was able to establish, after 
years of laborious hand calculations, 
that the orbit of Mars was an ellipse 
with the sun at one of the foci. It did 
not take Isaac Newton (1642-1727) 
long to generalize this to the motion 
of all objects great and small, and 
astronomical calculations came into 
their own. 

As the major astronomical obser- 
vatories were established, each ini- 
tiated its own computer division. The 
computer division was often housed 
in a single large room filled with work 
tables and the computers— the people 
who made the mathematical calcula- 
tions. An astronomer or mathemati- 
cian was in charge. When logarithms 
were devised, one of their first ap- 
plications, via detailed tables, was 
astronomical calculations, and when 
the mechanical Friden calculators 
became available, they too were ap- 
plied to astronomical calculations by 
the roomful. Mainframe digital com- 
puters were applied to this natural 
arena, and when microcomputers ap- 
peared, they too were quickly put to 
use by astronomers. While some 



older astronomers miss the smoothly 
clicking Fridens, digital computers— 
especially microcomputers— have 
made astronomical computations af- 
fordable to all observatories. The 
tiniest college or amateur observatory 
can, with an IBM PC an Apple II. or 
even a Commodore VIC-20, make 
more calculations in an hour than a 
roomful of people and Friden calcu- 
lators could in a week, or Johannes 
Kepler or Isaac Newton in an entire 
lifetime. And just what is this new- 
found power at smaller observatories 
being applied to? 

Some microcomputer-based com- 
putations are the traditional astrono- 
mical tasks, such as conversion from 
Gregorian to Julian calendar date, 
conversion from civil to sidereal time, 
and determining times for the rising 
and setting of the sun and moon. 
Thanks to formulas in the Almanac for 
Computers, quite precise predictions of 
planetary positions can be easily 
made by microcomputers in a flash. 
(For a list of books and periodicals 
mentioned in this and other articles, 

[continued) 

Russell M. Genet (629 North 30th St., 
Phoenix, AZ 85008) is corrector of the Fair- 
born Observatory. 

JULY 1985 • BYTE 179 



UPDATING ASTRONOMY 



see the "Astronomy Sources" text box 
on page 244.) Certainly lean Meeus, 
Vereniging voor Sterrenkunde, 
Belgium, is widely recognized as an 
expert in various positional calcula- 
tions. Determining the orbital equa- 
tions for asteroids and comets from 
just a few observations has always 
been tricky business. Carl Friedrich 



Gauss (1777-1855) put such deter- 
minations on a sound mathematical 
footing when he invented the "least 
squares" method to make such 
astronomical calculations more ac- 
curate. Today's expert is Brian G. 
Marsdea an astronomer at the Har- 
vard Smithsonian Center for Astro- 
physics, and it is to him that observa- 



Further Contacts 


Thomas Borlik 


Brian G. Marsden 


7239 North Butler Ave. 


Harvard Smithsonian Center 


Indianapolis. IN 462 50 


for Astrophysics 




60 Garden St. 


David Dunham 


Cambridge, MA 02138 


Computer Science Corp. 




8728 Colesville Rd. 


R. Edward Nather 


Silver Spring. MD 20910 


Department of Astronomy 




University of Texas 


David S. Evans 


Austin. TX 78712 


Department of Astronomy 




University of TtXAS 


Tim Persinger 


Austin. TX 78712 


Department of Astronomy 




Vanderbilt University 


Fred A. Franklin 


Nashville. TN 37235 


Harvard Smithsonian Center 




for Astrophysics 


Manfred Stoll 


60 Garden St. 


Institute for Astronomy 


Cambridge. MA 02138 


University of Vienna 




Vienna. Austria 


Robert E. Fried 




Braeside Observatory 


Mark Trueblood, Director 


POB 906 


Winer Mobile Observatory 


Flagstaff. AZ 86002 


10912 Broad Green Terrace 




Potomac. MD 20854 


Douglas S Hall 




Dyer Observatory 


Wayne H. Warren Jr. 


Vanderbilt University 


Astronomical Data Center 


Nashville. TN 372 3 5 


NASA-Goddard Space Flight 




Center 


William Herbst 


Code 601 


Van Vleck Observatory 


Greenbelt. MD 20771 


Wesley an University 




Middletown. CT 06457 


Nathaniel M. White 




Lowell Observatory 


R. Kent Honeycutt 


POB 1269 


Astronomy Department 


Flagstaff. AZ 86002 


Indiana University 




Swain Hall West 


Michael Zeilik 11 


Bloomington. IN 47401 


Department of Physics and 




Astronomy 


Mercedes jaschek 


University of New Mexico 


Centre de Donnees Stellaires 


Albuquerque. NM 87131 


1 1 rue de Universite 




F-67000 




Strasbourg. France 





tions on newly discovered comets (or 
newly reappearing ones such as 
Hal ley's) are reported. (See the "Fur- 
ther Contacts" text box for the ad- 
dresses of many of the astronomers 
mentioned in this article.) 

Microcomputers are now heavily 
used by astronomers for the reduc- 
tion and analysis of scientific obser- 
vations. At smaller observatories, 
such observations are predominant- 
ly photometric— determining the 
brightness and color of astronomical 
objects. Stars that vary their bright- 
ness over time are particular research 
favorites because we can learn much 
from such observations about the in- 
herent nature of many types of stars. 
Douglas S. Hall an astronomer at 
Dyer Observatory, has long coor- 
dinated photoelectric observations of 
spotted binary stars from smaller ob- 
servatories around the world. He is 
always glad to hear from interested 
observers. The American Association 
of Variable Star Observers (AAVSO) 
also assists new observers (see the 
"Helpful Organizations" text box on 
page 181). Reduction software pro- 
grams take the raw observational data 
and use it to account for the dimming 
of the light by the earth's atmosphere, 
the background light from nearby 
cities or the moon, and nonstandard 
color sensitivity of some particular 
photometer. Various microcomputer 
programs have been devised to 
calculate the exact instant of 
minimum light, given a series of 
brightness measurements. An eclips- 
ing binary star will change its time of 
minimum light because, as mass is 
transferred between the two stars, the 
change in momentum changes the 
rotational period. Small backyard tele- 
scopes equipped with photometers 
can easily make such observations, 
and even the smallest microcom- 
puters can accomplish the reductions 
and analysis. 

Some astronomical problems are 
too complex, even with microcom- 
puters, to solve directly, but simula- 
tions are possible. A famous case is 
the "w-body gravitational problem" 
where n is 3 or greater. Given initial 
positions and velocities, the future 



180 BYTE • JULY 1985 



UPDATING ASTRONOMY 



courses over time of a number of 
gravitationally interacting bodies, such 
as planets, stars, or galaxies, can be 
simulated by a microcomputer. An in- 
teresting microcomputer simulation 
(with an Apple II) was devised by Clint 
Poe, while a graduate student at 
Vanderbilt University, to determine 
the effects of large starspots on the 
light intensity versus time (light 
curves) of binary stars as viewed from 
the earth. As the spots rotate in and 
out of the line of sight from earth, the 
brightness goes up and down, but in 
a very complex way that depends on 
the number, sizes, and positions of 
the spots. You can change the micro- 
computer simulation parameters until 
the simulated light curve matches the 
actually observed light curve, thus 
deriving information about the sizes 
and locations of the starspots and 
their changes over time. Some simula- 
tions, such as the nuclear evolution of 
stars, can be difficult for microcom- 
puters, but microcomputers have now 
been applied to even these and other 
difficult astrophysical simulations. 

Catalogs and Atlases 

Man early on noted that, except for 
the sun, moon, "wandering" planets, 
and an occasional comet, the stars 
pretty much stayed put on the 
celestial sphere. Soon the brighter 
stars were broken into natural groups 
in the sky (constellations), and the 
brighter stars in each constellation 
were assigned Greek letters. lohn 
Flamsteed (1646-1719), the first 
astronomer royal at England's Royal 
Greenwich Observatory, determined 
the position and brightness of 3000 
stars. Edmond Halley (of comet fame, 
1656-1742) and Isaac Newton rushed 
Flamsteed's catalog into publication 
in 1712 while it still contained some 
errors. An angry Flamsteed managed 
to locate and burn the 300 published 
copies, and he eventually published 
his own version. Friedrich Argelander 
(1799-1875) made observations of 
the position and brightness of more 
than 300,000 stars, which he pub- 
lished as the Bonner Durcfimusterung. 

Catalogs available in computerized 
form are of special interest. The Yale 



Bright Star Catalog by Dorrit Hoffleit 
contains all the stars visible by the 
naked eye, with a margin for even the 
darkest skies and keenest eyes. The 
Henry Draper Catalog contains spectral 
types and other useful information on 
over 200,000 stars, while the Smith- 
sonian Astrophysical Observatory (SAO) 



Catalog contains detailed information 
on over 300,000 stars. And there are 
many specialized catalogs such as the 
General Catalog of Variable Stars, and 
others on such specific classes of ob- 
jects as binary stars, planetary 
nebulae, galaxies, etc. The repository 

[continued) 



Helpful Organizations 



American Association of Variable 
Star Observers (AAVSO). 
Photoelectric Photometry Committee. 
Contact Howard J. Landis. 50 Price 
Rd West. Locust Grove. G A 30248. 
Organized program for photoelectric 
photometry at amateur obser- 
vatories. Inquiries on getting started 
in photometry are welcome. Nice 
newsletter. 

American Astronomical Society 
(A AS), Special Interest Group for 
Microcomputer Use in Astronomy 
(SIGMUA). Contact Daniel B. Caton, 
Department of Physics and 
Astronomy, Appalachian State 
University. Boone, NC 28608. The 
AAS is a society of professional 
astronomers. SIGMUA helps to ex- 
change ideas on microcomputer use 
in astronomy. Newsletter and semi- 
annual meetings. 

Astromedia Corp., 62 5 East St. Paul 
Ave. Milwaukee. WI 53202. Publishes 
Astronomy magazine and Telescope Mak- 
ing, both of which occasionally have 
articles on the use of microcom- 
puters in astronomy. Also has helpful 
books. 

Astronomical League. Contact 
Donald Archer. Executive Secretary, 
POB 12821. TUcson, AZ 85732. Na- 
tional (U.S.) Organization of 
Astronomy. Annual national meeting, 
quarterly journal. Microcomputer 
users group. 

Astronomical Society of the 
Pacific Contact Andrew G. Fraknoi. 
1240 24th Ave. San Francisco. CA 
94122. Society of professional and 
amateur astronomers. Annual 
meeting. Monthly scientific journal, 
quarterly general-interest journal 
[Mercury). 

Automatic Photoelectric Telescope 
Service, Fairborn Observatory, 



629 North 30th St.. Phoenix. AZ 
85008. Provides automatic telescope 
systems and their operation and 
maintenance at a first-class Arizona 
site as a service for universities and 
research organizations. 

British Astronomical Association 
(BAA). Contact Andrew J. Hollis, Or- 
mada Observatory, 85 Forest Rd.. 
Cuddington. Northwich. Cheshire 
CW8 2 ED. England. Focal point for 
British and European small obser- 
vatory photometrists. Occasional 
European meetings. 

International Amateur Profes- 
sional Photoelectric Photometry 
(IAPPP) Association. Contact Robert 
C. Reisenweber. Rolling Ridge Obser- 
vatory, 3621 Ridge Parkway, Erie. PA 
16510. International organization of 
amateur and professional astrono- 
mers interested in photometry. 
Several meetings in various countries 
each year. Quarterly journal devoted 
to photometry, including microcom- 
puter use. 

International Occultation timing 
Association (IOTA), POB 596, Tinley 
Park. IL 60477. International 
organization devoted to visual and 
photoelectric timing of asteroid and 
lunar occultations. Occasional 
meetings. Nice newsletter. 

Sky Publishing Corp., 49 Bay State 
Rd.. Cambridge. MA 02238. 
Publishes Sky & Telescope magazine, 
which has a monthly feature on 
microcomputer use in astronomy. 
Source for catalogs and atlases, as 
well as books. Free catalog. 

Willmann-Bell Inc., POB 312 5, Rich- 
mond. VA 2 3 2 3 5. Source for catalogs 
and atlases. Also source for books in 
mathematical astronomy and optical 
design. Request their lists in these 
areas. Catalog available. 



JULY 1985 • BYTE 181 



UPDATING ASTRONOMY 



for such computerized catalogs in the 
United States is the Astronomical 
Data Center, directed by Wayne H. 
Warren Jr. The worldwide center is 
directed by Mercedes Jaschek at the 
Centre de Donnees Stellaires in 
Strasbourg, France. 

Atlases are essentially "maps" of 
the stars. They are generated from 



catalog data by plotting stars and 
other objects on large pieces of 
paper. Some of the nicest atlases have 
been made in Czechoslovakia by 
Antoni Becvar. The Borealis. Eclipticalis. 
and Australis atlases cover the entire 
sky with brightness depicted by the 
size of each star, while the spectral 
type (temperature) is indicated by the 



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printed color. Somewhat less detailed 
but popular atlases are Will Tiron's 
Sky Atlas 2000 and the Sky Catalog 
2000 by Alan Hirshfeld and Roger 
Sinnott. Just as you use a map to 
guide your car to a specific house in 
a particular city you use a sky atlas 
to direct your telescope to a specific 
star or other object in a particular 
constellation. Often, for convenience, 
observers make a small sketch on a 
larger scale of just a small part of the 
atlas to help locate a specific star 
while at the telescope eyepiece. Try- 
ing to hold up a big atlas with fine 
print while looking through a tele- 
scope in the dark is tough! These 
sketches are very helpful and are 
called "finder charts." 

The early microcomputers (and 
even many of the modern ones) were 
not well suited for working with 
catalogs and atlases. Catalogs require 
the storage of very large amounts of 
information with quick access to it. 
Atlases require significant graphics 
capabilities to be effective. However, 
with 16- and 3 2 -bit processors, hard- 
disk storage, and high-resolution bit- 
mapped graphics, some modern 
microcomputers have the needed 
capabilities. While most of the com- 
puterized catalogs are on 9-track 
tapes, versions are becoming increas- 
ingly available on disks of various 
formats. 

There are a number of advantages 
to microcomputer-based catalogs. 
You can search entire catalogs for 
specific objects or classes of objects. 
This is very helpful in formulating 
observing programs and in conduct- 
ing various statistical studies. One 
class of objects easily extracted from 
a catalog are all objects in a certain 
small area that have more than a 
given brightness. You can then plot 
those selected on the screen to form 
an instant custom finder chart. A 
small computer monitor near the tele- 
scope is much easier to see than an 
atlas, and you can display only the in- 
formation you need, avoiding confu- 
sion. Printed atlases only look at the 
stars from one fixed vantage point- 
that of earth. With a catalog contain- 

[continued) 



182 BYTE • IULY 1985 



Inquiry 184 





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UPDATING ASTRONOMY 



Photometric 



data-logging systems 
have been developed 
for many types 
of microcomputers 
in many countries. 



ing three-dimensional coordinates 
and a microcomputer with some com- 
putational and graphics capabilities, 
you can calculate and display a van- 
tage point from anywhere in space. 

Data Logging 

While casual visual observers may not 
record what they see, the serious 
researcher is always writing down in- 
strument readings. Although the 
popular literature gives the impres- 
sion that telescopes are used either 
to take pretty pictures or for visual 
observing by research astronomers, 
both of these activities are rarities in 
real research. Telescopes are light 
buckets for the researcher's instru- 



ments—mainly photometers and 
spectrometers. Because photometers 
are especially appropriate instru- 
ments for smaller telescopes, let's 
consider how microcomputers are 
taking over photometric data-logging 
tasks. 

In the days before microcomputers, 
photometry was often a two-person 
operation. One person would operate 
the telescope and the photometer 
while the other recorded the results. 
In variable-star photometry, for in- 
stance, the sequence of observations 
is rigidly fixed so that the data can be 
reduced in a standard manner. While 
the task is relaxing and peaceful, I 
must admit that I find making photo- 
metric observations and manually 
recording them a bit on the boring 
side. In 1979, 1 bought a Radio Shack 
TRS-80 Model I to reduce and analyze 
variable-star photometric data (see 
photo 1). It seemed wasteful to 
manually record the data and then re- 
record it into the TRS-80. To avoid 
this, I fed the photometer output 
through a voltage-to-frequency con- 
verter to a programmable counter 
tied to the TRS-80's bus (see photo 2 ) . 
A clock/calendar chip for recording 
the date and time and a remote hexa- 
decimal keypad for control were also 




Photo 1: laboratory testing of an early (1979) data-logging system for photoelectric 
astronomy. Developed by the author {right), this system used an early Radio Shack 
TRS-80 Model I microcomputer with 16K bytes of RAM. Programs and data were 
stored on cassette tape. The four electronic boxes on the right contained the computer 
interface, photometer DC amplifier, and high- and low-voltage power supplies. 



tied to the bus. Prompts on a monitor 
in the observatory suggested what to 
do next (very handy at 3 a.m.), and 
the data was displayed in neat rows 
and columns as it was gathered. (This 
made it easy to compare the latest 
data point with all the previous similar 
ones and correct any mistakes.) After 
observations on a given star were 
completed, reduction, display, and 
printout of the results took only 
seconds. 

In photometric data logging, the 
amounts of data handled are very 
modest, allowing the use of high-level 
languages and microcomputers with 
small memories. Yet the improvement 
in the observational environment and 
the reduction in errors is outstanding. 
With photometry as the main scien- 
tific concern at smaller observatories, 
it is not surprising that photometric 
data-logging systems have been devel- 
oped for many types of microcom- 
puters in many countries. An English 
amateur astronomer, Andrew Hollis, 
has done a particularly capable job 
on a low-cost Sinclair ZX81. 

Thomas Borlik has developed a 
straightforward data-logging system 
based on the Commodore VIC-20. 
However, the Apple is the favorite of 
many data loggers with nice systems, 
such as Tim Persinger of Vanderbilt 
University, Michael Zeilik II of the 
University of New Mexico, and Robert 
E. Fried of Braeside Observatory. 
Some of the fancier photometric data- 
logging systems are LSI- 11 -based, 
such as those by William Herbst of 
Van Vleck Observatory and Nathaniel 
M. White of Lowell Observatory. 

In some types of astronomical 
photometry, the event of interest hap- 
pens so fast that a human can't record 
the results. However, a microcom- 
puter can easily record brightness 
readings every millisecond. An oc- 
cupation of a star by the dark limb of 
the moon occurs when the moon 
(which, compared to the stars in the 
sky, travels east) catches up with and 
passes over or "occults" a star. The 
star winks out in a few hundredths of 
a second. Not only is the exact tim- 
ing of the "wink out" useful in estab- 

[continued] 



184 BYTE • JULY 1985 
























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IULY 1985 -BYTE 185 









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186 BYTE • JULY 1985 



UPDATING ASTRONOMY 



lishing the exact position of the moon 
and the occulted star, but if the star 
is binary, the light has an intermediate 
brightness value for a fraction of a 
second as one star is occulted but the 
other isn't yet. 

For bright stars with large diameters, 
a fringe pattern is created when the 
moon, acting like a giant "knife edge." 
sweeps across the star in a fraction of 
a second. A microcomputer high- 
speed recording of the brightness 
fringes enables us to determine the 
diameter of the star. David S. Evans 
and R. Edward Nather at the Univer- 
sity of Texas have long been recog- 
nized as experts in such high-speed 
photometry. 

Asteroids occasionally pass in front 
of stars, casting "asteroid shadows" 
along narrow paths on the earth's sur- 
face. Exact, high-speed photometric 
measurements of the time at the be- 
ginning and end of the shadow enable 
us to determine the size of the 
asteroid. David Dunham, an 
astronomer at Computer Science Cor- 
poration, is an expert in knowing 
where these shadows will fall. He runs 
about the world to record them and 
is always looking for some help. 
Dunham heads up the International 
Occultation Timing Association 
(IOTA). 

During 1985 and 1986. Jupiter's sys- 
tem of moons will be edge-on as 
viewed from earth, resulting in many 
mutual occupations and eclipses of 
these moons. High-speed photometry 
made from amateurs' backyards will 
contribute to much more precise 
determinations of their orbits. Fred A. 
Franklin, another astronomer at the 
Harvard Smithsonian Center for 
Astrophysics, has predictions of when 
the lupiter events will take place and 
is anxious for data. He welcomes in- 
quiries. These photometric observa- 
tions of Jupiter's moons can be easily 
made with a Meade Instruments 
(1675 Toronto Way, Costa Mesa, CA 
92626) 8-inch Schmidt-Cassegrain 
telescope that costs about $1000, an 
Optec Inc. (199 Smith, Lowell, MI 
49331) SSP-3 solid-state photometer 
that costs about $800, and a micro- 
computer such as the Commodore 



VIC-20. Optec sells a cable to connect 
the SSP-3 photometer to the VIC-20 
together with the subroutine software 
to make the basic measurement for 
$2 5. Interfacing to other microcom- 
puters is readily accomplished. Heath- 
kit makes a very accurate clock that 



can be interrogated by a microcom- 
puter via an RS-232C interface. 

Telescope Control 

Telescopes are actually a lot of fun to 
operate manually. Moving a telescope 

{continued) 




Photo 2: The early data-logging system as installed at the Fair born Observatory 
(East) in 1979. The photometer, mid-left, was attached to the telescope, upper left. 
Photometer electronics are on the lower left. The video monitor on the right was tied to 
the Radio Shack TRS-80 located some distance away in a warm room. We 
communicated with the computer via a hand-held hexidecimal keypad. The system was 
used for several years to make observations of spotted RS Canum Wenaticorum binary 
stars for Douglas Hall at Vanderbilt University. \t has been superseded by a fully 
automatic system that was recently moved from Ohio to Arizona, the location of the 
Fairborn Observatory (West). 



JULY 1985 • BYTE 187 



UPDATING ASTRONOMY 



quickly and efficiently to a specific 
star in the sky is a traditional skill of 
which many observational astron- 
omers are rightly proud. However, by 
about 3 a.m. on only the second night 
of a two-month observing run. even 
the hardiest astronomers start think- 
ing about supervising computerized 
telescope control from a warm room, 
with their feet propped up and soft 
music running in the background. 
While minicomputers control some of 
the larger telescopes, modern micro- 
computers are fully capable of tele- 
scope control and are increasingly be- 
ing so used. 

Microcomputer-controlled stepper 
motors can move smaller telescopes 
about, controlling two orthogonal 
axes. One axis is usually aligned 
parallel to the earth's axis to provide 
the ability to compensate for the 
earth's rotation by rotating just this 
single axis. If you start the telescope 



out at a low speed and continually in- 
crease this speed (a process called 
"ramping"), you can bring the tele- 
scope to a relatively high speed for 
long movements across the sky and 
then "ramp" it back down to a gentle 
stop just where you want it. Given the 
angular distance to be traveled be- 
tween an object just observed and the 
next to be observed, you can calcu- 
late exactly how many steps the step- 
per should take, just how to execute 
the ramp up and down, and how to 
actually generate the steps them- 
selves. (This last is a machine-lan- 
guage task as the steps must be made 
quickly, typically several thousand per 
second at top speed.) 

Larger telescopes generally take 
more muscle to move about than 
steppers can generate and often use 
large DC motors in a servo-loop ar- 
rangement. Such systems must sense 
the position of the telescope on each 




p«v 






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axis; incremental optical shaft-angle 
encoders are often used for this. 
While reading the encoders and clos- 
ing the servo loop complicates the 
control task somewhat, it still remains 
within the grasp of the more capable 
microcomputers. Because computer 
control tended to be applied first to 
the larger telescopes, most of the ini- 
tial applications used DC motors and 
angle encoders in servo configura- 
tions. Only recently, as control has 
moved to smaller telescopes, has the 
simpler stepper system become 
popular. 

One of the first microcomputer- 
controlled telescopes was the 36-inch 
telescope at Indiana University. R. 
Kent Honeycutt used an Intel 8080- 
based microcomputer, DC motors, 
and optical encoders in a classical 
servo control system. Another early 
system was the 24-inch telescope at 
the Institute for Astronomy at the 
University of Vienna in Austria, where 
Manfred Stoll used a Motorola 
6800-based microprocessor in the 
control system. The 6502, another 
early microprocessor, was used by 
Lloyd Robinson, Robert Kibrick, and 
others for telescope control at Lick 
Observatory. 

The 16-inch system from DFM Engi- 
neering (1035 Delaware Ave., Unit D, 
Longmont. CO 80501) is a good ex- 
ample of a recent stepper-controlled 
smaller telescope. It uses zero-back- 
lash friction drives in each axis and 
an Apple II-based "open-loop" con- 
trol system. DFM Engineering 
welcomes inquiries about this system. 

Designing a microcomputer-based 
telescope-control system combines 
positional astronomy computation 
with real-time control. Mark True- 
blood and I recently completed a 
book called Microcomputer Control of 
Telescopes that includes descriptions of 
all the needed parts (motors, angle 
encoders, etc.), astronomical and 
control-system formulas, and descrip- 
tions of actual systems. Mark lYue- 
blood is the director of the Winer 
Mobile Observatory and is working 
on a 30-inch trailer-mounted tele- 
scope controlled by an LSI-I I micro- 

[continued) 



188 BYTE • JULY 1985 



Inquiry 112 



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Inquiry 339 



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JULY 1985 • BYTE 



189 



PC Paintbrush 
outpaints 
PC Paint 



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Paint runs on just 3. 

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With PC Paintbrush, you have a choice 
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printers and plotters. With PC Paint 
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PC PAINTBRUSH PC PAINT 


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16 


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190 BYTE • IULY 1985 



UPDATING ASTRONOMY 



computer. The intent of this book is 
to encourage hackers with an astro- 
nomical bent to design their own 
telescope-control systems. 

Automatic Astronomy 

Of course the microcomputer piece 
de resistance has been saved for last. 
It combines (1) a microcomputer- 
based catalog of stars, (2) microcom- 
puter selection of the stars to be 
observed, (3) microcomputer control 
of the telescope to move it to the 
vicinity of the desired star, (4) a micro- 
computer-controlled photometer to 
actually find, center, and measure the 
stars. (5) a microcomputer-based 
photometric data-logging system, and, 
of course. (6) microcomputer data 
reduction and analysis. And these are 
not separate microcomputers. One 
single-board microcomputer does it 
all! 

The first completely automatic sys- 
tem was built by Arthur D. Code and 
his associates at the Washburn Obser- 
vatory in the mid-1960s. It used a DEC 
PDP-8. While technically a minicom- 
puter with only 4K bytes of RAM 
(random-access read/write memory), 
the PDP-8 today would not be con- 
sidered even a modestly capable 
microcomputer. It was built around a 
Titan missile-alignment system found 
in a junkyard and an 8-inch optical 
system built for a space telescope. It 
used optica] angle encoders for posi- 
tion sensing and a permanently 
mounted photometer to sense the 
stars and make the measurements. 



The fixed-sequence observing pro- 
gram was stored on punched paper 
tape. When the sky became dark, the 
system started itself up, opened its 
roof, and went looking for the first 
star. This process continued all night 
until the last star was observed or the 
sky became cloudy. 

While a number of semiautomatic 
or remotely controlled telescopes 
have been built over the years, the 
coming of capable and low-cost 
microcomputers and a persistent elec- 
trical engineer, Louis J. Boyd, put 
microcomputer-based "automatic 
astronomy" on a truly sound pro- 
duction-line basis. He began develop- 
ment of his Motorola 6809-based 
system in 1979; I was visiting him in 
Phoenix in November 1983 when it 
first ran by itself all night long. The 
system found, centered, and mea- 
sured hundreds of stars without mak- 
ing a single mistake. 

It is interesting to speculate about 
the future of microcomputer-based 
automatic astronomy. Since an expe- 
rienced engineer can keep many auto- 
matic telescopes operating, it seems 
likely that a number of such systems 
owned by various institutions will be 
placed at a single top site where 
clouds are a rarity. A list of objects to 
be observed will be sent via phone 
or disk by an astronomer; after all the 
requested observations are made 
automatically, the results will be sent 
back to the requesting astronomer in 
a similar fashion. In fact, such an 
'Automatic Photoelectric Telescope 



The first completely 
automatic system 
was built at the 
Washburn Observatory 
in the mid-1960s. 



Service" has been established in 
Arizona with Louis Boyd as the engi- 
neer minding the automatic systems. 
For some types of observation, the 
best vantage point would be from 
space, where there are no atmo- 
spheric problems to contend with. In 
fact, the space station might make a 
good platform for a contingent of fully 
automatic, microcomputer-controlled 
telescopes. 

Getting Started 

While it is only recent, the published 
literature on the use of microcom- 
puters in astronomy is growing rapid- 
ly. There are a number of books that 
will be useful for further research in 
the 'Astronomy Sources" text box on 
page 244. And, in the "Helpful 
Organizations" text box on page 181, 
I have suggested a number of 
organizations worth contacting. You, 
like many others, may have fun explor- 
ing and creating connections between 
the oldest science and the newest 
machines. ■ 



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JULY 1985 'BYTE 191 



r 







COMPUTERS AND SPACE 



MICROCOMPUTERS 
IN NASAS SIR-B 



by Richard Wilton 

A network of personal 
computers in the space program 



SINCE 1978, SCIENTISTS at the Jet 
Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) have 
been producing remarkable images of 
the earth's surface using orbiting 
radar systems (photos 1-3). The 
images generated by orbiting synthe- 
tic-aperture radars are of high resolu- 

Photo I : This image of Hawaii was 
acquired on October II, 1984, by the 
Shuttle \maging Radar-B (SIR-B) during 
space shuttle mission 4I-G. Artificial 
colors were used to enhance differences in 
surface characteristics in this computer- 
processed image. Red areas represent areas 
of smooth ash cover, dark green is smooth 
pahoehoe lava, light green is rough aa (eg) 
lava, and blue represents vegetation cover. 
The resolution of this image is about 30 
meters (100 feet). The area covered is 
about 26 kilometers wide and 110 
kilometers long (about 16 by 70 miles). 
The image was acquired by SIR-B at a 
rate of about 7.5 kilometers per second 
(4.6 miles per second) at an angle of 
2 7. 5 degrees. The radar was part of a 
package of experiments flown on the 
shuttle for NASA's Office of Space 
Science and Applications (OSSA). SIR-B 
was developed by JPL for NASA. Photo 
courtesy of ]PL. 



tion and are unaffected by cloud 
cover. They are of particular interest 
to geologists, oceanographers, and 
other students of the earth's surface. 

The shuttle imaging radar experi- 
ment, called SIR-B. was the third 
synthetic-aperture radar developed at 
JPL to be placed in earth orbit. It flew 
aboard the space shuttle Challenger 
from October 4 to 12, 1984. The SIR- 
B team at JPL is still analyzing many 
of the results of the experiment. 

Of course, a great deal of engineer- 
ing and computing effort went into 
the design of the radar hardware and 
into generating visual images from the 
raw radar data. However, this article 
focuses on two other essential 
aspects of the SIR-B experiment: plan- 
ning where and when the radar would 
be used and monitoring the status of 
the radar during the mission itself. 

Hardware 

The SIR-B mission-planning team at 
JPL put a great deal of thought and 
discussion into choosing the right 
computers for the complex task of 
planning the mission. The team made 
the decision to use several microcom- 
puters, rather than a single mainframe 



or mini, as far back as 1 982. The team 
felt that microcomputers provided the 
most cost-effective and flexible com- 
putational base for fulfilling the SIR- 
B mission-design requirements. 

The overriding considerations were 
for microcomputers that met the 
following criteria: 

• availability of hardware and soft- 
ware support 

• flexibility in hardware options (in- 
cluding memory expansion, commu- 
nications interfacing, and networking) 

• floating-point arithmetic capability 

Considering the diversity of software 
and the large quantity of numeric 
data to be processed, it was clear that 
no existing 8-bit processor would 
have been sufficient. Although a 
68000-based microcomputer might 
have been faster or able to address 
more RAM, the availability of the Intel 
8087 arithmetic coprocessor— and of 
programming languages that took ad- 
vantage of its speed and flexibility— 

[continued) 
Richard Wilton is a software consultant with 
Laboratory Microsystems Inc., 3007 
Washington Blvd., Marina del Rey, CA 
90292. 

JULY 1985 • BYTE 193 



SIR-B 



was a big advantage of an 8086- or 
8088-based system. The ease with 
which additional memory, communi- 
cations hardware, and a local network 
could be installed on IBM PCs finally 
led to their use during the SIR-B 
experiment. 

All of the IBM PCs and Compaqs 
that were used for SIR-B mission plan- 
ning were equipped with Intel 8087 
floating-point coprocessors, video 
graphics displays, dot-matrix printers, 
and lots of RAM— 51 2K bytes was 
considered a minimum workable 
amount of memory. 

Software 

A lot of new software was required 
from the outset of the planning phase 
of the SIR-B mission. Mission-planning 
software included a great deal of 
arithmetic computation as well as a 
fair amount of hardware-dependent 
programming for graphics and net- 
working. Real-time communications 
and data-management software was 
critically hardware-dependent. It inte- 
grated machine-level code, such as 
port-addressed I/O and interrupt 
handlers, with fairly sophisticated file- 
management routines. 

Both the SIR-B mission-planning 
software and the real-time communi- 
cations software were written primari- 
ly in FORTH. The off-the-shelf FORTH 
implementation (PC/FORTH by Lab- 
oratory Microsystems) included fast 
display graphics for the IBM PC, a 
standard PC-DOS file interface, and 
high-level support for the 8087 co- 
processor. Again, speed, adaptability, 
and readily available support were 
major considerations in choosing the 
programming language. 

Planning the SIR-B 
Experiment 

By mid- 198 3, most of the planning 
software had been written, including 
an orbit propagator and world-map 
display graphics. The calculated or- 
bital path of the space shuttle and the 
part of the earth at which the imag- 
ing radar might be aimed could be 
rapidly drawn on either a plotter or 
a video display (photo 4). 




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In order that the radar beam could 
be directed toward a specific location 
on the earth's surface, the calculations 
included the orbiter's attitude (roll, 
pitch, and yaw) and constraints on the 
way the radar antenna could be 
aimed at the earth (the width of the 
radar beam, the angle at which the 
radar antenna was tilted, etc.) 

SIR-B mission planners could then 
display, print, or plot arbitrary por- 
tions of the orbital track of the space- 
craft. Many complex orbit and atti- 
tude calculations were translated in- 
teractively into accurate graphical rep- 
resentations on the video display and 
on printers and plotters. Prior to the 
SIR-B experiment, these problems in 
orbital mechanics and spherical 
geometry had been accurately solved 
only on mainframe computers. 

Plans for the SIR-B experiment were 
encapsulated in a detailed database 
of control commands. During the ac- 

Photo 2: The Ganges floodplain in 
Bangladesh. SIR-B observations in this 
area are being used to study the ability of 
imaging radar to detect standing water in 
a tropical environment to aid in locating 
and eradicating habitats of malaria- 
carrying mosquitoes. Artificial colors in 
this computer-processed image enhance 
differences in vegetation and terrain. Pink 
and yellow represent forested areas, seen 
most vividly in the coastal forest preserve 
of Sundarban on the Indian Ocean at the 
bottom. The textured green and pink area 
in the center shows cultivated fields 
connected by extensive irrigation and 
drainage channels. The more uniform rose- 
hued area at the top is an area of the 
Ganges floodplain subject to flooding and 
major rework during the monsoon season. 
The city of \halakat on the Bishkhali 
River is the yellow spot in the center, and 
Barisal is at the upper left center. The 
area covered in this image is 
approximately 2 3 kilometers wide and 
155 kilometers long (about 15 by 95 
miles). The image has a resolution of 20 
meters (65 feet) and was acquired by 
SIR-B at a rate of about 7.5 kilometers 
per second (4.6 miles per second) at an 
angle of 45.6 degrees. Photo courtesy o\ 
JPL. 



194 BYTE* )ULY 1985 



SIR-B 



tual mission, sequences of these com- 
mands were transmitted from the 
ground to the SIR-B radar apparatus 
located in the shuttle's payload bay 
(photo 5). Each command sequence 
initiated a specific function, such as 
aiming the radar antenna, adjusting its 
power, or turning the radar trans- 
mitter on and off. 

Communications Software 

Monitoring the status of the SIR-B 
radar equipment during the mission 
produced a large amount of telemetry 
data that had to be processed in real 
time. Data from two separate tele- 
metry streams (serial-bit streams) was 
archived. Information concerning the 
status of the radar equipment (volt- 
ages, temperatures, and so on) as well 
as the position, velocity, and attitude 
of the spacecraft itself was recorded. 
Changes in the status of the radar 
were "logged" in print and on disk for 
reference during the mission and 
afterward. 

Programming for the telemetry 
communications interface began in 
lune 1984. The use of FORTH greatly 
accelerated the development of reli- 
able hardware interfaces. Assembly- 
language code was easy to incor- 
porate into high-level FORTH pro- 
grams. Because of the interpretive 
nature of the FORTH language, the 
communications software was easily 
tested and debugged on the hard- 
ware. 

During the Mission 

For the duration of the actual mission, 
four IBM PCs and two Compaqs were 
combined on an Ethernet local-area 
network (figure 1). The equipment was 
assembled in a user-support room at 
the Mission Control Center in 
Houston. 

The data pertinent to the SIR-B ex- 
periment was extracted from the shut- 
tle's telemetry streams by mainframe 
computers at the Mission Control 
Center. The radar telemetry data was 
formatted in blocks. Each block of 
data contained a date and time code, 
the attitude and orbital position of the 
spacecraft, and a sequence of engi- 




0mM 

affin- 



al.' 



foi 



neering telemetry values. 

A 68000-based computer, designed 
and built by SIR-B engineers, con- 
verted the raw telemetry data into 
several formats for further processing. 
This custom-built machine was pro- 
grammed in C and cross-compiled to 
ROM from a VAX. The output from 
this machine included a 4800-bps 
(bits per second) asynchronous data 
stream. 

A separate telemetry stream was 
processed by another mainframe 
computer at Mission Control. This 
data was provided as a 4560-bps 
binary synchronous bit stream. 

These two serial telemetry streams, 
one asynchronous and one binary 
synchronous, were received on a 
single Compaq. The data was refor- 
matted on the Compaq and trans- 
ferred across the network to the net- 
work server, an IBM PC XT with a 
IO-megabyte hard disk. All of the 
machines on the network, including a 
60-megabyte cassette tape drive, had 
access to the telemetry data as soon 
as it was saved on the server. Three 
color graphics displays, two dot- 

{continued) 

Photo 3: This image of northeastern 
Florida will be used to assess coniferous 
timber stands and management practices 
in conjunction with extensive ground 
measurements at experimental forests and 
test sites in the area. Artificial colors in 
this computer-processed image enhance 
differences in vegetation and terrain. 
Yellowish-green areas are generally stands 
of cypress drenched in early morning dew 
(the image was taken at 3:59 a.m. local 
time). Three prominent bodies of water 
(from left to right) are Ocean Pond, 
Palestine Lake, and Swift Creek Pond. At 
the bottom is the Gulf of Mexico. Dark 
green and purple areas are agricultural 
fields, and bright orange regions denote 
drainage channels. The image was 
acquired at an angle of 28.4 degrees at a 
rate of about 7. 5 kilometers per second 
(4.6 miles per second). The area covered 
is approximately 29 kilometers wide and 
174 kilometers long (about 18 by 106 
miles). The resolution of the image is 28 
meters (90 feet). Photo courtesy of JPL. 



JULY 1985 • BYTE 195 



SIR-B 




Photo 4: The path of five orbits of the space shuttle is superimposed on a map of the 
world. Photo by Su Kim. 




Photo 5: The SIR-B radar antenna in the pay/load bay of the spacecraft during the 
mission. The antenna, at the left, was built in three rectangular segments that were 
folded together when not in use. This was the case when this photo was taken. You can 
see most of the antenna's triangular support base, one of the hinges on which the 
segments of the antenna unfold, and, at the far left, a clasp that locked the antenna 
closed. The entire apparatus is covered with a white thermal fabric. Photo 
courtesy of NASA. 



All the commercially 
available hardware 
was used "as is"; 
no special hardware 
modifications were 
needed for the system. 



matrix printers, and a line printer were 
used as output devices. 

All of this commercially available 
hardware was used "as is"; that is, no 
special hardware modifications were 
needed to configure the system. 
Throughout the mission, the net- 
worked system performed reliably 24 
hours a day. 

When a KU-band communications 
antenna failure aboard the spacecraft 
compromised one of the essential 
telemetry links, a great deal of con- 
tingency planning was required. 
Because the SIR-B mission-planning 
software was easily accessible on the 
microcomputer network, the SIR-B 
planning team was able to work 
around some of the problems created 
by the loss of the communications 
antenna. 

Also, because it was possible to 
"replay" events from the telemetry 
stream over the network shortly after 
they occurred, the SIR-B engineers 
were able to keep a close eye on the 
performance of the radar and its 
subsystems. 

Conclusions 

All in all, the networked microcom- 
puter system that was created for SIR- 
B planning and data archiving per- 
formed remarkably well. The advan- 
tages of using networked micros in 
this real-time engineering application 
were clear: hardware redundancy, dis- 
tributed processing, and reliability 
and ease of use of off-the-shelf com- 
ponents. 

[continued) 



196 B YTE • IULY 1985 



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The experience gained from SIR-B 
(as well as the hardware and software) 
will be used in upcoming imaging 
radar missions. The SIR-B experiment 
itself will be repeated on a space shut- 
tle flight in early 1987. A more sophis- 
ticated experiment called SIR-C is cur- 
rently planned for the late 1980s, 

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BIBLIOGRAPHY 

Elachi, Charles. "Radar Images of the 
Earth from Space." Scientific American. 
December 1982. 

Ford, J. P. "Space Shuttle Columbia Views 
the World with Imaging Radar: The S1R- 
A Experiment." jet Propulsion Labora- 
tory publication 82-95. January 1983. 

Harris, Henry. "SMDOS: SIR-B Mission 
Design and Operations Software." jet 
Propulsion Laboratory document 
D-1081. 1984. 

"The SIR-B Science Investigation Plan." let 
Propulsion Laboratory publication 84-3, 
July 1984. 

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200 BYTE • JULY 1985 



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COMPUTERS AND SPACE 



COMET LINES 
IN FORTRAN 



by David S. Dixon 



The program described calculates 
the positions of asteroids and comets 



THE PROGRAM DISCUSSED in this 
article is intended to allow amateur 
astronomers to calculate the positions 
of asteroids or comets with greater ac- 
curacy than the programs previously 
published in general literature. Writ- 
ten in FORTRAN IV, the program 
should be translatable to any BASIC 
that supports double-precision calcu- 
lation. But be advised that this is a 
number-crunching program; it may 
run for hours if rewritten in inter- 
preted BASIC. 

Asteroids are a very challenging 
target for the observer: they appear 
as points of light just like the stars. 
Depending on the asteroid's position 
relative to earth, it may or may not 
demonstrate detectable motion 
against the background stars. Fre- 
quently, several nights of observation 
are required to see displacement and 
identify the asteroid. Successfully 
hunting a particular asteroid usually 
means having a good idea of the 
asteroid's position at the intended 
time of observation and having a 
good set of star charts. 

The problem is that accurate tables 
of locations for asteroids, known as 
ephemerides, are not easy to come 
by. The United States Naval Obser- 



vatory publishes ephemerides for the 
four major asteroids in The Astronomical 
Almanac each year, but there are thou- 
sands of named asteroids. (For a list 
of books and periodicals mentioned 
in this and other articles, see the 
'Astronomy Sources" text box on 
page 244.) The Soviet Union's Institute 
of Theoretical Astronomy publishes 
the Ephemerides of Minor Planets, which 
gives ephemerides for thousands of 
asteroids, but only for a few weeks at 
opposition, and it is a difficult publica- 
tion to obtain. Both the Russian and 
the Naval Observatory publications, 
however, also give the orbital ele- 
ments for a large number of asteroids, 
and with the elements it is possible 
to calculate the ephemerides of an 
asteroid yourself. 

Many of the books and magazine 
articles that address calculating the 
position of a planet solve the problem 
by the model devised by Johannes 
Kepler in 1609. The method models 
the motion of a body in the solar sys- 
tem as involving only the sun and the 
body in question. This means that to 
find the relative positions of Earth and 
Mars in a common coordinate system 
you solve the two-body sun-Mars 
problem, solve the two-body sun- 



Earth problem, and, using spherical 
trigonometry, combine the two results 
to solve the Earth-Mars problem. The 
method can produce results satisfac- 
tory for use in finding planets, but the 
accuracy for use on asteroids is fre- 
quently inadequate. Kepler's model is 
a remarkable achievement since he 
derived it by geometry as an em- 
pirical solution based on position 
measurements made by lycho Brahe. 
Kepler's model is summarized in his 
first two laws: 

First Law: The orbit of each planet is 
an ellipse, with the sun at one of the 
two foci. 

Second Law: The line joining the planet 
to the sun sweeps over equal areas of 
the ellipse in equal intervals of time. 

It was not until more than 50 years 
after Kepler's work was published that 
the work of Sir Isaac Newton ex- 
plained the process that Kepler's 
model described and how the model 
was incomplete. Newton's law of gravi- 

[continued) 
David S. Dixon is a quality engineer at a 
NASA test facility. His hobbies include micro- 
computing and amateur astronomy. He can 
be reached at 3208 \upiter Rd.. Las Cruces, 
NM 88001. 



JULY 1985 'BYTE 203 



COMET LINES 



ty showed that the orbit of a body in 
the solar system is not just a function 
of the sun and the body but involves 
every mass in the system, i.e.. not a 
two-body problem but an H-body 
problem. And Newton's three laws of 
motion allowed mathematical deriva- 
tion of what Kepler had deduced from 
empirical data and geometry. An n- 
body celestial mechanics problem is 
not trivial. It involves evaluating the 
mutually perturbing effects of the 
planets, asteroids, satellites of planets, 
and the sun. In practice one usually 
restricts the calculations to the sun 
and the planets. 

The two main classes of perturba- 
tion techniques used to attack the n- 
body problem are referred to as 
either general perturbations (absolute 
solutions) or special perturbations 
(solutions using iterative numerical 
techniques). Special perturbation 
techniques fall into two categories, 
Cowell's model and Encke's model, 
with numerous variations of each. 
Both use similar numeric integration 
methods, but because of the dif- 
ferences in the models, one model or 
the other may have an advantage in 
solving a particular type of problem. 
Cowell's model can be derived by 
direct application of Newton's laws. 

In Cowell's model, which was devel- 
oped in the early 1900s, all gravita- 
tional attractions by all n bodies are 
summed and integrated to give the 
motion of the body in question. 
Encke's model was developed in 1857 
(before Cowell's) and is a very straight- 
forward result of combining Kepler's 
first two laws and Newton's laws of 
motion and gravity. Starting at a given 
point in time, Encke's model describes 
the motion of a body as the combina- 
tion of a Keplerian two-body orbit be- 
tween the body and the primary (the 
sun) and the integration of all the 
other perturbing accelerations. In 
figure 1, p is the radius vector of the 
Keplerian orbit, r is the radius vector 
of the true orbit, and e is the dif- 
ference between the Keplerian and 
true orbits due to perturbation. 

Encke's model is therefore a little 
more complex than Cowell's, but I 
chose it for rriy program because, 





e. 


\ 


\TRUE PATH 


p // 

/ft 




\ 


\\ 






keplerian\\ 

ORBIT \\ 


SUN 
(BARYCENTER) 


f 


h 



Figure 1 : \llustration of Encke's model 
for calculating orbits around the sun: 
p is the radius vector of the Keplerian 
orbit r is the radius vector of the true 
orbit, and e is the perturbation [the 
difference between p and r). 

when used on problems dealing with 
elliptic motion, it usually allows larger 
integration steps and controls the 
growth of truncation errors somewhat 
better than Cowell's model. 

What Encke's model provides is an 
expression for the second order dif- 
ferential equation of e. 1 don't know 
of any closed-form solutions to 
Encke's model or any of the other 
special perturbation models of the n- 
body problem. In other words, there 
is no equation or formula that is the 
solution of the problem. Since there 
is no closed-form solution, an iterative 
numerical integration technique is 
used. The program uses a Runge- 
Kutta numerical integration method 
that, while not the fastest calculating 
method, is easy to program, is easy 
to change step size, and provides 
good stability and accuracy. The ac- 
curacy I was trying to obtain was 
about 0.1 right-ascension minute (6 
RA seconds), and 1 minute in declina- 
tion. The program will generally 
satisfy this accuracy for periods of 
calculation of two years or more if the 
initial osculating orbital elements are 
accurate. For comets and for asteroids 
with extremely eccentric orbits, I 
would not expect accuracy this good, 
but fortunately the images for comets 
are generally different than the back- 
ground stars. The program employs 



several simplifications that restrict the 
time over which the perturbations can 
be integrated and accuracy can be 
maintained. 

During my research for writing this 
program, I had the opportunity to ex- 
amine several perturbation programs 
used by professional astronomers. 
These programs were substantially 
longer and used either tabular data 
and interpolation for the positions of 
the planets or a program that calcu- 
lates perturbed motion for the planets 
as well' as the asteroid. The former re- 
quires large amounts of data entry or 
access to data in machine-readable 
form. The latter increases the amount 
of calculation further still. This pro- 
gram uses a series of polynomials 
that are calculated and gives the or- 
bital elements of each of the planets 
considered to be perturbation 
sources. The planetary positions 
derived from these orbital elements 
are not as accurate as the other 
methods. This error, and several 
others, leads to restrictions on the 
period of time over which the pertur- 
bations can be integrated by this pro- 
gram to about 800 days before the 
error exceeds the desired accuracy. 

One perturbing acceleration has 
been left out of the program. This is 
the acceleration resulting from the 
displacement of the body from the 
Keplerian path about the primary. The 
Keplerian path is a force-balanced 
path only so long as the body is on 
the path. When the asteroid is per- 
turbed off the path, an additional ac- 
celeration due to the primary comes 
into effect. Equation 1 is the expres- 
sion for the acceleration, and as long 
as e is small then this term is very 
small. The program forces a recom- 
puting of the osculating elements of 
the asteroid whenever e reaches a 
predetermined small value. For the 
desired accuracy, this perturbation 
term can be ignored. This is the major 
mathematical departure of the pro- 
gram from Encke's model. Encke's 
model includes this acceleration and 
still requires a routine to compute 
new osculating elements, but it allows 
e to grow to much greater size before 

[continued) 



204 BYTE • JULY 1985 



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COMET LINES 



rectifying the orbit. 
a = rn*\pl\p\ 3 - r/|r| 3 | 



(1) 



The differential equation on which the 
program is based is given in equation 
2. .If equation I and equation 2 are 
added you have the differential equa- 
tion of Encke's model. 

d 2 eldt 2 = 
^-m k *\(s a -s k )l\s a -s k \^(sJ\s k H(2) 

Subscripts a and ,k in equation 2 
refer to the asteroid and perturbing 
body; N is the number of perturbing 
bodies; s is the position vector of the 
body corresponding to the subscript 
relative to the solar system bary- 
center; m is the gravitational param- 
eter of body k. 

The program consists of the main 
code and four subroutines. The main 
program handles initial parameter in- 
put for the asteroid number, dates 
and increment for the ephemeris, and 



an initial integration step size. As writ- 
ten, the program expects to find a file 
of asteroid osculating orbital elements 
on disk. The short program DSKPRP 
is an example of a program used to 
initialize this file. The main program 
integrates the perturbations from the 
beginning epoch of the asteroid or- 
bital elements to the first date of the 
ephemeris. When the integration has 
reached the first date in the ephem- 
eris, the main program continues the 
integration at whatever time interval 
was specified for the ephemeris and 
calculates the coordinate transforma- 
tion from heliocentric ecliptic coor- 
dinates to equatorial coordinates and 
prints the ephemeris. Subroutine 
KEPLER solves Kepler's equation for 
the asteroid, Earth, and the other 
planets. This calculation is done in 
polar coordinates and then trans- 
formed to heliocentric rectangular 
coordinates. Subroutine NEWTON ac- 
cepts the rectangular coordinates of 
the ^steroid and a perturbing body 



Table I: Osculating orbital elements for asteroid 90 for epoch 27.0, December 
1980, in the order they would be entered in the program. 



Julian date_ 
Inclination (/)_ 



2444600.5 



Longitude of the ascending node- 
Argument of perihelion (w) 

Mean radius (a) 

Daily motion (n) 

Eccentricity (e) 

Mean anomaly {M) 

Brightness 8(1 ,0) 



_ 2.23553 Deg. 
_ 70.62207 Deg. 
234.84993 Deg. 
_ 3.1477109 AU. 
_ 0.17648663 Deg. 
_ 0.1659135 
. 212.56103 Deg. 
_ 9.3 



Table 2: 


The ephemeris calculated by the program for 


asteroid 90 




in the period 1 3.3 5, Septembet 


I983 to 1 3.45, 


September 


1983. 




Asteroid Number 90 


















Astrometric 1950.0 


















D 


M 


Y 


JD 


Right Ascension 


Declination 


Mag. 


Distance 


13.35 


8 


1983 


2445559.85 


23 


8 


24.1 


-9 


16 


31 


12.6 


1.734 


13.36 


8 


1983 


2445559.86 


23 


8 


24.1 


-9 


16 


31 


12.6 


1.734 


13.37 


8 


1983 


2445559.87 


23 


8 


23.8 


-9 


16 


33 


12.6 


1.734 


13.38 


8 


1983 


2445559.88 


23 


8 


23.4 


-9 


16 


35 


12.6 


1.734 


13.39 


8 


1983 


2445559.89 


23 


8 


23.1 


-9 


16 


38 


12.6 


1.734 


13.40 


8 


1983 


2445559.90 


23 


8 


22.8 


-9 


16 


40 


12.6 


1.734 


13.41 


8 


1983 


2445559.91 


23 


8 


22.5 


-9 


16 


43 


12.6 


1.734 


13.42 


8 


1983 


2445559.92 


23 


8 


22.1 


-9 


16 


45 


12.6 


1.734 


13.43 


8 


1983 


2445559.93 


23 


8 


21.8 


-9 


16 


48 


12.6 


1.734 


13.44 


8 


1983 


2445559.94 


23 


8 


21.5 


-9 


16 


50 


12.6 


1.734 


13.45 


8 


1983 


2445559.95 


23 


8 


21.2 


-9 


16 


53 


12.6 


1.734 



and calculates the perturbing ac- 
celeration due to the body. Subrou- 
tine ENCKE calculates a new set of 
osculating orbital elements for the 
asteroid from the old set and the per- 
turbations that have occurred to the 
asteroid. The last subroutine in the 
program, subroutine ORBIT, calcu- 
lates the orbital elements of the Earth 
and other perturbing planets by a set 
of polynomials and the Julian date. 

Using the program is not difficult. 
The program first prompts for the 
date on which you want the ephem- 
eris table to start, the interval of the 
table, and the length of time to be 
covered in the ephemeris. The unit of 
time is in days, i.e., 0.01 day or 10 
days. The time scale is universal time, 
which for the purposes of the pro- 
gram can be considered coordinated 
universal time, which is broadcast by 
WWV and other time stations. The 
program then prompts for an integra- 
tion step size. This generally should 
be between 5 and 40 days, with a 
maximum of about 2 percent of the 
orbital period and a minimum of 
about 0.1 percent of the orbital 
period. The closer the epoch of the 
orbital elements is to the first date in 
the ephemeris, the longer the inte- 
gration step may be. The objective in 
selecting the integration step size is 
to pick an interval small enough to 
make the truncation errors in the in- 
tegration small and have an interval 
large enough to keep round-off 
buildup minimized. The program then 
prompts for the asteroid number and 
fetches the asteroid's orbital elements 
stored on disk. The asteroid's orbital 
elements from the file are displayed. 
If more recent elements are available, 
the elements are entered and the file 
updated. The program then calculates 
an ephemeris for the dates and time 
interval entered. 

Ikble I contains the osculating or- 
bital elements from the 1980 Ephem- 
erides of Minor Planets for asteroid 
number 90, named Antiope. Ikble 2 
is the ephemeris calculated by the 
program for a 0.1 -day period on 
August 13, 1983. This period was 
chosen because it coincides with the 

{continued) 



206 BYTE • JULY 1985 



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♦ Source line display of Microsoft FORTRAN, Pascal and 
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♦ Make minor changes without reassembling. 
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♦ Similar to UNIX™ Make utility. 
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♦ Create, organize and maintain your object module 
libraries created with Microsoft Languages. 

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COMET LINES 



period in which the Lowell Obser- 
vatory made photographic plates of 
the asteroid and the resulting posi- 
tional measurements were published 
in Minor Planet Circular #8193 (October 
21. 1983) of the Smithsonian Astro- 
physical Observatory. The positions 
for asteroid 90 are as follows: 

Date 13.39167 Aug. 1983 

R.A. 23 hr 8 min 17.70 sec 

Dec. -9 deg 17 min 18.8 sec 



Date 13.42951 
R.A. 23 hr 
Dec. -9 deg 



Aug. 1983 

8 min 16.40 sec 

17 min 28.6 sec 



As you can see, the program satisfies 
the accuracy required. For a further 
comparison, table 3 is an ephemeris 
calculated by a program that uses 
only Keplerian motion and does not 
calculate the perturbations due to the 
major planets. 

The program was originally written 
to calculate ephemerides of asteroids 



but can also be used to calculate 
ephemerides of comets. When the 
program is used for comets it is 
necessary to do some minor calcula- 
tion to translate the orbital elements 
from the conventional form for 
comets to elements usable by the pro- 
gram. Also; comets are named by 
several different methods: year and 
order of discovery, name of dis- 
coverer and subsequent redis- 
covered, season of the year, or place- 
ment in the sky. Comet names just do 
not seem usable with the simple form 
of random-access file used for the 
numbered asteroids. I maintain 
separate ASTRO.DAT disks for comets 
and asteroids and keep a manual in- 
dex of what comet is in each record, 
l&ble 4 is a set of orbital elements for 
Halley's comet from Minor Planet Cir- 
cular #9214 (November 8. 1984). For 
this set of elements the mean 
anomaly (M) is not provided. Instead, 
the time of perihelion (T) is given. This 



Ikble 3: 


The ephemeris as in 


table 2, 


but calculated 


ising 








only Keplerian motion. 


















Asteroid N 


umber 90 


















Keplerian Motion Ephemeris Astrometric 1950.0 












D 


M 


Y 


JD 


Right Ascension 


Declination 


Mag. 


Radius 


13.35 


8 


1983 


2445559.85 


23 


12 


27.9 


-8 


50 


53 


12.6 


1.732 


13.36 


8 


1983 


2445559.86 


23 


12 


26.7 


-8 


51 


1 


12.6 


1.732 


13.37 


8 


1983 


2445559.87 


23 


12 


26.4 


-8 


51 


4 


12.6 


1.732 


13.38 


8 


1983 


2445559.88 


23 


12 


26.1 


-8 


51 


6 


12.6 


1.732 


13.39 


8 


1983 


2445559.89 


23 


12 


25.8 


-8 


51 


8 


12.6 


1.732 


13.40 


8 


1983 


2445559.90 


23 


12 


25.4 


-8 


51 


11 


12.6 


1.732 


13.41 


8 


1983 


2445559.91 


23 


12 


25.1 


-8 


51 


13 


12.6 


1.732 


13.42 


8 


1983 


2445559.92 


23 


12 


24.8 


-8 


51 


16 


12.6 


1.732 


13.43 


8 


1983 


2445559.93 


23 


12 


24.5 


-8 


51 


18 


12.6 


1.732 


13.44 


8 


1983 


2445559.94 


23 


12 


24.2 


-8 


51 


21 


12.6 


1.732 


13.45 


8 


1983 


2445559.95 


23 


12 


23.9 


-8 


51 


23 


12.6 


1.732 



T^ble 4: A set of orbital elements for Halley's comet. 



Julian date_ 



. 2446480.5 



Time of perihelion passage (7)_ 
Inclination (/) 



9.43867 Feb. 1986 



Longitude of the ascending node_ 

Argument of perihelion (w) 

Mean radius (a) 

Daily motion (n) 

Eccentricity (e) 



162.23932 Deg. 
_ 58.14397 Deg. 
_ 111. 84658 Deg. 
_ 17.9390115 AU. 
_ 0.01297198 Deg. 
_ 0.9672725 



Calculated from equation 3. 
Mean anomaly (M) 



0.1240284 Deg. 



is typical of the convention for report- 
ing comet orbital elements. The cal- 
culation of M is not complicated. M 
equals the daily motion times the dif- 
ference between the epoch of the ele- 
ments and T. Equation 3 is the 
mathematical expression for the cal- 
culation of M: 



M = n* (Epoch of elements - T) 



(3) 



The comet orbital elements general- 
ly do not include the mean anomaly 
(M). the mean radius (a), or the daily 
motion. Usually the time of perihelion 
(T) and the perihelion distance (q) are 
given instead. Like M, missing 
parameters can usually be calculated 
from what is given. For example, to 
calculate the mean radius from the 
perihelion distance q and the eccen- 
tricity, use equation 4: 

a = q I (1 - e) (4) 

If the daily motion (n) is not provided, 
you only need to have the mean 
radius and from equation 5 you can 
calculate n: 



n = 0.985609 / (a) 3 ' 2 



(5) 



These relationships should be suffi- 
cient to allow calculation of any or- 
bital element parameters that are not 
provided. The brightness coefficient 
£(1.0) is not applicable to comets. I 
have written the program to use this 
coefficient as a flag to prompt for the 
name of the comet and to change the 
output format slightly. A £(1,0) greater 
than 1000 flags the program that the 
ephemeris is of a comet. Sources 
of comet orbital elements are 
numerous. Occasionally a periodical 
on astronomy will include orbital ele- 
ments as part of an article. I expect 
to see this more frequently as 
amateur astronomers acquire and use 
personal computers to calculate 
ephemerides and indicate a desire to 
publishers to see orbital elements in- 
cluded in articles. 

Because comets are made of mate- 
rials that vaporize, they undergo some 
mass loss each time they form a coma. 
or tail. This mass loss also introduces 
a source of perturbation not found in 
asteroids. The program does not in- 

{continued) 



208 BYTE • JULY 1985 



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Inquiry 174 



4P019 



COMET LINES 



Table 5: 


A set of test calculations for 


Halley's comet. 










Comet Halley 






■ 












Astrometric 1950.0 


















D MY 


JD 


Right Ascension 


Declination 


Distance 


26.97 1 


1 1984 


2446031.47 


6 


21 


49.1 


11 


57 


4 


4.739 


26.98 1 


1 1984 


2446031.48 


6 


21 


50.0 


11 


57 


5 


4.740 


26.99 1 


1 1984 


2446031.49 


6 


21 


49.5 


11 


57 


4 


4.740 


27.00 1 


1 1984 


2446031 .50 


6 


21 


49.0 


11 


57 


4 


4.739 


27.01 1 


1 1984 


2446031.51 


6 


21 


48.5 


11 


57 


4 


4.739 


27.02 1 


1 1984 


2446031.52 


6 


21 


48.0 


11 


57 


4 


4.739 


27.03 1 


1 1984 


2446031.53 


6 


21 


47.4 


11 


57 


3 


4.739 


27.04 1 


1 1984 


2446031.54 


6 


21 


46.9 


11 


57 


3 


4.739 


27.05 1 


1 1984 


2446031.55 


6 


21 


46.4 


11 


57 


3 


4.739 


27.06 1 


1 1984 


2446031.56 


6 


21 


45.9 


11 


57 


3 


4.738 


27.07 1 


1 1984 


2446031 .57 


6 


21 


45.4 


11 


57 


2 


4.738 


27.08 1 


1 1984 


2446031.58 


6 


21 


44.9 


11 


57 


2 


4.738 


27.09 1 


1 1984 


2446031.59 


6 


21 


44.3 


11 


57 


2 


4.738 


27.10 1 


1 1984 


2446031.60 


6 


21 


43.8 


11 


57 


2 


4.738 


27.11 1 


1 1984 


2446031.61 


6 


21 


43.3 


11 


57 


1 


4.737 


27.12 1 


1 1984 


2446031.62 


6 


21 


42.8 


11 


57 


1 


4.737 



elude these nongravitational pertur- 
bations in the calculation. The ac- 
curacy of the results is acceptable for 
most purposes. Tkble 5 is an ephem- 
eris calculated by the program using 
the orbital elements for Halley's com- 
et in table 4. From Minor Planet Circular 
#9316 are measured positions for 
Halley's comet in the same period: 



Date 26.973 
R.A. 6 hr 

Dec. 11 deg 

Date 27.109 
R.A. 6 hr 

Dec. 1 1 deg 



Nov. 1984 

21 min 48.88 sec 
56 min 58.3 sec 

Nov. 1984 

21 min 41.80 sec 
56 min 5 5.6 sec 



T&ble 6: The epfiemeris for Halley 


's comet 


for )uly and August 1985 


as calculated by the 


program. 
















Comet 


Halley 


















Astrometric 1950.0 


















D 


M 


Y 


JD 


Right Ascension 


Declination 


Distance 


1.00 


7 


1985 


2446247.50 


5 


32 


2.0 


18 


13 


56 


4.424 


3.00 


7 


1985 


2446249.50 


5 


33 


19.5 


18 


16 


54 


4.392 


5.00 


7 


1985 


2446251.50 


5 


34 


38.3 


18 


19 


51 


4.358 


7.00 


7 


1985 


2446253.50 


5 


35 


57.2 


18 


22 


44 


4.324 


9.00 


7 


1985 


2446255.50 


5 


37 


16.1 


18 


25 


32 


4.288 


11.00 


7 


1985 


2446257.50 


5 


38 


35.1 


18 


28 


15 


4.251 


13.00 


7 


1985 


2446259.50 


5 


39 


54.0 


18 


30 


55 


4.214 


15.00 


7 


1985 


2446261.50 


5 


41 


12.9 


18 


33 


30 


4.175 


17.00 


7 


1985 


2446263.50 


5 


42 


31.5 


18 


36 


1 


4.135 


19.00 


7 


1985 


2446265.50 


5 


43 


49.9 


18 


38 


29 


4.095 


21.00 


7 


1985 


2446267.50 


5 


45 


7.9 


18 


40 


52 


4.053 


23.00 


7 


1985 


2446269.50 


5 


46 


25.5 


18 


43 


11 


4.010 


25.00 


7 


1985 


2446271.50 


5 


47 


42.7 


18 


45 


27 


3.967 


27.00 


7 


1985 


2446273.50 


5 


48 


59.2 


18 


47 


39 


3.922 


29.00 


7 


1985 


2446275.50 


5 


50 


15.2 


18 


49 


48 


3.876 


31.00 


7 


1985 


2446277.50 


5 


51 


30.4 


18 


51 


54 


3.830 


2.00 


8 


1985 


2446279.50 


5 


52 


44.8 


18 


53 


57 


3.783 


4.00 


8 


1985 


2446281.50 


5 


53 


58.3 


18 


55 


56 


3.735 


6.00 


8 


1985 


2446283.50 


5 


55 


10.9 


18 


57 


53 


3.686 


8.00 


8 


1985 


2446285.50 


5 


56 


22.5 


18 


59 


48 


3.636 


10.00 


8 


1985 


2446287.50 


5 


57 


32.8 


19 


1 


40 


3.585 


12.00 


8 


1985 


2446289.50 


5 


58 


41.9 


19 


3 


31 


3.533 


14,00 


8 


1985 


2446291.50 


5 


59 


49.6 


19 


5 


19 


3.481 


16.00 


8 


1985 


2446293.50 


6 





55.8 


19 


7 


6 


3.428 


18.00 


8 


1985 


2446295.50 


6 


2 


.3 


19 


8 


53 


3.374 


20.00 


8 


1985 


2446297.50 


6 


3 


2.9 


19 


10 


38 


3.319 


22.00 


8 


1985 


2446299.50 


6 


4 


3.6 


19 


12 


23 


3.264 


24.00 


8 


1985 


2446301.50 


6 


5 


2.2 


19 


14 


8 


3.207 


26.00 


8 


1985 


2446303.50 


6 


5 


58.6 


19 


15 


53 


3.151 


28.00 


8 


1985 


2446305.50 


6 


6 


52.5 


19 


17 


39 


3.093 


30.00 


8 


1985 


2446307.50 


6 


7 


43.7 


19 


19 


27 


3.035 



The accuracy for the comet ephem- 
eris is well within the tolerance estab- 
lished for use in locating asteroids 
and should be equally satisfactory for 
locating comets. 'Ikble 6 is an 
ephemeris for Halley's comet for July 
and August 1985. In July the comet 
will be rising in the early morning in 
the eastern horizon about an hour 
before the sun. 

1 need to give a word of warning to 
users about a future complication in 
the process of using this program. 
Astronomical positions are almost in- 
variably referenced to the Earth's 
equinox and ecliptic at some date. 
The problem is that with respect to 
the star field, this is a continually 
rotating set of coordinates. So, when 
you find osculating orbital elements 
or ephemerides for planets, asteroids, 
or comets, they are noted as mean 
ecliptic of 1950.0, or ecliptic of date, 
or mean ecliptic of 2000.0. The pro- 
gram is set up to calculate positions 
referenced to the equinox and eclip- 
tic of 19 50.0 and to use osculating 
elements referenced to this set of 
coordinates. The astronomical con- 
vention for comet and asteroid orbital 
elements and ephemerides is that the 
reference equinox and ecliptic will be 
at the century and half-century 
dates- 1900, 1950, 2000. We are near- 
ing a change point. Some reference 
sources are now using the ecliptic of 
2000 as the coordinate base, while 
many others retain the ecliptic of 1950 
as the base. If the source of orbital 

[continued) 



210 BYTE • JULY 1985 



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y 216 JULY 1985 'BYTE 



COMET LINES 



The convention for 
comet and asteroid 
orbital elements 
and ephemerides 
is that the reference 
equinox and ecliptic 
will be at the century 
and half-century dates. 



elements you use is referenced to the 
ecliptic of 2000, you will need to 
change the parameters for planetary 
position that are used in subroutine 
ORBIT the value for the obliquity of 
the ecliptic (EPSLN) in the main pro- 
gram, and the heading message for 
the printout in the main program. 
Values for the changes to be made 
can be found in Astronomical Formulae 
for Calculators. 

The program was originally written 
on a Digital Equipment Corporation 
PDP-11 in DEC FORTRAN IV. Later I 
translated the program to Digital 



Research FORTRAN-77 for the IBM 
PC and that is the version available 
on BYTEnet Listings ( (617) 861-9774). 
As I mentioned at the beginning of 
the article, the program is a number 
cruncher. The Digital Research FOR- 
TRAN has the option at link time of 
producing code for the 8087 copro- 
cessor or linking 8087 simulation 
routines. 

I have timed the program on a varie- 
ty of PC-DOS and MS-DOS systems. 
If the 8087 coprocessor is not used, 
a single integration loop of the pro- 
gram will take from 60 to 130 sec- 
onds, depending on the machine. 
With the 8087 coprocessor the time 
drops to about 1 second per loop. 
The program in its present form is in- 
tended to be as readable as possible. 
At least one change to speed up ex- 
ecution is possible. You can reduce 
the number of times you call subrou- 
tine KEPLER by almost one-third by 
modifying the program to assign the 
previous values of POS(I,I,3) to 
POS(I.J.l) at the beginning of any in- 
tegration loop in which the preceding 
loop did not call subroutine ENCKE 
and then began the loop calculating 
POS(IJ,2). I do not know how much 
this would improve execution time, 
but if your system does not have an 
8087, it is a modification that may be 



worth making. If you use the program 
extensively, the execution time im- 
provement of the 8087 may be the 
justification for adding one to your 
system. 

The program is written so that even 
if you don't have a mainframe com- 
puter and a degree in astrophysics, 
you can convert the program to your 
microcomputer's BASIC or FORTRAN 
and, I hope, not get lost in the pro- 
cess. Comments have been added to 
the program listings to reference the 
source of many of the values used for 
the calculations, so I am not going to 
discuss them further in text. 1 recom- 
mend that you obtain a copy of Astro- 
nomical Formulae for Calculators since 1 am 
confident that you will eventually 
need to refer to it for changes in the 
reference ecliptic. If you have a back- 
ground in calculus and are interested 
in the derivation and physics behind 
the program, I recommend Fundamen- 
tals of Astrodynamics as a very readable 
reference on the topic. ■ 

Editor's note: \f you are unable to obtain the 
source-code listings from BYTEnet Listings, 
Mr. Dixon will provide an IBM PC- 
compatible disk containing source code and 
compiled code for $18. Write to David S. 
Dixon. 3208 Jupiter Rd. t las Cruces, NM 
88001. 



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212 BYTE • JULY 1985 



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Inquiry 133 



JULY 1985 -BYTE 213 




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COMPUTERS AND SPACE 



TRACKING EARTH 
SATELLITES 



by E. H. Weiss 



The Stumpff program can help you calculate earth-orbiting 
satellite positions with high precision 



THE PURPOSE OF the program 
Stumpff is to compute the orbit or tra- 
jectory of a body of negligible mass 
(spacecraft or minor planet) in the 
gravitational field of three massive 
bodies. In the point-mass problem, 
each body behaves as if its entire 
mass is concentrated at a single point. 
In that case the Stumpff program con- 
verges to the exact solution. Another 
use of Stumpff is to obtain fast ap- 
proximations, especially to orbits 
within our solar system. In that case 
an accuracy on the order of one part 
in a thousand is usually maintained, 
even for lengthy and stressing cases. 

The program is named in honor of 
professor Karl Stumpff (1895-1970), 
who developed the theory upon 
which the program is based. 

The method described here has two 
major advantages over traditional 
methods. First, it is 10 to 15 times 
faster. Second, there is no need to 
store the positions of the massive 
bodies, called ephemerides, on disks 
or tapes. This point is crucial; without 
it a personal computer could not per- 
form the computations. 

Stumpff is written for a minimum- 
configuration IBM PC. An 80-column 
display console and a printer are re- 



quired. A listing of the BASIC source 
code and a compiled version for the 
IBM PC are available for downloading 
from BYTEnet Listings at (617) 
861-9774. 

Historical and Technical 
Background 

The two-body problem (motion of a 
planet around the sun) was solved by 
lohannes Kepler (1571-1630). Kepler's 
solution to the two-body problem 
enabled him to compute the position 
of a planet at any value of time by a 
series of formulas. Isaac Newton 
(1642-1727) tested his law of univer- 
sal gravitation by rederiving Kepler's 
laws with his own invention, the cal- 
culus. Newton found that the solu- 
tions are not only ellipses, as stated 
by Kepler, but also parabolas and 
hyperbolas (if the velocity of the less 
massive body is sufficient to escape 
the gravitational field of the more 
massive body). 

The search for the solution of the 
three-body problem occupied math- 
ematicians and astronomers until Karl 
G. I. lacobi (1804-1851) proved that a 
closed-form (general) solution is im- 
possible if a body is gravitationally at- 
tracted by two or more other bodies. 



It is, however, possible to obtain the 
solution by numerical techniques. 

Numerical Techniques 

The motion of a small body is de- 
scribed by a set of differential equa- 
tions and is traditionally computed by 
numerical integration. In order to per- 
form a numerical integration, you 
must first know the values of all mo- 
tion parameters at t . the start time. 
Then look up the coordinates of the 
massive bodies in a table of 
ephemerides. Next, numerically inte- 
grate the position of the small body 
to time t\. This is possible provided 
that the time step h = t\ - t is suffi- 
ciently small. Then, using the known 
values of the small body at time t\. 
compute the values at t 2 - The values 
of the motion parameters of the 
massive bodies are again obtained 
from tabulated ephemerides. Similar- 

{continued) 
E. H. Weiss, an advisory analyst for IBM, 
has more than 3 5 years of experience in 
government and private industry as a pro- 
grammer, instructor, analyst, and manager. 
His Stumpff program is his alone—it was not 
developed by or for IBM. He can be reached 
at 7568 Remington Rd., Manassas. VA 
22110. 



)ULY 1985 -BYTE 215 



TRACKING SATELLITES 



ly, "march" from time t 2 to t 3 , then to 
U. t 5 . etc., until the values of the mo- 
tion parameters at the desired end 
time are obtained. 

What has been said so far about nu- 
merical integration is quite general. It 
is equally valid for the numerical in- 
tegration of the equations of motion 
of a spacecraft and for any other dif- 
ferential equation. Is there a better ap- 
proach for astronomical or spacecraft 
problems? lohann Franz Encke (1791- 
1865) thought so. His clever method 
is useful if the major contribution to 
the motion of the small body is 
caused by the gravitational attraction 
of just one body. (This is frequently 
satisfied in our solar system.) In that 
case, a two-body method is used to 
compute the spacecraft motion due 
to that one massive body; this is 
called the reference orbit. The con- 
tribution of all other effects, called the 
perturbation, is obtained by numeri- 
cal integration, lb obtain the space- 
craft motion, you add the values of 
the reference orbit and the perturba- 
tion. Since the quantity to be inte- 
grated—the perturbation— is small 
relative to the reference orbit, a com- 
paratively large time step can be 
used. Thus, even though the calcula- 
tion time spent on one Encke time 
step is greater than for straightforward 
integration, the Encke method 
generally performs the entire com- 
putation in less time. 

Connection Between the 
Encke and Stumpff Methods 

The Stumpff method is an extension 
of the Encke method. The Stumpff 
reference orbit includes the gravita- 
tional attraction of all massive bodies 
and thus accounts for all point-mass 
effects. Furthermore— and this is 
crucial— the deviation between the 
reference and the actual orbits re- 
mains small even over protracted time 
intervals. Therefore, the time step for 
the Stumpff method can be larger 
than that for the Encke method, which 
in turn is larger than that for straight- 
forward integration. The bottom line 
is that the Stumpff technique is about 
10 to 1 5 times faster, even though the 
computing time per time step is 



slower than for other methods. 

The Stumpff method was first de- 
scribed in 1942 in reference 1. The ar- 
ticle explains and proves the method 
and illustrates it by computing the 
orbit of a minor planet. References 2 
and 3 provide a new and shorter 
proof and also include applications to 
artificial satellites. Reference 2 in- 
cludes four FORTRAN listings of the 
Stumpff technique for mainframe 
computers. 

A Sample Case 

Stumpff can compute the orbit of any 
body of negligible mass in the gravita- 
tional field of any three massive 
bodies. The program is set up to com- 
pute a sample case; other cases re- 
quire input changes, to be discussed 
shortly. The sample case computes 
the orbit of Explorer 33, which was 
launched on July 1, 1966. Explorer 33 
describes more than 10 highly eccen- 
tric orbits around the earth and moon 
in 180 days. There are several close 
approaches to the earth and the 
moon. 

Notation 

Stumpff computes the trajectory of a 
spacecraft in the gravitational field of 
three massive bodies. The mass of q , 
the spacecraft, must be negligibly 
small. The sample case is set up with 
<\\ as the earth, q 2 as the moon, and 
43 as the sun. The masses of the four 
bodies are denoted by m 0l m [l m 2 . and 
m 3 . 

Any coordinate system can be used, 
provided that the origin is at the 
center of body q x . The sample case 
uses the standard 1950.0 coordinate 
system. The x-axis points to the first 
point of Aries (also called the vernal 
equinox), the z-axis points north, and 
the y-axis completes a right-handed 
orthogonal coordinate system. All in- 
put and output is in kilometers (km) 
for position, kilometers per second 
(km/sec) for velocity, and days for 
elapsed time. 

The vector from q\ to q is denoted 
by pio. That is, p l0 is the position vec- 
tor of body q relative to (or as 
measured from) q { . The three coor- 
dinates of pio along the x-, y- t and z- 



axes are denoted respectively by 
Viod). Vio(2). and V I0 (3). More general- 
ly, let i = 0. 1. 2, or 3; j = 0, 1. 2, or 
3. Then p if is the position vector of qj 
relative to q it and its components 
along the coordinate axes are V, ;; (l), 
Y u [2). and 7^(3). The time derivative 
of p u is a velocity vector; it is denoted 
by v ( j and its components by y (4), 
^(5). and y, y (6). 

Input 

The Stumpff program always prompts 
for four data entries. It prints the 
default parameters for the sample 
case, then asks "DO YOU WISH TO 
MODIFY ANY OF THE ABOVE CON- 
DITIONS? Y OR N." If you respond 
with "N" or "n," the program im- 
mediately continues with the next of 
the three remaining prompts. 

In response to the prompt 
"RESULTS WILL BE PRINTED EVERY 
NTH DAY," type the desired frequen- 
cy (e.g., 10 to obtain printouts every 
tenth day). In response to the prompt 
"LARGEST VALUE OF TIME TO BE 
PRINTED, IN DAYS." type 180 if the 
length of the mission is 180 days, and 
so on. The last prompt is "TIME-STEP 
CONTROL CRITERION. IE -5 OR 
IE- 6 RECOMMENDED." Respond 
with an appropriate number, remem- 
bering that smaller values yield 
greater accuracy, but the calculations 
require more computer tirrte. 

If you respond to the first prompt, 
"DO YOU WISH TO MODIFY ANY OF 
THE ABOVE CONDITIONS? Y OR N." 
with "Y" or "y," the program prints all 
initial conditions, one at a time. If no 
change is required, merely press 
Enter; to change a value, type a new 
value, then press Enter. The initial 
conditions are displayed in the follow- 
ing order: 

Y10(l) . . . Y10(6) 

Y12(l) . . . Y12(6) 

Y13(l) . . . Y13(6) 

The canonical unit of length 

The canonical unit of time 

The starting time, in days 

ml. m2. m3 

Program lines 320 to 360 and the sub- 
routine on lines 1930 to 2790, 

{continued) 



216 BYTE • JULY 1985 



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Inquiry, 2 

\ \ 



TRACKING SATELLITES 



Table I : Printer output of Stumpff using the default sample data for Explorer 


33 and IE- 5 as the time-step control criterion. 




Position in km and velocity in km/sec. Origin at Q1 . 




Lines 1 & 2 Y10; lines 3 & 4 Y12; lines 


5&6 Y13. 




Line 1 ends with time in days. Line 7 gives spacecraft distance from Q1 and Q2. 


+ 1. 8352641 E + 05 ' 


-2.4094338E + 05 


-3.6452766E + 04 


+ 0.0000000E + 00 


+ 1.0044146E + 00 


-3.2081303E-01 


- 1. 51 68001 E- 01 




+ 2.1384734E + 05 


- 2.961 9053E + 05 


+ 1.6430464E + 05 




+ 8.4600699E-01 


+ 4.7626001 E- 01 


+ 1.7218044E-01 




- 9.38561 36E + 07 


+ 1.0949798E + 08 


+ 4.74861 28E + 07 




- 2.2920521 E + 01 


-1.6789843E + 01 


+ 7.281 7683E + 00 




R10.R20 


+ 3.0506469E + 05 


+ 1 .4254020E + 05 




Canonical units of length and time are: 






+ 6.3781650E + 03 


+ 8.0681 366E + 02 






Masses of bodies 1 , 


2, and 3 are: 






+ 1 .0000000E + 00 


+ 1.2299896E-02 


+ 3.3295128E + 05 




Start time, Date 


08:32:41 07-01- 


1984 


Time-step criterion 


+ 1.0000000D-05 




+ 4.0406591 E + 05 


+ 5.7658706E + 03 


-9.9387773E + 04 


+ 1.0000000E + 01 


-4.8275355E-01 


+ 5.1666003E-01 


+ 8.1928223E-02 




+ 1.7381369E + 05 


+ 3.1362872E + 05 


+ 1. 43801 52E + 05 




-9.3196988E-01 


+ 3.2447833E-01 


+ 2.3401 709E- 01 




-1.1224846E+08 


+ 9.3514536E + 07 


+ 4.0555028E + 07 




-1.9551346E + 01 


-2.0131100E + 01 


+ 8.7292433E + 00 




R10,R20 


+ 4.1614953E + 05 


+ 4.5490291 E + 05 




+ 3.7403688E + 05 


-2.5159747E + 05 


+ 7.2772000E + 04 


+ 2.0000000E + 01 


+ 5.6283206E-01 


+ 1.9169375E-01 


- 1.509281 1E- 01 




- 3.23971 41 E + 05 


+ 1.6550636E + 05 


-5.8775484E + 04 




+ 4.5049697E-01 


- 8.4750861 E- 01 


- 4.599551 3E- 01 




-1.2746285E + 08 


+ 7.4866512E + 07 


+ 3.2467906E + 07 




-1.5571598E + 01 


-2.2928595E + 01 


- 9.9447031 E + 00 




R10.R20 


+ 4.5661869E + 05 


+ 7.0343669E + 05 




+ 3.01 8871 9E + 05 


+ 1.0132476E + 05 


-7.8300773E + 04 


+ 3.0000000E + 01 


-9.3400902E-01 


+ 3.8737997E-01 


+ 1.9829461 E- 01 




+ 3.6786394E + 05 


- 1. 4087461 E + 05 


- 9.821 0367E + 04 




+ 4.1416159E-01 


+ 7.9788619E-01 


+ 3.7135252E-01 




-1.3902795E + 08 


+ 5.4090352E + 07 


+ 2.34571 96E + 07 




-1.1139797E + 01 


-2.5052975E + 01 


-1.0864564E + 01 




R10.R20 


+ 3.2792316E + 05 


+ 2.5181314E + 05 




+ 4.5098631 E + 05 


-1.9036528E + 05 


- 9.655041 4E + 04 


+ 4.0000000E + 01 


+ 3.2330784E-01 


+ 3.2467601 E- 01 


-1.0042379E-01 




- 5.631 8953E + 04 


+ 3.2954591 E + 05 


+ 1.7090238E + 05 




-1.0172640E + 00 


-2.3190196E-01 


-4.1716743E-02 




-1.4661626E + 08 


+ 3.1767970E + 07 


+ 1. 3777301 E + 07 




-6.3732409E + 00 


- 2.6502871 E + 01 


+ 1.1492944E + 01 




R10.R20 


+ 4.9894850E + 05 


+ 7.7407838E + 05 




+ 1.0722097E + 05 


+ 1.3195153E + 05 


-3.3376625E + 04 


+ 5.0000000E + 01 


- 1. 719931 5E + 00 


-2.0821010E-01 


+ 4.3421 927E- 01 




-1.5787850E + 05 


-3.1072731E + 05 


-1.4608538E + 05 




+ 9.0786868E-01 


-4.1719040E-01 


- 2.791 2253E- 01 




- 1 .4996200E + 08 


+ 8.5147130E + 06 


+ 3.6924375E + 06 




-1.3445547E + 00 


-2.7184437E + 01 


-1.1790426E + 01 




R10,R20 


+ 1.7326725E + 05 


+ 5.281 5294E + 05 


[continued) 



available on BYTEnet, deal with input 
to Stumpff. 

Output 

Seven lines are printed every n days, 
where n is an input parameter: 

Line 1: Y10(l), YI0(2), YI0(3). 

elapsed time 
Line 2: YI0(4), YI0(5). YI0(6) 
Line 3: YI2(1). YI2(2). Y12(3) 
Line 4: YI2(4). YI2(5). YI2(6) 
Line 5: Y13(l). YI3(2). YI3(3) 
Line 6: Y13(4). YI3(5). YI3(6) 
Line 7: "RIO, R20", R10, R20 
(where RIO is the distance be- 
tween q\ and qO and R20 is the 
distance between ql and qO). 

Lines 1260 to 1570 of Stumpff deal 
with computer output. 

Ikble I shows the sample case in- 
tegrated for 90 days. The time-step 
control criterion is IE- 5. 

Canonical Units 

The equations of motion include the 
Gaussian constant of gravitation, 
which involves the units of length, 
time, and mass and therefore as- 
sumes different numerical values for 
different basic units. But the constant 
appears in the equations of motion 
only as a multiplicative factor. There- 
fore, it need not be coded if it 
assumes the value of unity. 

Canonical units are a set of consis- 
tent units for which the Gaussian con- 
stant equals unity. Canonical units are 
used in all internal computations of 
Stumpff. The definition of canonical 
units is as follows: Let d be the 
distance between point-mass bodies 
a and b. Let body b describe one com- 
plete revolution around body a due 
to the gravitational attraction of a. and 
denote the period of one complete 
revolution by PER. The units of mass, 
length, time, and the constant of uni- 
versal gravitation are considered to be 
canonical if 

• the mass of body a is the unit of 
mass 

• the distance d is the unit of 
length 

• the period PER, divided by (2 * 

[continued) 



218 BYTE • JULY 1985 




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Inquiry 99 



TRACKING SATELLITES 



+ 4.2073403E + 05 


-8.1687375E + 04 


-1.3920300E+05 


+ 6.0000000E + 01 


-1.6991589E-01 


+ 5.4551 083E- 01 


- 4.07841 50E- 02 




+ 4.0053797E + 05 


+ 6.0884805E + 04 


+ 1.5494327E + 03 




-1.4566940E-01 


+ 8.5460287E-01 


+ 4.4591239E-01 




-1.4892976E + 08 


- 1. 497361 6E + 07 


-6.4940470E + 06 




+ 3.7287424E + 00 


-2.7058577E + 01 


-1.1733729E + 01 




R10,R20 


+ 4.5063006E + 05 


+ 2.0136027E + 05 




+ 2.2461516E + 05 


- 2.8893991 E + 05 


-3.9640344E + 04 


+ 7.0000000E + 01 


+ 8.1509495E-01 


-6.4160638E-02 


-2.9409379E-01 




-2.6377850E + 05 


+ 2.1918655E + 05 


+ 1.3143569E + 05 




-7.0102608E-01 


-7.3732376E-01 


- 3.24221 94E- 01 




-1.4353605E + 08 


-3.8023476E + 07 


- 1. 6489461 E + 07 




+ 8.741 3425E + 00 


-2.6167715E + 01 


-1.1348359E + 01 




R10,R20 


+ 3.6811628E + 05 


+ 7.2525019E + 05 




+ 3.4287069E + 05 


+ 6.1140590E + 04 


-1.2910519E + 05 


+ 8.0000000E + 01 


-6.4364934E-01 


+ 5.7552481 E- 01 


+ 1.6853730E-01 




+ 6.8223969E + 04 


-3.3873609E + 05 


+ 1. 78291 13E + 05 




+ 9.9896520E-01 


+ 1.2927669E-01 


-8.4648142E-03 




-1.3387658E + 08 


-5.9954040E + 07 


- 2.6001 038E + 07 




+ 1.3563957E + 01 


-2.4460604E + 01 


-1.0608757E + 01 




R10,R20 


+ 3.7143862E + 05 


+ 4.8759766E + 05 




+ 3.2928400E + 05 


-2.8257238E + 05 


-9.0272820E + 04 


+ 9.0000000E + 01 


+ 5.4575258E-01 


+ 2.4833123E-01 


-2.2335909E-01 




+ 3.0065381E + 05 


+ 2.4090578E + 05 


+ 1.0086758E + 05 




-6.7142922E-01 


+ 6.2881 094E- 01 


+ 3.7202370E-01 




-1.2021711E + 08 


-8.0078016E + 07 


-3.4727984E + 07 




+ 1. 79791 09E + 01 


- 2.2009541 E +01 


-9.5437965E + 00 




R10,R20 


+ 4.431 9781 E + 05 


+ 5.5801 769E + 05 




End time 


38:39:14 







3.14159), is the unit of time 
• the universal constant of gravita- 
tion equals unity 

The following canonical units are 
frequently used in astronomy. The 
unit of mass is the mass of the sun, 
the mean distance from the sun to the 
earth is the unit of length, and the unit 
of time equals one sidereal year 
divided by (2*3.14159), or 58.132 
days. 

The sample case in the program 
uses the mass of the earth as the unit 
of mass and the equatorial earth 
radius (6378.165 km) as the unit of 
length. The computation of the 
canonical unit of time can be left to 
the astronomers, who have stated that 
its value is 806.813645 seconds. 

Lines 260 to 300 of the listing ini- 
tialize the canonical values for the 
sample case. In the program, variable 
CML holds the canonical unit of 



length and CMT is the canonical unit 
of time. 

Mathematical Statement 
of the Problem 

There are four bodies, denoted by q . 
c\\, q 2 , and q 3 . with masses m , m ]t m 2 , 
and m 3 . The mass of body q is negligi- 
ble. The position vector of body ir- 
relative to cji is denoted by p { j(t n ). 
where i and / may assume numerical 
values 0, 1. 2, or 3; also, n is any in- 
teger, t is the abbreviation for time, 
and therefore t n denotes a specific 
value of time. The time derivative of 
Pij(t n ) is the velocity vector v (t„). 

The mathematical statement for the 
problem of this article is as follows. 
At the outset the values of the six vec- 
tors p, (t ). Pnlto). PnM, Vio(to). v 12 (to). 
and v, 3 (to) are known; they are called 
the initial conditions. The objective is 
to determine the value of p ]0 (t f ), where 
t f is the specified final time. This is ac- 



complished by first computing the 
values of the six vectors at time t\. 
Then, using the just-obtained values 
as new initial conditions, compute the 
vector values at t 2 . Continue "march- 
ing" to t 3 , U etc., until the values for 
t f are determined. 

It is mentioned in passing that any 
vector Pij can be computed from the 
three vectors p\ 0l p ]2 , and p 13 . To see 
this, remember the obvious vector 
relations 

Pu = -Pm 

Pu + Pjk = Pik (k = 0. 1.2, or 3) 

Pu = 

Thus, for example, p 2 o = Pi\ + Pio = 
-P\i + Pio. 

Two-Body Motion 

Suppose there are only two bodies, 
say q and q\. As before, Pio(fo) an d 
vio(to) denote the position and veloci- 
ty vectors of q relative to q\ at time 
to- The corresponding values at time 
ti are denoted by |pio(ti)| and |vio(ti)|. 
where the square brackets show that 
the values are the result of two-body 
motion. Over 100 useful procedures 
exist for solving two-body problems. 
In the days of paper-and-pencil com- 
putation, the human computer could 
easily switch procedures— for exam- 
ple, from an efficient procedure for 
elliptic motion to another procedure 
as the motion approached parabolic 
characteristics. Programmers for elec- 
tronic computers prefer one universal 
method for all types of two-body mo- 
tion. Stumpff uses a universal method 
called "subr See lines 1680 to 1910 
of the program. Stumpff spends the 
bulk of its time in this subroutine. 

Stumpff Reference Orbit 

This section presents the equation for 
P u . the Stumpff reference orbit for 
position, and V, v , the reference orbit 
for velocity, lb simplify the equations, 
the following conventions are used: P u 
and Vtj refer to time h; the two-body 
values, enclosed in square brackets, 
also refer to time tu all other terms 
refer to time to: fi = t\ - t \s the time 
step. 
It is easier to state the equations for 

[continued) 



220 BYTE • JULY 1985 



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Inquiry 63 



JULY 1985 'BYTE 221 



TRACKING SATELLITES 



four massive bodies; therefore, the 
condition that m = is temporarily 
removed. The equations are: 



Pio = Ipiol 

+ m 2 /(mi+m2) 

+ m 2 /(m2+mo) 

+ m3/(mi + m3) 

+ rniHrn-i+rno) 



V 



= \V\o\ 

+ m 2 /(mi+m2) 

+ m 2 /(m2+mo) 

+ m3/(m3+mo) 



(\V\7\-Vn-h*vn) 

(|P2o]-P20-^*V2o) 
(|Pl3|-Pl3-ft*V l3 ) 
(IP30|-P30-ft*V30) 

(|Vl2|-Vl2) 
(JV20)— V 2 o) 

(|Vl3|-V, 3 ) 
( V30I-V30) 



These equations exhibit remarkable 
symmetry. By interchanging the roles 
of subscripts and 2, for example, P\ 2 
and V12 are obtained. By similar inter- 
changes, one can obtain any Stumpff 
reference orbit, though the program 
requires only P\ Q , P n . and P\ 3 , as well 
as V10. Vn. and V^. Of course, the 
program saves time by using the con- 
dition that m = 0. 

Pij[t\) and V u (t\) are excellent ap- 
proximations to the true orbital pa- 
rameters, even for a relatively large 
time step. Therefore, Stumpff equates 
p u [U) and v -(t,) with P u lU) and V u [t\). 

The reference orbits are computed 
on lines 760 to 1330. The two-body 
subroutine, "subl," which starts on 
line 1680, is invoked six times. Note 



that the subroutine would be invoked 
five times to compute just one refer- 
ence orbit yet is called only six times 
for all reference orbits. 

Time Step 

The time step h is defined by ft - ti 
- t . (The program, however, uses TAU 
instead of h). Considerable effort was 
spent in finding a good criterion for 
the magnitude of the time step. It 
should be large to reduce the com- 
puting time, yet small to prevent the 
truncation error from building Up to 
an intolerable level. The criterion that 
was eventually chosen is based on an 
overestimate of the error. There exist 
better time-step criteria for the sam- 
ple case, but the chosen criterion has 
the virtue of working well for all cases 
that were investigated. 

The time step is calculated on lines 
620 to 740. It equals the fourth root 
of (q/ERRERR); q is computed on line 
1400 and involves the overestimate of 
the error; ERRERR is the user type-in 
following the prompt TIME-STEP 
CONTROL CRITERION. IE- 5 OR 
IE- 6 RECOMMENDED. A safeguard 
prevents the time step from becom- 
ing larger than 100 canonical units. 
Moreover, the time step is adjusted so 
that results are printed for the days 
that the user has specified. 



Mathematical Theory 
of Errors 

Functions encountered in the physical 
sciences can usually be represented 
as Ikylor series. If a procedure agrees 
with the Taylor series up. to and in- 
cluding terms of order n but not terms 
of order n+\, then the procedure 
is said to be of order n and the error 
of order w+h Higher-order pro- 
cedures provide a better approxima- 
tion than lower-order ones. Therefore, 
in general, equivalent accuracy is 
maintained by high-order procedures 
with large time steps and low-order 
procedures with small time steps. 

The reason the Stumpff method is 
so attractive can now be stated suc- 
cinctly: For point-mass bodies, the 
error of the Encke reference orbit is 
of order two, while that of the Stumpff 
reference orbit is of order four. ■ 

REFERENCES 

1. Stumpff, K. "Untersuchungenueberdas 
Problem der speziellenStoerungen in den 
rechtwinkligen Koordinaten." Astrono 
mische Nachrichten, vol. 273, 1942. 

2. Stumpff, K., and E. H. Weiss. "A Fast 
Method of Orbit Computation." NASA 
Technical Note TN D-4470, April 1968. 

3. Stumpff, K., and E. H. Weiss. 'Applica- 
tions of an N-body Reference Orbit" in 
Astronautical Sciences, vol. 15, number 5, 
September 1968. 



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Inquiry 255 



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Inquiry 122 



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COMPUTERS AND SPACE 



AUTOMATING 
A TELESCOPE 



by Louis J. Boyd 



Computerizing the repetitious tasks 
in variable-star photometry 



RECENTLY AT FAIRBORN Obser- 
vatory West, we completed automat- 
ing a telescope (photo I) for a con- 
siderable portion of the research pro- 
cess of photometry of variable stars 
requiring long-term observation. This 
article will explain the entire process 
from one end to the other, with em- 
phasis on what was automated, how 
it was automated, and what was pur- 
posely left to be done manually. 

Selecting the Stars 

Much of the success of this project 
has been due to our making obser- 
vations on the particular class of stars 
most suited for automation. As it is 
easier and less expensive to automate 
a small telescope than it is a large 
one, it was important that the type of 
observations being made were 
suitable for small telescopes. 

The main difference between large 
and small telescopes is the number 
of photons they can collect from a 
given star. Wide-bandwidth photom- 
etry (brightness measurement) makes 
the most use of the meager photons 
available to smaller telescopes. 
Photometry, as compared to spec- 
troscopy or direct imaging, also has 
the advantages of having a very 



repetitive measurement sequence 
and a low data-output rate, easing 
automation. 

Further, automation is ideally suited 
to the kind of research that requires 
observations each night for months or 
years on end. . 

Finally, it is helpful if the observed 
class of stars has many bright mem- 
bers to match the capabilities of a 
small automatic telescope, that there 
be strong current scientific interest in 
the results, and that there be an ex- 
pert on the class of stars willing to 
work with an automatic system. 

The RS Canum Venaticorum bina- 
ries and Dr. Douglas S. Hall fit the 
criteria in all respects. The RS Canum 
Venaticorum (or RS CVn) binaries are 
an exciting new class of stars that have 
highly active atmospheres, often with 
large groups of starspots that move 
about and change their sizes over 
time. These stars are similar to our 
own sun, but in a greatly exaggerated 
form. Tb learn how their starspots 
evolve and change over time, you 
must observe a significant number of 
the stars almost nightly for years. 
Besides the 40 or so known RS CVn 
binaries observable by a small tele- 
scope from the northern hemisphere, 



there are a number of stars suspected 
of being starspotted RS CVn binaries. 
Until recently, the photometry needed 
to detect any intensity variations as 
the spot groups rotate in and out of 
the line of sight from earth had not 
been done. There simply is not 
enough telescope time or. enough 
astronomers for such long-term ob- 
servations. However, the automatic 
system described in this article has 
discovered 1 5 such new variables dur- 
ing 1984 alone. One of these newly 
discovered RS CVn binaries can serve 
as an example to illustrate the ap- 
proach we took to automation. (See 
the text box "A New Variable Star" on 
page 230). Douglas Hall compiled the 
list of known and suspected RS CVn 
binaries from available data on the 
stars and, with the help of Russell 
Genet, screened the list to eliminate 
stars not suited to the automatic sys- 
tem (e.g., stars that are too dim, too 
far north or south, or too near other 
stars). For each variable (or suspected 

[continued) 
Louis J. Boyd has a B.S. in electrical engineer- 
ing and is codirector of the Fairborn Obser- 
vatory (629 North 30th St., Phoenix. AZ 
85008). He designed the automated photo- 
electric telescope described in this article. 

IULY 1985 • BYTE 227 



TELESCOPE 



The system must first 
determine if the sky 
is dark enough 
to begin observing. 



variable). Hall and Genet selected two 
additional stars to use in comparing 
the brightness differentially and to 
assist in locating and identifying the 
variable by the three stars' relative 
positions. Information about all of 
these stars was obtained from appro- 
priate catalogs and entered into a 
data file. The data included the coor- 
dinates of each star, the expected 
brightness of each star, periodic data 
on the variable star, if known, and 
coordinates of a nearby place in the 
sky containing no detectable star. 

This group data, together with 
similar data on all of the other groups 
of stars to be observed by the system, 
constitutes the astronomical input to 
the observational process. The pro- 
cess of deciding what variable or 
suspected variable stars to observe is. 



of course, a case of scientific intuition, 
and no attempt has been made to 
automate it. The selection of com- 
parison and check stars could be 
based on a set of rules relating 
brightness, separation from the vari- 
able star, and spectral class. The se- 
lection could be automated by allow- 
ing the computer to search star cata- 
logs, but, as it is a one-time task for 
each variable star, there is little incen- 
tive to do so. 

Observing the Stars 

Almost all of the observing process 
has been automated (figure I). The 
part that hasn't is the simple (for a 
human) process of looking at the sky 
in the afternoon, deciding if the 
weather is acceptable for observing, 
and opening the observatory roof. 
This manual process takes at most 
two minutes per day and has been a 
low-priority item to automate. Be- 
cause this task is repetitive, it will 
eventually be automated. We have 
made progress in that direction, but 
the difficulty is to reliably detect all 
forms of inclement weather including 
rain, hail, blowing dust, high wind, and 
heavy clouds that are likely to pro- 




Photo 1 : The automatic photoelectric telescope used to gather the measurements 
discussed in the article. The small box at the top of the telescope is the photometer. 



duce rain. We are currently testing an 
infrared clear-sky detector. After 
opening the observatory, we power 
up the system and compare the com- 
puter's real-time clock against the Na- 
tional Bureau of Standards' WWV 
time signals. From this point on. oper- 
ation is automatic. 

The system must first determine if 
the sky is dark enough to begin ob- 
serving. A human would do this by 
simply looking up and making a deci- 
sion. Not so for the computer. The 
program starts by repeatedly deter- 
mining the position of the sun by cal- 
culating the orbit of the earth and its 
rotation, given the date and time from 
the clock and knowing the location of 
the observatory. This function could 
have been handled with a lookup 
table for each week of the year. When 
the sun is 10 degrees below the 
horizon, the telescope is initialized to 
the southeast limits of its allowable 
travel range and the related position 
in the sky is calculated based on the 
time. At that instant, a frequency 
generator is turned on that steps the 
right-ascension motor of the tele- 
scope at a rate that very accurately 
compensates for the rotation of the 
earth. Thus, the software does not 
have to constantly take the earth's 
rotation into account. Most manually 
operated astronomical telescopes 
also have a motor that compensates 
for the earth's rotation, even though 
the stars are located by an operator. 

The system then decides which 
group it will observe first. The logic 
used is about the same as a human 
would use. Because viewing stars at 
low angles introduces errors due to 
all the air the starlight must penetrate, 
the maximum distance the star is 
from the zenith when it is observed 
is restricted to a 4 5-degree cone over- 
head. The program calculates the 
time that each group will rise and set 
within the defined observing cone 
and selects the group that will be the 
first to move out of the cone. The pro- 
gram determines whether the se- 
lected group is within 10 degrees of 
the moon. If it is, that group is 
skipped. Again, a human would sim- 
ply judge the angle by looking at the 



228 BYTE • JULY 1985 



TELESCOPE 



moon and the selected group, but the 
computer must calculate the position 
of the moon and compare it to the 
position of the group. 

The telescope must now be moved 
to the check star of the group being 
observed. A human observer would 
push the appropriate slew buttons to 
move the telescope to the position or 
release clutches and move the 
telescope by hand. The star is found 
by a combination of the use of set- 
ting circles, comparing the observed 
star field to "finder charts," and by 
simply recognizing the pattern of 
stars. The equivalent process for the 
computer is complex. First, the com- 
puter must calculate the angular 
distance the telescope needs to be 
moved to go from its present position 
to the sky position for the group. All 
star positions are corrected for 
precession of the earth's axis. The 
angles are passed to a module that 
breaks them into two separate moves, 
one with both right-ascension and 
declination motors being stepped 
together, and a second move with 
only one motor running. The exact 
number of steps required for each 
move is calculated and the direction 
and number of steps is passed to a 
stepper-motor driver routine. This is 
the only assembly-language routine 
used in the entire operation. It must 
calculate which windings of each 
motor need to be turned on for each 
step that the motors make. In addi- 
tion, it must provide smooth accelera- 
tion at the beginning of each move 
and smooth deceleration at the end 
of each move. The maximum stepping 
rate is on the order of 4000 steps per 
second, which could not be done in 
a high-level language. The next task 
is to take several measurements of the 
sky brightness in positions near the 
sky position to set a threshold to use 
while searching for the stars. The tele- 
scope is then moved to the position 
where it expects to find the star. A 
square spiral search is then started 
taking J/io-second readings of the sky 
brightness and comparing this to a 
value calculated from the expected 
brightness of the star. If the reading 
exceeds about one-half the difference 



f START j 



SELECT 
PROGRAM STARS 



SELECT 

COMPARISON a 
CHECK STARS 




OPEN 
OBSERVATORY 



INITIALIZE 
PHOTOMETER a 
TELESCOPE 



SELECT GROUP 
TO BE 
OBSERVED 



MOVE TO STAR 
AND MAKE 
SPIRAL SEARCH 




CENTER STAR a 
TAKE READINGS 
THRU 3 FILTERS 




STORE 

READINGS ON 
FLOPPY DISK 




CHECK IF GROUP 
SHOULD BE 
REOBSERVED 




YES 



CLOSE 
OBSERVATORY 




REDUCE AND 

SORT DATA 



PRELIMINARY 
ANALYSIS 
OF DATA 




PUBLICATION 
OF FINDINGS 



Figure I : A diagram of the operation of the automatic photoelectric telescope described 
in the article. The shaded boxes were left as manual processes, while all other activities 
were automated. Boxes marked with an asterisk are candidates for future automation. 



of the sky background and the ex- 
pected value, it is assumed that the 
star has been found. By using an ad- 
justable threshold, there is little 
chance of the system locking onto the 
wrong star. 

The next step of the process is to 
center the star. A human would look 
through the eyepiece and make sure 



that the star's image was centered, 
carefully adjusting the telescope's 
fine-motion controls. The automated 
system uses an iterative procedure, in 
which the telescope is offset to each 
of four positions by a little less than 
the radius of the diaphragm, and a 
reading is taken in each position. 

{continued) 



JULY 1985 'BYTE 229 



TELESCOPE 



There are 16 possible combinations 
that dictate which direction and how 
far the telescope must be moved to 
center it. This process is repeated 
until the star is detected in all four 



positions, where it is close enough to 
the center to take measurements. 

Measurements of 10 seconds each 
are made in three color passbands, 
changing the position of a wheel with 



colored glass filters between <;ach 
measurement. The elescop >ti 
moves to the sk; pc ition replacing 
the measurements, then to the com- 
parison, variable, etc. When all of the 



A New Variable Star 



liable A: 


Program parameters. 








NAME: HR 4430 DIAPHRAGM = 60" 








NAME 


RIGHT ASCEN. 


DECLIN. 


V-MAG. 


CHECK 


HD 102224 


11 46 3.0 


+ 47 46 46 


3.71 


SKY 




11 34 29.0 


+ 46 45 44 


.00 


COMP 


HD 101133 


11 38 33.0 


+ 46 50 3 


6.10 


VARI 


HD 99967 


11 30 25.0 


+ 46 39 27 


6.35 



liable B: 


Sample data. 
















GROUP=HR 4430 
















HELIOCENTRIC CORRECTION = .0045 












TYPE 


NAME 


ULTRA 


BLUE 


VISUAL 


SECZ 


HH 


MM 


SS 


CHECK 


HD 102224 


308.72 


2533.51 


4371.71 


1.05 


7 


56 


47 


SKY 




9.11 


21.69 


24.65 


1.04 


7 


57 


21 


COMP 


HD 101133 


176.54 


619.36 


515.79 


1.04 


7 


57 


58 


VARIABLE 


HD 99967 


35.02 


233.10 


410.78 


1.03 


7 


58 


53 


COMP 


HD 101133 


174.15 


619.39 


515.04 


1.04 


7 


59 


32 


VARIABLE 


HD 99967 


34.47 


218.37 


389.12 


1.03 


8 





21 


COMP 


HD 101133 


173.12 


601.62 


509.49 


1.04 


8 


1 


1 


VARIABLE 


HD 99967 


35.21 


227.78 


406.96 


1.03 


8 


1 


51 


COMP 


HD 101133 


173.98 


615.16 


511.58 


1.04 


8 


2 


38 


SKY 




8.85 


21.68 


25.34 


1.03 


8 


3 


11 


CHECK 


HD 102224 


313.27 


2577.48 


4426.84 


1.04 


8 


3 


54 



.10 












I I l 


I I I 


I 


1 1 








• 








.20 




•A.. 

• 

• •- 

• ■ 
• 

• 


• • 

1 


•v • • • - 

m 




.30 


• 
_ • 

i i i 


t 

1 1 1 


1 1 




.( 


) .1 .2 .3 


.4 .5 .6 


.7 


.8 .9 1 







HR 4430 







HR4430isthe numberofa star 
in the Yale Bright Star Catalog. 
It is also known as HD 99967. It was 
found to be photometrically vari- 
able by the automatic photoelectric 
telescope and process described in 
this article. Shown in table A is all 
the input information needed by 
the system to observe this sus- 
pected variable star, as well as com- 
parison and check stars and a sky 
position. Given are the positions 
(right ascension and declination) 
and the magnitude (brightness) of 
each star in the V (visual) band of 
the UBV photometric system. 

Table B shows actual photometric 
measurements as recorded direct- 
ly by the system. The check star, HD 
102224, was measured in the ultra- 
violet, blue, and visual bands, and 
this was recorded along with the 
amount of air through which the 
star was observed (straight up is 
1.00 air masses), which is the secant 
of the zenith angle (SECZ). The 
universal time in hours, minutes, 
and seconds was also recorded. 
Note that after moving to the check 
star, 10 additional moves to other 
stars or the sky are required to com- 
plete the sequence of 33 separate 
measurements. When reduced, all 
these measurements give but a 
single brightness point in each 
color band on a light curve. 

The final product of the entire 
process is a light curve that shows 
the variations in brightness of the 
star, confirming its variability (figure 
A). As mentioned in the text, this 
was published in the Information 
Bulletin of Variable Stars. 



Figure A: Light curve for HR 4430. 



230 BYTE • JULY 1985 



TELESCOPE 



measurements have been completed, 
which takes about six minutes includ- 
ing all of the searching and centering, 
the measured data is stored on floppy 
disk. The data that is saved includes 
the measured star brightness, the 
angle of the group from the zenith, 
the time, and a correction to apply as 
if the star had been observed from 
the position of the sun rather than 
from earth. One set of actual data 
taken one night on our example 
group, HR 4430. is shown in the text 
box. 

The next group to be observed is 
then selected. It is again the group 
that will set first and has not yet been 
observed. If every group in the 4 5- 
degree cone above the telescope has 
already been observed once, the sys- 
tem will start observing them a sec- 
ond time. Of course, as the earth 
turns, new groups keep coming into 
the observing cone from the east. If 
the observing program has the op- 
timum number of groups in it and the 
groups are not too highly clustered 
together, the system will not miss 
groups that come within the observ- 
ing cone, but it will not observe many 
for a second time. Although the 
searching and centering appears com- 
plex, it is done considerably more 
quickly by the automatic system than 
can be done manually. (Human ob- 
servers usually skip the reobserving 
portion of the program and go have 
a cup of coffee.) 

Between each group the program 
calculates the position of the sun; if 
it is less than 10 degress below the 
horizon, the system moves the tele- 
scope to its rest position and shuts 
down. If. during the course of the 
night, the system cannot locate a star, 
it reinitializes its position and moves 
to the next group. If this occurs four 
times in succession, either it is hope- 
lessly cloudy or there is a mechani- 
cal malfunction, in which case it also 
shuts the system down. 

Data Reduction, Analysis, 
and Publication 

Reduction is a highly repetitious pro- 
cess involving a great deal of mathe- 
matical computation. It calculates the 



differences in brightness between the 
variable and comparison stars and be- 
tween the check and comparison 
stars. The difference between the 
check and comparison star should be 
constant and provides a way to detect 
comparison stars that are variable. 
Corrections are applied to account for 
the background glow of the sky. atmo- 
spheric attenuation, nonlinearities in 
the detector, and deviations in the 
color response of the system from 
that of the standard system. Repeated 
observations within a group are 
averaged together. If no measurement 
errors have occurred and the com- 
parison star is stable, the reduced 
values of the variable star minus the 
comparison star represent the true 
changes in the brightness of the vari- 
able star. 

Currently, we allow the data to ac- 
cumulate for three months and then 
reduce it all at one time. After a 
week's data is gathered from the tele- 
scope, it is transferred to a high- 
density disk that can store about one 
month's raw data. Other than the 
changing of disks, the data-reduction 
process has been completely auto- 
mated. 

The primary output of the data- 
reduction program is a tabulated list 
of the brightness differences along 
with the time of the measurement and 
the mean error in the measurement. 
Measurements that have excessive in- 
ternal inconsistencies are automatical- 
ly thrown out. 

"Quick look" plots of brightness 
changes versus time are produced by 
the system, and it is on such plots that 
a human first knows that a suspected 
variable star is really variable. While 
useful in analyses, such plots made on 
a printer are not of sufficiently high 
quality to publish in most journals, 
and human graphic art must still take 
the final step. At the operator's re- 
quest, a particular program can plot 
the data by phase rather than date if 
the period of a star's variation is 
known, and another program can de- 
tect periodic variations in the data. 

For our example star, the final 
"product" was a paper coauthored by 
Boyd, Genet, and Hall in the July 6. 



Measurements with 
excessive internal 
inconsistencies 
are thrown out 



1984. issue of the Information Bulletin of 
Variable Stars (IBVS). an international 
publication received by all variable 
star researchers. The light curve of the 
new variable has been reproduced 
with the permission of the IBVS 
editor. Dr. Bela Szidel of Konkoly Ob- 
servatory, Budapest, Hungary. 

Software and Hardware 
Implementation 

Microware's OS-9 operating system 
and the BASIC-09 high-level language 
are used in this system. BASIC-09 is 
a structured language with most of 
the good points of both BASIC and 
Pascal. Of the many good features of 
OS-9 and BASIC-09, one that was par- 
ticularly important to this project was 
the use of position-independent code, 
which allows executable modules to 
be loaded anywhere in memory with- 
out recompiling. Also. BASIC-09 
allows passing of parameters between 
modules and to assembly-language 
modules using pointers. This feature 
made the use of completely software- 
driven stepper motors practical. Fur- 
ther, BASIC-09 allows programs to be 
edited, traced, and debugged prior to 
compilation, easing the job of op- 
timizing hardware performance. 

The program is broken into tasks 
and subtasks. each with its own posi- 
tion-independent code module. Each 
module performs a specific task. For 
example, one module calculates the 
coordinates of the sun, given the date, 
time, and observer's location. Another 
calculates the number of steps re- 
quired to move between specific 
coordinates. Modules call other 
modules as required, and modules 
may be released from memory if they 
are no longer needed, freeing mem- 
ory space for other modules. The pro- 

[continued) 



JULY 1985 -BYTE 231 



TELESCOPE 



The highly productive 
automated observatory 
still requires 
human attention. 

gram to operate the telescope and 
gather data uses approximately 40 
modules. 

A Peripheral Technology PT-69 
single-board computer forms the 
heart of the telescope control system. 
This computer features a 6809E pro- 
cessor, 56K bytes of RAM (random 
access read/write memory), a clock/ 
calendar, two serial ports, two 8-bit 
parallel ports, and a 2797 floppy-disk 
controller. The computer is used 
"stock" except for replacing the PIA 
(peripheral interface adapter) chip 



with an address decoder and bidirec- 
tional buffer on a DIP (dual in-line 
package) header to provide direct ac- 
cess to several memory locations. 

The rest of the control system elec- 
tronics is contained on a small wire- 
wrapped board that consists of a 
counter-timer chip to count the pulses 
from the photometer, output latches 
for the stepper motors, input buffers 
for the limit switches, weather detec- 
tors, and manual controls used dur- 
ing alignment. The power-handling cir- 
cuits for the stepper motors use a 
switching constant-current source and 
allow up to a five-times overvoltage 
to the motor during high-speed 
operation. 

The hardware just described is ac- 
tually a third-generation design being 
assembled as part of a joint Vander- 
bilt University-Fairborn Observatory 
program under the auspices of the 
National Science Foundation. An 



Optec photometer is being used 
because its solid-state photodiode 
detector, which is sensitive in the 
visual, red, and near-infrared portions 
of the spectrum, is well suited to 
observations of the relatively cool RS 
Canum Venaticorum stars. A small 
stepping motor changes the filters 
through a rack-and-pinion mecha- 
nism. The telescope being used is a 
16-inch diameter DFM Engineering 
unit employing very rigid aluminum 
castings and a stiff, backlash-free fric- 
tion-drive system, which is ideal for 
computer control. 

Keeping It Going Right 

While this automated observatory is 
highly productive, easily outproduc- 
ing most manually operated observa- 
tories, it does require human atten- 
tion. There are, of course, the normal 
housekeeping functions, such as 

[continued) 



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232 BYTE • JULY 1985 



Inquiry 188 




HELP Menu 



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WITH A VIEW 



'V^ f- .,', J V . -- - ^ - - - 

;:•/' ■ , • N\ . ■• .■ " ' 

v v Wbw Anchor ■glv^sVog^^d yays to keep 
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24,or Signalman Exptess is up to. v 

- ■-■ yHELP Menu^Tells'you what conrimands are 
initially avqjlableloyo^i.; ._ 
Set Register— Shc^ws you what the set regis- < 

; ters and dip switch&s are set to. k 
Phone Qirecfory— Allows. you :tg- store up to^ i 
< '10 numbers, each containing 48 characters. 
. Screens like these arejUst onfe more reason 
why Anchof modems are visibly better 

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^Naturally, : the Lightningand the Express 
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Anchor automation 

A Leader in Modem-Technology 
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Inquiry 33 for End-Users. Inquiry 34 for DEALERS ONLY;- 



TELESCOPE 



cleaning the telescope's mirrors. 
Because the telescope spends so 
much time in operation exposed to 
the sky. cleaning and lubrication need 
to be done somewhat more often 
than would otherwise be the case. 

While the system has been highly 
reliable, finding tens of thousands of 
stars with no known errors, it has had 
a few interesting problems and 
failures. On February 29, 1984, it re- 
fused to find any groups although the 
sky was clear and everything ap- 
peared to be working properly. It was 
finally determined that the clock/ 
calendar (in the first-generation 
system) had not been set for leap 
year, throwing the system off 1/365 of 
a circle, or almost an entire degree. 
And there have been a few more sub- 
tle problems that were only caught on 
close examination by the astronomer 
(Douglas Hall), such as a half-day error 
in the initial reduction of data The 



software was corrected and the data 
reduced again. 

It has been vital that the end user 
of the data take an active part in 
assuring that the system is doing what 
it is supposed to do. In spite of the 
fact that the system immediately 
started producing large amounts of 
very usable data, it has seemed pru- 
dent to develop self -checks of increas- 
ing sophistication. While from a 
superficial viewpoint the software and 
hardware seem simple for an essen- 
tially fully automatic system, the 
number of things that the astronomer 
using this system must do correctly is 
large, and thus the appearance of 
simplicity is perhaps deceptive. Much 
of what the user must learn for proper 
operation is learned by personal ex- 
perience, and it appears that a close 
and continuing association between 
the system, its engineer, and the 
astronomical end user is required. 



While much of the process has been 
automated, the need for human par- 
ticipation has in no way been elimi- 
nated. What, then, has been gained? 
What has been gained, of course, is 
greatly increased productivity. Not 
only can an automatic system greatly 
outproduce nonautomatic systems, 
but a single experienced engineer can 
easily take care of a number of sys- 
tems at one location with time to 
develop new systems and techniques. 
And everybody gets to sleep at 
night! ■ 

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS 
My thanks to Russell M. Genet, who 
helped think through many of the fine 
points of this process and this article, to 
Richard and Helen Lines, who provided 
the original catalyst for the project, and 
to the Vanderbilt University astronomer 
Douglas S. Hall, whose astronomical 
research has primarily occupied this auto- 
matic system. 



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234 BYTE • JULY 1985 



Inquiry 392 



Introducing the MIX Editor 

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PC COMPATIBLES Inquiry 98 



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COMPUTERS AND SPACE 



ASTRONOMICAL 
COMPUTING WITH 

MICROS 

by Richard Bochonko and William T. Peters 

Increasing the 
amateur astronomer's reach 



ASTRONOMERS LIVE AND DIE by 
computation. All aspects of astron- 
omy deal with numbers and compu- 
tations of varying degrees of com- 
plexity. Among the many problems 
that require a lot of computational 
power are the creation of models of 
the structure and evolution of stars, 
black holes, and galaxies; the syn- 
thesis of the spectra of stars; the 
determination of orbits of binary 
stars; and the determination of the 
positions of the sun, moon, and 
planets in the past, present, and 
future. 

As astronomers, we use microcom- 
puters by themselves and as terminals 
to mainframes. We use them to graph- 
ically analyze data and to prepare 
graphics for presentations and publi- 
cation. By themselves, micros are 
becoming standard equipment at the 
telescope for equipment control, data 
acquisition, and initial data reduction. 
At our desks, we use micros for com- 
puting problems of moderate com- 
plexity, to establish and maintain 
databases, for teaching, and for word 
processing. 



In addition to assisting the profes- 
sional astronomer, the microcom- 
puter has been valuable to the 
amateur. Until now, amateurs could 
not afford the powerful calculating 
tools that are so important to profes- 
sionals. The availability of inexpensive 
micros with outstanding software has 
led to their use by amateurs at the 
telescope as well as at home. 

If you have a micro that speaks 
BASIC, a good way to develop some 
useful programs— and to learn intro- 
ductory astronomy— is with Celestial 
BASIC by Eric Burgess. (For a list of 
books and periodicals mentioned in 
this and other articles, see the 
"Astronomy Sources" text box on 
page 244.) Burgess devotes each of 
his 23 chapters to a brief description 
of an astronomical principle or phe- 
nomenon and then follows the 
description with a program that helps 
you predict or learn about the 
phenomenon. 

Celestial BASIC is divided into four 
main sections: 'Time," "The Moon," 
"The Planets," and "General and 
Tutorial." The author has chosen ex- 



cellent programs, so after you have 
typed them in or purchased the disk 
with all the programs from the book's 
publisher, you're left with a set of 
utilities that replaces many of the 
tables in standard references like The 
Observer's Handbook and The Astronomical 
Calendar. 

The "Time" section offers a perpetu- 
al calendar, a date-of-Easter program, 
a variety of time and date conver- 
sions, and two programs of special in- 
terest to amateur observers: Epoch, 
which updates star coordinates for 
precession (the slow change in the 
direction that the earth's axis points 
among the stars); and Pstar, which 
helps determine the precise position 
of Polaris with respect to the true 
North Celestial Pole. Polaris is nearly 

[continued) 
Richard Bochonko and William T. Peters are 
astronomers living in Winnipeg. Contact them 
as follows: Dr. Richard Bochonko. Department 
of Mathematics and Astronomy. University 
of Manitoba. Winnipeg, Manitoba R3T 
2M8. Canada: William T. Peters. Manitoba 
Planetarium. 190 Rupert Ave.. Winnipeg. 
Manitoba R3B ON 2, Canada. 

JULY 1985 -BYTE 239 



ASTRONOMICAL COMPUTING 



Astronomical Software Resources 



Here are some of the software 
resources we have discovered. 
Keep checking the ads in astronomy 
magazines for new announcements, or 
contact the Griffith Observatory as 
listed for periodically compiled 
updates. 



Bear Creek Survey Service, 1991 Bear 
Creek Rd.. Kerrville. TX 78028. (512) 
367-4390. Astro: Yields altitude and 
azimuth of sun and 57 bright stars. 
(HP 4 lev) 

Celestial Software. POB 95, Dell 
Rapids. SD 57022. Utilities covering 
telescope properties, observing condi- 
tions, time, coordinates, and stellar 
properties. 

Celestron International, POB 3578, 
283 5 Columbia St.. Torrance. CA 
90503, (213) 328-9560. Computer- 
controlled pointing for the Celestron 
line of quartz stepper-motor-controlled 
telescopes. 

Chesnutt Programming, Rt. 5, Box 
348. Fayetteville. NC 28301, (919) 
588-4511. SIDCIjOCK: TUrns a Com- 
modore 64 into an accurate sidereal 
clock that also displays civil and univer- 
sal time. ($15 U.S.. $18 foreign) Catalog 
of other astronomy programs available. 
(Commodore 64) 

Commodore Business Machines Inc., 
1200 Wilson Dr., West Chester, PA 
19380. Sky Travel: Fully utilizes the 
Commodore 64's high-resolution graph- 
ics to display the constellations and 
solar system objects from any location 
on earth over a 20.000-year range. 
Available from Commodore dealers. 
(C-64 and disk drive) 

Computer Assist Services, 1122 13th 
St.. Golden; CO 80401. The_Sky: Plots 
a graphic representation of sun, moon, 
planets, stars, and Messier objects given 
a location, time, and date. Numerous 
utilities included. ($60 U.S.) (IBM PC 
128K DOS 1.1 or higher; will support 
8087) 



Cosmic Computer Works, 243 White 
St.. Belmont. MA 02178. Myoptics: Op- 
tical design program generates spot 
diagrams for telescopes and other op- 
tical systems. Planets: Yields the 
celestial and horizon coordinates of 
the sun. moon, and planets, along with 
apparent diameter, brightness, and 
percentage of illumination. Ephemeris: 
Converts orbital elements for a newly 
discovered comet or asteroid to 
celestial coordinates. Almanac: Rising 
and setting information for sun and 
moon. Also beginning and end of 
twilight. IMoons and SMoons: Graphic 
presentations showing the positions of 
the moons of Jupiter and Saturn visi- 
ble in small telescopes. (Apple, North 
Star, TRS-80. some others; disks or 
cassettes) 

Design Studio Software, 6209 South 
Joshua Lane, Lantana, FL 33462. Solar 
System Ephemeris: Celestial coor- 
dinates of solar system objects to very 
high accuracy. (Apple) 

Griffith Observatory, 2800 East 
Observatory Rd., Los Angeles. CA 
90027. Send a legal-size, self- 
addressed envelope with two first-class 
stamps for a directory of astronomical 
programs for microcomputers when 
this list has gone stale. 

Hopkins Phoenix Observatory, 7812 
West Clayton Dr., Phoenix, AZ 85033. 
Computerized stellar photometers and 
data-reduction software. (Most home 
computers) 

Charles Kluepfel, 11 George St.. 
Bloomfield. NJ 07003. Planets: Precise 
coordinates for the sun. moon, and 
planets. New Orrery: A view of the 
solar system looking down from the 
"top" for any date. Shows all nine 
planets. Planetarium: Screen plots a 
star map to a magnitude of 3.5 or 
deeper for any date and location on 
earth. World Map: Screen plot of world 
map shows areas experiencing 
daylight, darkness, moonlight. Eclipse 
Map: Accurate data for solar-eclipse 
paths and graphical plots of paths on 



earth map. Calendar Conversions: Con- 
verts among Julian, Gregorian, and 
Jewish calendars, giving Julian Day 
numbers and moon phases. (Apple 
only) 

K & W ASTRONOMICS. POB 2275. 
Orange. CA 92669. Programs to calcu- 
late coordinates of solar system objects 
and Messier objects. (Apple. VIC-20, 
Timex Sinclair, others) 

MlCROTECHNIC SOLUTIONS. POB 2940, 

New Haven. CT 0651 5. (203) 389-8383. 
Astro Positions: Provides solar, lunar, 
planetary, and stellar positions in 
geocentric, heliocentric, or topocentric 
coordinates. (Disk $49.95 U.S.) (Com- 
modore 64) 

Robert Moler, 5999 Secor Rd.. 
Traverse City, Ml 49684. Programs 
simulating travel at relativistic speeds, 
rotation of spiral galaxies, comets, and 
other solar system coordinates. (Timex 
Sinclair) 

Prentice-Hall Inc., Rte. 9W. 
Englewood Cliffs. NJ 07632. The 
Astronomy Disk: Sheridan Simon pro- 
vides 16 programs for simulating space 
travel, solar system and stellar 
phenomena. Thirty-eight-page hand- 
book. (Apple II only) 

Public Domain Software. POB 640. 
Stanley, NC 28164. Yale Catalog of 
Bright Stars: 9200 stars down to a 
magnitude of 6.5 with spectral, photo- 
metric, parallax, and proper-motions 
data. (Eight 8-inch CP/M single-sided 
single-density floppy disks) 

Saturn Software, R.R. 1. Box 673. Pat- 
terson. NY 12 563. Galilean Moons: 
High-resolution simulation of Jupiter's 
moons. (Atari, TRS-80) 

Schaf Software Systems Inc. Suite 
1068. 211 1-M 30th St.. Boulder. CO 
80301. (303) 666-5353. TellStar II: Solar- 
system object position and time conver- 
sions for amateur astronomers. Plots 
sun, moon, and planets on star maps. 
Maps include Messier objects. (Apple. 
IBM) 



240 BYTE • JULY 1985 



ASTRONOMICAL COMPUTING 



Brad Schaper, 7266 Volclay Dr., San 
Diego. CA 92119. Public-domain astron- 
omy disk. Lots of good stuff in every 
category. Good educational item. Worth 
study by programmers new to astron- 
omy. (Apple only) 

Scientific Computing. POB 5091. Lit- 
tleton. CO 80123. Astronomical Soft- 
ware 1: A menu-driven program pro- 
viding date. time, and coordinate con- 
versions. ($19.95 U.S.) (Timex Sinclair 
1000. 64K) 

StarSoft. POB 2 524. San Anselmo. CA 
94960. Halley's Comet: Coordinates for 
Halley's comet plus graphic views of the 
comet in sky and in solar system. (IBM 
only) 

S & T Software. 13361 Frati Lane. 
Sebastopol. CA 95472. Celestial BASIC 
programs as listed in the book by Eric 
Burgess. (Apple. Sorcerer, Timex 
Sinclair) 

Synergistic Software, 5221 120th 
Ave. S.E., Bellevue. WA 98006. The Star 
Gazers Guide: Crude sky and constel- 
lation charts with some tests about 
each constellation. The Planetary 
Guide: Rough planet positions plus 
"pictures" plotted on the high-resolu- 
tion screen and text information. 
(Apple II only) 

Universal Micro Products, POB 8067. 
Rolling Meadows. IL 60008-8067. 
Eclipse prediction, telescope mirror 
analysis, ray tracing, comet and minor- 
planet ephemerides. etc. (Commodore 
64 and VlC-20) 

Zephyr Services, 306 S. Homewood 
Ave.. Pittsburgh. PA 15208. (412) 
247-5915. Astrocalc: Time, calendar, and 
coordinate conversions along with coor- 
dinates for solar-system objects. Astro- 
Aid: Forty-four data conversions and 
utilities including Kepler's/Newton's laws, 
relativity telescope design, solar-system 
data, and characteristics of nearest and 
brightest stars. Astrobase: Database of 
300 deep-sky objects. 



a degree away from the true pole, far 
enough to cause problems in aligning 
a telescope mount if not com- 
pensated. 

The "Moon" section programs yield 
lunar positions, phases, and eclipse 
dates. The "Planets" programs yield 
positional data, distances, angular 
diameters, and. where applicable, 
phases and elongations of the 
planets. Rising and setting times of 
the sun. moon, and planets are gen- 
erated with special attention to data 
that will help observers find Mercury 
and Venus in the morning and even- 
ing twilight. Skyset and Skyplt are a 
particularly impressive pair of pro- 
grams that use high-resolution graph- 
ics to produce horizon star maps 
showing the visible planets, sun. 
moon, and stars for a specific date, 
time, and location on the earth. Since 
this program set is highly machine- 
dependent, it is given in two versions 
(Apple and Sorcerer). Also provided 
is a program called Plantf. which 
locates the sun. moon, and planets 
among the zodiacal constellations 
using plots composed of ASCII 
(American Standard Code for Infor- 
mation Interchange) characters on the 
text screen. 

Among the "General and Tutorial" 
programs, the ones providing infor- 
mation on annual meteor showers 
and photo-exposure information for 
the planets are particularly useful. 
There is also a pair of programs to 
help beginners learn the constella- 
tions. 

The programs in Celestial BASIC are 
written in Applesoft, Apple's variant 
of Microsoft BASIC. Burgess has taken 
some pains to avoid using the Apple's 
unique features in most programs, so 
it isn't too hard to get them running 
on other machines. We know of 
amateur astronomers who have had 
good results from some of the Celestial 
BASIC programs on TRS-80s. Commo- 
dore 64s. and Ataris, although they 
had to make some effort to translate 
Applesoft's way of doing things to 
their machine's BASIC. Burgess orig- 
inally wrote these programs on an 
Exidy Sorcerer. In an appendix. 
Burgess gives three of the more in- 



teresting graphics-based programs in 
their Sorcerer versions. Since there is 
now a paucity of Sorcerer software, 
this book should be of special interest 
to Sorcerer owners interested in 
astronomy. TimexISinclair 1000: Astron- 
omy is a new book from the same 
publisher as Celestial BASIC and uses 
similar programs that have been 
adapted to the T/S 1000. 

The biggest advantage of Celestial 
BASIC is the open code. Burgess sug- 
gests ways to combine and modify the 
programs, and there is no better way 
to learn about something than to 
wade into its innards and modify it to 
your own purposes. In this respect, 
the Celestial BASIC programs are much 
better learning tools than most of the 
prepackaged software on the market. 

While Burgess's programs are fine 
learning tools and information utilities 
for amateur astronomers, he doesn't 
discuss the source and quality of the 
algorithms in enough detail to satisfy 
a professional. Additionally, if you 
want similar programs in a language 
other than BASIC, trying to decipher 
the algorithms woven into Burgess's 
BASIC code can be tough going. 

Astronomy Fundamentals 

Until recently there was no collected 
source for the fundamental algo- 
rithms related to time, the calendar, 
and the positions and properties of 
solar system objects. Jean Meeus has 
done both amateur and professional 
astronomers a great service by look- 
ing through a wide variety of ancient 
and obscure sources and bringing the 
best of the material together in his 
Astronomical Formulae for Calculators. Since 
Celestial BASIC was written around the 
same time as Astronomical Formulae, 
Burgess didn't have access to Meeus's 
fine algorithms. Instead. Burgess often 
used algorithms of lower quality and 
more limited range. 

Regrettably. Meeus seldom gives his 
source for the algorithms. However, 
he provides a clear and definitive 
discussion of the formulae with imple- 
mentation hints and sample runs for 
Hewlett-Packard calculators. Meeus 
provides the formulae and general 

{continued) 



JULY 1985 -BYTE 241 



ASTRONOMICAL COMPUTING 



computational methods, rather than 
Hewlett-Packard listings, so these 
algorithms are equally accessible to 
everyone who can program. This 
book really opens the way for 
amateur astronomers to proceed into 
computational astronomy and is 
equally useful to the professional who 
needs to compute temporal, calen- 
dric. or solar system phenomena. 

Many of the algorithms in Astronom- 
ical Formulae can be implemented in a 
few lines of code. However, those that 
yield good positions for the sun, 
moon, and planets can grow into 
complex monstrosities. Roger Sinnott, 
proprietor of Cosmic Computer 
Works, an astronomical software 
house in Belmont. Massachusetts, has 
implemented these algorithms in a 
very elegant program called Planets. 
At $2 5 (last time we checked) the pro- 
gram is a bargain, and its open code 



is well worth a careful examination. 
Sinnott supplies Planets and a 
number of other superb programs in 
BASIC on disks or cassettes for Apple, 
TRS-80, and North Star computers. 

Planets yields the celestial position 
and apparent size, brightness, and 
phase (if applicable) of the sun, moon, 
and planets. When the user supplies 
the latitude and longitude, the pro- 
gram provides altitudes and 
azimuths— a handy feature, since 
astronomers are frequently called 
upon to provide solar altitudes and 
azimuths for other professionals. We 
have used Planets to provide this kind 
of data to architects building solar- 
collection features into houses, 
satellite-dish installers, weather scien- 
tists, and lawyers. 

In addition to very well organized 
and structured code, Sinnott has 
taken great care to avoid the pitfalls 



References 
for Computation 



Compact Numerical Methods for Computers 
by John C. Nash. Adam Hilger Ltd., 
Techno House. Redcliffe Way. Bristol. 
England BSI 6NX. A good section on 
machine and number characteristics 
precedes a concise discussion of prob- 
lems in linear algebra, matrixes, non- 
linear equations, and other topics. 
Helps to select methods appropriate 
for micros. 

Computer Approximations by John F. Hart. 
E. W. Cheney. Charles L. Lawson. Hans 
J. Maehly, Charles K. Mesztenyi, John 
Rice. Henry G. Thatcher Jr., and 
Christopher Witzgall. John Wiley & Sons 
Inc., 605 Third Ave.. New York, NY 
10158. A lot of authors, but they all 
deserve credit for providing the fun- 
damental source of polynomial ap- 
proximations for the standard trigo- 
nometric and mathematical functions. 

Floating-Point Computation by Pat H. 
Sterbenz. Prentice-Hall Inc., Rte. 9W. 
Englewood Cliffs. NJ 07632. Good func- 
tions require a good underlying system 
of arithmetic. A must for language 
writers teaching machines to add. sub- 
tract, multiply, and divide. 



"Improved 'Ifigonometric Functions for 
CBASIC-80" by Robert Lurie. Microsys- 
tems, vol. 4. no. 12. December 1983, 
pages 130-132. Uses algorithms from 
Computer Approximations to fix 
CBASIC-80's very poor trigonometric 
functions. 

Pascal User Manual and Report by Kathleen 
Jensen and Niklaus Wirth. Springer- 
Verlag New York Inc., 175 Fifth Ave., 
New York, NY 10010. The fundamen- 
tal source for Pascal users. 

Software Manual for the Elementary Functions 
by William J. Cody and William Waite. 
Prentice-Hall Inc.. Rte. 9W. Englewood 
Cliffs. NJ 07632. Implementation notes 
for Computer Approximations with FOR- 
TRAN test programs and comments on 
the quality of the algorithms. 

'"Ifanscendental Functions" by Hal 
Hardenbergh. DTACK Grounded no. 16, 
January 1983. and no. 18. April 1983. 
Digital Acoustics, 1475 E. McFadden 
Street. Suite F, Santa Ana, CA 92705. 
Uses the algorithms in Computer Approx- 
imations to implement the standard 
functions to 14 digits of precision on a 
68000 microprocessor. 



presented by the limited-precision 
binary floating-point numbers com- 
mon to most BASICS. For example, he 
splits Julian Day numbers into their in- 
teger and fraction parts to effectively 
provide double precision. In addition, 
he traces the fundamental constants 
given in the Meeus algorithms to their 
sources and compares the results of 
the program with the standard main- 
frame-generated tables to verify their 
validity over a range exceeding 3000 
years. This is one of the few really 
well documented astronomy pro- 
grams available. 

Star Authority 

In Canada, Great Britain, and the 
United States, the official source of 
astronomical data is the Astronomical 
Almanac. The compilers of the Almanac 
provide two publications that are a 
gold mine for advanced program- 
mers. The Explanatory Supplement dis- 
cusses in great detail, with a complete 
list of sources, the methods used to 
generate the book's superbly accurate 
tables. The Almanac for Computers is 
designed to help users of small com- 
puters generate positions for the sun, 
moon, and planets with accuracy 
comparable to the tables in the 
Astronomical Almanac. There is a penal- 
ty for this extreme accuracy. The 
equations have limited range, typically 
a month for the planets and five days 
for the moon. A different set of coef- 
ficients must be provided for the 
equations for each period, so pro- 
grams using these equations must 
store quite a bit of data. Like the 
Astronomical Almanac, the Almanac for 
Computers is published yearly, and each 
year the data it provides for each ob- 
ject must be updated in the programs. 
However, this is the way to go if you 
require Astronomical Almanac accuracy 
and you don't want to flip through all 
the pages. In addition, the Almanac for 
Computers offers the best discussion 
and method for calculating sunrise 
and sunset that we've seen. 

In the microcomputing world, a 
directory like the one we provide (see 
the "Astronomical Software Re- 
sources" text box on page 240) can 
go out of date rapidly. Fortunately, 



242 BYTE • JULY 1985 



John Mosly of the Griffith Observa- 
tory (2800 East Observatory R<±, Los 
Angeles, CA 90027) maintains a cur- 
rent list of astronomical programs. To 
obtain the Griffith list send him a 
legal-size, self-addressed envelope 
with two first-class stamps. He has 
reviewed a number of these programs 
in an article entitled 'The Universe on 
a Microcomputer," published in the 
October 1984 issue of Griffith Observer 
(vol. 48, no. 10, available from the 
observatory for 75 cents plus post- 
age). The article is illustrated with 
graphics and screen dumps from 
several of the programs along with a 
good discussion of their features. 

The best way to stay in touch with 
the world of astronomy is through Sky 
& Telescope magazine. The BYTE of the 
astronomical community, it serves 
both professionals and amateurs. Sky 
& Telescope advertisements list new soft- 
ware, and Roger Sinnott conducts a 
fine monthly section called 'Astro- 
nomical Computing." He frequently 
provides short utility programs in 
BASIC that are very carefully crafted 
and discussed, and he takes care to 
use a version of BASIC that can be 
adapted to a wide variety of 
machines. Frequently, the "Gleanings 
for ATMs" (amateur telescope makers) 
section of the magazine, also under 
the direction of Sinnott, has good 
hardware articles about applications 
like the microprocessor control of 
telescopes or image processing. 

Astronomy is another good magazine, 
directed more to an amateur and 
beginning astronomer audience than 
Sky & Telescope. Astronomy is a fine place 
to look for software ads, and it fre- 
quently publishes useful BASIC pro- 
grams that have been very carefully 
crafted to be friendly to newcomers 
to both astronomy and computing. 

Whether they're used to control a 
telescope, output a graph, or chart 
the position of a celestial object, 
microcomputers are changing the way 
amateurs and professionals alike are 
approaching the study of the sky. The 
accompanying text boxes will give 
you ample information to start with. 

Welcome to astronomical comput- 
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JULY 1985 'BYTE 243 



Astronomy Sources 



BYTE would like to thank the 
following authors for their contri- 
butions to this listing: Richard 
Bochonko. David S. Dixon, Russell M. 
Genet, and William T Peters. 

Astronomy magazine. Milwaukee. WI: 

AstroMedia Corporation. 
Superb artwork and illustrations. Easy 
reading for students and beginners 
yet satisfying to old hands. Astro- 
Media offers a wide selection of 
books via mail order. 

Ball. John A. Algorithms for RPN Calcu- 
lators. New York: John Wiley & Sons. 
1978. 

An astronomer's collection of 
general-science and astronomical 
methods arranged for the HP-4 5 and 
other HP calculators. 

Bate. Roger R.. et al. Fundamentals of 
Astrodynamics. New York: Dover Publica- 
tions. 1971. 

Burgess. Eric. Celestial BASIC. Berkeley. 

CA: Sybex Inc.. 1982. 
A fine selection of BASIC programs. 
Especially good for those new to 
astronomy and computing. Disk with 
programs listed in the book is avail- 
able from S & T Software (13361 Frati 
Lane. Sebastopol. CA 95472). 

Burgess. Eric, and Howard I. Burgess. 

TimexlSinclair 1000: Astronomy. Berkeley. 

CA: Sybex Inc.. 1984. 
BASIC programs for the Timex 
Sinclair microcomputer. Adapts 
material similar to that in Celestial 
BASIC to the Timex Sinclair. 

Crawford. D. Instrumentation in Astronomy. 

vols. I. II. Ill, IV. and V. Bellingham. WA: 

SPIE. 
Extensive series on instrumentation 
instruction including the use of mini- 
and microcomputers. 

Dickinson. Terence. Hightwatch. Scar- 
borough. Ontario. Canada: Firefly 
Books. 1983. 
Not a computing book, but an ex- 
cellent guide to the night sky and the 
world of astronomy if you need a 
place to start. 

Duffett-Smith, Peter. Practical Astronomy 
with Your Calculator. 2nd ed. London. 
England: Cambridge University Press. 
1981. 



t&>. 




A good selection of simple algo- 
rithms that are useful when you want 
quick, limited-precision results. 

Genet. Russell M.. and Mark TVueblood. 
Microcomputer Control of Telescopes. Rich- 
mond. VA: Willmann-Bell Inc.. 1985. 

Genet. Russell M.. ed. Microcomputers in 
Astronomy, vols. I and II. Fairborn. OH: 
Fairborn Observatory. 1983 and 1984. 
Telescope control, instrument con- 
trol, data logging, and other applica- 
tions. A collection of papers devoted 
to automatic telescope control and 
photometric data collection. 

Genet.. Russell M. RealTime Control with 

the TRS-80. Indianapolis. IN: Howard W 

Sams & Co.. 1982. 

Data logging, instrument control, and 

analysis for the Radio Shack TRS-80. 

Ghedini. Silvano. Software for Photometric 
Astronomy. Richmond. VA: Willmann- 
Bell Inc.. 1982. 
Reduction and analysis programs in 
HP BASIC. Just the thing if you want 
to seek meaning in the slowly vary- 
ing light of pulsating or eclipsing 
variable stars. The HP BASIC may be 
a bit tough, however, to convert to 
other machines. Good explanations. 

Hall. D.. and R. Genet. Photoelectric 
Photometry of Variable Stars. Fairborn. OH: 
Fairborn Observatory. 1982. 
Small observatory guide to photom- 
etry with some data logging and in- 
strument control. 

Henden. Arne A., and R. Kaitchuck. 
Astronomical Photometry. New York: Van 
Nostrand Reinhold. 1982. 
Well-rounded book on photometry 



including some software and inter- 
facing. 

Institute of Theoretical Astronomy. 
Ephemerides of Minor Planets. Moscow. 
USSR: USSR Academy of Sciences 
through Mezhdunarodnaja kniga. 
1980. 1982. 1984. 

lames. M. L. ( et al. Applied Numerical 
Methods for Digital Computation with Fortran 
and CSMP, 2nd ed. New York: Harper 
& Row. 1977. 

Jones. Aubrey. Mathematical Astronomy 
with a Pocket Calculator. New York: Halsted 
Press. 1979. 
Keystroke sequences in both alge- 
braic and RPN notation for problems 
related to time precession, proper 
motion, positions of solar system ob- 
jects, and orbits of binary stars. Good 
appendix with sophisticated HP-25 
and HP-67 programs mainly contri- 
buted by Jean Meeus. Methods are 
readily adaptable to other machines 
since formulae and sample problems 
are presented. 

Klein. Fred. Pocket Computer Programs for 
Astronomers. Los Altos. CA: Klein Publi- 
cations. 1983. 
Handy programs for use right at the 
telescope. Methods for finding ob- 
jects using setting circles on Dobson- 
ian and other altazimuth-mounted 
telescopes. The next best thing to an 
automated telescope. 

Marsden. Brian G. Catalog of Cometary Or- 
bits. Hillside. NJ: Enslow Publishers. 
1983. 

Meeus. Jean. Astronomical Formulae for 
Calculators. 2nd ed. Richmond. VA: 
Willmann-Bell Inc.. 1982. 
Classic reference on the topic. There 
are many others, but Meeus is 
authoritative. The best single com- 
pendium of algorithms. Available 
from Astronomy magazine. Sky & Tele- 
scope magazine, and Willmann-Bell Inc. 

Minor Planet Center. Minor Planet Cir- 
culars. Cambridge. MA: Smithsonian 
Astrophysical Observatory. 

The Observer's Handbook. Toronto. Ontario. 
Canada: The Royal Astronomical Soci- 
ety of Canada (RASC). Issued annually. 
The standard set of tables for 
amateur stargazers. Many programs 



244 BYTE • JULY 1985 



ILLUSTRATED BY MICHAEL BARTALOS 



seek to replace the table or offer the 
same type of information in a more 
versatile way. However, the Handbook 
is much easier to stuff into a jacket 
pocket than an Apple II. And its "ink- 
on-paper display" does not disap- 
pear at -40°C as does a liquid- 
crystal display. 

Ottwell. Guy. The Astronomical Calendar. 

Greenville, SC: Department of Physics, 

Furman University. 198 3. Issued 

annually. 
The same basic type of information 
as the RASC Observer's Handbook con- 
veyed with Ottwell's own deep sense 
of appreciation for all things cosmic 
and their connections to our ter- 
restrial realm. Superb hand-drawn il- 
lustrations by the author. A children's 
version called The View from Earth is 
also available. 

Sky & Telescope magazine. Cambridge. 
MA: Sky Publishing. 

A source for many of the books listed 

here. 



lattersf ield, D. Orbits for Amateurs with a 
Microcomputer. Somerset. NJ: John Wiley 
& Sons (distributor), Halsted Press 
(publisher), 1984. 
BASIC programs for orbital computa- 
tions with supplemental explana- 
tions. 

United States Naval Observatory, 
Nautical Almanac Office. The Almanac 
for Computers. Washington, DC: U.S. 
Government Printing Office. Available 
annually. 
High-precision polynomial approxi- 
mations for the positions of major 
solar system objects. Helpful intro- 
duction and discussion, though no 
programming examples are given. 
Excellent source for precise formulae 
for basic astronomical calculations. 

United States Naval Observatory. The 
Astronomical Almanac. Washington, DC: 
U.S. Government Printing Office, and 
London. England: Her Majesty's Sta- 
tionery Office. Available annually from 
1981 to 1984. 



Includes the standard tables refer- 
enced by astronomers and others in 
need of precise-time and celestial- 
position data. Some explanations, 
but refer to The Explanatory Supplement 
for all details. 

United States Naval Observatory. The 
Explanatory Supplement to the Astronomical 
Almanac. Washington, DC: U.S. Govern- 
ment Printing Office, and London. 
England: Her Majesty's Stationery 
Office. 
Explanations of how the official 
tables are made. A gold mine, but not 
all of the methods are adaptable to 
a microcomputer, and some of the 
explanations are hard to understand 
even for a professional. A scholarly 
work with detailed references. 

Wolpert. Robert C. and Russell M. 
Genet. Advances in Photoelectric Photometry, 
vols. I and 2. Fairborn, OH: Fairbom 
Observatory. 1983 and 1984. 

Data logging, instrument control, and 

some analysis. 



An Astronomy Glossary 



Celestial Sphere: Astronomy uses a 
coordinate system for the sky that is 
directly analogous to the earth's system 
of latitude and longitude. The celestial 
equator is coplanar with the earth's 
equator. The declination (latitude) 
ranges from +90 degrees (north pole) 
to -90 degrees (south pole). The 
celestial equator crosses the ecliptic 
(q.v.) at the two equinoxes. The vernal 
equinox serves as the prime meridian 
(0-hour or 24-hour) for the right ascen- 
sion (longitude) of the system. 

Ecliptic: The plane containing the 
earth's orbit around the sun, defined 
with respect to the first point of Aris 
(the vernal equinox). The ecliptic 
changes each year. 

Ephemerides: A table of position coor- 
dinates versus time for a celestial body: 

Obliquity of the Ecliptic: The angle 
between the plane containing the 
earth's equator and the ecliptic. The 
obliquity is a cyclically changing value 
centered on approximately 23 degrees, 
27 minutes. 

Orrery: A mechanical model of the 
solar system that shows the relative 
positions and motions of the various 
bodies. 



Osculating Orbital Elements: The 
Keplerian values for the theoretical or- 
bit of a body; that is. the two-body 
path of an orbit. In any case where 
there are more than two bodies in- 
teracting, in a system (such as in the 
solar system), the osculating orbital 
elements are only an approximation of 
the true orbital path. 

Parallax: The difference in the ap- 
parent position of a celestial body due 
to the earth's orbiting around the sun. 
The major scientific argument against 
the Copernican model of the solar sys- 
tem was that there was no such observ- 
able difference in the apparent posi- 
tions of stars during the year. It was not 
until the development of photography 
in the nineteenth century that the ef- 
fect was measurable. 

Parsec: Parsec, which stands for 
parallax second, is a unit of astronom- 
ical distance. It is defined as the 
distance that a celestial body would 
have to be from the sun in order for 
an earthly observer to see a one arc- 
second change in its apparent position 
(parallax) between the vernal equinox 
and the autumnal equinox (or any two 
orbital antipodes). The value is approx- 
imately 3.26 light-years. 



Right Ascension and Declination: 

See "Celestial Sphere." 

Setting Circles: Calibrated disks that 
attach to the axes of a telescope. Set- 
ting circles are an easy way to locate 
stars quickly. The right-ascension (see 
"Celestial Sphere") circle is marked in 
hours and minutes: the declination cir- 
cle is marked in degrees. To locate a 
star, look up its coordinates in right 
ascension and declination and rotate 
the telescope axes to the star's in- 
dicated position. 

Sidereal Time: Sometimes called star 
time, sidereal time is based on the time 
of the earth's rotation compared to any 
star other than our sun. A sidereal day 
is divided into 24 hours, but each day 
is about 4 minutes shorter than a solar 
day. Sidereal and solar time coincide 
only at the instant that the sun crosses 
the equator at the autumnal equinox. 

Star Classification: Stars are com- 
monly classified by spectral class as O, 
B, A. F, G, K, or M in order of decreas- 
ing temperature. The star's spectrum is 
compared to spectra in the Yerkes Atlas 
of Stellar Spectra to determine its class. 

Universal time: Another name for 
Greenwich Mean Time. 



JULY 1985 'BYTE 245 




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• PC Network 10MB INTERNAL V2 Height 459.00' (9 92) 
Autoboot Drive Newlower price 
Drives by Shuoart or Tandon 
PC Network 10MB Internal Tape Backup 475.00* (10.26) 

Same Unit used in Compaq's DeskPro! 



Maynard WS-2 same as WS-1 but with 


930.00* 


(20.30) 


Sandstar Floppy Controller (uses 1 slot) 






Panasonic Hall Height DSDD Drive Pair 


145.00* 


13 10) 


PC Network Hall Height Drives Our Volume 


77.50* 


(167) 


Lets us import These Brand Name Dnves 






Tando n TM 1 00-2 Full Height DSDD Drive 


93.00* 


(2.20) 


Tallgrass 25MB External/Hard Disk 


2,375.00* 


(51.30) 


with 60MB Tape Backup 
Teac FO 55-8 Hall Height DSDDDrives 
Teac 1.2MBHatlHeighlDiskDrive lor AT 






90.00* 


(1-94) 


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MEMORY CHIPS 






Allchips quaranteed tor hie 






64 K M emory Upg rada K Its ( 9 chips) S 
64K Dynamic Ram Chips (Each) 


8.55* 


(1001 


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(100) 


256K Dynamic Ram Chlpa (Each) 
1 28K AT Mother Board Chips (Each) 


5.00- 


(100) 


7.50* 


(100) 


MODEMS 






Anchor Mark XII $ 


230.00* 


(5.00) 


Hayes Smartmodem 300 


125.00* 


(5 00) 


Hayes Smartmodem 2400 


568.00* 


(5.00) 


LATEST IN COMMUNICATION TECHNOLOGY! 




Hayes Smartmodem 1200B with new 
Smartcom II VT 100 Emulator 


320.00* 


(2 50) 






Hayes Smartmodem 1200 


361.25' 


(5.00) 


Prometheus Promodem 1200 


279.00* 


(6.00) 



160CPS80COUFtic+Trac 

► Citizen MSP- 1 5 NE W 

160CPSl132COUFnc +Trac 

► Citizen MSP-20 NEW 

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C. Itoh F10/40 Slarwriler 40 CPS LO 
C. Itoh Prowriler 8510 AP 
Comrex CR420 420 CPS DPiLO Printer 

From the Epson Organization 

► Epson LX-80 I00CPS 80 COL LO Mode 

—New Model" 

► Epson FX-BO 

► Epson FX-10Q + 
Epson L0 1500 
Epson IBM-to-EPSON Parallel Cable 

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► NEC 2050 20C PS Letter Quality Printer 

► NEC 353033CPSLO Par allei 

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LO Mode-FnctlBM Graphics 

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LO' Mode- IBM Graontcs' + More (Requires imertace) 



875.00* 


(18 90) 


285.00* 


(6 16) 


.533.00* 


(33. 12) 


205.00* 


(4 J3) 


303.00" 


I65.U 


434.00* 


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875.00* 


(18.90) 


21.00* 


(100) 


605.00* 


(13 00) 


605.00* 


(13 00) 


960.00* 


(20 74] 


960.00* 


(20 74) 


,330.00* 


(28 73) 



200.00* (4 34) 



(2 35: 



69.00* (1 50) 



620.00* (13.40) 
550.00' (1188) 



1,640.00* 

1,155.00* 

CALL 



525.00* (5 00) 



External 100% Haves Compatible 

- U.S. Robotics Password 

LOWEST PRICE I200BPS Modem < 

- U.S. Robotics Courier 2 A00BPS Modem 

MONITORS 

Amdek Video 300G Composite Green J 
Amdek Video 300A Composite Amber 
Amdek Video 31 0A IBM Type Amber 
Amdek Color 300 (NEW!) Composite 
Amdek Color 600 (NEW!) High Res RGB 
Amdek Color 700(NEW!) Ultra High Res 
Amdek Color 71 Of NEW!) 700wlNon 

Glare/Long Phosphor 
Frln ceton HX-12 RGB Monitor 
Princeton MAX-12E RGB/MONO 
Princeton SR- 12 Ultra High Res RGB 
<• Quadram Ouadchrome II NEW' 

640x200 RGB \i ir Screen 

Black Phosphor Mask IBM Case 
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A great lookingperlor/mricj monochrome 



Texen 420 S uper High Res RG B Monitor 380.00 * 

Texan 440 Highest Res RGB (720x400) 525.00* 

Currently Available Works With PersyslBob Card 
Zenith ZVM-123 G reen High Res 76.00' 

(Consumer Reports Rated Best Buy!) 



00) 
(24 00) 



(100) 
(648) 



679.00* (14 70) 
530.00* (1145) 



110.00* 
120.00* 
130.00* 
215.00* 
395.00* 
455.00* 
485.00* 

CALL 
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370.00* 



(3.00) 
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273.00* 
244.00* 
365.00* 



(320) 
(2 50) 
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Okldata NEW! IBM Inter face for Okimale 

color 20 
OkldataML84P 200CPS 132 Col 
OkldataML93P 160 CPS WidePlaten 
Okldata 24 10P Pacemark350CPS 
Qume Sprint 1 1140 40CPS Letter Quality 
Qume Sprint 1 1190 90CPS Letter Quality 

New! Fastest Daisy wheel Out! 
Qume IBM Cable and Interlace (required) 
StarMlcronicsPower'ype 18CPSLQ 

► Texas Instruments 855 DPiLO w/Ti actor 
Toshiba P-1340 80 Col Version of P-1351 

VIDEO CARDS 
Hercules Color Card wIParallel Port 

► Hercules Monochrome Graphics Cards 
Paradise New Modular Mullidisplay Card 
Persy st Bob Card Ultra High Res Color 

Card with Mono Quality Text in Color 
*■■ STB Graphix Plus II NEW! 

(simultaneous Mono Graphics & Color) 

ACCESSORIES AND SUPPLIES 

► Brand Name DSDD Diskettes S 14.00" 

Guaranleed lor Life!! Not Generic 
Curtiss PC Pedestal II 32.50* 

► PC Network Replacement 130 Watt IBM-PC 90.00* 

Power Supply— Gives your PC (Old or New) the same 
capacity as an XT Good lor add in tape drives (without need 
for a piggyback unit) and large capacity disk drives 

SM A PC Documaie: Keyboard Templates lor 9.99' (100) 
LotusiDBASEIMultimale andothers (Each) 

WP Printer Paper 2600 Sheets 17.00* (10.00) 

Microline Perls (invisible when torn) 

•PC NETWORK Members pay just 8% above the wholesale 
price, plus shipping. All prices reflect a 3% cash discount. 
Minimum shipping $2.50 per order International orders call lor 
shipping & handling charges. Personal checks please allow 
10 working days to clear 



235.00* (5 00) 



(100) 



(2.50) 
(2.70) 



tRENT BEFORE YOU BUY— Members are eligible to join The NETWORK'S Business and Game Software 
Rental Libraries and evaluate products for a full 14 (Regular) or 30 (VIP) days to see if it meets your needs. 
And The NETWORK'S rental charc.es are far less than other software rental services— JUST 20% OF THE 
MEMBER WHOLESALE PRICE. We feature over 1,000 available titles in IBM/Apple/MAC and CP M 
Formats. Hardware prices highnted by ^ reflect recent major price reductions 



COMPLETE IBM™ PC SYSTEMS 



IBM PC BASE SYSTEM 

IBMPCW/256K 

Floppy Drive Controller 

2 Double Sided Double Density 320/ 
Your lowest cost starting point for the s 1 
monitors, video cards, multifunction ca 
The NETWORK can't be beat. 

IBM PC PROFESSIONAL 
HARD DISK SYSTEM 

IBM PC W/256K 

Floppy Drive Controller 
1 Double Sided Double Density 3201 
w Half Height Disk Subsystem. 




NETWORK 



$1 ,495.02* p 



$1,886.62' 



Increase produ< 



imbersome floppy disk changes, simpli 



iXT performance at a f 



s or professional situation. The 1 0MB hard disk 
changes, simplifies operations and dramatically 
3 NETWORK'S buying power provides you with bette 
r than you'd expect to pay for a standard PC. 



*PC Network Members pay just 8% above this wholesale price plus shipping. 
These prices have been prepared in May, 1985 and may have been changed 
with new product announcements. Call for latest prices. 



HARD DISK SYSTEMS 



PORTABLE HARD DISK SYSTEM 

W/256K/1 Floppy/1 0MB Hard Disk 

DESKPRO/TAPE BACKUP SYSTEM 

W/640K/1 Floppy/1 0MB Hard Disk/ 
1 0MB Tape Drive/Monitor 



$2,285.0(T 



$3,018.14 



FEATURED PRODUCTS! 

64K MEMORY EXPANSION KITS $ 8.55* 

Set of 9 chips Guaranteed for Life. Quantity Discounts Available. 
INTERNAL PC 1 0MB HARD DISK 459.00* 



We use our clout with Brand Name suppliers like COGITO/MMI/Tandon/ 
Fujitsu Miniscribe Shugart and others to bring you the best products at the 
Lowest Price in the Business! Call on the brand of your choice. 

- 1 0MB PC/COMPAQ TAPE BACKUP 475.00 

The same unit as used on COMPAQ'S DeskPro! Configured for internal mounting. 

LOTUS 1-2-3 265.00* 

1 /2 HEIGHT DS/DD DISK DRIVES 77.50* 

Just like our hard disks featured above. The Network buy's direct and makes 
fantastic deals with manufacturers like MPI/Tandon/CDC/Shugart/Qume/ 
TEAC and others to bring you fantastic prices and Name Brand drives for 
your PC/AT/XT or Jr/or Compatible. 

EPSON PRINTERS Unbelievable Low Prices!!! 

LX-80 80COL/100CPS 205.00* 

FX-80 80COL/160CPS 303.00* 

FX-100 132COL/160CPS 434.00* 

AST SIX-PACK PLUS w 64K 222.00* 

EVEREX MAGIC CARD64K 1 60.00 

Full six Pack Features— Game Port included Extra Software Fantastic Price!!! 

HAYES 1200B 320.00 

with new Smartcom ItiVTWO Emulator 

TALLGRASS TG-5025 2,375.00* 

25MG HARD DISK with 60 MG Tape Backup 

BRAND NAME DISKETTES 14.00* 

DS/DD Box of 10 Guaranteed for Life Not Generic 

TANDON TM100-2 FULL HEIGHT DRIVE 93.00* 

AMDEK V31 OA IBM TTL AMBER 1 30.00* 



'NETWORK members pay just 8% above these wholesale prices plus shipping 



CALL TOLL FREE 1 -800-621 -S-A-V-E (~ 

In Illinois call (31 2) 280-0002 validation code B375 

Inquiry 275 TM— Registered trademark of IBM and COMPAQ 



memberships 



...WITH THESE 15 
UNIQUE BENEFITS 

1COST + 8% PRICING — The NETWORK purchases mil- 
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2 OUR 600 PAGE WHOLESALE CATALOG— Members re- 
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QUARTERLY! 

3 IN-STOCK INSURED FAST HOME DELIVERY— The 
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NIGHT SERVICE IS AVAILABLE ON REQUEST. 

410 DAY RETURN POLICY— If you are not satisfied, for 
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The NETWORK within 10 days of receipt, we will refund your 
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5 MEMBERSHIP SATISFACTION GUARANTEE— If for 
any reason you are not satisfied with your membership within 
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6 EXPERIENCED CONSULTANTS— The NETWORK hires 
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Our consulting staff possesses in excess of 1 50 man years of per- 
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AS PROMISED— WE WILL TAKE IT BACK AT OUR EXPENSE 
FOR A 100% REFUND. 

7 FREE TECHNICAL SUPPORT— The NETWORK supports 
every product it sells. Our qualified TECH-SUPPORT staff will 
help you assemble your system, interpret vendor documentation 
and get your software and hardware to work. WE WILL GIVE YOU 
ALL THE HELP YOU NEED, WHEN YOU NEED IT— FREE! 

+ Q OPTIONAL BUSINESS RENTAL LIBRARY— All mem- 
O bers can join our BUSINESS RENTAL LIBRARY featuring 
over 1000 available titles for just $25 PER YEAR above the base 
membership fee. This entitles you to rent business software AT 
JUST 20% of the DISCOUNT PRICE FOR A 14 DAY PERIOD. If 
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ducted from the purchase price. VIP MEMBERS GET A FULL 
30 DAYS for just $30 above the V.I. P. base fee. This also in- 
cludes the game library privileges for a $5 combination 
savings. 

tQ OPTIONAL GAME SOFTWARE RENTAL LIBRARY— 

w The Game Rental library is available to members for just $1 
PER YEAR and permits evaluation (or just enjoyment) of any 
game or educational software product as above. 

Ifl SPECIAL SAVINGS BULLETINS— THE PRINTOUT 
\J — Issued Quarterly at no charge to Network members only! 
The Printout contains all the New Product listings and price 
changes you need to keep your Catalog up to date. ai SOi we buy 
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we turn around and make available to our members at fantastic 
savings via THE PRINTOUT. 

1-4 DISCOUNT BOOK LIBRARY— Working with numerous 
I publishers and distributors, The NETWORK has assembled 
a library of over 1000 computer related books and manuals at sav- 
ings of up to 75% from the normal store price. 

1Q MEMBERSHIP REFERRAL BONUS— Our most valu- 
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our members have been referred by word of mouth from other sat- 
isfied members. For those of you who refer new members, The 
NETWORK will credit a cash bonus to youraccountapplicableto 
any future purchase. 

1Q CORPORATE ACCOUNT PROGRAM— Almost 50% of 
O The NETWORK'S members are corporate buyers and users 
(see opposite page left). The NETWORK can establish open 
account status and assign designated accountmanagers to ex- 
pedite orders, and coordinate multiple location shipments. 

1A QUANTITY DISCOUNTS— For large corporations, clubs, 
H" and repeat or quantity buyers The NETWORK can extend 
additional single order discounts, when available to us from our 
manufacturers and distributors. 

1C PRICE PROTECTION— The PC Industry is crazy!! Prices 
vl change not yearly or monthly or even weekly but often day 
by day! These changes are sometimes up but are mostly down!!! 
THE NETWORK GUARANTEES THAT IN THE EVENT OF A 
PRODUCT PRICE REDUCTION, BETWEEN THE TIME YOU 
PLACE YOUR ORDER AND THE TIME THE PRODUCT SHIPS 
YOU WILL ONLY PAY THE LOWER AMOUNT!! 

JULY 1985 'BYTE 247 




\>- 




HALf PRICE 

Introductory Subscription Offer 

your cost right in half. At 50% 

BVTE 



If you're a technically-inclined micro user, subscribe to BYTE and cut your cost right in half. At 50% 
of the newsstand price, every BYTE issue will bring you stimulating, 
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products. If your first trial issue of BYTE isn't everything you 
expected, just write "cancel" on the invoice and return it. Your 

first issue is FREE to keep with our thanks for trying the small systems journal 



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BUTE 



Reviews 



Reviewers Notebook 

by Glenn Hartwig 251 

Texas Instruments 1 Pro-Lite 
Professional Computer 

by Richard Grehan and Eva White 252 

NCR Personal Computer Model 4 

by Elaine Holden 258 

Monitoring Halleys Comet 

by ]ohn E. Mosley 265 

Space-Flight Simulators 

by Benjamin Bernar 269 

MaxThink 

by William Hershey 279 

The Anchor Automation Signalman 
Mark XII Modem 

by George V. Kinal 287 

Review Feedback 295 



ONE OF THE NEWER MEMBERS of 'fexas Instruments' Professional Computer 
line is a portable called the Pro-Lite. This briefcase-size machine uses an 80C88 
processor and MS-DOS. It also features good communications capability and 
a number of expansion options available from TI. Richard Grehan and Eva 
White, two of BYTE's technical editors, team up to show you what the Pro- 
Lite can and cannot do. 

Our other system review this month studies the NCR Personal Computer 
Model 4, an IBM PC-compatible that is not portable. You can buy the NCR 
in one of six configurations, choosing the one that best suits your needs. It 
comes bundled with several tutorial programs and features the enhanced 
speed of a RAM disk. Author Elaine Holden concludes that this rugged 
machine is a good value. 

In keeping with our "Computers and Space" theme and in time for the return 
of Halley's comet, John E. Mosley has evaluated three comet-tracking pro- 
grams. The first two packages, Starsoft's Halley and S & T Software Service's 
Halley's Comet, include information specific to the most famous of comets. 
The third program, Cosmic Computer Works' Ephemeris, is more general and 
very accurate. Any of these programs will give you the opportunity to prac- 
tice for tracking Halley's comet this winter. 

If you prefer to imagine yourself actually in space, you'll be interested in 
Benjamin Bernar's review of two space-flight simulation programs. Your goal 
in both Rendezvous and Saturn Navigator is to meet with a space station 
already in orbit. The decisions you have to make in these simulations mirror 
the complexities of space travel. 

William Hershey follows up his June overview of idea processors with a review 
of MaxThink, an outline processor for the IBM PC. MaxThink's Thought Pro- 
cessing Language (TPL) is a powerful feature that lets you create programs 
to use as you develop a writing project. 

In the communications area, our review of Anchor Automation's Signalman 
Mark XII indicates that this modem is not entirely Hayes Smartmodem- 
compatible. Although it surpasses the Smartmodem by accepting commands 
in upper- and lowercase and recognizing telephone signals, the Mark XII has 
fewer LEDs than the Hayes, no DIP switches, and only 6 of the Hayes's 17 
software-loadable registers. Author George V. Kinal gives you the details. 



JULY 1985 -BYTE 249 



WordPerfect 40. 
Our highest marks yet. 



J\ perfect report card. It 
wasn't necessarily our goal when 
we added the most recent enhance- 
ments to WordPerfect. We were 
more interested in responding to 
the suggestions of our users and 
dealers. 

But a perfect report card is 
like icing on the cake. And it 
makes us more confidentthan ever 
that WordPerfect 4.0 is the most 
perfect WordPerfect yet. 

Easier. 

Most WordPerfect 4.0 functions 
require only one keystroke, a 
simple press of a finger. And new 
comprehensive documentation 
makes learning a 

Faster. -<S3^E 




information, see your dealer. 
Or call or write: 



matter how 
fast you type, 
WordPerfect 
won't slow you 
down. 

Better. 



InfoWorld 



Document ori- 
entation means h 
WordPerfect 4.0 never makes you 




WordPerfect 4.0 includes several 
features not found on many word 
processors. Like a 100,000-word 
phonetic dictionary; multi-page 
footnoting capability; table of 
contents and index generation; 
automatic outlining and para- 
graph numbering; 
and a 4.0 net- 
work version 
Get the word 
processor that 
lives up to 
its name (and 
its report card): 
WordPerfect 4.0. For more 



InfoWorld 



SSI Software 

288 West Center Street 

Orem, Utah 84057 

Information: (801) 227-4020 

Order Desk: 1-800-321-4566, 

Toll-free 




SSlboftware 

Reaching for perfection. 



250 BYTE • JULY 1985 



Inquiry 314 



REVIEWER'S NOTEBOOK 



When optical character recogni- 
tion (OCR) equipment first came 
out, it was the kind of item everybody 
wanted to take seriously. It just 
seemed the next logical step. No typ- 
ing, no manual input of any kind. All 
you had to do was pass a document 
over the right kind of camera and 
words were read from paper into 
memory. After that, document manip- 
ulation and output would proceed 
with normal electronic ease. The 
major problem has been the very high 
price of most OCR hardware/software 
systems. That, along with reports of 
poor reliability and limited capabili- 
ties for recognizing type fonts, kept 
relegating OCR to the wish list. 

With a little luck, we may be seeing 
a change in the availability of lower- 
cost, more functional OCRs. Datacopy 
Corporation of Mountain View, Cali- 
fornia, showed us its new flatbed- 
scanner-based Model 700 Word 
Image Processing System (WIPS). The 
$4000 unit has, as a $695 adjunct, 
OCR— or CIR (character image recog- 
nition)— capabilities. 

Whole pages from letters, books, or 
magazines (including pictures) can be 
entered as images into the computer 
in much the same way as making ordi- 
nary photocopies. You can then "edit" 
them in a variety of painting-program 
ways. This is fine if what you want to 
do is capture and store relatively 
static information. Anything that 
needs true editing requires an inter- 
face to a word processor; in the Data- 
copy product, this is where the CIR 
option comes in. It converts text por- 
tions of scanned documents to stan- 
dard ASCII that you can then manipu- 
late with word-processing software. 
The WIPS/CIR software handles pages 
that contain both images and text by 
creating windows for the text and let- 
ting you convert just the contents of 
the windows to ASCII. Initially, the 



$695 CIR package comes prepro- 
grammed to recognize only the 
Courier 10 and Prestige Elite 12 type- 
faces. The company says that about 
1 additional typeface-recognition 
modules for the software can be 
bought for $195 each. The company 
also says that another option will be 
available later this year. This one, 
called CIR-2, will be preprogrammed 
for the same two fonts but is sched- 
uled to have font-learning capabilities 
that will let you train it to recognize 
additional typefaces. 

So, with the $4000 cost of the hard- 
ware/software WIPS, the $695 mini- 
mum investment in CIR software, 



either a laser printer or an Epson 
printer (FX/RX series or LQ-I 500), and 
the required IBM PC XT or AT or 
equivalent, Hercules Graphics Card, 
and Mouse Systems PC Mouse, this 
is not something you'll be buying just 
to try it out. On the other hand, at a 
scanning rate of 30 seconds per page, 
the capability to use your own word- 
processing software, and a relatively 
good resolution of 200 dots per inch, 
it could win a good deal of support. 
A lot will depend on whether it works 
as well as it did in a demonstration the 
company gave us. 

—Glenn Hartwig, Technical Editor, Reviews 



Software Avalanche 
Forces New Policy 



Much as we love new software, 
we have finally reached our 
limit for handling unsolicited soft- 
ware packages. We try as many 
packages as we can, but that is a 
small percentage of what we 
receive. We receive so many unso- 
licited packages, in fact, that we 
can no longer be responsible for 
returning them unless they are 
accompanied by a prepaid return 
envelope. We regret the need for 
this change in policy, but the 
demands on our clerical time have 
become burdensome, and the 
shipping costs are high. 

We will continue to welcome 
press releases and other descrip- 
tive materials about new software. 
We will give serious attention to 
any literature sent. If the written 
information convinces us that the 
software described would appeal 
to BYTE's readership, we will send 
a formal written request for a 



review copy of the software. 

We will continue to return at our 
own expense all the software pack- 
ages we solicit. If we are unable to 
review a piece of solicited software, 
we will return it as soon as we ar- 
rive at that decision. If we review 
the package, we will return it as 
soon as the review is ready for 
publication. 

When packages arrive unsolic- 
ited and unaccompanied by pre- 
paid return envelopes, we will ac- 
knowledge receipt of them but will 
not return them. We will do our 
best to find time to use them but 
can make no guarantees. If we do 
not review unsolicited packages, 
we will store them for approxi- 
mately one year and then destroy 
them. If at any time we receive a 
prepaid return envelope for an 
unsolicited software package in 
storage, we will return the software 
as soon as possible. 



IULY 1985 -BYTE 251 




SYSTEM REVIEW 



Texas Instruments' Pro-Lite 
Professional Computer 

A briefcase- 



size computer 

compatible 

with the TI 

Professional 



by Richard Grehan 
and Eva White 



Richard Grehan and Eva White 

are technical editors for BYTE. They 

can be contacted at POB 372, 

Hancock. NH 03449. 



Texas Instruments has a new addi- 
tion to its TI Professional family, a 
briefcase-size computer called the 
Pro-Lite (see photo 1). Designed as a com- 
pact MS-DOS computer, it comes with an 
80-column by 2 5-line LCD (liquid-crystal 
display) screen, 256K bytes of RAM 
(random-access read/write memory), an in- 
ternal 3!/2-inch floppy-disk drive, a keyboard, 
and a parallel printer interface. This stan- 
dard unit costs $2995. The Pro-Lite's pro- 
cessor is an 80C88, which is a CMOS (com- 
plementary metal-oxide semiconductor) 
version of the 8088 for low power consump- 
tion, running at 5 MHz. It also boasts a wide 
variety of expansion options and some re- 
markable communication abilities. 

Closed up, the Pro-Lite is a gray molded- 
plastic box measuring 2 3 A by II/2 by 13 
inches and weighing IO/2 pounds. Some of 
the Pro-Lite's options add considerably to 
its dimensions and weight. The LCD also 
acts as the keyboard cover. r I\vo slide latches 
on either side toward the case's front 
release the display, and you swing it up on 
a large hinge. This hinge was stiff on our 
machine, and opening and closing the dis- 
play flexed the unit. The entire keyboard is 
mounted on a spring-loaded platform that 
tilts up when you open the unit so the keys 
are at a comfortable typing angle. 

The power switch is near the front of the 
machine on the right. You slide it up to turn 
on the Pro-Lite. If you forget to turn the 
machine off when you close the top, a tab 
on the display's frame slips through a notch 
and forces the switch to the off position. 

The Pro-Lite's AC/DC (alternating current/ 
direct current) adapter lets you run the unit 
from an ordinary wall outlet, but it consists 
of an ungainly transformer box that is posi- 
tioned along the length of the power cord 
in such a way that you have to make room 
for it on your desk. 

The Display 

The LCD screen working area is 9 l A by 4 
inches and the text is fairly readable, al- 



though, as with every other LCD screen 
we've seen, glare and reflection almost 
always overwhelm it. A contrast-control 
slider to the screen's right lets you adjust 
the intensity. Unfortunately half of the 
slider's range produces a display that is too 
light to read. 

Screen resolution is 640 horizontal by 200 
vertical pixels, and an optional LCD graph- 
ics board enables bit-mapped graphics on 
the screen. The Pro-Lite's characters are 7 
by 7 pixels right-justified in an 8- by 8-pixel 
grid. Thank's to the rectangular shape of the 
pixels (twice as tall as they are wide) the 
characters appear as they would on a CRT 
(cathode-ray tube) display. The character set 
comprises all the graphics (box-drawing), 
select Greek alphabet, and miscellaneous 
characters of the IBM PC's character set- 
including the normal and reverse-video 
smiling faces. Since the character definitions 
are downloaded into RAM from ROM (read- 
only memory) at boot-up time, you can de- 
fine your own if you don't like the set 
provided. 

Keyboard 

Texas Instruments has packed many fea- 
tures into the Pro-Lite's 79-key keyboard 
(see photo 2). The top row includes 12 pro- 
grammable function keys and some keys 
useful for text editing. On the right side of 
the keyboard, 18 keys double as an em- 
bedded numeric keypad that you enable by 
holding down the Shift and Num Caps keys; 
you disable it by pressing this combination 
again. An LED (light-emitting diode) on the 
Num Caps key glows green when the em- 
bedded keypad is enabled, glows red when 
the capitals are locked on, and is unlit 
(white) when the keyboard is in lowercase. 
Some compromises have been made on 
the keyboard's arrangement. The space bar 
has been shortened to accommodate a row 
of cursor-control keys to its. right and the 
single open-quotation mark (') and back- 
slash ( \ ) keys to its left. Also, Line Feed is 
on the top row with the function keys. 



252 BYTE • JULY J985 



The keyboard has a snappy and re- 
sponsive feel. We found it comfortable to 
work with, although the Tkb key is no larger 
than any other and we occasionally had to 
search for it. We were happy to find that the 
J and F keytops have tactile ridges for locat- 
ing the home position. 

A slot that runs the length of the keyboard 
platform just above the function keys will 
hold overlay strips as they become avail- 
able. This slot is narrow, hardly Vi inch tall, 
and since each function key could be pro- 
grammed to do three things (Shift-function, 
Alt-function, and Ctrl-function) it is hard to 
imagine an overlay that wouldn't be hope- 
lessly cluttered. In an apparent attempt to 
alleviate this problem, the Shift, Alt, and Ctrl 
keys have been color-coded. 

Behind Door Number 1 . . . 

A plastic door on the machine's right side 
toward the back unsnaps and swings down 
to reveal the disk drive and parallel printer 
connector (see photo 3). The drive is a 
3!/2-inch double-sided mechanism capable 
of storing up to 720K bytes per disk. The 
format is compatible with the proposed 
standard used by Microsoft for 314-inch disk 
MS-DOS systems. We were able to read and 
write files on a disk created on a Data 
General/One. 

The parallel printer connector is a 2 5-pin 
female D-type plug located directly below 
the disk drivo, It will drive any printer with 
a standard Centronics interface. If you own 
a Tl Portable Printer, a connector beside the 
parallel port lets you power your printer 
directly from the Pro-Lite. 

Options 

The Pro-Lite comes with a wide variety of 
options, most of which were unavailable at 
the time of this writing. They are divided 
into three groups determined by how they 
attach to the basic unit. 

Identical to the floppy-disk cover door, 
but on the opposite side of the machine, 
is the option-module door (see photo 4). It 



opens to a chamber of two option-module 
slots, and each slot can hold either a 
300-bps (bits per second) modem, an , 
RS-232C communications interface, an ex- 
ternal monitor interface, or a Solid State 
Software drawer. 

The modem is equipped with a standard 
RJ1 1 telephone-line jack as well as a built- 
in connector for an acoustic coupler. It has 
auto-dial and auto-answer capabilities. The 
RS-232C interface module lets the Pro-Lite 
use a serial printer or an external modem. 

The external monitor interface adds the 
video circuitry and extra RAM necessary for 
attaching an RGB (red-green-blue) color 
monitor to the Pro-Lite. Resolution on the 
external monitor is 720 by 300 pixels in 
eight colors. 

[continued) 




Photo 1 : The Texas Instruments Pro-Lite Professional Computer. 



JULY 1985 'BYTE 253 



REVIEW: TI PRO-LITE 



Solid State Software drawer is an- 
other name for a ROM cartridge. In 
this case, a drawer can hold up to 
2 56K bytes of ROM software. 

Yet another door in the back of the 
Pro-Lite leads to the rear bus connec- 
tor. Here you can attach a battery 
pack, a second 3 14-inch floppy-disk 
drive, or a combination disk and bat- 
tery. The second drive adds 3 more 



pounds to the system's weight and 5/2 
more inches to its depth. The battery 
pack provides up to eight hours of 
operation away from an AC outlet, 
depending on the options you are 
using. It adds 3 inches to the depth 
of the machine and 5 X A pounds to its 
weight. You bolt these options to the 
main unit with two long flathead 
screws. 




Photo 2: The Pro-Lite keyboard. Note the embedded numeric keypad, the 12 
programmable function keys, and the overlay slot for labeling the function keys. 




Photo 3: Behind the door on the Pro- 
Lite's right side is the VA-inch disk drive, 
parallel printer interface, and power 
connector for a TI Portable Printer. 



Photo 4: Behind the door on the Pro- 
Lite's left are the two slots for plugging in 
options: an RS-232C interface. 300-bps 
modem, external color monitor interface, or 
Solid State Software drawer. 



Be warned: You can attach only one 
option to the rear bus connector. If 
you want to use the battery and extra 
floppy simultaneously, you must get 
the combination disk/battery module 
(8'/2 pounds). The battery is packaged 
inside the disk-drive case. 

System options attach directly to 
the motherboard inside the Pro-Lite's 
casing, and they must be installed at 
the factory or by an authorized TI 
dealer. System options include up to 
three RAM expansion boards of 64K 
or 2 56K bytes each, an LCD graphics 
board, and an 8087 numeric copro- 
cessor chip. 

The standard unit comes with 2 56K 
bytes of RAM: I28K bytes on the 
motherboard and two 64K-byte ex- 
pansion boards. If you want the Pro- 
Lite with all the RAM it can hold 
(768K bytes), get it that way initially. 
A 768K-byte Pro-Lite has three 2 56K- 
byte expansion boards (the mother- 
board RAM is disabled) and expand- 
ing up to it would leave you with two 
homeless 64K-byte expansion boards. 

The LCD graphics board provides 
bit-mapped graphics on the screen 
with a virtual resolution of 720 by 300 
pixels. In other words, although the 
LCD screen can only display 640 by 
200 pixels at a time, the graphics op- 
tion makes the screen a window into 
an imaginary graphics display of 720 
by 300 dots. Holding down the Alt 
and Shift keys and striking the arrow 
keys scrolls this window around on 
the virtual display. 

Compatibility 

TI should get high marks for its efforts 
to keep the Pro-Lite compatible with 
the Professional Computer. (See 'The 
Texas Instruments Professional Com- 
puter" by Mark Haas, December 1983 
BYTE, page 286.) 

The TI Professional uses three-plane 
bit-mapped graphics: one plane each 
for red, green, and blue. When you in- 
stall the LCD graphics board option 
in the Pro-Lite, you are buying the 
equivalent of the blue video-memory 
plane. You can run graphics software 
on the Pro-Lite that was originally 
written for the Professional, with the 

[continued) 



254 BYTE • JULY 1985 



AT A GLANCE 



Name 

Texas Instruments Pro-Lite 
Professional Computer 

Manufacturer 

Texas Instruments Inc. 
Data Systems Group 
POB 809063 
Dallas, TX 75380-9063 
(800) 527-3500 

Size 

2 3 A by 11 1 /2 by 13 inches 

Components 

Processor: 80C88, 5-MHz 

clock 

Memory: 256K bytes 

Mass storage: One 3 1 /2-inch 

double-sided disk drive, 720K- 

byte capacity 

Display: 80 columns by 25 

lines 

Keyboard: 79 keys including 

12 programmable function 

keys and an embedded 

numeric keypad, LED 

indicator for locked capitals 

Expansion: Two option slots 

Software 

MS-DOS 2.13 

Options 

Add-on floppy-disk drive (with 
or without battery), battery 
pack, 300-bps modem, 
RS-232C interface, PC 
interface cable, 8087 
coprocessor, 64K-/256K-byte 
RAM expansion boards, 
external color monitor 
interface, Solid State Software 
drawer 



Price (suggested retail) 




Pro-Lite standard 


$2995 


configuration 




Second disk drive 


$595 


300-bps modem 


$300 


External color monitor 


$499 


interface 




RS-232C interface 


$225 


Battery pack 


$149 


PC interface cable 


$79 


LCD graphics option 


$150 


64K-byte memory 




upgrade 


$125 


256K-byte memory 




upgrade 


$595 




MEMORY SIZE (K BYTES) 
200 400 600 



800 



1000 



DISK STORAGE (K BYTES) 
400 800 1200 



1600 2000 



1 


; 










• 




II 









! 




















11 





BUNDLED SOFTWARE PACKAGES 
2 4 6 8 



10 



PRICE ($1000) 
2 4 



10 























1^ 





rn PRO-LITE |m IBM PC (n§§] APPLE EE 



The Memory Size graph shows the standard 
and optional memory available for the com- 
puters under comparison. The Disk Storage 
graph shows the highest capacity of a single 
and dual floppy-disk drive for each system. The 
Bundled Software Packages graph shows the 
number of software packages included with 
each system. The Price graph shows the list 



price of a system with two high-capacity floppy- 
disk drives, a monochrome monitor (an LCD 
screen for the Pro-Lite), graphics and color 
display capability, a printer port and a serial 
port, 256K bytes of memory (64K bytes for 8-bit 
systems), and the standard operating system 
and standard BASIC interpreter for each 
system. 



JULY 1985 -BYTE 255 




The rear panel of the Pro-Lite. Note the connector in the lovyer left A top view inside the Pro-Lite, 
corner for the AC/DC power adapter and the silver door that leads 
to the rear bus connector. 



DISK ACCESS IN BASIC (SEC) 
250 



200 



150 



100 



50 



56 



34 




37" 



_46 _ 



w 



33 iilr 



36 



BASIC PERFORMANCE (SEC) 
250 



200 




WRITE 

SYSTEM UTILITIES (SEC) 
50 



READ 



SIEVE 



CALCULATIONS 




SPREADSHEET (SEC) 
25 



40K FORMAT/ DISK COPY 40K FILE COPY 

PRO-LITE gi| IBM PC 




The graph for Disk Access in BASIC shows how long it takes to read 
this file. (For the program listings, see June 1984 BYTE, page 327, 
and October 1984, page 33.) The BASIC Performance graph shows 
how long it takes to run one iteration of the Sieve of Eratosthenes 
prime-number benchmark. In the same graph, the Calculations 
results show how long it takes to do 10,000 multiplication and 10,000 
division operations using single-precision numbers. In the System 



Utilities graph, the Format/Disk Copy was not performed on the Pro- 
Lite since this requires a dual-floppy system. The File Copy results 
show how long it takes to transfer a 40K-byte file using the system 
utilities. The Spreadsheet graph shows how long the computers take 
to load and recalculate a 25- by 25-cell spreadsheet where each 
cell equals 1.001 times the cell to its left. The spreadsheet bench- 
mark program is Multiplan. DOS 3.3 was used with the Apple II. 



256 BYTE • JULY I985 



REVIEW: TI PROLITE 



constraint that only the blue plane will 
be displayed on the LCD screen. (TI 
has modified the Pro-Lite's version of 
MS-BASIC so that anything drawn in 
a nonblack color will be displayed.) 

Also, another price has to be paid 
for the Pro-Lite's compactness. Since 
a character cell on the Pro-Lite is 8 
pixels wide, while a cell on the Pro- 
fessional is 9 pixels wide, a display 
generated on the Professional that 
contains mixed text and graphics will 
appear with the graphics out of place 
on the Pro-Lite. 

Purchasing the external color moni- 
tor option gives the Pro-Lite full video 
compatibility with the Professional. 
This option includes all the memory 
necessary for the three video planes, 
as well as circuitry for displaying full 
Professional-size characters. 

Additionally every key on the TI 
Professional's keyboard has a coun- 
terpart on the Pro-Lite's keyboard. 
This is possible in spite of the Pro- 
Lite's space limitations thanks to its 
embedded numeric keypad. 

Drive-Access Link 

Getting information from one com- 
puter to another is always a problem, 
and you'd expect this to be especial- 
ly true for the Pro-Lite with its 3 /2-inch 
drives in a 514-inch world. Normally 
you would be faced with purchasing 
either the 300-bps internal modem 
option or the RS-232C interface op- 
tion and transferring your files serial- 
ly, probably over the phone lines. 
However, TI has taken care of this with 
a clever interface called the PC inter- 
face cable. 

One end of the PC interface cable 
plugs into the rear bus connector. The 
other end plugs into the external drive 
connector found in the back of the TI 
Professional, the IBM PC, and some 
PC-compatibles. (The IBM PC's tech- 
nical reference manual refers to this 
connector as the 5!4-inch disk-drive 
adapter external interface.) This drive- 
access link, as TI calls it, lets another 
PC control the Pro-Lite's floppy as if 
it were external drive C:. 

When you use the drive-access link, 
the Pro-Lite's keyboard is disabled— 
you have what amounts to a very ex- 



Ikble I : The benchmark results for a 


word-processing 


test run on the Pro- 


Lite using WordStar. All times are in 


seconds. 




WordStar Test 


Pro-Lite IBM PC 


Document load 


6.6 9.9 


Document save 


21.3 24.2 


Search 


10.3 10.5 


Scroll 


9.6 41.2 



pensive 3 /2-inch floppy disk. However, 
the ease with which you can transfer 
files in this fashion beats a serial 
transfer any day; you simply use the 
standard MS-DOS Copy command. 
We used the drive-access link suc- 
cessfully with a TI Professional as well 
as an IBM PC. 

The Pro-Lite's MS-DOS 2. 1 3 normal- 
ly formats its disks to 80 tracks per 
side. This is no problem for the TI Pro- 
fessional since its MS-DOS 2. 1 3 is 
shipped along with the PC interface 
cable and can read this format. How- 
ever, since the IBM PC expects the ex- 
ternal drive to be formatted to 40 
tracks per side, you should format the 
disk from the IBM PC. (The MS-DOS 
provided with the Pro-Lite can read 
disks of either capacity.) Of course, 
disks formatted with 40 tracks per 
side will hold only half the normal 
amount of data. 

Also, a bank of DIP (dual in-line 
package) switches on the IBM PCs 
motherboard determines how many 
disk drives the system will recognize. 
Most PCs will have these switches set 
for only two drives so the IBM will not 
"see" an external drive. Before you 
use the drive-access link to connect 
the Pro-Lite to your IBM PC, you 
should refer to the PCs technical 
manual and make sure these switches 
are set appropriately. 

Software and Documentation 

The only operating system currently 
available for the Pro-Lite is MS-DOS 
2.13, which comes bundled with the 
system. Third-party application soft- 
ware packages available include 
WordStar, Volkswriter, dBASE III, 



Framework, Multiplan, and many 
others. Generally, you can expect any 
packages available for the Profes- 
sional to be available for the Pro-Lite. 

We were even able to transfer some 
of the software for the Professional 
through the PC interface cable to the 
Pro-Lite and have it run successfully. 
You should check your software li- 
cense agreement before doing this. 

The benchmark results for the Pro- 
Lite (see the "At a Glance" box) show 
a significant improvement over the 
IBM PC for everything except system 
utilities. The word-processing bench- 
marks (see table 1) also show an im- 
provement over the PC. 

An Operating Instructions guide 
and two MS-DOS manuals are pro- 
vided with the Pro-Lite. These 
manuals come in three-ring binders (8 
by 9 by 2 inches) with a box to put 
them in. The operating guide seems 
geared for new users; it has clear ex- 
planations, diagrams of the com- 
puter's parts, and not too much detail 
to confuse a beginner. I found only 
one typographical error in the guide: 
On page 2-2 the screen, keyboard, 
and option-module slots' labels were 
interchanged. 

Conclusion 

The Pro-Lite performs as advertised. 
We found that it concealed no unplea- 
sant surprises, and TI should be ap- 
plauded for the variety of expansion 
options available. If you add the op- 
tions that suit your needs, the Pro-Lite 
can be as powerful as most desktops, 
with the added advantage of portabili- 
ty. It is, however, priced noticeably 
higher than nonportables of compar- 
able capabilities, and some people 
might find the cost of portability too 
high. Also, the Pro-Lite is a little 
awkward as a portable, especially if 
you add the floppy/battery option- 
no one wants to carry a 19-pound 
computer in his or her briefcase. 

Systems like the Pro-Lite point in the 
direction of compact portable com- 
puters that are easy to use, have con- 
siderable power, and support as many 
options and peripherals as larger non- 
portables. The technology is getting 
there, but it hasn't arrived yet. ■ 



IULY 1985 -BYTE 257 




SYSTEM REVIEW 

NCR Personal Computer 
Model 4 



A sturdy 



by Elaine Holden 



The NCR Personal Computer Model 
4 is definitely not a portable— it 
^w weighs 50 pounds and measures 18 

—j — inches wide and almost 15 inches high (see 

COmpStiblG photo 1). But you couldn't find a more 
rugged computer. And NCR dealers provide 
dependable service. (Each dealer has a 
technician trained to handle any repairs. If 
you're not near a dealer, you can use NCR's 
mail-in service.) 

The NCR computer comes in six varia- 
tions. Choices include monochrome or 
color screen, one or two double-sided 
double-density floppy-disk drives, or a half- 
height 10-megabyte Winchester drive in 
place of the second drive. 

It is a pleasure to find the on/off switch 
and the volume and brightness controls 
located on the front of the unit. The quali- 
ty of sound is excellent. 



Software 

Like all other IBM Personal Computer (PC) 
clones, the NCR Personal Computer cannot 
have BASIC in ROM (read-only memory) as 
it is in the IBM PC. In order not to violate 
copyright restrictions, an IBM PC-com- 
patible BASIC must be on a floppy disk. The 
NCR version of GW-BASIC is easy to use, 
and the documentation provides excellent 
support. But the need to have BASIC on a 
disk almost necessitates the use of two 
drives; constantly switching disks can be 
annoying. 

I was impressed by the exceptional com- 
patibility of the NCR with the IBM PC. I was 
able to run Lotus 1-2-3, the Leading Edge 
word processor, and other packages for the 
IBM without any problems. 

The software that comes with the NCR 
computer includes self-teaching programs: 
NCR TUtor, NCR Pal, and an on-disk help 
facility, NCR Help. I found these programs 
to be well designed. The disks provide ex- 
amples of spreadsheets, word processing, 
games such as blackjack (I'm into the ma- 
chine for five grand), program-development 
software (editors, compilers, etc.), and 



Elaine Holden (22 Elm St., 

Peterborough. NH 03458). formerly 

an assistant professor of computer 

science, is doing advanced graduate 

work at the University of Lowell 



system software (operating systems, run- 
time interpreters, and utilities). NCR-DOS 
2. 1 1 , part of the same package, boots easi- 
ly and is operationally compatible with MS- 
DOS and PC-DOS systems found on other 
personal computers. A good feature for 
novice users is the control placed on the 
master disk. NCR has designed it to be 
copied only and not ever used. Once you 
make the copy, you store the original master 
and use the copy. This is excellent insurance 
against accidental loss of the master disk 
and also gets the user comfortable with 
making backup copies. 

RAM Disk 

Another interesting piece of software pro- 
vided by NCR is the RAM (random-access 
read/write memory) disk utility. While not 
to be confused with a plug-in card with lots 
of memory and the software to use the 
memory as a disk, this program' is* an at- 
tempt to use internal memory for the same 
function. Basically, the RAM-disk utility lets 
you partition the RAM and use part of it for 
information or programs normally stored 
on the floppy disk. The information or the 
program is kept completely in internal 
memory and can thus speed the function- 
ing of the computer because it has to ref- 
erence only the information held in RAM 
rather than go to the external floppy. It is 
like having a third, very fast, disk drive. 

Other microcomputers have lacked this 
convenience, and it does increase the speed 
considerably. And when using a word pro- 
cessor, the machine processes directly 
through the RAM disk and saves time by 
not referring constantly to the floppy disk 
for program instructions. The only drawback 
I see is the need for a large amount of 
memory to begin with. In order to fully 
utilize this feature, you would need almost 
all the memory NCR has to offer. 

If you have less than maximum memory 
in your Model 4, you will have to take my 
or the company's word for the feature since 
the RAM Disk Demo does not perform well 



258 BYTE • JULY 1985 



with less memory. The example included 
with the documentation clocks the time it 
takes to run a multiplication table with and 
without the RAM disk. Nice benchmark 
test— only they both took the same amount 
of time (II seconds): no difference noted 
with only the 128K bytes or up to 2 56K 
bytes of memory. 

Display 

I found the monochrome display to have ex- 
cellent resolution, competitive with any on 
the market. The green-phosphor screen has 
an 80-character by 2 5-line display. All char- 
acters are clear and easily read. I was equal- 
ly impressed with the clarity of the color 
display. This 16-color screen also has a dis- 
play of 80 by 25 and 640 by 200 pixels. 

Keyboard 

Weighing in at AVi pounds, the keyboard 
tilts forward or lies flat (see photo 2). NCR 
sells the keyboard separately It's plug-com- 
patible with the IBM PC and the Compaq 
Deskpro. The keyboard connection is easi- 
ly accessible at the back of the unit. Layout 
is compatible with the IBM PC but NCR de- 
signers have added a separate cursor- 
control pad as well as separate Control. 
Page Up, Page Down, Delete, End, and In- 
sert keys to the numeric keypad. I found this 
convenient because I could control func- 
tions in word processing while the numeric 
keypad was still on. Business users will find 
this a most important feature when jump- 
ing from one application to another. 

LED (light-emitting diode) indicators on 
the Caps Lock and Num Lock keys are also 
an improvement over the standard IBM key- 
board. They are not distracting but serve as 
gentle reminders. 

Processor Board 

The NCR Model 4 is controlled by an Intel 
8088 microprocessor. This unit functioned 
well through all the benchmarks. 

Standard for the NCR is 128K bytes of 
RAM, expandable to 640K bytes. Expan- 



sion from 128K bytes to 2 56K bytes is ac- 
complished by adding extra chips to the 
main board in increments of 64K bytes. This 
board is located behind the adapter boards. 
lb add memory you remove the back of the 
machine and all of the boards and insert 
the chips one at a time. If your fingers have 
been genetically programmed to resemble 
needle-nose pliers, you won't have any 
problem. However, I suspect the workspace 
may be cramped for the larger-handed 
members of our species. 

Another step in the process calls for the 
resetting of toggle switches located at the 
very top of the main board. 1 did not have 
a problem with this task, but I suspect that 
a novice user might, especially since the 
documentation is insufficient here. NCR 
should provide a clearer explanation and 
a set of diagrams. 

[continued) 




Photo I: The NCR Model 4 with two vertical disk drives. 



JULY 1985 -BYTE 259 



Computers 

For The 

Blind 

Talking computers give 
blind and visually impaired 
people access to electronic 
information. The question 
is how and how much? 

The answers can be found 
in "The Second Beginner's 
Guide to Personal Com- 
puters for the Blind and 
Visually Impaired" pub- 
lished by the National 
Braille Press. This compre- 
hensive book contains a 
Buyer's Guide to talking 
microcomputers and large 
print display processors. 
More importantly it in- 
cludes reviews, written by 
blind users, of software 
that works with speech. 

This invaluable resource 
book offers details on 
training programs in com- 
puter applications for the 
blind, and other useful 
information on how to buy 
and use special equipment. 

Send orders to: 

National Braille Press Inc. 
88 St. Stephen Street 
Boston, MA 02115 
(617) 266-6160 

$12.95 for braille or cassette, 
$14.95 for print. ($3 extra for 
UPS shipping) 



NBP is a nonprofit braille printing and 
publishing house. 



REVIEW: NCR PC 



You can further expand the system 
to the full 640K bytes of RAM by in- 
serting a 384K-byte memory board. 
But if you want extra memory by 
using the memory board, the 12 8 K- 
byte expansion chips must first be in 
place. Once again you have to reset 
the toggle switches and then replace 
the boards. 

This unit has five third-party-com- 
patible expansion slots and three 
ports: keyboard, integrated RS-232C 
asynchronous interface, and a Cen- 
tronics parallel interface for the 
printer. 

Disk Drives 

The NCR Personal Computer is avail- 
able with one or two 360K-byte 
double-sided double-density floppy- 
disk drives. An optional 10-megabyte 
Winchester drive can also be added 
in place of one of the floppy-disk 
drives, an obvious advantage for busi- 
ness users who demand extensive ex- 
ternal storage. The 5'/4-inch TEAC 
drives are positioned vertically to the 
right of the screen. This makes disk 
exchange very convenient. Initially, 
though, these drives seemed noisier 
than those on any of my other com- 
puters. 

Maybe the positioning of the drives 
is to blame, though vertical position- 
ing should not be a factor in more 
noise or vibration. Engineering of 



either horizontal or vertical disk drives 
provides for proper bearing place- 
ment and counterbalancing of the 
read/write head, which would pre- 
clude any extra noise. 

Rather than condemn vertical drives 
in general, I would rather say these 
particular drives are noisier. This may 
be related to the choice of manufac- 
turer; some companies do make 
noisier drives, particularly if they use 
metal drive bands. When I dismantled 
the computer I noted that the drives' 
magnetic-head carriage is moved 
along the guide shafts by a motor 
controlled by a steel belt. The drives 
are secured to a metal housing by 
three screws (two on the top and one 
on the bottom), and they rest on a 
metal plate that may act inadvertent- 
ly as a sound board. Future engineer- 
ing changes should deal with the 
source of the extra vibration and 
perhaps eliminate the sound board or 
cushion the assembly with a gasket to 
absorb more of the vibration en- 
countered by the drive movement. 

Documentation 

The documentation for the Model 4 
is, for the most part, excellent. Since 
setup is not complicated, a first-time 
user will feel at once comfortable and 
in control. The manuals are accurate, 
and they provide material ranging 

[continued) 




LLMauiuau-iuoia 



rfmi 




7 8 9 - 



Photo 2: The keyboard, sold separately by NCR, is plug-compatible with the IBM 
PC and the Compaq Deskpro. 



260 BYTE • JULY J985 



AT A GLANCE 



Name 

NCR Personal Computer 

Manufacturer 

NCR Corporation 
1700 South Patterson Blvd. 
Dayton, OH 45479 
(513) 445-5000 

Size 

14.8 by 14.6 by 18 inches; 
50 pounds 

Components 

Processor: Intel 8088, 
4.77 MHz 

Memory: 128K system 
memory, expandable to 256K; 
board expansion to 640K 
Mass storage: One or two 
360K double-sided double- 
density 5 1 /4-inch TEAC floppy- 
disk drives; optional half- 
height 10-megabyte 
Winchester hard-disk drive or 
dual 8-inch flexible-disk drives 
Display: 80 characters by 25 
lines, monochrome green 
(optional color), 640 by 200 
pixels 

Keyboard: IBM PC- 
compatible, plus separate 
cursor-control pad 
Expansion: Three IBM PC- 
compatible slots available in 
dual-disk system 
I/O interfaces: RS-232C port, 
parallel printer port 

Software 

GW-BASIC, NCR-DOS 2.11, 
NCR Tutor, NCR Pal, NCR 
Help, diagnostics 

Documentation 

Owner's manual, GW-BASIC 
manual, NCR-DOS manual 

Price 

Monochrome screen, one 
drive, and 128K RAM, $2400; 
second drive, $425; 
64K RAM, $90; 
128K RAM, $180; 
parallel or serial 
printer cable, $45; 
10-megabyte hard disk, $2195 








anssBai ma 



MEMORY SIZE (K BYTES) 

200 400 600 



DISK STORAGE (K BYTES) 
800 1000 400 800 1200 1600 2000 

























II 










BUNDLED SOFTWARE PACKAGES 
2 4 6 



PRICE ($1000) 
10 2 4 



8 10 




NCR PC 



IBM PC 1^>] APPLE HE 



The Memory Size graph shows the standard 
and optional memory for the computers under 
comparison. The Disk Storage graph shows the 
highest capacity of one and two floppy-disk 
drives for each system. The Bundled Software 
Packages graph shows the number of pack- 
ages included with each system. The Price 



graph shows the list price of a system with two 
high-capacity floppy-disk drives, a mono- 
chrome monitor, graphics and color-display 
capability, a printer port and a serial port, 256K 
bytes of memory (64K for 8-bit systems), the 
standard operating system for the computers, 
and their standard BASIC interpreters. 



D 
si 





IULY 1985 • BYTE 261 




The rear of the NCR PC Model 4. The power supply is at left, the Inside the Model 4. The main CPU board is visible behind the ex- 
RS-232C and parallel ports are at right. pansion slots. 



DISK ACCESS IN BASIC (SEC) 
250 



200 



150 



100 



50 



57 56 




BASIC PERFORMANCE (SEC) 
250 



200 



150 




100 



WRITE 



SYSTEM UTILITIES (SEC) 
50 



READ 



SIEVE 



CALCULATIONS 




SPREADSHEET (SEC) 
25 



40K FORMAT/DISK COPY 40K FILE COPY 

1 NCR PC 




In the Disk Access in BASIC graph, a 64K-byte sequential text file 
was written to a blank floppy disk and then read. (For the program 
listings, see June 1984 BYTE, page 327, and October 1984, page 
33.) In the BASIC Performance graph, the Sieve column shows how 
long it takes to run one iteration of the Sieve of Eratosthenes. The 
Calculations column shows how long it takes to do 10,000 multipli- 
cation and 10,000 division operations using single-precision numbers. 
The System Utilities graph shows how long it takes to format and 



copy a disk (adjusted time for 40K bytes of disk data) and to transfer 
a 40K-byte file using the system utilities. The Spreadsheet graph 
shows how long the computers take to load and recalculate a 25- 
by 25-cell spreadsheet where each cell equals 1.001 times the cell 
to its left. The spreadsheet program used was Microsoft Multiplan. 
The tests for the Apple He were done with the ProDOS operating 
system (except for the spreadsheet test, which was done with DOS 
3.3). The IBM PC was tested with PC-DOS 2.0. 



262 BYTE • JULY 1985 



REVIEW: NCR PC 



The technical manual 
is impressive with 
its detail The only 
section that could use 
revision is the one 
on installtion of 
additional memory. 



from a history of computers to the 
sort of technical information appreci- 
ated by long-time computer users. 
The technical manual is impressive 
with its detail. Again, the only area 
that could use revision is the section 
that describes installation of addi- 
tional memory. 

Support from the company is also 
notable. All dealers are trained to pro- 
vide technical assistance and trouble- 
shoot. The manuals, tutorials, and in- 
tegrated help package should get you 
through most crises. The manuals 
make frequent mention of contacting 
the local dealer if problems arise. 

Conclusion 

Although the NCR Personal Computer 
is not very portable and has the few 
imperfections I mentioned, it is still a 
good value. Ease of setup, documen- 
tation, tutorials, company backing, 
and solid engineering make this 
machine worthwhile. Other features 
include the choice between two ex- 
cellent displays, terrific graphics, a 
RAM-disk utility that runs programs 
faster than most IBM PC-compatibles, 
and moderately easy memory expan- 
sion. 

Having taught computer science to 
college students, I know the punish- 
ment that hardware must withstand. 
After giving the Model 4 the same 
type of rough treatment, I can say it 
is built like a tank. For heavy com- 
puter use and business purposes, this 
durability is a very important con- 
sideration. ■ 



How to go 

from 

UNIX to DOS 

without 

compromising 

your 

standards. 



It's easy. Just get an industry standard file access 
method that works on both. 

C-ISAM™fromRDS. 

It's been the UNIX™ standard for years (used in 
more UNIX languages and programs than any other 
access method), and it's fast becoming the standard 
for DOS. Why? 

Because of the way it works Its B+ Tree index- 
ing structure offers unlimited indexes. There's also 
automatic or manual record locking and optional 
transaction audit trails. Plus index compression to 
save disk space and cut access times. 

How can we be so sure C-ISAM works so well? 

We use it ourselves. It's a part of INFORMIX? 
INFORMIX-SQL and File-it!? our best selling data- 
base management programs. 

For an information packet, call (415) 424-1300. 
Or write RDS, 2471 East Bayshore Road, Palo Alto, 
CA 94303. 

You'll see why anything less than C-ISAM is just 
a compromise. 




RELATIONAL DATABASE SYSTEMS, INC 

© 1985, Relational Database Systems, Inc. UNIX is a trademark of AT&T Bell Laboratories. INFORMIX is 
a registered trademark and RDS, C-ISAM and File-It! are trademarks of Relational Database Systems, Inc. 



Inquiry 303 



IULY 1985 • BYTE 263 




FILET-MICNON PRINTERS 
AT A BURGER 




Leave it to JUKI® to serve up a hearty selection of letter-quality 
printers at a "fast-food" price that has sent the competition back to its 
recipes. 

For home or office use, the JUKI 6100. Fast, letter-quality 
printing for under $600! Prints 18 cps, performs all the word processing 
functions you need most, and has a 2K buffer memory (expandable to 
8K). Even handles your graphics! No wonder it's becoming an industry 
standard. 

For business use, you can't do better than the JUKI 6300. 
This one is even wide enough to handle your spreadsheets — along 
with graphics and all the requisite word-processing functions, at a 
zippy speed of 40 cps. Cost? Under $995! You also get a 3K 
buffer memory (expandable to 15K) in a high-tech machine 
that's built for many years of reliable printing. And like the 
6100, it fits almost any p.c. 

Mrnm. Delicious! 





■JUKI 

The workers. 

JUKI OFFICE MACHINE CORP. 



D 1985 JUKI OFFICE MACHINE CORP. 
264 BYTE • JULY 1985 



EAST COAST: 

299 Market St. , Saddle Brook, N J 07662 
(800)932-0590 

WEST COAST: 

23844 Hawthorne Blvd. , Suite 101, Torrance, CA 90505 
(800) 325-6134 • (800) 435-6315 (California) 

Inquiry 201 




Three 



programs 

for tracking 

the celestial 

visitor 



BY JOHN E. MOSLEY 



SOFTWARE REVIEW 

Monitoring 
Halley's Comet 



\ohn E. Mosley works at the 

Griffith Observatory (2800 East 

Observatory Rd., Los Angeles. CA 

90027), where he produces the 

planetarium show and is in charge 

of educational activities. 



In 1910 Halley's comet swept past the 
earth. People everywhere marveled at 
this heavenly visitor. The comet will be 
back this winter, and of course we'll all want 
to see it. Some of us will view it from our 
yards only; some of us will lug a telescope 
or newly purchased "comet hunter" binoc- 
ulars to the dark countryside; and some of 
us will pay a month's wages to take a cruise 
to the "land down under" to see the comet 
high and bright in the southern sky. Some 
of us are already watching it on little green 
monitors. 

It's fun to keep track of what is happen- 
ing in the sky and be able to anticipate 
celestial events. The motions of objects in 
the solar system, Halley's comet included, 
are generally too slow to perceive except 
by looking at them night after night. How- 
ever, with a computer you can control what 
you see; you can speed up time and peer 
into the future (or past), you can see 
celestial motions graphically and from dif- 
ferent perspectives, and you can find rela- 
tionships that printed tables do not show. 
Of course, the important thing is to see 
Halley's comet with your own eyes— nothing 
else counts— and with a microcomputer and 
some clever programs, you can be an in- 
formed participant as well as an enthusiastic 
observer. 

Although you could create microcom- 
puter programs that would tell you how and 
where to observe the comet, people have 
already done the work for you and made 
their programs commercially available. 
Some are surprisingly sophisticated, and 
we're fortunate that such software exists— 
just in time for Halley's return visit. 

Of the three good comet programs avail- 
able, two are tailored specifically to dem- 
onstrate a variety of aspects of Halley's 
coming appearance. There's also a new 
book on how to calculate comet orbits. 

Halley 

The most sophisticated of the three pro- 
grams is named after the English 



astronomer, Halley. It's distributed by Star- 
soft and is available on disk for the IBM Per- 
sonal Computer (PC). The program has four 
main parts. The first part plots the comet 
as it moves through the solar system from 
an imaginary vantage point high above the 
circling planets. It displays the sun and up 
to all nine planets at a scale you select. This 
allows you to see how the comet moves 
relative to the earth and other planets and 
how it accelerates as it approaches the sun 
and passes the inner planets. 

The second part of the program plots 
' Halley's comet on a standard rectangular 
star chart and shows how it moves through 
the constellations. These two parts of the 
program show not only the comet but the 
length and orientation of its tail— a fairly 
tricky feat. 

The third part is numerical rather than 
graphical and calculates Halley's celestial 
coordinates and distances from the earth 
and the sun on a given date or series of 
dates, allowing you to plot it accurately on 
a star chart and find it with a telescope even 
while it is still relatively faint. The accuracy 
is surprising: positions are to within 1 
minute of arc (one-thirtieth the diameter of 
the moon). The final part of Halley lets you 
change the orbital parameters and sub- 
stitute values for any other comet (or any 
object that orbits the sun) and plot the mo- 
tions of new comets as they are discovered. 
You can use the disk beyond 1986, which 
is especially valuable because several 
comets are discovered each year. 

The first three parts in Halley can show 
the comet during the coming months as 
well as any appearances back to ancient 
times, although with decreasing accuracy as 
you travel backward. Using the program, 
you can see why the comet's appearance 
in A.D. 732 was so spectacular (on this oc- 
casion, it came to within 4 million miles of 
the earth), how it appeared on the eve of 
the Norman conquest of England in 1066 
(when it inspired terror in the English 

[continued) 



JULY 1985 -BYTE 265 



AT A GLANCE 



Name 


H alley 


Halley's Comet 


Ephemeris 


Type 


Astronomy program 


Astronomy program 


Astronomy program 


Distributor 


Starsoft 

POB 2524 

San Anselmo, CA 94960 

(415) 453-1372 


S & T Software Service 
13361 Frati Lane 
Sebastopol, CA 95472 
(707) 874-2352 


Cosmic Computer Works 
243 White St. 
Belmont, MA 02178 


Computer 


IBM PC 


Apple, Commodore 64, 
Tl Professional 


Apple, TRS-80 


Format 


5 1 /4-inch floppy disk 


5 1 /4-inch floppy disk 


5 1 /4-inch floppy disk 


Price 


$34.95 


$49.95 


$25 



defenders), and how it will look when 
it returns in 2061. 

Halley's Comet 

Eric Burgess, author of Celestial BASIC 
(both the popular book and the disk), 
has created a new comet-tracking pro- 
gram called Halley's Comet. The 
package, distributed by S & T Soft- 
ware Service, is for Apple, Commo- 
dore 64, and Tfexas Instruments Pro- 
fessional computers. 

Like Starsoft's Halley, Burgess's 
package is an ambitious integrated 
suite of short and simple programs 
that attempts to cover its subject tho- 
roughly. It offers more text and op- 
tions than Halley, but it's less accurate. 

The first three programs in the pack- 
age provide a limited amount of back- 
ground, much of it historical, and in- 
clude a reference list of previous ap- 
pearances. Only in the fourth pro- 
gram, Orbit Plots, does the computer 
begin to make calculations. It also 
shows a solar system display similar 
to the first program in Starsoft's 
Halley, with the comet, Venus, Earth, 
and Mars as they looked at the time 
of any appearance since the year 
1000. You can select a year and let the 
orrery run or select a specific date 
and see a static display for that date 
while the comet's coordinates and 
distances from the earth and the sun 
are provided numerically. 

The fifth program shows the path of 
the comet through the constellations 
during its 1985-86 visit and provides 
a tabular printout of its positions. The 
entire sky is shown as it would look 
on a standard star chart; however, 



with only about 200 stars plotted, the 
constellations are difficult to identify. 

The last program offers observation 
information for a specific location on 
the earth's surface. You enter 
longitude, latitude, time, and date and 
are told the comet's altitude and 
azimuth and twilight times; you are 
then shown a display of the comet, 
complete with tail, in the appropriate 
part of the sky. The computer selects 
the proper direction to face, outlines 
the constellations in sufficient detail 
for the major constellations to be 
recognized immediately, and even in- 
cludes the moon and planets. 

Although the accuracy of Halley's 
Comet is limited and the displays 
rudimentary, it has enough clever fea- 
tures and options to keep a person 
busy for several nights. Another 
strength is that you can get inside the 
five programs and customize them to 
your liking. The program is ambitious, 
educational, and certainly worth the 
money. 

Ephemeris 

A third good comet program is 
Ephemeris by Roger Sinnott. It's avail- 
able for Apples and TRS-80s. This re- 
latively short (one-tenth of a disk) and 
inexpensive program was written 
several years ago, when Halley's 
comet was still distant. Apparently 
Sinnott didn't think to capitalize then 
on the comet's return. 

Ephemeris is a simple but surpris- 
ingly accurate program that requires 
you to enter the orbital elements of 
the object you are interested in— there 
are no default values. It then gives 



you, for the dates you specify be- 
tween A.D. 1 800 and 2 100, a printout 
of that object's celestial coordinates, 
distances, angular distance from the 
sun, and magnitude. The program has 
no graphical displays or other options, 
but it is straightforward and solid. 

Do It Yourself 

People who like to write their own 
programs will be interested in a new 
book, Orbits for Amateurs with a Micro- 
computer by D. T&ttersfield. This book 
tells you in a no-nonsense manner all 
you need to know to calculate a 
comet's ephemeris from the orbital 
elements, the elements from three 
observations of the orbit, and how to 
take into account perturbations and 
make differential corrections. It is 
clearly organized and includes all 
necessary formulas and tables, but it 
is not for the casual observer of the 
skies. 

Conclusion 

When Halley's comet last visited in 
1910. household electricity was a 
novelty and science fiction authors 
dreamed about futuristic airships. 
Buck Rogers was still a generation 
away. Few people who saw Halley's 
comet then would have guessed that 
the next time it returned, people 
around the world would use un- 
dreamed-of computing power to 
follow its progress on little green 
monitors. ■ 

For a list of books and periodicals on 
astronomy, see the "Astronomy Sources' text 
box on page 244. 



266 BYTE • JULY J985 




POPART 



QWhat would you call a desktop software package that 
• can Pop-Up Anything— spreadsheets, databases, or 
even DOS-over another application? What if it also offers 
a Pop-Up Standard Calculator and Financial/Statistical 
Calculator, Alarm Clock, Notepad, Clipboard, Calendar, plus 
PopDOS and Pop-Up Voice to dial your phone automatically? 
What would you call a single package that does all this, is 
non-copy protected and sells for $69.95? 

f\. Beautiful! New Pop-Up DeskSet from Bellsoft. 

CRITICS AGREE: 

"Bellsoft has taken the Sidekick idea a step further." 
Infoworld, 1/14/85 

USERS AGREE: 

"Much better than competition (know anyone who wants to 
buy a 'Sidekick?')" Ivan Myers, Cummins Engine Co. 

"This is an Excellent Package. (Thanks /'James Bondurant, 
ComputerLand Corporate 

New Pop-Up DeskSet includes Standard and Financial 
Calculators, Pop-Up Anything, PopDOS, Clipboard, Notepad, 
Calendar, Alarm Clock and Pop-Up Voice; $69.95. 

New Pop-Up DeskSet Plus includes all the above plus 
Pop-Up TeleComm, a telecommunications program;$129.95. 

Inquiry 51 

System requirements: IBM PC, XT, AT, 3270 PC, PCjr, or compatible. Phone dialer and 
telecommunications require a PC or XT and a Hayes compatible modem. 

Pop-Up, Pop-Ups, DeskSetare trademarks of Bellsoft, Inc. Sidekick is a trademark of 
Borland International. 



ONLY DESKSET OFFERS ALL THESE FEATURES: 




POP-UP™ 


DESKSET™ 


SIDEKICK™ 


"Pops-Up" any kind of application 






while running another 


YES 


No 


Entirely RAM-resident 


YES 


No 


Cut-and- paste capability 


YES 


No 


Gets DOS commands while running 






another program 


YES 


No 


Calculator with printable on-screen 






tape display 


YES 


No 



r^ 



DESKSET 

Available at leading software dealers. Or for 
a limited time you may order direct by 
mail or phone. Call 1-800-44-POP-UP 

(1-800-447-6787). Or mail this coupon to 
Bellsoft, Inc., 2820 Northup Way, 
Bellevue.WA 98004. 

Please send the following: 

□ DeskSet; $69.95 □ DeskSet Plus; $129.95 

+ $5 shipping 

Name: 




Company Name:. 
Mailing Address:. 
City: 



_ State:. 



_Zip:_ 



Phone: 

□ My check is enclosed □ Visa; D American Express; □ MasterCard 

Name on card: 

Card #: Exp. date:^_Z 



L J 



Signature: 

OELLSOaT (206) 828-7282 



J 



OEM & OWN BRAND 

COMPOSITE & TTL COMPATIBLE 
COLOR & MONO MONITOR 

TERMINAL 




SAMSUNG 

Electron Devices 



SEOUL OFFICE 



6~8TH FL, THE JOONG-ANG DAILY 
NEWS BLDG. f 7 SOONHWA-DONG, 
CHUNG-KU, SEOUL, KOREA 
TEL: 7516-955/7, 7516-959/961 
TLX: STARNEC K 22596 
CABLE: ''STARNEC" SEOUL 
TEL 

268 BYTE • JULY I985 



LONDON OFFICE 



6TH FLOOR, VICTORIA HOUSE 
SOUTHAMPTON ROW W.C. 
1 LONDON, ENGLAND 
TEL: (01) 831-6951/5 
TLX: 264606 STARS LG 
FAX: (01) 430-0096 



SANTA CLARA OFFICE 



3003 BUNKER HILL LANE, 
SUITE 201 SANTA CLARA, 
CAL. 95050, U.S.A. 
TEL: (408) 096-8441/3 
TLX: 171685 SAMSUNG SNTA 



TOKYO OFFICE 



GASUMIGASEKI BLDG., 2522 
GASUMIGASEKI 3-2-5 CHIYOTA-KU, 
TOKYO, JAPAN 

TEL: (03) 581-5804, (03) 581-9521~4 
TLX: 228009 SANSEI 



Inquiry 313 




SOFTWARE REVIEW 



Rendezvous 



with a 


space station 


or travel 


to Saturn 



by Benjamin Bernar 



Benjamin Bernar received a B.S. in 

geology from Ohio University in 

1976. His work with computers has 

led from uranium exploration in 

Wyoming to his current involvement 

with the space shuttle at Lockheed 

Space Operations. He can be 

reached at 201 South U St., #59, 

bompoc, CA 93436. 



Space-Flight Simulators 



Computer simulations of space flight 
have until recently been done only 
on mainframes and minicomputers. 
In this review, I'll discuss two programs that 
simulate space flight on a microcomputer. 

Rendezvous 

Rendezvous is a collection of simulations 
written by Wes Huntress, who, according to 
the program packaging, is a Ph.D. in 
chemical physics currently working for the 
California Institute of Technology's Jet Pro- 
pulsion Laboratory. The goal of these 
simulations is to rendezvous with a space 
station in a 1990-mile circular earth orbit. 
The mission is divided into four flight 
phases, each of which you can run indepen- 
dently and in any order. Animated color 
graphics is used to display the progress of 
the flight, which you control with the 
keyboard or joystick. 

Booting the Rendezvous disk brings up 
the mission menu and its options: earth lift- 
off, orbital rendezvous, approach, and align- 
ment and docking. 

The documentation describes the require- 
ments for completing each of these flight 
phases as well as the space-shuttle-type 
vehicle you use for this simulation. 

Like NASA's space shuttle, the Rendez- 
vous vehicle has two solid rocket boosters 
(SRBs). A big difference is in their burn time 
of 90 seconds as opposed to 132 seconds 
for the real thing. The main engines of the 
space shuttle are part of the orbiter and 
typically burn for about 510 seconds. They 
augment the thrust of the SRBs during the 
lift-off. The main engines of the Rendezvous 
vehicle are attached to the external tank in- 
stead of the orbiter and are jettisoned with 
it. The main engines are also turned on with 
the SRBs and only burn for an additional 
200 seconds. Like in the space shuttle, the 
engines of the orbital maneuvering system 
(OMS) in the orbiter usually provide for the 
final orbit-injection velocity. Unlike the OMS 
engines in the shuttle, they have enough ad- 
ditional fuel to reach an orbit almost three 



times higher than the shuttle can reach. 

Control of the Rendezvous vehicle during 
the launch phase is limited to attitude con- 
trol in the pitch axis and to on/off opera- 
tion of the OMS engines. The orbiter OMS 
engines are available after the external tank 
is jettisoned. You cannot control the throt- 
tle on any engine or the launch azimuth or 
orbit inclination. If an orbit is successfully 
achieved, it will be a polar orbit. 

The earth lift-off option presents in the 
right half of the display an outside view of 
the launch vehicle on the pad. The lower 
left displays a profile of the flight path. The 
bottom of the screen presents flight data 
and a prompt for ignition to initiate the 
launch. The upper left is unused. 

Huntress has made some simplifying 
design decisions in the launch simulation. 
Since the final orbit is polar, you don't have 
to worry about the launch azimuth or the 
effect of the earth's rotation on final vehi- 
cle velocity. One thing that does have to be 
determined for flight planning is the orbital 
altitude. 

The documentation suggests a minimum 
altitude of 119 miles. An orbit below this 
altitude could decay within one or two 
revolutions. In fact, the launch simulation 
won't permit orbit injections below 119 
miles; a low-altitude warning is displayed, 
and either you get the vehicle up by turn- 
ing the OMS engines on or you lose altitude 
and are destroyed by aerodynamic forces. 

An upper limit on orbital altitude is 
related to vehicle performance and mission 
requirements. In Rendezvous, this value is 
somewhere in the neighborhood of the 
location of the space station (1990 miles). 
Higher altitudes are possible, but you have 
to use more energy to get into them. Since 
the goal of these flight simulations is to 
rendezvous with another spacecraft, you 
need to get into the same orbit as the space 
station and time it so that the station is 
nearby when you match orbits. In principle, 
you could meet these requirements with a 

[continued) 



JULY 1985 'BYTE 269 



SAVE 
MONEY 

with Flexforms. 



Flex forms are pre-written, ready to use. contracts, 
agreements and letters designed to save your company 
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Each of the forms can be quickly tailored to suit 
yourindividualneeds without wading through confus- 
ing manuals. 

Flexforms help protect your legal rights, avoid tax 
problems, dramatically improve efficiency, increase 
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Four Popular Series: 



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Notices, Promissory Notes & 83 more! 



REAL ESTATE 



Designed for investors, developers, and property 
managers: 

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closures, Contractor Agreements and 75 more! 



CORPORATE 



Exceeds State and Federal Corporate Law require- 
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Resolutions, Employee Benefit Resolutions and 86 



PERSONNEL 



Created for growing organizations: 
Personnel Policy Manual, Employee Safety Manual, 
Employment Agreements & Applications, Secrecy & 
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four for $250 and we pay the shipping! Visa 
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(408)426-7638 



Inquiry 42 



REVIEW: SPACE FLIGHT 



direct injection into the station orbit 
from a ground launch; in practice, 
however, such an approach is not 
used. The launch could not tolerate 
any error in the flight profile, and con- 
straints on the time of launch, the so- 
called launch window, would be 
extremely tight. 

The usual procedure is to get into 
a parking orbit above or below the 
target and maneuver from there. The 
extra energy used to reach a higher 
orbit has to be dumped anyway, so 
parking altitudes below the target are 
typically chosen for efficiency. 

The documentation states a value of 
17,5 50 miles per hour (mph) as the 
minimum horizontal velocity (VELH) 
required for orbit injection. This cor- 
responds to a local circular velocity 
altitude of 65 miles. The 17,550-mph 
value seems to be a limit in the launch 
program since you aren't permitted to 
do an injection at speeds below this, 
regardless of your altitude. When you 
reach the altitude of the space station, 
your VELH value is 14,533 mph. 

Having selected the orbit, you are 
ready to plan a flight profile and get 
off the pad. The two forces to over- 
come are gravity and atmospheric 
drag. Of the two, gravity is by far the 
more important, so you want a flight 
path that curves as quickly from ver- 
tical as possible, becoming horizon- 
tal at the orbit-injection point. You 
must maintain a vertical or near- 
vertical attitude (as well as moderate 
velocities) in the lower, denser portion 
of the atmosphere. There is a region 
in the flight profile where aero- 
dynamic loads on the structure of the 
vehicle are largest. If the vehicle is 
manned, you need to keep accelera- 
tions below 8-10 G (a unit of accelera- 
tion equal to the standard accelera- 
tion of gravity, 9.80665 meters per 
second per second) by throttling the 
engines down in the terminal portion 
of the flight when vehicle weight is 
just a fraction of the launch weight. 

In the transition from vertical to hor- 
izontal vehicle attitude, you should 
avoid having a zero angle between the 
thrust vector and the horizon at any 
time other than orbit injection. If your 
ship is horizontal, all propulsion 



energy is used to increase VELH, and 
none is used to oppose gravity. In 
other words, you're falling, and the 
only time you're supposed to be fall- 
ing is in orbit. 

In a typical space-shuttle flight, the 
vehicle goes into a roll shortly after 
clearing the launch tower and pitches 
down slightly so that the crew is fly- 
ing heads-down over the Atlantic. The 
vehicle reaches Mach I (about 708 
mph) about 50 seconds into the flight; 
at SRB separation 82 seconds later, 
the vehicle is at an altitude of 28 miles 
and traveling at about Mach 4.5. Dur- 
ing this part of the ascent, the main 
engines are throttled down to as low 
as 60 percent of their rated thrust to 
limit aerodynamic loads and to keep 
accelerations below 3 G. The main 
engines are turned off at an altitude 
of about 70 miles. The OMS engines 
take you the rest of the way to the first 
orbit-injection point, about 12.5 
minutes from lift-off. 

The Rendezvous vehicle can't be 
rolled, so when you pitch away from 
vertical you are flying heads-up. The 
pitching of the vehicle is allowed only 
in one direction and to a maximum 
of -90 degrees (pointing straight 
down). SRB separation occurs at an 
altitude of about 2 5.8 miles and a 
speed of about Mach 4.8, which is 
similar to the space shuttle. The 
Rendezvous shuttle can handle the 
aerodynamic loads of a reasonable 
flight profile without throttling the 
main engines. The effect of the at- 
mosphere has been realistically 
modeled in the launch phase, varying 
as a function of velocity, attitude, and 
altitude. Fly too fast and too low and 
you'll lose the ship. Since you can't 
throttle the main engines, you can't 
control the G-forces on the crew. 

Hitting some kind of an orbit is not 
difficult with the Rendezvous launch 
simulation. After playing with various 
flight profiles for a while, it becomes 
rather easy. Hitting a parking orbit 
suitable for a transfer to the space sta- 
tion is something else, though. 

Earth Orbits 

If you select the option of orbital ren- 
dezvous from the main menu, you are 



270 BYTE • JULY 1985 



prompted for a starting orbital 
altitude and a position relative to the 
space station. If you've successfully 
achieved some sort of an orbit in the 
launch phase, Rendezvous automat- 
ically switches to this option. In either 
case, the simulation presents a view 
of a nonrotating earth along the 
equatorial plane showing the western 
hemisphere. The orbital paths of both 
the Rendezvous vehicle and the space 
station are plotted, and both revolve 
around the planet in a counterclock- 
wise direction. The bottom of the 
screen presents data about the cur- 
rent and projected vehicle orbits, such 
as energy remaining in the OMS 
engines and apogeefcerigee altitudes. 
All flight-parameter input is through 
the keyboard. 

Entering the orbital-rendezvous 
option through the mission menu 
puts you in a circular orbit at whatever 
altitude you choose. Selecting low- 
altitude orbits leaves the largest OMS 
fuel reserves for maneuvering. The 
maximum you can start with corre- 
sponds to changes in vehicle veloc- 
ity of up to 2000 meters per second 
(m/s). At this point, one of the reasons 
for choosing such a high space-station 
altitude becomes apparent. A circle 
representing the earth is 7972 miles 
in diameter, and a low earth orbit of 
2 50 miles produces a circle of 8222 
miles in diameter. The high-resolution 
graphics mode is just barely able to 
differentiate the two circles. 

Having 2000 m/s to play with and 
starting from a circular orbit, it's pretty 
easy to rendezvous with the space 
station. More interesting is trying it 
from the weird elliptical orbit you may 
have gotten into from the ground after 
burning most of your fuel. Many 
times, a partial orbit is achieved that 
intersects the atmosphere. These or- 
bits have to be circularized or trans- 
ferred from before you hit the at- 
mosphere. Elliptical orbits can be cir- 
cularized manually, but this is difficult. 
It's easier to set this up for the com- 
puter and let it do the worrying. Or- 
bital maneuvering by the space shut- 
tle is done exclusively through the on- 
board computers; manual control by 
the crew occurs only during approach 











Saturn Navigator 




AT A GLANCE 






Name 


Rendezvous 






Type 


Space-flight simulator 


Space-flight simulator 




Publisher 


Edu-Ware Services Inc. 
POB 22222 
Agoura, CA 91301 
(213) 706-0661 


sub-Logic Communications Corp. 
713 Edgebrook Dr. 
Champaign, IL 61820 
(217) 359-8482 




Computer 


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Documentation 


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Price 


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$34.95 



and docking, with the rendezvous 
target visible. 

Retrograde burns are available for 
orbit transfers from altitudes higher 
than the space station and for deorbit. 
At 2 50 miles, the space shuttle per- 
forms a deorbit burn that changes or- 
bital velocity by 90 m/s (about 200 
mph). Compare this to the 17,263- 
mph orbital velocity and you'll see 
that it doesn't take much to bring one 
of these things back down. The 
Rendezvous vehicle at this altitude 
will deorbit with 65 m/s or more, but 
the simulation doesn't provide for 
landings, so Huntress destroys you in 
the atmosphere. 

You can rendezvous with the space 
station in many ways. But, as in the 
launch phase, you have to do it with 
enough fuel remaining for the ap- 
proach and docking phases. A suc- 
cessful orbital rendezvous brings up 
the approach option automatically, or 
you can select it from the menu. 

The display is a star field with a 
cross representing the Rendezvous 
vehicle. The data display presents 
velocity and range data relative to the 
space station and remaining man- 
euvering energy. You control the flight 
through the keyboard or joystick. 

In an approach, you're in an almost 
identical orbit with the space station, 
either ahead of or behind it. There 
may also be some residual velocity 
along the approach vehicle's own in- 
ternal x- and y-axes that needs to be 
reduced to some minimal value. Since 
you're still in an orbit around the 



earth, firing an engine along the or- 
bital path to approach the station 
from behind increases your altitude 
and actually slows you down. In the 
early 1960s, this effect caused some 
difficulty for the Gemini program and 
the Soviet space program when 
rendezvous techniques were being 
perfected. The solution is to suc- 
cessively raise apogee in a series of 
translational burns, each time coming 
closer to the target. Since Rendezvous 
does not model this situation, it uses 
a direct approach for the simulation. 

For a successful approach, you have 
to get within 1.2 miles of the space 
station and reduce velocities along 
the three spatial axes to 20 m/s or less 
(with respect to the station). Ac- 
complishing this takes you to the last 
part of the Rendezvous simulation: 
alignment and docking. 

In the alignment and docking phase, 
the screen presents an animated, 
three-dimensional representation of 
the space station. Flight data available 
to you includes a graphical presenta- 
tion of your vehicle position and the 
station position in case you lose sight 
of it on the screen; other data in- 
cludes range, velocity, and vehicle 
rotation rates. In this part of the 
simulation you have control over rota- 
tion around the three vehicle axes: 
yaw, pitch, and roll. You manipulate 
this, along with translational motion, 
with the keyboard or joystick. 

Itanslational and rotational man- 
euvering is required to position your- 

[continued) 



IULY 1985 -BYTE 271 



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REVIEW: SPACE FLIGHT 



The documentation 
does not describe 
the ship, but it 
probably has some 
kind of nuclear-fission 
propulsion system 
like the Discovery 
in 2001 and 2010. 



self in front of the space-station dock- 
ing port. Arriving inside the port with- 
out hitting anything ends the 
simulation. 

Saturn Navigator 

Saturn Navigator, also written by Wes 
Huntress, was originally sold as an 
add-on program requiring subLogic's 
A2-301 graphics package to run. It is 
now available as a stand-alone pro- 
gram running under Apple DOS. 
Saturn Navigator is a collection of 
simulations. The goal is to rendezvous 
with a space station in orbit around 
Saturn. The mission is divided into 
four flight phases: interplanetary 
transfer orbit, Saturn approach and 
orbit injection, orbital maneuvering, 
and rendezvous with the Saturn space 
station. 

The program uses animated color 
graphics to display the flight; par- 
ticularly effective is a three- 
dimensional wire model of Saturn and 
its rings during mid-course correc- 
tions and approach and orbit injec- 
tion. You interact with the simulation 
through the keyboard. 

Each flight phase is run in order; 
unlike Rendezvous, there is no provi- 
sion for independent use of the indi- 
vidual programs. The documentation 
describes the options in the com- 
mand menu for each flight phase as 
well as the general requirements for 
completing each part of the mission. 
Starting the simulation brings up a 



nice graphic of Saturn and one of its 
moons. Next on the screen comes 
some explanatory text and a prompt 
for the velocity of the Saturn transfer 
orbit. 

The documentation for Saturn 
Navigator does not describe the ship, 
but considering its performance 
capabilities, it probably has some 
kind of nuclear-fission propulsion 
system like the Discovery in 2001 and 
2010. In setting up a transfer orbit to 
Saturn, you are presented with a plan 
view of the sun, Earth and its orbit, 
and Saturn and its orbit. 

When you input a transfer velocity 
the program calculates and plots a 
trajectory that intersects Saturn's orbit 
at that planet's location on the orbital 
path. It then provides the length of 
the flight in days, and you can request 
a view of the planet on approach for 
this trajectory or select a new transfer 
velocity. 

Saturn Navigator lets you play with 
the relationship between travel time 
and fuel. The most economical way to 
go is the Hohmann transfer orbit, but 
this is also the slowest. (A Hohmann 
transfer orbit is an elliptical, helio- 
centric orbit that tangentially inter- 
sects the orbits of two planets. In 
terms of energy, it is the cheapest way 
to travel from one orbit to another.) 
Inputting the Hohmann transfer 
velocity to the program produces the 
correct transfer orbit, one that just in- 
tersects the orbits of Earth and 
Saturn; however, the calculated travel 
time is a bit off. A ship on a Hohmann 
transfer to Saturn would require 6 
years for the flight; Saturn Navigator 
comes up with 5.8 years. The fastest 
transfer orbit you can select will get 
you there in 1.7 years, but you'll be 
left with precious little fuel for orbit 
injection and maneuvering. 

Once you've committed the ship to 
a trajectory, another text screen 
comes up suggesting that you consult 
the documentation for a review of 
mid-course maneuvering. The screen 
also displays a countdown, which 
delays the start of the flight until Earth 
and Saturn are properly aligned for 
the transfer. I suppose this adds to the 

{continued) 



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REVIEW: SPACE FLIGHT 



realism, but 1 found it annoyingly long 
after the first few flights. 

An animated display of the sun, 
Earth, Saturn, and the ship is pre- 
sented after the transfer-orbit injec- 
tion burn. Time into the mission in 
days and a plot of the ship's current 
position along the flight path are also 
displayed. At several points during 
the flight, you can make mid-course 
corrections of the flight path. 

On a close approach to Saturn, that 
planet's gravity acts to "draw" you 
into a hyperbolic path around the 
planet. There is a point on this hyper- 
bola where an appropriate engine 
burn causes the spacecraft to enter a 
closed orbit around the planet, a pro- 
grade orbit that doesn't hit the planet 
or the rings and leaves enough fuel 
for the orbital maneuvering required 
to rendezvous with the space station 
in an equatorial orbit around Saturn. 
You use mid-course maneuvering to 
target your approach so that you hit 
this point. 

At each mid-course opportunity, 
Saturn Navigator puts up a three- 
dimensional view of the planet on ap- 
proach along with a plot of the 
targeting point. Data about this point, 
such as the resulting orbital inclina- 
tion and periapsis (of the trajectory), 
is also presented. You use this infor- 
mation to move the targeting point as 
required for the desired final ap- 
proach. Once you've found and com- 
mitted to a suitable target point, the 
computer initiates a burn to adjust the 
flight path to the new target point. The 



display returns to a plot of spacecraft 
and planetary positions. Final ap- 
proach occurs two days out from the 
planet and automatically moves you 
into the approach and orbit-injection 
routines in the simulation. 

Using Saturn's gravity to help cap- 
ture your spacecraft expends far less 
energy than would be needed to cir- 
cularize an orbit at Saturn's "altitude" 
from the sun. On approach and orbit 
injection, the screen displays the ef- 
fect of gravity on the flight path and 
an overhead or polar view of the 
planet and ring system. This part of 
the simulation also allows views from 
the equatorial plane and changes in 
approach velocity or the initiation of 
the orbit-injection maneuver. Once 
you commit to an orbit insertion, a 
nice animated view of the approach 
appears on the screen. This is par- 
ticularly effective in high-inclination 
approaches. 

When you reach the point of closest 
approach, the computer does the 
orbit-injection burn. You can either 
manually initiate orbital maneuvering 
or complete half of the orbit for auto- 
matic transition. Maneuver sequences 
are loaded to the computer to change 
the orbit shape and size for imme- 
diate execution from circular orbits or 
delayed execution from elliptical 
orbits. This delay is to time the engine 
burn for either apoapsis or periapsis 
in a Hohmann-type fuel-efficient orbit 
transfer. You can also change orbit 
inclination. 

As soon as you have maneuvered 



Personal computers can 
provide a feel for ike 
problems of space flight 



into some kind of an orbit inside the 
inner ring and have an inclination of 
degrees, you are allowed to man- 
ually move into the final part of the 
simulation— the rendezvous with the 
Saturnian space station, which is in a 
circular orbit of 412 5-mile altitude. 
The rest of the simulation is almost 
identical to Rendezvous except that 
you aren't required to handle ap- 
proach and docking and you don't get 
a look at the station. 

Conclusion 

Personal computers and simulations 
can provide a feel for the problems 
and techniques involved in space 
flight that is obtainable in no other 
way save direct experience (an option 
not yet open to most of us). Books 
and equations dealing with orbital 
mechanics and rocket flight are very 
important, but they just can't provide 
the interaction necessary for an in- 
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spend an awful lot of time with 
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Inquiry 266 



JULY 1985 • BYTE 275 



RED-HOT RAM & EPROM PRICES 



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SN7443N 


IB 


125 


SN7444N 


16 


1.25 


SN7445N 


16 


69 


SN7446N 


16 


75 


SN7447N 


16 


75 


SN7448N 


16 


75 


SN74SWJ 


14 


19 


SN7459N 


14 


35 


SN7460N 


14 


39 


SN7470N 


14 


39 


SN7472N 


14 


39 


SN7473N 


14 


39 


74LS0O 


14 


29 1 


74LS01 


14 


29 


74LS02 


14 


.35 


74LS03 


14 


.29 


74LS04 




.39 


74LS05 


14 


35 


74LS08 


14 


35 


74LS09 


14 


.35 


74LS10 


14 


35 


74LSI1 




35 


74LS14 




59 


74LSI5 


14 


35 


741S20 


14 


29 


74LS21 


14 


35 


74LS26 




29 


74LS27 


14 


.35 


74LS28 


14 


39 


741S30 


14 


39 


74LS32 


14 


31 


74LS37 


14 


35 


74LS38 


14 


.39 


74LS42 


16 


.49 


74LS47 


16 


89 


74LS51 




29 


74LS73 


14 


39 


74LS74 


14 


49 


74LS75 


16 


45 


74LS76 


lb 


39 


74LS85 


16 


89 


74LS88 


14 


39 


74LS90 


14 


.55 


74LS92 


14 


55 


74LS93 




.59 


74LS96 


lb 


89 


74LS107 


14 


.39 


74LS109 


lb 


.39 


74LS112 


lb 


45 


74LSI14 


14 


39 


74LSI22 




49 


74LS123 


lb 


79 


74LS125 


14 


.59 


74LS126 


14 


59 


74SOO 


14 


35 1 


74SD2 


14 


35 1 


74S03 


14 


35 


74S04 


14 


45 


74S05 


H 


.45 


74S0fl 


14 


45 


74S09 


14 


39 


74S10 


14 


35 


74S11 


14 


35 


74S15 


11 


35 


74S20 


U 


35 


74S22 


11 


35 


74S30 


11 


35 


74S32 


11 


.45 


74S37 


14 


.99 


74S38 


14 


89 


74S51 


11 


.35 


74S64 


14 


39 


74S65 


11 


39 


74S74 


14 


.55 


74S85 


16 


1.99 


74S86 


11 


55 


74S112 


IB 


55 


74S1I3 


14 


55 


CA3046N 


H 


99 | 


CA3054N 


14 


109 


CA30S9N 


14 


2.95 


CA3060N 


15 


2.95 


CA306SE 


14 


1.49 


CA3060E 


8 


99 


CA3081N 


16 


1 15 


C04000 


14 


29 1 


CD4001 


14 


.29 


CO4D02 


14 


.29 


CD4006 


14 


.89 


CO40O7 


14 


.29 


CD40O8 


16 


89 


C04009 


16 


59 


C04010 


16 


.49 


C040I1 


14 


29 


CD4012 


14 


29 


CD4013 


14 


.39 


CD4014 


16 


.89 


CD4015 


16 


.39 


C04016 


14 


.49 


CO4017 


16 


79 


CD4018 


16 


.79 


C04019 


16 


49 


CD4020 


16 


.75 


C04021 


16 


.75 


CD4022 


16 


75 


CD4023 


14 


29 


CD4024 


14 


69 


CD4025 


M 


.29 


CD4026 


16 


1.59 


CD4027 


IG 


45 


CD4028 


16 


69 


CD4029 


tl 


79 


CD4030 


14 


.39 


CD4034 


24 


1.79 


CD4035 


16 


79 


CO4040 


16 


75 



SN7474IJ 
SN7475N 
SN7476N 
SN7479N 
SN7480N 
SN7482N 
SN7483U 
SN7485N 
SN7486N 
SN7489N 
SN7490N 
SN7491N 
SN7492N 
SN7493N 
SN7494N 
SN7495N 
SN7496N 
SN7497N 
SH74100N 
SN74I05N 
SN74107N 
SN74109N 
SN74U6N 
SN74I2IN 
SN74122N 
SN74I23N 
SN7.I125N 
SN74126N 
SN74128N 
SN74132M 
SN74136N 
SN74141N 
SN74142N 
SN74143N 
SN74144N 
SN74145N 
SN74147N 
SN74148N 
SN74I50N 
SN74151N 
SN74I52N 
SN74153N 
SM74154N 
SN74155N 
SN74156N 
SN74157H 



Pari No. Pirw Price 

SN74159N 24 195 

SN74160N 16 59 

SN74101JJ 16 59 

SH74162N 16 59 

SN74163H 16 59 

SN74164N 14 69 

SN74165N 16 69 

SN7416GN 16 69 

SN74I67H 16 295 

SN74170N 16 I 59 

SN74172H 24 4 95 

SN74173N 16 85 

SN74174N 16 59 

SH74175N 16 59 

SN74176N 14 79 

J74177N 14 79 

SN74179N 16 149 

SN74180N 14 69 

SN74181N 24 195 

SN74I82N 16 105 

SN74I8-W IE 2 29 

SN74I85N 16 229 

SPJ74190N 16 69 

SN74191N 16 .63 

SN74192N 16 69 

SN7-1193N 16 .69 

SN74194N 16 69 

SN74195N 16 49 

SN74196N 14 75 

SN74197N 14 75 

SN74I98N 24 119 

SN74199N 24 1 19 

J74221N 16 119 

SN7425IN 16 .79 

SN74273N 20 1 95 

SN74276N 20 2 49 

SN74279N IG 79 

SN74283N 16 139 

SN74284N 16 295 

SN74285N 16 295 

SN74365N 16 55 

SH743WN IG 55 

SN74367N IG .55 

SH74368N IG 55 

SN74390N IG 1 49 

SN7439.TH 14 1 49 



74LSI32 
74LS133 
74LSI36 
74LSI3B 
74LSI39 
74LS145 
74LS147 
74LS148 
74LS151 
74LS153 
74LSI54 
74LS155 
74LSI56 
74LSI57 
74LSI58 
74LS160 
74LS161 
74LS162 
74LS163 
74LS164 
'■JI.SKiS 
74LS168 
74I.SI69 
74LS170 
741S173 
74LS174 
74LS175 
74LS181 
74LS190 
74LSI9I 
74LS192 
74LS193 
74LS194 
74LS195 
74LS19Q 
74LS197 
74LS221 
74LS240 



74S114 14 55 

74S124 16 275 

745132 14 189 

745133 16 45 

745135 16 89 

745136 14 139 

745138 16 89 

745139 16 89 

745140 14 69 
74S151 16 .99 
74S153 16 .99 

745157 16 99 

745158 16 99 
74S160 16 2.29 
74S169 16 4.29 

745174 16 1.09 

745175 16 109 
74S188' 16 175 

745194 16 1.49 

745195 16 149 

745196 14 149 
74S240 20 195 

■JMnrara 

CA3082N IG 1 15 

CA3083N 16 1 15 

CA30S6N 14 85 

CA30B9N IE 1 95 

CA3096N 16 1 75 

CA3I27E IG 195 



74LS244 
74LS245 
74LS251 

74LS257 
74LS258 
74LS260 
74LS266 
74LS273 
74LS279 
74LS280 
74LS299 
741S322 
74LS323 
74LS347 
74LS353 
74LS364 
74LS365 
74LS366 
74LS367 
74LS368 
74LS373 
7JLS374 
74LS375 
74LS386 
74LS393 
74LS399 
74LS490 
74LS533 
74LS534 
74LS540 
74LS541 
74LS640 
74LS641 
74LS64.1 
74LS645 
74LS670 
74LS688 
81LS95 
81LS96 
8ILS97 
81LS98 



74S241 
74S242 
74S243 
74S244 
74S251 
74S253 
74S257 
74S258 
74S260 
74S273 
74S280 
74S287- 
74S288' 
74S299 
74S373 
74S374 
74S387- 
74S471- 
74S472' 
74S473" 
74S570' 
74S571' 
74S572- 
74S573- 



CA3I30E 
CA3140E 
CA3160H 
CA3160E 
CA316IE 

CA31B9E 
CA3401N 



14 



CD4041 
CD4042 
CO4043 
CO4044 
CO4046 
C04047 
CD4048 
CO4049 
C04050 
CD4051 
CO4052 
CD4053 
CO4056 
CD4D59 
CD4060 
CO4066 



CO4070 
CD4071 
CD4072 
CO4073 
CO4075 
CD4076 
CD4077 
CD4078 
CD4Q81 
CD4093 
CU4094 
CD4098 
CO4099 



CD4503 IG 

CO4506 IG 

CO4507 14 

CO4506 24 

CO4510 IS 

C04511 IG 

C045I2 IG 

C045I4 24 

C04515 24 

C04516 16 

C04518 16 

C04519 16 

C04520 16 

C04526 16 

C04528 16 

C04529 16 

CD4531 16 

CD4538 16 

CD4541 14 

C04543 16 

C04566 16 

C04583 16 

CD4584 14 

CD4585 16 

CD4723 16 

C04724 16 

MCI4410 16 

MCI 44 II 24 

MCM412 16 

MC14433 24 

MCI-I4W 16 

_ MCI 4572 16 



Price Part No. 



21C14 

27C16 
4164N-200 
6116P-4 
6116LP-4 



(200ns) CMOS SRAM .99 

CMOS USES LESS POWER 

(450ns) CMOS EPROM 9.95 

(Oram. 2.25-9/19.95 

I200HS1 SHAM 3.49 

l200ns> L P. SHAM 3.69 



Description 



6264P-15 

6264LP-15 

27128-25 

41256-200 

68764 

EWC-1 



1150ns) SRAM 
1 150ns) LP. SRAM 
(250nsl EPROM 
(200nsl DRAM 
(450ns) 21 V EPROM 
EPROM Window Covcis 



12.49 

12.95 

9.95 

8.95 

12.95 

10/.69 



El 



HrlHo 



-MIC80PR0CESS0R CHIPS- 

Pini Fundus 






D765AC 40 Floppy Oisk Comioiler 1695 

D3242 28 Aili.li Mulliple.er & Relief Counter 7 95 

IMS5501 40 SyrichiiiniuM, l!,il.i IrilwUe iSIHCl 1495 

Z80. Z80A. Z8DB. Z8D00 SERIES 

Z80 40 CPUIMK3880NII78OCI2 5MIH 2.75 

ZI0-C1C 28 Courilcr Hriier Circ.nl . . 349 

Z8Q-DART 40 Ilunl Asynclitism «oc MOTS 8 95 

Z80-OMA 40 Diiecl Memory Access Cucuil 1249 

Z80P10 40 Parallel l/Olnlorl.iccCfwIroller 295 

Z60S10/0 40 Serial I/O lUCfl .md RxCG BonUwll 1149 

Z80-S10.') 40 Senall/O (Ucks OIllll.i 1149 

Z80S10/2 40 Ser«ll'OIL.icksSVNCI!l 1149 

Z80S10'9 40 Seaill/O 1149 

Z8DA 40 CPUIMK3880N4II780C-II4MM; 295 

Z80A-CTC 28 Counlor Timer Chcuii 3 95 

Z80A-OART 40 Oual Asynchronous flxc 'Trans 995 

Z80AO\«A 40 Oireci Memory AaessCircuii 1295 

Z80API0 40 rtirallul I'Olnlerlace Comroller 395 

ZSOA-SIO'O 40 Senal I/O (T»Clt .mil IHCU BanrJcO) 1195 

Z80AS10/1 40 Serial I'D (LicVs DIHUI 1195 

Z80A-S10;2 40 Senal I/O lLacksSYNCBl 1195 

Z80A-SH9 40 Serial I/O 1195 

Z80B 40 CPU IMK3880N-6I 6MM; 895 

Z80B-CIC 28 Counlei limer Cucuil 1 1 95 

Z803-DART 40 Dual Asynclironous Rec/Ttans 1995 

Z80BP10 40 Parallel I/O InlcrlaceConlroller 1095 



— 6500/6800/68000 SERIES - 



695 



65023 40 MPU with Clock (3MH/) 

6520 40 ftirnhcml Intel Adaplcr 

6522 40 Vcr5aine Inter AdaWet, 

6551 28 Async Coutm Iriterl.iceAilapt 

6800 40 MPU 

6802 40 MI'Uwilli Clock and HAM 

6809 40 CPU - 8-liil (On Chip Oscdbloi) 
6809E 40 CPU - a 
68B09E 40 CPU - 8 Oil (Ext Clocking! 2MH; 

6810 24 128x8 Sialic RAM 
68B10 24 128x8 SlaticHAM i2MH:1 
6821 40 Peripheral InieiAdapl IMC6820I 
68B21 40 Peripheral Irllerl.Tce Adajiler (2MH/I 
6345 40 CRI ConliollenCRTC) 
68345 40 CRI Comrotlei ICflIC)2MH: 
6850 24 Asynchronous Comin Atlafller 
6360 24 OOOODpsDig.lal MODEM 
680001 8 E4 MPU 16 fill <8MHi> 
68488P 40 General Purposelnl Adapter 
68661 28 Enhanced Prtnj Comm Inlcrtal2661) 895 

B000/80000 SERIES 



34 95 



40 Conti 
40 MPU- 



)B,I 



«;HAM& I/O 



8085A 

80S5A-2 

8086-2 



8224 

8228 

8237-5 

823S 

8243 

8250?; 

8251 

8251A 

82535 

8255 

8255A-5 

8257-5 

8259 

8259-5 

8272 

8274 

8275 

8279 

8279-5 

8282 

8284 

8286 



8748 
8749 
8755 
801866 



CPtJ-S0lCiiip8-B.|ll2Bt)lsflAMl 

40 CPUI256 bylcs RAM) 

40 CPU- 8 Oil NMOS 

40 CPUw/Basic Micro Interpreter 

40 CPU 

40 CPU 

40 CPU-8-Hil N-ClianncH5MHjrl 

4Q CPU 16-l>it8Mlfc 

40 Anlhmelir: P/ocessor 15MHz). 

40 Anihinrjtic Piocessoi (8MH« 

40 CPU 8/16 -llil . 

40 HMOS RAM 1/0 toil-Timer 

40 RAM Wilh I/O Porl anil limel 

16 Hi Speed 1 ou 1 01 8 llinaiy Decoder 

24 8-Bil Inpul/Oulpul I74S412I 

16 CiockGeneratoi/Orivei 

28 Sy? Con1/BusOm«r I74S428) 

40 High Peif Prog DMA Cool <5Mlb| 

28 Sysrem Conirotler |74S438| 

24 10 Expander lor 48 Series . 

40 Async Comm Element 

28 Proq Comm I/O [USAHTl 

28 Prog Comm Inleitace IUSAHT) 

24 Proq Interval Tuner 

40 Prog Pcnohetall/OlPPlI 

40 Prog ftiiipheral I/O (PPII 5MHz 

40 Prog OMA Controller 

28 Ploy Inlerrupl Corlliol 

28 Prog Interrupt Controller 

40 Sn/e/Dule Oeosiiy Floppy Disk Com 

40 MulliPiOloColSctMlConl (7201) 

40 Prog CHT Corilrollcr . . . 

40 Pmg KeylmaidfDrsplav Inledace 

40 Pio(i Keyljoard/Drsplay inlcrlace 

20 Ocial Lalch 

16 Clock Generaior/Onwr .... 

20 OcialiJus Transceiver. 

20 Oclal Hus Transceiver l Inverled). 

20 Bus Controller 

20 BusAioiler 

40 8 Bit Univ Peripheral Interlace . 

40 HMOS EPIIOM MPU 

40 MPU 8-8d IEPROM Vtetsoi ol 80191 



2495 
1995 



40 I6K 



19 95 

2495 

3995 

MPU 4995 

J(8-BnOaia Bus) 4995 



V:347r= 
VM532!f. 

■VMvrl ?-..:■, 

■.".■ ■ .,v, ; 

MM ■".i'V:-£'--,T 



— SPECIAL FUNCTION 

18 Floppy Disk Read Amp Syslem 

15 TV Camera Sync Gwierator 

24 l/'i'i[ir.i. i-, i.;r H-.il t,m. ; i; ;;<>, 

Itj Mn id (j ni|:a:il::e lime Clock 

8 Phkj Oiciiiainr /Divider (6(111/ 1 

J Pro; (Knll.diir.Div r tlOOU/l 



Low Profile (Tin| Sockets 

M Ho. 1-8 10-99 100 ap 



8 p:n LP If, 

14 pin LP 17 

16 pin LP 19 

18 pin LP .26 

20 pm LP .30 

22prnLP .31 

24 pin LP .33 

28 pin LP 40 

40 pin LP .49 



Soldertsil [Gold] Standard 

PirtNa. 1.9 10-99 100 up 



)4pinSG 49 45 39 

If. pin SG 55 49 45 

16 pin SG 65 .59 51 

?0pinSG 75 65 59 

22pinSG 79 S9 GS 

74 pin SG 79 69 6b 

2BpinSG 95 85 75 

36pmSG 125 115 99 

40 pin SG 139 125 1 15 



Digitalker 



IMsMd:(tW*We];Mt]>M-Jt]gNg.]fel 



1103 

Wi 

■tlliN 15 
ni.-l.ij 

4in;:j-:-'5 

ll,,lll IM! 
■Ill, 4N 200 
MM!i?fi1 
MM526? 
MM52/0 

41256-150 
4125S-2O0 
4128 



2147IIN 

2148HN 

TMSJ045 

IMS-I0I47 45 

5101 

MM5257 

HM6I16P-2 

IIM6116LP-2 

I ;'.'■, I ill 1 .1 
HM61I6LP-4 

HMI:/l,li' 1 ' 

in,." in . 
HM6264P-15 
,i" , in i- 
27LS00 
7489 

74C930 
74SI89 
7<S289 
P2S10 
82S25 



18 1024x1 |300ns| 

16 4096«t (25Dnsl 

16 I6.38-U1 (150nsl 

16 16.384x1 1200ns) 

16 16.381x1 l250nsi 

16 65.536x1 1150ns) 

16 135.536x1 I20()rls| 

16 1024i(1 (300ns) 

22 2048x1 

16 409Gx1 

2Z 4096x1 

16 8192x1 

16 262.144 

16 262.144x1 1200ns) 

16 131072x11250ns) 

STATIC RAMS 

ZZ 256x4 |450ns)8101 

16 1024x1 1350ns) 

16 1D24x1 (250ns) LP (91L02I 
|450ns) 8111 
(450nsl MOS 



.:i65riS| 

(250ns) 

(200ns)2107 

(200ns) 

(150nsl 



99 

149 

I39-0'1O95 

79-8/6 29 

69-875.49 

■>V} ■'}.'? 195 

?;>', y/m«5 

35 -8/1 95 

35 - 8/1 95 

.495 



16 1024x4 |450ns) 
16 1024x4 (450nsl LP 



16 4096) 

16 1024x4 (70ns) 

16 1024x4 (450ns) 

20 1024x4 (450ns) 

Z2 256x4 

16 4096x1 

24 2048x8 



1 29 - 8/995 
165-8/1295 
139-8/1095 
169- 8/1349 



1702A 



27160-5 
2732 

. -•• :- 

'.■i-t:i, 

2/64-25 

l\ 1 l. 
:;i i-i 

■1,'n ", 

',"M, ", 
MCM6B764 
74S188 

l' '• 

.'::;■;; i 
i :/. 

.■:,;•. 

,■:-.::.. 

■ ' 
/■;;;-■>,' i 
,:.„'/ 
74S573 
:..-.:■< 
82SII5 
82S123 
82S126 
. ,r- 

02S191 

•:,:■,'. -i', 

. 
DM87S191N 



l450ns)CMOS 
(450ns)4044 . 
1 120ns (CMOS 
(120ns) L P CMOS 
24 2048x8 1150ns) CMOS 
24 2048x8 1 1 50ns) L P CMOS 
24 2048x8 (200ns) CMOS 
24 2048x8 |2O0ns) LP CMOS 
28 8192x8 fl20n:;) CMOS 
28 8192x8 IMIiislLRCMOS 
28 811)2x8 (IM) 
28 8192x8 |150nsl LP CMOS 
16 256x1 180ns] L P 
16 16x4 iSOns) 3101 

16 256x4 (250ns)CMOS 
18 1024x1 I250nsl CMOS (6518) 
16 16x4 (35ns1 93405 

16 16x4 • |35ns)3101 
16 1024x1 (50ns| DC 1934151 
16 1Sx4 (50ns) OC I74S289I 

PROMS/EPROMS 

24 256x3 |TmS> 

24 ?0.t8<H (450(151 

24 4095x8 (450ns) 

28 8192x8 (450ns) 

24 1024x8 <450ns| 

74 ?Li-:sx8 (450ns) 3 vollaqe 

24 204(*«fl i-i'.i ',l 

24 ry.r.S CMOS 

24 2WBxfl 1350ns) 

24 2048«8 iSSOns) 

24 4096«8 (450ns) 



74 .Sii-iixii ,i;;ii„ ii'iViCMO:,! 
ZB 8192x8 (200ns) 21V 



_. 8KI2xl( CMUS2IV 

IZ iii:iii-'.-.i; (2'.;in-,i K'HK 21V 

7B :;:>/i- ; i...ii c;- mm .. :-.i,k i i^vi 

Z4 BI9?x8 |450ns) 21V .. 

PnOMOC (6330-11 . 

p;ium is if,:ioi-ii 

PROMTS 16331-1) 
PROMOC (G300H 
PROMTS 16309-1) 
PHOMTS (6349-11 
PROMOC I634BI 

rr '.' ■:- . '.'-. ■ 

PROMOC 163401 



16 32x8 

ID :'i--,..: 

16 32x8 

IE 256x4 

20 256«8 

20 512x8 

20 S12»8 

Z4 S12xS 

24 512x8 

18 ).,:■:..: IK,. Ml.-, 

74 )u?-:,.-, RfKMlS. 

- 512x4 " 
512>4 



PROMOC 163051 
PHOM IS I630GI 

18 ILL'-!..; HiiiMDi: ,«,.!',,'! 

■ ■ i,. iM t , ,' .i ; 
PTOMQC (27S181 
I,,1M 1 , ,1 , 
PflOM TS (2/S19) 
PROMOC I27S20I 
PROM TS (27S21) 
PROMOC (2/S12J 



16 32x8 

74 512.ri 

16 .CMI 

16 2LL-1 

16 :■„><-; 

IE 512x4 



OC10 

ADC0801 

Aocosoa 

;.,;i.i,,i 

■\|'. :>;■:■! 
ADC0816 

;.i . -17 

i :■:■--; 

■ ■ 

OAC1230 

il/.l 1.-I1 
.-,. , , I- , 

AY ', !l!i:)A 



IB 2048x4 PROMTS ■ 

24 2048x8 IBOns) 

24 1024x8 PROMTS (B2S181) 

18 2048x4 PROMOC B 

19 2048x4 PHOM IS mffill!!,! 
Z4 2048xB CIIOM IS liPSI'Hi 

— DATA ACOUISITIQN- 



.....-9V 2.95 

20 li-[iit A/11 Crnn.rrM H-llSIH 14 '15 

20 B-liit A/I) Cuuvi'Mer i I/2LSB) . . 4.95 

20 uii.l A-HCuiivvil,:, IILSB) 349 

78 KHilAIH -,.. v, M.i,., ;i An.il.--i 'JL'5 

28 8-Bil A/0 Converter |8-Cti MutH I 4 49 

i_nnel Analog 14 95 



« 8-Bd A/0 Cc ... .. 

IB ?^i; .■■••■, ,0 7* :L«1) 

IE 8 n D'A CDMHIH (MC1408-7| 

IE BB-t D'A Converter IMC1406-8I 

2: 



ZO 10-Bil D'A Qm Micro Contp 10 20-vl 6 95 

IE 10 Bil D'A Crtriv (0?[) ; l,n I 595 

IB 12-flilD/AConv !0 20 : uLin) 695 

20 12 [jil Up DA [;,,„ ( |)Ij-- Lin) 14 95 

70 ].'-iJ:t U;j t).-A (j.iiv ( 111' tin.) 1395 

40 2LK H.,..::l IIAHI 4 25 

■!() Ji. 'K ll.i Alii (IR 16021 .3.95 



Wire Wrap 
Suckels ■ 
(Cold) Level #3 



B pin WW 55 ,49 

10 pm WW .69 65 

MpirtWW 75 .69 

16 pin WW 79 72 

18 pin WW .95 .85 

20 pin WW 1.19 109 

22 pin WW 129 119 

24 pin WW 1.35 1 19 

28 pin WW 1.69 155 

36 pin WW 1 89 1 79 

40 pin WW 229 195 



Header Plugs (Gold) 

Put Hi. 1-8 10 99 100 up 



14 pin UP 65 59 
16 pm IIP 69 65 
24 pin HP 1.15 99 



in* 15 13 
in MC 19 17 
in HC ?9 25 



S10 Minimum Order - US. Funds Only CA Residents: Add 6*i% Sales Tax Spec Sheets - 30* each 

Shipping: Add Septus S1. 50 Insurance Send S1 Postage for FREE 1985 Jameco Catalog Prices Subject to Change 

Send stamped, self-addressed envelope to receive a Monthly Sales Fryer ~ FFEEI 




MJWHM 



ameco 

1355 SHOREWAY ROAD, BELMONT, CA 94002 
7/85 PHONE ORDERS WELCOME- (415) 592-8097 - Telex: 176043 




Part No. Pins Function Price 

2816 24 2048x8 16K ETOM 350ns. . . 12.95 

Features: * On-board Address/Data Latches ■ Auto-llmed Byte Write (on 
chip timer) • SV Erase/Write/Read • Optional High Voltage Erase/Program 
(12V-22V) • Power Up/Down Write Protection • Auto Erase before Write 

the 2816 is an Ideal nonvolatile memory providing in-system alterability 
wilh t he same ease and with I he same features ns 2Kx8 Static RAMs 

U I I UOU ~~ Hflictunt: Tuctiiri) nil! ipplunces. clock!. >i 
linguiietnnslibgns. tie. TheOTl05Ois a sliwlarO UlGll ALKfR kit encoded witft 137 separate 
ani] usclul words. 2 tones, and 5 dilleienl silence duralions The word sand (Dries have been 
assigned discrete addresses, making ,| possiblelooulpulsmgle wids* v.Wds»ncalenaled 
mioplirases o r even senlences The "voice"oulpul otthe 011050 isa tnqhlyintelligiolemale 
voice Tta DT1050 wnosh tl i Sjeecb Prtcour Crup. HM54I04 |49 iio| Hid ho PI Speed) ROM; 
MM57IMSSai ind MX52I64SS82 [24 pio| ilgnrj witti Mailer WbnJ hit ind i nnmautci uhewtc 
dujnm on the wuotirjn steel 

DT1050 Digitalker™ S34.95 ea. 

MM54104 Processor Chip S14.95 ea. 

DT1 057-£jpjiirJs Hit 0TI 050 NOMM) Iran 137 lo ««r 260 Mr* tad 2 ROMs ind specs 

Part No. DT1057 $24.95 ea. 



INTERSIL 



Pirlrfo 



FE0202O 40 

FE0203D « 

7045IPI 28 

70-iSEV'Krl 21 

7106CPL 40 

7I06EV-K.I 40 

7107CP1. 40 

7I07EV/KU 40 

7116CPI 40 
72011US 

7205IPG 24 

7205EV/KH 24 

7206Cjrt 16 

7206CEV/KH 16 

7207AIPO 14 

7207AEV/Ki1 14 

721IIFT 40 

721IMIPI. 40 

7215IPG 24 

72l5EV,Kjl 24 

72I6AUI 26 

7216DIP1 28 

7217UI 26 

7217AIP1 28 

722-1IPL 40 

7226AEV/Kil 40 

130009 1983 



.lOili.llCOIfepl.iyN /.'Dill S /JIIMIIl 

:i'.-i}ri|ilLCin).«.!>l,iylirr 71(16* 71IG 

CMOS Precision Timer 

Stopwatch Chip XII lEv.ilu.ltmn Kitl 

3'rDiaitAyDlLCilOiivel 

IC. Circuit Bcwrd. [)ispl.iy iEvjIiuVw Kill 

J'jDiaitADiLEDOriwl 

IC. Drcwl Biuid [)is|il,iy ilv.Hn.ilum Kill 

3': Digil A.-D LCD [lis HLI) 

Ll-.s B.illfiy Vult Indicator 

CW0SLf[lS!i.:|w.tli:h/TnliL-r 

SLv-uIlIi i;h,p XU ([i.iln.il.1111 Kill 

Tone Generaior 

ToneGeneiator Chip.XIL (Evaluation Kill 

OscillalofControHer 

Fteq Counter Chip, XTL lEvaiiwrion Kill 

4 Oigil LCD Dispijy OecoOei/Onvcr ITTl 

i Oigil LCO Oisptoy OecodenOriver IMicroproc 

4 Func CMOSSlopwatch CKJ 

4 Func Stopwatch Chip. XTL lEvalualion Kill 

flOigl Univ Counter C A 

8 Oigil Fret) Counter C C 

4 Oiqil LED Up/Down Counlei CA 

4 Drgil LEO Uprlmvn Counter C C 
LCD 4': Digit Up Counter 0111 

5 Fmidiun Counter Chip, X1L IEviilu;mon Kit) 



4695 
1095 
4695 
1095 



3149 
2149 

10 95 



INTERSIL Data Book oasep > . 



74HC High Speed CMOS 



74IIC00 14 

7.1HC02 14 

74HC03 14 

74HC04 14 

74HCU04 14 

74HC08 14 

74HCI0 14 

74I1C11 14 

74HC14 14 

74HC20 14 

74HC27 14 

74HC30 14 

74HC32 14 

74KC42 16 

74HC51 - 14 

74HC58 14 

74HC73 14 

74HC74 14 

74HC75 16 

74HC76 16 

74HC85 16 

74HC86 14 

74HC107 14 

74IIC109 16 

7.1HC112 16 

74IIC123 16 

74HC125 14 

74IIC132 14 

74HC137 16 

741IC138 16 



74HC139 
74HC147 
74HC151 
74MC153 
74HC154 
74HC157 
74HCI58 
74HC160 
74IIC161 
74HCI62 
74HC163 
74MC164 
74HC165 
74HC166 
74HC173 
74HC174 
74HC175 
74HCI90 
74HCI91 
74HC192 
74HC193 
74HCI94 
74HC195 

74HC237 
74IIC240 
74HC241 
74HC242 
74HC243 
74HC244 



74CC0 
74C02 
74C04 
74C08 
74C10 
74C14 
74C20 
74C30 
74C32 
74C42 
74C48 
74C73 
74C74 
74C85 
74C86 
74C89 
74C90 
74C93 
74C95 



14 



74HC245 

74HC251 lb 

74HC253 16 

74HC257 16 

74HC259 16 

74HC266 14 

7JHC273 20 

74HC280 14 

74HC299 20 

74HC366 16 

74HC367 16 

74HC373 20 

74HC374 20 

74HC390 16 

74HC393 14 

74HC533 Ztl 

74HC534 20 

74HC595 16 

74HC688 20 

74HC4024 14 

74HC4040 16 

74HC4049 16 

74HC4050 16 

74HC4060 IB 

74HC4075 14 

74HC4078 14 

74HC45II 16 

74IICJ514 24 

/■'.H(MV';i 16 

74HC4543 16 
7 1ttifVM* 



14 



DSO026CN B 
TL071CP I 
TL072CP 8 
TL074CN 14 
ROStCP 8 
TL082CP 8 
TL084CN 14 
LM109K 
LM30ICN B 
LM302H 
LM304H 
LM305H 
LM307CN 8 
LM308CH 8 
LM309K 
LM310CN 8 
LM3I1CN I 
LJJI312H 
LM317T 
LM317K 
LM318CN 8 
LM319N 14 
LM32CK-5 
LM320K-12 
LM320K-15 
LM320K-24 
LM320I-5 

LM320M5 

LM320T-24 

IM322N 14 

LM323K 

LM324N 14 

LM3290Z 

LM33IN 8 

LM334Z 

LM3352 

LM336Z 

LM337MP 

LM337T 

LM338K 

LM339N 14 

LM340K-5 

IM340K-I2 

LM340K15 

LM340K24 

LM340T-5 

LM340T-12 

LM340T-15 

LM340T-24 

LF347N 14 

LM348N 14 

LM350K 

LF351N B 

LF353N 6 



74C107 


14 


79 


7-5C1M 


16 


219 


74C154 


?< 


325 


74C157 


16 


175 


74Cl<iiJ 


16 


U9 


74CI61 


lb 


1 19 


74CIE? 


IS 


H9 


74C163 


16 


1 19 


7.:Cii;-i 


14 


129 


7-:CHi', 


IE 


129 


74C173 


16 


89 


;.!i:iM 


16 


1 19 


7-li;i75 


16 


1 II 


7-lCr-'2 


16 


139 


74CI93 


16 


139 


74CI95 


16 


129 


74C221 


16 


175 


HE 

LF355N 


11 

a 


109 


LF356N 


8 


109 


I r.W,.'ir.' 


e 


59 


LM3'.!!.'j 


14 


179 


LM370N 


14 


495 


LM373N 


14 


495 


LM377N 


14 


195 


LM380CN 


a 


109 


LM380N' 


14 


89 


LM38II( 


14 


179 


LM382N 


14 


149 


LIJI384N 


14 


195 


IM3S6N3 


t 


83 


Lf4387li 


8 


139 


LM389,'J 


16 


1 19 


LM391N-80 16 


1.19 


LM392N 


8 


59 


LM393N 


8 


45 


LF398N 


8 


3 95 


LM399H 




595 


LF412CN 


8 


195 


IL494CN 


16 


279 


IL496CP 


8 


159 


NE531V 


8 


179 


MES40H IC540HI 


295 


NE544N 


14 


195 


NE550A 


14 


195 


NE555V 


8 


35 


XRL555 


a 


69 


IM556N 


14 


79 


NE558N 


16 


159 


NE5S4N 


16 


195 


IM5C5N 


14 


.9'-} 


LMS66CH 


8 


149 


LM567V 


R 


99 


NE570N 


16 


295 


flE57tN 


16 


249 


NE592N 


14 


119 


LM703CN 


8 


149 


LM710N 


14 


69 


LM7IIN 


14 


n 


LM723N 


14 


-i-i 


LM733N 


14 


89 


LM739M 


14 


195 


LM74ICN 


a 


3'J 



74C240 
74C244 
74C373 
74C374 
74C901 
74C902 
74C903 
74C905 
74C907 
74C91I 
74C912 
74C9I5 
74C917 
74C922 
74C923 
74C925 
74C926 
80C95 
8X97 



2D 



LM747N 14 

LM740N B 
UA760HC 

LMI456V 8 

LM1458CN 8 

LM1488N 14 

LM1489N 14 

LM1496N 14 
LM1605CK 

LM187IN 16 

LM1872N 16 
LM1877H-9 14 

LM1689H 16 

LM1896N 14 
VWZSu7T 

LILN2003A 16 

XR2206 16 

XR2207 14 

XR2208 15 

XR221I 14 
LM2877P 
LM2878P 

LM2901N 14 

LM2902N 14 

LM2907N 14 

IM29I7N 8 

LM39O0N 14 

LM3905CN 8 

LM3909N B 

LM3914M 16 

LM3915N 16 

LM3916N 16 

RC4136N 14 

RC4I51NB B 

RC4193NB 8 
RC«I95TK 

LW4250CN 8 

NE5532 B 

fJE553i B 
78L05A 
781 12A 
79L05A 
79y05AH 

ICL8038 14 

LM13080N 8 

LMI36G0N 16 

75477 8 

TWO? 14 

70177 ZS 



30003 1982 Nat. Linear Data Book p§52pgs | .S11.95 



276 BYTE • JULY I985 



Inquiry I96 



ELECTRONICS I 



Commodore® Accessories 



RS232 Adapter 
for VIC-20 and 
Commodore 64 



The JE232CM allows connection of standard serial RS232 
printers, modems, etc. to your VIC-20 and C-64. A 4-pole 
switch allows the inveision of the 4 control lines. Com- 
plete installation and operation instructions included. 

• Plugs into User Port • Provides Standard RS232 signal 
levels • Uses 6 signals (Transmit, Receive, Clear to Send, 
Request to Send, Data Terminal Ready, Data Set Ready). 

JE232CM $39.95 







i APPLE® Accessories 




VOICE SYNTHESIZER 
FOR COMMODORE VIC-20 AND C-64 

Plug-In — Talking in Minutes! 
JE520CM $99.95 



TRS-80 Accessories 



MPI 5V4" DISK DRIVE 

• Use as a second disk drive ■ Single- 
sided - Single/double density • Full- 
height drive * 48 TPI • Documentation 
included ♦ Weight: 3.7 lbs. 

MPI51S. : . . $89.95 or 2 for $159.95 

EXPAND TRS-80 MEMORY 

TRS-80 MODEL I, III 

Each Kit comes complete with eight MM5290 (UPD41 6/41 16) 16K Dynamic 
RAMs anc documentation lor conversion Model 1 16K equipped with Ex- 
pansion Interlace can be expanded lo 48K with 2 Kits Model III: Can be 
expanded Irom 16K lo 48K using 2 Kits. Each Kit will expand computer by 
16K increments 

TRS-16K3 200ns (Model III) S6.29 

TRS-16K4 250ns (Mode) 1) $5.49 

TRS-80 COLOR AND COLOR II 

Easy to install Kit comes complete with 8 each 4164N-20 (200ns) 64K 
Dynamic RAMs and documentation lor conversion. Converts TRS-80 Color 
Computers with D. E, ET. F and NC circuit boards lo 32K Also converts 
TRS-80 Coior Computer II to 64K. Flex DOS or OS-9 required lo utilize 
lull 64K RAM on all computers 

TRS-64K-2 $17.95 

TRS-80 MODEL IV & 4P 

Easy to install K it comescomplete with 8 ea 4 1 64N-20 (200ns) 64K Dynamic 
RAMs and conversion documentalion. Converts TRS-80 Model IV computers 
trom 16K to 64K. Also expands Model 4P from 64K lo 128K. 

TRS-64K-2 $17.95 

(Converts the Model IV from 16K lo 64K or will expand (he Model 4Pf rom 
64K lo 128K) 

TRS-64K2PAL (Model IV only) $38.95 

(8- 4164's with PAL Chip lo expand If om E4K lo 128K) 

• TRS-80 Model 100* • NEC • Olivetti 

•ALSO COMPATIBLE WJTH NEC PC-8201A AND OLIVETTI M10 
Easy to install module plugs right into the socket increasing memory in 8K 
increments. Complete with module and documentation lor conversion. 

M1008K (TRS-80 Model 100 Expansion) $49.95 

NEC8KR (NEC PC-8201A & Olivetti M1 0) Please Specify $49.95 



PROMETHEUS MODEMS 



Intelligent 300/1200 
Baud Modem with Real 
Time Clock/Calendar 

The ProModem'" is a Bell 212A (300/1200 baud) in- 
telligent stand-alone modem • Full featured expandable 
modem • Standard features include Auto Answer and 
Auto Dial, Help Commands. Programmable Intelligent 
Dialing, Touch Tone" 1 & Pulse Dialing and More ■ Hayes 
command set compatible plus an additional extended 
command set • Shown w/alphanumeric display option. 

PM1200 RS-232 Stand-Alone Unit $319.95 

OPTIONS FOR ProModem 1200 

PM-COM (ProCom Communication Software) S79.95 

Please specify Operating System. 

PM-OP (Options Processor) S79.95 

PMO-16K(Oplions Processor Memory - 16K) S 4.50 

PMO-32K (Options Processor Memory -32K) S 9.00 

PMO-64K (Options Processor Memory - 64K) S18.00 

PM-ALP (Alphanumeric Display) S79.95 

(Incl. Options-Processor, 

PM-SpeCJal Alphanumeric Display) $1 69.95 



SURGE PROTECTORS & BACK-UPS 



PROTECT YOURSELF. 
UT , DATASHIELD 

^Fj |(b Surge Protector 

/ f Eliminates voltage spikesandEMl-RFI noise be- 
k >f ~ lore it can damage your equipment or cause dala 
loss. 6-monlh warranty Power dissipation (100 
microseconds): 2,000.000 walls 
PART NO. DESCRIPTION PRICE 

MODEL 75 4 Sockets. On/Off Switch S49.95 

MODEL 100 6 Sockets, Super Filters. 

Low Voltage Alarm S69.95 

^■f" DATASHIELD" 

Back-Up Power Source 

Protect your computer from block-outs, brown-outs, 
power surges and line noise, PTVs PC200 is designed 
lor PCs with floppy disk storage. Irte XT30Q for hard 
disk storage and the ATS00 lor mulli-uscr systems, A 
typical compatible PC for each of these standbys will 
be supported for 1 5 to 25 minutes after power is lost 
Weight (PC200: 27 lbs ) - (XT300 43 lbs.) - [AT500: 
eSlbs.t - (AT800: 83 lbs) 

PC200 (200 Watt Rating) $299.95 

XT300 (300 Watt Rating) $399.95 

AT500 (500 Watt Rating) $699.95 

AT800 (800 Watt Rating) $799.95 



1! 



APPLE* 
Compatible 



Key: a = Apple II or 11+ pAPRQ 
b = Apple We V*r\ llUO 



16K RAM Card (Language Card) 

The ARC-1 6K RAM Card allows the Apple' II and II+ computersto expand Irom 48K to 64K. 

Complete with instructions. Key: (a) 

ARC-16K $39.95 

Z-80 CP/M Card 

The AZ80-1 is Soft-card compatible. Used with CP/M related programs. Software not 

included. Key: (a.b) 

AZ80-1 $49.95 

EPROM Burner Card 

The AEB-2 allows user to program and work with standard EPROMs (2716. 2732 & 2764). 
Easy to use. on-board firmware. Menu contains the following options: Write, Read, Copy. 
Compare. Blank-Check and Monitor. Complete with instructions. Key: (a.b) 
AEB-2 $69.95 

80-Column Card w/Soft Switch 

The A80-C is an 80-column card designed for the Apple* II and tl+ computers. The card is 
equipped with a soft switch which allows easy hookup for any monitor. The A80-C also 
features inverse video capabilities. This card is similar to the Videx"* 80 column card. 
Complete with instructions. Key: (a) 
A80-C $74.95 

Super Serial Card 

The ASSC-P is a serial card with a printer mode. Itgeneratesstandard RS-232C signals 
and is similar to the Apple" Super Serial Card. Complete with instructions. Key: (a.b) 
ASSC-P $99.95 

Parallel Card w/64K Buffer 

The APC-64K is a parallel card with a 64K buffer and graphic dump capabilities. Complete 

with instructions. Key: (a.b) 

APC-64K. . : $129.95 

80-Column/64K RAM Card 

Extended 80-Column/64K RAM Card expands memoiy by64Ktogive 128K when used 

with programs like VisiCalc™. Complete with instructions. Key: (b) 

JE864 $79.95 

trademarks ot APPLE Compulers 

""Videx is a registered trademark of Videxfnc 

*«sc 



APPLE" Compatible 
5V«" Half-Height Disk Drive 



li *8i 




• Uses Chinon Pinch-type mechanics • 143K formatted 
storage • 35 tracks • Super quiel ■ Works with Apple 
Controllers or other compatibles (ACC-1) (lelt) • Com- 
plete with connector - just plug inlo your controller 

• Size: 5VWx 1 VH % 80 ■ Wl: 4 Ibs.Key (a.b) 

ADD-12 $159.95 







APPLE™ 
Compatible 
5V4" Disk Drive 
& Controller 
Card 

• Uses Shugart SA390 mechanics ■ 143K formatted 
storage - Color matches Apple Computer - Works wilh 
Apple Controller or other Apple-compatible controllers 
(ACC-1) • Complete with connector - jusl plug inlo 
your disk controller card ■ 35 tracks • Size: 6"W x 
3VH x 8-9/16-0 ■ Wl.: 4". lbs. Key: (a.b) 

ADD-514 (Disk Drive) $149.95 

ACC-1 (ConlroilerCard, $ 49.95 

APPLE ,M lie Compatible 
5V«" Half-Height Disk Drive 

■ Seme specs as ADD-12 (left) except 

ADD-llc. r.^fr.Tr.^ $169.95 



Additional Apple* Compatible Products 

APF-1 Cooling Fan with surge protection ■ Key: (a.b) $ 39.95 

JE614 Numeric/Aux. Keypad -23 accessible functions ■ Key: (b). ... $ 49.95 

EAEC-1 Expanded Apple Enclosure Case only ■ Key: (a) $ 59.95 

KHP4007 Switching Power Supply • Key: (a) $ 59.95 

KB-A68 68-Key Apple Keyboard only ■ Key: (a) $ 79.95 

MON-12G !2"Green Monitor with swivel stand ■ Key: (a. b&//c) $ 79.95 

JE520AP Voice Synthesizer - Plug-in. User Ready ■ Key: (a.b) $11 9.95 

KB-EA1 Apple Keyboard and Case ■ Key: (a) $1 34.95 

PM1200A Prometheus Internal Modem - 2 cards • Key: (a.b) $299.95 

PM1200M Prometheus Macintosh Ext. Modem • Key: (Macintosh, $369.95 



General Application rawer Supplies 



Power/Mate Corp. REGULATED POWER SUPPLY 

•Input: 105-1 25/21 0-250VAC @ 47-63Hz -Line regulation: 
±0.05% ■ Three mounting surfaces • Overvoltage protection • UL 
recognized • CSA certified 

Part No. Output Size Weight Price 




4* 



EMA5/6B 

EMA5/6C 



5V@3A/6V@2.5A 4VLx4"Wx2lVH 
5V@6A/6V@5A 5VLx4VWx2ft"H 



2lbs. 
4lbs. 



S29.95 
S39.95 



KEPCO/TDK 4-OUTPUT SWITCHING POWER SUPPLY 

• Ideal for disk drive needs of CRT terminals, microcomputers and 
video games • Input: 115/230VAC. 50760Hz • Output: +5V @ 5A. 
+ 12V @ 1.8 A. +12V @ 2A. -12 V @ 0.5 A • UL recognized ■ CSA 
certified • Size: 7WLx 6-3/16"W x 1%"H • Weight: 2 lbs. 

MRM 174KF $49.95 



4-CHANNEL SWITCHING POWER SUPPLY 

■ Microprocessor, mini-computer, terminal, medical equipment and 
process control applications- Input: 90-130VAC. 47-440Hz • Out- 
put: +5VDC @ 5A. -5VDC @ 1A; +12VDC @ 1A. -12VDC @ 1A 
• Line regulations: ±-0.2% • Ripple: 30mV p-p ■ Load regulation: 
±1% • Overcurrent protection ■ Adj: 5V main output ±10% • Size: 
6WL x 1%"W x 4-15/16"H • Weight: 1 Vi lbs. 

FCS-604A $69.95 



S 1 Minimum Order - US. Funds Only CA Residents: Add 6 V> % Sales Ta x Spec Sheets- 30« each 

Shipping: Add 5% plusSLSO Insurance Send $1 Postage for FH£E 1 985 JamecoCatolog Prices Subject to Change 

Send stamped, sett-addressed envelope to receive a Monthly Seles Flyer ■ ™ 




"«— ■' 



ameco 

1355 SHOREWAY ROAD, BELMONT, CA 94002 
7/85 PHONE ORDERS WELCOME - (415) 592-8097 - Telex: 1 76043 




ELECTRONICS l 




IBM® Accessories 



* Cables *— -^ 

* Cables !^jp. 

8-Foot Parallel Printer Cable 

IBM-8PC (OB25 Male toCentionica36-pln Male) $19.95 

6-F6ot Serial Printer/Modem Cable 

MMS-2206 (DB2SMaletoD82SM»le, $14.95 

MFS-2206 (OB25M«lelo DB25 Female) $15.25 

5-Foot Keyboard Extension Cable for 
IBM-PC and XT Computers 

IBM-KEC $9.95 

MEMORY EXPANSION KITS 

IBM PC, PC XT and Compatibles 

The IBM64K Kil will Increase memory in 64K byte increments. The Kil issimple 
lo install - just insert the 9 - 64K RAM chips irt the provided sockets and set 
the 2 groups ot switches Conversion documentalion included 

IBM64K (Nine 200ns 64K RAMs) $19.95 

IBM PC AT 

Each kit comes complete wilh nine 126K dynamic RAMs and documentalion 
lor conversion 

IBM128K (Nine 250ns 128K RAMs). . . . $133.95 

Lf> S<k IBM PCXT Equivalent 
* k 130 Watt Power Supply 
UPGRADE YOUR PC! 

• Input: 1 10V@ 60Hz ■ Output: +5VDC @ 15A, -5VDC <§ 
0.5A. + 1 2 VDC @ 4.2 A. - 1 2 VDC <§ 0.5 A ■ Plug compatible 
connectors ■ Fits into IBM PC • Weight: 6 lbs. 

IBM-PS $159.95 




Prometheus Modems 

The ProModem 1200B/BS is a 1200/300 baud modem 
card which plugs into IBM PC and XT. Provides a third 
serial Comport. Two versions available: 1200B (without 
software) and 1200BS (with software). The PM1200BS 
is supplied with powerful MITE communications software 
from Mycroft labs. 

PM1200B (without Software) $239.95 

PM1200BS (with MITE Software) $274.95 



legible'- DISK DRIVES 




Documentation 
Included 

RFD480 (Remex 5'V DS full-ht.) $ 99.95 

FD55B (Teac 5V DS half-ht.) $139.95 

SA455 (Shugart 5V DS half-ht.). . . . $139.95 

TM100-2 (Tandon 5 V DS full-ht.) $1 59.95 

5V DISK DRIVE ENCLOSURES 

Complete with power supply, switch, power 
cord, fuseholder and connectors 

DDE-1 FH (Houses 1 full-ht 5 '4 "drive) $69.95 

DDE-2HH (Houses2 !4-M. 5V drives) $79.95 



General Application Keyboards 



Mitsumi 54-Key 
Unencoded 
All-Purpose 
Keyboard > 



II 



• SPST keyswitches ■ 20 pin ribbon cable connection 

• Low profile keys ■ Features: cursor controls, control, 
caps (lock), function, enter and shift keys ■ Color (key- 
caps): grey • Weight: 1 lb. * Pinout incl. * Size: 13VL x 
4VWx VH 

KB54. $14.95 



7d-Km, JKQHBBCJ 




MB 












rf. m i i i-mVi'i'i'm-i- i 






Cherry r mimm ill l ill l 






K^yhnard ILjjJ ' '*' ! M ' llrjii^ 









• 7-bit parallel ASCII ■ Full Upper Case, Full Lower Case 
except I, m, n, o and p. • Cursor keypad ■ SPST mechani- 
cal keyswitches • 26-pin header connector • Color: white 
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SOFTWARE REVIEW 



An outline 

processor 

that has 

its own 

programming 
language 



by William Hershey 



William Hershey is a systems 

engineer with a B.S. in engineering 

from Princeton and an M.A. in 

computer and communication 

sciences from the University of 

Michigan. He is also an instructor 

in computer literacy at the 

University of Maryland's University 

College. You can contact him at 

MITRE Corp., 1820 Dolly 

Madison Blvd.. Mclean, VA 

22102. 



MaxThink 



Many software developers are 
entering the field of "idea pro- 
cessing," a name that is often 
too presumptuous for their products' capa- 
bilities. MaxThink from MaxThink Inc. is a 
well-conceived program for the IBM PC that 
begins to live up to the term. Of course, pro- 
grams do not process ideas; people do. But 
MaxThink has the proper tools to help you 
process your ideas and a well-written 
manual that goes beyond the mechanics of 
the program. The manual is so good that 
you don't even need the program to apply 
many of its thinking and writing techniques. 
MaxThink's developers obviously thought 
a great deal about how people organize 
thoughts. 

MaxThink is an outline processor similar 
to Thinklknk and the outlining features in 
Framework (see references 1 to 3). In this 
review I'll focus on MaxThink and use Think- 
Iknk and Framework as points of reference. 
Like its predecessors, MaxThink can handle 
information in the form of lists, outlines, and 
paragraphs of text, but the underlying struc- 
ture is the outline. 

Most thought processors include three 
types of commands: viewing commands 
that let you look alternately at the outline's 
various levels of detail; moving, copying, 
and sorting commands for restructuring the 
outline; and editing commands for enter- 
ing and changing text. Of lesser importance 
are commands for formatting the printed 
outline and handling files. 

MaxThink handles an outline as a hier- 
archy of lists, showing only one list on the 
screen at a time. Moving from one place to 
another in the outline is easy. The biggest 
differences between MaxThink and the 
Framework and Thinkl&nk programs are in 
the restructuring commands. Framework's 
commands for restructuring are consistent 
and easy to use. Thinkfenk's are less so. 
MaxThink best addresses the restructuring 
of outlines by simplifying common se- 
quences of Move commands and offering 
several ways of executing them. 



Unfortunately, cursor movement in Max- 
Think's editor is sluggish. And you must ac- 
cess editing commands through an edit 
menu, which might seem backward to peo- 
ple who are used to conventional word- 
processing programs. The program's for- 
matting and file-handling commands are 
better than Thinkfcnk's but not as power- 
ful as Framework's. You might want to use 
MaxThink to produce a first draft, then 
transfer the text of your draft into your 
favorite word processor for polishing. 

An especially powerful feature in Max- 
Think is its Thought Processing Language 
(TPL) that lets you write executable pro- 
grams for handling outlines. (Framework has 
a programming language, but Thinklknk 
does not.) 

MaxThink is a versatile tool. The manual 
illustrates progressive uses of the program 
through three stages of thinking and writing. 
In the early "perception" stage of thinking 
about a subject, you can use list structures 
to collect facts, possible concepts, and ten- 
tative approaches. At the second "process- 
ing" stage you use the outline structure to 
organize, categorize, and analyze the infor- 
mation, showing hierarchical relationships 
between the lists and their component units 
of information. In the final "integration" 
stage you fill in the structure with para- 
graphs of text to develop your insights and 
solutions into a sequential, coherent, 
polished presentation. 

Following the above prescription is easier 
said than done. However, I have found that 
MaxThink holds a slight edge over Frame- 
work and a clear advantage over Thinkfcnk 
throughout the stages of a writing project. 
Also, at $59.95 MaxThink is priced far below 
what you would expect to pay for its capa- 
bilities. 

Outlines 

To get a better idea of MaxThink, you have 
to examine how it works. MaxThink com- 
mands, prompts, and messages appear on 

(continued) 



IULY 1985 -BYTE 279 



REVIEW: MAXTHINK 



the screen's bottom four lines. Your 
document occupies the rest of the 
screen. MaxThink encourages you to 
develop an outline as a hierarchy of 
lists. Each item in a list is called a 
"topic" and MaxThink numbers them 
sequentially for you. The screen dis- 
plays a single "parent" topic at the top 
and an indented list of its direct 
descendants below. You use the up- 
and down-arrow keys to move a selec- 
tion arrow from one topic to another. 
Highlighted or underlined topic 
numbers indicate the existence of 
deeper levels, as do Thinkfenk's plus 
signs or Framework's triangular flags. 
By pressing the right-arrow key you 
can zoom in on a selected topic with 
its subtopics. Conversely, the left- 
arrow key takes you to the outline's 
next higher level. Again a parent topic 
will appear at the top of the screen 
followed by an indented list of its 
topics. At the highest level, the "root" 
topic (i.e., the outline's title) appears. 



MaxThink's display of a list hierarchy 
is slightly different from the methods 
used in Thinkfenk and Framework. 
These programs maintain an outline 
view of your headings (topics) on the 
screen and let you expand any head- 
ing in the outline to any deeper level. 
(Framework also offers a frame-based 
view of the document's hierarchy.) 
Like MaxThink, the other programs let 
you view any outline level as a list of 
headings, but you might need several 
steps to collapse or expand parts of 
the outline to show the desired list 
without subheadings. MaxThink main- 
tains the list format automatically. An 
improved version of MaxThink. which 
the publisher says will be available by 
the time you read this, will use a func- 
tion key to toggle between list and 
outline views of a document. 

MaxThink offers you a great deal of 
flexibility in the ways you can use 
topics. A topic can be one word or 
several lines long. When you reach 



2 Overview* 1 

i MaxThink is an outline processor si Hilar to TlrinkTank and the 
I Haxlhink, FraHework and TMnklank have Minor operational differences 
3 Unfortunately, Haxlhink's editor is sluggish, find use of the edit 

*■ 4 An especially powerful feature in Haxlhink is its Thought Processing 
5 MaxThink is a versatile tool. The Manual illustrates progressive 



the end of a line, the text wraps to the 
next line as it would in most word pro- 
cessors. The second and succeeding 
lines become the "annotation." 

You can thus format a topic either 
as a section heading or simply as the 
first line of a paragraph. I've found this 
flexibility especially helpful in the in- 
tegration stage when I'm transforming 
an outline to a series of paragraphs. 
ThinkTank and Framework maintain 
outline headings and the paragraphs 
beneath them as independent enti- 
ties. With these programs it is more 
awkward to retain some headings to 
serve as formal section headings and 
replace others with paragraphs. 

The F2 function key toggles be- 
tween two views of a given list of 
topics. You can look at the topics 
alone, each of which could be a sec- 
tion heading or the first line of a 
paragraph (see photo 1). The alternate 
view shows the annotations along 
with the topics, revealing all your 
paragraphs (see photo 2). This feature 
lets you move easily within your docu- 
ment and can be a handy editing tool. 
For example, in writing this review I 
replaced the first several topics in my 
initial outline with paragraphs and 
pressed F2 to get an overview. The 
topic-only view revealed that I had 
begun five out of the first six para- 
graphs with the name Matfltiink. I 
quickly made some adjustments to 
add variety. 



Cora Delete Edit Files Get Help Insert 
Juip mvo Options Put Quit TPL Setjutrker Undo 



Metro of Bra ins tow* cowtands 
HEAD PflTH: 0.2.4 



7960 Bytes fflftlHINX: hH.mx 



Photo I : A sample list of topics in MatYkink. A topic can be a heading or the 
first line of a paragraph. \n this case topic 2 is a section heading and its subtopics (2.1. 
2.2, etc.) are the first lines of paragraphs. The word HEAD at the bottom left corner of 
the screen indicates that only the first lines of topics are displayed. The F2 key toggles 
between this display and the one in photo 2 showing full paragraphs. Highlighted topic 
numbers indicate that subtopics exist. At the bottom of the screen is MaiVhink's main 
menu. Other information at the bottom includes the amount of memory remaining, the 
filename, and the "path" designation for locating the topic targeted by the topic-selection 
arrow. 



Brainstorming 

The Move command is fundamental 
in word processing. Without it you 
might as well go back to scissors and 
tape. The ability to move the elements 
in a list or an outline is perhaps even 
more important than moving sen- 
tences or paragraphs in a text docu- 
ment. If you are really processing 
ideas, you have to be free to experi- 
ment with different ways of relating 
them to each other. Framework's 
Move command is easy to use. Think- 
l&nk's is awkward except in the Macin- 
tosh version. MaxThink goes beyond 
conventional Move operations. In 
MaxThink you select the Brainstorm 
option .in the main menu. This calls 
the "structure editor" into action. 



280 BYTE • JULY 1985 



REVIEW: MAXTHINK 



The structure editor is merely a 
handy collection of commands for 
putting a list in a new order or for 
moving groups of topics from one 
level in your outline to another. These 
commands thus fall into two classes: 
ones that change the order of your 
topics in a list and ones that change 
the hierarchy. 

The commands that change the or- 
der of topics include Prioritize, Ran- 
domize, and Sort. Prioritize inserts a 
separator line of pluses and the word 
PRIORITIZE at the top of your list. 
You then point to the topics with the 
cursor and press the Enter key to 
move them, one by one, from below 
the marker to above the marker. 
When you finish, the separator disap- 
pears. Randomize simply puts your 
list in a random order to give you a 
fresh perspective on the topics. The 
Sort command sorts the topics in your 
list in ascending or descending order, 
starting at the column you specify. 
Because you can specify the sort col- 
umn and sort-string length, you could 
impose a tabular structure on a list of 
topics and sort on any column or field 
as though the list were a mini-data- 
base. 

Commands that affect the hierarchy 
of topics include Binsort, Divide, Join, 
Fence, Categorize, and Levelize. Bin- 
sort is just a manual sort. It lets you 
group topics into higher-level bin 
topics. You simply enter a bin number 
for each of the topics to be moved 
(see photo 3). 

The Divide command splits a topic 
into new topics for each word, line, 
sentence, or paragraph according to 
your instructions. The Join command 
combines multiple topics into single 
ones by lines or words. 

The Fence command adds fences or 
boundaries to a list that is already in 
cojrect order. It provides an alter- 
native to Binsort. After you insert hori- 
zontal fence separators into your list, 
each with a label, you can use the 
Categorize command to convert the 
fences to topics, with the other topics 
in the list subordinate to them. The 
Levelize command can reverse the ef- 
fect of Binsort or Categorize by con- 

[continued] 



ranks highest on the Host inportant features.4 

-* 4 An especially pe»erful feature in Hax hink is its Thought Processing 
Language (TPL) that enables gou to wite executable program for 
handling outlines,! (FraHe»ork has a programing language, but 
Thinklank does not.) Using TPL, gou can custoHize the prograit . 
aenus for specific applications, create text tejplates, and design 
advice systeas and coHputer-aided instruction (Cfll) prograis.i 

5 faxlhink is a versatile tool, The Manual illustrates progressive 
uses of the progras through three stages of thinking and yriting. 
In the earls "perception" stage of thinking about a subject, gou 
can use list structures to collect facts, possible concepts and 
tentative approaches, At tlw second "processing" staae gou use 
the outline structure to organize, categorize and analyze m 
indorsation, stowing hierarchical relationships anong the lists 
and their conponent units of infomtion. In the final 
"integration 8 stage gou fill in the structure with paragraphs of 
text to develop your ideas, insights and solutions into a 



Annotate Delete Find Get Insert Help 
fetype. Put Replace Single.comt Undo 
Mm to «in-*™ AIli . UA m2 Bytes mmm \ atLnax 



Photo 2: A view of Maffhink paragraphs. Each contains a topic, or first line, followed by 
an annotation, which in this case is the remainder of the paragraph. This display was 
obtained by pressing function key F2. Also note that the edit mode has been selected from 
the main menu. The edit menu appears at the bottom, and a cumbersome \nsert command is 
necessary before you can enter text at the cursor position. 



IILE* 

1 Change Order* 

2 Change Hierarchy* 

4 Hain* 

5 Binsort* 

6 Categorize* 

7 Mvide* 

8 Fence* 

9 Help* 
10 Join* 

ii Levelize* 

IE Prioritize* 

13 Random ze* 

14 Sort* 

15 Tag* 

16 lintag* 



MB: 1§ 

Please enter path for Binsort 

PATH: 0.5 



38836 Bytes HAXIHM: connands 



Photo 3: Binsort is one of the Brainstorm commands that make it easy to restructure 
Maflhink outlines. Binsorting is the manual process of assigning topics to groups or bins. 
You designate any number of bin topics (in this case two), and Mafthink inserts the Binsort 
separator line beneath them. You then point to each of the other topics and type the number 
of the bin where you want to put it as a subtopic. You could accomplish the same result 
with the Move command but not as quickly. 



IULY 1985 -BYTE 281 



REVIEW: MAXTHINK 



AT A GLANCE 



Name 

MaxThink 

Type 

Outline processor 

Manufacturer 

MaxThink Inc. 

230 Crocker Ave 

Piedmont, CA 94610 

(800) 227-1590 

In California, (800) 642-2406 

Format 

One 5 1 /4-inch floppy disk 

Computer 

IBM PC (or compatible) with 256K bytes, 

one drive, PC-DOS 2.0 

(Macintosh and CP/M versions available 

soon) 

Features 

Outlining, organizing, text editing, 
programming (Thought Processing 
Language), advice systems 

Documentation 

Tutorial, reference guide, programming 
guide, thinking techniques, writing 
techniques 

Price 

$59.95 

Audience 

Writers and others who need to plan and 
organize ideas 

Comments 

The program has a cumbersome editor but 
is otherwise very well thought out with a 
good manual and a great price 



verting subtopics into topics. 

MaxThink also has the more con- 
ventional Move, Copy, and Delete 
commands, and even an Undo com- 
mand. The Brainstorm commands, 
however, greatly simplify restructuring 
of lists and outlines. 

Editing, Formatting, 
and File Handling 

The text editor is MaxThink's weakest 
component. It uses the cursor, Delete, 
and backspace keys conventionally 
and offers both insert and overtype 
modes. It executes several functions 
(like block copy and move) better than 
the Thinklknk editor but does not 
come close to the editor in Frame- 
work. The version I reviewed lacked 
niceties such as tabs and word dele- 
tion. Also, it is slow. I was not able to 
outtype the MaxThink editor, but 
autorepeated cursor movement with 
the arrow keys was very slow in long 
passages of text. I suppose the key is 
to keep your paragraphs small and to 
avoid putting too many of them 
beneath a topic. Neil Larson of Max- 
Think Inc. advises not to scroll 
through paragraphs but to jump from 
one to the next at the list level. He 
claims it is easier to keep track of your 
thoughts this way. Because of this 
slowness, you must also be careful 
when deleting characters; it is easy to 
go beyond the part you wish to 
delete. For deleting large blocks of 
text, use the Delete command in the 
edit menu. 

If you are accustomed to WordStar 
or other word processors that put you 
directly into edit mode and expect 
control commands for most other 
operations, the MaxThink edit menu 
(at the bottom of photo 2) will seem 
backward to you. From the main 
menu, it takes two steps to begin 
editing: Edit, which invokes the menu, 
and Insert, which lets you type. You 
must return to the menu (with Esc) to 
perform block operations or Find/ 
Replace commands. Deleted blocks 
go into a buffer, and you can copy 
them to other parts of your docu- 
ment. The Put command copies 
blocks from the buffer to the docu- 
ment. The Get command copies a 



block into the buffer, as Delete does, 
but leaves the block intact in your 
document. The Put command will 
also work from the main menu. 

The editor does not format your 
text on the screen as it will appear on 
paper, but the program does give you 
control over margin settings and other 
parameters. You can view your outline 
on the screen before printing if you 
wish. 

The Format command offers 22 for- 
mat settings for controlling the format 
of a printed document. Many of these, 
such as indentation settings, are 
specific to outlines. You can even set 
the multilevel numbering scheme for 
the topics in your outline to any com- 
bination of upper- and lowercase 
Roman numerals, Arabic numerals, 
and upper- and lowercase letters. One 
option lets you save a document in a 
format that WordStar can read. 

In addition to standard commands 
for printing, loading, and saving out- 
line files, MaxThink gives you access 
to five DOS-like commands for copy- 
ing, erasing, and renaming files, and 
for setting the system date and time. 

Thought Processing 
Language 

Potentially the most interesting fea- 
ture of MaxThink is its programmabili- 
ty via the Thought Processing Lan- 
guage. TPL programs can access the 
same commands that are in the Max- 
Think menus. When put into the for- 
mat required for TPL, the commands 
are said to be in MaxMode format. A 
program of TPL commands is an out- 
line, and you can switch easily be- 
tween your program outline and your 
text outline while editing. 

It is possible to specify any position 
within an outline by using what Max- 
Think calls a "path." For example, the 
path for the second subtopic of the 
third topic of an outline would be 
0.3.2. Most spreadsheet programs 
give you the alternatives of pointing 
to a cell with the cursor or specifying 
that cell's row and column coor- 
dinates as a letter and a number. 
Similarly, MaxThink provides the path 
specification as an alternative to mov- 

[continued) 



282 BYTE • JULY I985 




I 




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IULY 1985 



1 Y T E 283 



REVIEW: MAXTHINK 



\n a comparison 
against two other 
popular outline 
processors, MajcThink 
ranks highest on the 
most important features. 



ing the selection arrow in an outline. 
TPL, like formulas in spreadsheets, 
uses the path to reference a given 
topic in an outline. 

Each topic of a program outline can 
be a MatfThink command, a comment 
line, a blank line, data, or a TPL direc- 
tive. Some directives affect the se- 
quence of operations, the construc- 
tion of menus, and statement branch- 
ing. Others affect messages displayed, 
help screens, movement of data be- 
tween the text and program outlines, 
and program execution. TPL has near- 
ly 30 directives. The TPL menu that 
is accessible from Ma^hink's main 
menu provides commands for creat- 
ing, loading, running, and testing TPL 
programs. 

1 have written only a few simple TPL 
programs, so I can't claim to know 
how to take advantage of all of TPLs 
features. One thing is clear, however: 
it is a macro language, not a full pro- 
gramming language. The manual says 
that you can program MaxThink to 
provide advice, information, or 
customized help for applications that 
require listing and outlining capabili- 



ties. MatfThink can be programmed to 
branch through an outline on the 
basis of user responses, so the 
manual claims you could use TPL to 
develop CAI (computer-aided instruc- 
tion) applications and portions of ex- 
pert systems. These claims are a bit 
overblown. TPLs menu-handling com- 
mands are nice, but the language has 
no arithmetic capabilities, and tests 
for conditional branching are limited 
to simple string and path matching. 
1 wrote a program to give a multiple- 
choice test, but 1 could not use TPL 
to add up the number of correct 
responses. 

Documentation and Support 

The MatfThink manual is undergoing 
extensive revisions even as I type, so 
the version you see will almost cer- 
tainly be different from the one 1 have 
been using. However, I can report that 
the manual 1 saw was well written and 
makes learning the program easy. 
Mine came in a loose-leaf binder with 
attractive artwork. The publisher says 
that the final format will be a paper- 
back book. 

The documentation includes tho- 
rough introductory, tutorial, and ref- 
erence sections and a programming 
guide for TPL. The program also in- 
corporates an on-line help feature 
that uses a 60K-byte help file. You 
might find the supplementary sec- 
tions on writing and thinking most 
valuable of all. These provide some 
good techniques for collecting, orga- 
nizing, and conveying information. 

Conclusion 

l^ble 1 ranks Ma^hink against the 
two other popular outline processors. 



T^ble 1 : Ratings of three outline processors and the convenience of their outline- 
processing commands. The highest rating is a 1; the lowest is a 3. 




MaxThink 


Framework ThinkTank 


Summary Feature 






Restructuring 
Viewing 
Editing 
Formatting 
Manipulating files 


1 
1 
3 
2 
2 


2 3 
2 3 
1 2 
1 3 
1 3 



The five summary features of the pro- 
grams appear in order of their impor- 
tance for idea processing, so Max- 
Think ranks highest on the most im- 
portant features. 

Along with the manual, the program 
itself is currently undergoing improve- 
ments. MatfThink keeps your entire 
outline in memory, and the current 
limit is about 38 K bytes. The publisher 
is removing that limit to let your out- 
line occupy as much memory as is 
available in your machine. 

I had some anxious moments when 
Ma^hink garbled the directory of the 
disk l was using to save this article. In 
fact, it also garbled my backup disk. 
The DOS CHKDSK utility saved me 
from retyping the whole article. The 
programmer at MaxThink said I had 
experienced a file-allocation problem 
related to the current limitation on 
memory. Another problem was that 
the program sometimes chopped off 
carriage returns at the ends of para- 
graphs during Load operations. A fix 
is in the works, but l advise you to be 
cautious with this program until its 
record is proven. Large files seem to 
cause the majority of problems right 
now. 

MatfThink's copy-protection scheme 
has undergone several changes. The 
publisher plans to provide a version 
that can be transferred onto a hard 
disk and used directly, so it won't be 
necessary for you to have the master 
floppy disk handy. 

Aside from the trauma of nearly los- 
ing this review, the limitations of the 
editor, and the minor inconvenience 
of the copy-protection scheme, I am 
enthusiastic about MaxThink. The 
publisher seems eager to provide a 
quality product and the support to go 
with it. The price of Ma^hink is one 
indication of his sincerity; for $59.95 
you can't go wrong. ■ 



REFERENCES 

1. Hershey, William R. 'ThinkTank." BYTE, 
May 1984, page 189. 

2. Hershey. William R. "Idea Processors." 
BYTE, June 1985. page 337. 

3. ladmicek, Rik, John Markoff. and Ezra 
Shapiro. "Framework." BYTE. August 1984, 
page 121. 



284 BYTE • JULY 1985 



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286 BYTE • JULY 1985 




The Mark XII 

incorporates 

interesting 

features, yet 

lacks full 



Hayes 



compatibility 



by George V. Kinal 



HARDWARE REVIEW 

The Anchor Automation 
Signalman Mark XII Modem 



George V. Kinal (636 South 
Carolina Ave.. Washington. DC 

20003) is a communications 
systems engineer specializing in 

satellite data communications. 



If imitation is the sincerest form of flat- 
tery, Anchor Automation's Signalman 
Mark II modem is a compliment to the 
Hayes Smartmodem 1200. But, like many 
imitators, this product isn't entirely faithful 
to the original. 

The Anchor Mark XII supports the 300- 
bps Bell 103 mode and the full-duplex 
1200-bps Bell 212 mode. It operates in 
originate and answer modes. It can auto- 
answer an incoming telephone call and will 
auto-dial in either pulse or tone modes. The 
Mark XII has no switches except on/off; all 
programming is through the RS-2 32C inter- 
face. It adjusts its mode and data transmis- 
sion rate to match that of an incoming caller 
(modem), or you can set the data rate 
desired on an outgoing (originated) call. 

The modem has a gray plastic case. 6 by 
9 by I inches. It uses an external power 
supply and a plug-in (R) 1 1) telephone cable. 
Unlike most other modems, which have a 
female DB-2 5 connector for the RS-2 32 C 
connection, the Anchor has a 1-foot ribbon 
cable, on the end of which is a male DB-2 5 
connector. You can plug this connector 
directly into the female DB-2 5 that most 
computers have, except the IBM PC. (You 
can purchase more recent versions of the 
Mark XII with either a male or a female 
connector.) 

The Mark XII has a jack for your tele- 
phone so you don't need to buy a two-jack 
adapter if you want the modem and the 
phone on the same line. Thus, you might 
be able to save both the cost of an RS-2 3 2 C 
cable and the adapter, which would be re- 
quired with most other modems. The 
modem consumes less than I watt of elec- 
trical power and stays cool. 

Compatibility 

The Mark XII is advertised as a Hayes 
Smartmodem 1200 work-alike. As I previ- 
ously mentioned, it comes with the cables 
and two RJ11 telephone jacks, unlike the 
Hayes. The Anchor has a few extra features 
not available on the Hayes, but it also lacks 



some of the Smartmodem's features. 

The Mark XII recognizes all of its com- 
mands in upper- or lowercase; the Hayes 
must have the initial AT in uppercase. More 
significant, the Mark XII recognizes the dial 
tone and most busy signals and sends ap- 
propriate messages back to your computer. 
This is an advantage with certain commu- 
nications software packages and so-called 
macros. 

The disadvantages are that the Mark XII 
has fewer LEDs (light-emitting diodes) on 
the panel, and no DIP (dual in-line package) 
switches. The only one of the LEDs that I 
miss is OH (off hook). Both products have 
the HS (high speed) and CD (carrier detect) 
indicators. Where the Hayes has separate 
lights for send and receive data, the Mark 
XII uses one for both (SD/RD). 

Hayes has 17 software-loadable registers, 
and Anchor has only the first 6. For exam- 
ple, in the Hayes you can change the dura- 
tion and spacing of the touch tones. In the 
Mark XII, these parameters are preset to 
values like those to which the Hayes 
defaults. 

The Mark XII will not produce dial tones 
for the * or # buttons, which are not really 
necessary for public telephone networks. 
Anchor apparently has made design 
choices in deleting some of the Smart- 
modem's features, but most users will not 
notice the omissions. 

One rather significant technical difference 
might make the Mark XII unsuitable for 
some users. The modem will not pass on 
the so-called Break signal in 1200-bps 
operation, only at 300. The Break is not an 
ASCII (American Standard Code for Infor- 
mation Interchange) character. Instead, it is 
a sustained (75 to 300 milliseconds) trans- 
mission of the Space signal. (When not 
sending specific ASCII characters, the inter- 
face and modem are sending the Mark 
signal.) 

Many mainframe computers use the 
Break as an indication to interrupt whatever 

[continued) 



JULY 1985 -BYTE 287 



REVIEW: MODEM 



AT A GLANCE 



Name 

Anchor Automation Signalman Mark XII 
Modem 

Type 

300/1200-bps modem for data 
communications (Bell 103 and 212 
standard) 

Manufacturer 

Anchor Automation Inc. 
6913 Valjean Ave. 
Van Nuys, CA 91406 
(818) 997-7758 

Size 

6 by 9 by 1 inches 

Weight 

13 ounces 

Power Requirements 

12-volt DC, 60 mA, from 110-volt AC 
adapter supplied 

Necessary Hardware 

Any computer or terminal with 
asynchronous serial (RS-232C) interface 

Necessary Software 

Dumb terminal firmware or software 
sufficient, communications software with 
macros desirable 

Features 

Auto-answer, auto-dial smart modem (all 
functions commanded via data interface); 
low power consumption, two-year warranty 

Documentation 

29-page manual, 5 by 8 1 /2 inches 

Price 

$399 



is going on. For example, you might 
temporarily halt transmission of a 
long file to save the already received 
portion to disk. Some computer sys- 
tems have been modified to respond 
to XOFF (usually a Control-S). The 
remote database/network services all 
accept XOFF, as do almost all micro- 
computer bulletin boards. 

The Mark XII will respond to com- 
mands of any parity but will not send 
back result codes with 8 bits and no 
parity (8Nl). This has led some peo- 
ple to believe that the modem cannot 
handle 8-bit data, which is not the 
case. 

Finally, the Hayes has a speaker so 
you can hear what is going on; the 
Mark XII does not. You can check on 
the results of a dial attempt by pick- 
ing up the telephone handset (with 
pulse dialing, you must wait until the 
dialing sequence is finished). 

User Experiences 

I have tested the Mark XII on the 
Apple II and lie with a wide variety 
of serial interface cards. I also sub- 
stituted it for a Hayes Smartmodem 
1 200 on an IBM PC Software used in- 
cluded ASCII Express-Professional, 
Ttansend II, MODEM7-a public- 
domain program, a homebrew pro- 
gram called COMTERM based on the 
TAFT program (see TAFT: Terminal 
Apple with File Transfer" by Tom 
Gabriele, June 1982 BYTE, page 410), 
BLAST on the Apple and the PC, and 
PC-Tklk. The modem performed satis- 
factorily and was functionally identical 
to the Hayes. 

Surprisingly, 300-bps operation was 
less than perfect. When I called a local 
bulletin board, the Mark XII showed 
an occasional tendency to garble the 
received data. This was apparently 
caused by its inability to tolerate 
signals that were stronger than nor- 
mal. If you take the telephone off the 
hook during the session, the garbling 
is almost completely eliminated. 
Other owners of the Mark XII re- 
ported the same problem when mak- 
ing a local call. The people at Anchor 
insist that a firmware change repairs 
this problem, but a replacement 
PROM (programmable read-only 



memory) they sent failed to cure it. 

A colleague tested the Mark XII 
using Hayes Smartcom II software on 
the IBM PC (certainly an acid test of 
the claim to Hayes compatibility). 
Again, 1200-bps operation was flaw- 
less. However, at 300 bps, in addition 
to the garble problem, the Anchor did 
not always reliably hang up upon 
completion of a session. 

Another problem is that if the data 
carrier is suddenly dropped (the other 
end hangs up, for example), the 
modem won't respond to your com- 
mands. You can restore function only 
by turning the power off momentari- 
ly. This flaw makes the current version 
of the Mark XII unsuitable for auto- 
answer applications such as bulletin 
boards. 

The biggest problem with the Mark 
XII seems to be the difficulty in get- 
ting it operating. The interface-card 
manual the software manual and the 
modem manual each give different 
connection instructions. The typical 
RS-232C interface does not expect to 
receive data until the carrier detect is 
high. But the modem manual says 
that when you send the AT command 
to the modem, you should see the 
response OK. Without carrier detect, 
you see nothing and assume that the 
new modem isn't working. Even 
worse, some interface cards for the 
Apple present a DCE instead of the 
DTE interface convention, so a cross- 
over cable or null modem is required. 
But the standard null modem does 
not strap the carrier detect high. 
These difficulties are not the fault of 
the modem design but can be frus- 
trating. 

Documentation 

As for documentation, the Mark XII 
manual is no match for the thorough 
Hayes manual. It has barely enough 
information to install and use the 
product. However, producers of 
modems that might be used with 
many different computers, terminals, 
and interface cards are in a situation 
similar to that faced by printer manu- 
facturers a few years ago. It is impossi- 
ble to provide enough information in 

[continued] 



288 BYTE • JULY 1985 



Inquiry 326 — ♦ 










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REVIEW: MODEM 



The Anchor's low 
power-consumption 
design contributes to 
long-term reliability. 



a short manual to cover all the possi- 
bilities. 

A key phrase appears in the manual: 
"Minimum to operate are pins 7, 2, 
and 3." In other words, the modem is 
perfectly happy with only these three 
wires of the RS-232C interface con- 
nected. But in most cases, the inter- 
face (computer) probably will not 
work. Most people are able to get the 
Hayes working, perhaps by trial and 
error, because of its Force DTR true 
and Force CD true switches. Anchor 
should do what Epson and Okidata 
did: print a separate booklet showing 
the interface requirements for all 
popular computers and interface 
cards. 

Conclusions 

The Mark XII's operation is good at 
1200 bps, except for the firmware's in- 
termittent refusal to reset properly. A 
signal-level sensitivity problem occurs 
at 300 bps. Since the modem comes 
with a two-year warranty, perhaps 
these flaws will be corrected by the 
manufacturer in due course. 

For about 90 percent of the poten- 
tial applications, the Mark XII's lack 
of LEDs, DIP switches, and registers 
doesn't matter. The provision of two 
Rill jacks and the male DB-2 5 on 1 
foot of cable can save the customer 
a few more dollars. Also, the Anchor's 
low power-consumption design 
should contribute to long-term reli- 
ability. 

If you need RJ12/13 capability or the 
flexibility that the additional registers 
in the Hayes give you (for example, 
the ability to force the modem to 
transmit in the absence of received 
carrier), the Anchor is not for you. 
And before you consider the Mark 
XII, make sure that you can get along 
without the Break capability. ■ 



290 BYTE • JULY 1985 



Inquiry 342 



". . . it is impossible to lead in the 
development of new technology 
when your entire system design 
is dedicated to following;' 



[This is one of a series of design philosophy 
discussions with Rod Coleman, President of 
Stride M/cra™ fonneriy Sage Computer\ 



RC: In the rush to gain instant 
marketshare, the concept of good 
microcomputer system design 
has been forgotten by many man- 




ufacturers. The worst abuses are 
among those who think that sys- 
tem design is deciding what color 
to paint your PC clone. 

Q: So you're refening to the 
compatibles? 

RC: They're the worst offenders, 
but lack of attention to system 
design is present at all levels. The 
IBM™ PC itself, as first designed 
and introduced in 1981. was a failure. 
They sold relatively few of their 
original cassette-based systems. 
It was the floppy diskette option 



that made the product more rea- 
sonable and allowed the PC to 
dominate the market 

Likewise, the success of the 
hard disk model is more a credit 
to the innovators and second- 
source vendors who first provided 
Winchester disk add-ons. The XT is 
a tribute to independent ingenuity, 
not any system design work by IBM 
in Boca Raton. 

Of course, the pure imitators 
are the worst Some companies 
would have you believe that system 
design is determining which ver- 
sion of Apple or IBM to clone. The 
perversion here is that it is impos- 
sible to lead in the development 
of new technology when your entire 
system design is dedicated to 
following. 

Q: How would you change that? 

RC: Current practices aside, the 
correct way to approach design is 
to first define the problem or mar- 
ket need. Standards should be fol- 
lowed wherever possible. However; 
if technology is significantly advan- 
ced, the system design should 
never be unduly biased by fear 
of incompatibility. 

Our work on the NOD™ cursor 
control device is a good example 
of this theory in practice. In looking 
at the mouse as a method of 
directing cursor movement, we 
recognized the problems of 
having to remove the hands from 
the keyboard and the require- 
ment of having additional clear 
desk area. 

This design began with the 
generalization of "what are we try- 
ing to do?" instead of looking for 
mouse re-designs or spinoffs like 
"foot mice" 



" . . system design 
should never be 
unduly biased by fear 
of incompatibility." 




Q: Where did that lead? 

RC: It allowed our engineers to 
be creative. We examined human 
factors such as whatmuscle groups 
have the finest control and the 
general aversion to having any 
wires attached to one's body. 
Then we matched those objectives 
against available technology, and 
our answer was something totally 
different: a cursor control system 
that tracks head movement using 
light rays. It's similar to the tech- 
nology of a television remote 



control device. Today we offer 
it as a development product to 
innovative software engineers, 
tomorrow its potential is unlimited. 
The point here is that whether 
it's the NOD individually or our sys- 
tem design in general, we seek the 
best solutions, whether they're 
standard or not The goal is provid- 
ing the best answer; not just the 
usual answer. Maybe the philoso- 
phy is best summarized in Stride s 
tagline: "Performance By Design™" 




STRJDS 

Formerly Sage Computer 

For more information on Stride or 
the location of the nearest Stride 
Dealer call or write us today. We'll 
also send you a free copy of our 
32 page product catalog. 
Corporate Offices: 
4905 Energy Way 
Reno. NV 89502 
(702)322-6868 
Regional Offices: 
Boston: (617) 229-6868 
Dallas: (214) 392-7070 



IBM PC and XT are trademarks of 
International Business Machines Corp. 

Stride. NOD. and "Performance By 
Design" are trademarks of Stride Micro. 



Inquiry 343 



JULY 1985 'BYTE 291 



Got a minute? 



The folks who make very modern personal computers would have you accept 
a very old fashioned idea. Namely that you should buy everything else 
frorn them, too. 
Including their printers. 

But IBM owners everywhere are finding that while the IBM PC may be the 
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business on paper is the all new Microline 192 from Okidata. And it 
isn't taking therrt long to find out. 

First there's speed. The Microline 19£ is twice as fast as the IBM 
Graphics Printer. But IBM PC owners are finding some other very 
remarkable features about the Microline 19c! that the Graphics Printer 
doesn't have. 



PRINTER COMPARISON 




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Oh, one other comparison worth repeating. In the minute and ten 
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the IBM Graphics Printer wouldn't have told half the story. 



OKIDATA, an OKI AMERICA company 




OKIDATA MICROLINE 192 



That's about all it takes to discover 
why Okidata's new printer 
beats the IRM m Graphics Printer. 



The folks who make very modern personal computers would have you accept 
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•from them, too- 
Including their : printers. , 

But IBM owners everywhere are finding that while the IBM PC may be the 
right too] for their business, the ideal tool -for putting their 
business on paper is the all new Microline 192 from Qkidata. And it 
isn't taking them long to find out. 

First there's speed. -The Microline 192 -is- twice as fast as the IBM ■ 
Graphics Printer. But IBM FC owners are fi hding some other very 
remarkable features about the Microline 192 that the Graphics Printer 
doesn't have. 



*> ^ 



PRINTER COMPARISON 




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REVIEW FEEDBACK 



MODULA-2/86 

We would like to clarify some important 
points regarding the review of Logitech's 
Modula-2/86 by Kevin Bowyer (February, 
page 311). 

Three months prior to the review's pub- 
lication. Logitech released a new version 
of Modula-2/86. Release 1.1 provides sig- 
nificant enhancements, and modifications 
to 1.0. 

Modula-2/86 1.1 no longer requires an 
8087 numeric coprocessor chip. In addi- 
tion to 8087 in-line code, the system now 
provides software emulation for real data- 
type operations and exception handling 
for real operations. 

A utility program called LOD2EXE is 
now available as part of Modula-2/86's 
utilities package. This utility merges the 
run-time support (M2.EXE) with a .IjOD file 
to produce one DOS-executable file (.EXE) 
so you can execute Modula-2/86 programs 
directly from PC-DOS. Modula-2/86 re- 
quires 256K bytes of RAM and is now 
compatible with MS-DOS 3.0. 

The overall speed of compiling and link- 
ing has been improved by a factor of 10 
to 40 percent. 

A symbolic run-time debugger is avail- 
able and sold as a separate package. The 
user interface of the new postmortem de- 
bugger, included in the base package, has 
been improved and made compatible with 
the optional symbolic run-time debugger. 
The run-time debugger is sold as a sepa- 
rate package. 

The messages displayed during com- 
pilation have been changed to be more 
descriptive. And Modula-2/86 for MS-DOS 
is compatible with generic MS-DOS and 
therefore runs on a variety of machines 
other than the IBM PC. 

Christopher R. Cale 

Logitech 

Redwood City, CA 

EasyLink and MCI Mail 

We believe that Wayne Rash's review of 
EasyLink and MCI Mail (Feburary, page 
317) contained some misleading impres- 
sions. Also, several features added to 
EasyLink shortly before the issue was 
published make the service easy to use 
and inexpensive. 
EasyLink's major new features are 



prompting, two-hour express-document 
and overnight delivery of letter-quality 
documents, and session control. The 
prompting feature leads users step by step 
through creating and sending a message 
or retrieving information from the mail- 
box. To activate prompting, users type / 
Prompt and Enter. Once EasyLink users 
become familiar with the system, they can 
bypass prompting. 

Two-hour express-document delivery is 
available for $20 to most major U.S. metro- 
politan areas, with overnight delivery ser- 
vice available for $7.75 to the entire coun- 
try. Both services, which are provided by 
DHL Worldwide Courier Express, are less 
expensive than the MCI alternative. 

The session-control feature lets EasyLink 
users move directly from EasyLink to 
another service (such as FYI) and back 
during the same phone call. Session con- 
trol features menus to lead users through 
the switching process. 

Your review states that from the infor- 
mation you had, the two software pack- 
ages are functionally equivalent. But 
Instant Mail Manager from Western Union 
offers features superior to those in the 
package offered for MCI Mail, including 
a text editor, address-list maintenance, 
local-filing (message-management) capa- 
bility, and easy communication with other 
hosts. 

While your review employs a few com- 
parisons that show EasyLink to be more 
expensive than MCI Mail, it can just as 
easily be shown that EasyLink is less ex- 
pensive. Since the majority of business 
correspondence contains fewer characters 
than the MCI ounce. EasyLink would be 
less expensive in most cases. 

Mel Webster 

Miller Communications 

Boston, MA 

Janus/Ada 

The review of Janus/Ada by Mark I. Welch 
(February, page 295) was based on a ver- 
sion that was almost a year old. Mr. Welch 
had problems with several nonstandard 
features of lanus/Ada. The latest version. 
1.5.1. contains a standard, full Ada gram- 
mar. Any program written in Ada will be 
accepted by Janus/Ada as syntactically cor- 
rect (with some features marked as unim- 



plemented). The "empty parentheses" 
problem does not exist in version 1.5.1; 
function calls have been updated to match 
the current Ada standard. 

The new version also comes with an 

Ada-standard (subset) text io module. 

The get line routine is Ada-standard. No 

get line routine in Ada takes a single 

parameter, so Mr. Welch's program 
wouldn't have worked anyway. The Ada 
get for strings is the same as a loop that 
reads a fixed number of characters, so it 
is useless for interactive input. 

The lanus/Ada code generator, parti- 
cularly local-variable access, has been im- 
proved in version 1.5.1. The BYTE prime- 
number benchmark (as a subprogram, not 
a package) now runs in 18.44 seconds on 
an IBM PC XT. You can get a further im- 
provement to 1 5.80 seconds by using the 
stand-alone .optimizer provided in the 
tools. The optimizer was previously a 
separate product. 

The prime-number benchmark is some- 
what misleading since an Ada main pro- 
gram is a normal procedure. Unlike other 
languages, in Ada you can call a main pro- 
gram recursively. Thus the data contained 
in it must be allocated on the stack, rather 
than in memory. That makes Ada slower 
than most other languages in benchmarks, 
no matter how good the compiler. 

Ada does not have an unsigned integer 
type, so I see no reason why the reviewer 
expected one. The Fibonacci benchmark, 
which expects 16-bit unsigned integers, is 
unfair to any language that does not have 
them (including Pascal). 

Long integer is not a predefined type 

in Janus/Ada; it is an optional Ada type. 
We have been providing notes about the 

use of long integer for a long time; 

perhaps Mr. Welch did not get them. We 
have revised Janus/Ada's manual to elimi- 
nate problems like the erroneous mention 

of long integer as a predefined type. We 

also renumbered the sections to match 
the 1983 ANSI Ada standard. The new ver- 
sion of Janus/Ada has floating-point soft- 
ware and can use the 8087 chip. We 
generally recommend using the float- 
ing-point capabilities rather than the 
long integer routines. 

The version 1.5.1 compiler completely 

[continued) 



JULY 1985 • BYTE 295 




This ad 

is for all those 

who ever wonder 

why your 

company runs 

a United Way 

campaign. 

When it comes right down 
to it, you're probably the best rea- 
son your company has for getting 
involved with the United Way. 

You see, they know almost 
all of the money given to the 
United Way goes back out into 
the community to help people. 

So if you, or the people you 
work with, should ever need any 
of our services, like day care, 
family counseling or health care, 
we'll be right there to help. In 
fact, there are tens of thousands 
of United Way-supported pro- 
grams and services in cities and 
towns across the country That 
means help is nearby wherever 
you are. 

And your company knows 
that could mean the difference 
between keeping or losing a val- 
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That's why they give. And 
that's why they ask you to give. 
Because there may come a day 
when you need help yourself. 




United VNfay 

Thanks to you. it works, for ALL OF US. 



Ol A Public Service of This Magazine & The Advertising Council 



REVIEW FEEDBACK 



implements exceptions and exception 
handlers, including those on blocks and 
packages. 

Last, the prices mentioned in the arti- 
cle changed at the beginning of 1985. We 
no longer directly sell the CP/M version 
of Janus/Ada. but it is still available through 
Workman & Associates (112 Marion Ave.. 
Suite 3B. Pasadena. CA 91106. (818) 796- 
4401). The C-Pak (the compiler, linker, and 
Ada-standard libraries), which is mainly in- 
tended for education, is available for 
$99.95. The D-Pak. which includes the 
C-Pak, the tools, and the full set of 
libraries, is now priced at $900. The S-Pak, 
which includes the D-Pak, our Pastran 
Pascal-to-Ada translator, and the source 
code to the libraries, is $1 500. The D- and 
S-Paks are intended for software develop- 
ment. 

Randall L. Brukardt 

RR Software Inc. 

Madison. Wl 

I am glad that RR Software has updated 
its compiler to handle Ada's current syn- 
tax. My impression as I finished the 
review was that the new version had not 
yet been released. I will be pleased to 
update the review when RR loans me the 
compiler's new version; they have prom- 
ised to do so. 

Mr: Brukardt is correct about geLJine. 
Ada does not have a single- parameter 

get line procedure (get line also 

returns a natural integer for the length 
of the string). My intent was to point out 
that geLJine had not been implemented 
as a procedure, something that has 
presumably been fixed in the new 
version. 

Regarding BYTE benchmarks, I used 
the standard BYTE Sieve of Eratosthenes 
prime-number benchmark in Ada (Janu- 
ary 1 983, page 288); BYTE does not nor- 
mally review the performance of optional 
optimizers or of rewritten benchmark 
programs, since these defeat the purpose 
of benchmarks. If the optimizer is now a 
standard component of /anus/Ad ] a, an up- 
dated review should include its perfor- 
mance. Anyone who can suggest a bet- 
ter compiler benchmark that can be fairly 
translated across all languages should let 
me know. 

I realize that Ad a does not have an un- 
signed integer type. My point was that 
you cannot run the Fibonacci benchmark 
in Janus/Ada because the language can- 
not handle numbers that large without 
overflowing the stack or heap. I wasn't 
faulting the compiler or language as 
much as explaining why I couldn't pro- 



vide a value for this standard benchmark. 
Since the maximum and minimum values 
for integer are not specified in the refer- 
ence manual, other Ada compilers might 
be able to execute this benchmark. 

I am happy to hear that the compiler's 
price is now $99.95. If, as Mr. Brukardt 
reports, the compiler now matches stan- 
dard Ada 1983 syntax, Janus/Ada is a 
bargain and a must for hobbyists trying 
to learn Ada. 

-Mark J. Welch 
Staff Writer 

Altos 586 

I agree with Greg Corson's review of the 
Altos 586 with the XENIX Development 
System (March, page 247). However, we 
have managed to circumvent some of the 
problems he mentions. 

We are using two Altos 986-40s with 
Altos Worknet, 10 terminals, two high- 
speed printers, two modems, and six local 
screen printers. The modem communica- 
tion problem was solved by purchasing 
M-Link. This communication program lets 
us control communication protocol rather 
than rely on the standard Altos output. 

The XENIX Development System is 
amazing; much like CP/M. you understand 
XENIX from other authors' articles and 
books, not from the original documenta- 
tion. However, we are using programs writ- 
ten in COBOL. FORTRAN, C, and MS- 
BASIC interchangeably and without know- 
ing which program is written in what 
language. 

With the advent of XENIX 3.0 and Work- 
net 3.0. the documentation is now in 13 
manuals covering 2 inches of shelf space. 
Both the hardware and the XENIX system 
are superior, but liaison between hardware 
and software becomes extremely confus- 
ing. 

Richard C. Lofberg 
Teaneck, NJ 

Atari 800XL 

I was pleased to see Ion Edwards's review 
of the Atari 800XL (March, page 267). The 
800XL is a superior machine for the 
money. For $300. a computerist can get 
a disk drive and a 64K-byte 6502C 
machine. 

Literally thousands of programs are 
available for the Atari, and two magazines 
devoted entirely to the machine do an out- 
standing job. 

Also, the Action! compiler works faster 
than any I have seen, and it produces 
good, tight machine code. It is highly 
structured, complete with subroutines, 

[continued) 



296 BYTE • IULY 1985 



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Janet/2 shares hardware, software, and data. Ubraries can 
be centrally secured for controlled access by a number of 
users. Run your favorite programs under standard DOS. 

Janet/2 consists of a file server connected to a maximum of 
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•WATFOR, WATFIV and WATBOL are registered trademarks of the University of Waterloo. 
•IBM PC and IBM XT are registered trademarks of International Business Machines Corporation. 
298 BYTE • JULY 1985 



Inquiry 3 79 



REVIEW FEEDBACK 



global variables, local variables, and 
arguments. I wish someone would tell 
computer teachers in elementary schools 
how cheaply they could teach structured 
programming instead of BASIC. 

I. Ray Wood 
Benton, IL 

Jukis Tractor Feed 

John ). Williams's letter in Review Feedback 
(March, page 303) found sympathetic 
readers: We experienced the same difficul- 
ty with the tractor feed. Since we have four 
Juki printers, we felt we had bought into 
a lemon factory until we hit on what ap- 
pears to be an inexpensive solution. 

The paper path from the underside of 
the tractor, around the platen, and back 
again through the top is too long and 
allows for paper slippage. This isn't too 
bad unless you need some form of 
double-printing. We finally found a 
method to take up the slack that gets rid 
of the wandering without causing gear- 
stripping friction. 

The steel rod just below the paper-out 
bail is mounted to each end plate. We 
could remove only the left screw, but this 
was enough to access one side of the rod. 
We took polyethylene spiral wrap for har- 
nessing cables and worked it on over the 
steel rod. The size we used was % inch out- 
side diameter, but Vi inch would probably 
be easier to work with. A light touch of 
silicon lubricant helped it slide more 
easily, and any residue that made it to the 
outer surface of the wrap probably re- 
duced the paper friction. 

This slight addition to paper-path length 

worked wonders for us. The spiral wrap 

should be available locally, but several 

electronics mail-order catalogs carry it too. 

John J. Neville 

Onamia, MN 

Tecmars jrCaptain 

In Glenn Hartwig's review of jrCaptain 
(March, page 299), he remarked about the 
cosmetics of the keyboard, the limitations 
of a single disk drive, and the need for 
more memory. In home use, I have found 
none of these problems insurmountable. 
When you spend a lot of time with a 
PCjr, you find two less obvious problems, 
one major and one relatively minor. The 
minor one is the limited keyboard buffer. 
The serious problem is lack of direct- 
memory access (DMA): Everything stops 
when you read or write to disk. Almost 
every PCjr owner I meet has problems 
downloading files from remote host com- 
puters. There is a crying need for software 
that will support flow control for receiving 



ASCII files, as well as XMODEM for binary 
files. 

I assume that expansion units like lec- 
mar's do not provide DMA but do get 
around these problems by providing a vir- 
tual disk in RAM. Are reliable file transfers 
possible this way? Is that also possible 
without the memory expansion? In other 
words, is there a RAM-disk program that 
is compact and will fit 40K or 50K bytes 
of storage into the PCjr above the com- 
munications program? 

P. M. MORETTI 

Stillwater, OK 

Perhaps other PCjr owners can offer sug- 
gestions. 

-Glenn Hartwig 
Technical Editor, Reviews 

Glenn Hartwig could not find the data 
sheet for an 8314 memory chip on lec- 
mar's jrCaptain because it does not exist. 
The number 8314 is a date code repre- 
senting the 14th week of 1983 when the 
part was manufactured. Almost all semi- 
conductors are branded by the manufac- 
turer with its logo, a part number, and a 
date code for lot traceability. Off -brand or 
retested parts will have the manufacturer's 
logo obliterated or removed but will 
generally leave a generic part number 
such as 4164 and the date code. 

David W. Thomson 
Highlands Ranch, CO 

Microsoft BASIC 

Manly W. Mumford, commenting on 
Microsoft BASIC in Review Feedback 
(March, page 303). made the same obser- 
vation my students do at first: It seems 
crude compared to BASICS on lap and 
home computers because it lacks a full- 
screen editor and a Clear Screen state- 
ment. 

The problem is that MS-DOS and CP/M 
provide software with only a simple ser- 
vice to print ASCII characters to the 
screen. When Microsoft designed MBASIC 
to run, without changes, on any computer 
(that is, working strictly through the sys- 
tem), this limited cursor movements to the 
directions provided by ASCII or the sys- 
tem. Since ASCII was designed around 
Teletype terminals using paper, text dis- 
play can proceed only to the right and 
down except for backspacing along the 
current line. This rules out the possibility 
of a full-screen editor. 

For similar reasons, ASCII, MS-DOS. and 
CP/M do not provide for clearing the 
screen. To provide these services to soft- 

(continued) 



DeSmet 



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■ IEEE S/W Floating Point 

Assembler, Linker, and Librarian 
Machine Code Debugger 
Source Code Editor 

"SHELL" Interface 

■ Environmental Variables 

■ Wild-Card Expansion 

■ Many Built-in Functions 

■ Command History 

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>120 Function STDIO Library 

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Call 9 a.m.-1 p.m. to CHARGE by VISA/MC/AMEX. 

I Street Address:505 W.Olive, #767, Sunnyvale, CA 94086 I 
JULY 1985 -BYTE 299 




Se habla Espanol Call for programs not listed 

Technical & Other Information (602) 246-2222 
TOLL FREE ORDER LINE 1-(800)-421-3135 



Call lor pricing on oncriDV n^ r*rkliJirniTimO Authorized Sperry Dealer 

other Sperry Computers. OrtHH I rU L/LMVIrUltrTO Dealer Inquiries Invited. 

Mono Desktop 256K, 2 Drives, Serial Port, Par. Port, 

Clock, MSDOS 2.11, GWBasic plus Other Software $1650 

Portable Computer 256K 2 Drives Full IBM Compatibility $1650 



FREE! PRINTER SET SOFTWARE 

Purchase an Okidata, Epson, Gemini or 
Toshiba printer and receive at no charge a 
menu driven program to set print character- 
isticsortomakeyourcomputerfunctionasa 
correcting typewriter. Retail value $35. 
Available for most disk formats. 



PRINTERS 

CITIZEN 

MSP-10 $299 

MSP-15 Call 

MSP-20 425 

C-ITOH 

F-10-55 1030 

8510 Parallel (Pro-writer) 295 

8510SEP 399 

DAISYWRITER 2000 795 

EPSON 

FX 80+ 335 

FX 1 00+ 469 

LX 80 255 

LQ 1500 Parallel 906 

Homewriter w/interface 360 

JUKI 

Juki 6100 385 

Juki 6300 685 

Juki Tractors 129 

NEC 

3550 1190 

8850 1500 

P2 Parallel 525 

P3 Parallel 725 

OKIDATA 

Okidata 192 Microline 369 

Okidata 1 93 Microline Call 

Okimate 20 Color Printer Call 

Okidata 182 Microline 229 

Okidata 84P 650 

SILVER REED 

EXP400P 235 

EXP 500P 289 

EXP 550P 399 

EXP 770P 699 

STAR MICRONICS 

SG-10 235 

SG-15 369 

Call for prices on other models 
TOSHIBA 

1340 549 

P351 1164 

AB PRINT SWITCH 85 



MOUSE SYSTEMS 

PC Mouse w/Paint $135 

TERMINALS 

Qume QVT-102 Green 448 

WYSE50 450 

MICROSOFT 

Bus. Mouse 129 

Serial Mouse 129 

MODEMS 

Hayes 1200 395 

Hayes 1 200B 359 

Hayes 2400 595 

Anchor Mark XII 239 

Anchor Express Call 

Promodem 1 200B 262 

Promodem 1 200 309 

RAM 

64K 150NS Chips (set of 9) 12 

256K Ram Chips (set of 9) 69 

BOARDS 

AST Six Pack Plus 249 

AST Advantage 395 

Hercules Color Card 149 

Hercules Graphics Board 295 

Paradise Graphics Board 259 

Paradise Five Pak w/64K 175 

Quad ram Board w/p/s/g 225 

Quadcolor I 185 

Sigma Maximizer 239 

Sigma 384K bd w/256K 220 

STB Graphics II 245 

STB Mono Board 155 

DISK DRIVES 

CDC Disk Drives 139 

Iomega Bernoulli 20 mg 2495 

Iomega Bernoulli Plus 20 mg 2625 

1 mg External Hard Drive 825 

33 mg External Hard Drive 1625 

Turbo 10 Internal Drive 685 

Turbo 20 Internal Drive 1019 

MONITORS 

AMDEK Call for price 

Taxan 425 399 

Taxan 121 Green 125 

Taxan 1 22 amber 134 

Princeton HX-12 449 

Princeton Max 1 2E 179 

CP/M SOFTWARE 

Call us for pricing on CP/M Software! 
Programs like Multiplan, Wordstar 
Propack, Fortran, Move-It, Crosstalk and 
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WAREHOUSE DATA PRODUCTS 

2701 West Glendale Ave., Suite 6 

Phoenix, AZ 85021 



REVIEW FEEDBACK 



ware, terminals recognize escape se- 
quences—sequences of two or more 
ASCII characters, often beginning with the 
Escape character— as special commands 
to move the cursor, erase lines, clear the 
screen, and so on. Unfortunately, each ter- 
minal maker uses different sequences. To 
clear my Osborne l's screen, I print Ctrl- 
Z; on my employer's DEC Rainbow 100, 
I print seven characters: Esc | 2 J Esc | H. 

Microsoft provided an Install program 
that lets the user adapt MBASIC to any ter- 
minal. You can solve your editing problem 
by saving your MBASIC program in ASCII 
form and using your favorite text editor. 
On my Osborne l , I set up two function 
keys that transfer my work back and forth 
between MBASIC and the WordStar-like 
(but faster) public-domain editor VDO; the 
transfer takes only seconds in either direc- 
tion. Mr. Mumford should be able to use 
MemoMaker on his HP 1 10 in this way. 

Similarly, his terminal manual should 
describe a sequence that clears the 
screen. If such terminal-specific sequences 
are always written as subroutines or de- 
fined functions. MBASIC programs can be 
ported to other terminals by changing 
only those subroutines. I hope those mov- 
ing up to MBASIC from home computers 
will notice the improvements, especially 
the ability to use up to 40 characters in 
truly descriptive variable names. 

Alan T. Chattaway 
\fancouver, British Columbia, Canada 

NewWord 

In John Heilborn and Nanci Reel's review 
of NewWord (February, page 291). I was 
shocked to read: 'The R command. . .is 
missing from NewWord. and NewStar Soft- 
ware has no plans to add it to NewWord's 
vocabulary." Our household has two Mor- 
row MD3s that came bundled with New- 
Word 1.19 and NewWord 1.32; both in- 
clude the R command, which I use fre- 
quently. In addition to formatting blank 
disks, running the program STAT.COM 
allows maintenance of disk data. 

Photo la in the review is clearly the in- 
troductory screen from a demonstration 
program, so perhaps the R function was 
deleted from the demo or perhaps the 
statement in the review pertains only to 
the MS-DOS/PC-DOS versions of NewWord 
( 1. 19 and 1. 3 2 are CP/M versions). 

Robert C Brooks 
Nashua. NH 

Geneva PX-8 

I have some comments on Rich Malloy's 
review of the Epson Geneva PX-8 lap com- 

(continued) 



300 BYTE • JULY 1985 



Inquiry 378 




UNtX'MUMIK 

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He's considered a heavy in the com- 
puter book market. Yet his writing 
style is light and informative. He's 
Mitch Waite. 

Sams offers a wide variety of Waite books. 
We published Waite's first book in 1975. And 
we continue to add books to our Waite series 
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From operating systems to programming, 
Sams Waite books make computing simple. 
They're easy-to-read and include various 
charts, diagrams, and command 
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Better yet, Sams has four new Waite 
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They're Waite's best books yet. And 
they'll help you learn the intricacies 
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There's never been a better time to buy 
Sams Waite books than now! Visit your local 
Sams dealer. Or call our toll-free number 
and ask for Operator 135. 

Modem Connections Bible, No. 22446, 

$24.95 

Inside Xenix'? No. 22445, $22.95 

UNDC" System V Primer, No. 22404, $19-95 

Tricks ofthe UNIX Masters, No. 22449, 

$24.95 




CP/M® Primer (2nd Edition), No. 22170, 

$16.95 

CP/M Bible: The Authoritative Reference 

Guide to CP/M, No. 22015, $19-95 

Soul of CP/M: How to use the Hidden Power 

of Your CP/M System, No. 22030, $19-95 

Al on the Mac, No. 22447, $21.95 

Advanced UNIX Assembly Programmers 

Guide, No. 22403, $18.95 

Using the IBM® PC LAN, No. 22448, 

$24.95 



800-428-SAMS 

In Indiana, call 317-298-5566 



SAMS 



Inquiry 312 



Howard W. Sams & Co., Inc. 
4300 West 62nd Street 
Indianapolis, IN 46268 



Inquiry 121 




F3P APPLE II COMPATIBLE DE5KTOP/PORTABLE COMPUTER 
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BOX 4-4, NANKANG 4, TAIPEI, TAIWAN R.O.C. TELEX:14025 
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REVIEW FEEDBACK 



HARD DISK DRIVE SETS AS LOW AS $529!!! 
Other models available • Prices change rapidly • Please Call. 





130W Switching 
Power Supply 



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10 MB Set with Tandon Drive $529 

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cover plate, mounting screws, installation instructions. 
Full year warranty. You cannot beat the value & our low 
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Multifunction Board (OK) $149 

Includes one serial port, one parallel port, one game 
port, clock/calendar & 6 memory banks. Can add up to 
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Direct replacement for your IBM PC power 
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Please call for FREE catalog and CURRENT LOW PRICES! 

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Check, moncyorder. Visa, MasterCard or American Express (include # & cxp. date) S2.50 shipping & handling in Continental U.S. 
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puter (February, page 302). 

The reviewer describes the connectors 
on the Epson as DIN connectors. However, 
the DIN connectors you can purchase in 
Radio Shack and from other sources are 
not compatible with these plugs. The usual 
DIN connectors are [ A inch in diameter; 
the Epson connector is something like % 
inch. 

The review concludes that the PX-8 
would make a good second computer. 
Most people with two computers want 
them to be able to talk to each other. The 
PX-8 comes with two programs. TERM and 
FILINK. for this purpose. TERM does not 
allow the transfer of binary files, only 
ASCII text files, and consequently isn't of 
much use; you can't transfer programs or 
WordStar text with TERM. Serious com- 
munication between your desktop com- 
puter and the PX-8 should be carried on 
through FILINK. If your first computer is 
an Epson QX-10. you have no problems 
since the QX-10 will talk to the Epson 
FILINK protocol. Everybody else is out of 
luck. In the vast documentation supplied 
with the PX-8. Epson neglected to de- 
scribe the protocol used by FILINK. You 
can write or buy some other communica- 
tions program, but this is counter- 
productive in a portable computer with 
extremely limited storage space. 

The PX-8 comes with a version of Word- 
Star. The review says: "The only features 
lacking are certain printing capabilities." 
The PX-8 WordStar will print only on an 
Epson or compatible printer. It's not a 
question of only being able to use fancy 
features with an Epson printer; the PX-8 
WordStar appears to be deliberately con- 
figured to make its output impossible to 
use on any other printer. 

Finally the review commends the PX-8 
documentation. In terms of user orienta- 
tion. 1 agree. However, the PX-8 CP/M 
manual keeps referring to something 
called PX-8 System Essentials whenever a 
technical question arises. This document 
is not provided with the PX-8. 

I cannot recommend the Geneva PX-8 
to average users because, for the price, it 
has too many things wrong with it and not 
enough right. 

Gregor Owen 
Port Jefferson Station, NY 



REVIEW FEEDBACK is a column of readers 
letters. We welcome responses that support or 
challenge BYTE reviews. Send letters to Review 
Feedback. BYTE Publications. POB 372. 
Hancock. NH 03449. Name and address must 
be on all letters. 



302 BYTE • JULY 1985 



Inquiry 271 



Dac-easy accounting 



$49.95 



Introductory Price 



The software revolution of the year! 



All 7 complete modules on 1 
disk! Compare our features 
with other packages costing 
thousands more! 

General 

•Menu Driven •Fully Integrated 
•MS-DOS & PC-DOS 
•RUNS ON PCjr, PC, XT, AT, AND 
COMPATIBLES 

•Password Protection In All Programs 
•Slipcased Binder 

•OVER 300 DIFFERENT REPORTS!! 
•OVER 90 ROUTINES!! 
•File Capacity Limited Only By Disk Space 
•Service Contract Available 
•ONLY $49.95 FOR ALL 7 MODULES 
•Money Back Guarantee 

General Ledger 

•Double Entry •Unlimited # Of Accounts 
•Multi-Level Accounting 
•Unlimited Departments 
•3 Year Account History For CRT Inquiry 
•Pencil & Pen Feature To Correct Mistakes 
Without Reverse Entries 
•UNIQUE Budgeting Routine (See Forecasting) 
•CRT Voucher Inquiry 

•All Reports Compared to Last Year or Budget 
•Unlimited Journals 

Accounts Receivable 

•Open Item or Balance Forward 

•7 Customized Columns For Aging Report 

•Unlimited # Of Customers 

•Mailing Labels With 4 Different Sorts 

•Automatic Finance Charges 

•Supports Partial Payments • Directories 

•3 Year Customer History for # Of Invoices, 

Sales, Costs, And Profits 
•Customized Text On Statements 
•Cash Flow Analysis "Sales Analysis 
•Automatic Sales Forecasting By Customer, 

Salesman, Or Customer Type 



Accounts Payable 



•Check Printing "Automatic Allocation Of 

Available Cash To Payables 
•Vendor Directories With Sorting By Vendor 

Code, Name, Or Territory 
•Aging Reports With 7 Customized Columns 
•Unlimited # Of Vendors 
•Mailing Labels «3 Year Vendor History For 

CRT Inquiry And Printing 
•Flexible Payment Calendar 
•Automatic Forecasting of Purchases 
•Unlimited Allocations Per Invoice 
•Up To 10 Invoices Paid Per Check 



Inventory 



•Supports Average, Last Purchase, And Standard 

Costing Methods "Physical Inventory 
•Accepts Any Measure Units Per Case Like 

Fractions/Dozens/Gross/Etc 
•Automatic Changing Of Costing Methods 
•Time A d Product Inventory 
•3 Year Product History In Units, Dollars, Cost, 

And Profits 

•Automatic Forecast Of Product Sales 
•Automatic Pricing Assignments 
•Alert And Activity Reports With 1 1 Sorts 
•CRT Shows On-Hand/On-Order/ 

Committed/Sales/Cost/Profit/Turns/GROI 

Purchase Order 

•Allows Up To 99 Lines Per Purchase Order 
•Per Line Discount In °la 
•Purchase Order Accepts Generic 

Discounts/Freight/Taxes/Insurance 
•Purchase Order Accepts Back Orders & Returns 
•Purchase Journal 
•Automatic Interfacing With General Ledger, 

Payables, And Inventory 



Billing 



•Invoicing On Plain Or Pre-Printed Forms 
•Prints Sales Journal 

•Automatic Updating Of Committed Products In 
Inventory 

•Ability To Customize Invoice For Remarks 
•Allows Return Credit Memo 



•Interfaces With Inventory, Accounts Receivable 
And General Ledger 



Forecasting 



•Unique program that automatically forecasts 

using your 3 year history 
•Forecast Revenue And Expe se Accounts 
•Forecast Vendor Purchases 
•Forecast Customer Sales, Cost, And Profit By 

Customer Or Salesperson 
•Forecast Inventory Item Usage By 4 Automatic 

Methods 
•Forecast By Same As Last Year, Or Vo Base 

From Last Year, Or Trend, 

Or Least Square Trend Line Analysis Method 

NOT COPY-PROTECTED 

Minimum Hardware Requirements: 

128K memory, one 5 1/4 DSDD floppy disk, 132 
column printer in compressed mode, 80X24 CRT, 
MS-DOS, PC DOS 2.0 or later. 



Runs on your: ibm (PCjr/pc/XT/AT), 

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ACCOUNT NO.. 



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Name 



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City 



State 



Zip 



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Phone Signature 17 



Inquiry 115 



Get the best of both worlds: 
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PC 

PROGRAMMERS 

CORNER 

Borland 

Turbo Pascal $ 37 

CompuView 

Vedit $130 

Vedit+ 179 

Digital Research 
C Basic Camp 

(CB-86) $339 

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Concurrent CP/M 

w/ Windows 119 

Concurrent DOS.... 179 

Display Mgr. 279 

Fortran 77-DOS 

arCP/M... 279 

Personal Basic 99 

Emerging Technology 

Edix (editor) $139 

Heritage 

Smartkey 11+ $ 75 

Microsoft 

C Compiler $319 

Pascal Comp 199 

Basic Camp 249 

Morgan Computing 

Prqf Basic ,...$79 

Trace86 99 

Peter Norton 

Norton Util 3.0 $ 59 

Supersoft 

Fortran $209 

Lifeboat 

Lattice Windows.... $209 

Run-C 99 

Dr Halo (Graphics). 79 
PMate 159 



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SOFTWARE 

Alpha Software 

Data Base Mgr II $179 

Anderson Bell 

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dBose II Call 

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Framework (v. 1.1) ...;. Call 

Friday Call 

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Printer Boss NEW v. 5 $ 99 



Dow Jones 

Market Analyzer $229 

MarketManager +.... 169 

Spreadsheet Link 179 

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Microstat $239 

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w/ Plotter Option 279 

Fastware Thor $245 

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Financier II $119 

Tax Series 105 

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dGraph 159 

Quickcode (III or II).... 159 

Quick Report 159 

dUtil (III or II) 58 

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FYI 3000 259 

Sort Facility 99 

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Project Manager $249 

Total Project Mgr 279 

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Volkswriter Deluxe $155 

Volkswriter Scientific . . 299 
Living Videotext 

Think Tank (256K) $119 

MDBS 

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Menlo Corp. 

In Search $319 

Micropro 

Wordstar ProPak $255 

Wordstar 2000 255 

Wordstar 2000+ 295 

Microrim 

R-base4000 $265 

R-base Clout (V2.0)... 159 

R-Writer 95 

Prog Interface 259 

Microsoft 

Flight Simulator $ 39 

Project 1.01 169 

Word 1.15 229 

MuMath/MuSimp 179 

Microstuf 

Crosstalk $ 99 

Multimate (V 3.3) $265 

Northwest Analytical 

Statpok $329 

Open Systems 

Acct'g Programs .. ea $379 

Peachtree 

Acctg Modules $359 

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Samna Word III 329 

Satellite Software 
Word Perfect w/Sp... $229 
Sensible Designs 

d Programmer $199 

Software Arts 

TK! Solver $265 



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PFS: File, Graph 

Write, Plan ea $ 89 

PFS: Report 79 

PFS: Access, Proof. eo 59 
Sorcim 

Supercalc III $249 

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Acct'g Partner $219 

Acct'g Partner II 599 

Warner Software 
(PC Jr. Compatible) 

Desk Organizer $ 1 29 

Westminster Software 

Pertmaster Call 

.. .and many more! 



MACINTOSH 
CORNER 

SOFTWARE 
Arrays, Inc. 

Home Acct $ 69 

Creative Solutions 

MacForth $ 99 

MacForth II 169 

Human Edge Software 
Sales, Mgmt 

Edge ea $159 

Commun. Edge 139 

Infocom Call 

Living Videotext 

Think Tank $ 89 

Microsoft 

Basic Interp $ 99 

Chart 79 

File 139 

Multiplan 139 

Word 139 

Sierra On-line 

Frogger $ 32 

Software Publishing 
PFS: File & 

Report Combo $119 

Telos Software 
Filevision...... $109 



APPLE 
SOFTWARE 

Alpha Software 

Apple-IBM 

Connection $169 

Arrays, Inc. 

Home Acct $ 59 

FCM 79 

Ashton-Tate Call 



Dow Jones 

Market Analyzer $229 

Market Manager 1 89 

Spreadsheet Link 179 

Living Videotext 

Think Tank $ 99 

Micropro 

Pro Pak $349 

Microsoft Call 

Peachtree 

Back to Basics $149 

PeachPak 

Series 40 or 80 $229 

Software Publishing 
PFS: File, Graph, 

Report :. eo $ 79 

CP/M 
SOFTWARE 

All prices below are for 
8" standard. 
Ashton-Tate 

dBose II Call 

CompuView Call 



Digital Research 

DR Assem&Tools86.$119 
C Basic Comp (CB-80) 289 

SPP(86) 149 

Display Mgr 80 239 

Display Mgr 86 279 

Pascal MT+ 80 199 

Pascal MT+ 86 349 

PL/186 399 

Access Mgr 86 239 

Fortran 77 86 199 

Infocom 

All Games Call 

Micro Pro 

WordStar $250 

Pro-Pak (WS, 

MM, SI, SS) $359 

Microsoft Call 

Microstuf 

Crosstalk $ 99 

Northwest Analytical 

Statpak $365 

Oasis 

Word Plus $110 

Punctuation & Style.... 99 

Supersoft 

Disk Doctor $ 74 



PC SOFTWARE SPECIALS 

Enertronics — Energraphics 

Interactive, 3-dimensional computer graphics tool $209 

w/ Plotter option 269 

Microsoft — Fortran Compiler 

Designed specifically for solving numerical problems. 
Widely used programming language for scientific and 

engineering applications $239 

MDBS — Knowledge Man 

Integrated data mgmt, statistical analysis, spreadsheet, 

structured programming language pkg $269 

Optional integrated components: 

K-Graph 135 

K-Text 99 

K-Paint 59 

K-Mouse 65 

K-Report 135 

Spectrum Software — Micro-Cap 

Microcomputer Circuit Analysis Program. A professional 
design tool created to enhance the productivity of elec- 
tronics design by providing an interactive drawing and 

simulation system $359 

Micro-Cap II 695 

Micro Logic 345 

Mathematics Series 45 

Wadsworth Professional Software — Statpro 
Data Analysis Package. Enter, manipulate, transform, 

edit and graphically portray data and results $599 

Lifetree Software, Inc. — Volkswriter Scientific 

Roman & Greek alphobets and oil of the commonly used 
scientific and mathematical symbols and technical characters 
available for use. Multiple fonts and typesizes displayed 
on the screen exactly as they will print. Typeset oriented 

for excellent quality printing $279 

Special prices in effect through July 3 1, 1985 




■"■■..•'. .•- " ; 






APPLE/ 
FRANKLIN 



ALS 

CP/MCard $269 

Smarterm II 119 

Z-Engine 139 

CCS 

7711 Asynch Serial $ 99 

Microsoft 

Softcard+ $449 

Prem Softcard (HE) 295 

Microtek 

Printer l/F $ 75 

Dumpling-16K 169 

Dumpling-GX 89 

Orange Micro 

Grappler + $119 

Prometheus 

Versacard $159 

Videx 

Videoterm VT-602 $249 

Ultraterm 249 



DISPLAY CARDS 


Fredericks/Plan- 




tronics Colorplus. 


.$389 


Hercules 




Graphics Board... 


..$339 


Color Board 


. 199 


MA Systems 




PC Peacock 




Calor Board 


.$249 


Paradise 




Modular/Display.. 


. 309 


Quadram 




Quadcolor 1 


.$199 


Quadcolor II 


. 3B9 


Tecmar 




Graphics Master.. 


.$479 



PLOTTERS 

Amdek 

DXY-100 $599 

Amplotll B99 

Enter 

Sweet P Six Shooter... Call 

Houston Instruments Call 

Panasonic 

VP6B01P Plotter $1375 



IBM/PC 



Memory Chips Call 

AST Research 

Six Pak + 64K 
(exp 384K, S/P, Clk) .. $265 
MegaPlus 64K, (Cl/Cal, 
S Port, 512K cap 

w/Megapak) $269 

Megapak 256K up- 
grade far Megaplus. Call 

BYAD, Inc Call 

Maynard Electronics 
Floppy Drive Cntrlr.... $11 9 

w/ Par Port 169 

w/SerPort 179 

Sandstar Call 

Orange Micro 

Mr. Chips Call 

Orchid Technology 

"Orchid Blossom" Call 

Quadram 

Quadboard 64K, (exp 
384K, Clk/Cal, S&P 

Ports, Software) $269 

Microfazer Stack Printer 
-P/P8K(exp512K)....$139 

-S/P 8K (exp 64K) 149 

-S/S 8K (exp 64K) 149 

Quadlink64K Mem... 385 

Other Products Call 

Tecmar 

Captain's Bd w/64K...$299 

1st Mate 259 

2nd Mate 250 

3rd Mate : 379 

Xedex/Microlog 

Baby Blue $325 

BobyBluell 525 



MONITORS 

Amdek 

300A Amber $149 

310A 179 

300 Clr 265 

500 Clr RGB 385 

600 Clr HR 455 

700 Clr Ultra HR 535 

NEC 

JB1260-12" Green ....$119 

JC1216RGB 429 



PGS 

HX12 RGB Clr $489 

MAX12E 179 

SR12 (690x480 Res)... 639 

Doubler Card 175 

Quadram 

Quadchrome $489 

Quadchrome II 429 

Amberchrome 175 

Quadscreen HiRes 1449 

Sanyo 

8112 12" HR Green.... $169 

Taxan 

440 $679 

420L 499 

425 w/ audio Call 

Zenith 
135(RGBorcomp)....$499 

136 669 

Others Call 



MODEMS 

Hayes 

Smartmodem 300 $209 

Smartmodem 1200.... 429 
Smartmodem 1200B... 369 
Prometheus 

Pramodem $399 

Quadram 

Quadmodem $529 

US Robotics 

Auto-Dial 300/1200... $459 

S-100 Modem 349 

Password 325 

Zoom Telephonies 
Networker w/o SW ... $109 



DISK DRIVES 

CDC 1800 $159 

Corvus Hd Call 

Davong Hd Call 

l-Omega 

Bemoufli Box Call 



Maynard Electronics 

Maynstream: Port- 
able back-up for HD 

System 60 find 
1 cntrlr cd) $1695 



Mountain, Inc 

FileSafe Combo 

Disk/Tape Pack for 

the IBM PC or XT Call 

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for Wisconsin customers Call 

Tandon TM-100-2 Call 



PRINTERS 

C. Itoh Electronics, Inc. 

Starwriter 

F10-40P (40cps) $999 

A10-20S (20cps) 529 

Diablo 

630 ECS Call 

Epson Call 

NEC Call 

Okidata 82-93 Call 

Quadram 

Quadjet Call 

Star Micronics Call 

TeletexTlOU $399 

. . .and much more. 



DISKETTES 

3M, Maxell, Verbatim 
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MISC. 

Alpha-Delta "MACC 8" 
Surge Protector $ 69 

Computei 

Power Din 
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P12 IBM F 
P22 Stanc 

Electronic 
Protection Devices 

Lemon/ EC I $ 38 

Lime /ECU 55 

Orange /EC IV 75 



Computer Accessories 

Power Directors 

P2 Mtr Base $109 

P12IBMPC 145 


P22 Stand Alone . 


. 75 



Hauppage 

8087 w/o software ....$149 

8087 w/ software 255 

80287 AT Chip w/o.... 289 

Other Products Call 

Kensington 

Masterpiece $109 

Keytronic 

KB 5150 $169 

KB 5151 173 

KB 5151 Dvorak 173 

Mouse Systems 

PC Mouse $159 

Touchtone Technology 
Touchtone II 

(PC Keypad) $169 

Versa Computing 

VersaWriter $239 

WICO 

Joysticks (Ap) $ 39 



PCJr 



KeyTronic 

KB 5150 Jr $169 

KB 5151 Jr 173 

KB 5149 (Numeric 

Keypad) 89 

Legacy 

Legacy I $239 

Legacy II 479 

Quadram 
Quad Jr 

Exp Chassis $529 

Quad Jr Exp Mem 

(for Chassis) $219 

Quadmem Jr 128K. Call 

Tecmar 

Jr. Captain 

(128K,C,P) $319 

Jr Wave (64K exp). 259 
Jr 2nd Mate 

(No Mem,C,P) 129 

Jr Cadet (64K exp 

for Jr Captain) 169 



For assistance in 
determining your needs 
use our technical line? 
We will be happy to 
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BVTE 



Kernel 



Computing at Chaos Manor: The renovation at Chaos Manor is nearing completion, but it was still chaotic 

Come to the Faire enough for Jerry to spend much of his time on the road, making visits to the 

by jerry Pournelle 309 Stride Fairej Texas InstrumentSi an d t h e MacFaire. At the Stride Faire he had 

Chaos Manor Mail a chance to meet Niklaus Wirth; at the MacFaire he discovered that the flood 

conducted by \erry Poumelle 338 of so f twa re for the Macintosh has finally begun. In addition to his travels, he 

byte West Coast: snobol and Icon also spent some time answering readers' letters. 

by Ezra Shapiro 341 On the West Coast this month, Ezra Shapiro, BYTE's West Coast bureau chief, 

byte U.K.: Starlit Spectrum talked to Ralph Griswold about SNOBOL4 and his new language, Icon. 

by Dick Pountain 353 Dick Pountain reports from London on Andrew Hollis's Ormada Observatory 

byte Japan: Peripherals. in northern England and on the application of the Sinclair Spectrum microcom- 

Chips, and New Computers puter in measuring the brightness of celestial objects. 

by miiam Raike 363 p rom Japan, Bill Raike reports on the Silver-Reed EB50, Fujitsu's new erasable 

According to Webster: Startup optical-disc technology, the ongoing battle of memory chips in that country, 

by Bruce Webster 367 and on two new personal computers. 

Mathematical Recreations: Parsing This month sees the debut of a new column. According to Webster is another 

and Solving Linear Equations vehicle that will let us provide informed commentary on new products. This 

by Robert t. Kurosaka 385 column, taken in conjunction with Computing at Chaos Manor, will help us 

Circuit Cellar Feedback better cover the many products that are appearing on the market. The author, 

conducted by Steve Garcia 391 Bruce Webster, knows the computer industry. His introductory column deals 

bytelines largely with Macintosh products. 

conducted by Sol ubes 393 In Mathematical Recreations, Bob Kurosaka presents a BASIC program that 

.^^^■■^.^M^n. turns a system of equations into something a computer can deal with. 

And finally, Steve Ciarcia provides a brief sampling, in Circuit Cellar Feed- 
back, of the numerous letters he receives each month, and Sol Libes offers 
more news and speculation on the personal computing industry in BYTELINES. 



JULY 1985 -BYTE 307 



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ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE 



ExpertLISP - Interpreter: Common 
LISP syntax, lexical scoping, toolbox, 
graphics. Native code COMPILER. 

51 2K MAC $465 
ExpertE ASE - Expert system tool. 
Develop by describing examples of 
how you decide. PCDOS $625 

EXSYS - Expert System building 
tool. Full RAM, Probability, Why, 
serious, files PCDOS $275 

GC LISP- "COMMON LISP", Help, 
tutorial, co-routines, compiled 
functions, thorough. PCDOS Call 
INSIGHT 1 - Expert Sys. Dev't, 
decent PCDOS $ 95 

M Prolog -full, rich, separate 
work spaces. MSDOS $725 

PROLOG-86 - Learn fast, Stan- 
dard, tutorials, samples of Natural 
Language, Exp. Sys. MSDOS $125 
TLC LISP - "LISP-machine"-like, 
all RAM, classes, turtle graphics 
8087. CP/M-86, MSDOS $235 



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BRIEF Programmer's Editor - undo, 
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VEDIT - well liked, macros, buffers, 
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C LANGUAGE 



C Terp Interpreter by Gimbel, 
full K&R, .OBJ and ASM interface, 
8087. MSDOS $275 

INSTANT C - Interactive develop- 
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EdittoRun-3Secs. MSDOS $445 
"INTRODUCING C" - Interactive 
C to learn fast. 500 page tutorial, 
examples, graphics. PCDOS $ 95 
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has fast compile, tight code, K&R. 
toolkit, .OBJ, DisASM MAC $275 

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sys. 1 1 1 syntax, lint included, fast, 
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APPLICATION TOOLKIT by Shaw - 
Complete: ISAM, Screen, Overlay 
mgnt, report gen, Strings, String 
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includes Modem7, interrupts, etc. 
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C SHARP Realtime Toolkit - well 
supported, thorough, portable, ob- 
jects, state sys. Source MANY $600 

C Index + - full B+Tree, variable 
length fields. Source, no 
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option. Lattice, C86 MSDOS $ 95 



FORTRAN LANGUAGE 



MacFORTRAN - full 77, '66 option, 
toolbox, debugger, 128K or 51 2K, 
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BetterBASIC all RAM, modules, 
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SNOBOL4+ -great for strings, 
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BASIC DEVELOPMENT SYSTEM - 
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"C" LANGUAGE 



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308 BYTE- JULY 1985 



Inquiry 286 




COMPUTING 

AT CHAOS MANOR 



Come to the Faire 



The Stride Faire 

Niklaus Wirth 

Micro Modula-2 

The Nod 

ScenicWriter 

Lilith CAD System 

The MacFaire 

MegaMac 

Mac Software Galore 



by Jerry Pournelle 



\erry Pournelle holds a doctorate in 

psychology and is a science- fiction 

writer who also earns a comfortable 

living writing about computers 

present and future. 



I" 've just been upstairs to look at my 
new office suite. The floors are still 
bare plywood, the electricity isn't 
hooked up, and the windows haven't been 
installed; but the walls are up, the ceiling 
beams are in, and I can see what it's going 
to look like. It's magnificent. Of course, it's 
not done. Half the house is folded into the 
other half, I'm still crammed into the living 
room, and everything I own is in boxes. One 
more month. Sigh. 

Fortunately, I was able to spend a good 
part of my time away from home. While the 
contractors drove our housekeeper, my 
staff, and my wife nearly out of their minds, 
I was able to get to the Stride Faire, visit 
'fexas Instruments in both Dallas and Austin, 
and go to the MacFaire in San Francisco. 
Clever, no? 

Stride Faire 

I still think of it as the Sage Faire, but they 
can call it anything they want to: it's one of 
my favorite computer shows, and this year 
there was a special treat. Thanks to Stride 
Micro I got to have lunch with Niklaus Wirth 
of the Swiss Federal Institute of 'technology 
in Zurich, one of the genuine heroes of the 
computer revolution. I'm not usually at a 
loss for words, but when he told me he 
reads these columns I think I actually stam- 
mered a bit. 

In my judgment, Stride Micro is still the 
leading outfit developing low-cost usable 
micro systems based on the Motorola 
68000 chip family. 

I now have a problem: longtime readers 
know what I mean by "chip family." Newer 
readers won't, and why should they? I'll take 
a moment to explain. 

Chip family: the micro is built around the 
"computer on a chip." At the heart of any 
micro is a single chip called the central pro- 
cessing unit (CPU). There are four main fam- 
ilies of microcomputer chips: the 8088, 
8086, 80186, 80286 family from the Intel 
Corporation used in PClones and upgrades; 
the Motorola 6500, 68000, 68010, 68020 



family used in Apple and Stride computers, 
etc.:' National Semiconductor's 32016 and 
32032 family which has yet to be adopted 
by a major manufacturer; and the Zilog Z80, 
which dominated the 8-bit market (I'm 
writing this on Zeke II, a CompuPro Z80) but 
whose upgrade, Z8000, has yet to catch on. 

Now back to the 68000 family. Stride con- 
tinues to stay on top of new developments 
in computer hardware. The new Stride ma- 
chines are built around the VME bus and 
are designed with upgrades in mind: when 
superchips such as the 68020 and beyond 
become common, Stride will be right there. 

Stride does have a rival, Pinnacle Systems. 
So far 1 haven't seen any Pinnacle equip- 
ment, but people 1 trust, including Carl 
Helmers, have been impressed. One day 
perhaps I'll do some comparisons; mean- 
while, the 68000 machines get more useful 
and more powerful all the time. Now that 
2 56K-byte chips are available in quantities, 
even the smallest Stride can have 2 
megabytes of memory and can run at 12 
megahertz. That's fast. 

Quo Vadimus? 

The mainstream of the micro community 
still looks as if it's flowing from Intel and the 
8086 family. IBM certainly thinks that's the 
mainstream. 

Then there's National Semiconductor with 
the 32016 (which used to be known as the 
16032 and don't ask me why National 
changed the name); a lot of knowledgeable 
enthusiasts, including Dr. William Godbout, 
are highly impressed with its architecture. 

A lot of top people ignore the Motorola 
68000 family. Even so, it always happens: 
when I get among enthusiasts for the 
Motorola 68000 chip, and especially when 
I get around Stride Micro's president, Rod 
Coleman, I begin to wonder. Add Jack 
Brown, Motorola engineer and product 
manager, and the enthusiasm is catching. 

According to Brown, the 68000 is the best 
thing in general use, while its follow-on 

[continued) 



JULY 1985 -BYTE 309 



Inquiry 67 for End-Users. 
Inquiry 68 for DEALERS ONLY. 

ARC X turbo Board™ 

40 % Faster Then XT, 640K On Board 




Had it AIM! 

The Ultimate in Add-On's for 
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Hard Disk 

KeyBoard 

Panasonic 
Floppy Drive 



Multifunction Card, 2 
Serial, 1 Parallel Port, 4 
Floppy Drives, Clock/ 
Calendar, Game Port 

Multifunction Card, 
(OK-384k) 

High Resolution Letter 
Quality Monochrome 
Adapter 

Monochrome Graphic 
Card Hercules Type 1 - 
2-3 Compatible 

Color Graphic Card 

Computer Case 
Standard Size Heavy 
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Computer Case ex- 
cellent for ARC X turbo 
Board, 2 L.E.D. Indicator 

135 Watt Switching 
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Printer Buffer Card 64K, 
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Floppy Disk Control 
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Call(818)-576-1621 



V 



X turbo Board is the trademark of ARC 

IBM PC/XT are registered trademarks of IBM Cap. 



CHAOS MANOR 



68020 is a better chip "than anything 
out there." In fact the 68020 is faster 
than available memory, although 
that's changing rapidly. Machines 
using the 68020 can economically put 
the equivalent of a VAX at every work- 
station. Brown says Motorola will ship 
7 5,000 of the 68020 chips this year. 

Of course, the 68020 will become 
cheaper, just as all chips do. Brown 
put it this way: "If GM could do what 
we in the semiconductor industry can 
do, a Cadillac today would cost less 
than a thousand dollars. It would also 
be about a foot long . . ." 

The 68020 is very much upward- 
compatible with the 68000, and all 
68000 programs ought to run in 
68020 machines without problems. 

As I listened to different speakers 
tell of the virtues of the 68000 series, 
I kept wondering: Why isn't this the 
mainstream? Why hasn't the chip 
caught on better in the micro com- 
munity? 

There s the Rub 

I suppose the big problem with the 
68000 family has been the operating 
system. The only popular one is the 
Lisa/Macintosh system developed by 
the folks at Apple, and not only are 
they not interested in standardization, 
they seem to fight it. Apple wants to 
sell Apple hardware. It's a policy that 
helps IBM more than Apple, but I 
don't expect the Apple strategists to 
understand that. More on the Macin- 
tosh when I get to the MacFaire. 

There was also the Fortune-32 sys- 
tem using UNIX. That never caught 
on. Meanwhile, the Sage— introduced 
at the same West Coast Computer 
Faire as the Fortune-32— came out 
with SofTech's p-System as its major 
operating system. This tied Sage/ 
Stride to a company whose marketing 
philosophy seemed to me a combina- 
tion of the worst features from Apple 
and AT&T arrogance, indifference to 
customer complaints, and total unwill- 
ingness to make any changes. Sof- 
Tech's attitude seemed to be "We 
have this wonderful product, and if 
you're too stupid to realize just how 
wonderful it is, then you don't deserve 
to use it." 



Understand, there was much to like 
about the p-System. It was too slow, 
but at first that wasn't much of a prob- 
lem because the 68000 chip was so 
fast. Later, though, rival hardware got 
faster, but the p-System didn't. In- 
deed, as the rest of the micro world 
raced ahead, the p-System didn't. 
Meanwhile, Digital Research didn't do 
any better with CP/M-68000. 1 confess 
I had thought Digital would develop 
CP/M-68K into a new standard com- 
patible with CP/M-86, after which 
CP/M would move forward to dom- 
inate the 1 6-bit world as thoroughly 
as CP/M-80 dominated the 8-bit micro 
universe. Boy, was I ever wrong. 

There were a few other rather inter- 
esting operating systems, such as the 
British-developed Metacomco system, 
but none of them really caught on. 
Like it or not, the Sage's destiny was 
intertwined with the UCSD p-System. 

Things may be different now. First, 
Soffech has reorganized, and the 
SofTech people assure me they've 
had a great change of heart. "We 
know we acted strangely," one of their 
reps told me at the Stride Faire. "It 
really is a good system, though, and 
we're working to make it better. We're 
working with the users groups, and 
we're open to suggestions from any- 
one." They've improved their relations 
with USUS, the p-System users group. 
Another visible sign of their change 
of attitude happened three days ago: 
an enormous box of Sof Tfech products 
arrived at Chaos Manor. In the past, 
they not only wouldn't send review 
copies, they didn't even answer their 
mail. 

Second, Sof'fech's p-System doesn't 
have to stand alone. Modula-2 has 
arrived. 

Violations and Volitions 

I first got interested in Modula-2 
through the enthusiasm of Rod Cole- 
man, and my first experiences with 
the language were on the Sage II. 
Naturally it ran under p-code. The 
Modula-2 implementation was devel- 
oped by Volition Systems of San 
Diego. This was a typical start-up com- 
pany with a small staff and little capi- 

[continued] 



310 BYTE • JULY 1985 




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Inquiry 147 

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Inquiry 332 




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CHAOS MANOR 



tal; everyone worked in hopes of 
developing a best-selling product. It 
was likely that they'd do that They 
were sharp troops, and many of Voli- 
tion's people came from the Univer- 
sity of California at San Diego and had 
thus worked on UCSD Pascal, from 
which grew the UCSD p-code that 
later became SofTfech's p-code. 

The best introduction to Modula-2 
I've yet encountered was the Volition 
Modula-2 documentation. That was 
written by Richard Gleaves (general- 
ly called Glitch) and has since been 
published by Springer-Verlag. Alas, it 
isn't a beginner's book; it assumes 
you know something about program- 
ming in general and Pascal in partic- 
ular. However, if you like Pascal, get 
Glitch's book; it will probably make a 
Modula-2 convert of you, and at the 
least it will show how easily Pascal 
programmers can learn Modula-2. 

After Volition's people developed 
the p-System's Modula-2 compiler, 
they set to work on a native-code 
compiler for the 68000 chip. This was 
a product sorely needed, and the first 
company to bring out a reasonably 
bug-free compiler would get big sales. 
They might not do quite as well as 
Borland International did selling 
Tlirbo Pascal, but the potential market 
was large and growing. 

Alas. Volition didn't focus its effort. 
Moreover, as often happens in small 
start-up companies, personality con- 
flicts developed. Some of the original 
founders went away to work else- 
where. They retained ownership rights 
and promises that when Volition 
struck it rich they'd be paid for back 
salaries owed. Meanwhile, those who 
remained to work on the compiler 
were working for little to no pay. 

This went on far too long. When the 
compiler was not quite finished, 
things came apart. Tensions had 
already developed between those 
who had left and those who stayed 
behind. Once the compiler was in 
sight, the tensions worsened. Reor- 
ganizations were announced. Proxy 
fights developed. The management 
team changed. Equipment was sold 
off. Volition went from healthy to 

[continued) 



312 BYTE • JULY 1985 



Inquiry 333 



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Inquiry 167 







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JULY 1985 • BYTE 313 



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CHAOS MANOR 



struggling to near death. 

Meanwhile, a few test versions of 
the compiler drifted about the micro 
community. One landed in the hands 
of Erik Smith of Scenic Computer Sys- 
tems Corporation, a firm you'll hear 
more about shortly. Erik cleaned up 
most of the remaining bugs and 
worked on the documents. His im- 
proved version went to Stride Micro. 
The Stride people did some more 
work, with the result that they have, 
in house, a Modula-2 compiler that 
works splendidly with the Stride com- 
puters; works so well, in fact, that 
Stride wrote their 68000 assembly 
language in Modula-2. 

The Volition Modula-2 compiler 
uses the p-System for the editor and 
file manager, and the compiler runs 
under the p-System; but once you 
have compiled the file, it is a true 
native-code program that has only 
minimal interface with the p-System. 
Volition Modula-2 programs don't 
have the 64K-byte limit on code size 
that p-System programs have; and 
they're very fast compared to p-code. 

The new Stride Micro computer sys- 
tems have great graphics capabilities. 
Stride now uses Wyse terminals, and 
they've done nearly incredible things. 
They can repaint a screen instantly, 
faster than Zeke II manages with 
memory-mapped video. The nice part 
is that Modula-2 is very nearly the 
perfect language for exploiting 
Stride's graphics. It is also a great 
language in which to develop a text 
editor. I've got a couple of colleagues 
working on doing just that. So, I 
suspect, does Stride. 

Moreover, Modula-2 was explicitly 
designed as a language you can use 
to write an operating system. After 
Niklaus Wirth wrote Pascal, he spent 
a sabbatical year at the Xerox Palo 
Alto Research Center (PARC). Alan 
Kay was also at PARC Much of the 
Macintosh operating system is no 
more than an implementation of Kay's 
ideas. Wirth left PARC with many of 
those ideas and went home to Zurich 
to write Modula-2. As a consequence, 
the Modula-2 operating system 
strongly resembles the Mac's. A 

{continued) 
JULY 1985 • BYTE 315 



CHAOS MANOR 



Modula-2 operating system for the 
Stride could have most of the better 
features of the Macintosh without the 
limitations. 

So far there's no Modula-2 operat- 
ing system for the Sage, but that will 
change. Meanwhile, I did see demon- 
strations of Volition Modula-2 pro- 
grams working within the p-System, 



and they were fast. The Stride, unlike 
the Macintosh, can handle lots of 
memory, extra disk drives, tape back- 
ups, and the other peripherals one ex- 
pects microcomputers routinely to 
make use of. I'd already thought that 
Modula-2 and the Sage, oops. Stride 
Micro machines were made for each 
other; seeing what they'd done using 



the Volition compiler, 
ly sure of it. 



was absolute- 



TAKE ON TOMORROW 

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Arbitration, Anyone? 

There was one big problem. The Voli- 
tion compiler was all tied up in law- 
suits and acrimony. There was no way 
any publisher could get an unclouded 
license to market it. 

I'd heard bits and pieces of the Voli- 
tion controversy before going to Reno 
for the Stride Faire. It had seemed un- 
fortunate; but now that I'd seen the 
compiler working on a Stride, it was 
tragic. Stride was arranging to trade 
my Sage IV for a Stride 440— but they 
couldn't let me have the Modula-2 
compiler. 

Representatives from most of the 
major factions in the Volition dispute 
were present at the Faire. It wasn't 
hard to get each to give his version 
of the problem. When I'd heard them 
all, I wanted to cry. We had here a 
classic case of a failure to communi- 
cate, with serious complications 
caused by an awful lot of wounded 
pride. 

Certain facts stood out. First: there 
were no villains here. Sure, each side 
could persuade itself that the others— 
or at least one of the others— was a 
villain, but objectively it just wasn't 
true. 

More important, though, from what 
each told me he wanted, it was ob- 
vious they aren't even very far apart. 
It may well be that their lawyers have 
made needless claims— lawyers tend 
to do that— but from what the princi- 
pals to the dispute told me, they'd all 
be better off if they all lost. That is: if 
in order to get the compiler on the 
market they agreed that each side 
would get no more than the other was 
willing to concede, and some random 
stranger, or the government, took all 
the rest, all of the factions would still 
be better off than they are now. The 
potential sales of the compiler— pro- 
vided that it gets out there while it has 
a chance to grab some market share- 
are large, while the potential return 
from liquidating the company is small. 

The image 1 get is a farm: the goose 
is dead, but there's one unhatched 

[continued) 



316 BYTE • JULY 1985 



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75 



CHAOS MANOR 



Many of the language's 
limits were imposed 
by the machinery 
Vs/irth had available, 
and they might 
be changed in 
later revisions. 



egg. All the heirs to the farm are 
standing in the nest fighting with 
sledgehammers. 

It seemed a perfect situation for ar- 
bitration. I spent a good part of my 
time at the Stride Faire trying to per- 
suade all parties of that. Now, it's a 
truism that the best way to make 
enemies is to stick your nose in other 
people's quarrels— but damn all this 
isn't just their fight. Anyone interested 
in the future of the 68000 chip family 
has an interest in the outcome. As a 
result, I not only tried to persuade 
them to submit this mess to arbitra- 
tion, but I even offered to get involved 
if that would help. So far no one has 
taken my offer; but I do understand 
there's a good chance they can come 
to sufficient agreement to get the 
compiler on the market. 

Last-minute flash: it looks like they 
have. Stay tuned. 

MOSYS 

It's almost an embarras de ricfiesses. Until 
recently, there wasn't a good operat- 
ing system for 68000-based com- 
puters. Now there are several based 
on Modula-2. One that I saw at the 
Stride Faire was MOSYS, which comes 
from the British. firm Robinson Sys- 
tems. I've known Brian Kirk, manag- 
ing director (sort of like president) of 
Robinson for some time, and I'm 
always astonished at what^his people 
can accomplish. 

MOSYS is a full operating system 
and comes with an editor, document- 
processing program, and Modula-2 



compiler. You also get quite a lot of 
source code. I saw it work on Stride 
systems, and I have the documents: 
a bit dry but thorough. I anticipate no 
problems with MOSYS. A copy will 
come with my Stride system; full 
report Real Soon Now. 

The Master Speaks 

1 liked last year's Faire, but the big at- 
traction for me this year was Dr. 
Niklaus Wirth, certainly one of the 
most influential leaders of the micro 
revolution. On my way to Reno I tried 
to imagine what Wirth would be like. 
I had a few clues: there's a famous 
story about his reply when asked how 
to pronounce his name. 

"You can call me by name, or you 
can call me by value," he is supposed 
to have answered. "If you call me by 
name, it is 'VIRT.' If you call me by 
value, it is 'Worth.' " 

I can't confirm that Wirth ever ac- 
tually said anything like that. I think 
I do not know another pun that ex- 
ploits three languages (German, 
English, and Pascal). Certainly the 
man I met would have been capable 
of it. He has a puckish sense of humor 
and speaks excellent English, as does 
his wife. Frau Wirth found Reno 
fascinating. During lunch she kept 
making one-dollar keno bets on 
numbers that mathematicians would 
find interesting; at last count she was 
about $50 ahead. 

After lunch Dr. Wirth gave a talk on 
Modula-2. He said too much for easy 
summarization; 1 expect I'll be crib- 
bing pieces of it for a year. He man- 
aged, in a bit more than an hour, to 
say more interesting things about 
compiler design than I've learned in 
five years. I don't find Wirth a good 
writer; but he's a fascinating speaker. 

Because I am a staunch Modula-2 
enthusiast, a number of readers have 
asked me, more or less politely, to ex- 
plain some of the curious aspects of 
the language. Why has Wirth done 
this? Why has he left that out? After 
hearing Wirth's lecture, I can make this 
generalization: when Wirth designs a 
compiler, there are no "accidents." 
There's a good reason for everything 
he does. 



Wirth begins with a philosophy: 
keep it simple. "There should not be 
a compiler that takes 100,000 lines of 
source code and requires experts and 
armies of programmers to maintain. 
Such things should not exist." Com- 
pilers should be simple and consis- 
tent. There should be no surprises. 
When Wirth mentions Ada, he grows 
contemptuous. "They put in exception 
handling. They don't know how to 
program." 

Of course, not all omissions and in- 
clusions grow out of high philosophy. 
"If you are at a university and have 
only a few students to help you, you 
better don't do vast projects." At 
Wirth's university during 1975-76 he 
had only one machine, a PDP-11 with 
56K bytes of storage. "This set definite 
limits to the size of programs, in- 
cluding compilers." 

Of course, many people cannot dis- 
tinguish between a language and their 
implementation of it. After Pascal's 
success showed the need for a follow- 
on language. Wirth developed 
Modula-2; but he had only a little 
time— part-time one summer— to write 
an implementation of it. The idea was 
to keep the compiler small and com- 
prehensible and get it running. Once 
a Modula-2 compiler existed, it could 
be used to write a better compiler. 

His first Modula-2 compiler took 25 
minutes to compile itself. By working 
recursively, he was able to develop a 
version that would compile itself in 2 
minutes. "As you see. you can gain not 
only by making fast hardware." The 
speed was not done at the sacrifice 
of comprehension. 

Many of the language's limits were 
imposed by the machinery Wirth had 
available, and they might be changed 
in later revisions. On the other hand, 
Wirth is contemptuous of program- 
mers who read through the language 
report and call for extensions before 
they have even tried to use the lan- 
guage. He has special scorn for those 
who insist that a language have excep- 
tion handling. 

"If you are deep inside nested struc- 
tures, it can be good to raise your 
hand and shout 'Help!' But could not 

{continued) 



318 BYTE • JULY 1985 



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Gorvus 



JULY 1985 -BYTE 319 



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CHAOS MANOR 



Industry needs 



standards much more 
than universities. 
Even so, there is 
such a thing as 
too much standards! 



that problem have been handled 
before? Rather than build exception 
structures— surprises— into the lan- 
guage, is it not better to raise flags 
and check them later?" 

Wirth also commented on what he 
called the "urge to standardization. I 
appreciate the need of industry for 
standards. Industry needs standards 
much more than universities. Even so, 
there is such a thing as too much stan- 
dards." Programmers must be clever 
enough not to explore the language 
and find "features" not described in 
the language report, or else they will 
later clamor that those "features" be 
in the language— yet there may be a 
very good reason why they should be 
left out. "A language report should 
not only be taken for what it says but 
for what it does not say." 

Wirth finds one omission serious. "I 
will probably introduce forward 
definitions, but I do not like it. In 
general, you should not add complex- 
ities to handle a few pathological 
cases. If there were a trivial fix to the 
problem of forward declarations, I 
would have done it already." 

There was a great deal more; 
enough that I'm still digesting his lec- 
ture while rethinking some of my ob- 
jections. I'll admit it: I was one of 
those who clamored for certain exten- 
sions and changes to the language 
before I did much programming in it. 
On reflection, I find that a particular- 
ly silly form of hubris and a mistake 
I don't intend to continue. When we 
get Chaos Manor rebuilt and I have 
my machines set up again— at the mo- 

[continued] 



320 BYTE • JULY 1985 



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CHAOS MANOR 



ment there's only room for Zeke II, 
and he's crowded into the living 
room— I'll do some more exploration. 

How Do We Really Do It? 

After Wirth's lecture, there was a 
panel on the Modula-2 language. 
Alas, whether due to the hour or the 
speakers, I slept through much of it. 

There were a few interesting points. 
Ion Bondy, former officer of USUS, 
talked about Modula-2's seeming 
simplicity. "At the end of a month I 
thought I knew all about the language, 
but then I feel this way every month." 
The real value of Modula-2 is that big 
projects can be broken up into mean- 
ingful parts for different people to 
work on— and it really works. 

Tom DeMarco commented on pro- 
gramming philosophy and gave the 
opinion that Modula-2 is a major step 
toward developing a "standard soft- 
ware bus," which all of us, profes- 



sionals and amateurs alike, can make 
use of. 

One of the major advantages of 
Modula-2 is that it is truly possible to 
use teams of programmers to work on 
large projects. Modula's, er, modular 
structure allows projects to be broken 
apart and keeps the interfaces be- 
tween pieces thin; according to the 
panelists, thinner than with any other 
language. Bondy told of some recent 
projects he'd worked on. "We wouldn't 
be finished without Modula-2." 

All the panelists agreed that pro- 
grammers think too little and begin 
writing code too early. "It's the API^ 
FORTH philosophy," Bondy said. 
"Don't think about the problem, just 
start hacking at it." 

With Modula-2 you needn't do that. 
In fact, if you have a team of program- 
mers, you can't do that. Instead, you 
must spend time breaking things 
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accomplished. These "definition 
modules" can be passed back and 
forth, and once agreed on, they can 
be fixed even though the implemen- 
tation modules that actually do the 
work are changed. This is the way to 
proceed. 

I listened to all this and nodded 
agreement, but then I began to 
wonder. It all reminded me of how 
English teachers tell us we ought to 
write. Do outlines. Think of what you 
want to say. Get it all organized. Most 
people start writing too early. Don't. 
Wait until you know where you're go- 
ing ... 

I don't know any professional 
writers who do that. Certainly I don't. 
If English teachers follow their own 
advice, it's no wonder that so few of 
them can support themselves by writ- 
ing. It's perfectly true that badly 
organized material reads badly; but 
it's not necessarily true that the best 
way to do well-structured writing is to 
sit and think and outline forever. If 1 
had to do that, I'd get so discouraged 
that I'd never write anything at all. 

Most writers I know simply start 
hacking at the problem, writing what- 
ever comes to mind. Get it down and 
written; then, later, when there's 
something to organize, you can work 
on the structure. That's what's so 
wonderful about writing with com- 
puters: it makes reorganization so 
easy. In the old days I had to use 
scissors and paste. 

For me, at least, the big problem of 
writing is getting the thoughts down 
on paper. (Well, in my case, on disk.) 
The easiest thing I can find is a good 
reason why I should think about my 
essay or story rather than writing it. 
In fact, the best way I know of to get 
writer's block is to insist that first-draft 
stuff be presentable. 

I find programming much the same. 
It's a lot easier to sit and think about 
structures than it is to hack out code. 
Now it may be that programming is 
a fundamentally different kind of 

[continued] 



322 BYTE • JULY 1985 



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CHAOS MANOR 



creative activity from writing and dif- 
ferent rules ought to apply; but I don't 
believe it. I'm not a professional pro- 
grammer, but I have written some 
pretty complicated programs, includ- 
ing the accounting system I use; and 
I find that the best way to get a pro- 
gram done is to treat it like an essay. 
Think about where you want to go; 
look at what must be done to get 
there; and start working on the parts 
that look the most interesting. It will 
all get reorganized later. 

Most programmers I know work that 
way. Get something running; that's 
work, but it's also rewarding to see 
progress. When you're tired of writing 
code, stop and think again. It's a 
recursive process. Of course, pro- 
grammers can, if not careful, get into 
a blind alley and be faced with throw- 
ing away a lot of work or hacking up 
some particularly horrible kludge; but 
that's also true for writers and only 



goes to prove that courage is in- 
dispensable to programmers and 
writers alike. 

Books written in collaboration need 
more organization than those written 
solo, of course; but once again, there's 
a strong motivation factor. Larry Niven 
and I have written five novels (the 
latest. Footfall from Ballantine Books, 
ought to be in your local bookstore 
right now) together; and the hardest 
part of it is when we have to work 
alone. When we get together and I see 
text I didn't write, or improvements in 
something I thought was pretty good 
to begin with, the result is a flurry of 
work. It's often necessary to sit at the 
conference table and work on an out- 
line; but the real inspirations come 
when the words begin to flow. 

Now, I am willing to concede the 
value of good organization and of 
thinking things out in advance; but 
just as good writing requires rewriting 



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and editing, so, I think, does good 
programming. It would be remarkable 
if my first cut at organizing an essay 
turned out to be optimum; and 
though I have less experience at pro- 
gramming, I suspect it's no different 
there. In fact. I'm tentatively putting 
it forth as one of Pournelle's laws: in 
any large programming effort the 
outline will change when coding 
begins. 

For all that, the panelists were 
agreed that Modula-2 makes it easier 
to do proper organization, as well as 
to compensate for organizational 
mistakes, whether you're working solo 
or as part of a team; and I believe 
that. 

Just Turn Your Head . . . 

Some love them, some hate them, but 
many users have strong feelings about 
mice. Touch-typists find mice some- 
times useful but are annoyed by 
machines that have no arrow keys and 
thus make you take your hands off the 
keyboard. In my own case, my desk 
is always covered with papers: not 
only is there no place to operate the 
mouse, but often I can't even find the 
silly thing. 

Alternatives to mice include foot- 
controlled mice— sometimes called 
rats— joysticks, trackballs, thumb balls, 
and touchpads. Comes now the new 
Stride "spot," which they call The Nod. 
That is: Stride's engineers have 
mounted a small infrared source and 
detector on the screen. The operator 
takes a circle of silvered tape about 
the size of a quarter and mounts it on 
his head. You can stick it on your fore- 
head, on your glasses, or on the end 
of a pencil to stick behind your ear. 
It doesn't matter. You can now con- 
trol the cursor by moving your head. 

This works. Naturally there are a 
number of control features. You can 
program in the slewing rate and that 
sort of thing, and there are various 
ways to enable/disable it. I don't know 
how I'll like it, because due to the con- 
struction here I don't have mine set 
up yet; but I had no trouble using the 
one on demonstration in Reno, and 
I rather like the idea. My new Stride 

[continued) 



324 B YTE • JULY 1985 



Inquiry 402 



To succeed in the future, 

you must learn 

to speak its language. 




Martin Marietta Denver Aerospace is committed to 
a future of computer software excellence. Ada® is 
part of that future. But our commitment to becoming 
the software center of excellence requires exceptional 
people — people who don't wait for the future, but 
work to create it. 

We are now looking for software and other aerospace 
professionals to move ahead with us, to step into the 
future and help lead the way. There are already many 
opportunities to work with Ada as we explore its many 
applications. We are continuing our intensive on-site 
software engineering education curriculum for our 
employees (a full-time, 13-week hands-on Ada program). 

So, if you want to succeed in the future, come to where 
we already speak its language — Martin Marietta Denver 
Aerospace. 

We have opportunities available for aerospace profes- 
sionals with at least 3 years experience in: 

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• Systems Safety • Logistics • Mechanical Engineering 



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• Manufacturing • Finance Estimators 

Other career opportunities exist at Martin Marietta 
Aerospace in Baltimore, Maryland; Orlando, Florida; & 
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RECENT EXPERIENCE ON GOVERNMENT/DOD 
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Please send your confidential resume to: Martin 
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Denver, Colorado 802 01. No agencies please, we prefer 
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U.S. Citizenship Required. 

An Affirmative Action Employer Actively Seeking the 
Veteran and Handicapped. 



AfXI#7TVAf Af>Q#?/ 



* Ada i s a registered trademark of the Department o f Defense. 



Inquiry 2 21 



JULY 1985 -BYTE 325 



CHAOS MANOR 



Lilitk's CAD software 
is designed for use by 
technicians who know 
something about taping 
boards and don't 
want to become 
computer jocks. 



440 will be equipped with The Nod. 
More Real Soon Now. 

Scenic 

If you're interested in computerized 
typesetting, you need to talk to the 
people at Scenic Computer Systems 
Corporation of Redmond. Washing- 
ton. They've developed a number of 
typesetting/formatting programs, in- 
cluding the one used to set type for 
Glitch's Modula-2 book. Their original 
ScenicWriter programs were in 
various languages, including assembly 
languages, but now they're working 
seriously with Modula-2. ScenicWriter 
can do a lot. and once it's in Modula-2 
it will be even easier to add special 
features. It will also be more portable. 
Their system takes the output from 
a text editor— nearly any text editor— 
and formats it for a variety of printers, 
including the HP LaserJet and the new 



Apple laser printer. I was fascinated 
by all the things they can do with the 
LaserJet making use of the various 
font cartridges available from HP. Erik 
Smith, their vice president for engi- 
neering whom I mentioned above, is 
impressively informed about both 
typesetting and computers. He tells 
me that the LaserJet is very nice. 
Those who do fancy printing may find 
Apple's LaserWriter is worth the extra 
money, but LaserJet is darn good. 

This is a show report, not an evalua- 
tion: I'll have more on ScenicWriter 
when I get the Stride 440 set up in my 
new quarters. Meanwhile. I liked what 
I saw. and if you're in the fancy text- 
formatting business, look at Scenic- 
Writer. You may like it a lot. 

Sign of the Times 

A quick note: I now have review 
copies of three different commercial 
programs written in Logitech's 
Modula-2 for the IBM PC They work. 
The language has come of age. and 
I expect to see many more Modula-2 
programs in the coming year. 

SUPERPRACTICAL LlLITH 

The Lilith computer is a wonderful 
Modula-2 programming environment, 
and I don't hesitate to recommend it 
for anyone seriously interested in 
writing big programs in that language. 
It's not likely to catch on as a mass- 
market machine, so I haven't in con- 
science been able to recommend it to 
anyone but Modula-2 programmers. 
That's all changed. 



If your business involves laying out 
and taping circuit boards, you need 
to call Richard Ohran at Modula Cor- 
poration. He has turned the Lilith into 
a superbly practical engine for gen- 
erating circuit-board templates. 

The CAD (computer-aided design) 
software is designed for use by tech- 
nicians who know something about 
taping boards and don't want to 
become computer jocks. The system 
can be learned in two days. The con- 
version is simple because Ohran's sys- 
tem is designed to be easy for com- 
puter neophytes to learn. After a cou- 
ple of days' experience with the Lilith, 
board designers can take a complex 
multilayered board from circuit 
diagram to photo templates in a week 
or less. 

Dr. Ohran had Lilith set up in his 
hotel room, and we went up after the 
Saturday dinner show— the MGM puts 
on the San Francisco Quake twice 
nightly, and it's still one of the best 
dinner shows I've ever seen— for a 
demonstration. I watched Ohran play- 
ing about with the system. He drew 
lines. Called in circuit components. 
Rerouted lines. Changed layouts. 
Marked chunks to be enlarged, 
worked on them, and changed their 
scale. 'That's as good as I've seen on 
a Symbolics machine." I said. 

Ohran didn't even chuckle. "Sym- 
bolics isn't as fast." 

He was dead serious, and I'm sure 
he's right. I've seen nothing as fast for 
manipulating circuit elements. The 

(continued) 



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326 BYTE • JULY 1985 



Inquiry 209 



New Generation Communications 



Our new Crosstalk Mark 4 behaves 
just as reliably as the Crosstalk 
you've always trusted. But when you 
ask it for a bit extra, you're in for 
some surprises. 

Up To 15 

Concurrent 

Sessions 

Mark 4 supports the X.PC multiple- 
session protocol, so it's capable of up 
to 15 concurrent communications 
sessions, each with the end-to-end 
error-checking needed for 
tomorrow's higher speed modems. 

With more than one session going 
on at once, you need some way to 
keep track of them all. Crosstalk Mark 
4 has that, too. 

What You Get Is 
What You See 

Mark 4 identifies each session with 
a "page" number. You can flick from 
one session to another with one 
keystroke. See each one full screen. 

But if you'd like to keep an eye on 
more than one session at once, you 
can create windows — as many as 
you need in any size or shape — to 
display them all. 

Menu? Or 
Command? 

No matter how expert you are, 
Mark 4 is just your speed. It operates 
on command, or with a menu, or 
any combination of the two. 

Inquiry 24 7 




If you need help at any point in 
your command sequence, Mark 4 
gives you suggestions that apply 
precisely to the task at hand. 

Why Repeat 
Yourself? 

If you make the same calls often, 
as most people do, Mark 4 can save 
you a lot of dull repetition. It has 
built-in command programs to call 
up and log in to most of the major in- 
formation utilities. 

But Mark 4 goes one step further. It 
can "memorize" any command 
sequence you perform, then repeat it 
that way any time you ask it to. You 
can't make programming much 
easier than that. 

And Now, By 
Popular Request ... 



IBM 3 1 1 , DEC VT-52, VT- 1 00, and 
the Tele Video 900 series. Most other 
programs emulate one or two. 
— In addition to X.PC, Crosstalk 
Mark 4 supports Kermit, Xmodem, 
and of course our own Crosstalk 
protocol. 

How New Is New 

Generation 

Communication? 

New enough for the advanced 
breed of modem that's already 
coming around the corner. New 
enough to give you the best high- 
speed, error-checked communication 
possible on noisy phone lines — or 
secure dedicated lines. 

Finally, because Crosstalk is 
already the industry standard for 
small business computers, Mark 4 is 
at home in a broader universe than 
any other communications software. 

It may be new and improved 
and revolutionary — but 
it's still Crosstalk. 



— Mark 4 has a text-editor built 
in. You can create and 
edit files without 
having to leave 
Crosstalk. 

— Mark 4 
emulates the 
most popular 
terminals, including 




iMICRQSTUFf 



1000 Holcomb Woods Parkway / Roswell, Georgia 30076 

JULY 1985 'BYTE 327 



CHAOS MANOR 



Lilith CAD system uses the mouse to 
draw circuit lines, chip-mount pads 
(the little wide spots that chips or chip 
sockets would be soldered to), and 
the other stuff that goes onto circuit 
boards. Elements, such as pads, can 
be built up into larger units, as large 
as you want. Since each is an element 
in the file, changes can be made at 



any level. For example, if you change 
the design of one of the chip-mount 
pads at the lowest level, then every in- 
stance of that particular pad, hun- 
dreds of them, will change instantly. 
Alternatively, you could change one 
of them at the highest level of abstrac- 
tion and only that particular one 
would change. 



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The system has a real mode and a 
quick mode. In quick mode the cor- 
ners aren't exactly rounded, and there 
are other subtle shortcuts; but it's very 
fast recalculating hundreds of images 
and redrawing them nearly instanta- 
neously. Real mode is slower but 
shows on screen exactly what you'd 
get if you made printouts and tem- 
plates. Real mode does size and 
shape and scale changes fast enough 
to work with; it's slow only in com- 
parison to quick mode. 

The Lilith will certainly raise produc- 
tivity. One Santa Monica outfit has a 
Lilith CAD system with a slightly flaky 
hard disk. Dr. Ohran keeps urging 
them to ship the unit back to him for 
repair; but they say they can't spare 
the machine even for a couple of 
days. They'd rather keep lots of 
backups than be without the unit. 
"One of these days I'll have to ship 
them a loaner," Richard Ohran says. 

The Lilith system is about $21,000 
with software, which is a bit beyond 
the price range I usually review. Still, 
I'm no great expert on CAD systems 
for making circuit-board templates, 
but I'd be much surprised if there's 
anything this effective at anything like 
its price. Anyone in that business 
should certainly find out about it. 

MacFaire 

The Macintosh Faire was held in San 
Francisco's Brooks Hall the 22 nd and 
23rd of February. I had a long-stand- 
ing dinner engagement with Frank 
Herbert for the night of the 22nd, 
leaving nothing for it: I caught an 
airplane to San Francisco at 0700 
Saturday the 23rd. This was unlikely 
to put me in a good mood for look- 
ing at MacProducts. 

It didn't matter. Besides being in 
Brooks Hall, where the West Coast 
Computer Faire was held for so many 
years, the MacFaire had something 
else in common with the early West 
Coast Faires. There was an almost 
electric air of excitement. The Mac- 
Faire was full of people who like small 
computers. Whatever else I might 
think about the Macintosh, I give it full 
marks for bringing the fun back to the 

[continued) 



328 BYTE • JULY 1985 



Inquiry 214 



# 



TIME & MONEY 

SemiDisk is the disk emulator that saves you more of both. 







\Jtfeve just done something we know you'll like. We've made 
the SemiDisk far more affordable than ever before. With price 
cuts over 25% for most of our product line. Even our new 2 
megabyte units are included. 
COMPARE WITH THE OTHERS. 

SemiDisk Systems builds fast disk errjulators for more 
microcomputers than anyone else. S-100, IBM-PC, Epson QX40, 
TRS-80 Models II, 12, and 16. Up to 2 megabytes per board, 
standard. Up to 8 megabytes per computer, using only four bus 
slots, max! Software drivers are available for CP/M 80, MS-DOS, 
ZDOS, TurboDOS, VALDOCS 2, and Cromix. SemiDisk turns 
good computers into great computers. 
GREAT NEWS FOR IBM PC AT USERS. 

New MS-DOS 3.0 software drives take full advantage of the 
80286's expanded instruction set, moving data four times faster 
than can be done on PC or XT. 
BATTERY BACKUP, TOO. 

At 0.7 amps per 2 megabytes, SemiDisk consumes far less 
power than the competition. And you don't have to worry if the 
lights go out. The battery backup option gives you 5-10 hours of 
data protection during a blackout. Nobody else has this 
important feature. Why risk valuable data? 



IT'S EXPANDABLE TO 8 MEGABYTES 

You can start with as little as 512K bytes, and later upgrade to 
2 megabytes per board. At your own pace, as your needs expand. 

In an IBM PC, XT, and AT you can have multiple drives on a 
single system. And the SemiDisk gives you mainframe 
performance on the top of your desk. 
AND THE BEST NEWS IS SAVED FOR LAST: 





512K 


1Mbyte 


2Mbyte 


SemiDisk I, S-100 


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SI 395 




SemiDisk II, S-100 


S995 




J 1995 


IBM PC, XT, AT 


1695 




SI 795 


QX-10 


S595 




SI 795 


TRS-80II, 12, 16 


S695 




SI 795 


Battery Backup Unit 


S150 


$150 


S150 



SEMIDISK 

SemiDisk Systems, Inc. 

P.O. Box GG, Beaverton, Oregon 97075 

503-642-3100 

Inquiry 317 



Call 503-444-5510 for CBBS/NW, 503-775-4838 forCBBS/PCS, and 503 449-8327 for CBBS/Aloha, all SemiDisk-equipped computer bulletin boards 
( 300/1200 baud). SemiDisk, SemiSrxx>l trademarks of SemiDisk Systems, CP/M trademark of Digital Research. 



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We just hatched a new line of automatic sheet 
feeders for the Epson FX-80+ and FX-100 + . 

They're called the Lettermate l/e's and they sell for 
chicken feed; starting at $199.00. 

Being LetterMates from BDT Products, they have all 
the features you'd expect: continuous feeding action, 
an adjustable bin for horizontal or landscape printing, 
and easy, super-fast installation by the user. 

Your local BDT dealer would be proud as a peacock 
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Nothing tops a printer lihe a LetterMate 

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Inquiry 49 for End-Users. Inquiry 50 for DEALERS ONLY. 




CHAOS MANOR 



small-computer game. 

Moreover, there's no question about 
it: useful MacSoftware is beginning to 
appear. It's now possible to use the 
Macintosh as a serious business ma- 
chine—and still have some fun while 
doing it. 



Before a number of you write me 
triumphant letters saying tl I told you 
so." let me hastily add that just about 
all that new software is for the 512K- 
byte Macintosh; the 128K-byte Mac 
still has severe limits. When the Mac 
first came out, 1 advised readers not 



to get one. Those who took my advice 
saved a lot of money; now you can get 
a Fat Mac for less than you'd have 
paid for the thin one a year ago. Dur- 
ing that year the 128K-byte Mac might 
have been a good companion for 

{continued) 







Items Discussed 




Baron 




Macintosh 




NEC PC-8201 


. $399 


(for Macintosh) 


.$59.95 


128K bytes 


. $2195 


NEC Home Electronics 




Millionaire 




512K bytes 


.$2795 


1401 Estes Ave. 




(for Macintosh) 


.$59.95 


Apple Computer 




Elk Grove Village, IL 60007 




Tycoon 




20525 Mariani Ave. 




(312) 228-5900 




(for Macintosh) 


.$59.95 


Cupertino, CA 95014 








Blue Chip Software 




(408) 973-2222 




Omnidrive (for Macintosh) 




6740 Eton Ave. 








5.5 megabytes 


$1495 


Canoga Park, CA 91303 




Lilith CAD System 


$21,000 


1 1 megabyes 


$1995 


(818) 346-0730 




Lilith Computer 


. $8000 


2 1 megabytes 


$2995 


CONCERTWARE 




MAcModula-2 


. . . $150 , 


Corvus Systems Inc. 
2100 Corvus Dr. 




Modula Corporation 




(for Macintosh) 


$49.95 


950 North University Ave. 




San lose, CA 95124 




Great Wave Software 




Provo, UT 84604 




(408) 5 59-7000 




POB 5847 




(801) 377-3598 








Stanford, CA 94305 




MacNosy 


....$50 


p-System 1V2 




(415) 325-2202 




Jasik Designs 




(SofTkch's liaison) 


.$250 






343 Trenton Way 




Stride 440 starts at $5900 


CP/M-68000 OEM p 


Menlo Park. CA 9402 5 




The Nod 




Digital Research 




(415) 322-1386 




(available as a development 




60 Garden Court 








tool) 


. $400 


Monterey, CA 93940 




MegaMac 


. .$1395 


with cable 


(408) 649-3896 




Micrographic Images 




Stride Micro 








21040 Victory Blvd., Suite 210 


4905 Energy Way 




Fast Finder 


. . $100 


Woodland Hills, CA 91367 




Reno, NV 89502 




ISrdis Software 




(818) 368-3482 




(702) 322-6868 




2817 Sloat Rd. 












Pebble Beach. CA 93953 




Modula-2 (for IBM PC) ... . 


. . .$495 


TechFonts (for Macintosh) 




(408) 372-1722 




Logitech Inc. 




Price unavailable 






805 Veterans Blvd. 




Paragon Courseware 




HP-110 


.$2995 


Redwood City. CA 94063 




4954 Sun Valley Rd. 




LaserJet 


.$3495 


(415) 365-9852 




Del Mar. CA 92014 




Hewlett-Packard 

974 East Arques Ave.. MS 7 2 LP 


Modula-2 (for Stride) 

ScenicWriter 


..$500 
$995 


UnderWare Colorpens 


$14.95 


Sunnyvale. CA 94086 
(800) 367-4772 

Hyperdrive (for Macintosh) 




Scenic Computer Systems 

Corporation 
14852 Northeast 31st Circle 
Redmond WA 98052 




Diversions Inc. 
15 50 Winding Way 
Belmont, CA 94002 
(415) 591-0660 




for 512K-byte Macintosh . . 
for 128K-byte Macintosh 


. $2195 
. $2 79 5 


(206) 885-5500 




Wyse WY-50 Terminal 


. $695 


(includes $600 upgrade 




MOSYS Operating System 




Wyse Technology 




to 512K-byte Macintosh) 




(for Stride) Price unavailable 


3040 North First St. 




General Computer Company 




Robinson Systems 




San Jose, CA 95134 




215 First St. 




Red Lion House 




(408) 946-3075 




Cambridge. MA 02142 




St. Mary's St. 




(inside California) 




(800) 422-0101 




Painswick GL6 6QR 
United Kingdom 




(800) 421-1058 
(outside California) 




LaserWriter 


. $6995 


0452-813699 









JULY 1985 • BYTE 331 



CHAOS MANOR 



The Modula Corporation 
now has a working 
Modula-2 compiler 
for the Macintosh. 



those trying to grow a beard or mak- 
ing a study of wristwatch icons, but 
serious users would have gotten a lot 
more mileage out of something else. 
The Mac is a better buy now. Of 
course, the documents still are inade- 
quate in my judgment; even the $ 1 50 
"Inside Mac" package you can buy 
extra— do you know of any other com- 
pany that sells you photocopied 
loose-leaf sheets in lieu of providing 
real technical documentation?— isn't 
very complete. 

Hacking Your Mac 

The day I returned from the MacFaire 
I packed up my Macintosh and 
shipped it off to General Computer. 
Eight days later it returned with 5 1 2 K 
bytes and the internal hard disk they 
call Hyperdrive. It's fast and works 
fine. 

I also ordered another 128K-byte 
Mac. That one will go to Janek 
Kaliczak. president of Micrographic 
Images Corp., the outfit that did many 
of the House of Dracula special ef- 
fects for the Universal Studio tours. 
Janek and his people demonstrated 
the MegaMac at the MacFaire. This is 
a package that can be installed by 
dealers in 20 minutes for less than 
$1 500; and it puts a full megabyte of 
memory at the MacUser's disposal. 
The Micrographic Images people did 
some clever work integrating the 
MegaMac into the Macintosh operat- 
ing system, but even so the Macintosh 
can't make full use of more than 512K 
bytes of memory. However, the other 
500K bytes in the MegaMac isn't 
wasted. It's used as a RAM (random- 
access read/write memory) disk. That 
lets the Mac swap screen images 
faster than I'd have believed. Every 
time I went past the MegaMac display, 
Janek was surrounded by huge 



crowds fascinated by the Mac's new- 
found speed. 

When it came time to integrate 
memory into the Mac, Janek used a 
VAX to disassemble the Macintosh 
ROMs (read-only memories) and 
operating system into source code. 
There's another way now. One of the 
programs demonstrated at the Mac- 
Faire was MacNosy, a disassembler 
that can be aimed at the Macintosh 
ROMs or any other Mac program. I 
haven't used it yet, but I have looked 
at the documentation. As you may 
suspect, you need to know something 
about 68000 assembly language and 
how disassemblers work. Given that 
and determination, though, you can 
find out a lot about what's happening 
in the Mac; more than Apple tells in 
its overpriced "developer's" docu- 
mentation. 

Anyway, my second Mac will 
become a MegaMac, after which the 
Corvus people will install their new 
hard disk, Omnidrive. I'll then be able 
to compare that system against the 
Fat Mac with Hyperdrive. It should 
prove interesting. 

MacModula-2 

The Modula Corporation now has a 
working Modula-2 compiler for the 
Macintosh. The compiler was an- 
nounced last summer, but it took a 
while to deliver. I don't recommend 
the 128K-byte Mac for any but the 
most patient users, but amazingly the 
compiler will even work with that. A 
story goes with that. 

Richard Ohran got his Ph.D. from 
the Swiss Federal Institute of Tech- 
nology in Zurich. Niklaus Wirth was 
his sponsor. Ohran believes he under- 
stands Modula-2. Moreover, the 
Modula Corporation has developed a 
perky little board for the Apple II that 
lets you write good Modula-2 pro- 
grams and run them on that vener- 
able machine. (The board speeds up 
the Apple II to be faster than a Macin- 
tosh. Apple owners ought to look into 
it.) Consequently, Dr. Ohran thought 
little of promising a Modula-2 com- 
piler for the 128K-byte Mac even 
though he hadn't done much work on 
it. 



"It almost ruined the company," 
Ohran told me. "They say it's a 128K- 
byte machine, but they use chunks of 
memory for everything. The screen, 
the operating system, clipboard, you 
name it. There's not more than 60K 
bytes of usable memory in the 128K- 
byte Mac" 

"Agreed," I said. "But why didn't you 
just abandon the effort and wait for 
the 512K-byte Mac?" 

"Because I'd promised to do the 
128K-byte compiler." 

There are still people who believe 
a promise made is a debt unpaid. 
Richard Ohran is one of them. 

In the 128K-byte Mac, the compiler 
is still more curiosity than useful. 
Don't get me wrong. You can use 
Modula-2 to write useful programs for 
the small Mac; it will just take you a 
while because the compiler is slow. Of 
course, it takes a long time to write 
programs for the 1 28K-byte Mac in any 
language. Once compiled, Modula-2 
programs run as fast as anything else. 
On the 128K-byte Mac that isn't very 
fast, but many find it adequate— or say 
they do. 

However. MacModula-2 really 
shines in the 512K-byte Mac. The Fat 
Mac is no Lilith. nor yet even a Stride; 
but it's plenty good enough to learn 
Modula-2 with, and in the learning 
you can write some really power- 
ful—and useful— programs. 

Ohran's MacModula-2 is complete. 
It gives you access to the Mac Tool- 
box and QuickDraw. There's an editor, 
a linker, and a run-time system to ex- 
ecute programs. 

There's also an excellent manual. 
This documentation is more than 
complete, comprising not merely a 
manual on how to use Modula-2 with 
the Macintosh but a darned good in- 
troduction to the Modula-2 language. 
The manual explicitly states that it 
does not contain enough information 
for you to learn the Modula-2 lan- 
guage without additional source 
materials, and I suppose that's true; 
but anyone at all familiar with Pascal 
will have little trouble writing pro- 
grams in MacModula-2. especially if 
they have Glitch's Modula-2 for the Pascal 

{continued) 



332 BYTE • JULY 1985 



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Inquiry 329 



JULY 1985 • BYTE 333 



CHAOS MANOR 



Concertware is a 
music program 
that simulates 
different instruments 
and explains harmony. 



User at hand. There's plenty of infor- 
mation tucked into the MacModula-2 
manual's 540+ pages. It also has an 
index and an analytical table of con- 
tents. I wish every software publisher 
would get a copy and study it; the 
MacModula-2 manual could serve as 
a standard for the rest of the industry 
to shoot for. Sure. 1 can find some 
things to gripe about, but there's not 
a lot out there this good at this price. 



Modula Corporation's Mac- 
Modula-2 will do for the Macintosh 
what Borland's TUrbo Pascal did for 
the IBM PC. If you're a Macintosh en- 
thusiast, make haste to get a copy. 
You'll be glad you did. 

And Still More . . . 

There was a lot more excellent Mac- 
intosh software. Given that I'm run- 
ning out of space, I think the best 
thing I can do is list some of what im- 
pressed me and promise full reviews 
for later. 

Paragon Courseware has some won- 
derful technical fonts for the Mac. If 
you're into doing circuit diagrams, op 
amps, or complex math, look at what 
Paragon offers. It's great. 

In previous columns I've mentioned 
Blue Chip Software's stock market 
simulation game Millionaire; now they 
have T/coon, the commodity market 
game, and Baron, the real estate 



game, for the Macintosh. The PC ver- 
sions of these games are quite enjoy- 
able, but the Mac versions are even 
nicer than that. These games will 
teach you a lot about real-world 
finances. They're also a lot of fun. 
Recommended. 

Concertware from Great Wave Soft- 
ware is a music program that I'm still 
fooling around with. It simulates dif- 
ferent instruments, explains harmony 
and in general taught me more about 
music than I thought I'd ever learn. 
Highly recommended. 

Diversions Inc. has added Under- 
Ware Colorpens to their UnderWare 
line. UnderWare is a ribbon for the 
Mac Imagewriter that will put iron-on 
transfers on a sheet of normal bond 
paper. The idea is to use the Mac to 
create a T-shirt design; flip it to a mir- 
ror image; and print it on normal 
paper. You can now take the Under- 

(continued) 



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334 BYTE • JULY 1985 



Inquiry 93 



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Inquiry 72 




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CHAOS MANOR 



Ware Colorpens and color in yellow, 
red, blue, green, and orange. This pro- 
duces an iron-on that is colorfast 
unless you have a housekeeper who 
believes in using very hot water and 
Clorox. 

If you're looking for something to 
put on your T-shirt, Miles Computing 
(Suite 2 1 2, 7136 Haskell Ave., Van 
Nuys. CA 91406. (818) 994-7901) has 
a treasury of clip art called Mac the 
Knife; this is a whole bunch of pat- 
terns, new fonts, and illustrations from 
Star 'Trek and Star Wars (R2D2 and the 
Enterprise are both here); Liberty 
Enlightening the World; fancy 
borders; international symbols; U.S. 
and world maps; the Illuminati 
Pyramid and Eye; and lots of other 
fun stuff. It's obviously useful for more 
than 1-shirt design, but I intend to use 
it with UnderWare to produce some- 
thing for the next science-fiction con- 
vention I go to. Recommended. 

I also picked up the latest version 
of Mike Lehman's Fast Finder, a pro- 
gram I reviewed in the March issue. 
It's much faster than the standard 
Finder and highly recommended for 
anyone trying to do program devel- 
opment on the Mac. I am told by in- 
siders that the new official Macintosh 
Finder— not released as I write this — 
corrects a lot of the original Finder's 
defects, so that Fast Finder is not quite 
as vital as it once was. On the other 
hand, I don't have the new Finder, so 
I can't compare. I do know that Fast 
Finder is fast, allows batch commands, 
works, and is in production. 

There was a lot more Mac software. 
The flood has begun. 

WINDING DOWN 

I haven't even mentioned my trip to 
Texas Instruments in Dallas and 
Austin. TI has a corporate center for 
human factors where they're develop- 
ing a keyboard that will knock your 
eyes out. I can hardly wait until they 
have an experimental model. 

They're also doing fantastic things 
with artificial intelligence and natural- 
language interfaces. I've got some of 
their programs for Big 'Ifex, our TI Pro- 
fessional; alas, given the construction 
I've been unable to do justice to what 



TI has wrought. Next month for sure. 

I've also got a huge pile of Hewlett- 
Packard software and hardware, in- 
cluding the HP 1 10 lapboard portable. 
I'm quite impressed with the 1 10. Like 
Percy, my NEC PC-8201 lapboard, you 
can't lose text by turning the machine 
off. Alas, although I find the HP 1 10's 
electronics, keyboard, and on-board 
programs (Lotus 1-2-3 and WordStar 
in ROM already) really nice, I cannot see 
the electronic-crystal display. I know 
such displays can be made visible, 
because I have no trouble adjusting 
Percy for almost any angle and light 
condition; but the 110 needs strong 
light and I have to hold my head right, 
else I find myself squinting at the dis- 
play. It may just be me. I have no trou- 
ble recommending the HP 110— I've 
now taken it on three trips, and while 
it's a bit heavier than the NEC it's no 
more trouble— for those who've ex- 
amined it and don't have visual prob- 
lems; but for heaven's sake try it 
before you buy one! 

I also have a pile of new fonts for 
the HP LaserJet; Tony Pietsch has yet 
another version of WRITE, my favorite 
text editor, with print drivers to use 
the Laserjet's true proportional spac- 
ing and other such goodies. My love 
affair with the printer continues 
unabated. 

The book of the month is Ben Wat- 
tenberg's The Good News Is the Bad News 
Is Wrong (Simon and Schuster, 1984). 
It doesn't have much about com- 
puters, but it tells why we'll live to en- 
joy the computer revolution. There's 
no game of the month. What with the 
house construction and the annual 
school play, neither the boys nor I had 
time. 

Next month we'll be upstairs in the 
new quarters, the Good Lord willing 
and the San Andreas don't let go. ■ 



jerry Pournelle welcomes readers com- 
ments and opinions. Send a self -addressed, 
stamped envelope to \erry Pournelle, do 
BYTE Publications, POB 372, Hancock, 
NH 03449. Please put your address on 
the letter as well as on the envelope. Due 
to the high volume of letters, \erry cannot 
guarantee a personal reply. 



336 BYTE • JULY 1985 



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Byte 7/H5 

JULY 1985 -BYTE 337 



CHAOS MANOR MAIL 



RAM Disks and Calendar/ 1 

Dear Jerry, 

In the February BYTE, you rightly con- 
demn those authors and publishers who 
hurry to put out "junk" computer books 
and thereby reap quick and cynical prof- 
its; because, in your words, "newcomers 
to the computer field are desperate for 
books." making them ripe for rip-off. I 
agree, and' I also agree with your implied 
argument: that if newcomers were greeted 
with real information and patient instruc- 
tion, not with mysticism and condescen- 
sion, they would become knowledgeable 
and able to pick out the good from the 
bad. 

I was distressed to read on page 340: 
"A RAM (random-access read/write mem- 
ory) disk, for those few who tuned in late (my 
emphasis), is ..." If I said that from the 
pulpit, I would be condemned for putting 
down newcomers, to my church or to com- 
puters, and that condemnation would be 
just and justified. Later (page 352) you ex- 
plain: "96-tpi (tracks per inch) ..." If you 
need to explain "tpi" to your readers, why 
condescend to those who haven't learned 
what "RAM disk" means? 

On another subject. I finally (after some 
anxious inquiry as to compatibility) 
bought Calendar/1 from Clear Systems. 
You praised it highly; I can testify that your 
praise was not loud enough. For me. and 
I think for anyone who works with non- 
uniform schedules for several-to-many per- 
sons or groups, this thing is worth its 
weight in platinum. That's not what I want 
to tell you about Calendar/1, though. 

What I want to tell you is that the folks 
at Clear Systems have one of the better 
license agreements I've seen. I think you 
will smile rather than frown at it. Parts read 
like this: "Clear Systems grants . . . license 
to use the software in any computer belong- 
ing to the customer ... the customer may 
modify or make copies of any part of the software. 
provided . . . |that only 5 copies are made 
and that they are labeled with Clear Sys- 
tems' trademark and copyright notices, 
and that they aren't sold or given away|" 
(all emphasis mine). And further, in an ac- 
companying letter from Barbara Like (pro- 
pitious name), product manager, I was 
told, "We're very nice about refunding 
money if the program isn't compatible 



with a mysterious (to us) computer," and 
there follow hints and encouragements 
about making Calendar/1 run. 

Run it does on Zaccheus my Z-100, to 
my delight; and delighted I am. also, to 
meet some nice, courteous, and (on the 
evidence) competent software people. 
Calendar/1 and its folks are (famous 
phrase): Recommended. 

John Carl Bowers 
Bronx, NY 

It's a real dilemma: although most of 
my readers have read one or more of my 
columns before, and many will have read 
quite a few of them, BYTE is a growing 
magazine, and thus inevitably there will 
be a fair number of readers who have 
never read my stuff at all 

I can't claim to have discovered RAM 
disks, but I was one of the earliest to 
write about them, and I've covered the 
subject in at least a dozen columns. I 
grow weary of explaining what a RAM 
disk is, but of course I must lest I lose 
someone just starting to read BYTE. Thus 
my "for those few who tuned in late,'' 
meaning (I thought) for those who just 
began reading my column. Since I hadn't 
explained tpi— or certainly hadn't as 
often as I'd explained RAM disk— I saw 
no need to think of a tag for that. 

You're saying my tag was terminally 
cute. Perhaps you're right. It's still a prob- 
lem: What do I say when I must for the 
benefit of those who have just begun 
reading BYTE, explain something yet 
once more? 

Glad you had pleasant experiences 
with Clear Systems. One of the satisfac- 
tions of writing this column is discover- 
ing small companies that my readers like. 

Best— Jerry 

Terminal Recommendation 

Dear Jerry. 

I saw the letter from Kaye Caldwell in the 
September Chaos Manor Mail (page 385) 
and wanted to add my praise of the Wyse 
WY-50. 1 have had mine for six months and 
couldn't be more pleased. Everything in 
that letter is true, especially about the feel 
of the keyboard and the location of the 
keys. Although it was not advertised, mine 
came with the function keys programmed 



for WordStar, but that can be deselected 
and the functions programmed any way 
you want. The list price may be $695, but 
it is available for much less (I got mine for 
less than $ 500 from Computer Warehouse 
in Phoenix). 

The only criticism I have is with the lit- 
tle user's manual that comes with it. It is 
sufficient to hook up and use the terminal, 
but there are no explanations or defini- 
tion of terms, as if every buyer is an ex- 
pert on terminals. The reference manual 
($2 5) and maintenance manual ($50) are 
extra, but don't expect to get them fast. 
It took three letters to Wyse just to get a 
response saying how much they were. 

Nevertheless, the WY-50 is quite a bit of 
terminal for the money. 

Charles D. Hamilton 
APO New York 

Stride Micro (Sage) has recently 
adopted the Wyse as its standard ter- 
minal. I saw a bunch of them at the Stride 
Faire and liked them. I was particularly 
impressed with the way they can com- 
municate with the host computer at 
38,400 bits per second; that's effective- 
ly as fast as my memory-mapped video! 

However, two Wyse users told me that 
Wyse terminals have an intermittent 
keyboard-bounce problem. Shades of 
TRS-80 Model I! I gather it's not prohibi- 
tively severe, but it can be annoying. 
We're getting a Wyse: more when I know 
more. Thanks.— Jerry ■ 



Users Group Corner 

Computer Writer's Association 

POB 312 

Milford, OH 45150 

Excellent market report and news- 
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about computers. Dues $15/year. 

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338 BYTE • JULY 1985 




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BYTE WEST COAST 



Language 

designer 

Ralph 

Griswold 

looks at 

his language 



by Ezra Shapiro 



SNOBOL and Icon 



BYTE West Coast is prepared 

monthly by BYTE's editors and staff 

in San Francisco and Palo Alto. 

Correspondence should be addressed 

to BYTE West Coast. BYTE 

Magazine. 42 5 Battery St.. San 

Francisco. CA 94111. 



During the course of 1984, three imple- 
mentations of SNOBOL dialects ap- 
peared on the microcomputer language 
market (see page 350). SNOBOL, a convoluted 
acronym for "string-oriented symbolic language',' 
emerged from Bell Laboratories in the mid-1960s 
and has been a staple of the mainframe and minicom- 
puter environments ever since. It's a unique language 
with an unusual syntax, geared to text processing 
and string pattern matching. Because SNOBOL is 
unlike any other programming language, it is still 
taught in many computer science departments. \t has 
also spawned a loyal community of users who find 
it the easiest way to solve programming problems 
involving nonnumeric data. However, because the 
language has never been sold commercially, it has 
remained something of an oddity . . . although it 
has refused to die. The most widespread version of 
the language, SNOBOL4, has changed little since 
its release to the public domain in 1968. 

One of SNOBOL4' s authors, Ralph E. Griswold, 
now teaching at the University of Arizona, has gone 
on to create a new language called Icon that com- 
bines many of SNOBOL's facilities for string 
analysis with more traditional control structures— 
although its philosophy and operation are anything 
but traditional. Icon is not yet available for personal 
microcomputers in any commercial form. 

Early this year, Bruce Webster and I got a chance 
to chat with Griswold about SNOBOL, Icon, and 
computer languages in general. We found him to be 
charming, outspoken, and bemused by the sudden 
spurt of interest in SNOBOL. 

BYTE: It's funny, when you look at the "hot new 
languages' and start looking back at SNOBOL4, 
you notice that a lot of the concepts— things like list 
processing, goal-directed programming, and object 
orientation—have always been a part of SNOBOL. 
Griswold: Part of the reason for that is the 
philosophy we had at the time we devel- 
oped SNOBOL4; we tried to find things that 
would make life easier for the program- 
mer—not necessarily for the implementor. 
We kind of let ourselves freewheel with 
SNOBOL4. We didn't know a lot of com- 
puter science; we weren't constrained by 
knowledge. We were more concerned with 



facility than efficiency at that time. We 
thought that human beings were more valu- 
able than computers, which is something 
people forget. 

I think a lot of things in SNOBOL4-list 
processing, so-called object-oriented pro- 
cessing, even a strong coherent system for 
string processing— have not been in later 
languages because of concerns about im- 
plementation. 

I'll give you an example. In SNOBOL4 a 
string is a data type; it's not an array of char- 
acters. It's a type in its own right; a string 
is a data object. That's a concept that's still 
not generally accepted in programming lan- 
guages. Even in C a string is essentially still 
an array of characters, and there's a dif- 
ference, a substantial difference as far as the 
user is concerned. 

But those ideas were going on back then. 
They're not really new ideas; they've just 
achieved a level of public acceptance that 
they didn't have then. 

BYTE: Has the major interest in SNOBOL over 
the years been in the humanities community, for 
things like syntactic analysis? 
Griswold: Well, that's a major component 
of it— people doing research in the human- 
ities have always been SNOBOL fans. PL/I 
took over at some point as being the pre- 
dominant language because many of these 
people were at IBM mainframe facilities, 
and SNOBOL4 is not officially supported by 
IBM. SNOBOL4 became the language of 
choice for computing in the humanities in 
Europe, more so than in this country, 
because they have so much textual material 
to process. There's always been a substan- 
tial user community there. 

But people using SNOBOL4 cover every 
application imaginable except perhaps busi- 
ness applications. Systems programmers 
use it a lot when they have data-processing 
jobs to do— processing compilers, reformat- 
ting things. There's a lot of scientific pro- 
gramming; people working in molecular 

(continued) 



JULY 1985 -BYTE 341 



BYTE WEST COAST 



genetics or areas where the data is 
naturally nonnumeric do a lot of work 
with it. For a long time there was (and 
maybe still is) a fair amount of use of 
it in the federal government in 
classified departments— particularly 
for cryptography The CIA and the 
NSA used it quite a bit for some time. 
The major use of the language has 



been in academic institutions. It's a 
traditional part of the curriculum in 
courses in comparative programming 
languages at upper division levels and 
lower graduate levels, as a language 
that's sufficiently different to be inter- 
esting from an intellectual standpoint. 

BYTE: Availability is always a critical factor. 



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Griswold: That's true. The success of 
SNOBOL4-to the extent that you 
would call it successful— is due to its 
availability, the fact that it's in the 
public domain, it's been supported 
for a great deal of time, it's essential- 
ly free in most of its implementations. 

What usually makes a language 
available is when a computer manu- 
facturer supports it officially. For very 
good reasons, computer manufac- 
turers don't want to support a wide 
range of products, particularly those 
that are out in left field somewhere, 
because it's a very expensive process 
to support products like that— dis- 
tribution, documentation, the mainte- 
nance burden. Something has to be 
really in demand before somebody 
will officially support it. If a company 
decides to make something available, 
then it comes into widespread use no 
matter how bad it is. 

SNOBOL4 has never been officially 
supported by any organization. It's 
always been unofficial. Even at Bell 
Laboratories it was unofficial. There 
was never an official SNOBOL project 
there; it was done as a by-product of 
other work. It was never budgeted, it 
was never officially acknowledged. It 
was released but not marketed. 

With the personal computer com- 
munity and the computer networks, 
software is becoming more readily 
available, and that's going to change 
things. Sometimes it takes longer than 
one expects for the change to occur. 
In the case of SNOBOL4, the three PC 
implementations all came out within 
a few months of each other. After 
years and years and years of people 
talking about it and saying it couldn't 
be done, all of a sudden three of them 
came out. Until they did, I wasn't sure 
anybody would ever do it. 

BYTE: Is SNOBOL going to go through 
another round of evolution at this point? 
Griswold: I've talked with the imple- 
mentors and know the pressures they 
feel on both sides, the advantage of 
remaining compatible with existing 
programs versus the desire to take ad- 
vantage of the nature of the com- 
puting equipment and facilities that 

[continued] 



342 BYTE- JULY 1985 



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BYTE WEST COAST 



y \con is competition 
for SNOBOL4; it's a 
successor to it in a 
sense. Most people 
prefer it to SNOBOL4! 



are available at the present time. I've 
advised them to make compromises. 
Maintain the integrity of the language, 
but not at the expense of making it 
awkward and out of date or out of 
kilter with the computing context in 
which people are using it. That in- 
cludes things like input and output, 
memory use, and so forth. 

There's another point that inhibits 
them besides the desire to be com- 
patible. They're working from existing 
implementations; they're not starting 
from scratch. They're taking generic 
implementations, the original 
SNOBOL4 implementation, called the 
SIL implementation, which was done 
in the 1960s, and Macro SPITBOL, 
which was done in the 1970s. Those 
are portable, generic systems, and all 
but one or two implementations of 
SNOBOL4 work from them. 

I don't think anybody's going to do 
a language redesign for several 
reasons. It's not a language that most 
people will be able to implement 
starting from scratch. People learn in 
compiler courses how to write imple- 
mentations of Pascal; there are a lot 
of tools for this— it's conventional 
knowledge. SNOBOL4 is complicated, 
difficult, sophisticated, the algorithms 
are not obvious, the implementation 
techniques are arcane. Very few peo- 
ple have attempted to implement it 
from scratch, and many of those have 
failed to implement the most impor- 
tant features of the language. It's a lot 
of work. I don't think there's enough 
motivation for anyone to undertake 
that; not that people don't exist that 
can do it, but it's not something an 
average programmer can sit down 
and do. A person who can write a C 



compiler might not be able to imple- 
ment SNOBOL4. 

And I think there's enough wrong 
with the language that changing it rep- 
resents a very substantial problem, 
not just in the implementation, but in 
deciding what to do with the things 
that are wrong with it. 

What does happen is that people 
write preprocessors for SNOBOL4 to 
make it look more palatable to the 
user. I've done that myself with some 
success. But that's not quite the same 
as redesigning the language. 

The other thing is that it's got com- 
petition. Icon is competition for 
SNOBOL4; it's a successor to it in a 
sense. It wasn't designed to replace 
it. but it's a product of the same work. 
Most people prefer it to SNOBOL4. 
So there's enough competition there 
that I think that someone would be 
reluctant to invest the person-years of 
effort it would take. 

BYTE: Tell us about Icon. Where did it start? 
Griswold: It didn't start anywhere 
really; it sort of crept up behind us. 

SNOBOL4 was developed at Bell 
Laboratories by a small group of peo- 
ple who needed a tool for doing 
something. We weren't language 
designers and we weren't computer 
scientists; we had some text to pro- 
cess (symbolic mathematics, in fact). 
So we just sat down and wrote some- 
thing because we didn't have anything 
else. It was so successful we turned 
from solving the problem to becom- 
ing language designers. 

FORTRAN was a tremendous 
triumph in terms of language design, 
but the designers had available to 
them a repertoire of mathematical 
notation, operations, and syntax and 
semantics that people were used to. 
There was nothing like that for string 
processing; I mean, nobody pro- 
cessed strings seriously until com- 
puters came along— it's too much 
trouble. Short of algebraic operations, 
there wasn't any accumulated body of 
knowledge on which to base the 
linguistic facilities— and they're hard to 
implement, especially on conven- 
tional architectures that aren't de- 

[continued] 



344 BYTE • JULY 1985 



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Inquiry 283 



JULY 1985 -BYTE 345 



BYTE WEST COAST 



x With Icon, you can 
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signed for this kind of thing. We 
became interested, from a research 
point of view, in linguistic facilities for 
string and list processing, and in im- 
plementational techniques. 

I came here to the University of 
Arizona in 1971 from Bell Laborator- 
ies and got funding from the National 
Science Foundation, and it's been 
funded since then. That's 15 or 16 
years of continuous funding in this 



area. We've been working on develop- 
ing programming languages for pro- 
cessing nonnumerical data and tech- 
niques for implementing them— the 
two going hand in hand. 

This is a research project; it's not 
designed to produce another pro- 
gramming language— there are too 
many of them already— or a commer- 
cial product, but it's nice when your 
research can produce a by-product 
that's useful in the computing com- 
munity. Every so often we've gotten 
to the point where the results of the 
research needed to be embodied in 
a working programming language; 
we've implemented it and made it 
available to the computing commu- 
nity. 

There was a language called SL/5 
following SNOBOL4. SL/5 stood for 
"SNOBOL Language 5-1 think we 
were kind of embarrassed by the 
name SNOBOL. which was originally 




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intended to be a joke and then caught 
up with us. At some point we realized 
that we had a conceptual break- 
through in the area of programming- 
language facilities and we set SL/5 
aside and started working on a new 
linguistic context that became Icon. 

Icon looks a lot like SNOBOL4 in 
some respects, but it looks very dif- 
ferent in others. I use both of them in- 
discriminately, although I prefer Icon. 
I've taught both of them; I prefer to 
teach Icon because some of the 
things in SNOBOL4 date back to a 
time when our ideas about program- 
ming were very different from what 
they are now, and it's kind of embar- 
rassing. Fun. but embarrassing. 

In one sense Icon can be looked at 
as just what you were talking about, 
an attempt to keep the good features 
of SNOBOL4 and replace the bad 
ones with better ones. It's not an en- 
tirely accurate characterization, but 
it's one way of looking at it. 

BYTE: Wto do you see as some of the special 
features of Icon? 

Griswold: In the first place, it carries 
some of the features of SNOBOL4 
that were attractive to begin with— 
attractive for certain kinds of uses, for 
certain kinds of people. It tries to 
make programming easy, at the pos- 
sible expense of efficiency. It tends to 
support the programmer. It's also 
good for one-shot programs. You can 
write an easy program that's quick 
and dirty— use it once and throw it 
away— very much like SNOBOL4. 

The thing that's most intellectually 
interesting about it and most poten- 
tially significant in its influence on pro- 
gramming languages of the future is 
that expressions can have more than 
one value. This is a carryover from 
SNOBOL4 string pattern matching 
where patterns could first match one 
thing and then match another. 

What motivated Icon really was the 
recognition that this didn't have to be 
limited to pattern matching; it could 
be a general feature of programming, 
not just string processing. Expres- 
sions in Icon are capable of produc- 
ing a sequence of results. This works 

{continued) 



346 BYTE • JULY 1985 



Inquiry 148 




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SNOBOL lets 

people write 

really simple, compact 

natural code 

instead of crazy loops, 

nested things, 

and so forth! 



just as well in numerical domains and 
list processing as in string processing. 
It makes very simple and natural 
some kinds of formulations that are 
contorted and difficult in other lan- 
guages. 

Expressions may produce an in- 
finite number of results. In that sense, 
Icon is a superset of ALGOL-like lan- 
guages where you evaluate one ex- 
pression and you get one result, 
period, no matter what. In Icon you 
may get zero results, which corre- 
sponds to failure in SNOBOL4; you 
may get one, which corresponds to 
normal computation; or you may get 
a lot of results if the surrounding con- 
text needs them to arrive at a solu- 
tion. There's a flavor of logic program- 
ming in Icon; you can see logic pro- 
gramming as a subset of it. There's 
logical conjunction and disjunction. It 
all fits into a uniform theoretical 



framework that the programmer may 
never have to see but which has the 
nice feature that you can see general- 
izations. 

This is what turns people on; they 
can find new ways of expressing 
things they couldn't have before. You 
can iterate overall solutions. There are 
several programming languages that 
have iterators, going back to IPLV, 
and more recently Alphard, CLU, and 
SETL, but they're all limited to specific 
kinds of structures or contexts over all 
the elements of a set. In Icon you can 
just have a lot of expressions that 
produce a lot of results and you can 
iterate the results overall. You can 
produce sequences; you can manip- 
ulate sequences. Those were all in- 
herent in SNOBOL4 but they were 
limited to a very small context, and 
the programmer couldn't get his or 
her hands on them. Now it's been 
generalized, and that is what I think 
is going to appeal to people. 

That, I think, is the most significant 
thing. In fact, it surprised us; we didn't 
expect that to be the result. That's 
what really excites people; they can 
write really simple, compact, natural 
code instead of all these crazy loops 
and nested things and so forth. It 
looks like it ought to look and it pro- 
duces the results it ought to produce. 

Icon produces interesting programs, 
and it's fun— which can't be knocked. 
Programmers are, after all, human 
beings. 

BYTE: What Icon implementations are out 



there right now? 

Griswold: There are several versions. 
The one that is current, and main- 
tained and supported, is version 5, 
which is the UNIX-based system. It's 
written mostly in C It's available on 
PDP-lls, VAX-lls, Sun workstations, 
AT&T 3B20s, Onyx. ... We have it 
running on PC/IX now— it's not ready 
for release, but the full language is 
running. And there's a VAX VMS im- 
plementation. There are 80 or 90 
VMS systems out that we know of, 
most of those in educational environ- 
ments. 

There are probably two dozen im- 
plementations of Icon for various 
kinds of processors in progress, but 
what will become of them I don't 
know. 

We've decided to go with C as an 
implementation language and UNIX 
as an environment. It's not easy to im- 
plement this in assembly language. 
Implementing Icon from the start is 
considered to be a research project. 
How you implement the expression- 
evaluation mechanism efficiently is 
not something that's obvious. It's in- 
compatible with stack-based imple- 
mentations of languages like 
ALGOL-68 or Pascal. So again, the im- 
plementations come from a generic 
one, and that limits its availability 

BYTE: Do you see a specific group of people 
using Icon? 

Griswold: There is an academic group 
again. It's being taught in comparative 

[continued] 



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Inquiry 298 



JULY 1985 -BYTE 349 



BYTE WEST COAST 



programming languages as a replace- 
ment for SNOBOL4 here at the Uni- 
versity of Arizona, and at Carnegie- 
Mellon, Illinois Institute of Ikchnology, 
Duke, and a few other places. That's 
probably because Icon is more 
cosmetic from a computer science 
point of view, even if you think of it 
as SNOBOL4 embedded in Pascal, 
which it isn't, but even if you think of 
it that way. 

People in industry are using Icon for 
VLSI |very large scale integration] lay- 
out. They're using it for utility pro- 
gramming; we have quite a few utili- 
ties written in it here. It's good for all 
kinds of things, from producing nice- 
ly centered labels for mailing lists to 
random-sentence generators, lin- 
guistic analysis, all those unusual 
things that other languages don't do 
well. It fits into the humanities very 
nicely; we're getting a lot of people 
really looking at Icon in the humani- 
ties now. Icon tends to be a catchall 
like SNOBOL4 for all those applica- 
tions that other languages are not 
designed for. 

It's still fairly young; SNOBOL 
started in 1962 and SNOBOL4 came 
out in 1968. Icon wasn't available to 
anybody outside the University of 
Arizona until about 1978 or 1979, and 
the current version, the UNIX version, 
is quite a bit more recent than that. 

I don't think Icon will develop an 



identifiable user community. I think it 
will be a tool that some people use 
by preference or other people use for 
special purposes. 

BYTE: W% the name "Icon"? 
Griswold: No reason. You need a 
name when you want to talk about 
something. 

One of my colleagues was into one- 
character names at the time, C being 
the current attraction, but there were 
languages called A and B before C 
He wanted to call the language S, 
because it's short. Well, that doesn't 
look very good when you're writing- 
it looks like you've made a typo. C is 
bad enough and S is worse. 

So we sat around for a long time try- 
ing to think up names. I personally am 
not very enthusiastic about acronyms 
or naming languages after famous or 
infamous people, but you need a 
name. 

I'm responsible for the name. You 
can find some thread, in the sense 
that the language development of 
which it's a by-product has been 
rather iconoclastic. But that's not why 
we picked the name; it's just an ex- 
cuse I can give you for it. 

In hindsight, I think the unfortunate 
thing is that it's caused some confu- 
sion because of the use of the word 
"icon" to mean a symbol in program- 
ming systems— the Lisa and so forth— 





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which came after Icon was developed 
and published. Every so often we get 
a request for Icon because somebody 
thinks he's going to get some kind of 
screen-manipulation package. But we 
couldn't have anticipated that, I don't 
suppose. 

We chose not to call it SNOBOL6 
because that sounds like it's just an- 
other revision, and it's so substantial- 
ly different. It's as different as PL/I is 
from FORTRAN. 

It's a problem, picking names. You 
pick a name and later on you wish 
you hadn't. 

BYTE: Where do you think microcomputers 
are taking us? 

Griswold: I've been in computing for 
about 2 5 years. When I first got into 
it I thought, "Gee, wouldn't it be great 
if I could have my own computer! But 
what happens when 1 retire because 
the machine is an IBM 360/50 and 
costs a million dollars and it's as big 
as this room?" One of my colleagues 
said that was his ambition— to have a 
360 in his basement. Now, of course, 
I run UNIX on an IBM PC XT and have 
at my fingertips essentially the kind 
of computation that used to be too 
expensive for even a whole organiza- 
tion to own, at a price I can afford. 
And I don't think we fully understand 
what the impact of that is going to be. 

BYTE: \n the next few years, we'll be seeing 
microprocessors that can address gigabytes of 
memory. There are wry few languages or pro- 
gramming concepts out there now that can't 
be done in that kind of space. 
Griswold: Someone will invent one. 
Someone always invents one. Given 
that amount of space, they'll find a 
reason. ■ 

FOR FURTHER INFORMATION 
Griswold. R. E., j. F. Poage, and I. P. 
Polonsky. The SNOBOL4 Programming Lan- 
guage, 2nd ed. Englewood Cliffs, NJ: 
Prentice-Hall, 1971. 
Griswold, M. T. and R. E. Griswold. The Icon 
Programming language. Englewood Cliffs, 
NJ: Prentice-Hall. 1983. 

For information on Icon, contact the Icon 
Project, Department of Computer Science. 
University of Arizona. Tucson. AZ 85721. 



350 BYTE • JULY 1985 



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Starlit Spectrum 



Using the 

Sinclair 

Spectrum to 

collect and 

process 

astronomical 



data 



by Dick Pountain 



Dick Pountain i s a technical author 

and software consultant living in 

London. England. He can be 

contacted do BYTE. POB 372. 

Hancock. NH 03449. 



The subject of this month's column 
is the prominent U.K. amateur as- 
tronomer Andrew J. Hollis. He uses 
a low-cost Sinclair Spectrum microcomputer 
to perform data capture and processing on 
observations obtained by photoelectronic 
photometry (the electronic measurement of 
the brightness of celestial objects). 

Mr. Hollis, who is a chartered engineer by 
profession, runs the Ormada Observatory 
from the garden of his house in the north- 
ern England country village of Cuddington 
in Cheshire. 

He became interested in astronomy in 
1957 when his parents showed him the 
comet Arend-Roland through a pair of 
opera glasses; from this beginning he went 
on to join the British Astronomical Associa- 
tion (B.A.A.) and build his own 8-inch reflect- 
ing telescope in the late 1960s. Though his 
interest in astronomy is broad, he is par- 
ticularly interested in variable stars and in 
the asteroids (more properly called the 
minor planets) and is now director of the 
minor planets section of the B.A.A. 

No science (with the possible exception 
of ornithology) is as open to contributions 
by "amateurs" as astronomy Indeed, the 
term "amateur," which has acquired faintly 
derogatory overtones in this century, seems 
barely adequate to describe their efforts. 
There is certainly nothing "amateurish" 
about the activities at Ormada Observatory. 
Therefore, I shall intend the term in its 
original sense of one who works for love of 
the subject. The results obtained by Mr. 
Hollis and his coamateurs are often signifi- 
cant enough to be published in the B.A.A. 
and other astronomical journals. 

The advantage of a large telescope is that 
it collects more light, hence it can measure 
fainter objects that smaller telescopes can't 
detect. Since the giant telescopes are 
almost always dedicated to the inspection 
of the most remote objects beyond our 
galaxy, it's not uncommon for professional 
astronomers to actively solicit the participa- 
tion of serious amateurs when an event of 



interest like an eclipse occurs in this solar 
system. The combined small telescopes of 
amateur observers around the world add 
up to a formidable instrument. 

Time on the large telescopes at major 
observatories must be booked many 
months in advance and is tightly rationed. 
An observer whose allocated slot comes up 
is then at the mercy of the weather; if con- 
ditions are bad. the whole session may be 
fruitless. Consequently, a professional 
observer who wishes to study a particular 
variable star or minor planet may get only 
16 or so hours of observation a year. Hollis 
reckons that he can get in at least 50 hours 
per year because he is in a position to 
observe from his garden observatory any 
time the weather is fit. 

Photoelectronic Photometry 

The study of both variable stars and 
asteroids depends in part upon measuring 
their brightness. In the case of a variable 
star, the aim is to chart the changes in 
brightness over time. The shape of the light 
curve so produced can help to answer 
several questions about the star system that 
produced the stars: Is it a binary or ternary 
system of stars orbiting each other? What 
are their relative sizes? Do they have exten- 
sive atmospheres? Are they exchanging 
matter? 

Andrew Hollis spends much time measur- 
ing such light curves to derive the times of 
minima (those points in a star's cycle when 
the brightness is at its lowest level). He ac- 
quires further information by taking ac- 
curate measurements of the period of vari- 
able stars, i.e., the time between minima. If 
this is done to sufficient precision, long- 
term fluctuations can be distinguished, as 
some stars appear to slow down or speed 
up over years or decades. Mr. Hollis also 
measures the brightness of asteroids and 
plots this against their progress in orbit 
around the sun. These measurements yield 
details about their shape and orientation. 

[continued) 



JULY 1985 'BYTE 353 



BYTE U.K. 



Before the advent of electronics, 
brightness was estimated visually 
using the magnitude system. Certain 
important groups of stars were clas- 
sified into groups of similar bright- 
ness, and these groups were then 
ranked in magnitudes— first magni- 
tude being brightest and so on in 
order of decreasing brightness down 
to the limits of visual discrimination 
at the sixth magnitude. 

To estimate the brightness of an 
object visually you use a star map to 
identify a nearby star of known mag- 
nitude, compare the object with it, 
and decide whether the object is 
more or less bright in the telescope 
than the nearby star. Choose another 
known star and repeat. By making 
numerous comparisons of this sort 
you can assign a magnitude to the ob- 
ject, interpolating if necessary be- 
tween the two nearest known values. 
Though it may sound rough, skilled 
observers can in fact produce remark- 
ably accurate estimates this way. 
However, it lacks the degree of preci- 
sion necessary to follow fine varia- 
tions in variable stars. 

Photoelectronic photometry re- 



places this visual ranking method with 
a direct measurement of the light 
entering the telescope from the 
object. (To accommodate this, the 
magnitude system has been refined 
into a more quantitative logarithmic 
scale that permits fractional magni- 
tudes extending down to the 20th 
magnitude and below.) 

Some kind of photoelectric detec- 
tor is placed at the prime focus of a 
telescope so that the image of the star 
falls on it. The current or voltage pro- 
duced by the detector must be in 
some way proportional to the amount 
of light falling on it. The telescope is 
not used to magnify the image of 
stars, as we do with terrestrial images, 
but merely as a light collector. 

The telescope collects light from a 
more or less large region of sky 
(determined by its aperture), not 
merely from the desired star. To nar- 
row this field to the object of interest, 
a diaphragm plate with a tiny hole in 
it is placed at the focus and the star 
image is positioned (by eye) over this 
hole, thus excluding surrounding stars. 
A further refinement is to take a sec- 
ond light reading with the telescope 




Photo 1: The photodetector subsystem attached to the telescope has a (lip-up mirror in 
the left-hand compartment that directs light to the eyepiece on top. 



focused on a region of empty space. 
This reading can be subtracted from 
the first to eliminate the residual ef- 
fect of background light and the 
spurious dark current produced by 
most detectors. 

Photodetectors typically respond to 
a broad band of wavelengths in the 
starlight. Astronomers are interested 
in certain wavebands and so will 
usually interpose filters between tele- 
scope and detector, allowing only cer- 
tain bands to pass. Hollis works in 
three widely studied bands known as 
the UBV. for ultraviolet, blue, visual. 

Readings taken straight from the 
photodetector bear a most indirect 
relation to the magnitude of the star, 
and it is here that a computer can be 
used to make the necessary conver- 
sions. 

The Hollis System 

At the time of my visit to Ormada in 
February, Andrew Hollis's own 300- 
millimeter telescope was away being 
rebuilt, and his photometry system 
was mounted on a borrowed 1 3 5-mil- 
limeter telescope (it sits on a German 
equatorial mounting, powered by a 
synchronous electric motor from a 
home-built power supply). 

At the heart of the system is a side- 
window photomultiplier tube (RCA 
1 P2 1 ) that does the actual detecting- 
it looks like those vacuum tubes used 
in old radios. Photo 1 shows the 
detector mounted in its enclosure on 
the telescope— the eyepiece and flip- 
up mirror allow visual positioning of 
the star image onto the diaphragm 
plate. 

Inside the evacuated glass envelope 
of the photomultiplier tube are nine 
metal anode chambers. At one side 
is a window through which light 
passes and falls onto a photocathode, 
dislodging a few electrons. 

A DC voltage of around 1000 volts 
accelerates these electrons to the first 
anode. On striking the anode, each 
electron dislodges more electrons, 
which accelerate to the second 
anode, etc. This snowballing effect 
results in a huge amplification, with 
around I million electrons arriving at 

[continued] 



354 BYTE • JULY 1985 



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JULY I985 -BYTE 355 



BYTE U.K. 



The interface program 
is written to use 
interactive printer 
output much like the 
old days of the Teletype. 



the final anode for every electron ini- 
tially dislodged by a photon. 

The end result is a tiny burst of cur- 
rent, measured in nanoamps or even 
picoamps. proportional to the original 
amount of light, lb increase efficiency, 
the star image is actually defocused 
by a lens after passing through the 
diaphragm aperture, so that it covers 
more of the photocathode; only the 
total amount of light is important, not 
the image itself. 

The processing of this tiny signal 
begins immediately when it is passed 
to a high-gain current-to-voltage 
amplifier. (Hollis uses an Intersil 
ICL7650 chopper stabilized op-amp 
on a single chip.) The output is now 
a DC voltage in the range of 0— 10 
volts. However, it varies during each 
observation, and reading it directly 
would involve messy averaging calcu- 
lations. Consequently, Hollis passes 
this signal to another chip, a Teledyne 
9400CI voltage-to-frequency con- 
verter, which outputs either a stream 
of pulses or a continuous square wave 
whose frequency is proportional to 
the input voltage. 

This can now be sent to a pulse 
counter and the count read off from 
a calculator-style visual display. By 
recording for a fixed period of time, 
the number of pulses counted will be 
a measure of the light received inte- 
grated over that period. 

Hollis finished his basic system in 
1983 and began recording observa- 
tions manually from the pulse-counter 
display. Each observation requires at 
least three readings: two from the star 
(which are averaged) and one from 
the background sky (to be sub- 
tracted). Sometimes readings must be 



repeated because some stray event 
lights up the sky and causes a bad 
reading. 

lb obtain standard star magnitudes, 
these readings must be performed on 
both the object of interest and a com- 
parison star of known magnitude. 
Then these two readings need to be 
reduced using various mathematical 
formulas to convert them from in- 
strumental magnitude to the Standard 
UBV Magnitude. One formula calcu- 
lates the differential air mass (i.e., the 
distance the light had to travel 
through the earth's atmosphere) ac- 
cording to the stars' heights above the 
horizon, another corrects for instru- 
mental scale factors, while others con- 
vert from geocentric to heliocentric 
time. 

Finally, subtracting these results 
yields the differential magnitude of 
the object of interest; a long, timed 
series of such differential magnitudes 
is required to show the variation in 
brightness, and thence the time of 
minimum. 

Computerized Data 
Acquisition 

It quickly occurred to Hollis that this 
whole rigmarole, including the initial 
capture of data from the instrument, 
could be performed by a microcom- 
puter with considerable savings of ef- 
fort and increase of reliability. He 
selected the Sinclair .Spectrum 
because of its low cost, availability, 
and its large volume of add-on cir- 
cuitry published in the electronics 
hobby press. 

The Spectrum, Britain's largest sell- 
ing computer, was sold for some time 
in the U.S. (in a slightly modified form 
as the Timex 2000). For those who are 
not familiar with it, it's a Z80-based 
machine with 48K bytes of RAM 
(random-access read/write memory) 
and a highly individual BASIC in ROM 
(read-only memory). It is supplied 
with no standard I/O (input/output) 
ports (e.g.. RS-232C or Centronics) but 
has a parallel expansion socket, using 
a proprietary bus. and cassette port. 
Internally it is a low chip-count design, 
with all the peripheral activities con- 
trolled by a single ULA (uncommitted 



logic array, or gate array as it is com- 
monly called in the U.S.). 

Hollis built his own interface box to 
fit onto the bus-expansion connector. 
This contains the high-gain amp and 
voltage-to-frequency converter chips 
and a Z80A-PIO (parallel I/O) chip. 

Instead of taking the pulse output 
from the voltage-to-frequency con- 
verter to a counter, the alternative 
square-wave output is taken to the 
first data pin of the PIO. The PIO is 
configured in mode 3, or control 
mode, with no handshaking. The net 
effect is that the central processing 
unit sees the first bit of an 8-bit port 
toggling on and off at the frequency 
of the square-wave signal. 

Hollis realized that Sinclair BASIC 
would be too slow to read this port— a 
sampling rate of at least 6500 reads 
per second is required. He wrote a 
short machine-code subroutine that 
counts the number of changes of 
state of the single bit that is input over 
a variable integration period, typically 
1 seconds, and returns the answer in 
the Z80's BC register to the main in- 
terface program, written in BASIC. 

Hollis doesn't like to take a televi- 
sion set out into the confined and 
often damp environment of the ob- 
servatory, and so the interface pro- 
gram is written to use interactive 
printer output, much like the old days 
of the Ikletype. Data can be inspected 
immediately on the Sinclair printer, a 
tiny low-cost device that prints elec- 
trostatically on rolls of 4-inch metal- 
lized paper and takes its power from 
the Spectrum. Any reading that is 
clearly wrong can be deleted and 
taken again. Satisfactory readings can 
then be stored on cassette tape for 
further processing by other programs. 

To further simplify the business of 
gathering data. Hollis has built a 
remote-control unit to operate the 
Spectrum. This is made from an off- 
the-shelf 5-key cursor keypad 
mounted in an alloy box and con- 
nected by a long lead to another in- 
terface box on the bus-expansion 
port. It allows Hollis to take readings 
without leaving the telescope. 

After an observing session the 

[continued) 



356 BYTE • ]ULY 1985 




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Inquiry 1 39 



JULY I985 'BYTE 357 



BYTE U.K. 



Spectrum is taken back indoors and 
the results are reduced by a second 
program that applies all the various 
corrections, converts the date and 
time to the required Julian calendar, 
and finally prints out the time of 
minimum of the variable star under 
study, together with statistical cer- 
tainty estimates. This program works 
on a TV screen as well as the printer. 

A third program is used to predict 
the time of minima. This contains a 
database of the periods of 67 
selected variable stars, gleaned from 
the General Catalog of Variable Stars. It 
calculates and prints out a list of the 
times of all the minima for a given 
night, allowing Hollis to plan his even- 
ing viewing efficiently. 

A home-brewed graphing program 
for the diminutive Sinclair printer pro- 
duces neat and highly presentable 
scatter graphs of light curves. Figure 
1 shows a typical light curve for the 
asteroid VW Cephei. 

Timing Matters 

The Spectrum has proved itself highly 
competent and cost-effective for the 
sort of work that Hollis requires. Its 
main limitations are the lack of 
double-precision floating-point arith- 
metic and a real-time clock. The rela- 
tively slow BASIC and cassette 



storage are no problem and are only 
noticeable in the Minima Prediction 
program. 

Precision is not too serious a mat- 
ter as the 10 significant figures of the 
Spectrum's BASIC are well beyond the 
inherent accuracy of the photometer 
readings. The only problem involves 
the representation of Julian dates, in 
which the time and date are com- 
bined to give the time in fractional 
days since noon on January I of the 
year 4713 B.C. These numbers have 
seven figures before the point and up 
to six places after it, if you're measur- 
ing to fractions of a second (I'm 
writing this word at approximately 
2446123.57540). Hollis gets around 
this by dropping the initial 24 in in- 
ternal calculations, which is unlikely to 
cause any problems for a century or 
two. 

Timing is a more serious problem. 
The Spectrum uses interrupts for its 
I/O, causing the software clock to stop 
during printing and cassette opera- 
tions. At first, Hollis tried timing the 
printing operations and adding a cor- 
rection factor, but he was soon look- 
ing for a proper real-time clock. 

He found a suitable design pub- 
lished in an electronics magazine and 
built it. It has battery backup and is 
based on an MM 58174 clock chip 





dm 
0.9 




VW CEPHEI 


JULY- AUGUST 1983 
COMPARISON BD+75°753 

P 0.276500d 
± 0.000003d 




0.7 


_ 


% ' 










* ** 


*. 




0.5 


■• 




A J HOLLIS 

ORMADA OBSERVATORY 
135 mm REFLECTOR 
DC PHOTOMETER 




0.3 




i 


i 




0.0 


0.5 
PHASE 


1.0 



Figure I : A typical light curve for the asteroid VW Cephei 



with its own 2K-byte static RAM into 
which the Spectrum can write key pa- 
rameters such as the latitude and 
longitude of the observatory and the 
year (which the chip's designers inex- 
plicably left out). This clock card 
stacks onto the bus-expansion con- 
nector at the back of the Spectrum, 
making quite a pile of hardware. 

There is a scheme afoot, however, 
to provide even more precise timing. 
Hollis intends to move into new areas 
of observation, including studying the 
orbits of Jupiter's moons and the oc- 
cupation (i.e., hiding) of stars by 
asteroids. This requires high-speed 
photometry using the highest pos- 
sible sampling rate. 

For a slowly changing variable star, 
integration of the light received over 
a 10-second period is satisfactory, but 
to resolve detail in the occultations 
occurring over a few seconds, the light 
needs to be sampled at subsecond 
intervals. 

To time such observations, Hollis 
has built a radio receiver that can pick 
up a time signal called MSF, broadcast 
on 60 Hz from Rugby in the Midlands. 
Fortunately, there's no need to syn- 
chronize the readings with the trans- 
mitter (which would be a major pro- 
gramming problem); it is sufficient to 
merely record the time "pips" along- 
side the data like the time base on an 
oscilloscope. 

Light Detectors 

There is now a small community of 
astronomers like Andrew Hollis using 
the comparatively cheap side-window 
photomultiplier tube as a light detec- 
tor. By experimenting and exchanging 
their findings they have extended the 
limits of its performance in quite 
unexpected ways. 

One drawback of the device is its 
comparatively large and variable dark 
current (i.e., the signal produced even 
when no light is falling on it). Hollis 
and confederates have discovered 
that this dark current can be drasti- 
cally reduced and made more con- 
stant, not by cooling as is often done 
with photodetectors, but by drying 
the environment in which it operates. 

{continued) 



358 BYTE • JULY 1985 



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360 BYTE • JULY 1985 



BYTE U.K. 



Placing silica gel 
in the chamber 
dries the environment. 



This is accomplished by placing silica 
gel in the chamber that houses it. 

No one knows for certain why it 
works, but Hollis's theory is that ad- 
sorbed moisture on the insulating 
base of the tube creates variable 
resistive paths between the high- 
tension pins (up to 1000 volts). Dry- 
ing the moisture raises the resistance 
of such paths. 

Hollis is also trying out other types 
of photodetectors. When I visited, he 
showed me an experimental setup 
that uses a photodiode, though so far 
the results from it have been unsatis- 
factory. 

Conclusion 

I was impressed by the simplicity and 
effectiveness of the system Andrew 
Hollis developed. Excluding the tele- 
scope, the hardware costs less than 
£600 (about $760 at the current ex- 
change rate) and yet can produce 
results with a certainty of ±0.01 
magnitude, or around I percent error. 
It's also gratifying to see one of the 
humblest of home microcomputers 
serving science in such a competent 
fashion. 

Interestingly, Hollis denies that he 
is in any way a computer buff; he has 
learned only enough about com- 
puters to get the job done, with 
astronomy always being most impor- 
tant. It's rather sobering to think that 
the amount of computing he had to 
learn would probably qualify him as 
a computer design engineer; we are 
still living very much in the frontier 
days. 

During my visit to Ormada, a fond 
hope that I once entertained was 
revived: that the spread of personal 
computers might do for computer 
science what cheaper telescopes have 
done for astronomy and encourage 
amateurs to make significant contri- 
butions. ■ 




Genlech 



■ Hih'.IJDHlKd " 

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ZF-151-21 w/10 MB Hard Disk . . . $Call 

ZF-161 -52 (Portable, 2 Dr) $Cal1 

BLUE LYNX 3278 SCall 

DCA Irma/lrmaline/lrmaKey SCall 

IDEAcomm 3278 SCall 

ANCHOR MarkXIl $239 

HAYES 

Smarlmodem 1200/2400 $385/SCall 

1200B w/Smartcom II $355 

NOVATION SmartCat Plus $329 

PRENTICE POPCOM 

C100/X100 $255/$270 

VEN-TEL 300/1200 Half Card $409 




AST RESEARCH INC. 

ADVANTAGEI (for AT) SCall 

SIX PACK PLUS W/64K SCall 

jrCOMBO (exp. to 512K) SCall 

HERCULES Graphics Card $299 

Color Card (RGB/Comp/Par) . . . $155 

INTEL 8087/80287 SCall 

ORCHID PCTurbo 186 w/128K $655 

PARADISE SYSTEMS Multi-Display $280 

Modular Graphics Card $269 

Module A/B $75/$179 

PROMETHEUS Promodem Ext $315 

QUADRAM 

EXPANDED QUADBOARD W/64K . $239 

QUAD 512+ W/384K $309 

SIGMA DESIGNS Color 400 

/Mouse $519/3575 

STB SYSTEMS Graphix Plus II. . . $269 

SuperRiow/64K $279 

TALL TREE JRAM-2 SCall 

TANDON TM 100-2 (DSDD) .... $149 
TEAC FD-55B (Thinline DSDD) . . $125 

TECMAR Graphics Master $485 

Captain w/OK $179 

jrCaptain W/128K $309 



AMPEX 20 MB w/25 MB Tape . . . SCall 
C0RVUS 

11.1 MB Omnidrive Starter Kit ... $1649 
45 MB Omnidrive $4149 




INTERDYNE Tape Back Up SCall 

IRWIN Internal Tape Back Up $549 

IOMEGA Bernoulli 20 MB $2499 

MICROSCIENCE/SEAGATE SCall 

MAYNARD ELECTRONICS SCall 

SYSGEN Image/Qic-File/XL SCall 

TALLGRASS 

TG-5025 (25 MB w/60 MB Tape) $2759 

TG-6180 {80 MB w/60 MB Tape) SCall 

C-IT0H All Models SCall 

CITIZEN 

MSP-10 . . $329 MSP-15 . . $489 
MSP-20 . . . SCall MSP-25 . . . SCall 




EPSON JX-80 Color $489 

LQ-1500 $899 LX-80 $229 

FX-80+ $345 FX-100+ $485 

NEC P2/P3 Pinwriters . . . . $525/8735 
OKIOATA 

192 $359 ML84P SCall 

Okimate 20 . SCall Pacemark . . SCall 
PANASONIC KX-P1091/1093 .... SCall 
STAR MICRONICS 

Gemini 15X $345 SG-10 $229 

SD-10/15 SCall SR-15 $619 

TOSHIBA 

P1340 $559 P351 SCall 



LETTER QUALITY 



BROTHER/DYNAX 

HR-15Xl(20CPS) $359 

HR-25/HR-35 $495/$729 

HEWLETT-PACKARD LaserJet. . . SCall 
DIABLO 630 ECS/IBM $1799 

JUKI 6100/6300 $409/$730 

NEC 

ELF 360 . . $415 2050. . . . $669 
3550. . . . $1069 8850. . . . $1499 
QUME Sprint 1140/1155/1190 .... SCall 

SILVER REED EXP 500/550 S250/S449 

STAR MICRONICS Power Type . . $339 



PLOTTERS & DIGITIZERS 



POLAROID PALETTE 81175 

ENTER COMPUTER Six Shooter. . $779 




HOUSTON INSTRUMENTS 

PC-695. . . $549 DMP-41/42 $2349 
DMP-29 . . $1799 DMP-51/52 $3529 
DT-11 Digitizer $679 

ROLAND DXY-800/880 $699/$920 

SUMMAGRAPHICS SummaSketch SCall 



MONITORS & TERMINALS 



AMDEK 

Video 300/300A/310A $125/130/155 

Color 500/710 $359/$579 

PRINCETON GRAPHICS Max-12E $175 

HX-12/SR-12 S469/S599 



SCall 



QUME All Models 

ROLAND 

MB-122G . $155 MB-142 . . . SCall 

CB-141. . . $269 CC-141. . . $559 

TAXAN 

115 $115 116 $125 

420/L .... SCall 440 $559 

TELEVIDED All Models SCall 

WYSE 

WY-50 $459 WY-350 SCall 

ZENITH 

ZVM-123A. . $79 ZVM-124. . . SCall 

ZVM-135. . $439 ZVM-136. . . SCall 

Z-29A .... SCall Z-49 SCall 



FOR APPLE ll/lle 



MISCELLANEOUS 



ALS Smarterm II (80 Col. Card) . . $129 
AST RESEARCH INC. Multi I/O. . . SCall 
DIGITAL RESEARCH CP/M Gold Card 8269 
FOURTH DIMENSION 16K RAM Card. 855 

80 Column Card (lie) 855 

HAYES 

Micromodem He w/Smartcom I . . $149 

MICROSOFT Softcard II 8339 

MICROTEK Dumpling GX 869 

NOVATION Apple Cat II 8209 

212 Apple Cat II (1200) $389 

ORANGE MICRO Grappler + . . , . $79 

Buffered Grappler+ $145 

PCPI Applicard 6 MHz SCall 

MACINTOSH DRIVE! CALL FOR SS 

RAM CHIPS 

64KSET $14 256KSET SCall 

call for quantity pricing 
DOUBLE-SIDED DISKETTES 

3M $27 Dysan .... $30 

Maxell. ... $25 Wabash ... $19 

PRINT BUFFERS 

QUADRAM Microfazer 

Parallel/ Parallel 16K $139 

64K .... $185 128K. . . . $239 
Serial/Serial, Ser/ Par, Par/Ser 

8K $139 64K .... $159 

INTER.STRUCT. Shuffle- 
Buffer 32K $269 

SURGE PROTECTORS 

EPD/CURTIS All models SCall 

NETWORX Wire Tree/Plus S39/$55 

ULTIMA SF-600 $39 

EMERGENCY POWER SYSTEMS 

SOLA Mini UPS SCall 

TrippLite BC425-FC (425 Watts) $375 
SWITCHBOXES 

CABLECD 3 Way Serial/Parallel . . . SCall 
COMPUTER ACCESSORIES 
Data Directors (All Models) . . . SCall 



CUSTOMER SERVICE 



401-781-0020 



800-843-4302 



150 Broadway, Suite 2212, NY, NY 10038 

HOURS 9-B EST. MONDAY-SATURDAY 
Personal Ck (2 WeeksTo Clear), Cashier's Ck, 
Money Order 
APO Orders Add 6% (minimum $7). Add 3% 
For Net Terms. All Returned Non-Defective 
Merchandise Are Subject To A 20% Restocking 
Charge. GenTech Reserves the Right to Change 
Advertised Prices. 



Inquiry 15 7 



JULY 1985 -BYTE 361 



The fastest micro in the world 




No micro in its right mind would 
want a showdown with Pinnacle. 

Its a wesome firepower is 
provided by the superb Motorola 
68000 charging along at 12MHZ 
with no wait states (giving about 
3MIPS). 

And Pinnacle's ammo belt is just 
bristling with high powered options 
to give rapid fire to all seven users. 

P-System, Unix,® CP/M-68K® 
Mosys, BOS, Mirage, Tripos all obey 
instantly - along with their armies of 
applications. 



Up to 8 Megabytes of directly 
addressable RAM and 110 
Megabytes of Winchester storage 
dance when Pinnacle barks its 
sharp orders 

And that's just for starters. 
There's also the Pinnacle IX with 
TWO 68000's, DMA, and Memory 
Management hardware. Ideal for 
disk intensive operating systems 
like Unix® and Pick 



And a Pinnacle IX expansion 
chassis allowing nine 68000 
processors to network 56 users. 

A micro's gotta do what a micro's 
gotta do. 

And starting at under $4000 
Pinnacle's just the fastest there is. 

PINNACLE 

The accessible peak of performance 



US DISTRIBUTORS Pinnacle Systems Inc. 10410 Markinson Road, Dallas, Texas 75238. Tel. (214) 340-4941. Telex 88-8442 

ELECTRONIC manufacturing/service Lamtech Electronics Corporation, 620 Easy Street, Garland, Texas. Tel. (214) 272-3504 

international-Systems GROUP I SG Pinnacle, Dallas, Texas, Tel. (214) 340-4941. (Distributor enquiries invited). 

vertical market systems VMS Pinnacle, Dallas, Texas. Tel (214) 340-4941. 

European distributors TDI Pinnacle Ltd, 29 Alma Vale Road, Bristol BS8 2HL, England. Tel. (0272) 742796. Telex 444653. 

UNIX isa Registered Trade Mark of Bell Labs. CP/M-68K is a Registered Trade Mar kol Digital Research. Inquiry 281 




BYTE JAPAN 

Peripherals, Chips, 
and New Computers 



Erasable 



In the past month at least two new per- 
sonal computers have appeared on 
the market here; the battle of the 
memory chips continues with the major 
contenders evidently undaunted by the 
slump in the chip market (both Toshiba and 
Hitachi have introduced new large-scale 
memory chips); Fujitsu announced a new 
erasable optical-disc technology; there are 
glimmers of hope that the dismal situation 
in the Japanese software industry may be 
DrO dUCtS beaded for improvement; and I discovered 
^ the Silver-Reed EB50, a battery-powered 

lap-size portable four-color printer/plotter/ 
typewriter/thingamajig that's just plain neat. 



optical-disc 

coating from 

Fujitsu and 

more new 



Japanese 



BY WILLIAM M. RAIKE 



William M. Raike. who has a Ph.D. 
in applied mathematics from North- 
western University, has taught opera- 
tions research and computer science 
in Austin. Texas, and Monterey. 
California. He holds a patent on a 
voice scrambler and was formerly an 
officer of Cryptext Corporation in 
the United States. In 1980. he 
went to \apan looking for 6AK-bit 
RAMs. He has been there ever since 
working as a technical translator and 
a software developer. He can be 
contacted do BYTE. POB 372. 
Hancock. NH 03449. 



Take Your Graphics Along 

It's hard to know just what to call the Silver- 
Reed EB50. It looks like a briefcase-size por- 
table electronic typewriter, but there's no 
print element. Instead there are four ball- 
point pens (black, red, blue, and green) 
mounted in a little drum that draws the 
characters you enter from the keyboard 
(alphanumeric or katakana) in any of three 
sizes, in either Courier or italic type, either 
vertically or horizontally You can also draw 
four-color graphs in any of 12 styles, in- 
cluding various kinds of pie charts, bar 
graphs, and broken-line graphs, complete 
with labels and axes. A 1 5-character liquid- 
crystal display helps you orchestrate all this 
from the keyboard. 

The EB50 has a built-in serial interface, so 
it only needs paper and an RS-232C cable 
to turn it into a four-color plotter. A hard 
carrying case with a handle is standard, and 
the total weight, including batteries, comes 
to 5!/2 pounds. I still don't believe the list 
price; it's only about $200. However, I don't 
have any idea whether the company is plan- 
ning to export the EB50. 

New Fujitsu 
Optical-Disc Material 

Optical discs, like videodiscs and compact 
digital audiodiscs, store large amounts of 
data; you read the data by scanning the 



discs with a laser beam. But you can write 
data on the newer types of optical discs 
with a computer, something you cannot do 
to videodiscs and compact discs. The two 
main types of optical discs are DRAW 
(direct read after write), on which you can 
only write once, and erasable, on which you 
can write, erase, and rewrite a number of 
times. 

Fujitsu has just developed a new coating 
material for optical discs that allows data 
to be written by creating holes in the 
coating with a laser beam. Then this 
material can be partially melted by a lower- 
power laser beam that effectively erases the 
data. It also overcomes one of the main 
drawbacks of earlier materials: it is thermal- 
ly stable, which makes long-term data stor- 
age practical. The new material, a thin 
crystal layer of selenium, indium, and an- 
timony, also resists corrosion and oxidation 
better than the exotic tellurium used in 
other optical-recording materials. 

lb record data, you shine a 5-milliwatt 
laser beam on the surface for 1 00 nanosec- 
onds; the surface reflectivity of the resulting 
hole ends up being about 30 percent higher 
than the surrounding area. When a half- 
power laser beam heats up the same spot 
for several microseconds, the hole is 
smoothed out, reducing reflectivity by 
about 20 percent and effectively erasing the 
data. 

Existing optical-disc units store about 1 
gigabyte per 20-centimeter disc, but accord- 
ing to BYTE's Japanese sister publication, 
Nikkei BYTE, which featured optical discs 
in a recent issue, 5!4-inch units are on the 
way and promise to open up new applica- 
tions. We should start to see commercial 
products within the next two years. 

Let the Chips Fall . . . 

Just about all the Japanese electronics 
giants got into the chip act in recent weeks. 
First, there was NEC's announcement of a 
new superfast Josephson-junction inte- 

{continued) 



JULY 1985 -BYTE 363 



BYTE JAPAN 



grated circuit (IC). In the US., IBM 
abandoned Josephson-j unction 
research and development as imprac- 
tical about two years ago; NEC ob- 
viously thinks it's not that impractical. 
Josephson-junction devices use super- 
conductors cooled to -269 degrees 
Celsius and are capable of the fast- 
est operations currently known. 
Logic gates based on Josephson- 
junction technology can operate in 
times as short as 5 picoseconds, and 
speed will be a crucial factor in future 
supercomputer projects. NEC's latest 
IC, an experimental device, was a 
multiplier circuit; it could multiply a 
pair of 4-bit numbers in only 280 pico- 
seconds, several times faster than 
previously possible. The whole circuit 
is on a chip only 2.7 millimeters 
square, and it contains 862 Josephson 
junctions arranged to form 249 logic 
gates. 
Meanwhile, Toshiba claims to have 



developed the fastest 1 -megabit 
dynamic RAM (random-access read/ 
write memory) chip. It has an access 
time of only 60 nanoseconds. Like 
many new ultralarge-scale ICs. it's 
based on CMOS (complementary 
metal-oxide semiconductor) technol- 
ogy, which means low power con- 
sumption; the new 1 -megabit memory 
requires only three-quarters of the 
power of the 256K-bit dynamic RAM 
chips being sold now. 

Speaking of 256K-bit dynamic RAM 
chips, I spotted some Hitachi 150- 
nanosecond memory chips on sale in 
the electronics bazaar in the Akiha- 
bara district of Tokyo just a few days 
ago. The cost is now down to about 
$4.60 per chip; last year the first units 
were selling for over 10 times that 
amount. 

Recently Hitachi also made a tan- 
talizing announcement: It has 
developed a "multilevel slant-cell 



Togetalot 

out of your 

printer, you 

need a lot of 
programs, 

right? 



Wrong. 

Sure, you could buy one 

package to change type 

sizes, another to create 

fonts, and still another 

to print sideways. 

Or you could get one 

simple program to 

do it all! 



Printworks. 
It's loaded. 




rlr 




rir 



SoftStyle 



SoftStyle. Inc. 7192 Kalanianaole Hwy. Suite 205 
Honolulu. Hawaii 96825 Phone (800) 367-5600 
$69.95. Enhances over 30 dot matrix printers, including 
Epson and Okidata IBM PC or compatible 



rlrj 
£IEJ 




dynamic RAM." According to the 
company, with this new technique you 
can store four times as much informa- 
tion with no change in the dynamic 
RAM structure; instead of holding 1 
bit of data each cell holds 4 bits 
(represented by a 16-level staircase- 
voltage signal). The speed of this new 
type of memory, I to 2 microseconds, 
is slow compared with conventional 
dynamic RAM chips, presumably 
because of some type of analog-to- 
digital conversion. Nevertheless, it's 
not hard to think of applications 
where the speed penalty wouldn't be 
important. There was no word from 
Hitachi on when it might be possible 
to buy a multilevel slant-cell dynamic 
RAM, or what the cost for such a chip 
might be. 

Japan Moves to Improve 
Software Quality 

Japanese computer manufacturers 
and software houses are aware of the 
low productivity and questionable 
quality of much software-develop- 
ment activity in Japan; one software 
company here, Reed Corporation, is 
dealing with the problem by commis- 
sioning over a dozen U.S. software 
firms to develop custom software, 
linking minicomputers in Tokyo with 
the U.S. companies via a satellite 
hookup. 

The Japanese government, through 
MITI (the Ministry of International 
Trade and Industry) and its subagency 
the Information Technology Promo- 
tion Agency (IPA). is concerned about 
the software problem, which is pro- 
jected to get worse with time because 
of the increasing shortage of software 
specialists. MITI started the Sigma 
Project this past April in cooperation 
with domestic and foreign software 
firms. Combined government and 
private spending on the project will 
be almost $12 million the first year 
and $100 million over the next five 
years; the objective is a fourfold im- 
provement in software productivity 
and a dramatic improvement in reli- 
ability and modularity, particularly in 
the area of business software. 

As hardware costs decrease and 
computing power increases, software 



364 BYTE • JULY 1985 



Inquiry 322 



BYTE JAPAN 



for personal computers and low- 
priced office computers is certain to 
be a major factor in the success, and 
even the survival of computer manu- 
facturers. Part of the dramatic success 
of the NEC personal computers stems 
from the company's efforts to en- 
courage and attract independent soft- 
ware houses to develop and sell soft- 
ware products specifically designed 
for NEC machines. Some other 
lapanese manufacturers are providing 
monetary incentives to software de- 
velopers to encourage them to design 
and develop software that runs only 
on their hardware. This could help 
counter the reluctance of many soft- 
ware firms to invest heavily in the 
development of general-purpose soft- 
ware for wide distribution; those firms 
currently rely on orders for high- 
priced custom software. 

The New IBM 5540 and the 
Oki IF800/60 

Last year IBM Japan Ltd. announced 
its JX personal computer; it was too 
little too late— basically an IBM PCjr- 
compatible at IBM PC prices. It was 
greeted with thundering silence at the 
cash registers. On the other hand, 
IBM's 5 550 workstation achieved a 
limited popularity as an office com- 
puter, despite its $4000-plus price tag 
and extreme sluggishness in recogniz- 
ing lapanese-language kanji input. 

Now IBM has introduced the 5540. 
In a nutshell, the 5 540 is yet another 
computer based on the 8086 micro- 
processor, but not much else. Even 
the kanji ROM (read-only memory) 
isn't standard; you have to buy it as 
an option. You get either one or two 
5 '/4-inch 720K-byte floppy-disk 
drives— not particularly impressive 
when you consider the 1-megabyte 
drives in the Fujitsu FM-11BS and 
FM-160, or in the newest version of 
NEC's market-dominating personal 
computer, the PC-9801M2. (See the 
May BYTE Japan, page 35 5, for more 
information.) Standard memory is 
256K bytes, expandable to 640K 
bytes. The IBM 5 540 has no color- 
display capability; other than that, it 
can run all the 5 5 50 software, which 
amounts to a tiny fraction of the soft- 



ware available (for example, for NEC's 
PC-9801 machines). This lackluster 
bundle costs about $1450 for the 
single-drive version and $1700 for the 
two-drive version— about the same as 
for either the Fujitsu or NEC machine, 
but it has far fewer capabilities and a 
much narrower choice of software. 

The newest machine from Oki Elec- 
tric, the if800 model 60, is far more 
likely to win the hearts and minds of 
the computer-buying public than the 
IBM 5540. Despite having very little 
software written specifically for it, the 
if800/60 comes with Japanese-lan- 
guage MS-DOS 2.11, so owners have 
access to the mass of generic MS- 
DOS software on the market. Interest- 
ingly. Oki has developed its own win- 
dowing software, called SuperView, 
which runs hand in hand with MS- 
DOS on the new machine. SuperView 
also has standard 720- by 512-dot 
color-graphics capability supported 
by 512K bytes of graphics video RAM 
in addition to the 51 2K bytes of stan- 
dard main RAM. That's more than 
double the memory of the NEC 
PC-9801 M2 and better graphics capa- 
bility than the new Fujitsu FM-160. 
Like the NEC machine, the new Oki 
if800/60 runs an 8-MHz 8086-2 micro- 
processor; the Fujitsu FM-160 uses 
the faster 80186 processor and a 
video coprocessor. All three of these 
machines include two 1-megabyte 
5 !4-inch floppy-disk drives; on the Oki 
you can fit an optional 10-megabyte 
hard disk into the main unit along 
with the two floppy disks. The list 
price for the if800/60 is about $1750; 
unlike most other Japanese com- 
puters, the Oki's price includes a high- 
resolution monochrome display, so it 
actually ends up costing a few hun- 
dred dollars less than either the NEC 
or the Fujitsu machine, and discounts 
of at least 20 percent are inevitable 
in this highly competitive market. 

Coming Up 

In next month's column I'll report on 
the first-ever COMDEX in Japan and 
on several of the products on display 
there, including a Fujitsu lap-size 
portable, the NEC PC-8401A, and 
more. ■ 



If they can 
make it here, 
they 11 make 
it anywhere. 




When's the last time you saw 
"digging a well" on someone's 
resume? Working in the 
Peace Corps is not your average 
everyday job. 

Whatever it takes to be 
Peace Corps volunteers, it's 
a way of working that develops 
a resourcefulness and a degree 
of self-reliance that volunteers 
use long after they've come 
home. Anyplace they work. 
On any job they're given. 

Hire a former Peace Corps 
volunteer, and put that 
experience to work on your 
"toughest job." Call Peace Corps 
toll-free, 800424-8580 
(ext. 76) to tell them about 
job possibilities for returned 
volunteers. Or if you know of 
those who might like to 
volunteer, use the same phone 
number (ext. 93) to put their 
experience to work where 
it can do a world of good. 

Peace Corps 

The toughest job 
you'll ever love. 



A Public Service of This Publication (jOUICII 
JULY 1985 -BYTE 365 




The Everex Hard Disk/Backup Systems Are Your 
Expansion Systems too... with little additional cost. 



More Room To Expand, Not More Money 

Think about Off-loading expansion boards 
from you r PC or XT to an External Hard 
Disk/Backup System. Everex provides a 
complete line to choose from . . . 

• Full-size system with eight expansion 
slots and room to add up to four hard disk/ 
backup systems. 

• Half-size system with four expansion 
slots and space for two hard disk/backup 
systems. 

• Slimline system, only 2 1 /2 inches high with 
three full-size, one half-size expansion 
slots and room for two hard disk/backup 
systems. 

• All Expansion systems are available with 
any combination of Everex hard disk drives 
and backup systems. 

Unique Features 

• One shielded round cable (as IBM) instead 
of flat ribbon cables. 



Replace the clumsy flat ribbon cable 
with Everex's shielded, round cable. 




• Advanced design eliminates "wait states" 
for faster data transmission. 

• Compatible with more controllers than 
other systems. 

Visit your local Everex dealer today and ask 
to see Everex Hard Disk/Backup Systems 
in action. For the name of your nearest 
Everex dealer, please call (415)498-1111, 
47777 Warm Springs Blvd., Fremont, 
CA 94539. Dealer Hotline (800) 821 -0806. 
In CA (800) 821 -0807 

Imagineering Ultimo, Australia TLX: 74349 IMAGIN AA 

Microage Distribution Ltd. London, England TLX: 881 3241 

WONGS G 

Feeder Paris, France TLX: 4413241 FEEDER 

Automated Office Systems Hout Bay, South Africa 2721 -70-8091 

Survex, 1027 Speers Road, Oakville, Ontario Canada L6L-2X5, 

416-842-6093 

Pride Computers, 102-8167 Main Street, Vancouver, 

British Columbia, V5X 3L2, 604-321 -5690 

IBM, PC. XT and AT are registered trademarks of International Business 
Machines Corporation. 



EVER for Excellence 



366 BYTE • JULY 1985 



Inquiry 1 43 



SAVE 50 % 





4275 



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Elsewhere D $37 (surface mail), U.S. Funds enclosed 

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ACCORDING TO WEBSTER 



Start-up 



Fat Mac 



MacWorld Exposition 



XL/Serve 



MacAide 



MacNosy 



Airborne 



QC-10 



Mac Bernoulli Box 



ChipWits 



Macintosh p-System 

MacAdvantage 

Mind Prober 

Videx 



GEM Seminar 



by Bruce Webster 



Bruce Webster is a consulting editor 

for BYTE and a charter member of 

the PMS Commandos. He can be 

reached do BYTE. 42 5 Battery St.. 

San Francisco. CA 94111. 



As you probably know, the period 
of time after a product is released 
until a review shows up in BYTE 
can be pretty long. Our editorial staff is all 
too aware of that delay. According to 
Webster is an attempt to close that gap a 
little. Its goal is to look at what's new in soft- 
ware and hardware and to comment on the 
industry itself. We can't bring you the latest 
news; our three- to four-month editorial lag 
time just won't permit it. But we can— and, 
we hope, will— bring you reasoned, in- 
formed commentary. 

A Word About the Author 

You're probably wondering who I am and 
why I am writing this. I'm a semiretired pro- 
fessional software engineer who has de- 
cided to pursue writing full-time for a while. 
My educational background includes a B.S. 
in computer science (BYU 1978) and some 
graduate work at the University of Houston. 
My professional background includes work 
at General Dynamics, the Lunar and 
Planetary Institute, and Monitor Labs. 
Perhaps more significant is that I spent two 
years working for a microcomputer software 
house. While there, I helped bring two prod- 
ucts to market. I wrote about 5 percent of 
the first one and 95 percent of the second. 
Both received many glowing reviews, both 
have been commercially successful, and 
both are still on the market— so I'll refrain 
from identifying them or the firm I worked 
for. 

I don't bring this up to pat myself on the 
back; I just want to point out that I don't 
fall into the second category of "those that 
can. do; those that can't, teach/review/cri- 
tique/etc." I know firsthand all the headaches 
and difficulties in developing a product, put- 
ting it on the shelves, and supporting it. On 
the other hand. I know the shortcuts, the 
excuses, the temptations to cheat, and the 
song-and-dance routines that the customers 
get. Of course, this doesn't mean that I used 
them ... at least, not very much. It does 
mean that I know the difference between 



problems inherent in the application and 
problems caused by sloppiness or corner- 
cutting. 

While I am no longer developing commer- 
cial software. I still spend most of my time 
in front of computers. I currently own three, 
all paid for out of my own pocket. The first 
is a Compaq, which I use mostly for word 
processing and telecommunication. When 
I'm not using it, I run a bulletin board on 
it. The second is a Macintosh, which is used 
for word and outline processing, software 
development, and other tasks. The third is 
an Apple He, which right now isn't used for 
much of anything. And, of course, I have 
various chunks of hardware and software 
floating by from time to time. 

Which brings us back to this column and 
why I am writing it. Some of you are prob- 
ably asking yourselves. "If he's such a hot- 
shot programmer, how come he's writing 
this?" The truth is. I burned myself out 
finishing an updated version of product #2. 
I had been writing articles part-time for 
several years, so I decided to try it full-time. 
BYTE graciously offered me the chance to 
write this column, and the rest, as they say, 
is history. I still do software development; 
in fact. I spend more time writing code than 
prose. The difference is. I'm doing it for my 
own pleasure and entertainment, nobody 
else's. 

Enough about me. As mentioned above, 
the idea is to cover the latest in software 
and hardware. Unfortunately, I've got 
several months' accumulation of "the 
latest," so it's going to take a column or two 
to clear things out. Not only that, but most 
of it is for the Macintosh. Those of you who 
aren't Mac fans can skip to the section en- 
titled 'And Now for Something Complete- 
ly Different." The rest of you can read on. 

Macintosh Redux 

In my review of the Mac (August 1984, page 
238), 1 stated that the 128K-byte one-drive 
Mac was "an amazing machine but not 

[continued] 



JULY 1985 -BYTE 367 



ACCORDING TO WEBSTER 



really a powerful one" and that a 
512K-byte Mac with two drives "is 
both amazing and powerful." This, of 
course, was conjecture on my part, 
since the 512K-byte Mac wasn't avail- 
able when 1 wrote that. As you all 
know, that changed last September. A 
few months ago, Apple lent me a Fat 
Mac so that I could test the truth of 



my statement. It's true: a 512K-byte 
Mac with two drives is both amazing 
and powerful. A 512K-byte Mac with 
a hard disk is even better. You 
shouldn't even consider buying a 
128K-byte machine; it just isn't worth 
the aggravation. 

More significant has been the 
dramatic drop in prices. At the time 



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of the review, a 512K-byte Mac with 
two drives and an Imagewriter printer 
would have cost $4 500, which doesn't 
compare very well with the $3000 I 
paid for my Compaq (51 2K bytes, two 
360K-byte drives. Epson RX-80 
printer). This week I saw two com- 
puter stores advertising that exact Fat 
Mac system for $2795. Since $2795 
is the current official list price for a Fat 
Mac, those stores are effectively 
throwing in the printer and extra disk 
drive for 'tree." By contrast, my Com- 
paq system has barely dropped in 
price; it would cost me about $2800 
today. Coincidental^, $2800 is almost 
exactly what I spent on my 128K-byte 
single-drive Mac (with Imagewriter) a 
year ago. It shows what a difference 
a year can make, but most of you 
already knew that. 

Though it's old hat as I write this, I 
have to comment on Apple's 512K- 
byte upgrade policy. The initial $1000 
cost (it dropped to $700 in January) 
was in my opinion atrocious and in- 
excusable, especially since other firms 
are now offering $300-$400 Mac up- 
grades. Apple's price was designed to 
make money, which I'm sure it did. 
Unfortunately, Apple squandered a 
far more precious resource: the good- 
will and loyalty of tens of thousands 
of Mac users who were patiently put- 
ting up with a crippled machine while 
waiting for the upgrade to come out. 
Almost every Mac user I know ex- 
pressed disgust or disappointment at 
finding that upgrade priced pretty 
much out of his or her reach. Apple 
users are known for their zeal and 
fervor; in many Mac users, that's been 
replaced with caution and cynicism. 
And I don't even know if Apple peo- 
ple realize what they've lost. 

Macworld Exposition 

I spent two days at the MacWorld Ex- 
position in San Francisco in February. 
The show wasn't overly large; it didn't 
quite fill up all of Brooks Hall, the 
underground portion of the Civic 
Center. On the other hand, as Guy 
Kawasaki of Apple noted in a talk, had 
the show been held a year earlier, 
only three exhibitors would have been 

[continued] 



368 BYTE • JULY 1985 



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JULY 1985 'BYTE 369 



Inquiry 301 



The Best Source 
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ACCORDING TO WEBSTER 



A 5\2Krbyte Mac 
with a hard disk 
is a nifty system. 



there . . . and two of those would 
have been showing carrying cases. 

There were a lot of start-up com- 
panies, firms that were banking their 
whole future on the success of the 
Macintosh. Indeed, the Mac appears 
to be attracting companies who 
believe that the IBM market is over- 
crowded and tends to be dominated 
by a few major companies. They see 
the Macintosh as a chance to get in 
on a ground floor that the IBM market 
passed three years ago. Others, most 
notably software developers, follow 
the Mac because they find it a more 
interesting and challenging machine 
than the IBM PC. Yet others, such as 
Hayden, see the Mac as a chance to 
get back into an industry that they've 
been slowly squeezed out of. And, of 
course, we must remember that all 
these firms must (and want to) make 
money. Most are still waiting to see if 
the Mac helps them to do just that. 

There wasn't much new at the show, 
unless you knew where to look. 
Several hard disks were announced, 
although most won't be ready to ship 
for a while. Infosphere showed two 
products that didn't appear all that 
flashy, but they could be very impor- 
tant to increased acceptance of the 
Macintosh. XL/Serve is a program that 
turns a Mac XL (aka Lisa) into an 
AppleTalk file server. This means that 
AppleTalk is an immediate reality. 
What's more, it runs in "background" 
mode, so that the Mac XL can still be 
used for other tasks, although perfor- 
mance is degraded. MacAide is a Z80- 
based board (designed mostly for 
OEMs) that serves as a bridge from 
AppleTalk to just about anything else: 
SASI, serial. IEEE-959 bus, even an- 
other AppleTalk network. The Info- 
sphere people had an $800 Xybec 
hard disk (10 megabytes) talking to a 
Mac through a MacAide card. Keep 
an eye on this product. 



Other interesting products were 
shown. For die-hard hackers, Steve 
Jasik was selling MacNosy, a disas- 
sembler that lets you rip the Toolbox 
ROM (read-only memory) and other 
programs apart. (Incidentally, Jasik. 
who has looked at all the ROM rou- 
tines, had harsh things to say about 
the quality of some of the code there- 
in.) Professional Data Systems showed 
an external video adapter for the Mac, 
along with a large (2 3 inches) high- 
resolution monochrome monitor and 
a high-resolution video-projection sys- 
tem. Large crowds gathered to look 
at the Hyperdrive, a 10-megabyte 
hard disk that mounts inside the Mac. 
Everyone wants one, but they're leery 
about letting someone mess with the 
innards of their Macs. Large crowds 
also flocked to the Odessa booth, 
where they were displaying Helix 
(which is finally shipping). And the 
Apple booth itself attracted many 
people. 

The award for "Most Original Boot- 
up Sequence" goes to Silicon Beach 
Software, which was previewing its ar- 
cade game Airborne. If you boot Air- 
borne on a 512K-byte Mac, it plays 20 
seconds of Wagner's "Ride of the 
Valkyries." We're not talking about the 
four-voice chamber music found in 
MusicWorks— this is a full orchestral 
rendition. Tlirns out the folks at SBS 
took the excerpt from an actual sym- 
phonic recording, digitized it using a 
VAX, and then downloaded it to the 
Mac. The file takes up 138K bytes, 
which is why it plays only on the Fat 
Mac. The game itself isn't terribly 
original— a cross between Sabotage 
and Choplifter— but the sound effects 
are nice. 

The show was enjoyable and man- 
ageable. It will be interesting to con- 
trast it with the West Coast Computer 
Faire. Look for comments here in a 
few months. 

Mass Storage 

As mentioned above, a 512K-byte Mac 
with a hard disk is a pretty nifty 
system. The extra storage and faster 
response time do much to overcome 
the limitations of the basic Mac sys- 

[continued] 



370 BYTE • JULY 1985 




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JULY 1985 -BYTE 371 



Inquiry 360 






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ACCORDING TO WEBSTER 



tern. For the last month or so, I've had 
the pleasure of working with two 
mass-storage devices for the Mac: the 
QC-IO from Quark and the Mac Ber- 
noulli Box from IOmega. 

The QC-IO is a nice piece of hard- 
ware with good software support. It's 
a IO-megabyte hard disk that can be 
used with the Macintosh, the Apple 
II. and the Apple III. What's more, you 
can use one disk with all three sys- 
tems. The QC-IO Volume Manager 
software lets you allocate chunks of 
the disk for the Mac, DOS, ProDOS, 
and SOS. (Software to support Apple 
Pascal is under development.) For ex- 
ample, the unit I had on loan (and 
have since, regretfully, returned) had 
a 2-megabyte SOS volume, a 2-mega- 
byte ProDOS volume, and four Mac 
volumes, two of I megabyte and two 
of 2 megabytes. Each Mac volume 
acts like a floppy disk, with its own 
volume name and directory. Using the 
Volume Manager, each volume can be 
mounted or dismounted, and each 
can be selected for automatic mount- 
ing on boot. Yes, you do have to boot 
off a disk. 

As many hard disks do, the QC-IO 
makes chirping noises during read/ 
write operations, but they are by no 
means annoying. Most important, 
during a month of heavy use, I never 
had a single problem with the QC-IO: 
no crashes, no lost files, nothing. Note, 
though, that all my QC-IO use was 
with a 5l2K-byte Mac. A friend who 
has been using the QC-IO with a 128K- 
byte Mac has reported some prob- 
lems. I can't verify that since I no 
longer have the QC-IO here, but be 
warned. 

The QC-IO plugs into the Mac's ex- 
ternal drive port. It has a matching 
port on back, but you can't plug an 
extra Mac drive in there (yet). How- 
ever, if you're using it with an Apple 
He or a He with a DuoDisk, you can 
indeed plug your drives into that port. 
For example, to hook the QC-IO up to 
my lie, I would plug it into the Duo- 
Disk controller, then plug the DuoDisk 
unit into the QC-10. A special cable 
is provided to connect it to a regular 
Disk II controller. You use two rocker 
switches to tell the QC-IO just what it's 



talking to. All the cables needed are 
provided, along with a tiny screw- 
driver (very thoughtful), and, of 
course, Mac, DOS/ProDOS, and SOS 
versions of the Volume Manager 
software. 

The speedup on the Mac was nice, 
although it was not as great as l would 
like. However, the same appears to be 
true of most hard disks and is largely 
due to the Mac system software. 
Apple knows this and is apparently 
taking steps to correct it. A press 
release handed out at the Apple 
shareholders' meeting in lanuary 
stated that ". . . during 1985 we will 
enhance the Macintosh user interface 
and file system to significantly im- 
prove Macintosh performance, partic- 
ularly with hard disks." I hope so. 

If you're considering getting a hard 
disk for your Mac (or Apple II or 
Apple III), you should take a good 
look at the QC-IO. If you have two or 
more of those models, you should 
look very closely. 

Question: What looks like a hard 
disk, acts like a hard disk, but isn't a 
hard disk? Answer: a Bernoulli Box. 
Built by IOmega Corporation, the Ber- 
noulli Box has been around for some 
time as a mass-storage device for the 
IBM PC. Instead of using rigid platters, 
it uses a flexible disk inside a remov- 
able plastic case. In other words, it's 
like a very fat floppy-disk drive. How 
fat? From 5 to 10 megabytes per disk. 
I've been intrigued with the Bernoulli 
Box ever since it came out, so I was 
pleasantly surprised to spot a Macin- 
tosh version at COMDEX last 
November. It holds "only" 5 mega- 
bytes per disk, but since you can buy 
disks at $60 a pop, your total storage 
is limited only by your wallet. 

I received a loaner unit in 
December, about a month sooner 
than expected. It was one of the first 
ones off the assembly line and, as 
might have been expected, was D.O.A. 
Actually, it would power up and every- 
thing; it just wouldn't format any disks. 
A few weeks later, an IOmega repre- 
sentative visited me and replaced a 
ROM, fixing the problem. 

The Box plugs into the modem port 

[continued] 



372 BYTE • JULY 1985 




When you're on the road, don't leave 
your office to manage itself. Give them a 

call on AT&T Long Distance from a 

public phone. And make sure everything's 

under control. Wherever you are. 



AT&T 

The right choice. 



ACCORDING TO WEBSTER 



I can recommend 
both the QG10 and 
the Bernoulli Box if 
you are adding mass 
storage to your Mac/ 



and looks like a single disk drive to 
the Mac. Unfortunately, the Mac 
Finder has problems supporting more 
than 128 files on a single drive; if you 
create too many files on the drive, the 
system crashes. Since a 5-megabyte 
drive can easily hold two or three 
times that many files, it's hard to make 
full use of the disk space. IOmega has 
just released software to let you make 
the drive look like several disks; look 
for a follow-up next month. 

The Bernoulli Box is noticeably 
faster than the QC-10; at least, I no- 
ticed the difference when I returned 
the QC-10 and went back to using the 
Box. It's also much quieter. The disk- 
drive emulation is consistent and 
thorough. You can "eject" the current 
disk; the drive door actually does pop 
up, and you can remove the disk and 
insert another one. You can swap 
disks, transfer files, and generally treat 
the Box like another disk drive. 

The real advantage of the Box is 
that you can set up different mass- 
storage environments. For example, I 
have two disks: Development and 
Write/Paint. The Development disk 
has MacAdvantage (UCSD Pascal), 
MacASM (68000 assembly language), 
Microsoft BASIC, MacFORTH, Copy II 
Mac/MacTools, IconEdit, Resource- 
Editor, other utilities, and numerous 
program source files. The Write/Paint 
disk has Microsoft Word, Think- 
Tknk-512. MacWrite, MacPaint, Multi- 
plan, Dollars and Sense, and Hayden: 
Speller, along with numerous docu- 
ments. And I have plenty of room on 
both disks for more. In other words, 
I've replaced a few dozen disks with 
just two. When I want to program, I 
plug in the Development disk and 



everything I need is right there. If I 
need to write or paint, I eject the 
Development disk, plug in the Write/ 
Paint disk, and go to work. 

An ideal use for a Bernoulli Box 
would be on a Mac shared by two or 
more people. Each person would 
have his or her own 5-megabyte disk 
with all the programs and data files 
that he or she needs. No problems 
with security, no need to worry about 
accidental (or deliberate) alteration or 
deletion of files, and no fighting for 
space. 

Aside from the initial ROM problem 
and the limit on number of files, the 
Bernoulli Box has been almost as 
solid as the QC-10. I say "almost" 
because at one point some of my de- 
velopment software started acting 
flaky, and I wasn't entirely sure if the 
problem was with the Box or with the 
512K-byte Mac (which has had a few 
hardware problems of its own). I 
copied all my program files off, refor- 
matted the disk, put everything I 
needed back on it, and it's been solid 
ever since. Since the Mac is on 12-18 
hours each day, the Box, like the 
QC-10, has gotten plenty of work. 
Also, I have worked with the Bernoulli 
Box hooked to a 128K-byte Mac, and 
I have run into a situation where I 
can't eject the Box's disk via the 
regular method, forcing me to reboot 
before ejecting. Recommendation: If 
possible, upgrade to a 512K-byte ma- 
chine before (or soon after) getting 
the Box. 

Besides the partitioning software, 
IOmega is also planning to release a 
slave drive (also 5 megabytes) for the 
Box. It would be smaller and cheaper 
and would plug into the pass-through 
RS-422 port in the back of the Box. 
Among other things, this would let 
you do quick backups, doing a com- 
plete disk-to-disk transfer. I have no 
idea when this will be available or 
how much it will cost. 

I can recommend both the QC-10 
($1995) and the Bernoulli Box ($1895) 
for anyone adding mass storage to 
their Mac. Each has its own strengths 
and weaknesses; you need to con- 
sider how each might (or might not) 
meet your needs. And again: If you 



are considering getting any hard disk 
for your Mac, you should first upgrade 
your Mac to 512K bytes. Heck, you 
should upgrade to 5 1 2K bytes even if 
you aren't considering getting a hard 
disk, but that's already been dis- 
cussed. 

Product of the Month: 
ChipWits 

When 1 first saw the Macintosh, I 
thought about how it would be to de- 
velop a graphical programming lan- 
guage for it, i.e., a language that used 
graphical images instead of text. At 
the Consumer Electronics Show, I was 
startled and pleased to see that some- 
one had taken a stab at it. Doug Sharp 
and Mike Johnson (of Discourse Inc.) 
have come up with a delightful game 
called ChipWits. The game resembles 
a cross between two classic Apple II 
programs: Robot Wars and Rocky's 
Boots. Your goal is to design a robot 
to get through a given environment, 
i.e., a collection of rooms connected 
by doors. The robot must avoid 
obstacles; refuel by finding and pick- 
ing up coffee and pie; avoid (or 
destroy) dangers such as electrocrabs, 
bouncers, and bombs; and gain 
points by collecting 'good items" like 
oil cans and disks. Eight different en- 
vironments are included, each with its 
own mix of objects and overall goal. 
If that were all there was to Chip- 
Wits, the game would be merely nice. 
What makes it remarkable is the icon- 
based programming language, IBOL, 
that Doug and Mike have imple- 
mented. To program your robot, you 
position and connect icons on a grid 
(6 by 10) of rectangles. Program flow 
starts in the upper left corner of the 
grid (which always has a "green light" 
icon). Each icon points to the next 
one to be executed. A number of 
icons make tests and have TRUE and 
FALSE arrows that show which way to 
go based on the test. A "return to 
start" icon always takes you back to 
the green light, as does an empty rec- 
tangle. And it has subroutines: seven 
additional grids that you can call from 
the main grid. Like the main grid, each 
subgrid starts with a green light icon 

[continued) 



374 BYTE • JULY 1985 



If you don't have a 

Hercules Graphics Card, you could 

end up looking like this: 



"I know, because one day it hap- 
pened to me . . . 

"I was running some routine 
tests on a non- Hercules mono- 
chrome graphics card when I 
was struck by a severe case 
of low resolutionitis. I'm the 
president of Hercules and 
that's me exhibiting the 
symptoms of the disease 
in its advanced stages. Not 
a pretty sight, is it? 

"What causes low res- 
olutionitis? Experts point J 
to ordinary monochrome j 
graphics cards with 
coarse, hard-to-read 
graphics. A bad case of eyestrain may 
develop if action is not taken immediately. 

"Fortunately for me, a Hercules Graphics 
Card was nearby. A quick change brought 
soothing 720 x 348 graphics. That's twice 
the resolution of ordinary 640 x 200 graph- 
ics cards. 

"Which means better graphics for 
Lotus™ 1-2-3™ Symphony 7 " Framework™ 
pfs:Graph* Microsoft* Chart and Word, 
Super Calc3* AutoCad" and dozens of 
other programs. 

"Including Microsoft Flight Simulator, 
now Hercules compatible! 

"Oh, and don't forget that a parallel 
printer port is standard on the Hercules 
Graphics Card, not an extra cost option. 

"Now, if you're worried about buying 
a new product that hasn't had all the bugs 




worked out, relax. Hercules has 
sold more monochrome graphics 
cards for the IBM°PC,XT™ and AT™ 
than anyone else in the world. 

"So . . . you're convinced that 
you should buy a Hercules 
Graphics Card. Now, steer 
clear of cheap imitations. 
You may save af ew bucks, 
but you won't get all of 
these five essential features 
which only Hercules has: 
"1) A safety switch that 
helps prevent damage to 
, your monitor, 2) the 
b^ ability to keep a Hercules 
^^^^^^^^^^™ Color Card in your 
system, 3) the ability to use the PC's BASIC 
to do graphics, 4) a Hercules designed chip 
that eliminates 30% of the parts that can go 
wrong, and 5) a two year warranty, because 
we think reliability is something you should 
deliver and not just talk about." 

"Call 1-800-532-0600 Ext 408 for the 
name of the Hercules dealer nearest you 
and we'll rush you our free info kit. 




Hercules. 

We're strong on graphics. 



Address:2550 Ninth St., Berkeley, CA 94710 Ph: 540-6000 Telex: 754063 Trademark/Owners: Hercules/Hercules ComputerTech; IBM.XT.AT/IBM; Lotus 1-2-3, 
Symphony/Lotus Development; Framework/ Ashton-Tate; Microsoft/Microsoft; pfs:Graph /Software Publishing; SuperCalc3/Sorcim-IUS; AutoCad/AutoDesk. 



Inquiry 168 



JULY 1985 • BYTE 375 



ACCORDING TO WEBSTER 



in the upper left; a special "boomer- 
ang" icon returns you to the main 
grid. What's more, you have three dif- 
ferent stacks to use (values, objects, 
and directions), which lets you do 
things like set up loops or pass pa- 
rameters to subroutines. On top of 
that are single-stepping and trace 
functions that let you observe the 
icons, the stacks, and other variables 
while watching the robot run around. 
Figure 1 shows one of my creations. 
This may all sound complicated; it 
isn't. I sat down my 8-year-old 
daughter (who has never pro- 
grammed) in front of it. Within 10 
minutes, and with only a little help 
from me. she had built a pretty good 
beginning robot. More than that, she 
knew why it was doing what it was 
doing— she understood the program 
that she had written. One of the ad- 
vantages of IBOL is that it is impossi- 
ble to write a program with a syntax 
error in it. All programs run and run 
in predictable ways. This makes it an 
ideal language to introduce program- 
ming to nonprogrammers, because 
anything they write will run. The robot 
may not do very much— indeed, it 
may even hasten its own destruction— 



but the program will at least run. 

The only real weakness in ChipWits 
is the documentation (which wasn't 
written by Doug and Mike, though it 
probably should have been). I had a 
very hard time finding the information 
I wanted, either because it was stuck 
in some obscure location or because 
it just wasn't in there. On the other 
hand, the IBOL quick-reference card 
tells you most of what you really need 
to know. I did find one or two minor 
bugs in the program itself, but they 
were truly minor; I passed them on to 
Doug and Mike, and I'm sure they'll 
have been corrected by the time you 
read this. 

Even with the poor documentation 
(did I mention the ugly packaging, 
also?), ChipWits is a program that 
every Mac owner should have. It really 
shows the strength of the visually 
oriented approach that the Mac pro- 
motes. Plus it's a lot of fun. Get it. 

Two Pascals for the Mac 

When the Macintosh was first re- 
leased, you had to buy a Lisa (since 
renamed the Macintosh XL) to devel- 
op software for it. This, understand- 
ably, was a sore point with many de- 



Warehouse Workshop Enuironments Options 



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Figure 1: A portion of one of the author's IBOL robot-control programs in the 
game ChipWits for the Macintosh. 



velopers, since the Lisa 2/10 cost two 
to three times as much as a Macin- 
tosh. In the last year, the situation has 
changed dramatically. A growing as- 
sortment of development systems 
that run on the Mac itself have ap- 
peared, aided by the release of the 
512K-byte Mac and various hard disks. 

T\vo Pascal development systems for 
the Mac are available. Both are from 
SofTech Microsystems, and both use 
a p-code interpreter. The first to come 
out was the Macintosh p-System. a 
full-fledged port of the p-System onto 
the Macintosh. Instead of using the 
Mac interface (mouse, desktop, pull- 
down menus), it uses the standard 
p-System menu and utilities (filer, 
editor, etc.). If you've done any p-Sys- 
tem development on another com- 
puter, as I have, you'll feel right at 
home here. However, if you want to 
bring up a Mac-like application, you're 
pretty much out of luck. A small 
graphics library supports sections of 
QuickDraw and the Event Manager, 
but that's about it. 

The basic Pascal Development Sys- 
tem costs $195 and includes the oper- 
ating system, compiler, editor, filer, 
and some other odds and ends. It 
also includes a few manuals, which 
are general to the p-System, and a 
supplement specifically for the Macin- 
tosh. If you're going to do any serious 
programming, you'll also want to get 
the Advanced Development Tool Kit 
($1 50), which has a 68000 assembler, 
a native-code generator, some other 
advanced utilities, the source code 
(both Pascal and 68000) for the graph- 
ics library given in the basic package, 
and a few more manuals. 

I have mixed feelings about this 
Pascal implementation. My big soft- 
ware project was done with a version 
of the p-System, and since it had its 
own user interface, I think I could have 
converted it to the Mac in a relatively 
short time using this package. But 
that's something of a rare case. Most 
people who want to write software for 
the Mac want to make some use of 
the Mac interface; this package 
doesn't let you do that. On top of that 
comes the problem of Sof Tech's li- 

(continued) 



376 B YTE • JULY 1985 



Compare the 
Hercules Color Card 

to IBM's. 

Five reasons why the Hercules Color Card is better. 




1. Compatibility 



3. Size. 



4. Flexibility. 



5. Warranty. 



IBM Color Adapter $244 

Runs hundreds of graphics 
programs. 



2. Printer port. None. 



13.25 inches. Limited to long 
slots. 

Can't always work with a 
Hercules Graphics Card. 



90 days. 




Hercules Color Card $245 

Runs the same hundreds of 
graphics programs. "The 
Hercules Color Card is so nearly 
identical to the IBM Color/ 
Graphics Card that it's almost 
uncanny." PC Mag. 

Standard. Our parallel port 
allows you to hook up to any IBM 
compatible printer. 

5.25 inches. Fits in a long or short 
slot in a PC, XT, AT or Portable. 

Always works with a Hercules 
Graphics Card by means of a 
software switch. 

Two years. 



Any one of these five features is enough reason to buy a Hercules Color Card. But 
perhaps the most convincing reason of all is just how easy the Hercules Color Card is to 
use: "Right out of the box, the Hercules Color Card goes into an empty expansion slot, 
ready for you to plug in . . . and go to work — no jumpers, no software. For most 
applications, it's just that easy." PC Magazine. 

Call 1-800-532-0600 Ext. 421 for the name of the Hercules dealer nearest you and 
we'll rush vou our free info kit. tt i 

Hercules. 

We're strong on graphics. 

Inquiry 169 
Address: Hercules, 2550 Ninth St, Berkeley, CA 94710 Ph: 415 540-6000 Telex: 754063 Trademarks /Owners: Hercules/Hercules Computer Technology; IBM/IBM. 



ACCORDING TO WEBSTER 



Mind Prober has 
a personal flavor. 
Its purpose is to 
kelp you find out 
what makes people 
tick— why they do 
what they do. 



censing fees, which involve a per-copy 
fee, some of which ($2000-36000) 
has to be paid in advance. This actual- 
ly represents a dramatic improvement 
over the fees that SofTech used to 
charge (which required as much as 
$50,000 up front), but it puts this 
product at the very high end of Mac 
licensing fees. Unless you have a 
product that's closely tied to the 
p-System, and unless you don't want 
to use the Mac interface, you really 
shouldn't consider this package for 
software development. 

Sof'fech's second package has the 
unwieldy name of MacAdvantage: 
UCSD Pascal. That's the only unwieldy 
thing about it. MacAdvantage is a 
UCSD Pascal development system 
that runs under the Mac operating 
system, i.e., the Finder. With this 
system, you can point, click, and drag, 
just as with other Mac applications. 
More important, you have access to 
more than 9 5 percent of the Tbolbox 
routines, which means that you can 
create Mac-style applications that also 
let you point, click, and drag. 

The editor, developed by Bill Duvall 
of Consulair Corporation, is a nice 
MacWrite-like program editor. It is 
disk-based, so your programs don't 
have to fit into memory all at once. 
You can open up to four files at the 
same time, which makes it easy to 
move chunks of code between pro- 
grams. You can even open the same 
file more than once, which lets you 
look at one part of the program (such 



as global declarations) while editing 
another part. It has an auto-indent op- 
tion for easy formatting of your Pascal 
programs. 

Another feature of MacAdvantage 
is a little (4K bytes) program called Ex- 
ecutive. When you run it, it clears the 
desktop and changes the menu bar 
to reflect the development environ- 
ment (editor, compilers, utilities, run, 
etc.). This is helpful because it takes 
only a second or two to go from, say, 
the editor back to Executive, while it 
takes 1 to 1 5 seconds to go from the 
editor back to the Finder. You can 
move quickly through the develop- 
ment cycle (edit, compile, run), avoid- 
ing the constant, agonizing redrawing 
of the desktop. 

Yet another asset of MacAdvantage 
is the resource compiler, RMAKER. 
With it, you can set up your resources 
(menus, windows, icons, cursors, and 
so on) in a separate text file and com- 
pile them into a resource file. When 
you compile your Pascal program, 
these resources are copied into the 
resulting code file. 

The Pascal compiler does produce 
p-code, but you never have to be 
aware of this. When you double-click 
a code file, it automatically loads in 
the interpreter and run-time library, 
then runs the program. Only two real 
disadvantages arise when you have 
p-code files. First, they execute more 
slowly than machine-code files (those 
produced by Lisa Pascal and the vari- 
ous C compilers). Second, you can't 
produce a stand-alone program to 
distribute; the interpreter and the run- 
time library have to go with it. You 
used to have to pay an annual licens- 
ing fee, but no more. As of 1 July, 
Soffech dropped that fee. Sof'fech 
also dropped the price of MacAdvan- 
tage from $295 to $119. 

The abolition of the licensing fee 
represents a growing trend in devel- 
opment software. Creative Solutions 
Inc., maker of MacFORTH, has lowered 
the price of its Level III development 
system from $2500 to $499 and has 
dropped the per-copy fee altogether. 
Likewise, Modula Corporation has 
eliminated all licensing fees con- 
nected with its MacModula-2 product. 



Most notable are the various C com- 
pilers, which produce fast stand-alone 
code and have never had any fees. 
Because of that, C is becoming the 
standard Mac development language. 
This is ironic since Apple wanted to 
make Pascal the standard: however, 
Apple's inability (or unwillingness) to 
come out with a true compiled Pascal 
for the Mac has dimmed the chances 
of that happening. Sof'Ifech's efforts 
help but may be a case of too little 
too late. 

Mind Prober 

Human Edge Software Corporation 
specializes in "mind-reading" soft- 
ware, products to give some sort of 
edge in dealing with others. Most of 
these are business-oriented (sales, 
negotiations, etc.); however, Mind 
Prober has more of a personal flavor. 
Its purpose is to help you find out 
what makes someone else tick— why 
they do what they do. 

Mind Prober works by asking you to 
give a little information on the subject 
(male/female, over 18/18 and under) 
and then asking you to choose 
AGREE or DISAGREE for a long list 
of attributes (CHARITABLE, PRECISE, 
SELF-BLAMING, SPONTANEOUS). 
When you've finished, you can then 
ask for a report on that person, to be 
sent either to the screen or to the 
printer. The report attempts to 
describe the subject, talking about his 
or her feelings and actions with 
regards to work, sex (or, if he/she is 
under 18, school), relationships, 
stress, personal interests, and so on. 
The reports discuss both reactions to 
situations and underlying motivations. 
You are then supposed to use this in- 
formation somehow. 

My wife and I separately ran the 
program on each of us. It was inter- 
esting to see how accurate many por- 
tions of the report were, while noting 
the different ways we view ourselves 
as opposed to how we viewed each 
other. We then tried a "committee" 
run on myself. In other words, we both 
sat and together answered the ques- 
tions, with some discussion (and argu- 
ing). The result was not accurate at all. 

[continued] 



378 BYTE • JULY 1985 



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watch the relief begin. 



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JULY 1985 'BYTE 379 



ACCORDING TO WEBSTER 



Attempts to fine-tune the report by 
changing answers didn't help much. 
Our conclusion was that the program 
worked best if you didn't think too 
hard or long about the answers. 

A psychologist, Dr. Irene Brennan, 
then took the program and our Mac 
for a week. She ran Mind Prober on 
her family and some of her clients. 



Her conclusion: Mind Prober does in- 
deed help to reveal information about 
us. She also thought it was fun. 

We did encounter several limitations 
with the program. First, after doing a 
number of reports, the same sen- 
tences start to appear over and over 
again, which makes the program lose 
some of its "oracle" aura. Second, 



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EXTENSIBLE Create your own 
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COMPILED Each line 
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when the report didn't match exactly, 
we tended to tweak the answers to get 
a more accurate report. This implies 
that the program is always right and 
that we had just answered the ques- 
tions wrong. This, of course, is not 
necessarily the case. Third, we 
wondered how useful the program 
would be if we didn't know the sub- 
ject that well. Changing just a few 
answers often had a dramatic effect 
on the report; if we were forced to 
guess about that many answers, the 
possible reports that could come out 
would diverge wildly. 

Keeping these limitations in mind, 
Mind Prober is an interesting and en- 
tertaining program. In fact, I've seen 
it used at a few parties as sort of the 
modern version of Mad Libs. Just be 
sure not to take the report too seri- 
ously. 

Software from Videx 

Videx has released a number of soft- 
ware packages for the Macintosh: a 
desk accessory and several games. 
The desk accessory, MacCalendar, 
isn't really worth getting. Some public- 
domain calendar desk accessories 
function almost as well; and if you 
need something more powerful than 
those, you should probably look at 
Front Desk (from Layered). 

And Now for Something 
Completely Different 

Well, not quite. If imitation is the sin- 
cerest form of flattery, the folks at 
Apple can feel honored indeed. I 
spent two days this month at the GEM 
seminar put on in Monterey by Digital 
Research Inc. GEM is a Mac-like en- 
vironment that DRI hopes to support 
on a number of machines, most not- 
ably the IBM PC (and clones) and the 
Atari ST (lackintosh) series. The simi- 
larities to the Mac are striking: tex- 
tured desktop; windows that you can 
drag, size, scroll, and make go away; 
icons that you can click (or double- 
click); mouse-oriented system; drop- 
down menus (not to be confused with 
pull-down menus, for various legal 
reasons); alert and dialog boxes; and 
so on. Much of the terminology is un- 

[continued] 



380 BYTE • JULY 1985 



Inquiry 344 



AHH. IT S LONELYKT THE TOF 




TWAs FIRST CLASS SLEEPER-SEAT- TO EUROPE 

AND THE AMERICAN EXPRESS® CARD PUT YOU 

COMFORTABLY AHEAD OF THE CROWD. 

Success has its rewards. Md TWAs First Class and 
the American Express Card are two rather impressive 
examples. 

In TWAs First Class you can select from a menu 
that includes caviar and champagne. Entrees like 
Chateaubriand. And vintage wines like Pliligny- 
Montrachet. 

Then stretch out comfortably in a Sleeper-Seat, 
and sleep the flight away. 

And as a First Class passenger, you'll be treated 
accordingly from the moment you first reach the air- 
port. With a separate check-in desk for your con- 
venience. And a special invitation to relax in TWAs 
Ambassadors Club* lounge before your flight. 

And when you take the American Express Card 
along, you have an ideal travelling companion. Because 
it's known and welcomed all over the world. 

So you can use it to pay for your TWA tickets, your 
hotel, rental car, meals— 
or just about anything else 
that strikes your fancy along 
the way. 

And of course, when you 
carry the American Express 
Card, you carry all the 
cachet that comes with it. Don't leave home without it/" 

And do take TWAs First Class on your next 
trip to Europe. It's in a class by itself. 





LEADINGTHE \WXWA. 



JULY 4'98 ! 5, -BYTE 381 



ACCORDING TO WEBSTER 



abashedly borrowed from Inside Macin- 
tosh, and, for that matter, why not? It 
would have been annoying and con- 
fusing for DR1 to have come up with 
brand-new names for everything. 
There is also a desktop program to 
replace the MS-DOS interface with a 
Mac-like display. 



GEM actually has some striking im- 
provements over the Mac operating 
system. First, of course, is that the IBM 
PC version supports several graphics 
cards (three from IBM, the Hercules 
card, etc.), so you can have a Mac-like 
environment with glorious color. The 
response time on the IBM PC AT was 



Items Discussed 




Airborne 


$34.95 


Macintosh (512K bytes) 


$2795 


Silicon Beach Software 




and falling 


11212 Dalby Place, Suite 201 




Apple Computer Inc. 




San Diego, CA 92126 




20525 Mariani Ave. 




(619) 695-6956 




Cupertino, CA 95104 
(408) 996-1010 




Big Mac Monitor System . . . 


. $1995 






Proiect-a-Mac System 


. $4495 


Macintosh p-System 


. .$195 


Professional Data Systems 




MacAdvantage: UCSD Pascal 


. .$119 


20 Sunnyside Ave. 




SofTfech Microsystems Inc. 




Mill Valley CA 94941 




16885 West Bernardo Dr. 




(415) 383-5537 




San Diego, CA 92127 
(619) 451-1230 




ChipWits 


.$39.95 






Brainpower 




MacNosy 


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24009 Ventura Blvd., Suite 250 


Jasik Designs 




Calabasas, C A 91302 




343 Trenton Way 




(818) 884-6911 




Menlo Park, CA 9402 5 
(415) 322-1386 




GEM Development System . . 


..$500 






Digital Research Inc. 




Mind Prober 


$49.95 


60 Garden Court 




Human Edge Software Inc. 




POB DRI 




2445 Faber Place 




Monterey CA 93942 




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very quick, and it didn't seem all that 
much slower on the PC XT. An in- 
genious object definition allows every- 
thing to be linked together in a tree- 
based structure. This can make for 
some sophisticated graphics manip- 
ulation on the screen. Best of all is the 
amazing Resource Construction Set. 
which lets you graphically lay out 
menus, dialog boxes, windows, etc., 
and which then generates the neces- 
sary resource code for that item. This 
last tool had a lot of Mac developers 
in the audience drooling, and I 
wouldn't be surprised to see some 
Mac versions of that appear in the 
near future. 

As impressive as GEM looks, 
anyone who has done Mac develop- 
ment starts to see gaps and barriers. 
A number of arbitrary limits crop up: 
only eight windows open at one time, 
and only four of those can belong to 
the application; a maximum of six 
desk accessories (and that limit can 
be further constrained by RAM). Text- 
editing and memory-management 
routines are primitive. And so on. The 
result: GEM requires more work to get 
generally less effect. 

The most serious limit announced 
at the seminar nearly caused a riot 
among the software developers (300 
or so). In the last session, the DRI 
marketing people announced that the 
MS-DOS version of GEM would run 
only on IBM equipment and not on 
any of the compatibles ... at least, 
not until each manufacturer of a com- 
patible machine had paid an OEM fee 
to DRI. The developers immediately 
saw the headache of having to either 
maintain a separate version of their 
product for each compatible (bun- 
dling GEM in) or else release the 
product without GEM bundled and 
hope that the end users would buy 
GEM so that they (the end users) 
could run the product. In the session, 
in the lobby, in the taxis and limos, at 
the crowded Monterey airport, and on 
the planes, the single topic of discus- 
sion was this deliberate crippling of 
GEM. And the consensus was nearly 
universal: DRI was making a big 
mistake. 

Digital Research got the message. 



382 BYTE • JULY 1985 



ACCORDING TO WEBSTER 



The following week, a call came from 
Tom Byers at DRI. He said that the 
marketing people at DRI had recon- 
sidered and that a patched version of 
GEM that would run on all the major 
compatible machines was being dis- 
tributed to all the developers. This 
should greatly increase the chances 
of GEM being accepted by both hard- 
ware and software developers. 
Whether or not GEM itself catches on 
remains to be seen. 

In the Queue 

I still have many packages on which 
to comment, but I haven't been able 
to wring them out quite as much as 
I'd like, and 1 hate to pass judgments 
based on 5 minutes' worth of playing 
around. I hope to clear out the back- 
log of Mac software next month and 
get to more recent releases. Items 
planned for commentary next month 
include several packages from 



Hayden, a company that threatens to 
dominate the Mac software market; 
Copy II Mac, which has no problems 
copying most of the protected soft- 
ware out there; ThinkTknk-512, which 
I used to outline this column; Micro- 
soft Word for the Mac; MacASM from 
Mainstay; MacModula-2 from Modula 
Corp.; and some other odds and 
ends. I hope to include some MS-DOS 
products as well and even up the mix 
a little more. 

Getting in Touch 

I'm a firm believer in feedback and 
discussion. Please feel free to contact 
me with comments, questions, rebut- 
tals, and whatever else you have. I am 
an avid telecommunicator, spending 
two to three hours each day maintain- 
ing my own bulletin board and check- 
ing on other systems. Because of that, 
you stand a much better chance of 
getting a quick reply if you contact me 



electronically. One obvious option is 
to write to me via BIX, BYTE's elec- 
tronic conferencing system, which 
should be up and running by the time 
this sees print. You can reach me 
there by joining the conference 
"ask.webster." Other addresses in- 
clude CompuServe: 75166,1717 (in 
MAUG, BOR, GAM); MCI Mail: 
138-5892; ARPANET crash Ibwebster 
@ucsd; uucp: {ihnp4, cbosgd, 
sdcsvax,noscvax}!crash!bwebster; 
USPS: c/o BYTE, 42 5 Battery St., San 
Francisco, CA 94111. 

Note well that the last address is the 
least reliable and has the longest turn- 
around time. Also, because of 
demands on my time, I must regret- 
fully reserve the right to limit my 
responses— I enjoy talking (and 
writing) too much and might find 
myself spending six to eight hours a 
day on the modem. See you on the 
bit stream. ■ 




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Inquiry 393 



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MATHEMATICAL 
RECREATIONS 

Parsing and Solving 
Linear Equations 



Set up 



and solve 
simultaneous 
linear 

equations 



by Robert T. Kurosaka 



Robert T. Kurosaka teaches 

mathematics in the Massachusetts 

State College system. He invites 

your correspondence do BYTE. 

POB 372. Hancock. NH 03449. 



Mary has $1.10 in nickels and 
dimes. She has a total of 12 
coins. How many of each coin 
does she have? 

John is 5 years younger than Bob. Next 
year, John will be two-thirds of Bob's age 
now. Find their present ages. 

x + y = 5 

x + Viy = 2x + 1 

Look familiar? Of course they do. You've 
been required to solve systems of linear 
equations ever since your first course in 
high school algebra. This month's column 
is about teaching computers to solve them. 

With computers, as with students, the 
hard part is teaching them how to set up 
the equations. Solving the system is easy. 
I wouldn't know how to write a program to 
set up the two story problems I began with, 
but I have written a BASIC program to turn 
the system of equations into something the 
computer can deal with (that is, to parse the 
expressions). That doesn't seem as if it 
should be difficult to do. When we write 
BASIC programs, we commonly write code 
that looks a lot like algebra already— x=y- 7 
or x=x+ I (oops!). So the first thing I want 
to do is clarify the difference between what 
BASIC means by x and what algebra means 
by x. The key is in that funny BASIC state- 
ment x=x+\. 

In an algebraic expression like \/6x + 1/12 
x + 5 = x. x has some numerical value or 
set of values. The function of algebra is to 
determine what those values are. In a BASIC 
expression like x=x+ 1, on the other hand, 
x is the name of a memory location. The 
function of BASIC is to modify the contents 
of that memory location in the way 
specified by the expression. Put different- 
ly, algebraic expressions state facts; BASIC 
expressions specify operations. The value 
of x in BASIC is always known (at least by 
the computer), while the value of x is the 
object of our inquiry in algebra. How then 
do we solve a system of linear equations? 

We have a variety of methods for solving 



systems of linear equations: matrix 
methods (by normalization of the matrix or 
by inverse matrices), by determinants 
(Cramer's rule), and many more. I will use 
the normalization method. TWo considera- 
tions make this an attractive choice. First, 
consider the situation where we have four 
equations for two unknowns, and three of 
the equations are equivalent. The system is 
soluble, and we want our method to handle 
it in a straightforward manner. Second, con- 
sider an incomplete or inconsistent system. 
In that case, the system will be insoluble. 
We want our program to tell us that without 
the program hanging because of something 
like a divide-by-zero exception. 

I will use the equations in table 1 to il- 
lustrate the way this program will solve 
systems of linear equations. The equations 
in table la create the matrix shown in table 
1 b, with the constant terms occupying the 
zeroth (leftmost) column in the matrix and 
the other columns filled by the coefficients 
of the alphabetically ordered variables. In 
equations that do not include a given vari- 
able, a coefficient is entered. That is, each 
column corresponds to one— and only 
one— variable. 'IWo row operations are 
needed for as much normalization as is nec- 
essary to solve the system. They are (I) 
multiply or divide a row by any nonzero 
constant, and (2) add or subtract a nonzero 
multiple of a row to another row. 

To begin our procedure, we locate the first 
nonzero coefficient, or pivot, in the matrix. 
In our example, the first pivot is the "2" at 
the (1 ,2) position. Set the pivot term equal 
to 1 by dividing the entire row by the pivot 
value (table lc). (RI)/2 means divide each 
element of row I by the number 2. 

Use that pivot to create zeros elsewhere 
in its column. That is, eliminate the "1" and 
"2" below the pivot. The "I" is removed by 
subtracting row 1 from row 3 |(R3)-(R1)|, 
and the "2" is removed by subtracting twice 
row 1 from row 4 |(R4)-2(RI)|. Of course, 
we need not do anything to row 2. The 

{continued) 



JULY 1985 -BYTE 385 



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PARSING EQUATIONS 



Table l: Steps in solving simultaneous linear equations. 



2y-z=1 
2x + z = 3 
x + y = 2 
2x+2y + 3z=1 



a: the system 

of equations 



xy 

1 | 02 
3 | 2 

2 | 1 1 
1 | 22 



b: the matrix 
from (a) 



xy 

0.5 | 1 
1.5 | 1 

1.5 | 1 
| 2 

e: (R2)/2 



z 

-0.5 
0.5 
0.5 
4 



0.5 
1.5 




xy 
101 
MO 

00 



z 

-0.5 
0.5 




-3 |00 3 

f:(R3)-(R2), 
(R4)-2(R2) 



xy z 

0.5 | 1 -0.5 
3 | 20 1 
2 | 1 1 
1 | 2 2 3 

c: (R1)/2 



x y z 
0.5 | 1 -0.5 
1.5 | 1 0.5 
| 
-1 |00 1 



g: (R4)/3 



x y z 

0.5 | 1 -0.5 
3 | 2 1 
1.5 | 1 0.5 
| 20 4 

d: (R3)-(R1), 
(R4)-2(R1) 

x y z 

| 1 
2 | 1 00 
| 

-1 | 1 

h: (R1)-0.5(R4), 
(R2)-0.5(R4) 



ENTER EQUATION 1 ? 2y-z=1 
ENTER EQUATION 2 ? 2x + z = 3 
ENTER EQUATION 3 ? x + y=2 

THE STANDARD FORMS OF THE EQUATIONS ARE 

y -05z = 0.5 
x +05z = 1.5 
x + y = 2 

TOO FEW INDEPENDENT EQUATIONS 



Figure 1: Screen dump of the programs response to an underdetermined system. 
Notice that adding the standard forms of equations 1 and 2 gives equation 3. 



THIS PROGRAM'S LIMITATIONS INCLUDE 

(1) IT WILL HANDLE ONLY 'LINEAR EQUATIONS*. THAT IS, INEQUALITIES AND 
VARIABLES MULTIPLIED OR DIVIDED BY VARIABLES WILL CAUSE ERRORS. 

(2) 2y IS WRITTEN AS SHOWN, NOT AS 2*y OR 2xy. SPACING IS OPTIONAL. 

(3) YOU MAY NOT USE THE LETTERS d OR e AS VARIABLE NAMES. 

(4) YOU MAY USE ONLY ONE EQUAL SIGN IN AN EQUATION, I.E., x = y = z IS 
NOT ALLOWED. 

(5) PARENTHESES CAN BE USED ONLY IN VARIABLE NAMES, I.E., -(-2x) IS 
NOT A VALID TERM, BUT — 2x(1) IS. 

(6) MIXED FRACTIONS (E.G., 1 1/2 x), TRAILING COEFFICIENTS (E.G., x/2), AND 
SCIENTIFIC NOTATION (1 e- 2 x, 1 x10 - 2 x) WILL CAUSE ERRORS. 

(7) IF THE SYSTEM OF EQUATIONS CONTAINS MORE THAN 10 VARIABLES, IT 
WILL CAUSE A SUBSCRIPT OUT OF RANGE ERROR. 

ENTER THE NUMBER OF EQUATIONS IN THE SYSTEM (MAX. 10)? 



Figure 2: Screen dump of the program's limitations. 



386 BYTE • JULY 1985 



Inquiry 273 for End-Users. 
Inquiry 2 74 for DEALERS ONLY. 



PARSING EQUATIONS 



result is table Id. In table le our sec- 
ond pivot (2,1) has been set equal to 
I |(R2)/2|. Note that row 3 has gone 
to in table If. If equations I through 
3 were the only ones in our system, 
the set would be underdetermined, 
i.e.. insoluble (figure 1). If all of row 3 
except for the constant (zeroth term) 
went to 0. the system of equations 
would be inconsistent. 

Since row 3 is all zeros, we skip over 
it and find the last pivot in row 4. In 
table Ig we have set the pivot term 
equal to I by (R4)/3. We then elimi- 
nate the z-term from rows I and 2 by 
(RI)-0.5(R4) and (R2)-0.5(R4). The 
final result is table Ih. The solution set 
for our system is thus y=0. x=2, and 
z=-l. 

As I mentioned earlier, the hard part 
is not solving the system of equations 
but getting from table la to table lb. 
How do we do that? Consider the ex- 
pression 3x-x+l=x+2. We want to 
begin by collecting terms. In a linear 
equation, a term is separated from 
the next term by " + ," ,, - ( " or ,, = ." 
Let's limit our attention to the left- 
hand side of the equation for now. 
Clearly, we want to combine the x 3x" 
term and the %> -x" term. We add the 
coefficients. 3 and - 1, to get 2x. The 
third term. "1," is on the "wrong side" 
of the equation. So we want to change 
its sign to minus and save it as a con- 
stant. Now we can deal with the right- 
hand side. We see that "x" is on the 
wrong side. We must change the sign 
of its coefficient and add it to the 
other "x" term, giving a total of Ix. 
The 2 should be added to the con- 
stant term, leaving I. Thus, our col- 
lected expression is x= 1. 

If that looks like a lot of work, you 
don't know the half of it. Consider the 
expression x-y=0. This is entered in 
BASIC as a string expression. I use the 
VAL operator to identify the coeffi- 
cient. In our example, the VAL 
operator will return for the value of 
each term. What we want returned are 
I. -I. and 0, respectively. Again, 
1 x= Viy will return I for the coefficient 
of each term. Clearly, the program 
needs to do a lot of bookkeeping. 

Figure 2 is a screen dump of the first 
screen of the program I have provided 



Parsing string data 
in BASIC requires 
a lot of bookkeeping. 



for downloading on BYTEnet Listings 
at (617) 861-9774. As you can see, I 
left many potential problems unad- 
dressed in the program. I invite you 
to alter the program to cover what- 
ever limitations you think need to be 
eliminated. What I want to do here is 
just discuss what the limitations tell 
you about the program. 

Limitation number 2 is rather 
typical. If you enter 2* y= 1 instead of 
2 y=\, the parser will interpret the 
variable name as *y. If another equa- 
tion is in the system, say y-z= 5. the 
program will not treat the two ys as 
the same variable. The same is true 
for using 2xy. It would be a small ad- 
dition to the program to make the 
parser throw away all occurrences of 
"V and the first problem would be 
overcome. The case of indicating 
multiplication by x is more prob- 
lematic. There is no reasonable way 
to distinguish between an x used as 
a multiplication sign and an x used as 
a variable name or the first letter of 
a variable name. 

Limitation 3 is kind of interesting. 
Consider the expression 2e+3/=4. 
The VAL operator will return 2000 as 
the numerical part of the string 
because 2e+ 3 is a valid BASIC way of 
saying 2000. If you change the e to a 
d. you just have a double-precision 
way of saying 2000. 1 eliminated the 
ambiguity by disallowing both e as a 
variable name and 2e+3 as a coeffi- 
cient (limitation 6). You could avoid 
limitation 3 by separating the "2" 
from the rest of the string before tak- 
ing its VAL. As for scientific notation, 
it seems to me that such notation has 
too many different ways of writing 
numbers to be worth the effort of 
using. 

In limitation 4 the variable on the 
right-hand side would be y=z accord- 
ing to the parser. In limitation 5 the 

[continued) 



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JULY 1985 -BYTE 387 



Inquiry 153 



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PARSING EQUATIONS 



ENTER EQUATION 1 ? 0.05 NICKELS + 0.10 DIMES = 1.10 
ENTER EQUATION 2 ? NICKELS + DIMES = 12 

THE STANDARD FORMS OF THE EQUATIONS ARE 

DIMES + 0.5 NICKELS = 11 
DIMES + NICKELS = 12 

THE SOLUTION SET FOR THE SYSTEM OF EQUATIONS IS 

DIMES = 10 
NICKELS = 2 



Figure 3a: Screen dump of the program's handling of the coin problem. 



ENTER EQUATION 1 ? JOHN'S.AGE = BOB'S.AGE - 5 
ENTER EQUATION 2 ? JOHN'S.AGE +1=2/3 BOB'S.AGE 

THE STANDARD FORMS OF THE EQUATIONS ARE 

BOB'S.AGE - JOHN'S.AGE = 5 
BOB'S.AGE - 1.5 JOHN'S.AGE = 1.5 

THE SOLUTION SET FOR THE SYSTEM OF EQUATIONS IS 

BOB'S.AGE = 12 
JOHN'S.AGE = 7 



Figure 3b: Screen dump of the age-problem solution. The period is used in the 
variable names for readability because the program removes all spaces. 



coefficient would be - I and the vari- 
able name (-24 Both of these are 
avoidable without much trouble. The 
second one seems more interesting 
to me because you will commonly use 
linear expressions of the form 3(x+ I) 
= 4. It would be useful for the parser 
to multiply through the parentheses 
rather than leave everything in paren- 
theses uninterpreted. If you do this, 
be careful. You don't want to multiply 
through the parentheses on an ex- 
pression like 3x(I); an expression like 
3(x+ I) should be multiplied through; 
and an expression like x(x+\) should 
generate an error. 

We've already discussed one aspect 
of limitation 6. The problem with I 1/2 
x is that the parser removes all blanks 
from a string. Otherwise, "x" and " x" 
will be two different variable names. 
Therefore, I 1/2 x actually looks like 
1 I/2x, as does eleven-halves x. A dif- 
ferent approach to parsing will avoid 
this if you want to. In x/2 the parser 
will treat the coefficient as I and the 
variable name as x/2. Avoiding this 
problem would be more work than it 



looks like and probably more work 
than it's worth. 

Limitation 7 is simply a matter of 
having left all of the arrays undimen- 
sioned. 

At least one more interesting situa- 
tion can arise in the program. I'm not 
sure 1 want to call it a limitation. Con- 
sider the equation x+^=x+3. If you 
enter this equation by itself in the pro- 
gram, you will be told that it has too 
many variables for the system to be 
soluble, even though the program will 
also print out the standard form of the 
equation as y=3. Most of us would 
take y=3 as the answer. However, x is 
clearly underdetermined. If you want 
the parser to handle this kind of situa- 
tion, the variable name x must be 
removed from the list of variable 
names in the expression when the co- 
efficient of x goes to 0. 

In closing, I have provided a screen 
dump of the program solving the two 
story problems at the beginning 
(figure 3). I hope you get a chance to 
download the program and that you 
enjoy playing with it. ■ 



388 B YTE • JULY 1985 




EM CARD 



FOR APPLE® lie - 1200 BPS 



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Inquiry 77 



See us at NCC '85 
Booths #6278 & #6279 



CIRCUIT CELLAR FEEDBACK 



Conducted by Steve Garcia 



Offer Extended 

Dear Circuit Cellar Project Builders, 

In my November 1984 article on the 
Lis'ner 1000 voice-recognition board, I of- 
fered the software separately to Circuit 
Cellar project builders for $17 through 
March I, 1985. Requests have poured in 
throughout the offering period, but the 
majority of foreign mail has just started 
to arrive. To give everyone time to prop- 
erly evaluate the project and respond, I 
am extending the availability of the soft- 
ware through August I, 1985. Thanks for 
your support— Steve 

Trump Card and NEC 

Dear Steve, 

In rereading some older issues of BYTE 
recently, I came across your Irump Card 
project (May and June 1984). Though I find 
it very intriguing, it raises several questions 
regarding its adaptation and use with my 
PC look-alike, the NEC APC 111. I feel that 
I can overcome the minor problems with 
physical board-size differences but want 
to know what possible problems there 
would be with using the software men- 
tioned under MS-DOS 2. 1 1 . Another issue 
is that of using 256K-byte RAMs rather 
than 64K-byte RAMs. I don't feel that the 
project would warrant consideration if the 
software mentioned could not be 
modified to run on the system. 

My computer is currently configured 
with 2 56K bytes, dual 360K-byte disk 
drives, serial and parallel ports, graphics 
card (I92K bytes), 102-key keyboard, and 
640- by 400-pixel resolution color monitor. 
It is an 8-MHz 8086-based processor. I 
thought this additional information might 
be helpful in determining whether or not 
this project is feasible. 

I would be interested in your thoughts 
on the design and adaptation of a RAM- 
disk board using 1-megabit bubble- 
memory modules instead of either 64K- 
or 2 56K-byte dynamic RAM chips. 

Otto Bartsch 
Piano. TX 

The Trump Card was tested on several 
different systems running under MS-DOS 
2.0 and operated without problems on 
these systems. Since the Trump Card 
project was presented, the software has 



been updated by Sweet Micro Systems. 
Any specific questions about the soft- 
ware interaction with a particular system 
should be addressed to Sweet Micro 
Systems Inc., 50 Freeway Dr., Cranston, 
Rl 02920, (401) 461-0530. 

If you change the memory chips in the 
Trump Card to 256K-byte chips, you 
should use chips with 1 50-nanosecond 
access times. You will also have to change 
the address decoding to accommodate 
the added address lines on the 256K- 
byte chips. 

Bubble memory is still relatively high 
priced compared to other types of 
storage, especially with the prices of hard 
disks coming down as fast as they are. 
However, bubble memory still has a 
place in systems where the environment 
is not suited for hard disks and where the 
price is not a factor. If you are interested 
in building a bubble-memory system, you 
should read the two-part article by Louis 
Wheeler in the January and February 
1984 issues of BYTE called "Bubbles on 
the S-100 Bus."— Steve 

8749 Programmer 

Dear Steve, 

For some time now, I have wanted to ex- 
periment with the Intel 8749 single-chip 
microcomputer. On reading your Novem- 
ber 1983 article ("Build the H-Com Handi- 
capped Communicator"), 1 learned that 
you have used the Intel 8748, which is 
very similar to the 8749. 

The only real problem I have is burning 
the code into the 8749. Can you please 
refer me to any articles that describe an 
8749 programmer? Perhaps it can be con- 
nected to a few I/O ports of a personal 
computer. 

Nicholas T. Vasil 
Bridgeport. CT 

Several companies advertising in BYTE 
offer EPROM programmers that are ca- 
pable of programming the EPROM on 
the 8749 microprocessor. These pro- 
grammers can be interfaced to any com- 
puter through an RS-232C serial port. For 
example, GTEK Inc. sells the Model 7128 
EPROM programmer that will program 
19 different types ofEPROMs. 5 different 
EEPROMs, and 7 different microproces- 



sors with on-board EPROMs. Contact 
GTEK Inc.. POB 289, Waveland. MS 
39576, (601) 467-8048. 

If you intend to build a dedicated pro- 
grammer for the 8749, you can obtain 
the programming voltage specifications 
and the programming timing sequence 
from the Intel Component Data Catalog. 
You can obtain this catalog from Intel 
Corporation, Literature Department 
SV3-3, 3065 Bowers Ave., Santa Clara, CA 
95051. 

For information on how to connect an 
EPROM programmer to an RS-232C 
serial port, see my article on page 104 
of the February BYTE (' 'Build a Serial 
EPROM Programmer" ). —Steve 

Speech and the VIC-20 

Dear Steve, 

While perusing some back issues of 
BYTE, I noticed that you have published 
several articles on speech synthesizers. ! 
purchased a speech chip from Radio 
Shack to connect to my VIC-20, but I am 
unable to figure out how to interface it to 
my computer. Can you give me any help? 
Gary W. TIdwell 
Killen. AL 

The chip set that you got at Radio 
Shack was probably the General Instru- 
ment SP0256-AL2 Allophone Speech 
Processor with a special ROM chip con- 
taining encoded words for use as a talk- 
ing clock. See "Build a Talking Clock 
Speech Synthesizer" by Ernest H. Piette 
(May BYTE, page 143) for details on in- 
terfacing the SP0256-AL2 to a variety of 
microcomputers, including the VIC-20. 
—Steve ■ 



Over the years I have presented many dif- 
ferent projects in BYTE. I know many of you 
have built them and are making use of them 
in many ways. 

1 am interested in hearing from any of you 
telling me what you've done with these proj- 
ects or how you may have been influenced by 
the basic ideas. Write me at Circuit Cellar Feed- 
back, POB 582, Glastonbury, CT 06033. 
and fill me in on your applications. All letters 
and photographs become the property of Steve 
Garcia and cannot be returned. 



COPYRIGHT © 1985 STEVEN A. GARCIA. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED. 



JULY 1985 -BYTE 391 



Lotus, dBase, WordStar and MultiMate Users 



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Inquiry 186 



© 1985 Innovative Software. Inc. 



BYTELINES 



Conducted by Sol Libes 



Congratulations to Altos for being the first 
company to introduce a system using the 
Motorola 68020 microprocessor, a true 
32-bitter. The Altos 3068 runs UNIX Sys- 
tem' V and will handle up to 30 users. 

At the January Consumer Electronics 
Show, Atari's Jack Tramiel (chairman of the 
board) promised the company would ship 
5 million of its new Sl-series machines this 
year. In March, Atari's president, Sam 
Tramiel (Jack's son), cut the prediction to 
just over a million units. Rumors now are 
that Atari will not start shipping the ST in 
earnest until this month, which would 
make it difficult to achieve the revised 
goal. Meanwhile, Leonard TVamiel (another 
son) revealed that Atari plans an OEM ver- 
sion of the 68000-based machine as well 
as a local-area network for the system. It 
is expected that the LAN will use the ST's 
MIDI (musical instrument digital interface) 
port and operate at 3 1 .2 5 kbps. This would 
make it slower than the Applelalk net but 
faster than LANs using RS-232C interfaces. 

Digital Research is expected to add an 
MS-DOS emulation feature to the GEM 
operating system running on the new Atari 
68000-based computer, meaning that 
users may be able to run many of the pro- 
grams written for the IBM PC. 

Manufacturers of clones are moving 
from the IBM PC to the PC AT market- 
place. Expect landy Hewlett-Packard. 
Wang, Honeywell. Philips. Siemens. 
Ericsson, and AT&T (plus several Japanese. 
Korean, and Taiwanese companies) to in- 
troduce ATcompatible machines before 
the end of the year. Compaq. Xerox, NCR, 
Texas Instruments. Zenith, and Kaypro 
already have AT clones out. There are 
even rumors that Apple is seriously con- 
sidering producing one. Most are ex- 
pected to run faster than the AT and have 
display circuitry compatible with IBM's 
Enhanced Graphics Adapter (EGA). Chips 
and Technologies, a custom IC maker in 
San lose. CA. is reportedly attempting to 
reduce the EGA from 150 to 23 ICs. 

Also, rumors are going around that 
General Electric and AT&T have attempted 
to acquire Apple Computer. 

IBM Rumors and Speculations 

The long-rumored PC II is expected to be 
officially announced by IBM next month, 



with shipments to users starting in the 
fall. . . . Industry pundits expect that this 
fall IBM will bring out a more powerful and 
faster version of the AT running UNIX Sys- 
tem V and handling up to 16 users. . . . 
Rumors say that IBM may put TbpView into 
ROM on future PC products along with a 
new operating system being developed in- 
house. . . . Expect IBM to introduce a 
laser printer with much better dot density 
than current Apple and HP printers. 

Future Computing of Dallas predicts that 
IBM will sell 3 50.000 ATs this year worth 
$1.6 billion. The people there estimate that 
in 1984 IBM shipped 90.000 ATs worth 
$500 million. 

Expect IBM to shortly switch to 3 !/2-inch 
floppies. IBM has ordered 1.5 million 
1 -megabyte disks from 'Ibshiba, Alps, and 
Matsushita. 

It is estimated that IBM, at the time the 
company announced it was ceasing pro- 
duction of the PCjr, had around 350,000 
units in its warehouses. There are reports 
that IBM, in an attempt to move large 
quantities of the units, offered them to 
liquidation brokers for $80 each but did 
not get any takers. There are also reports 
that IBM. this spring, had as many as 
600.000 XTs in stock. In an effort to move 
them out of warehouses, IBM reduced the 
XT price by 12 percent, included several 
software packages, and also began selling 
PCs with XT motherboards. The feeling is 
that the introduction of the AT last sum- 
mer severely undercut sales of the XT Fur- 
ther. IBM raised the price of the PC to dis- 
courage dealers from upgrading PCs to 
X1S using non-IBM components. In any 
event. IBM's overstocked warehouses ap- 
pear to be the cause of the delay in the 
introduction of the PC 11. 

Some reports say that IBM is putting the 
squeeze on independent suppliers of soft- 
ware packages that it distributes. Currently, 
these companies give IBM 40 to 60 per- 
cent discounts. It is reported that IBM is 
now asking for 70 percent discounts. 

Apple Bytes and Pits 

First there was the Macintosh with 128K 
bytes of RAM, quickly followed by the Fat 
Mac with 512K bytes. Now. industry 
watchers expect Apple to soon introduce 
a 1 -megabyte Mac. Apple already offers 



a 1 -megabyte plug-in RAM card for the 
Mac XL (nee Lisa 2). 

The 1 -megabyte Mac should improve 
performance, particularly for memory- 
hungry spreadsheets and font-generating 
programs. It would also encourage a RAM- 
disk operation to compensate for the 
Mac's slow disk access. 

Several companies already offer do-it- 
yourself Mac memory add-ons of up to 2 
megabytes, and we can expect these in- 
dependents, when 1-megabit chips 
become available, to offer 4-megabyte 
RAM upgrades (the maximum addressing 
limit of the Mac). These upgrades require 
opening the Mac and soldering to the 
main processor board, a violation of 
Apple's warranty, and is not recom- 
mended for the inexperienced. Levco 
Enterprises (11568 Sorrento Valley Rd. 
#14, San Diego. CA 92121) and Beck-Tech 
(41 llmnel Rd.. Berkeley. CA 94705) offer 
such kits. Levco also offers a motorless. 
piezoelectric fan to cool the 2 megabytes 
of RAM. 

I also hear rumors that Apple may in- 
troduce a new version of the Mac with a 
bus-expansion slot, a feature being asked 
for by value-added retailers. Also ex- 
pected is a doubling of the ROM from 64K 
bytes to I28K bytes to improve and ex- 
pand the operating system. The likelihood 
is that Apple will offer a new dealer- 
installed enhanced processor board for 
the 3 50,000 Macs already sold. However. 
Apple will have to figure out how to make 
this upgrade more popular than its $995 
upgrade from I28K bytes to 5I2K bytes, 
which created a great deal of resentment 
among JVlac owners, many of whom did 
not take Apple up on the offer. 

Finally. Apple is expected to introduce 
an Apple II with the Western Design 

{continued) 

BYTELINES. news and speculation about personal 
computing, is conducted by Sol Libes, the author 
o\ numerous books and articles on computers. He 
is the founder of the Amateur Computer Group 
of New \ersey and a coorganizer of the Trenton 
Computer Festival. He edits and publishes Micro/ 
Systems journal, a bimonthly publication for 
system programmers and integrators. He can be con- 
tacted do BYTE, POB 372. Hancock, NH 
03449. 



JULY 1985 -BYTE 393 



BYTELINES 



Center 8-/1 6-bit 65816 microprocessor. 
Look for it to be introduced at Apple's 
January stockholders' meeting. There is 
some question as to whether Apple will 
provide an upgrade kit for the current 2.5 
million Apple II users. If Apple doesn't do 
it, you can bet somebody else will! 

Microsoft to Introduce 
MS-DOS 4.0 

Late this year, Microsoft is expected to 
release version 4.0 of MS-DOS, the 
primary operating system for the IBM 
PC/XT/AT family of computers and com- 
patibles. Version 4.0 should add multitask- 
ing and a virtual memory space in excess 
of 640K bytes. Multitasking is expected to 
improve the operating speed of Micro- 
soft's Windows environment. Currently, 
the only way to get PC software-com- 
patible multitasking on PC-compatible 
machines is with Digital Research's Con- 
current DOS. The latest version of Concur- 
rent DOS (4.1) also includes the GEM user 
interface. 

Also, version 5.0 of MS-DOS is reported- 
ly in development, designed specifically 
for the 80286 processor. It should execute 
programs in the 80286 protected virtual- 
address mode. 

Intel Unwraps 386 

Intel is expected to shortly make a formal 
announcement of its new 80386 32-bit 
microprocessor. For the first time. Intel 
finds itself running behind National Semi- 
conductor (already shipping production 
quantities of the 32032), Motorola (sam- 
pling for close to a year and ready to start 
68020 production), and AT&T (selling its 
32-bitter to OEMs). Production of the 
80386 is not expected until next year. This 
means that the first computers using the 
device may be introduced by late 1986. 
The 80386 is expected to be upward- 
compatible with the 80286 (used in the 
IBM PC AT), contain more than twice the 
number of devices, and be two to three 
times faster. It should have on-chip mem- 
ory management, with a protection fea- 
ture, to work with up to 4 gigabytes of 
physical memory and 64 terabytes of vir- 
tual memory. 

Memory Sizes Increasing 

In Japan, large-volume pricing of 2 56K-bit 
RAM chips is already less than $4 each, 
with 64K-bit chips less than $1. Toshiba. 
NEC. Hitachi, and Fujitsu are expected to 
start sampling 1-megabit chips by year's 
end. Such chips should start appearing in 
equipment in 1987. earlier than previously 
expected, making the life of 256K-bit chips 



shorter than the 641<-bit and 161<-bit chips. 
The base RAM memory size in 1987 is ex- 
pected to be 1 megabyte, compared to 
the current 2 56K-byte and previous 64K- 
byte standards. 

ROM size is also growing. Several com- 
panies are sampling 1-megabit ROM chips 
organized as 128K 8-bit words or 64K 
16-bit words. This means that the entire 
operating system for most personal com- 
puters can now be in ROM, allowing faster 
operation and freeing up valuable disk 
space. HP already has a UNIX portable 
machine with the operating-system kernel 
in 2 56K bytes of ROM. Further, plug-in 
application-software ROM cartridges will 
contain larger programs. 

Micro Market in Slump 

A definite slowdown in personal computer 
demand developed in the late spring of 
1984. just as many manufacturers, carried 
away with the euphoria of the early 1 980s, 
brought increased production facilities on 
line. This resulted in an inventory buildup 
for most manufacturers. (IBM reportedly 
had $1.8 billion of finished goods plus 
$300 million of parts in inventory.) Many 
companies attempted to cope with the 
situation with special promotions during 
the fall and Christmas seasons. IBM cut 
the price of the PCjr and included a color 
monitor and software, which brought the 
list price of a complete system down to 
less than $1000 (with a street price of 
substantially less than $900). Apple, Com- 
modore, and Atari also offered special 
prices to move inventory out of ware- 
houses. This policy proved effective in 
moving out a lot of systems, particularly 
during the Christmas selling season. 

However, since the first of the year, 
manufacturer inventories have soared as 
demand fell off again. Some manufac- 
turers have restored higher prices. For ex- 
ample, IBM raised the price of the PCjr to 
more than $1400 and saw demand for the 
unit shrivel to virtually nil. 

Apple had such a buildup of inventory 
that it closed all its plants for a week in 
March and forced employees to take a 
vacation. Also, it offered dealer rebates 
of as much as $300 in an attempt to get 
Apple lis and Macs moving again. 

Sinclair Going WSI 

Sinclair Research, the British company that 
startled the industry with its inexpensive 
ZX80/81 microcomputer just a few years 
ago, is rumored to be planning a new 
breakthrough. It is expected to introduce 
late next year a portable system (tentative- 
ly called Proteus) using wafer-scale integra- 



tion (WSI) and the flat-screen display cur- 
rently being used in its pocket TV. WSI is 
expected to allow several megabytes of 
memory to be built on one wafer. Sinclair 
is now in the initial stages of constructing 
a factory to build an estimated 300.000 
units a year. 

A PC Clone for Less Than $900 

1 just came back from attending the TYen- 
ton Computer Festival. This event held 
every April has the largest personal com- 
puter flea market in the country. With com- 
ponents 1 purchased at TCF, mostly from 
laiwan. 1 was able to put together a very 
close copy of the IBM PC for less than 
$900. If you are looking for the best prices 
on microcomputer equipment, I suggest 
you check out computer flea markets held 
in your area. At TCF 1 also was able to buy 
supplies at incredibly low cost (e.g.. DS/DD 
floppies for 70 cents each). If you want 
specific information on how I built my 
clone, send me a stamped self-addressed 
business-size envelope. Send it to POB 
1192, Mountainside, NJ 07092. 

Zilog Delays Z80000 and Z800 

Zilog has again pushed back introduction 
of its Z80000 32-bit and Z800 super 8-/ 
16-bit (Z80-compatible) microprocessors 
to the spring of 1986. If Zilog does 
manage to ship samples when promised, 
it will be a full six years since announcing 
it was developing the units. 

Zilog. owned by Exxon, has shown a 
profit only one year in its 1 1-year life and 
recently cut 400 people from its payroll. 
Although a pioneer in microprocessor de- 
velopment, with its Z80 and Z8000 8- and 
16-bit microprocessors, it has suffered 
from a reliance on microprocessor manu- 
facturing, while competitors like Intel, 
Motorola, and National Semiconductor 
have used microprocessors as loss leaders 
to sell memory and other types of ICs. 

Random Bits 

Novix, Cupertino. CA, has introduced a 
16-bit microprocessor that directly ex- 
ecutes the FORTH language. ... A 
catalog issued by Markline Co., Belmont, 
MA, features a $39.95 electronic toaster 
using a microchip to assure uniform toast- 
ing ... . For the first time, it appears that 
there will not be a waiting list for booth 
space at this month's National Computer 
Conference. . . . Hewlett-Packard, long a 
pioneer in the computer business (first to 
introduce the touchscreen, the 3 /2-inch 
disk, a UNIX portable, etc.), is expected 
to be the first company out with a com- 
puter optical-disc unit. ■ 



394 B YTE • JULY 1985 



BOOKS RECEIVED 



Advanced Level I DBASE: 
Concepts for First-Time Users. 
Alan Freedman. Englewood 
Cliffs. NI: Prentice-Hall. 1985.-71 
pages, spiral-bound. ISBN 0-1 3- 
011420-0. $6.95. 

Advanced Programming: A 
Practical Course. D. W. Barron 
and J. M. Bishop. New York: 
John Wiley & Sons. 1984; 300 
pages, hardcover, ISBN 0-471- 
90319-1. $24.95. 

THE Analysis of Algorithms. 
Paul Walton Purdom Jr. and 
Cynthia A, Brown. New York: 
Holt, Rinehart & Winston, 
1985; 560 pages, hardcover. 
ISBN 0-03-072044-3. $39.95. 

Animation Magic with Your 
IBM PC and PCir, Ron Person. 
Berkeley, CA: Osborne/McGraw- 
Hill. 1985; 2 56 pages, softcover. 
ISBN 0-88134-145-2. $15.95. 

Apple Computer Directory: 
Hardware. Software, and 
Peripherals-Apple I1/1I+, 
Apple He. Macintosh. Lisa, 
Apple III. Apple lie. Kelly- 
Grimes. New York: John Wiley 
& Sons, 1985; 496 pages, soft- 
cover, ISBN 0-471-87818-9. 
$26.95. 

Application Debugging. Robert 
Binder. Englewood Cliffs, NJ: 
Prentice-Hall, 1985; 382 pages, 
hardcover, ISBN 0-13-039348-7. 
$29.95. 

Assembly Language Program- 
ming for the VAX-II. Michael 
H. Pressman. Palo Alto, CA: 
Mayfield Publishing Co.. 
1985; 400 pages, hardcover. 
ISBN 0-87484-599-8. $28.95. 

BASIC. Bijan Mashaw, Palo Alto. 
CA: Mayfield Publishing Co. 
1985; 560 pages, softcover. 
ISBN 0-87484-692-7. $23.95. 
Includes instructor's manual 
(ISBN 0-87484-737-0). 

The Basic Adam: A Self- 
Teaching Guide, William Abikoff 
and Gary Cornell. New York: 
John Wiley & Sons, 1984; 536 



pages, softcover, ISBN 0-471- 
80807-5. $14.95. 

Basic Programs for the Atari 
600XL & 800XL. Timothy Orr 
Knight. Blue Ridge Summit, PA: 
Tab Books. 1984; 128 pages, 
softcover, ISBN 0-8306-1726-4. 
$8.95. 

Best Microcomputer Hard- 
ware, Chung I. Park. ed. Morton 
Grove. IL: Ad Digest, 1985; 
64 pages, softcover, 
ISBN 0-939670-03-8. $3.95. 

Best Microcomputer Soft- 
ware, Chung I. Park, ed. Morton 
Grove, IL: Ad Digest. 1985; 
64 pages, softcover. 
ISBN 0-939670-04-6. $3.95. 

C Language for Programmers. 
Kenneth Pugh. Glenview, IL: 
Scott, Foresman and Co.. 
1984; 206 pages, softcover, 
ISBN 0-673-18034-4. $17.95. 

The C Programmer's Hand- 
book. M. I. Bolsky. Englewood 
Cliffs. NJ: Prentice-Hall. 1985; 88 
pages, spiral-bound. ISBN 0-13- 
110073-4. $14.95. 

Charged Bodies: People. 
Power, and Paradox in 
Silicon Valley. Thomas Mahon. 
New York: New American 
Books. 1985; 352 pages, hard- 
cover. ISBN 0-453-00487-3. 
$15.95. 

'The Chip: How TWo Americans 
Invented the Microchip & 
Launched a Revolution, T R. 
Reid. New York: Simon & 
Schuster. 1985: 246 pages, hard- 
cover, ISBN 0-671-45393-9. 
$17.95. 

Commodore 64 BASIC Made 
Easy. David A. Gardner and 
Marianne L. Gardner. Engle- 
wood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice-Hall. 
1985; 256 pages, hardcover, 
ISBN 0-13-152067-9. $19.95. 



Commodore 64 Basics: A Self- 
Teaching Guide, Ann Harris. 
New York: John Wiley & Sons. 
1985; 4 56 pages, softcover. 
ISBN 0-471-88008-6. $15.95. 

Commodore 64 Logo: A Learn- 
ing and Teaching Guide, Peter 
Goodyear. New York: John Wiley 
& Sons, 1984; 204 pages, soft- 
cover. ISBN 0-471-81964-6. 
$14.95. 

'The Complete PFS: Book. Ralph 
Mylius. Piano, TX: Wordware 
Publishing, 1985: 200 pages, 
softcover. ISBN 0-915381-70-2. 
$19.95. 

Computer Genealogy: A Guide 
to Research 'Through High 
Technology, Paul A. Andereck 
and Richard A. Pence. Salt Lake 
City. UT: Ancestry Inc., 
1985; 304 pages, softcover. 
ISBN 0-916489-02-7. $12.95. 

Computer Usability Testing 
and Evaluation. Richard H. 
Spencer. Englewood Cliffs. NJ: 
Prentice-Hall. 1985; 240 pages, 
hardcover. ISBN 0-13-164088-7. 
$27.50. 

Computers and Application 
Software: An Introduction. 
Wilson T. Price. New York: Holt. 
Rinehart and Winston. 1985; 
582 pages, softcover. ISBN 0-03- 
000349-0. $26.95. 

DBASE II: Techniques and 
Reference Manual, Jack E. 
Lohman. Milwaukee, Wl: dTECH- 
NIQUE. 1984; 146 pages, soft- 
cover. ISBN 0-9614034-0-3. 
$19.95. 

THE DBASE DOZEN FOR DBASE 

II. Alan Freedman. Englewood 
Cliffs. NJ: Prentice-Hall. 1985; 71 
pages, spiral-bound, ISBN 0-13- 
195967-0. $6.95. 

THE DBASE Dozen for DBASE 

III, Alan Freedman. Englewood 



THIS IS A LIST of books received at BYTE Publications. It is not meant to be exhaustive: 
its purpose is to acquaint BYTE readers with recently published titles in computer science 
and related fields. We regret that we cannot review all the books we receive: instead, this 
list is meant to be a monthly acknowledgment of these books and the publishers who sent them. 



Cliffs, NI: Prentice-Hall, 1985; 71 
pages, spiral-bound, ISBN 0-13- 
196288-4. $6.95. 

THE DBASE Query Language. 
Alan Freedman. Englewood 
Cliffs. NJ: Prentice-Hall. 1985; 72 
pages, softcover. ISBN 0-13- 
196171-3. $6.95. 

Debugging BASIC Programs. 
David R. Cecil. Blue Ridge Sum- 
mit. PA: 'Tab Books, 1984; 178 
pages softcover, ISBN 0-8306- 
1813-9. $9.95. 

DEC Microcomputer Direc- 
tory: Hardware, Software, 
and Peripherals- Rainbow. 
Rainbow Plus, Decmate II, Pro- 
fessional Series. Kelly-Grimes. 
New York: John Wiley & Sons, 
1985: 366 pages, softcover, 
ISBN 0-471-87822-7. $26.95. 

Defect Correction Methods: 
Theory and Applications. 
K. Bohmer and H. J. Stetter. eds. 
New York: Springer-Verlag, 
1984; 256 pages, softcover. 
ISBN 0-387-81832-4. $20. 

Dictionary of Microelec- 
tronics and Microcomputer 
Technology (German- 
English/Engish-German), Yvonne 
Helene Attiyate and Raymond 
Shah. Philadelphia. PA: Heyden 
& Son, 1984; 460 pages, hard- 
cover. ISBN 3-18-400652-2. $31. 

Do You Really Need a Home 
Computer? Derek Rowntree. 
New York: Charles Scribner's 
Sons. 1985; 160 pages, soft- 
cover. ISBN 0-684-18182-7. 
$6.95. 

8086/8088 Assembly Language 
Programming, Bik Chung 
Yeung. New York: John Wiley & 
Sons, 1984; 280 pages, soft- 
cover, ISBN 0-471-90463-5. 
$19.95. 

The Electronic Link: Using the 
IBM PC to Communicate. 
Lawrence J. Magid and John 
Boeschen. New York: John Wiley 
& Sons, 1985; 280 pages, soft- 
[continued) 



IULY 1985 -BYTE 395 



Inquiry 226 



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with a daughterboard which fits into the 8087 socket, an 8087, a 
break button and the necessary software. A number of additional 
features are invoked through its novel break button. These enable 
the user to lock out the keyboard, exchange information with pro- 
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rently, spool LOTUS output to a printer and install a single protected 
copy of 1 -2-3 and FASTBRE AKon your hard disk. An optional LOCK 
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BOOKS RECEIVED 



cover. ISBN 0-471-88382-4. 

$15.95. 

Essential Programs for 
Small Business Planning of 
the Apple I1/IIe/IIc. Michael 
Kilpatrick. New York: John Wiley 
& Sons. 1985; 272 pages, soft- 
cover. ISBN 0-471-80602-1. 
$46.90. Includes floppy disk. 

Everything You Need to Do 
Your Taxes with Lotus 1-2-3. 
Michael Kwatinetz. Joel Pitt, and 
Leonard Kwatinetz. New York: 
Sterling Publishing Co., 
1984; 320 pages, softcover. 
ISBN 0-8069-7928-3. $14.95. 

Everything You Need to Do 
Your Taxes with SuperCalc, 
Michael Kwatinetz. Joel Pitt, and 
Leonard Kwatinetz. New York: 
Sterling Publishing Co., 
1984; 264 pages, softcover. 
ISBN 0-8069-7932-1. $12.95. 

First Book on UNIX for Ex- 
ecutives. Yukari Shirota and 
Tosiyasu L. Kunii. New York: 
Springer-Verlag. 1984; 170 
pages, softcover. ISBN 0-387- 
70003-X. $16. 

FORTH. W. P. Salman. 
Q Tisserand. and B. Toulout. 
New York: Springer-Verlag, 
1984; 176 pages, softcover. 
ISBN 0-387-91256-8. $14. 

Foundations of Computer 
Music. Curtis Roads and John 
Strawn. eds. Cambridge, MA: 
MIT Press. 1985; 736 pages, 
hardcover. ISBN 0-262-18114-2. 
$50. 

Going from BASIC to C. Robert 
J. TVaister. Englewood Cliffs. NJ: 
Prentice-Hall. 1985; 176 pages, 
softcover. ISBN 0-13-357799-6. 
$17.95. 

Guide to Ielecommunications 
with Your IBM PC. Greg 
Kearsley, Beverly Hunter, and 
Hal Hunter. Glenview. IL: Scott. 
Foresman and Co.. 1985; 176 
pages, softcover. ISBN 0-673- 
15944-2. $39.95. Includes floppy 
disk. 

How To Repair and Maintain 
Your IBM PC. Gene B. Williams. 
Radnor. PA: Chilton Book Co.. 
1984; 224 pages, softcover. 
ISBN 0-8019-7537-9. $12.95. 

IBM PC Compatible Computer 
Directory: Hardware, Soft- 



ware, and Peripherals- 
Compaq, Eagle, Columbia, 
Hyperion, Tl Professional. . . . 
and more. Kelly-Grimes. New 
York: John Wiley & Sons. 1985; 
608 pages, softcover. ISBN 
0-471-87819-7. $26.95. 

IBM PC Computer Directory: 
Hardware, Software, and 
Peripherals-IBM PC, PCjr. CS 
9000. IBM PC/XT. Kelly-Grimes. 
New York: John Wiley & Sons. 
1985: 590 pages, softcover. 
ISBN 0-471-87821-9. $26.95. 

IBM PC 8088 Macro Assem- 
bler Programming. Dan 
Rollins. New York: Macmillan 
Publishing. 1985; 464 pages, 
softcover. ISBN 0-02-403210-7. 
$18. 

Ihe IBM PC/XT Making the 
Right Connections. Martin D. 
Seyer. Englewood Cliffs. NJ: 
Prentice-Hall. 1985; 320 pages, 
hardcover. ISBN 0-13-449026-6. 
$24.95. 

IBM Portable Personal Com- 
puter User's Handbook, staff 
of Weber Systems. Cleveland. 
OH: Weber Systems Inc.. 
1984; 316 pages, softcover. 
ISBN 0-938862-17-0. $15.95. 

The Illustrated Lotus 1-2-3 
Book. Thomas H. Berliner and 
David T. Reeves. Dallas. TX: 
Wordware Publishing. 1985; 
304 pages, softcover. 
ISBN 0-915381-52-4. $17.95. 

Improving CA1 in BASIC. Sharon 
Burrowes and Ted Burr owes. 
Eugene. OR: The International 
Council for Computers in 
Education. 1985: 88 pages, soft- 
cover. ISBN 0-924667-08-7. $6. 

Information Management 

with BASIC for the IBM PC/XT. 

Tom Shoemaker. Reston. VA: 

Reston Publishing. 1985; 

192 pages, softcover. 

ISBN 0-8359-3076-9. $14.95. 

Intelligent Systems: the 
Unprecedented Opportunity. 
J. E. Hayes and D Michie, eds. 
New York: John Wiley & Sons. 
1984: 224 pages, softcover. 
ISBN 0-470-20139-8. $19.95. 

Introduction id Ada. 2nd ed.. 
S. J. Young. New York: John 
Wiley & Sons. 1984; 404 pages, 
softcover. ISBN 0-470-20112-6. 
$29.95. 



396 BYTE • JULY 1985 



Inquiry 249 



Inquiry 124 



BOOKS RECEIVED 



Introduction to Non-Linear 
Optimization. L E. Scales. New 
York: Springer-Verlag. 1985; 2 56 
pages, softcover. ISBN 0-387- 
91252-5. $19.80. 

Introduction to Numerical 
Methods for Parallel Com- 
puters, U. Schendel. New York: 
John Wiley & Sons. 1984; 152 
pages, hardcover, ISBN 0-470- 
20091-X. $21.95. 

Learning Assembly Language, 
Hugo T. Jackson and A. M. 
Fischer. New York: Harper & 
Row, 1985; 318 pages, softcover, 
ISBN 0-06-043247-0. $19.95. 

Learning FORTH, Margaret A. 
Armstrong. New York: John 
Wiley & Sons, 1985; 226 pages, 
softcover, ISBN 0-471-88245-3. 
$16.95. 

Learning MS-BASIC on the 
TI Professional Computer, 
Donald W. Drury. Blue Ridge 
Summit. PA: larj Books. 
1984; 240 pages, softcover. 
ISBN 0-8306-1815-5, $15.95. 

Learning with Commodore 
Logo. Daniel Watt. New York: 
McGraw-Hill, 1985: 332 pages, 
spiral-bound, ISBN 0-07- 
068581-9. $19.95. 

Logics for Artificial In- 
telligence, Raymond llirner. 
New York: John Wiley & Sons, 
1984; 128 pages, hardcover, 
ISBN 0-470-20123-1. $29.95. 

MacGuide: The Complete 
Handbook to the Macintosh. 
Leslie S. Smith. New York: New 
American Library. 1985; 288 
pages, softcover. ISBN 0-452- 
25569-4. $14.95. 

Mac 'Ielecommunications, 
Jonathan Erickson and William 
D. Cramer. Berkeley, CA: 
Osborne/McGraw-Hill, 1985; 
224 pages, softcover, 
ISBN 0-881 34-1 5 5-X. $16.95. 

Managing Microcomputers in 
Large Organizations. National 
Research Council. Washington, 
DC: National Academy Press, 
1985: 160 pages, softcover, 
ISBN 0-309-03492-2. $13.95. 

Mastering Your Commodore 
64 through Eight Basic Proj- 
ects. Robert M. 1ripp, ed. 
Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice- 
Hall. 1984; 192 pages, softcover, 



ISBN 0-13-559543-6. $19.95. 
Includes floppy disk. 

Microcomputers and Micro- 
processors: Ihe 8080, 8085. 
and Z-80— Programming, Inter- 
facing, AND TROUBLESHOOTING. 
John Uffenbeck. Englewood 
Cliffs. NJ: Prentice-Hall. 
1985; 688 pages, hardcover. 
ISBN 0-13-580309-8. $31.95. 

Multiplan Made Easy, Macin- 
tosh Edition. Walter A. Ettlin. 
Berkeley, CA: Osborne/McGraw- 
H ill, 1985: 288 pages, softcover, 
ISBN 0-88134-153-3. $14.95. 

Okidata Printer User's Hand- 
book, staff of Weber Systems. 
Cleveland, OH: Weber Systems 
Inc., 1984; 304 pages, softcover, 
ISBN 0-938862-19-7. $15.95. 

OR on the Micro. David 
Whitaker. New York: John Wiley 
& Sons. 1984; 208 pages, hard- 
cover, ISBN 0-471-90083-4, 
$19.95. 

The PC Software and Systems 
Directory for Computer-Aided 
Engineering, the editors of 
CAD/CIM Alert and CAE Work- 
station Alert. Brookline, MA; 
Management Roundtable Inc., 
1985: 86 pages, spiral-bound, 
#002PC $79. 

The Personal Computer 
Investment Handbook, Jon 
Zonderman. Blue Ridge Summit. 
PA: lab Books, 1984; 160 pages, 
softcover. ISBN 0-8306-1807-4. 
$11.95. 

Ihe Plain English Mainte- 
nance and Repair Guide for 
IBM Personal Computers: 
IBM PC. PC XT. PCir. and 
Compatibles, Henry F. 
Beechhold. New York: Simon & 
Schuster, 1985: 272 pages, soft- 
cover, ISBN 0-671-52864-5, 
$14.95. 

The Principles and Practice 
of Cost/Schedule Control 
Systems, Chuck M. Slemaker. 
Princeton, NJ: Petrocelli Books, 
1985; 440 pages, hardcover, 
ISBN 0-89433-227-9, $39.95. 

Programmer's Guide to Video 
Display Terminals. David 
Stephens. Dallas, TX: Atlantis 
Publishing, 1985: 336 pages, 
softcover. ISBN 0-936158-01-8. 
$30. 

[continued) 




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Inquiry 307 



JULY 1985 'BYTE 397 



Inquiry 180 



DYNAMIC RAMS 






STATIC RAMS 






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4164 


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$ 1.50 


6116P 


2Kx8 


120 ns 


$ 2.60 


150 ns 


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$ 2.35 


200 ns 


$ 1.15 


5514 


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BOOKS RECEIVED 



Programming in IBM PC DOS 
Pascal. David M. Chess. 
Englewood Cliffs. -NJ: Prentice- 
Hall. I985; 240 pages, softcover. 
ISBN 0-1 3-730292-4. $14.95. 

Programming TIps for the 
Commodore 64. David 
Highmore and Liz Page. New 
York: John Wiley & Sons. 
1985; 112 pages, softcover. 
ISBN 0-471-81553-5. $14.95. 

Recursion via Pascal. I. S. 
Rohl. New York: Cambridge 
University Press. 1984; 206 
pages, hardcover. ISBN 0-521- 
26329-8. $34.40. 

Research and Development 
in Information Retrieval. 
C I. van Rigsbergen. ed. New 
York: Cambridge University 
Press. 1985; 450 pages, hard- 
cover. ISBN 0-521-26865-6. 
$49.50. 

Sanyo MBC User's Hand- 
book, staff of Weber Systems. 
Cleveland. OH: Weber Systems. 
Inc.. 1984; 340 pages, soft- 
cover. ISBN 0-938862-24-3. 
$17.95. 

Serious Programming for 
the Commodore 64. Henry 
Simpson. Blue Ridge Summit. 
PA: lab Books. 1984; 208 pages, 
softcover. ISBN 0-8306-182 l-X. 
$9.95. 

6502 Machine and Assembly 
Language Programming. Mike 
Smith. Blue Ridge Summit. PA: 
lab Books. 1984; 322 pages, 
softcover. ISBN 0-8306-1750-7. 
$12.95. 

Software for Amateur Radio. 
Joe Kasser. G3ZCZ. Blue Ridge 
Summit. PA: lab Books. 1984; 
304 pages, softcover. ISBN 0- 
8306-0260-7. $15.95. 

Star Power: Mastering Word- 
Star. MailMerge. SpellStar. 
DataStar. SuperSort, Calc- 
Star, InfoStar, StarIndex. 
CorrectStar, StarBurst. 
ReportStar. & PlanStar, Paul 
Garrison. Blue Ridge Summit. 
PA: lab Books. 1985; 320 pages, 
softcover. ISBN 0-8306-1742-6. 
$16.95. 

Stock Selection: Modern 
Portfolio Management. IBM 
PC Version. Robert ]. Bibbero. 
New York: John Wiley & Sons. 
1984; 110 pages. 3-ring binder. 



ISBN 0-471-805 50-5. $125. 
Includes floppy disk. 

Systems Analysis. Design, and 
Development with Structured 
Concepts. Perry Edwards. New 
York: Holt, Rinehart and 
Winston. 1985; 526 pages, hard- 
cover. ISBN 0-03-OOOI42-0. 
$27.95. 

Iext Processing. A. Colin Day. 
New York: Cambridge University 
Press. 1984; 160 pages, hard- 
cover. ISBN 0-521-24432-3. 
$29.95. 

A User Guide to the UNIX 
System. 2nd ed.. Rebecca 
Thomas. Ph.D., and Jean Yates. 
Berkeley, CA: Osbome/McGraw- 
Hill, 1985; 736 pages, softcover, 
ISBN 0-88134-109-6, $18.95. 

Word Processing Cookbook. 
Glenn B. Stuart. Englewood 
Cliffs. NJ: Prentice-Hall. 1985; 
304 pages, softcover. ISBN 0-13- 
963380-4. $18.95. 

Word Processing for the IBM 
PC & PCjr and Compatible 
Computers. Carole Boggs 
Matthews and Martin S. 
Matthews. New York: McGraw- 
Hill. 1985; 248 pages, softcover. 
ISBN 0-07-040952-8. $18.95. 

Word Processing Software 
for the IBM PC Ronni T. 
Marshak. New York: McGraw- 
Hill. 1985; 208 pages, softcover. 
ISBN 0-07-056322-5. $15.95. 

WordStar in 3 Days. Miranda 
Morse. Huntington. NY: Maple 
Hill Press. 1984; 216 pages, 
spiral-bound. ISBN 0-93054 5- 
02-8. $14.95. 

WordStar Without Iears: A 
Self-Teaching Guide. Ruth 
Ashley. Judi N. Fernandez, and 
Robert Sansom. New York: John 
Wiley & Sons. 1985: 2 20 pages, 
softcover. ISBN 0-471-80540-8. 
$14.95. 

Working from Home. Paul and 
Sarah Edwards. Los Angeles. 
CA: Jeremy P. larcher Inc.. 
1985; 432 pages, softcover. 
ISBN 0-87477-240-0. $11.95. 

The ZX Programmers' Compan- 
ion. John and Catherine Grant. 
New York: Cambridge University 
Press. 1984; 2 56 pages, soft- 
cover. ISBN 0-521-27044-8. 
$11.95. ■ 



398 BYTE • JULY 1985 



Inquiry 228 



Your #1 first-stop source of information 

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JULY 1985 -BYTE 399 



A COMPUTER 

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THAT SPEAKS 

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400 BYTE- JULY 1985 



LETTERS 



[continued from page 32) 

where the values of x 8 and x 9 are arbitrarily 

selected. 

For example, if a magic number of 9 is 
desired and if x 8 and x 9 are arbitrarily 
selected to be 3 1 and 1 5 respectively the 
values for the remaining boxes are 



Xj 


= 


-15 


+ 6 




-9 




*2 


= 


-31 


+ 6 = 




-25 




*3 


= 


31 + 


15 - 


3 


= 43 




x 4 


= 


31 + 


30 - 


6 


= 55 




*5 


- 


3 










*6 


= 


-31 


- 30 


+ 


12 = 


-49 


*7 


= 


-31 


- 15 


+ 


9 = - 


37 



The derivation of this general solution is 
extensive. Solutions for larger squares 
(higher order of m) can also be obtained 
using this technique. 

Listing I is a short BASIC program (writ- 
ten for the unheard-of IM-1 computer 
manufactured by the 'late" APF Industries) 
that will calculate a magic-square solution 
using the equations described above. Ex- 
cept for the second line of code (which 
is directed to turning the audio off and 
clearing the screen), this program should 
work on virtually any computer that runs 
some version of BASIC. 

Alfred A. Fressola 
Fairfield, CT 

Modem Mismatch 

Since I am in charge of a laboratory com- 
puter system ! needed a modem link to 
my home to save me trips into town to fix 
small problems that could have easily 
been handled over the phone. Our system 
already had a Racal-Vadic Model VA3455 
modem (300/1200 bps) installed on it for 
remote diagnostics by our software 
vendor so I figured that I would use it. I 
bought an Anchor Automation Mark XII 
300/1200-bps modem and hooked it up 
to my Model 4P at home. I thought I was 
all set. 

What I discovered was that the two 
modems would not lock into each other. 
After a couple of phone calls I was told 
by Anchor Automation that its modem 
first checks at 1200 bps and then at 300 
bps if it hasn't detected a carrier and that 
Racal-Vadic performs just the opposite. 
The two units were both switching data 
rates so that they would never lock in! 

It appears to me that there is some 
degree of nonstandardization in the 
modem industry that should be made 
known to others. Since modems are be- 
coming cheaper, smarter, and more pro- 
lific. I am sure that others will also run into 
this problem. The problem would not exist 



INTPUT X8 



INPUT "VALUE ",X9 



Listing I: A program to calculate magic-square solutions. 

5 DIM A$(1) 

10 POKE 24578,38: CALL 17046 

20 INPUT "ENTER MAGIC-SQUARE NUMBER",MAGIC 

22 IF INT (MAGIC/3)< >MAGIC/3 THEN GOSUB 300 

30 MAGIC = - ABS ( INT (MAGIC)) 

40 PRINT "MAGIC-SQUARE NUMBER IS ", - MAGIC 

50 PRINT : PRINT "CHOOSE LOWER MIDDLE BOX VALUE": 

60 X8= ABS( INT(X8)) 

65 PRINT : PRINT "LOWER MIDDLE BOX = ";X8 

70 PRINT : PRINT "CHOOSE LOWER RIGHT-HAND BOX" 

75 PRINT : PRINT "LOWER RIGHT-HAND BOX = ";X9 

90 X9= ABS( INTX9)) 

110 X1 = -X9- 2 'MAGIC/3 

120 X2=-X8- 2* MAGIC/3 

130 X3 = X8 + X9 + MAGIC/3 

140 X4 = X8 + 2*X9 + 2* MAGIC/3 

150 X5= -MAGIC/3 

160 X6=-X8-2*X9-4*MAGIC/3 

170 X7= -X8-X9 -MAGIC 

200 PRINT : PRINT : PRINT "MAGIC-SQUARE BOX VALUES FOR A": PRINT 

"MAGIC- SQUARE VALUE OF "; - MAGIC;" ARE" 

205 PRINT : PRINT 

210 PRINT X1,X2,X3 

220 PRINT X4,X5,X6 

230 PRINT X7,X8,X9 

250 END 

300 PRINT : PRINT : PRINT "FOR A WHOLE NUMBER IN EACH BOX" 

310 PRINT "YOU MUST ENTER A MAGIC VALUE" 

320 PRINT "THAT IS EVENLY DIVISIBLE BY 3." 

330 PRINT : PRINT "KEEP THE PRESENT VALUE ?" 

340 INTPUT A$ 

350 IF A$="Y" THEN RETURN 

360 GOTO 330 



if the remote were a single-speed unit, but 
the problem seems to arise when two 
automatic two-speed units trying to 
establish a link continously shift gears in 
opposite directions. 

I would be interested if others have had 
this same problem and whether some- 
thing can be done to remedy the situation. 

T. TED SCHWANINGER 



Super Hyper 

Thank you for publishing Richard B. Lein- 
ing's "Factoring with Hyper" (March, page 
396). The enclosed program (listing 2) was 
derived entirely from his equation (II) and 
considers right triangles instead of rec- 
tangular hyperbolas. Loop I factors quick- 
ly and exactly those numbers that can be 
factored directly without overflow, and 
loop 2 shrinks the remaining number to 
trigonometric ratios (between and I ) that 
can be manipulated without overflow and 
then enlarged. The program requires the 
same number of iterations (always fewer 



than m/I 2) but factors 94,815.109 three 
times as fast and factors numbers with 
almost twice as many digits. My program 
(I call it BIGFAC) can factor 99,876.225,023 
on my 12 -digit computer in the blink of 
an eye, but it takes more than half an hour 
to determine that 999.983 is prime. When 
I get a multitasking computer (perhaps the 
Hewlett-Packard Integral) I can run BIGFAC 
simultaneously with a program that can 
factor any 1 2 -digit number in half an hour 
(see jim Horn's "Fast Factoring on the 
HP-7 5C" Computer journal of PPC, 
November/December 1982). 

To convert this HP BASIC program to 
Microsoft BASIC, you need to know that 
HMS$ converts elapsed seconds into 
hours, minutes and seconds, ! equals 
REM, @ equals :, and DISP is similar to 
PRINT. On a 16-digit computer one would 
want to lengthen L to 16 digits in line 80 
and L9 to 15 digits in line 90. 

Gordon D. Kirchhevel 

Chicago, IL 

{continued) 



JULY 1985 -BYTE 401 



LETTERS 



Richard Leining replies: 
Bravo! You've reaffirmed the progress 
begotten by publication. You've beaten 
the size of the numbers being juggled 
from N 2 /4 in Hyper to N in BIGFAC. That 
triangular simplification was really slick. 
It wouldn't have occurred to me in a long 
time. My efforts to fit right triangles to 



the origin, foci, and differences of a 
hyperbola, in search of some kind of 
Pythagorean triple, led nowhere. I was 
still glued to that hyperbola, while you 
were free of it. 

The use of upper or lower numbers 
was neat; I'm just learning them. I looked 
for some w,r analogy to the key numbers 



Listing 2: The BIGFAC factoring program. 

10 ! BIGFAC: factoring program 

20 ! derived from 

30 ! Richard B. Leining's HYPER 

40 ! BYTE, March 1985, p. 396 

50 ! written in Hewlett-Packard enhanced BASIC 

60 ' for the HP-85A computer 

70 ! with Advanced Programming ROM. 

80 ! LET L = 999999999999 ! Largest integer (on 12-digit computer) 

90 ! LET L9 = 99999999999 ! Largest N to integerize r accurately 

100 DISP "Number to be factored"; 

110 INPUT N@ T = TIME ! T is the starting time. 

120 IF N<4 THEN BEEP @ DISP "Number too small." @ GOTO 100 

130 IF L9<N THEN BEEP @ DISP "Number too large." @ GOTO 100 

140 IF N\2*2 = N THEN DISP 2;N/2 @ GOTO 360 ! N \ 2 = INT(N/2). 

150LETS = SQR(N) 

160 LET W = IP(S) ! (IP(S) = INT(S) 

170 IF N MODE 4 = 1 AND W MOD 2 = THEN LET W = W-1 

180 IF N MOD 4 = 3 AND W MOD 2 = 1 THEN LET W = W-1 

190 IF W<STHEN LET W = W + 2 

200 LETW9 = (N\3 + 3)\2 @ LET W5 = MIN(SQR(L),W9) 

210 ! Loop 1 

220 IF W>W5 THEN 260 

230 R = SQR(W*W-N) 

240 IF FP(R) = THEN DISP W + R;W-R@W=L! FP(R) = R-INT(R). 

250 W = W + 2 @ GOTO 210 

260 ! Exit loop 1 

270 LET l = 10~LEN(VAL$(N))-1 ! I is an "integerizer" as long as N. VAL$ = 

STR$. 

280 ! Loop 2 

290 IF W>W9THEN 340 

300 C = S/W ! Cosine of a right triangle whose sides are w (hypotenuse), r, and 

square root to N 

[continued) 



used to find Pythagorean triples and 
primitive hypotenuses, without finding 
any. After all, one side of your triangle 
is irrational, whereas Fermat and Euler 
were obsessed with integers. 

Your scaling down of the problem is a 
clever way to get the most out of limited- 
precision software. In the long run. there 
is more growth potential in working with 
arrays of integers. Their running times are 
an incentive to eliminate trial values of 
$ (or w) with a minimum of arithmetic. 

IBM-Interference Solution 

There I was. typing away on my IBM PC 
and churning out copies of the world's 
greatest program on my Epson FX-80, 
when l received a phone call from my 
landlady. 

She called to ask if I was using a com- 
puter. When l told her I was. she replied 
that a television repairman was at her 
place to fix her TV, which was suffering 
from terrible reception. Seems she had 
been throwing away one "bad" TV after 
another, until she finally called the repair- 
man, who told her there was nothing 
wrong with the sets, there was just some 
jerk in the area who was operating a per- 
sonal computer. 

At first. I didn't believe l was the jerk. 
I turned off my computer. "Hey, my TV is 
working OK now," came the startled cry 
from my landlady over the phone. I turned 
the computer back on. "Ack. It just went 
bad again," she said. 

I was the jerk. 

I confessed to the crime, turned off my 
computer, and sank into a deep depres- 
sion. Visions of being drummed out of the 
neighborhood by the FCC danced through 
my head. Human nature being what it is. 
I began experimenting. 

(continued) 






MASTERBYTE COMPUTERS OF NEW YORK, INC. 
Ste. 815, 19 W. 34 St., NY, NY 10001 • (212) 760-0341 

SERVING BUSINESSES SINCE 1984 



402 BYTE • JULY 1985 



Inquiry 224 



MICROWAY'S 8087 RUNS 1-2-3 m ! 



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87FFT-2™ performs two-dimensional FFTs. 
Ideal for image processing Requires 87FFT...$75 

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RTOS - REAL TIME OPERATING SYSTEM 

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INTEL COMPILERS 1 

FORTRAN-86 $750 

PASCAL-86 $750 

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87C (LATTICE/MICROWAY) $750 

ASM-86 $200 

1 Requires RTOS or iRMX-86. All Intel compiler names and 
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64KRAMSet $9 

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256KCMOS RAM Set $135 
1 28K RAM Set pc at $169 
NUMBER SMASHER" 1590 

9.54mhz 8087 coprocessor board with 512K 

FORTRAN and UTILITIES 

Microsoft Fortran 3.2 229 

IBM Professional Fortran 545 

Intel Fortran-86 1 750 

FORLIB-f 65 

STRINGS and THINGS 65 

C and UTILITIES 

Lattice C 299 

Microsoft C Version 3.0 299 

C86 299 

FLOAT87 1 50 

BASIC and UTILITIES 

IBM Basic Compiler ♦ 270 

87BASIC 150 

87BASIC/INLINE 200 

Summit BetterBASIC" 1 75 

Summit 8087 Module 87 

MACROASSEMBLERS 

IBM Assembler with Librarian 1 55 

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PASCAL 

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FASTBREAK and NUMBER SMASHER are trademarks of 
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Inquiry 250 



JULY 1985 • BYTE 403 



LETTERS 



310R = SQR(1-C*C)*W + I-I 


Converts cos to sin, solves for r and integerizes 


near-integer r's. 






320 IF FP(R) = THEN GOSUB 390 




330 W = W + 2 @ GOTO 280 






340 ! Exit loop 2 






350 IF W<L + 2THEN DISP N 


"is prime." 




360 T2 = TIME @ BEEP @ DISP HMS$((T2-T + 


86400) MOD 86400) @ DISP I 


Displays elapsed time. 






370 STOP 






380 ! Subroutine: Test product 






390 BEEP @ P = W + R @ Q = 


W-R @ IF P*Q 


= N THEN DISP Q;P @ W = L 


400 RETURN 






410 END 







It turned out that whenever I had the 
parallel printer cable connected to my 
computer, the interference was emitted. 
It didn't matter if the cable was connected 
to the printer, or if the printer was on. I 
was using an AST SixPak card as a parallel 
printer adapter, but I don't know if that 
had anything to do with the problem. 

I called my dealer. He was out of town. 
His technical-support manager didn't 
know what to do but suggested I write to 



Washington for "a bulletin that gives hints." 
IBM told me to call my dealer. My friends 
told me to wrap the cable in several layers 
of aluminum foil (kept me off the streets 
for a night, but it didn't do a thing for the 
interference). I borrowed a shielded cable 
from work and tried it on my errant sys- 
tem. It didn't make an ohm of difference. 
Then I saw a catalog from Moore Com- 
puter Supplies (Box 20, Wheeling, IL 
60090), and there on page 31 was a pic- 



ture of a cable that was like none other: 
"full tinned copper braid sleeve for highest 
degree of transmission shielding:' a metal 
casing extending from the cable and onto 
the connectors "for total EMI/RFI protec- 
tion." and a grounding lug! 

Moore had a toll-free number for tech- 
nical support, and it had Business Centers 
that stocked its equipment all over the 
country. There was one in San Diego, from 
which I ordered the cable. The cable that 
was sent had no grounding lug and didn't 
offer much improvement. I explained the 
problem to manager Gary Hick, whom I 
found to be very helpful and courteous. 
He contacted the manufacturer, who said 
the cable was specially made for the IBM 
because of the very problem I was ex- 
periencing. Two days later, I had a new 
cable. 

The cable made a remarkable difference. 
It cut out about 90 percent of the inter- 
ference, and I trust the distance from my 
apartment to my neighbors' will take care 
of the rest. 

Bill Parker 
Los Angeles, CA ■ 







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hard disk $420 

MINISCRIBE 20MB Vt hi. H.D $620 

KEYTR0N1C compatible #5151 

keyboard $130 

High Tec keyboard $130 

AMDEK 310A (Amber monitor) $147 

AMDEK 600 RGB (640x200) $385 



DEALER INQUIRIES WELCOME - S0VA Pan KITS AVAILABLE 

COMPUTRADE COMPANY (in Koll Commercial Center) 

780 Trimble Road, Suite 605, San Jose, CA 95131 
U. (408) 946-2442, Tfelex: 171605 

Hours: Mon-Fri 9:00 a.m.-6:00 p.m. 



a message to 
our subscribers 

From time to time we make the BYTE subscriber list 
available to other companies who wish to send our 
subscribers material about their products. We take great 
care to screen these companies, choosing only those 
who are reputable, and whose products, services, or 
information we feel would be of interest to you. Direct 
mail is an efficient medium for presenting the latest 
personal computer goods and services to our 
subscribers. 

Many BYTE subscribers appreciate this controlled use 
of our mailing list, and look forward to finding 
information of interest to them In the mail. Used are 
our subscribers' names and addresses only fno other 
information we may have is ever given). 

While we believe the distribution of this information 
is of benefit to our subscribers, we firmly respect the 
wishes of any subscriber who does not want to receive 
such promotional literature. Should you wish to restrict 
the use of your name, simply send your request to the 
following address. 

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Attn: Circulation Department, 

70 Main St., Peterborough, NH 03458 



404 BYTE • JULY !985 



Inquiry 104 



A growth market. 

The kids of today are the real growth market 
of tomorrow. They are the doctors and nurses, the 
engineers and scientists, the teachers and journalists, 
the leaders who will create tomorrow's prosperity. 

It will take your company's help to assure these 
children a first-rate college education because today 
colleges are having a hard time coping with the high 
costs of learning. 

Invest in the future of America by giving to the 
college of your choice. 

You'll be making an investment in the leading 
growth market of America. And you couldn't ask 
tor a better investment 
than that. 



Send for our free booklet: "Guidelines— How to Develop 
an Effective Program of Corporate Support for HigheT Education." 
Write CFAE, 680 Fifth Avenue, New York, NY J0019. 




Invest in the future of America. 
Give to the college of your choice. 



** • I M K« C 



>0 FIFTH AVlNUf NEWTOfc NY 1001? 



WHAT'S NEW 



NEW SYSTEMS 



Talking Computer 

Computer Aids Corpora- 
tion's Small lalk is a five- 
pound, battery-powered, 
talking computer. Small lalk 
is based on the Epson 
HX-20 notebook computer. 
The manufacturer uses the 
SSI-263 speech chip and a 
specially developed text-to- 
speech program to produce 
speech. 

Small Talk contains a built- 
in dot-matrix printer and 
cassette storage. It has a 
speaker, a headphone jack, 
and two RS-232C serial 
ports for connecting external 
printers, modems, or braille 
devices. 

A version of Computer 
Aids Corporation's Word-lalk 
word processor is built into 
Small lalk's firmware. Word- 
Talk vocalizes each key as it 
is pressed in a synthetic 
voice, and it provides 
spoken review of characters, 
words, lines, or entire 
documents. 

Also in Small lalk's firm- 
ware are a scientific cal- 
culator and a clock/calendar. 
An optional terminal pro- 
gram is scheduled for 
release in the fall. Small lalk 
is completely programmable 
so the user can write her or 
his own BASIC programs. 

With its carrying case and 
battery charger, Small lalk 
sells for under $2000. Con- 
tact Computer Aids Corp., 
124 West Washington, Lower 
Arcade, Fort Wayne, IN 
46802. (219) 422-2424. 
Inquiry 620. 




The Olivetti M24 IBM PC-compatible. 



Olivetti M24 

IBM PC-Compatible 

Olivetti's M24 is an IBM 
PC-compatible personal 
computer that uses an 
8-MHz 8086-2 processor 
and MS-DOS 2.11. Its stan- 
dard features include 128K 
bytes of RAM (expandable 
to 640K bytes) on dual-disk 
models or 256K bytes of 
RAM (also expandable to 
640K bytes) on hard-disk 
models, a 12-inch monitor 
with 640- by 400-pixel 
resolution, serial and 
parallel ports, a clock/calen- 



dar, a graphics card, and 
seven expansion slots. 

You can choose your disk- 
drive configuration: two 
360K-byte slim-line floppy- 
disk drives or one 360K-byte 
floppy disk and one 10- 
megabyte slim-line hard-disk 
drive. The 8 3 -key keyboard 
has LED indicators and is 
detachable, 

In its 128K-byte configura- 
tion with dual floppy-disk 
drives and monochrome 
monitor, the Olivetti M24 is 
priced at $274 5. The same 
system with a color monitor 
is $3395. Contact Docutel/ 
Olivetti Corp.. 5615 High- 
point Dr.. Irving. TX 75062. 
(214) 258-5400. 
Inquiry 621. 



IBM PC 

AT-Compatible 

Transportable 

Corona Data Systems' 
Corona AT 'Iransport- 
able (ATP) computer is an 
MS-DOS machine that uses 
Intel's 80286 processor. It 
has a built-in color/mono- 
chrome video graphics card 
and can operate as a stand- 
alone system or a worksta- 
tion for the IBM PC AT. 

The Corona ATP runs at 6 
MHz and supports the 
80287 numeric coprocessor. 
It includes parallel printer 
and RS-232C serial ports 
and a built-in floppy-disk 
controller. The green- 
phosphor. 9-inch display has 
640- by 400-pixel resolution. 
Three of the system's five 
expansion slots are AT- 
compatible; the remaining 
two are XT-compatible. The 
AT-style detachable keyboard 
features an IBM PC XT 
interface. 

You can choose the 
ATP-6-QD or ATP-6-Q20 
model of the Corona ATP. 
The ATP-6-QD has a 
1.2-megabyte floppy-disk 
drive, a 360K-byte floppy- 
disk drive, and 512K bytes 
of RAM. The ATP-6-Q20 has 
a 20-megabyte Winchester 
drive, a 1.2-megabyte floppy 
drive, 512K bytes of RAM. 
and an AT-compatible hard- 
disk controller. 

Suggested retail price for 
the ATP-6-QD is under 
$4500; the ATP-6-Q20 is 
priced under $5500. For 
more information, contact 
Corona Data Systems Inc., 
275 East Hillcrest Dr., Thou- 
sand Oaks. CA 91360, (805) 
495-5800. 
Inquiry 622. 



406 BYTE • JULY 1985 



WHAT'S NEW 



A D D - 1 N S 



Instrument Modules 
for IBMs 

PCl-20000 from Burr- 
Brown consists of a 
family of instrument 
modules and a bus- 
compatible carrier board for 
the IBM PC PC XX PC AT, 
or Compaq computer. The 
carrier board provides the 
computer interface, power 
supply, and intermodule 
communications, as well as 
inputs for three modules. An 
optional carrier configura- 
tion gives you 32 points of 
buffered TTL-compatible, 
digital I/O. 

The carrier bus is de- 
signed for data acquisition 
and measurement. It per- 
forms standard computer- 
bus functions and allows for 
chaining analog signals 
among the plug-in in- 
struments. The bus lets sync 
and trigger signals pass 
among the modules. 

Among the instrument 
modules available are a 
16-channel, 12-bit accuracy, 
data-acquisition module; a 
data-acquisition expansion 
module; two types of 
analog-output modules; a 
digital-I/O module; and a 
counter/timer/pulse-generator 
module. Three different ter- 
mination panels connect 
field signals to the 
PCI-20000 instrument 
modules. 

Prices for the PCl-20000 
system start at $295 each 
for carrier boards and $199 
for each instrument module. 
Contact Burr-Brown Corp., 
POB 11400. 'Iucson, AZ 
85734. (602) 746-1111. 
Inquiry 623. 




The PCI-20000 instrument modules jor IB M-compatibles. 



IBM PC AT 
Debugger 

Atron's AT Probe is a 
hardware/software com- 
bination for the IBM PC AT 
that provides hardware- 
assisted debugging. The AT 
Probe intercepts signals to 
and from the processor and 
can trap and trace all occur- 
rences in the system. 

A 1 -megabyte on-line sym- 
bol table, independent of PC 
AT memory, lets you debug 
large applications and 
facilitates source-level 
debugging. The AT Probe 
supports source-level (sym- 
bolic) debugging for the 
standard assembler and for 
high-level languages such as 
C. Pascal, and FORTRAN. 
Real-time trace lets you cap- 
ture and store program ex- 



ecution to create a rolling 
window of the last 2048 
memory cycles. Also, you 
can set breakpoints on 
reading or writing memory, 
on doing I/O, at instruction 
execution, or upon 
interrupts. 

The AT Probe's perfor- 
mance and timing-analysis 
software lets you create a 
histogram to display where 
the program spends its time. 
You can profile execution of 
individual procedures and 
display a procedure-duration 
measurement or do program 
event-count analysis and 
display an event-count 
measurement. 

The AT Probe lists for 
$2495. Contact Atron. 



20665 Fourth St., Saratoga. 
CA 95070, (408) 741-5900. 
Inquiry 624. 



TanPak Expansion 
Board 

The lanPak multifunction 
board is specifically 
designed to fit the landy 
1000's II -inch expansion 
slots. It contains DMA cir- 
cuitry, a serial port, and a 
clock, as well as software to 
support its features. 

The TanPak comes in 
128K-. 256K-. and 512K-byte 
versions. You can also get 
256K-byte upgrade kits for 
those versions with less than 
512K bytes of memory. 
The 128K-byte lanPak 
board costs $399. Contact 
Hard Drive Specialist. 16208 
Hickory Knoll. Houston. TX 
77059, (800) 231-6671; in 
Texas, (713) 480-6000. 
Inquiry 625. 

Apple He 
Multifunction Card 

Street Electronics says it 
has combined the most 
common Apple lie inter- 
facing needs on its Business- 
Card. It includes two serial 
interfaces, a clock/calendar 
with battery backup, and 
built-in high-resolution 
graphics and text-screen 
printing capabilities using 
pull-down menus. 

By adding three buffer 
chips, you can give the 
BusinessCard a 16K- or 64 K- 
byte print buffer. The 64K- 
byte version allows storage 
of up to 20 pages of text. 

The BusinessCard has 
more than 60 commands for 
printing graphics and text. 
Graphics printing commands 
include windowing, zoom, 
rotate, and inverse. Among 
available text-formatting 

{continued) 



JULY 1985 'BYTE 407 



WHAT'S NEW 



A D D - I N S 



features are setting margins, 
line and page length, page 
titles, and page numbers. 

The BusinessCard is also 
available in a version for 
parallel printers. It sells for 
less than $200. Contact 
Street Electronics Corp.. 
1140 Mark Ave.. Carpinteria. 
CA 93013. (805) 684-4593. 
Inquiry 626. 



Quadsprint 

Quadram's Quadsprint 
board, which comes 
with a plug-in cable that 
connects to the 8088 socket 
on the IBM PC's system 
board, doubles the PC's pro- 
cessing speed. 

Quadsprint has a 10-MHz 
8086 microprocessor with 
4K bytes of high-speed 
cache memory. Its installa- 
tion does not affect existing 
system memory. 

Retail price for Quadsprint 
is $645. Contact Quadram 



Corp., 4355 International 
Blvd.. Norcross, GA 30093, 
(404) 923-6666. 
Inquiry 627. 



Intel IBM PC 
Memory Products 

Intel's add-in boards let 
you expand IBM PC, XT, 
and AT system memory up 
to 8 megabytes. Software 
support for Above Board/PC 
and Above Board/AT in- 
cludes Lotus's Symphony 
and 1-2-3 and AshtonTate's 
Framework. Four Above 
Board/PCs. each with a max- 
imum of 2 megabytes, ex- 
pand IBM PC and PC XT 
system memory up to 8 
megabytes. Two Above 
Board/AlS, each with a max- 
imum of 4 megabytes using 
piggyback memory, expand 
PC AT system memory up to 
8 megabytes. 

An operating system 
driver, Above Board's Ex- 
panded Memory Manager 



supervises the expanded 
memory and supports multi- 
ple applications. You can 
mix memory types on one 
board to accommodate 
memory requirements. 

The Above Board products 
include RAM-disk and print- 
buffer capabilities. They of- 
fer menu-driven installation, 
memory diagnostics, and 
fault isolation. 

Intel is selling Above 
Board products in conjunc- 
tion with its 8087/80287 
Math Coprocessors. Above 
Board/PC retails for $395 
with 64K bytes and $595 
with 256K bytes of memory. 
Above Board/AT is $595 
with 128K bytes and $995 
with 512K bytes. Above 
Board/AT with piggyback 
memory costs $295 with 
128K bytes and $795 with 
51 2 K bytes. Contact Intel 
Corp.. 5200 Northeast Elam 
Young Parkway, Mail Stop 
TOC-03. Hillsboro. OR 
97124-6497. (503) 629-7354. 
Inquiry 628. 



MacMegabytes 
and RAMDISC 

Beck-Tech's MacMega- 
bytes memory-expan- 
sion board lets you have 
more than a megabyte of in- 
ternal memory in your 128K- 
or 512K-byte Macintosh. 

With the MacMegabytes 
hardware, Beck-Tech provides 
the RAMDISC software 
package, which includes 
slide-show utilities and ac- 
cess to an electronic disk 
for faster program and data 
access. 

MacMegabytes conver- 
sions are priced at $849 for 
your 128K-byte Macintosh 
and $549 for a 512K-byte 
machine. You can purchase 
MacMegabytes as a kit for 
$699 if you have a 128K- 
byte Mac and $399 if you 
have 51 2K bytes. The RAM- 
DISC software alone is 
$39.95. Contact Beck-Tech 
Co.. 41 TUnnel Rd.. Berkeley. 
CA 94705, (415) 548-4054. 
Inquiry 629. 



PER1PHER 



Programmable 
Backup Subsystems 

Sysgen's Smart Image 
and Smart QIC-File tape- 
backup systems can be pro- 
grammed to automatically 
back up your hard-disk drive 
or selected files at predeter- 
mined times. You program 
these drives using a menu- 
driven utility program that 
lets you preselect the files 
to be backed up. Files 
specified may include sub- 
directories or only those 
files that have changed 



since the last backup. Files 
may be backed up twice 
daily. 

Your computer will beep if 
in use when a backup is 
scheduled. Then you can 
either approve the action or 
put the backup on hold 
until you exit to the 
operating system. Utility pro- 
grams verify that the proper 
files have been backed up. 
The same file can be stored 
in different tape sets, and 
data can be restored to dif- 
ferent hard disks than were 
originally backed up. 

The cassette-based Smart 
Image subsystem is $995. 
The Smart QIC-File, which 
uses the QIC-format car- 
tridge! costs $1395 (internal) 
and $1495 (external). Con- 



tact Sysgen Inc.. 47853 
Warm Springs Blvd., Fre- 
mont, CA 94539, (415) 
490-6770. 
Inquiry 630. 



Memory-Card System 

Dataser-Station encodes 
and reads pocket-size 
storage cards that are less 
sensitive to harsh en- 
vironments than floppy 
disks. The station is compati- 
ble with any microprocessor 
that has a standard RS-232C 
interface. 



The Datalok Memory 
Cards are configured in 
either 2K by 8 bits or 8K by 
8 bits. The cards are 
hermetically sealed to ex- 
clude hydrocarbon solvents, 
dust, smoke, and chemical 
vapors. Electromagnetic field 
and electrostatic discharge 
do not affect the cards. 

The Dataser-Station is 
$599.75. The 2K- by 8-bit 
card costs $85.95. while the 
8K- by 8-bit card costs 
$226.80. The interface 
module lists for $376.2 5. 
Dataser-Station is manufac- 
tured by Bl ELEC SA of 
Switzerland; information is 
available from the U.S. rep- 
resentative. Survivors Ltd., 
4654 20th St. N. Arlington. 
VA 22207. (703) 528-1498. 
Inquiry 631. 



408 BYTE • JULY 1985 



WHAT'S NEW 



PERIPHERALS 




The Codex 2206 modem transmits data at 4800. 7200. or 9600 bps. 



9600-bps Modem 

The Codex 2206 modem 
can transmit data at 
9600 bps over dial or 
leased lines or at optional 
rates of 7200 or 4800 bps. 
It can operate in either two- 
wire half-duplex or four-wire 
full-duplex modes. 

This microprocessor-based 
device uses a double-sided 
band, eight-phase, 
quadrature amplitude 
modulation (QAM) scheme. 
The QAM schemes 1200-Hz 
digital adaptive equalizer 
with multiple settings im- 
proves output. 

Currently available, the 
2206 modem lists for $1995. 
Contact Codex Corp. 20 
Cabot Blvd.. Mansfield. MA 
02048, (617) 364-2000. 
Inquiry 632. 



Digital Copiers for 
IBM PCs 

Two digital photocopiers 
from LaserFAX scan 
photographs, artwork, and 



text and digitize the cap- 
tured image for use on an 
IBM PC XT, PC AT. or PC- 
compatible. The stored 
images can then be manip- 
ulated using graphics-editing 
software that is supplied 
with the copiers. 

Scanning 200 lines per 
inch, the SpectraSCAN 200 
copies 8!/2- by 14-inch color 
pages, while the DS-200 
digitizes black-and-white 
images. Peripheral equip- 
ment ranging from dot- 
matrix to laser devices can 
print the digitized images. 

The scanners are software- 
driven; you control opera- 
tions through icon screens 
pulled down by a mouse. 
This screen looks like a stan- 
dard photocopier control 
panel. 

The machines contain 
vacant IBM slots for future 
applications. Current op- 
tional cards include the 
LaserFAXimile card for com- 
munications with facsimile 
machines and the TEX- 
reader for direct scan-to- 
processing text reading. 

The SpectraSCAN 200 
costs $3995. and the DS-200 
scanner lists for $2995. The 
LaserFAXimile card is $995. 



while the TEXreader costs 
$1200. Contact LaserFAX 
Inc., 2000 Palm St. S. 
Naples. FL 33962. (813) 
775-2737. 
Inquiry 633. 



Hard-Disk/Tape- 
Backup Subsystem 

The PC Megastore 227 
by Ampex Corporation 
gives you 20 megabytes of 
hard-disk storage and 2 5 
megabytes of tape backup. 
This subsystem can be used 
with the IBM PC, XT, and 
compatibles and with the 
Apple II and lie. Cards for 
the Macintosh. TRS-80. 
S-100 bus systems, and 
other systems will soon be 
available. 

The tape backup has its 
own 64K-byte buffered 
memory, is directly ad- 
dressable, and can function 
as the primary storage unit. 

The PC Megastore 227 
costs $3400; an adapter 



card is priced at $175. 
Available separately, 10- and 
20-megabyte hard disks cost 
$1995 and $2395. respec- 
tively, and a 2 5-megabyte 
tape backup lists for $1995. 
Contact Ampex Corp.. 10435 
North lantau Ave.. Cuper- 
tino. CA 95014. (800) 
421-6863; in California. (213) 
640-0150. 
Inquiry 634. 



19-inch Color 
Graphics Terminal 

Amtrons CDI920 color 
monitor offers 150-MHz 
bandwidth, automatic ver- 
tical synchronization up to 
180 MHz, and 0.31-mm dot 
pitch resolution resulting in a 
1280- by 1024-pixel display 
The terminal is said to work 
well with Artist and BMW 
graphics engines, but it must 
be adjusted to interface with 
the various boards' timing 
signals. The 19-inch screen 
is nested in a chassis of 
dimensions common for a 
1 5-inch monitor. The ter- 
minal weighs 47 pounds. 

The price for a single 
CDI920 ranges from $3800 
to $4100. depending on op- 
tions and on the host 
graphics system. 

Contact Amtron Corp., 
2260 De La Cruz Blvd.. 
Santa Clara, CA 95050, (408) 
748-8500. 
Inquiry 635. 



Portable Disk Drive 
for Tbndy Model 100 

The Chipmunk portable 
disk drive allows Tandy 
Model 100 and 200 owners 
to store data on 3 /2-inch 
disks. Weighing in at VA 
pounds, the Chipmunk 
emulates the 100's "main 
menu" concept and appears 
[continued] 



JULY 1985 -BYTE 409 



WHAT'S NEW 



PERIPHERALS 



to the user as an extension 
of the computer's memory. 
The disk drive fits into the 
computer's 40-pin main bus 
and is controlled by CDOS— 
the Chipmunk Disk Operat- 
ing System, which requires 
5K bytes of the IOO's RAM. 

The drive lists for $599 
and comes bundled with a 
telecommunications program 
and five other business pro- 
grams. Contact Holmes Engi- 
neering/PCSG, 11035 Harry 
Hines Blvd. #207. Dallas. TX 
75229. (214) 351-0564. 
Inquiry 636. 



Dot Matrix for IBM 

Fujitsu America's DotMax 
Model 241 is a 24-wire 
dot-matrix printer that's 
compatible with IBM com- 
puters. The Model 241 
emulates an IBM graphics 
printer for word processing 
and graphics, yet it can ac- 
cept commands for the Ep- 
son FX-80 printer. 

This printer features bit- 
mapped graphics, block 
character sets, and two 



1 


^^™ 


■ 


■■ 


1 


9 


1 


1 


1 


mam ' Rotetw - 


■ : i-M 


1 


C^" 


9 



The MB-142 TTL black-and-white monitor. 



graphics modes: an 8-bit im- 
age mode with 200- by 
160-dot-per-inch resolution 
and a 24-bit image mode 
with 360 by 180 dpi. The 
DotMax 241 includes 
downloadable character 
fonts, cutsheet feeder com- 
mands, and such print op- 



tions as underline and 
boldface. 

The $1995 printer reaches 
speeds of 80 cps (letter 
quality) and 240 cps (draft 
quality). Dual serial and 
parallel interfaces are stan- 
dard. Contact Fujitsu 
America Inc., 3055 Orchard 



Dr.. San Jose. CA 95134, 
(408) 946-8777. 
Inquiry 637. 

Black-on-White 
Monitor 

The MB-142 TTL monitor 
displays characters 
black-on-white or vice versa 
on command. The 14-inch 
display screen provides 720- 
by 3 50-dot resolution and 
creates characters somewhat 
larger than standard display 
Text and graphics can be 
displayed simultaneously 
The format is 80 columns by 
25 lines. 

The monitor plugs directly 
into the monochrome board 
of IBM and IBM-compatible 
computers. Text boards, in- 
cluding Persyst. STB, 
Paradise. Hercules, and AST, 
can be used. The MB-142 
has a 25-MHz bandwidth. 

The MB-142 is priced at 
$375. Contact Roland DG 
Corp., 7200 Dominion Circle, 
Los Angeles. CA 90040. 
(213) 685-5141. 
Inquiry 638. 



SOFTWARE • IBM PC 



Matrix Laboratory 

An integrated analysis 
program that specializes 
in matrix computations, PC- 
MATLAB combines graphics 
and data-manipulation capa- 
bilities to turn an IBM PC 
into a scientific and 
engineering workstation. It's 
suitable for such applica- 
tions as numeric analysis, 
matrix theory, statistics, con- 
trol theory, signal process- 
ing, geophysics, and other 
disciplines that employ 
matrix computation and 
linear algebra as tools. 



The program accepts com- 
mands in standard mathe- 
matical notation for matrix 
operations. Eigenvalues and 
eigenvectors, fast Fourier 
transforms, digital filtering, 
linear-equation solution, 
singular-value decomposi- 
tion, and matrix inversion 
are among its analytical 
capabilities. Graphics com- 
mands include linear, 
semilog, polar, and three- 
dimensional mesh surface 
plots. 

Written in C. this program 
runs under MS-DOS 2.0 and 
higher on the PC, XT. AT, 
and compatibles with 256K 
bytes of memory and an 
8087 coprocessor: an IBM 



color/graphics board is 
necessary if you want to use 
the graphics capabilities. PC- 
MATLAB costs $695. Con- 
tact The MathWorks Inc.. 124 
Foxwood Rd.. Portola Valley. 
CA 94025, (415) 851-7217. 
Inquiry 639. 



Electronic-Design 
Package 

The CT2000 CAE Design 
System, a program for 
designers of integrated cir- 
cuits and printed-circuit 
boards, reportedly provides 
the functionality of a CAE 



(computer-aided engineer- 
ing) workstation. Case Tech- 
nology says its package 
should not be confused with 
schematic-entry and elec- 
tronic CAD programs; the 
system includes a version of 
the SCALD tools developed 
in a mainframe environment 
at Lawrence Livermore Na- 
tional Laboratories. 

CT2000 incorporates a 
structured graphics editor 
for schematic entry and 
design capture, a SCALD 
hardware compiler, a netlist 
postprocessor, a hardcopy 
postprocessor, a cross- 
reference generator, a firm- 
ware compiler, and compo- 
nent libraries. 

According to Case, you 



410 BYTE • JULY J985 



WHAT'S NEW 



FT W ARE 



IBM P C 



can easily create a hierar- 
chical design database with 
the graphics editor. As you 
manipulate your design, the 
system automatically keeps 
track of all changes and 
maintains the database 
describing the state of the 
electrical circuit. You can 
create a schematic using 
your own guidelines and 
then use that same diagram 
as input to advanced 
design-analysis programs, 
such as a timing verifier and 
a logic simulator (both of 
which the vendor sells for 
$3 500 each). 

CT2000 runs on an IBM 
PC. XT. and AT. It costs 
$5200. Contact Case Tech- 
nology Inc.. Suite 2 50, 633 
Menlo Ave., Menlo Park. CA 
94025. (415) 322-4057. 
Inquiry 640. 

Analytical 
Chemistry Software 

Sim-Soft and Lab-Stat 
from Scientific Com- 
puting are software pack- 
ages for use in analytical 
chemistry labs. Both pro- 
grams run on an IBM PC or 
PC XT with at least 128K 
bytes of RAM. 

Sim-Soft provides data- 
base management for lab 
samples and handles data 
storage, maintenance of data 
files, and status reports of 
samples. The package costs 
$895. (The company said 
versions for Apple and 
Hewlett-Packard computers 
will be available this 
summer.) 

Lab-Stat is a statistical- 
analysis program that calcu- 
lates standard deviation, 
relative standard deviation, 
percent error, average per- 
cent recovery, correlation 
coefficient, mean variance, 
and standard error of mean. 



It can be used as a stand- 
alone program or as a 
module of Sim-Soft. Lab-Stat 
is priced at $215, but if you 
buy Sim-Soft by September 
15. Lab-Stat comes for free. 

For more information, con- 
tact Scientific Computing 
Inc.. 249 Jericho Rd.. Essex 
Junction. VT 05452. (802) 
899-2147. 
Inquiry 641. 



APL Without an 8087 

Running APL on a PC 
normally requires an 
8087 (or 80287) math co- 
processor, but the 8087 
Eliminator from Fort's Soft- 
ware lets you run IBM's APL 
without the coprocessor by 
emulating its functions. 

Two versions are available. 
The standard Eliminator 
works with the PCjr, PC and 
PC XT and costs $49. The 
8087 Eliminator/AT supports 
the PC AT and costs $75. 
Both programs have a 
30-day money-back 
guarantee and are not copy- 
protected. Minimum re- 
quirements are IBM APL 
version 1.0. PC-DOS 2.0 or 
higher and 128K bytes of 
RAM (although the vendor 
recommends 192K for all 
configurations except a PC 
with PC-DOS 2.x). 

For more information, con- 
tact Fort's Software, 
Inquiries, POB 396. Manhat- 
tan. KS 66502. 
Inquiry 642. 

PC XT Serial 
Communications 

I SAC (Integrated Serial 
Asynchronous Communi- 
cations) is a multilayered 
communications system writ- 
ten specifically for the PC 
XT and compatibles. The 
two top layers provide the 
commonly used functions of 



terminal emulation. ISAC can 
operate in its own smart 
mode or, with an option, 
emulate a DEC VT-100. It 
maintains a 10-page memory 
buffer to record data from 
the external host. You can 
selectively display the full 
contents of the buffer or 
write portions of it to disk 
without disturbing the serial 
link. ISAC can insert vari- 
able-length intercharacter 
and interline time delays 
and wait for a prompt from 
the host before transmitting 
each line. 

The lower layers form 
what the vendor calls the 
SPM (Serial Port Manager), 
an assembly-language pro- 
gram that becomes an ex- 
tension of DOS when you 
load it into memory. SPM 
provides an RS-232C/CCITT- 
style link between the PC 
and the outside world that's 
capable of running at up to 
9600 bps. It's interrupt- 
driven, automatically buffers 
all data, and operates on 
either IBM serial port. 

ISAC is priced at $140: the 
VT-100 emulator costs an 
extra $30; BASIC FORTRAN. 
C and Pascal interfaces to 
ISAC cost $2 5 each. Contact 
Akron Software Research 
and Development, 53 
Hillside Ave.. Toronto, 
Ontario M8V IS7. Canada, 
(416) 251-1866. 
Inquiry 643. 

Bulletin-Board 
Program 

A bulletin-board program 
from Micro-Systems 
Software supports electronic 
mail and program- or data- 
file exchanges on PCs and 
compatibles. BBS-PC pro- 
vides 16 separate sections, 
or sub-boards, four file- 



transfer protocols, and a 
terminal-mode feature that 
supports a second modem. 
COM port, and phone line 
to let you answer one 
modem and dial out on 
another. 

BBS-PC. which can handle 
1200 or 2400 bps. supports 
MODEM, XMODEM. 
MODEM7. and other pro- 
tocols of the MODEM 
family, plus standard ASCII 
line- or block-transmission 
modes. A system can be 
partitioned into four sec- 
tions: default drive or direc- 
tory, with the system pro- 
gram, its master data file, 
and a user-log data file; 
message base; member 
files; and upload/download. 

Other features include true 
message formatting, perma- 
nent user records, private 
messages, chat mode, and 
automatic reclamation of 
space when messages are 
deleted. The sysop has com- 
plete control over all sec- 
tions and can implement 
2 56 security levels. 

BBS-PC runs on the PC, 
XT, and PCjr with 2 56K 
bytes of memory. Suggested 
retail price is $249. The 
vendor also offers applica- 
tions software, including a 
word processor ($79.95), a 
smart-terminal communica- 
tions package ($79.95), and 
a full-screen editor ($199). 
Contact Micro-Systems Soft- 
ware Inc., 4301-18 Oak Cir- 
cle, Boca Raton. FL 33431, 
(305) 391-5077. 
Inquiry 644. 



Plotting with the IBM 
and HP's Plotters 

A graphics package devel- 
oped for the IBM PC 
and Hewlett-Packard's HP 
7470A and HP 7475A plot- 
ters. GRA-FIT is intended 

(continued) 



JULY 1985 -BYTE 411 



WHAT'S NEW 



SOFTWARE 



IBM PC 



primarily for engineers and 
scientists. The program gives 
you control over the graph 
layout: pen selection, axis 
dimensions and labeling, 
titles, etc. 

GRA-FIT is driven from a 
sequential command file 
that you create using EDLIN 
or another text editor. You 
can plot multiple curves on 
one graph and multiple 
graphs on one sheet of 
paper in horizontal or ver- 
tical format. 

The package offers several 
methods for plotting. Data 
points can be plotted, 
points can be connected 
with straight lines or joined 
with a cubic spline, and data 
can be smoothed with 
piecewise polynomials prior 
to plotting. You can com- 
bine any number of these 
interpolation techniques on 
one graph or on one set of 
data. 

GRA-FIT costs $95. is not 
copy-protected, and requires 
at least 128K bytes of 
memory, one disk drive. MS- 
DOS 1.1 or later, and an HP 
plotter. Contact Jayar Sys- 
tems. POB 2885. Station A. 
Sudbury, Ontario P3A 5J3, 
Canada. 
Inquiry 645. 



Images and Text Over 
Ordinary Phone Lines 

You can capture images 
with a video camera 
and transmit them to a 
remote IBM PC over or- 
dinary telephone lines with 
PhotoMail. an icon-driven 
communications kit from 
Chorus Data Systems. Still- 
frame pictures of people, 
diagrams, and text can be 
sent at a resolution of up to 
640 by 400 in 16 colors or 
levels of gray. Once an 
image is transmitted, you 



can save it on a disk or 
print it. 

In addition to video im- 
ages, the system can handle 
IBM 320 by 200 four-color 
graphic displays and screen 
displays generated by some 
applications programs. The 
communications icon sup- 
ports the Hayes Smart- 
modem and compatibles as 
well as some 2400-bps units. 
Besides PC-to-PC com- 
munication with pictures. 
PhotoMail can format 
images to be used with 
electronic-mail services. 

The complete PhotoMail 
kit is priced at $2495. which 
gets you a video digitizer, 
graphics display card, 
mouse, and software; the 
software by itself costs 
$795. PhotoMail runs on the 
PC. XT. AT and compatibles. 
Contact Chorus Data 
Systems. 6 Continental Blvd.. 
POB 370. Merrimack. NH 
03054. (603) 424-2900. 
Inquiry 646. 



Speak Your 
Commands 

With Pronounce, you 
can give instructions 
to your computer and enter 
data by speaking into a 
microphone. This speech- 
input system accepts vocab- 
ulary files of 128 words or 
short phrases. Each word or 
phrase can be associated 
with up to 2 55 keystrokes, 
thus letting you form a 
macro to fit your needs or 
standardize nonrelated pro- 
grams under natural voice 
control. 

When you say 'memorize." 
Pronounce starts remember- 
ing the keystrokes you type. 
You then give these key- 
strokes a natural-language 
name and store them. 
Speaking the name into the 
microphone invokes them. 
At any time you can exit 



your application program, 
enter Pronounce, and add. 
modify, or retrain vocabulary 
words. 

Pronounce costs $895 and 
consists of a circuit card, 
microphone, manual, and 
software. You'll need a PC. 
XT, AT or true compatible 
with at least 2 56K bytes of 
memory. The vendor claims 
it works with most PC-DOS 
or MS-DOS applications. 
Contact Microphonics Tech- 
nology Corp.. Suite B. 234 
Southwest 43 rd St.. Renton. 
WA 98057. (206) 251-9009. 
Inquiry 647. 



Package for Tlirbo 
Pascal Programmers 

TurboPower Software has 
released a set of nine 
utilities for Tlirbo Pascal pro- 
grammers. The package is 
designed to provide utilities 
usually found in a main- 
frame environment. 

TUrboPower Utilities in- 
cludes a structure analyzer, 
execution timer, execution 
profiler, prettyprinter. com- 
mand repeater, pattern 
replacer. difference finder, 
file finder, and directory. 
When practical, the utilities 
use MS-DOS path names 
and standard I/O facilities, 
the company said. 

The package supports 
Tlirbo Pascal 2.0 and 3.0 
and runs on the PC. XT AT 
and compatibles. An ex- 
ecutable version that in- 
cludes a manual costs $55; 
with full source code and a 
detailed programmer's 
manual, the price is $95. 
Contact TlirboPower Soft- 
ware. Suite 196. 478 West 
Hamilton Ave.. Campbell, CA 
95008. (408) 378-3672. 
Inquiry 648. 



MIDI 
Sequencer/Editor 

Octave Plateau's 
Sequencer Plus is 
designed to turn a PC into a 
64-track MIDI recording and 
editing facility. The software 
records the control informa- 
tion from MIDI instruments 
(notes on and off. keystrike 
velocities, pitch bends, etc.) 
and stores them in memory. 
You can then use your PC to 
edit them and play them 
back through the instru- 
ments. 

Among the program's fea- 
tures are full editing of all 
tracks (including indepen- 
dent per-track control of the 
MIDI channel); capacity to 
add to. copy, delete, and 
name individual tracks; auto- 
matic record of each track's 
bar length; full visual editing 
of all notes; recording and 
manipulation of MIDI pro- 
gram changes, both within a 
music track or as a separate 
control track; and playback 
quantizing that ranges from 
quarter notes down to 64th- 
note triplets. 

You can control the time 
signature of each track, from 
i/2 to 32 / 6 . and mix time 
signatures within a track (or 
create polyrhythms between 
tracks). You can set the 
playback tempo from 16 to 
2 55 beats per minute. With 
a 2 56K-byte system, you can 
store approximately 12.000 
notes; a 640K-byte system 
can handle up to 60.000 
notes. The program has 10 
memory buffers. 

Hardware requirements in- 
clude a PC or compatible. 
Roland Corporation's 
MPU-401 MIDI processing 
unit and interface cables, 
and MIDI-equipped instru- 
ments. Sequencer Plus 
retails for $495. Contact Oc- 
tave Plateau. 51 Main St.. 
Yonkers. NY 10701. (914) 
964-022 5. 
Inquiry 649. 



412 BYTE • JULY 1985 



WHAT'S NEW 



SOFTWARE • APPLE 




I . ML 




Zericoris two-dimensional drafting system, Vision 2000, works with Apple and IBM computers. 



FORTH 

for the Macintosh 

MasterForth 1.0. an 
implementation of 
FORTH for Apple's Macin- 
tosh, provides a 68000 
macroassembler and sup- 
ports the mouse, finder, 
menus, and graphics tool- 
box. With relocatable utili- 
ties and transient definitions, 
you can run substantial soft- 
ware packages even on a 
128K Mac. the vendor said. 
The string package and resi- 
dent debugger are regular 
features. 

MasterForth 1.0 matches 
the FORTH-83 standard as 
described in Mastering 
FORTH by Anita Anderson 
and Martin Tracy (Bowie. 
MD: Brady Communications 
Co., 1984), a copy of which 
is included with the 
software. 



MasterForth 1.0 is also 
available for the Apple II 
series, the IBM PC, the Com- 
modore 64, and CP/M 
machines. You can write 
software on one system and 
run it on all the others. 

The price of MasterForth 
1.0 is $12 5. Optional exten- 
sions are available. Contact 
MicroMotion, 12077 Wilshire 
Blvd. #506. Los Angeles, CA 
90025. (213) 821-4340. 
Inquiry 650. 



Spectrum Analyzer 

Zentech Systems' Data 
Analyzer is a hardware/ 
software combination that 
converts your Macintosh in- 
to a spectrum analyzer. This 
package comprises a wave- 
form digitizer that plugs into 
the Mac's modem port and 
control and analysis 
software. 

Waveforms are displayed 
on the screen and can be 
manipulated, stored on disk. 



and subsequently trans- 
formed for analysis. Soft- 
ware control panels contain 
text, push buttons, and 
sliders to display and con- 
figure the parameters of the 
digitizer and to make such 
adjustments to the size, scal- 
ing, and viewing area of 
waveform windows. Wave- 
forms can be transformed 
through functions such as 
FFT, IFFT, and convolution. 
Suggested retail price of 
the Data Analyzer is $1499. 
Contact Zentech Systems 
Corp.. 2226 West 12th Ave.. 
Vancouver. British Columbia 
V6K 2N5. Canada. (604) 
736-9764. 
Inquiry 651. 



Tool for Drawing 
Circuit Boards 

McCad is a package for 
drawing circuit boards 
on a Macintosh with either a 
mouse or a graphics tablet. 
The system supports six 
layers and comes with utility 
functions. You can design, 
printed-circuit boards up to 
30 by 30 inches. 

The program outputs each 
layer individually in addition 
to a composite check-print. 
For output, you can use an 
Apple Imagewriter. Apple 
Laser Printer, or an ink 
plotter. 

McCad runs on a Mac or 
Lisa. It costs $395. Contact 
VAMP Inc.. POB 411. Los 
Angeles. CA 90028, (213) 
466-5533. 
Inquiry 652. 

CAD Drafting 
Package 

A two-dimensional draft- 
ing system for Apple 
and IBM computers. Vision 
2000 consists of a graphics 
touch-tablet and CAD soft- 
ware with automatic dimen- 
sioning capabilities for $495. 
An optional robotic pen 
plotter, which works with 
paper sizes up to 24 by 36 
inches, is an additional 
$395. 

Vision 2000 can be used 
to produce just about any 
kind of drawing, the vendor 
said, such as architectural, 
mechanical, and technical. 
Other applications include 
electrical schematics, circuit- 
board layouts, flowcharts, 
and interior designs. 

With the tablet, you select 
screen commands and posi- 
tion the drawing cursor. You 
can create graphics to 14 
decimal places of accuracy 
(continued) 



IULY 1985 -BYTE 413 



WHAT'S NEW 



SOFTWARE • APPL 



on the PC and 6 decimal 
places on the Apple II. 
Commands are menu- 
selectable and a pop-up 
keypad handles numeric 
input. 

Among its other features 
are multiple metric and 
English database units in 
fractions or decimals. 256 
registered overlays, floating- 
point database structure, 
and relative and local coor- 
dinate systems. The system 
incorporates a device-inde- 
pendent software module 
that supports most popular 
pen plotters and graphics- 
input devices. Contact 
Zericon, Suite 416. 655 lohn 
Muir Dr., San Francisco. CA 
94132, (415) 585-9329. 
Inquiry 653. 

Electrical Engineering 
with Mac 

MacEngineer— Electric 
Engineering for the 
Macintosh contains formulas 
for the most frequently used 
calculations in such areas as 
lighting, motors, trans- 
formers, and direct current. 
You select a formula in one 
of these categories, enter 
the variables, and the soft- 
ware calculates and displays 
the result. Using the Mac's 
graphics capabilities, the 
program also prepares x.y 
and line graphs. 

Formulas for lighting in- 
clude room ratio, ceiling 
cavity ratio, and number of 
lamps needed. Some of the 
motor formulas are motor 
horsepower, full-load torque, 
and energy required for in- 
ertia. Among the formulas 
for transformers are number 
of turns/secondary winder, 
rated primary current, and 
secondary winding current. 



Direct-current formulas cover 
condensor capacitance and 
condensor requirements. 

The price is $99.95. For 
more information, contact 
Superex Business Software, 
151 Ludlow St., Yonkers. NY 
10705. (800) 862-8800; in 
New York. (914) 964-5200. 
Inquiry 654. 

Interactive 
Statistics 

StatView is a technical 
utility designed for data 
analysis. While keeping data 
on the screen, the package 
lets you use the Macintosh 
mouse to select data for 
analysis and choose the 
type of analysis from a pull- 
down menu. Results appear 
in another window, which 
changes as modifications 
are made to the data. In a 
window next to the data 
screen you can have tables, 
charts, scattergrams, or 
other graphic repre- 
sentations. 

The types of evaluation 
possible with StatView in- 
clude descriptive statistics, 
comparative statistics, and 
nonparametric tests. The 
program's descriptive capa- 
bility encompasses harmonic 
and geometric mean, stan- 
dard deviation and error, 
variance, median, and fre- 
quency distribution. All 
calculations are done with 
80-bit precision using IEEE 
floating-point mathematics. 

StatView is for use on all 



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A screen dump of Brainpower's StatView. 



Macs and the 1-megabyte 
Lisa equipped with Mac- 
Works. Suggested retail price 
is $199.95. Contact Brain- 
power Inc.. 24009 Ventura 
Blvd.. Calabasas. CA 91302. 
(818) 884-6911. 
Inquiry 655. 

Electronic Music 
Applications 

Computers and Music has 
released several prod- 
ucts for making music with 
Apples and synthesizers. 

The Analyzer/Interpolator 
is a software/hardware 
system for the He that can 
digitally record a sound, 
analyze its harmonic con- 
tent, plot the sound's 
amplitude envelope, and 
show the sampled sound- 
wave cycles on the screen. 
In addition, it lets you 
create a wave from a sam- 
pled sound that's compati- 
ble with systems from Syn- 
tauri. Passport Designs, and 
Mountain Music. It costs 
$100 and requires the 
Decillionix DX-1 Apple 
sampling board. 

The MIDI Librarian soft- 
ware offloads either in- 
dividual presets or banks of 
presets from the synthesizer 



into computer memory. You 
can then name, save, and 
retransmit the presets to the 
synthesizer. Also, you can 
reassign individual sounds 
from one bank to another. 
The MIDI Librarian is also 
available for the IBM PC. 
Both versions are $49.95. It 
supports the Yamaha DX-7, 
Roland Juno 106. Oberheim 
OB-8. and Casio CZ 101 and 
1000. 

The Apple lie MIDI 
Development System con- 
tains one MIDI board (com- 
patible with Passport. 
Yamaha, and Korg) and 
documented source code 
for sending and receiving 
MIDI bytes. Appropriate 
addresses are indicated, and 
a short program that dis- 
plays MIDI bytes from any 
device that sends MIDI data 
is included. Board and soft- 
ware cost $12 5; software 
alone is $2 5. 

For more information, con- 
tact Computers and Music, 
1989 Junipero Serra Blvd., 
Daly City. CA 94014, (415) 
994-2909. 
Inquiry 656. 



414 BYTE • JULY 1985 



WHAT'S NEW 



SO FT WAR E • OTHER COMPUTE R S 



Window Controller 
for TRS 

The PRO-NTO window- 
controller and applica- 
tions-manager package runs 
on the TRS-80 Models 4/4P. 
11/12/16. or the Lobo 
MAX-80. 

PRO-NTO's Window func- 
tion supports four nested 
overlay windows that can be 
used directly from BASIC, C. 
FORTRAN. Pascal, and other 
languages by simple file I/O 
statements. Window sizes 
range from I by I to an 80 
by 24 format screen. Other 
functions are character 
PEEK/POKE, cursor position- 
ing, image transfer, and 
import/export between 
windows. 

The application manager 
includes address mailing 
label and rotating index file, 
appointment scheduler, cal- 
culator, card filer and note- 
pad, telephone list, and 
auto-dialer. 

PRO-NTO lists for $49.95. 
Contact MISOSYS Inc.. POB 
239. Sterling. VA 22170. 
(703) 450-4181. 
Inquiry 657. 

Local-Area Network 
for T^ndy Computers 

ViaNet software and 
ARCnet hardware link 
landy computers running 
MS-DOS into a local-area 
network (LAN). ViaNet is an 
off-the-shelf LAN software 
system with a distributed ar- 
chitecture and thus does not 
require a dedicated file 
server. 

Each computer on the net- 
work receives a board but 
also must have 12 8K bytes 
of its RAM dedicated to the 
network. Transparent to the 
user, ViaNet is logically 
structured and possesses a 
set of 1 1 simple commands. 



The hardware/software 
package for each computer 
costs $499.95. Contact 
landy Corp./Radio Shack. 
1800 One landy Center, Fort 
Worth, TX 76102, (817) 
390-2728. 
Inquiry 658. 

Modula-2 Language 
for Z80 CP/M 

Hochstrasser Comput- 
ing's Modula-2 System 
for Z80 CP/M-based com- 
puters consists of a com- 
piler, a linker, utility pro- 
grams, and a library of utili- 
ty modules. The resulting 
Z80 code, which can be 
embedded in ROM, is said 
to be fast, small, and reen- 
trant. Chaining and shared 
data between several pro- 
grams are supported. 

The entire system costs 
approximately $150. which 
covers any royalty fees for 
programs developed by 
using this system. Contact 
Hochstrasser Computing AG. 
Leonhardshalde 21, CH-800I 
Zurich. Switzerland; 
tel: 01/47 55 48. 
Inquiry 659. 

Expert System 
and C Compiler 

XPER and Super C sys- 
tems from Abacus Soft- 
ware are said to offer ad- 
vanced programming capa- 
bilities for the Commodore 
64 and 128 computers. 



XPER is an expert system 
that lets you build databases 
according to your own deci- 
sion framework. Later, the 
system guides you through a 
series of searching tech- 
niques. 

The Super C Language 
Compiler is a development 
system that supports the 
Kernighan & Ritchie C- 
language standard. The 
editor handles source-code 
files up to 4 IK bytes in 
length. The compiler pro- 
duces 6510 machine code. 

XPER costs $80. while the 
Super C compiler lists for 
$60. Contact Abacus Soft- 
ware Inc.. POB 7211. Grand 
Rapids. MI 49510. (616) 
241-5510. 
Inquiry 660. 

Pocket References for 
UNIX and C 

Four versions of the 
UNIX Command Sum- 
mary booklet are available 
from Specialized Systems 
Consultants: the 3 2 -page 
System III booklet, the 
48-page BSD version, the 
48-page System V reference, 
and the 32-page XENIX 
edition. 

Other resources include 
the VI Reference, a com- 
prehensive guide to 
Berkeley's visual editor on 
an 8-sided card; a 16-page C 
Library Reference that includes 
all library functions; a C 
Reference Card for program- 
mers without access to 



WHERE DO NEW PRODUCT ITEMS COME FROM? 
The new products listed in this section of BYTE are chosen from the thousands 
of press releases, letters, and telephone calls we receive each month from 
manufacturers, distributors, designers, and readers. The basic criteria for selection 
for publication are: [a) does a product match our readers interests? and [b] 
is it new or is it simply a reintroduction of an old item? Because of the volume 
of submissions we must sort through every month, the items we publish are 
based on vendors' statements and are not individually verified. \f you want 
your product to be considered for publication [at no charge), send full infor- 
mation about it. including its price and an address and telephone number 
where a reader can get further information, to New Products Editor, BYTE. 
POB 372, Hancock, NH 03449. 



library functions; and the 
Fortran 77 Reference on a 
10-sided card. 

Prices range from $2.50 
for individual cards to $4 
for the booklets in 100-piece 
quantities. Contact Spe- 
cialized Systems Consultants. 
POB 7, Northgate Station. 
Seattle. WA 98125. (206) 
367-8649. 
Inquiry 661. 



LISP on UNIX 

UniLISP is fully compati- 
ble with Common LISP 
and is suitable for develop- 
ing expert systems. Its kernel 
requires 32K bytes of mem- 
ory on most UNIX ma- 
chines, so you can use it for 
building interpretive filters, 
knowledge networks, and 
natural-language front ends. 

UniLISP offers a seg- 
mented object list called 
OBLIST and optional math, 
statistical, and graphic add- 
on object lists for expert- 
system development. It also 
features standard UNIX I/O 
support, support for UNIX 
operating systems calls, 
physical memory access, 
and such editing features as 
vi. UniLISP has arithmetic 
primitives, the ability to link 
and unlink files or pipes, 
and concurrent communica- 
tions. 

UniLISP runs on the DEC 
Pro 300 series and IBM PC 
AT machines. Ports to other 
computers are in the works. 
Pricing was not available at 
press time, but a company 
spokesperson estimated that 
the end-user price will be 
less than $1000 when 
UniLISP ships at the end of 
August. A demonstration 
disk is $30. Contact r/1 
group, 7623 Leviston St., El 
Cerrito. CA 94530. (415) 
527-1438. 
Inquiry 662. 



JULY 1985 • BYTE 415 



Inquiry 113 



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This series in the CCT line exploits the speed and power of the Intel 80286 and Zilog Z-80H (8MHz), on the 286Z CPU 
board. Thiscombination, along with CompuPro DMA controllers and I/O boards, yields a dramatic improvement in system 
throughput speeds, from basic CP/M operation, up to large powerful multi-user/multi-tasking machines. The CCT-4 
represents the most advanced hardware presently available in a microcomputer to run the thousands of CP/M type 
software programs on the market, and with CONCURRENT DOS 8-16 and the CompuPro PC Graphics board (when 
available), all software written for the IBM PC machines. This series is for the serious business/scientific user. 

CCT-4A State-of-the-art power in it's basic form. Consists of CCT-286Z CPU board and CCT-M256 (256K), along with Com- 
puPro: Enclosure 2 Desk (21 slot MF), Disk 1A, System Support 1 , Interfacer 4, the CCT-2.4 floppy drive system, and 
CP/M 80 and CP/M 86, and with SF-200 surge suppressor system $5,495.00 

CCT-4B Single-user/hard disk power. As the 4A, except priced without the CCT-2.4, to add in your choice of CCT hard/floppy 

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(Example: CCT-4B Mainframe with CCT-10/1 = $6,548.00) Plus cost of selected drive subsystem 

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stead of Interfacer 4; SF-400 instead of SF-200, plus Concur. DOS 8-16 O.S (6 user system) $6,075.00 

(Example: CCT-4C Mainframe with CCT-40/1 = $9, 248.00) Plus cost of selected drive subsystem 

\^w Limited Time Offer - FREE Supercalc 86 with any CCT-4 

^^id^ The above systems include all necessary cabling, assembly, testing, minimum 20 hour burn-in, 

^ and the CCT unconditional 12 month direct warranty. 

CCT-M512 CCT introduces it's 512K static RAM board. IEEE Standard 12MHz. 512K in one slot! Introductory Price: $1 ,799 

CCT-M256 256K version of M512 upgradeable to full 512K. Perfect 256K RAM board for any CompuPro system $949 

CUSTOM COMPUTER TECHNOLOGY / BOX 4160 / SED0NA, ARIZONA 86340 

TOLL FREE ORDERING: 800-222-8686 / For technical support / service: 602-282-6299 



SUNTRONiCS CO.,iNC. 

12603 Crenshaw Blvd., Hawthorne, CA 90250 



1-800-421-5775 (Order Only) 
(213) 644-1 140 (CA Order & Info ) 

STORE HOURS 
Mon -Fn 9am lo6pm 

Sal 10 a m. to 5 P m 



TERMS VISA MASTERCARD COD (Cash or Certified 
Chech Required) Check I Allow 2-3 Weeks tor Oeaiingi 
Shipping & H C S3 00 loi 3 Lbs plus 50c tor each add i Lb 
Caiil residenlsaddCalel Sales Tax SiO 00 Minimum Order 
IBM and Apple are re isiered uademarkso' IBM & Apple 



SUN-XT COMPUTER SYSTEM ■ 





■ 2 DSDD DISK DRIVES 

■ 258 K RAM 

■ MONOCHROME GRAPHICS CARD 

■ 135 W POWER SUPPLY 

■ MONOCHROME MONITOR (TTL) 

■ PARALLEL PRINTER PORT 
IBM-XT COMPATIBLE $995.00 



SUN-XT CPU BOARD 

I 8088 MPU 

I 8 EXPANSION SLOTS 

I RAM EXPANDABLE TO 1 MEG BYTE 

I FULLY IBM COMPATIBLE 

I DIMENSION SAME AS IBM PC/XT 

I NO RAM 



$195.00 



MONOCHROME 
GRAPHICS CARD 

HIGH-RES MONOCHROME CHARACTER 

720(H) x 348(V) 

80 x 25 TEXT MODE 

RUN LOTUS 1-2-3 ETC. 

WITH PARALLEL PRINTER PORT 



$149.00 



FLOPPY DISK 
CONTROLLER 

STANDARD DOUBLE BIDE/ 
DOUBLE DENSITY 
RUN 2 INTERNAL & 2 EXTERNAL 
WITH CABLE 



$59.00 



I 

■ : 

J ■ 



MULTI-FUNCTION 
BOARD 



EXPANDABLE TO 384K 
SERIAL/PARALLEL PORT 
CLOCK CALENDAR 
w/BATTERY BACK UP 
GAME PORT 
SPOOLS RAM DISK 
NO RAM 



$159.00 



COLOR GRAPHICS CARD 

■ RGBS COMPOSITE VIDEO 

■ B40 x 200 HI-REB 

■ 320 x 200 LO-REB 

■ 80 x 29 TEXT MODE 

■ WITH LIGHT PEN INTERFACE 



$105.00 



IBM STYLE CABINET 

B BLOT BACK PANEL 

COMES WITH MOUNTING BRACKET 

& HARDWARE 

FITS IBM POWER SUPPLY 



ii 



I 
I 

$59.00 | 



135 WATT POWER SUPPLY $ 97.00 

150 WATT POWER SUPPLY $119.00 

FULL-FUNCTION KEYBOARD $ 79.00 

MULTI I/O C A RD(FDC.CLOCKCALENDAR, SERIAL PARALLEL). . . $189.00 

HARD DISK CONTROLLER W/CABLE 

(10MB & 20MB) $219.00 

PARALLEL PRINTER PORT $ 39.00 

ASYNC RS 232 CARD $ 59.00 

APPARAT EPROM BLASTER (28 pin, 24 pin) $129)0 

TEAC 55B DISK DRIVE (360K) $ 89.00 

IBM UP GRADE KIT(4164 150NS) $9.50/Kit 

IBM UP GRADE KIT (41256 150NS) $49.00/Kit 

MICROLOG Z80B CO-PROCESSOR 

(MULTI-FUNCTION) NO RAM $450.00 



DEALERS OEM INQUIRIES INVITED!!! 



APPLE COMPATIBLE & GENERAL PRODUCTS 

■ SUN Z80 CARD (w/o software apple ii & n+ only) $ 39.00 

■ SUN 80 COLUMN CARD (apple ii &II+ only) $ 89.00 

■ POWER SUPPLY (5AMP) $ 52.00 

■ COOLING FAN $ 38.00 

■ FLOPPY DISK CONTROLLER $ 33.00 

■ 18K RAM CARD $ 39.00 

PARALLEL PRINTER CARD W/CABLE $ 39.00 

APPLE COMPATIBLE DISK DRIVE $139.00 

APPARATEPROM BLASTER $1 19.00 

SAM SUNG TTL MONITOR (AMBER OR GREEN) 

FOR IBM $105.00 

12" SAM WOO MONITOR (HIGH RES COMPOSITE) $ 85.00 

14" SUPER COLOR MONITOR (R&B 654 x 490) $385.00 



416 BYTE • JULY 1985 



Inquiry 34 5 



TOLL-FREE 

ORDERING: 

800-222-8686 

FOR TECHNICAL SUPPORT/ 

SERVICE /IN ARIZONA: 

602-282-6299 



CCT 



CUSTOM COMPUTER 
TECHNOLOGY 

1 CCT PLAZA — P.O. BOX 4160 — SEPONA, ARIZONA 86340 

Purchase your Hardware and Software directly from an OEM / Systems Integrator. Take advantage of our buying power! We stock a 
full line of Board Level Components, Software and Peripherals. Call for your needs. We'll give you the Lowest Prices, and the Technical 
Support and Know-How we are quickly becoming well-known for. Satisfied Customers Nationwide. The Nation'sCustom Systems House 
for Business, Education and Science. Call for a system quote. CCT implements tomorrow's technology today! 

FOREMOST QUALITY • ADVANCED SUPPORT • REASONABLE COST • 






CCT 



© 



lompuPro 



80286 NOW! 
□ CCT-286Z is our model designation 
for the MI-286 dual processor board 
from Macrotech. It features the super 
high speed combination of Z-80H and 
80286, with provision for the 80287 
math chip. Directly replaces 8085/88 
and 8086 CPUs running CP/M, MP/M 
Concurrent DOS, and MS-DOS, at 
throughput increases of 3X to 5X! 
SPECIAL PRICE-$895 
80287 Option -Installed -$250 



SEE THE CCT-4 SERIES 

USING THIS BOARD 

DETAILED ON THE FACING PAGE 



NEW-TRUE 

IBM PC INTERFACE 

ULTRA HI-RES GRAPHICS! 

CCT S-100/PC is a break-through for the 
Science/Business user Mini-enclosure ac- 
cepts PC& compatable boards and direct- 
ly connects to your S-100 system, running 
PC-DOS or Concurrent DOS. Hercules™ 
Graphics System— Coming this May! 
!! THE BEST OF BOTH WORLDS!! 



LIBERTY TERMINALS 

• Superior Reliability • 

110-14" GREEN-80/132 Column .... $499 

110-14" AMBER $519 

200-14" GREEN-80/132 Super Deluxe $569 
200-14" AMBER $589 

OKIDATA PRINTERS -Top Quality 
82 -80 Col.. CALL 83 - 132 Col .. CALL 
92 -80 Col.. CALL 93 -132 Col. .CALL 
84 - 132 Col/200cps-Top of the line. . CALL 
For Serial Interfaces— Add CALL 

TOSHIBA P351 - 288 CPS/24 PIN - $1499 

DIABLO — Letter Quality Series 
Model 620 . . $969 Model 630 . . $1799 

WE HAVE ALL SOFTWARE-CALL 



$ ACROSS THE BOARD PRICE REDUCTIONS $ 



INDUSTRIAL GRADE 
SUPERIOR QUALITY 



CCT DISK DRIVE SYSTEMS 

S-100 HARD DISK SUBSYSTEMS 



ROLLS ROYCES OF 
THE INDUSTRY 



Professionally engineered ST-506 type systems forthe business market S-100 Computer user. In- 
cludes industry top quality drives, CompuPro Disk 3 DMA controller, all cabling, A&T, formatted, 
burned-in. Provisionsfor uptotwohard disks in each system. We includeoperating system update. 
CP/M 80, CP/M 86, CP/M 8-16, MP/M 8-16, CP/M 68K. (/1 Systems are CCT innovated hard/floppy 
combinations, with Mitsubishi DSDD 8" drive.) 12 month warranty. 



CCT-10(11 + MEG) $1499 

CCT-20(22+ MEG) $2019 

CCT-40(36+ MEG) $2499 

CCT-60(58 + MEG) (New) $3699 

CCT-90(87 + MEG) (New) $4909 

CCT-125(123 + MEG) (New) $6099 



NEW 



CCT-10/1 $2049 

CCT-20/1 $2569 

CCT-40/1 $3049 

CCT-60/1 $4249 

CCT-90/1 $5459 

CCT-125/1 $6649 

10 MEG REMOVABLE CARTRIDGE DRIVE SYSTEM 
for hard disk back-up — DMA using Disk 3 controller. 
Super fast/ Ultra reliable — Available April 



CCT-2.4 • Dual 8" DSDD FL0PPY SYSTEMS C CT-5 • 5 V 4 " DSDD 

Mitusbishi 2.4 Megabyte in Extra Heavy horizontal enclosure, IBM Compatible Tandon 320K. Extra Heavy Cabinet 
removeable filter air system, all cabling, A&T, Burned in. The accommodates two drives, hard or floppy. All cabling, A&T, 

fastest system available: $1229 Burned-in. Perfect for our PC-DOS Package .... $399 

CCT-8/5 • FULL IBM COMPATABILITY 

One Mitsubishi 8" DSDD (1 .2 Meg)/One 5-Va " DSDD (360K) IBM Drive 

Both 3mssteprate — For Concurrent DOS and PC DOS $1029 



* SUPERPRICES * COMPUPRO COMPONENTS* INST0CK * 

CPU-Z-$229 • Disk 1A- $399 • Disk 1A w/CP/M - $499 • CPU 8086/10 - $359 • SPU-Z-? 

CPU 8085/88 -$229 • CPU 286 -$849 • CPU68K-10Mhz-$359 

PC Graphics -$399 • Disk 3 -$459 • RAM 22 (256K) - $1179 • RAM23/64K-$279/128K-$469 

NEW - M-Drive/H - 512K - $469 / 2 Meg ■ $1989 

Enclosure 2 Desk -$699/Rack- $749 • Interfaced -$409 • Interf acer 4 - $289 • System Support 1 - $299 

Concu rrent DOS 8-16 (CC1CMX) - $309 • CP/M 80 (CCT HMX) - $125 • CP/M 86 (CCTTMX) - $175 

CP/M 8-16 (CCTTMX) -$199 • CP/M 68K (CCTCX) - $279 • Operating System Updates/Remakes -$30 



16 Bit Upgrade Kit: CP/M 86, RAM 23, System Support 1, Cable $729 D CP/M 8-16 - Kit - $753 



CCT-1 - ENTRY LEVEL S-100 BUSINESS SYSTEM 

• Enclosure 2-Desk-21 Slot Mainframe • • CCT-2.4-Dual 8" Mitsubishi 
• CPU 8085/88 - 6Mhz 8085/8Mhz8088 • DSDD Drive System - 2.4 Megabytes • 

• Disk 1A - DMA Floppy Disk Controller • • CP/M 80 - 2.2 HMX - CCT Modified • 

• RAM 23 - 64K Static RAM - 12Mhz • . ah Cabling, Complete CCT Assembly, 

• Interfacer 4 - 3 Serial/2 Parallel I/O • Testing, and Minimum 20 Hour Bum-in • 

RUNS ALL STANDARD 8" CP/M SOFTWARE • INCLUDES OUR EXCLUSIVE 12 MONTH DIRECT WARRANTY 



SPECIAL PRICE 

$3,375 



Prices & availability subject to change. All products new, and carry full manufacturer's warranties. Call for catalog. Free technical help to anyone. All products we sell are CCT individually tested 
and set up for your system - Plug-In & Go! Arizona residents add sales tax. CCT® Trademark — Custom Computer Technology; MS-DOS® Trademark — Microsoft; IBM® Trademark — 
International Business Machines; CompuPro® Trademark — W.J. Godbout; CP/M® MP/M® Trademarks — Digital Research; HERCULES™ Trademark — Hercules ComputerTechnology 



Inquiry 114 



JULY 1985 'BYTE 417 



Contact us for other low prices on hardware and software. 

Next Day Air Extra 



FREE SHIPPING. 
NO SURCHARGE FOR 



Call for latest prices. 



10, 20, 33 AND 44 MEG INTERNAl AND EXTERNAL HARD DISK SYSTEMS 



10 MEG 



20 MEG 



33ME6 



44 MEG 



Internal 



$495 



$619 



$995 



$1195 



External 



$645 



$769 



$1095 



$1295 




Externals mounted with independent power supply and fan. Fully DOS 2.X or 3.X compatible. Both Internals and 
f Externals boot from Hard Disk. 33 and 44 Meg Internal Disks include extender power supply. The system comes com- 
J plete and ready to install with the Hard Disk, Controller, Cables, Manual, Software, and Mounting Hardware. One Year 

Warranty. 

10, 20, and 3 3 Meg Hard Disks are available with combined Floppy /Hard Disk Controller Card for additional $75. 




COmPML 



$2549 

256K, 1/360K drive/ 
10 Meg Internal 




Now using yti" shock-mounted Winchester drives. The 
same as used in the Compaq Plus'*. Also available with 
2 half -height drives and 10 MEG HD- &9T A Q 

Or upgrade your Compaq to a Compaq Plus™ equivalent 
with our 3 ft" shock-mounted Winchester disk kit. In- 
cludes Hard Disk, Controller, Cables, Manual, software, 
and Mounting Hardware. One year warranty. 



$549 



COMPAQ. 



!t simply works better. 



640K,One360K Drive, 

One 10 Meg Internal Hard Drive 

Tape Backup Unit. 

$3495 



Includes Monitor 




With 20 Meg Internal Hard Drive- $36 19 
With 33 Meg Internal Hard Drive--$3995 
With 44 Meg Internal Hard Drive -$41 95 





IBM PC 

CALL 



KM b • troJoM* ■( ISM Cor*. 



Call us for competitive prices on larger quantities of RAM chips. 



64K RAM 

Set Of 9 OHpSf 200 or 150 Nanoseconds 



$10 



256KRAM 

Set of 9 chips 



$39 



ASTSixP-kPI«,» JSSS&i 



w/64K $249 
w/384K$299 



• Upgradable to >84K 

• Clock/Calendar 

• Software included 



w/0K $149 
w/384K$209 



• Parallel Port 

• Serial Port 

• Optional Game Port. 125 




DISK DRIVES 

TEAC 

5 5-B, Half -Height, DS/DD 

$95 



INTEL 8087 
Math Co-processor 




8087'2-CAU 80287- CALL 



SOLVE YOUR POWER PROBLEM. 

XT POWER 135W 

^t[% $95 

Fully XT" compatible. 

One Year Warranty. 

Directly Replaces Power Supply in PC" 



I0or more$85 |l50W$U9 




fl 



IBM PC AT* 
PRODUCTS 



128KRAM $59 

20 MEG Internal Hard Disk $649 
32 MEG Internal Hard Disk $995 

Fully compatible w/JBM PC At' Disk Controller. DOS .1.0 or S. 

These are blgb performance disk drives, 

well-suited for the AT™. 

UK h i indtnirk at UN Corp 



irr final Oil Itctiaicil iuppo« (or iciui 

Any ouulhorlrro' rtmro mbtcci 10 > 10 
rtttocktof Itc. Pitpjld cb«k». money onto 
VISA. MutcrCiid. Amrrkia Eiprcu. or > 
prom) rompioy poitbiKOrdcn Jft tccrpic 
Xosarrhitgc for VISA or HuKrOrd. 3% w 
c;b»I<(or AmrriciaEiprtH. 




PC'S LIMITED 



Irwin Tape 
Backup System 




• l»es Floppy Controller Card 

• 10 IS Meg Formatted Capacity 

• Used in Compaq Dcskpro. 



• Half Height 

• Low Power 



Compaq, TEAC, IBM, Irwin, and 
Intel arc trademarks of their 
respective companies. All brand 
names arc registered trademarks. 
We arc an Independent sales 
organization. 



OUTSIDE TEXAS, ORDERS ONLY, CALL 1-800-IBM-5150 

7801 N. Lonur, #E-200, Austin, Texas 78752 

All calls for technical support and inside Texas, 

call (512) 452-0323. 

Telex No. 9103808386 PC LTD 




Ad number 407 



418 B YTE • JULY 1985 



Inquiry 277 



What the world really needs 

is a 99 cent 

Double Sided, Double Density Diskette 

with a LIFETIME WARRANTY! 

And DISK WORLD! has it. 



Introducing Super Star Diskettes: 

the high quality diskette with 

the lowest price 

and the best LIFETIME WARRANTY! 



In the course of selling more than a million diskettes 
every month, we've learned something: higher prices don't 
necessarily mean higher quality. 

In fact, we've found that a good diskette manufacturer 
simply manufactures a good diskette... no matter what 
they charge for it. (By way of example, consider that none 
of thebrandsthatwe carry has areturnrateof greaterthan 
1/1, 000th of 1 percent!) 

In other words, when people buy a more expensive 
diskette, they aren't necessarily buying higher quality. 

The extra money might be going toward flashier adver- 
tising, snazzier packaging or simply higher profits. 

But the extra money in a higher price isn't buying better 
quality. 

All of the good manufacturers put out a good diskette. 

Period. 

How to cut diskette prices 
. . .without cutting quality. 

Now this discovery posed a dilemma: how to cut the 
price of diskettes without lowering the quality. 

There are about 85 companies claiming to be "diskette" 
manufacturers. 

Trouble is, most of them aren't manufacturers. 

Rather they are fabricators or marketers, taking other 
company's components, possibly doing one or more steps 
of the processing themselves and pasting their labels on 
the finished product. 

The new Eastman Kodak diskettes, for example, are one 
of these. So are IBM 5V«" diskettes. Same for DYSAN, 
Polaroid and many, many other familiar diskette brand 
names. Each of these diskettes is manufactured in whole 
or in part by another company! 

So, we decided to act just like the big guys. That's how 
we would cut diskette prices... without lowering the 
quality. 

We would go out and find smaller companies to manu- 
facture a diskette to our specifications... specifications 
which are higher than most. ..and simply create our own 
"name brand" diskette. 

Name brand diskettes that offered high quality at low 
prices. 



DISKETTE STORAGE 
CASES 



PERFECTDATA DIAL 'N FILE 

Terrific! Holds 10 5 1 /4 W diskettes. Just flip 
the lever and they all slide up for easy access 
and identification. Grey with smoked plastic 
front. 

$2.75 Ea. + .35 Shpng. 

DISK CADDIES 

The original flip-up holder for 10 5'/4" 
diskettes. Beige or Grey only, 

$1.65 ea. + .20 Shpng. 

DISKETTE 70 STORAGE 

Dust-free storage for 70 5V*" diskettes. 
Six dividers included. An excellent value. 
l $11.95 ea. + $3.00 Shpng. 



3>, 



HOURS: 

Human: 8AM-6PM Central Time, Monday through Friday 

Answering Machine: 6PM-8AM, All Times 

MCI MAIL 24 hours a day. 



SSDD DSDD 
.91 ea. I .99 ea. 

Qty.50 I Qty.50 



Qty.50 



Super Star diskettes are sold in multiples of 50 only. Diskettes are 
shipped with white Tyvec sleeves, reinforced hubs, user ID labels 
and write-protect tabs. 

Boy, did we get lucky. Our Super Star 

Diskettes are the same ones you've been 

using for years... without knowing it. 

In our search for the low priced, high quality diskette of 
our dreams, we found something even more interesting. 

We found that there are several manufacturers who 
don't give a hoot about the consumer market for their 
diskettes. They don't spend millions of dollars in advertis- 
ing trying to get you, the computer user, to use their 
diskettes. 

Instead, they concentrate their efforts on turning out the 
highest quality diskettes they can... because they sell 
them to the software publishers, computer manufacturers 
and otherfolks who (in turn) put their name on them. . .and 
sell them for much higher prices to you! 

After all, when a software publisher or computer manu- 
facturer or diskette marketer puts their name on a diskette, 
they want it to work time after time, everytime. (Especially 
software publishers who have the nasty habit of copy- 
protecting their originals!) 



HOW TO ORDER: 



ORDERS ONLY: 

1-800-621-6827 

(In Illinois: 1-312-944-2788) 

INQUIRIES: 

1-312-944-2788 
FOR FASTEST SERVICE, USE NO-COST MCI MAIL: 
Our address is DISKWORLD. It's a FREE MCI MAIL 
letter. No charge to you. (Situation permitting, we'll 
ship these orders in 24 hours or less.) 

SHIPPING: 5 1 /4" & 3VV DISKETTES— Add $3.00 per each 
100 or fewer diskettes. OTHER ITEMS: Add shipping charges 
as shown in addition (o other shipping charges. PAYMENT: 
VISA, MASTERCARD and Prepaid orders accepted. COD OR- 
DERS: Add additional $3.00 special handling charge. APO, 
FPO. AK. HI & PR ORDERS: Include shipping charges as 
shown and additional 5% of total orderamount to cover PAL 
and insurance. We ship only to United States addresses, except 
for those listed above. TAXES: Illinois residents, add 8% 
sales tax. 

MINIMUM ORDER: $35.00 or 20 diskettes. 



Super Star Diskettes. You already know 

how good they are. Now you can buy 

them... cheap. 

Well, that's the story. 

Super Star diskettes don't roll off the boat from Pago- 
Pago or emerge from a basement plant just east of 
Nowhere. 

Super Star diskettes have been around for years. ..and 
you've used them for years as copy-protected software 
originals, unprotected originals. Sometimes, depending 
on which computer you own, the system master may have 
been on a Super Star diskette. And maybe more than once, 
you've bought a box or two or more of Super Star diskettes 
without knowing it. They just had some "big" company's 
name on them. 

Super Star Diskettes are good. So good that a lot of 
major software publishers, computer manufacturers and 
other diskette marketers buy them in the tens or hundreds 
of thousands. 

We buy them in the millions. 

And than we sell them to you. 

Cheap. 

When every little bit counts, 
it's Super Star Diskettes. 

You've used them a hundred times... under different 
names. 

Now, you can buy the real McCoy, the same diskette that 
major software publishers, computer manufacturers and 
diskette marketers buy... and call their own. 

We simply charge less. 



Super Special! 




DISK WORLD!, Inc. 



Order 50 Super Star Diskettes 
and we'll be happy to sell you an 
Amaray Media-Mate 50 for only 
$8,75, shipping included. ..a lot 
less than the suggested retail price 
of $15.95. 



Regular DISK WORLD! price: $10.95 ea. 
+ $2.00 Shpng. 



The Super Star 
LIFETIME WARRANTY! 



Super Star Diskettes are unconditionally warranted 
against defects in original material and workmanship 
so long as owned by the original purchaser. Returns 
are simple: just send the defective diskettes with proof 
of purchase, postage-paid by you with a short expla- 
nation of the problem, and we'll send you the replace- 
ments. (Incidentally, coffee stained diskettes and 
diskettes with staples "driven through them don't 
qualify as "defective".) 



WE WILL MEET OR BEAT ANY NATIONALLY 

ADVERTISED PRICE 

ON THE SAME PRODUCTS AND QUANTITIES 

SUBJECT TO THE SAME TERMS AND CONDITIONS. 



Suite 4806 

30 East Huron Street 

Chicago, Illinois 60611 



Inquiry 1 26 



JULY 1985 -BYTE 419 




Teamwork is 
making a comeback 
in America. 

Cooperation on the 
production line helped America 
win World War II. We're in another kind of 
battle today —a fight for economic survival in an 
increasingly competitive world market. Coopera- 
tion in the workplace is helping us meet this 
challenge too. 

In plants and offices throughout the country 
management is asking employees for their ideas 
on how to increase productivity and improve the 



work environment. And workers 
and their unions are responding 
with a wealth of practical sugges- 
tions and a renewed spirit of 
cooperation. 

For information about how 
others are working better by working 
together, contact: 

Cooperative Labor-Management Programs 

U.S. Department of Labor 

Washington, D.C. 20216 

202—523-6098 

U.S. Department of Labor 



HIJTB 
















DVI Krback issues 




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1985 


Prices include postage in the US. Please add $.50 per 
copy for Canada and Mexico; and S2.00 per copy to 
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□ Check enclosed 

Payments from foreign countries must be made in 
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Signature 

Please allow 4 weeks for domestic delivery and 12 
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NAME 

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$2.75 


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$3.25 




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Special BYTE Guide to IBM PC's — $4.75 


Circle and send requests with payments to: 
BYTE Back Issues 


P.O. 
Ham 


Box 
rock, 


328 
NH 


0344 


^9 












STATE ZIP 



420 B YTE • JULY 1985 



100% GUARANTEED ICs - MONEY BACK! 

1-800-245-2235 



SPECIAL* 
64K DRAM 
.65 

FULLY FUNCTIONAL 

WITH SLIGHTLY 

SHORTER LEADS 

200ns or FASTER 



MICROPROCESSORS 



TMS990O 

Z8001 

B031 

8035 

8039 

808OA 

8085 

3086 



2.00* SQ37-3 99.00 

7J5G 803g 7.50 

5.00 68000-8 18.00 

2.00 $3000-10 24.00 

ZOO 68008*8 18.00 

.75* 87XX 10.00 

2 00 EX300 6.00 
4.00 



LINEAR 



XR22XX 
CA3XXX 
3470 



L00 

.50 

L50 



CONTROLLERS/UARTS 



1601 

mx 

1791 

1*793 
1795 
1 797 
2651 



5,25 2661 

6.50 5027 

; 10 00 5037 

5.00* 7201 

10.00 765 ■ 

IC.OO CQM8116 

4:00 8250 : 



4.00 
5.00 

4,50 
4.00 
5.00 
4,00 



SOUND CHIPS 



76477 
76489 
AY3S910 
AY3-8912 



2.00 
3.50 
2,00 
2.00 



82XX PERIPHERALS 



8202 
8212 
821$ 
8224 
8228 
8237 
8238 

m$ 

8251 
8253 
8254 
8255 
8257 



0026 
1488 
1489 
88XX 
8TXX 



14.00 8259 

1.00 8272 

LOO 8273 

3.00 8274 

3.00 8275 

3.00 8276 

2.50 8279 

1.50 8281 

2 00 8283 

ZOO 8284 

4.00 8288 

2,00 8291 

Z00 8292 



2,00 
4.00 

1000 
9.00 
9.00 

15.00 
3.50 
750 
5.50 
2.00 
4,00 

20.00 

21.00 



INTERFACE 



1.50 75XXX .50 

.50 3232 1.00 

.50 3242 4.00 

.50 8303 3.00 

,50 8304 1.75 



That's rlghtl . . . 100% money-back guaranteed ICs at prices never 
before posslblel Krueger Technology's unique patented IC removal pro- 
cess Is the key to our ability to sell so tow. The fact Is, It costs less to 
retrieve and refurbish an IC from an obsolete PC board than manufac- 
ture a new one. Since we maintain an Inventory In excess of six million 
ICs and process over 100,000 ICs per day (over thirty million In the past 
ten years) we can supply you with most. If not all of your IC needs. 

Until this year our vast Inventory of ICs was available to only 
manufacturers and distributors. The phenomenal growth of the 
catalog market has allowed us to open our Inventory to you. You can 
now buy direct and cut out all middlemen. ° 

Call today and discover what seven of the ten largest computer 
manufacturers already know . . . 'The Krueger Alternative". Don't 
forget, you get an additional 30% discount on orders over $5001 



DYNAMIC RAMS 



41256-lSOns 

4164450ns 

4164-200ns 

4164~250ns 

4416- 150ns 

4118450ns 

4116'200ns 

4118250ns 



7 50 

1 25 

1.10 

.75 

1.50 
.75 
.35 
.25 



STATIC RAMS* 



6264-1 50n$ 

6116150ns 

61 16 200ns 

6116-250ns 

1420-55ns 

2147,2148,2149 

2114~450n$ 

2114-FASTER 



6.00 
2,00 
L75 
1.25 
2.00 
2.00 
,50 
.80 



Of\0/^ DISCOUNT OIM 
JV /O $500 ORDERS 



EPROMS 



2?12S-250ns 


7.00* 


27128-300ns 


6.00* 


27128450ns 


5.00* 


2764-250ns 


3.50 


2764300ns 


3,00 


2764450ns 


2.50 


2764-650ns 


2.00 


2732-250ns 


3.50 


2732300ns 


3.00 


2732450ns 


2.50 


2716350ns 


2.25 


27 16-4 50ns 


2.00 


2716650ns 


L35 


2708 


2,00 


68766,68764 


6.00 


68708 


4.00 


CMOS version tit double the 


above prices 




25 Series EPROMS are 


the 


same price as 27 Series 


EPROMS 




DIGITAL 


MC4024 2.00 8136 


4.00 


MC4044 2,00 9602 


.75 


8131 2.25.96L$02 


1.50 

mm 


E3 

ANY 10K LOGIC 


1,00 


ANYECIRAM 


3.00* 


ANY 100K LOGIC 


5.00 



Z80 SERIES 



2.5 MHZ 



CPU,CTC,PK) 
DMA, DART, $10 


L00 
3.00 


4.0 MHZ (A) 




CPU,CTC,P!0 
DMA, DART, SIO 


2.00 
4.50 


6.0 MHZ (B) 




CPU F CTC,PIO 
DMA, DART, SfO 


3.00 
9.00 



TMS 9900 SERIES 



9901 1.50 
9918 20,00 
9980 10.00 

ALL OTHER 99XX SERIES 
3.00 



ADC/D 



ADC08XX 
DAC08XX 
DAC80 



3.50 
1.50 
8.00 



* 30% discount does not 
apply to RAMS or 
asterisked specials 



SPECIALS* 

74LS322 .50 

8080A .75 

Z80ASI0/0 3.75 
TMS9900 2.00 
27128450ns 5.00 
FDC1793 5.00 



74 SERIES 



74XX .25 

741XX .35 

742XX .50 

743XX .50 

74LSXX .25 

74LSIXX .35 

74LS2XX .50 

74LS3XX .50 

74FXX .35 

74F1XX .45 

74F2XX .60 

74F3XX .60 



74SXX ;35 

74S1XX .45 

74S2XX 60 

74S3XX .60 

74ALSXX 35 

74ALS1XX .45 

74ALS2XX .60 

74AIS3XX -60 

74HCXX .35 

74HC1XX .45 

74HC2XX ,60 

74HC3XX 60 



74HCTXX .35 

74HCT1XX 45 

74HCT2XX .60 

74HCT3XX .60 



CMOS 



ANY 4000 SERIES .25 
ANY 4500 SERIES .50 



6500/6800 SERIES 



ANY65XX 

ANY65XXA 

ANY65XXB 

ANY68XX 

ANY68AXX 

ANY68BXX 

6810 



2.00 
2.50 
3.00 
2.00 
2.50 
300 
.75 



OURPOUCY 

Delivery; Orders norrriatfy shtpj^w*thih 
2 business days. Add 5 3 for UPS grpund-5 # 
& under. Add $4 for UPS blue {aarj, 2M & 
under, for each addftjonalair pound add 
$1 . Arizona residents add 6% sales tax. 
Payment; Visa, MC cashiers check, cer~ 
titled check, rr>oney order, personal check 
accepted. {Aliow J Q days for personal 
checks to dear ) No surcharge on aedrt 
card orders. COO* welcome wrth cash, cer- 
tified cl ieck. cashiers check or money order 
Add $3 COO handing dwge 
Pricing: Minimum order 52CX 30% dis- 
count on orders over $500, Prices subject 
to change without notice. AH items limited 
to stock on hand. 
We reserve the right to limit quantities. 



KRUEGER Technology, Inc 

001Q CrA.im /lQfh Ctroot • TA mn n ATflROPO **JwJ 




. MasterCard) 



2219 South 48th Street • Tempe, AZ 85282 

800-245-2235 

In Arizona 602-438-1570 



HOURS: 7a.m. -5:30p.m. 
tf (MOUNTAIN TIME) 

Monday Thru Friday 



Inquiry 204 for End-Users. Inquiry 205 for DEALERS ONLY. 



JULY 1985 -BYTE 421 



IC 



PROMPT DELIVERY!!!! 

S SAME DAY SHIPPING (USUALLY) 



OUTSIDE OKLAHOMA: NO SALES TAX 



8087-3 MATH $110.00 

8087-2 COPROCESSORS 150.00 

DYNAMIC RAM 
256K 256Kxi 120 ns 
256K 256Kxi 150 ns 



64K 



27C256 

27256 

27128 

27C64 

2764 

2732A 



64Kxi 1 50 ns 
EPROM 

32Kx8 250 ns 
250 ns 
250 ns 
200 ns 
250 ns 
250 ns 



$ 5.65 
4.45 
1.10 



32Kx8 
16Kx8 

8Kx8 

8Kx8 

4Kx8 

STATIC RAM 

6264LP-158Kx8 150 ns 
6116LP-3 2Kx8 150 ns 



$6.25 
2.24 



OPEN 6V 2 DAYS: WE CAN SHIP VIA FED-EX ON SAT. 



NO EXTRA 
COST ON 
F EX SAT 

DELIVERY 



MasterCard/VISA or UPS CASH COD _ 

Factory New, Prime Parts JiPoo 
MICROPROCESSORS UNLIMITED 
24.000 S PeonaAve .. /Qlfll 267-4961 
BEGGS. OK 74421 \»IO;^0# H5JO I 

Prices shown above are for May 28, 1985 

Ptease cal tor OHM pnces. Prices Sut*xt to change Please eiped hqfier crlwvor pncas on 
some parts duo to siflcrfy 4 demand and our changing coste. Srippfig S nsuranoe extra Cash 
dscourt press shown Orders recerved by 6 PM CST can usualty bo ctekvorod to you by the next 
M Standard Air fu 16.00. or Priority One § 111.561 



Call For 



DEALER'S 
ADVANTAGE 



Add-on Products for IBM PC® 



Inquiry 242 



* IBM is a registered trademark ol International 
Business Machines, tnc 



CRANE Associates, Inc 

3928 S. Sepulveda Blvd., Ste. 12 

Culver City, CA 90230 

(213) 390-9840 



Inquiry 111 



1st PLACE 

COMPUTER SYSTEMS 
13422 N. CAVECREEK RD. 
PHOENIX, AZ. 85022 



CALL FREE 1-800-841-2748 

Hi - I'm Joan, 

We are still 

doing business 

as usual, same 

low prices, fast 

and courteous 

service. We've 

gone small for 

the summer to keep our prices 

low. Call me for current pricing. 

I'll be waiting for your call. 

Thanks again and God Bless 
-Joan 




WYSE -JUKI -CITOH 



Inquiry 405 



Universal Machine 
Independent Assembler 

MOPI; 

A unique software development 
system. 

The only assembler capable of 
generating machine code for any 8- 
or 16-bit micro using; a universal 
set of instructions, including proce- 
dural, the manufacturer's or user 
defined instructions. 

The first assembler to implement 
a proposed AL Standard, applicable 
to any computer; simplifies learn- 
ing AL, reduces development time, 
offers limited portability. 

Simple enough for a beginning pro- 
grammer, sophisticated enough for 
experienced computer professionals. 
For CP/M or PC-DOC - $195 

rsri vocs 

P.O. Box 3705 



it*} 



Mpls., MN 55403 



PC EXPANSIONS 

AST SixPakPlus (64 k) $259 

SixPakPlus(384k) $339 

MegaPtus (64k) $269 

Advantage (128k) $419 

I/O Plus $129 

PCnet - starter kit $809 

Quadboard (64k) $245 

Quadboard (384k) $319 

Quadmeg-AT (1 28k) $319 

Quadport-AT $105 

HERCULES graphics board $319 

Color Card with PP $159 

HAYES Modems: 2400 Scall 

Smartmodem 1 200 $409 

Smartmodem 1 200 B $379 

Setol9 chips (64k) $15 

256k chips (each) $6 

8087 chip $119 

Maynard Disk Controller $1 00 

Sandstar Series Scall 

Internal Hard Disks from $679 

MaynStreamtapebackupfrom. , $979 

Qume 142A $129 

Teac FD55B $1 29 

TandonTMlOO-2 $129 

CDC 9409 $129 

Verbatim Dalahle disks (10) $25 

VLM Computer Electronics 

10 Park Place • Morristown, NJ 07960 
(201) 267-3268 Visa, MC, Check or COD. 



PERCON® E-Z-READER™ 

BAR CODE READERS 




$595 



QUANTITY ONE --^ 

QUALITY, PERFORMANCE, PRICE 

IBM"J PC, XT, AT KEYBOARD 

COMPATIBLE VERSION Works with most compatibles. 

hooks up in seconds without changing soltware 

RS 232C SERIAL VERSION 

READS UPC A/E. CODE 39. CODABAR. ABC. I 2 OF 5 
DECODES BOTH DOT MATRIX & HIGH 
DENSITY PRINTED LABELS ACCURATELY 

MS/PC DOS Bar Code Printing Software $99 

503/344-1189 
2190 W. 11th St. 
Eugene, OR 97402 

1 Year Limited Warranly In Stock VISA. M/C or COD 



Inquiry 375 



Inquiry 374 



Inquiry 2 79 



Commodore 64 

One Megabyte 

Disk Drive 



179 



00 



5'j times the capacity of the 1541 on 
double sided disks. This IEEE drive 
works with PET, B128, 8032. and C-64 
w Interface. Perfect as a second 
drive. List S899. Sale 5179. 

(Add S17. 50 Shipping) 

PROTECTO 

22392 N. Pepper Rd„ Barrington, IL 60010 

312/382-5244 

We Love Our Customer* 



vM \ferbatim® 

Data Life Diskettes 

Lifetime Warranty 

Catalog it Box of 10 
5V<" SSDD 18158 $15.50 

5V<" DSDD 18188 $19.95 

5V<" DSQD 18239 $28.50 
minimum quantity 100 

Disk Drives 

5 1 /<" V? heights 
TEAC 55B $119 

Panasonic/Shugart $109 

3V 2 " SS Shugart SA 300 $110 

limited quantity 

hfimtfOn KT-7® Terminal 

Compatible to Televideo® 925 $545 
Also carry complete line of computer products 

MfCROSCRIBE. INC. 

3350 Scott Blvd., Bldg. 15 Santa Clara, CA 95054 
Call M-F 8:00 -5:00 (408) 748-1333 




jSa^SMiRW 



KEYBOARD PROTECTOR 
Remains in place during keyboard use. Prevents 
damage from liquid spills, dust, ashes, etc. Fits 
like a second skin, excellent feel. Available for: 
IBM-PC, AT, Apple (all), Compaq, Model 100, 
NEC 8201. C64, Zenith 150, DEC, Kaypro and 
many others, Send $29.95, check, M.O., Visa 
& MC include exp. date. Specify computer type. 
Dealer inquiries invited. Free brochure avail. 

Merritt Computer Products, Inc. 

2925 LB J Fwy. #180 / Dallas, Texas 75234 

(214) 942-1142 



Inquiry 289 



Inquiry 388 



Inquiry 229 



m 



icro 
products 
i international 

dl7 14/898-0840 






«M5 m 



*&*.*,* 




Inde pendence Spe cials 

New Hayes SmartModem Compatible! 



Finally a price breakthrough on a Hayes compatible, external 300/1200 
' modem. This low price is without 
driver software, but if you need it add $25.00. 
Call for a 26 page catalog of our special deals, 
in this spot every month for Hot, New items ( 
sure to catch your interest. 




%. 



Runs the popular 

Hayes communications software 

• FCC apprvd direct RJ-11 connection 1 

• Phone Cable & power supply 
one low price. <nooi 

MOD-8100-00. $229.00 



IBM PC-XT SELECTRIC KEYBOARDS 

volume purchase of these excellent Selectric type keyboards will bring the 
'features you nave been wanting down to a price you can't resist. So many features 
you'll love it!! • Single Key reset 

• Separate numeric keypad 

• Separate "Arrow" keypad 
Dimple marked "5", F, & J keys 

'KEY-1 051-00 Selectric $129.00 

' KEY-1 050-00 Standard 89.00 



' 



i i ■ ■ • i • iu 'J 






TUBED MOTHERBOARD 

Micro Products announces a powerful new IBM XT type motherboard. 4 layers for superior reliability 
& speed. Turbo mode allows 75% higher thru-put by increasing sys- 
tem clock to 7 MHz under software control. Designed to use new 
256K RAM chips or 64K chips. 640K memory expansion does not 
require use of valuable card slots. Many outstanding features com- 
bined with our new 7 PAK Multifunction board make previously 
expensive options standard features at a LOW LOW Cost. 
BOA-6078-00 Supplied with OK $349.00 



ADD-ON POWER SUPPLIES 



K 



SSL 



Two new, thoroughly 

tested IBM PC/XT power 

supplies for your system 

upgrade. Best price in 

Byte with ONE YEAR 

warranty!! 

POW-104Q-00 135 watt 

POW-1044-00 150 watt $115.00 



V 



.V 




SUPER 12 PAK MULTI-FUNCTION 

This one is really loaded! Features: One Parallel Port, One RS232-C 
Serial Port, One Game Port, Real-Time Clock/ Calendar with Bat- 
tery Back-up, Expandable to 384Kof Parity-checked Memory, Sup- 
plied OK Memory, all cables, PrintSpooler 
and RAM Disk Software. 

BOA-6335-00 $149.95 

Additional (9) 64K Memory Chips 
KIT-8000-00 $ 1 0.00 



Do it Yourself I 




*1395°° WOW! 

Complete --— — 



Add-On H.D. & Tape 



firee ways to begin - an Empty cabinet • a "Basic" system 
i Full system ■ all that you assemble yourself! 
CABINET ONLY 

Slot CAB-3068-00 $75.00 

"BASIC" 
abinet, Keyboard, Power Supply, Motherboard w/OK 

IYS-8000-00 $525.00 . 

XPC KIT J 

abinet, Keyboard, Power Supply, Motherboard, j 

loppy Controller, Mono Video, TTL Monitor, 2 - 

rives, no software - Vh hrs. Assembly. 1 

'JT-9500-00 $11 95.00 

This is OUR Junior! 

Jse this "Driveless " workstation for low-cos! Networking. J 

'eatures: • 4-slot IBM™ compatible Motherboard 
» 1 28K Standard Memory • 8088,8087 Math Co-pro- 
:essor • Optional Floppy Drive with Controllers. 

■YS-B100-00 $475.00 

ull System w/Keyboard, Mono Monitor, Video Display 
:ard, 256K 1 RAM Drive SYS-8725-QQ $895.00 



System! -£^=~^=- 
NEW 1 7,000 in Service! ^ o m K 9 s y " , m? , 

$ 1995 00 



Features! 

MRAM Disk 
MGame Port 
W640K cpcty 
lPrintSpooler 
ITurbo mode! 
477 MHz 
to 7 MHz! 
MSer,Par 
aClock 







20 Meg Color 

Complete System! 

'2550 00 

40 Meg w/Tape 

Complete System! 

$ 3035 00 

Software 

• XWORD 

• XBASIC 

• XBASE 

• XCALC 

• XCOM 



10 Meg $1295 
20 Meg $1395 
26 Meg $1595 



10 or20 Megabyte on the 
top, your choice of Hard Disk 
on the bottom, Super ap- 
pearance! Requires one slot 
in your PC for SASI interface 
and an extension connector 
on the floppy card. Every- 
thing else is supplied by us. 
40 Meg $1995 
105 Meg $4395 
140 Meg $4995 



Add-On Hard Disk 

Two ways to go. The Internal system Is cheaper because 
it does not need a P/S & Chassis. The sameP/S & Chassis 
can be used for a 10 Meg Tape Back-up on your XT! 



10 Megabyte 
*595lnt/*695ext 

20 Megabyte 
*695lnt/*795ext 

26 Megabyte 
«795lnt/»895ext 



40 Megabyte 
M195lnt/M295ext 

105 Megabyte 
*3795lnt/*3995ext 

140 Megabyte 
»4395 lnt/*4695 ext 



Check These Standard Features: 

• Full-Size, Feather-Touch, Capacitance Keyboard, 10 Function Keys, Calculator-Type Numeric Keypad • 

• Parallel & Serial I/O • Real Time Clock • Game Port • 2-Slimline 5V* " DS/DD 48 TPI 360K Drives • 

•8 IBM expansion slots • RAM Disk • PrintSpooler • 4 DMA & 3 Timer channels • 

• Full 640K capacity on-board • 8088 16-bit CPU • Monochrome Video Card • 

• Up to 32K of EPROM (fullSK supplied) • Supports PC-DOS • MS-DOS -CP/M-86 • 

• Power Supply Hard-Disk-Ready, no need to add-on additional power • 

• High resolution 12" Monitor, Green Screen, 22 MHz bandwidth » 



Add-On 20 Meg Tape 

If your IBM-AT needs a lit- 
tle help in the Back-up I 
category, you won't be 
able to beat this price! 
Cables, software and 
everything! 
SUB-8300-00 $595.0 




Not enough room here - Call for Catalog 




PROM LASER 

This is the One! Our PROM Burnerallows reading, storing-to-disk, recalling, and 
burning. Hi-speed alogrithmes burns 2764 
in 45 seconds! Also handles 2716, 2732, 
27128, 27256, Features: Zero insertion 
force sockets; On-board Voltage Generator; 
I No Interference with normal computer 
operations. 
BOA-8640-00 $199.00 

MISCELLANEOUS $$$ SAVERS 

7 PAK Multifunction Floppy, RTC, 2 Serial, 1 Parallel, Game, RAM Disk 

BOA-6250-00 $1 89.00 

64KMemoryChlps(9) NECfor IBM KIT-8000-00 $ 1 0.00 

256K DRAM Memory Chips (9) = 256K KIT-9000-00 $ 45.00 

AdtHJn Memory, (up to512K)Supplied OK BOA-6350-00 $ 99.00 

Floppy Controller, Controls up to four drives, 5 VI ' 48/96 TPI 

BOA-610Q-00 $ 95.00 

Monochrome Graphics Card, (Hercules type) (1-2-3 compatible) 720h x 348v 

BOA-6150-00.. . $175.00 

Color G raphlcs Card, 320 x 200 Res. Color, 640 x 200 Monochrome 

BOA-62 M-OO $145.00 

Clock Calendar Board, fits in "short slot" w/battery Back-up 

BOA-6375-00 $ 55.00 

HardDlsk Controller, standard ST-506 interface f orDOS1.1 & 2.0 

BOA-8060-00 $1 85.00 

300 / 1200 Baud Modem Internal w/PC Talk III Communications Software 

BOA-8725-00 $239.00 

Monochrome Monitor, 22MHz bandwidth, co mposite input or TTL 
MON-1725-00Green/Comp 99.00 MON -1700-00 Amber/Comp 104.00 
MON-1775-00Green/TTL. 104.00 MON-1750-00 Amber/TTL ..109.00 



We want your DRIVE business! 

1 1 1 1 1 

Shugart 360K TEAC 360K NEC 10meg Tulln 26meg Memtek ^g 
*85 00 *95 00 *345 00 *695 00 *495 00 



INTERNATIONAL ORDERS 

Micro Products Is ready t o serve your needs In several countries. Each Office has 
Sales Literature, Local Pricing, Inventory andTechnlcalServiceavailable to sup- 
port your needs. There are no problems with U.S. Export Forms. 



USA OFFICE 
Darryl R. Green 

15392 Assembly Lane, Unit A 
Huntington Beach, CA 92649 
Tel: 714/ 898-0840 
Tlx: 887841 XORDATA HTBH 
AMSTERDAM OFFICE 
Cynthia Clark 
Building 70, 4th Floor 
1117 ZH Schlphol-East 
Amsterdam, The Netherlands 
Tel: (020) 45 26 50 -Tlx: 18306 
AUSTRALIAN OFFICE 
8 Irwin Street, Bellevue 
W.Australia 6056 
Tel: 274-3701 



MARACAIBO OFFICE 
Jim Stevens 

Av. 3F Esq. CalJe 81 
Centro Com. Maelga - Local #5 
Maracaibo, Venezuela 4001-A 
Tel: 061-913328 -Tlx: 62344 PEMIN 
BOMBAY OFFICE 
DhlraJ House 
311 Sindhl Lane 
Nanubhal Oesai Rd. 
Bombay 400-004 India 
Tel: 357172 -Tlx: 011-2868 
CANADA OFFICE 
Andrei Desrochers 
264 Principals St. Blaise, 
Quebec, Canada JO J1W0 
Tel: 541/291-3118 



Now XPC -XT in a Kit! 

Completely XT Compatible 

*1195 00 




Why didn't anybody think of it before? if 

you have a phillips screwdriver and 1 - 2 hours 
available, SAVE yourself a bundle of MONEY! No- 
where will you beat this deal on a complete 8 slot 
ready-to-assemble and run XT compatible. 

• Cabinet • 2-360K Shugart Drives 

• 135 watt Power Supply • Floppy Controller & 

• Keyboard Cable 

• 8 Slot Motherboard • Mono Video Card 

• 256K RAM • TTL Amber Monitor 



Inquiry 236 

Micro Products 



• 15392 Assembly Lane • Huntington Beach, C A 92649 • 71 4/898-0840 «« 



:::; ibmpc/vtioo 

EMIOO for IBM PC, XT, AT, JR. 

• ^7702 emulation 

• File Transfer 

• 132 Column modes 

• Color Support 

■ EM100-4010 

• Tektronix 4010 emulation 

• VTI02 emulation 

• Picture files 

• High resolution hardcopy 

• Supports IBM, IBM Enhanced, 

• Hercules and Tecmur 
graphics cards. 

Multicopy discounts 



m 



Diversified Computer 
Systems, Inc. 

100 Arapahoe, Boulder, CO 80302 
(303)447-9251 



Trademarks: VTiOO- Dii-ital Equipment; IBM PC. XT- IBMCoqy. 
Hercules — Hercules Computer Technology 




"KING OF THE ELECTRONICS JUNGLE" 



LEO ELECTRONICS, INC. 

P.O. Box 11307 

Torrance. CA 90510-1307 

Tel: 213/212-6133 800/421-9565 

TLX: 291 985 LEO UR 

FAX: 213/212-6106 



MEMORY EXPANSION CHIPS 



RANDOM ACCESS MEMORY 

PRICE EACH SET OF 8 SET OF 9 



4164-150ns . 
4164.200ns I 64K 
4128.150ns (IBM/AT) 
41256 150ns|256K 
HM6116P-3 



1.80 
13.65 
750 
3.50 



$14.40 
$15.20 



$80.00 
$28.00 



$ 16.20 
$ 17.10 
$122.85 
$ 67.50 



EPROMS 

2716 

2732 

2764 

27128 

27256 



PRICE 
$ 2.60 
$ 3.50 
$ 4.50 
$ 7.00 
$15.00 



WE NOW CARRY: 

Disk drives. Power supplies. 
384K Multifunction boards. 
Color/graphic boards, and 
more. . , 
CALL FOR BROCHURE 




fflT mflRYfTlflC ,NDUSTRIES INC 

800-231-3680 

Radio Shack TRS-80's 
Epson Printers 

People you Trust to give you the very best! 



• Lowest 
Discount 
Prices 

• Reliable 
Service 

• Quality 
Products 



'World's largest independent authorized Tandy dealer!' 

22511 Katy Fwy., Katy (Houston) Texas 77450 
(713) 392-0747 Telex 774132 







Inquiry 1 29 



Inquiry 2U 



Inquiry 223 



The Statistician 



CPM IBM-PC 
TRS-DOS XENIX 



Multiple Regression 

Stepwise 

Ridge 

All Subsets 

Backward Elimination 
Time Series Analysis 
Descriptive Statistics 
Transformations 



* Survey Research 

* Nonparametrics 

* X-Y Plots 
*AN O/A 

* Random Samples 

* Data Base 

* Search & sort 

* Hypothesis tests 



Please call TOLL FREE 
1-800-334-0854 (Ext. 814) 



Q 



for more information 

or write: 

Quant Systems 

Box 628 

Charleston, SC 29402 

VISA-M/C Accepted 



=S DataI 


— i 



Lifetime Warranty- 1 00% Certified 

TREE 1 DELIVERY 



5V4" $105 



i 



P»c*»d top* Soil P»c* 



5 1 A" $125 

SINGLE SIDE I u 

siHtii f density ■ ^arri 



5V4" $165 

ooueu density ■ each 



BULK 
SSSD 



89L 



I&5 $107 

Zticif. ■ each 



BULK 
DSDD 



$1 42 h 

I each 



24 Hour Order Desk 

1-800-634-2248 



TOLL 
FREE 
NATL. 



Visa. MasterCard. Cert, chk., M/O. COD. cash. 

Get immediate shipment. SchooIsS govt, on P.O. #. 

Personal or company checks held 14 days. 

APO. FPO Can. and other non-UPS delivered, add S5. 



Software Services 

132323idSUeelSouin SuileC Fargo, ND58103 1-701-280 



3M Diskettes 
Lifetime Warranty 



TIRED OF WAITING 
FOR SERVICE AND PRICE? 

9 out of 10 SURVEYED 
DISK BUYERS PREFERRED 

NORTH HILLS 

#1 IN SERVICE AND PRICE 

1-800-328-3472 

Formatted and hard sectored disks 
in stock-Dealer inquiries invited. 

COD, VISA, MASTERCARD 
All orders shipped within 24 hrs. 



AA4 



m 



NORTH HILLS CORP. 
INTERNATIONAL 

3564 Rolling View Dr. 

White Bear Lake, MN. 55110 

MR call collect— 61 2-770-0485 



Inquiry 296 



Inquiry 328 



PRINTER RIBBONS 



PRICE 



PER PER 
RIBBON DOZEN 



ANADEX 9500 10.50 109.80 

APPLE DMP 5.50 58.80 

BROTHER HR-15/25 MS 5.95 68.40 

C. IT0H PROWRITER 5.50 58.80 

COMMODORE MPS-801 8.00 90.00 

EPSON MX-FX 70/80 5.00 48.00 

EPSON MX-FX 100 6.95 75.00 

EPSON LQ-1500 9.75 111.00 

GEMINI 10-10X-15-15X 2.50 23.40 

IBM/IDS 4-C0L0R 15.75 180.00 

IDS MICROPRISM480 5.75 58.80 

NEC -3500 M/S Non Flip 6.25 69.00 

NEC -3500 NYLON 9.00 96.00 

NEC - 8023A 5.50 58.80 

0KIDATA 80/82/83/92 2.50 23.40 

RADIO SHACK DMP-2100 7.50 87.00 

RADIO SHACK LP VI & VIII .... 5.75 58.80 

RITEMAN 8.50 96.00 

SILVER REED EX 550 M/S 8.50 90.00 

SILVER REED EX 550 NYLON .... 6.95 75.00 

TALLY SPIRIT - 80 M/S 7.50 84.00 

TALLY - MT-160 8.00 90.00 

TALLY - MT-180 8.50 96.00 

TOSHIBA - 1350/1351 7.50 87.00 

Add $3.00 Ship. & Hand. — To Order Call 

Toll Free 1-800-742-1122 

In Ml (313) 569-3218 or Write for our Catalog 

DWIGHT COMPANY, INC. 

15565 Northland Drive - West Tower 
Southfield, Michigan 48075-6496 



DATA ACQUISITION 

and control for ANY computer 




The Model 1232 communicates via RS-232, 
and has 8 analog inputs (±4 VDC; 12 bits), 
8 digital inputs and outputs, and a 2000 
point buffer. Suitable for field data logging 
or lab use, the 1232 costs only $690. The 
8-bit system (0-5 VDC) is $490. Detailed 
manual, $6. Phone our applications 
engineer at 617-899-8629 or write: 



STARBUCK w w 

DATA COMPANY 'T"T' 



** 



Inquiry 134 



225 Crescent St., Waltham, MA 02154 



Inquiry 340 



r v 



WESOME 

TECHNOLOGY, INC. 



Poor Man's TopView" 
"MULTIPLE CHOICE" Provides: 

A) Screen switching under DOS 

B) Up to 8 programs in memory 

C) Efficient memory use -run 123 
with WordStar in 256K 

D) Data transfer screen snapshot 
v/E) All of the above available NOW 

Multiple Choice is only $64 and runs on IBM 

PC/XT/AT/clones 

For Information, Call (408) 646-1384 

AWESOME TECHNOLOGY, INC. 

177WebsterSt. Ste. A-416 

Monterey, CA 93940 

Order Toll Free (VISA/MC) 
Outside CA (800) 548-2255 Ext 803 
Inside CA (BOO) 624-2644 Ext 803 
Top View is a trademark of IBM Corporation 



Inquiry 45 



IBM PC SPECIALS! 



IBM PC, 256K, One Half Height 
320K Disk Drive DS/DD, Persyst 
Color Card With Printer Port, 
Taxan Green Monitor, DOS 2.1 , 
PLUS a 10MB Hard Disk Sub 
System All For: 

$2599. 



IBM PC, 256K, Two Half Height 
Drives DS/DD, Persyst Color Card 
With Printer Port, Taxan Green 
Monitor, DOS 2.1, 130 Watt Power 
Supply, 10MB Hard Disk Sub 
System, PLUS 10MB Tape Back 
Up System All For: 

$3499. 



MONITORS 



AMDEK 300 Green 

AMDEK 300 Amber 

AMDEK 310 Amber W/TTL Plug. 

PGS HX-12 

PGS MAX-12 

PGS SR-12 



TAXAN #115 Green Composit 

TAXAN #116 Amber Composit 

TAXAN #121 Green W/TTL Plug_ 
TAXAN #122 Amber W/TTL Plug . 
TAXAN #425 COLOR MONITOR . 
TAXAN #440 COLOR MONITOR . 
IBM MONOCHROME DISPLAY _ 
IBM COLOR DISPLAY 



.$135.00 
.$149.00 
.$165.00 
. $465.00 
.$185.00 
. $625.00 
.$125.00 
.$135.00 
.$149.00 
. $159.00 
. $449.00 
. $569.00 
. $260.00 
. $590.00 



PRINTERS 



OKIDATA182 

OKIDATA192 

OKIDATA193 

OKIDATA 83A 

OKIDATA92P 

OKIDATA 93P 

OKIDATA 84P 

OKIDATA 2350P- 
OKIDATA 2410P_ 
NEC 3550 



NECPINWRITER8OC0I. _ 
NECPINWRITER130COI. 

EPSON LX 80 

EPSON FX 80 

EPSON FX 100 

EPSON RX 100 

EPSON JX 80 

EPSON LQ 1500 

COMREX CR 420 

TOSHIBA 351 



STAR MICRONICS SG 10 _ 
STAR MICRONICS SG 15 _ 
CITIZEN PRINTER MSP-10 _ 
CITIZEN PRINTER MSP-15_ 
CITIZEN PRINTER MSP-20 _ 
CITIZEN PRINTER MSP-25. 

JUKI LQ 6100 

JUKI LQ 6300 

BROTHER HR-25 

BROTHER HR-35 

DYNAX DX 15XL 



_ $235.00 
_ $385.00 
_ $599.00 
_ $555.00 
_ $385.00 
_ $599.00 
_ $725.00 
.$1925.00 
.$1899.00 
.$1550.00 
_ $699.00 
_ $899.00 
_ $249.00 
_ $399.00 
_ $525.00 
_ $399.00 
_ $525.00 
_ $925.00 
.$1895.00 
.$1275.00 
_ $259.00 
_ $395.00 
_ $375.00 
_ $585.00 
_ $545.00 
_ $740.00 
_ $425.00 
_ $745.00 
_ $665.00 
_ $895.00 
_ $389.00 




MiiMMIl 1 




IBM PC, 256K, Two Half Height 
Drives DS/DD, Persyst Color Card 
With Printer Port, Taxan Green 
Monitor, DOS 2.1 , 130 Watt Power 
Supply PLUS a 10MB Hard Disk 
Sub System All For: 

$2899. 



MODEMS 



HAYES SMART MODEM 1200_ 
HAYES SMART MODEM 300_ 
HAYES 1200B PLUG IN CARD . 
HAYES 2400 BAUD MODEM _ 

POP COM 1200 EXTERNAI 

AST REACH MODEM 

QIC MODEM INTERNAI 



. $459.00 
. $209.00 
. $399.00 
. $714.00 
. $375.00 
. $389.00 
. $275.00 



DRIVES 


tanddn TM-100-? ns/nn 


$ isfi.on 


TOSHIBA SI IMI INE DS/DD 


$139 nn 


TEAC SI IMI INE DS/DD 


$139 nn 




HARD DISKS 



10MB SUB SYSTEM INTERNAL- 
EXTERNAL _ 

20MB SUB SYSTEM INTERNAL- 
EXTERNAL _ 

40MB SUB SYSTEM INTERNAL- 
EXTERNAL _ 



_ $750.00 
_ $925.00 
_ $975.00 
.$1150.00 
.$1295 00 
.$1475.00 



HARD DISKS & TAPE BACK-UP UNITS 
(EXTERNAL) 



10MB HARD DISK 

W/10MB TAPE BACK UP . 
20MB HARD DISK 

W/10MB TAPE BACK UP . 
40MB HARD DISK 

W/10MB TAPE BACK UP. 



.$1795.00 



IBM PC, 256K, Two Half Height 
Drives DS/DD, Persyst Color Card 
With Printer Port, Taxan Green 
Monitor, DOS 2.1 , 130 Watt Power 
Supply, 20MB Hard Disk Sub 
System All For: 

$3299. 



IBM PC, 256K, Two Half Height 
Drives DS/DD, Persyst Color Card 
With Printer Port, Taxan Green 
Monitor, DOS 2.1 , 1 30 Watt Power 
Supply, 20MB Hard Disk Sub 
System, PLUS 10MB Tape Back 
Up System All For: 

$3899. 



MULTIFUNCTION BOARDS 



AST I/O MINI CARD, 1-SER 

AST SIX PACK 64K, 1-SER., 1-PAR. 
AST PREVIEW 



AST ADVANTAGE CARD 
128K FOR AT 



ALR CHALLENGER CARD 
128K FOR AT 



PERSYST COLOR 

PRINTER ADAPTER 

PERSYST MONOCHROME 

PRINTER ADAPTER 

PERSYST BOB CARD 

HERCULES COLOR 

PRINTER ADAPTER 

HERCULES GRAPHIC 

PRINTER ADAPTER 



STB GRAPHIC PLUS II 

IBM COLOR GRAPHIC ADAPTER 

IBM MONO PRINTER ADAPTER 

GENOA SPECTRUM GRAPHIC CARD 

ORCHID TURBO-186, 128K 

ORCHID DAUGHTER 
TURBO-186, 128K 



.$150.00 
. $265.00 
. $309.00 

. $495.00 

. $395.00 

.$179.00 

. $199.00 
. $395.00 

.$179.00 

. $325.00 
. $325.00 
. $225.00 
. $230.00 
$349.00 
$975.00 

$219.00 



GENERAL 



.$1250.00 

MAXELL DISKETTES MD2_ 
. $1475.00 MAXELL MD2-HDM FOR AT_ 



. $35.00/box 
. $65.00/box 
CONTROL DATA DISKETTES _$30.00/box 
KEYTRONIC KEYBOARD KB 5151 $189.00 



Many other products available, Please call for Low, Low Prices! 




(714) 838-7530 

2640 Walnut Avenue, Unit K, Tustin, California 92680 

Prices & availability subject to change without notice - IBM is a registered trademark of IBM Corporation 



Inquiry 245 for End-Users. Inquiry 246 for DEALERS ONLY. 



JULY 1985 'BYTE 425 



LOW COST 1 7 N X V K K S A T, 
E ( E ) P-ROM PROGRAMMER 




* SUPPORTS: (EPHOMS) 2516 THRU 64, 2716 THRU 512, 
27C16 THRU 128, 68732 THMJ 66 (EEPROMS) 52B13 
THRU 33, 2816A THRU 64A (MICROS) 8711 THRU 491) 

* NO PERSONALITY MODULES, ONBOARD POWER SUPPLY 

* RS232C INTERFACE, XON-XOFF, RTS, CTS, DTR 

* ACCEPTS KEYBOARD ENTRY WITH LINE EDITING 

* ACCEPTS ASCII, INTEL, AND MOTOROLA FORMATS 

* USER FRIENDLY MONITOR FOH I/O DEBUGGING 

* FAST PROGRAf-WING SUPPORTED: 2764 UNDER 3 MIN. 

* LOW/HIGH BYTE PROGRAMMING FOR 16 BIT DATA PATH 

* BYTE, BLOCK, OR CHIP ERASE ( EEPHOMS ONLY) 

* LIST IN INTEL OR MOTOROLA HEX FORMAT 

* VERIFY PROGRAM AND VERIFY BLANK COWANDS 

* 1409-01: 4K FIRMWARE, PCH, XFORMER, DOC $90.00 

* 1409-02: 1409-01 + FULL SET OF PARTS $200.00 

* 1409-03: ASSEMBLED AND TESTED UNIT $300.00 

* 1409-11: 8K FIRMWARE, FCR, XFOIWKR, DOC $125.00 

* 1409-12: 1409-11 + FULL SET OK PARTS $250.00 

* 1409-13: ASSEMBLED AND TESTED UNIT $350.00 

* COMMUNICATION DRIVERS FOR MOST PC'S $35.00 

B8.C MICROSYSTEMS 

6322 MOJAVE DR, SAN JOSE. CA 95120 
Tel. (408)997-7685, 1WX 4995363 



m 



<flrtf Sure 
ifls insured? 

SAFEWARE® Insurance provides full 
replacement of hardware, media and 

purchased software. As little as $39/yr. covers: 
• Fire • Theft • Power Surges 

• Earthquake • Water Damage • Auto Accident 

For information or immediate coverage call: 

1-800-848-3469 

hi Ohio c all 1-614-262 -0559 

SAFEWARE, The Insurance Agency Inc. 



A New Text Editor 

for the DEC® Rainbow® 
and IBM® PC 

• Edit many files at once 

• Memory mapped video display 

• Buffered input 

• Context sensitive help 

• Undo deletions 

• Create, edit & save scratch buffers 

• Powerful buffei operations 

• Keystroke macros 

• Easily reconfigurable 

• Fast, Small for Its power (38K) 

• Utilizes all memory available 

• Not copy protected 

• Much more 

Also included: A speller with a 25000+ wot<J 
expandable dictionary, and a text formatter 
redefinable to familiar commands. 
DEC: Both MS-DOS* & CP/M®, manual 
IBM & compatibles: MS-DOS version, manual 

$49.95 M/C, Visa accepted 

Plus $3 shipping. 1A res add 4% sales tax. 

Orders: 1-800-227-2400 ext 975 

1-800-772-2666 ext 975 (within CA) 

College Software • 911 Clark Avenue 

Ames, 1A 50010 • (515)233-4023 



Inquiry 311 



Inquiry 83 



64K & 256K 

DRAMS 

8087-3 

8087-2 

B I T T N € R 




eiecraoNics 

1287 CLIFF DRIVE 

SUITE ONE 

LAGUNA BEACH, CA 92651 

(714)497-4910 






8051/52 DEVELOPMENT BOARD 

8051-Based Single-Board Computer with 

Monitor/Debugger 

■4 28-pin byte-wide 

sockets; monitor will 
program EEPROMS. 
■Perfect for System 
Development and 
^^ ^^^ Educational Applications 

M IBS S335 
^Binary Technology 



J P.O. BOX 67 • MERIDEN, NH 03770 ■ 603/469 3232 



*TM 



48tpi and/or ybP . . _ ^ 

. SYSTEM SUPPUr n ^^ 

.sSSs , .rjr.:;-: : s 

60069 ■ 13^P J - ||# 

•If**!*?* 



Inquiry 53 



Inquiry 52 



Inquiry 125 



IBM AT 3Mb 
COMBO CARD 

WTIH LIFETIME WARRANTY* 




The AT Multifunction Card that can give you up to 
3Mb of added memory plus added I/O features. 

Expandable f torn 128K to 3Mb. Add memoty as you need it. • IBM AT Compat- 
ible ' Parallel Port • Serial Port • Spooler « Supports IBM VDISK • User 
Upgradable • Parity Checking Standard • Split Memory Addressing. 

Complete with 128K RAM, Serial and Parallel Port $449 

AT RAM Expansion Card (010 $129 

Additional RAM available at our low prices. OTHER ADD ONS 384 K 
RAM/ Clock. 512K RAM Card, Spoolers, RAM Cards for PPCs and more 



ApparotJnc. 



ADO ON AND ON AND ON AND ON AND ON 

4401 So. Tamarac Parkway / Denver, CO 80237 / 303/741-1778 

ORDERING AND DEALER INFORAIATON 

800/525-7674 

Stores in tenvw & Chicago / *0n all cards sold after June 1, 1984 



NEC PRINTERS 



2050 $ 625 

3550 $ 990 

8850 $1400 

2010/15/30 $ 625 

3510/15/30 $ 990 

8810/15/30 $1400 

Elf 360 $ 399 

Pinwriter P-2 $ 490 

(w/lnterface & Tractor) 

Pinwriter P-3 $ 690 

(w/lnterface & Tractor) 
Terms: PREPAID - FREE FREIGHT!! 

QUALITY PRINTERS 
8415 Cement City Rd. 
Brooklyn, Michigan 49230 
Phone: 517-592-3749 



DOS UTILITIES 

Attrib* - set/reset file attributes 

Crypt - file encryption 

DSort - sort directory files 

Find* * find strings in files 

Log - log computer usage for IRS 

Move* - rename across directories 

Tree - disk/file usage statistics 
* supports DOS wildcards 

SEE - Full screen editor: 

supports optional microsoft mouse; 
block pick, put, cut, paste; search 
1000 wps; single & global replace; 
multiple windows & files; center, 
justify; spell check, correct 300 wps 
from supplied + user dictionary; 
32000 lines/file, 32000 chars/line; 
Instruction course included. 

$49 for all 8 programs 

$79 unprotected 
Visa/MC - CA add 6% sales tax 

California Scientific Software 

25642 Hazelnut, El Toro, CA 92630 
(714) 581-7654 



Inquiry 35 



Inquiry 295 



Inquiry 70 



PRIORITY M ELECTRONICS 



ONE 



Paradise 5 PACK 

MULTIFUNCTION 
CARD FOR IBM PC" 

With 084K! 

• One Serial Port 

• Clock Calendar with 

battery backup 

• RAM disk software 

• Print Spooler software 

BSPAR5PACK384 

Memory shipped 

uninstalled 




$249 



SURGE SUPPRESSORS 

Don't lot power spikes pull you 
down! Protect your equipment 
from All angles 

AC Power line RS232 Telephone/ 

With 6 outlets Serial Modem 

BSWBRDG115S BSPRISP25MF BSPRITELSSW 

Sh.Wt.2lbs. Sh.Wt.1lb. Sh.Wt.1lb. 



YOUR 
CHOICE 



$29.95 



each 



150VA&300VA 
Line Conditioners 

Better Than A Surge Suppressor! 

Provides both surge and noise supresslon 
along with brownout protection as well! 

150VA OOOVA 

Great for Your PC! Great for Your XT! 


$99 

BSSHP150 

Sh.Wt.15lbs. 


$139 

BSSHP300 

Sh.Wt.30lbs. 



20Mbyte Add-On Hard 

Disk For Your IDM PC ™ 

and Compatibles 

Comes Complete With Half High 
Disk Drive, Controller, and Cobles 

INTERNAL EXTERNAL 
$899 $1099 

BSPRIPCSUB20I BSPRIPCSUB20X 
Include $5.00 (Internal), $9.00 (External) lor Shipping 




Speed Computer Operations 
By As Much As 3500%!!! 

VIASYN/CompuPix> 
M-Drive @ /H™ 512K 

S-100 Disk Emulation Card 

Lin prtce: $549. ea 

$695.00 9 AJ 
BS6BTA072 2 OT MOre 
Sh. Wt. 2lbs $499 



Memory Expansion 
iSue rChip Sets 
64K 256K 

Set of 9 = 64K Set of 9 = 256K 

$14.95 $69. 



BSPDBIBMMEM9 
Set ol 36 = 256K 



BSPDB256MEM9 
Set ol36 = 1 Meg 



BSP0BIBMMEM36 BSPDB258MEM36 

CALL for QUANTITY PRICING 



Disk Drive Cabinets 


from JMR Electronics 


Part Number 


Description 


Price 


BSJMR1C5 


5V4" Sgl Floppy 5lbs. 


$ 59. 


BSJMR2C5 


5V4" Dbl Floppy 9lbs. 


$ 89. 


BSJMR2C5C 


JMR2C5 with data cable 


$ 99. 


BSJMR2SV5 


Dual 5V4" V?H\ Flpy 7lbs. 


$ 85. 


BSJMR2C8 


Dual B" Floppy 35lbs. 


$229. 


BSJMRDTCB 


Dual 8" V 2 Hi Floppy 12lbs $179. 


BSJMRHDC51 


Sgl 5V4" Hard Disk 16lbs. 


$199. 


BSJMRHDC51HH Sgl 574" V? Hi Hard 16lbs. 


$199. 


BSJMRHDC52 


Dual 5V4" Hrd Dsk 20lbs. 


$299. 



D & K Precision 1560 
Dual Trace 100MHz Scope 



BSBKP1580 




List Price 

$1595.00 60AC 

Sh.Wt.25lbs. <^W*TW 

You Save $700.00!!! 




5Y4" Double Sided Double 
Density Diskettes 

$1.20 $1.00 950 

Each h Packs Each In Packs Each In Packs 

of 50 0(250 0(1000 

$1.20x50= $1.00x250= 950x1000 = 

$60.00/pack $250.00/pack 950.00/pack 

BS5DS50 2lbs. BS5DS25Q 8lbs BS5DS1000 30lbs 



Shugart SA604 
5Mbyte Hard Disk 

ST506 Compatible! 



BSSHU804 
Sh.Wt. 9lbs. 

BSSHU604M Manual 



$15.00 



Inquiry 285 



PRIORITY 




ELECTRONICS 






■■■ 9151 Deenng Ave.. Chotsv^rth, CA 9B11-5B6/ 
ORDER TOLL FREE (600) 423-5922, Local: Colo) 709-51 1 1 

MINIMUM PREPAID ORDER S25.00. Terms U.S. VISA, MC, BAG, Check, Money Order, U.S. Funds ONLY. CA residents add 6%, 6 $&%, or 7% Sales 
Tax, depending on your local rates. Include MINIMUM SHIPPING & HANDLING of $3.00 for the first 3 lbs., plus 40C for each additional pound (20C if 
within California) Plus 25C per S1 00.00 value of your order for Insurance. Orders over 70 lbs. sent freight collect. Just in case, include your phone 
number. Prices subject to change without notice. We will do our best to maintain prices through July 1985. Credit card orders will be charged 
appropriate freight. We are not responsible for typographical errors. 



ORDER TOLL FREE (800)423-5922 - CA, AK, HI CALL (818) 709-51 1 1 




A word lor this Punch/Reader Combo is 



Speed! Model 510 punches paper tape at 110cps, 
reads at 150cps. This rugged machine is computer 
compatible offering RS232C, current loop, parallel 
inputs. The ASCII-to-Baudot code conversion per- 
mits direct keyboard entry for Telex/TWX transmis- 
sion. Plus: 256 character storage. 75-9600 baud 
rate, 5-8 level tape, stock. ADDMASTER CORR 416 
Junipero Serra Dr., San Gabriel, CA 91776 • 
818/285-1121. 



""""Heath 
Users 




Double Your 
5%" disk storage 
capacity without adding a drive. 

Get twice as much from your H88 or 
H89 microcomputer. Our FDC-880H 
floppy disk controller, in conjunction 
with your 5 1 /" drives, for example, 
expands memory capacity from 256 
bytes to 512 bytes per sector. 

And it handles single and double- 
sided, single and double-density, 8" and 
5 1 /" drives — simultaneously. 



Ol 



CD.R. Systems inc. 
Controlled Data Recording Systems Inc. 
7210 Oairmont Mesa Blvd., San Diego, CA 92111 

(619) 560-1272 



M PC/XT USERS! 




M COGTREE Utilities by 




Cogitate SI 29.95 




# LYNC by Norton-Lamber SI 99.95 




M DATAFLEX by Data Access . . . Varies 




f RM/COBOL by Ryan/ 




McFarland Varies 




# Universe by Omnitrend . . . . S 98.50 




* Blue Mac! by Cogitate S 599.00 




# CadPower + by Trilex S 995.00 




M Softext Teaching Aids S 95.00 




M PrintSet by Cogitate S 79.95 




-T CogiTAPE by Cogitate CALLU 




f Anti-Static Products Varies 




J~ Uninterruptible Power 




Backups Varies 




J~ TeleVideo Software CALLI! 




ElifWIE 




'A Higher Form of Software" 




24000 Telegraph Road 




Southfleld. Ml 48034 




(313) 352-2345/Telex 386581 




VISA/MASTERCARD ACCEPTED 




Dealer Inquiries Welcomed 





Inquiry 15 



Inquiry 75 



Inquiry 81 



DATA ACQUISITION TO GO 

INTERFACE FOR ANY COMPUTER 




Connects via RS-232. Built-in BASIC. 
Stand alone capability. Expandable. 
Battery Option. Basic system: 16 ch. 
12 bit A/D, 2 ch. D/A, 32 bit Digital I/O. 
Expansion boards available. Direct 
Bus units for many computers. 

SPECIALISTS IN PORTABLE APPLICATIONS 

(201) 299-1615 

P.O. Box 246, Morris Plains, NJ 07950 



ELEXOR 




Solve your dbc problem* buy 1 00% mai ace 
tested 0yaafl Jah^ba AD order* ahtjiped 
from stock, wUfcfci 24 houm Call toll FREE 
(800) 2354137 for prices and fc nfown an on . 
VW and Maater Card accepted. 



PACIFIC 
EXCHANGES 

100 Foothill Blvd. 
San Luis Obispo. CA 
93401. (In Cat call 
(805)543-1037 





33fc». 



$495 W^ 

PC MOTION™ Control Board 

IRM PP/YT compatible stepper motor 
IDIfl r U/ A I control plug-in board 

• 4 Axis stepper motor controller interface 

• 32 digital I/O with (5) interrupts 

• 4 channels encoder pulse inputs 

• Includes real time interrupt-driven easy to 
use software 

Smart board for Industrial and Robotic 
motion control that uses only a small 
percentage of cpu time. System needs only 
simple BASIC commands from application 
software. 

— 100's ol satisfied customers 

use our products — 

***30-day money back guarantee*** 



PnrrPQ I ARQ TeL ( 714 ) 751-0442 
ROGERS LABS Te| ' ex 681393 

2727 Croddy Way #E, Santa Ana, CA 92704 



Inquiry 137 



Inquiry 272 



Inquiry 304 



Electronic 

Circuit 

Analysis 

• New release 

• Transient, AC, DC analysis 

• Full nonlinear 

• Over 200 nodes 

• Full editing 

• Macro circuits 

• Worst case, Monte-Carlo 

• Temperature effects 

• Frequency dependent parts 

• Time dependent parts 

For MS-DOS. 128k minimum. 
$395.00 

Tatum Labs 
P.O. Box 698 
Sandy Hook, CT 06482 
(203) 426-2184 



Erases Most Eproms 
in 3 Minutes ^ 




Solid State 2-8 Min. 

Timer Version $54.95 

For all 24 or 28 pin devices— 2 at a time. 

90 DAY WARRANTEE SHIPPING & HANDLING 
DEALERS WELCOME M R ||i» NTS 

. ... ^.^ ^-.^ ADD6%TAX 

WdLLIMG CO. 



4401 S . JUNIPER • TEMPE, A2 85282 • (602) 838-1277 



SUPERCOPY 
FOR IBM PC 

Powerful utility copier, it allows making of 
backups of any diskette for IBM PC and com- 
patibles. 

Very compact, it replaces the Diskcopy 
without virtually losing any space. Its menu 
offers easy access to functions such as pro- 
tection against copies from a diskette; anal- 
ysis diagnosis; parameter modification and 
erasing of the target diskette. 

Available in English, French and Spanish 
with instructions included in the diskette. 

Frequently updated, its price is $30 each 
or $15 for orders of ten or more. This product 
is provided for the purpose of enabling you 
to make archival copies only. 

N.Y. residents add sales tax. 
Send check or money order to: 

Yet i ware 

P.O. Box 1368 

New York, NY 10025 

212-222-6682 

IBM PC is a trademark of IBM Corporation. 

WE WANT DEALERS. 



Inquiry 349 



Inquiry 376 



Inquiry 384 



LOWEST PRICES 
OF THE SUMMER 



PRINTERS 

OKIDATA 

MLl82P120cps 229 

ML 182 IBM Graphics Comp 229 

ML182S 10" Carriage 279 

ML83A, 15" Para. & Ser 545 

ML192P, 160cps 359 

ML192 IBM Graphics Comp 359 

ML192S,160cps 465 

ML193P,160cps 579 

ML193IBM GraphicsComp 579 

ML193S, 160cps 599 

ML84P,200cps 669 

ML84IBM 669 

ML84S, 200 cps 769 

STAR MICRONICS 

SG-10, 120cps,2Kbuffer $ 239 

SG-15, 120cps,2K buffer 389 

SD-10, 160 cps, 10" carriage 369 

SD-15, 160cps r Core Qual 479 

SB-10 Draft & NLQ24wireprinthead 799 
EPSON 

LX80, 100 cps, 1 0" carriage Call 

FX80 + , 160 cps, 10"carriage Us 

RX100,100cps, 15" carriage First 

FX100 + ,160cps, 15" carriage For 

LQ1500DraUNLQ Lowest 

SQ2000, All New Prices 

*We Are An Authorized Dealer 
C. ITOH 

Prowriter8510AP + , 120cps $ 329 

Prowriter8510SP, 180cps 399 

Prowriter I1 1 550 P, 15" 120cps 435 

Prowriterll1550BCD,15"120cps .. 499 

1550SP,180cps 525 

StarwriterF10-40PU,40cps 949 

Print master F10-55PU, 55 cps 1 029 

DYNAX 

DX15XL,20cps By Brother $ 379 

JUKI 
6100,L.Q.18cpsw/proportionalspc.$ 379 

6300 689 

TOSHIBA 

P1340P $ 595 

P1340S 595 

P351 P, Faster than 1351 1 275 

P351 P/S, Fasterand MoreVersatile 1325 

PANASONIC 

1091 w/Tractor,120cps,1yr. war. . .$ 279 

1092 439 

1093 669 

HARD DISK DRIVES 

RODIME 

10Megw/Cont.,1yr.warr. $ 650 

SEAGATE 

10 Meg w/Cont., 1 yr. warr $ 679 

ALPHA OMEGA 

10Megw/ControllerCard $ 699 

20Megw/ControllerCard 1099 

33MegvWControllerCard 1395 

DISK DRIVES 

TANDON 

TM100-2forlBMPC $ 95 

QUME 

V 2 Ht. ds/dd360K, 100% IBM Comp. . . $ 85 

TEAC 

55B Double Sided 360K $ 99 

Quad Density 159 

Drives For Apple & Franklin 
MICRO-SCI 

A-2 $ 169 

A.5Cfor Hew/cable 179 

A.5 1 / 2 height forllE 189 

Controller Add 55 



PRINTER 
ACCESSORIES 

ORANGE MICRO 

Grappler + $ 85 

Buffered Grappler + , 16Kexp.64K . 155 

TOSHIBA 

Bi-DirectionalTrac. 1351/351 . . .$ 149/155 

Font Disk forDown loading P1351 . . 50 

MICROTEK 

Dumpling GX(sameasGrappler +) $ 69 

Dumpling GX w/16K buffer 135 

Dumpling GXw/32K buffer 147 

Additional Buffering 16K 12 

FOURTH DIMENSION 

Par.Card& Cable for Apple $ 47 

OKIDATA 

Plug and Play for IBM $ 49 

Tractor for 82A& 92 49 

JUKI 

Bl-Direc. Tractor for6100/6300 .$ 125/135 

Serial Interface 65 

CABLES 

IBM PC to Parallel Printer $ 18 

SerialCable 18 

Centronics M/M or M/F 18 



DISPLAY MONITORS 

QUADRAM 

Amberchrome IBM compatible $ 165 

AMDEK 

V300G $ 125 

V300A 135 

V310AforlBMPC 159 

Color 500 Color Composite 339 

Color600 RGB Hi-Res 429 

Color710 Super Hi-Res 545 

TAXAN 

IBM Green Monochrome#121 $ 129 

IBM Amber Monochrome #122 139 

RGBIBMw/CableRGBComp 429 

RGB Super Hi-Res. #415 393 

RGBSuperHi-Res. #440 Best Buy . . 499 

RGB/Comp. Med. Res. #210 259 

PRINCETON GRAPHICS 

HX-12 for use with IBM PC $ 445 

Max12EAmberforlBM 179 

SR 12Super Hi-Res 565 

Scan Doubler 185 

X-TRON 

AG-12, 1000 x 450 H i-Resw/tlt. swvl. . $ 130 
AA-12, 1000 x450 Hi-Res w/tlt. swvl. . 135 




13 


m 




» 


"XT' 


Tsrapn: 


■ 


K 


H^M 


IBM PC 


COMPAQ DESK TOP 


• 256K of Memory 


• One Drive 


• Two V* Height Drives 


• 256K of Memory w/Par. Port 


• Color Graphics Card 


• 10 Meg Hard Disk 


• Taxan Green Monitor 


• Taxan Green or Amber 


S1750 


$2450 


IBM PC XT 




• 256K of Memory 


COMPAQ DESK TOP 


• One IBM Floppy 


• 640K of Memory 


• 10 Meg. Hard Disk 


• Two Disk Drives 


• Color Card 


• 10 Meg Hard Disk 


• Taxan #425 RGB Hi-Res & 


• Taxan Green or Amber 


Comp. Gr. 


• Epson LX80 w/Cable 


$3190 


S2995 


"THE COMPANY THAT DELIVERS" 



IBM PC ACCESSORIES 



IBM 

IBMDos3.0 $ 69 

Tech Ref.f or Dos 2.1 or3.0 69 

PARADISE 

Modular Graphics Card $ 269 

ModuleA 79 

Module B 120 

165 




14 



i 199 
239 

349 



VUTEK (2 yr. war.) 

Vutek - CPS Board, RGB & Composite 

w/Par.&Ser.Ports,2Yr.War $ 239 

ColorCard(Herc. comp.)w/Para. ... 159 
Monographic Card (Here, comp.) . . . 269 
AST RESEARCH 

SixPak + w/64K $ 239 

Game Port 49 

KEYTRONICS 

KB5151 $ 179 

MICROTEK 

MonochromeTextPar.&Ser $ 185 

Color Graphics Card 165 

TECHMAR 

PCMate64Kexp. to256K $ 99 

PC Mate Mem. Brd. w/256K Installed 175 



5-Pak 

64K MEMORY UPGRADE 

64K(9chlps)200ns $ 

PERSYST BOARD 

Bob H i-Res Display Adaptor $ ; 

QUADRAM 

Quad Color 1 Board 3 

Exp. Quadboard w/64K & Game Port 
Quadlink3000 Run Apple sft on IBM 

APPLE & FRANKLIN ACCESSORIES 

ADVANCED LOGIC SYSTEMS 

ZEngine2.2 $ 119 

APPLE 

Super Serial Card $ 135 

ASTAR 

RF Modulator $ 17 

MICRO-SCI 

64K,80Col.Card $ 85 



ACCESSORIES 

Kensington SystemSaver $ 69 

Fan f orApple 1 1 & II E w/surge 37 

MICROTEK 

Serial Interface $ 75 

MICROMAX 

Viewmax 128K extended 80 col. card 

for Apple ME W/64K $ 124 

80co^ardforAppleim^^^^^139 






PERSONAL SYSTEMS 

APPLE 

Professional Sys. inch Apple HE w/128K & 
80 col., tilt mon., duo disk w/con't kit . $1345 

Apple lie Lightweight Portable Call 

IBM 

IBM PC Bare w/cont. & keyboard . . .$1345 

IBM PC64K.1 Drive 1475 

IBM PC, 2 Drives w/256K 1 599 

IBM XT, 10 Meg., 360K Dr. w/256 .... 2795 
IBM XT Barew/256K& IBM Floppy. . 2095 

Call About All "AT" Systems 
SANYO 

MBC550-2 w/1 320K Drive & sftwr. . . $ 750 
MBC 555-2 w/2 320K Drives & 

more software 990 

Portable Call 

Serial Port for Sanyo 79 

COMPAQ 

256K, w/2 -320K Drives $1975 

DeskTop Model 1 1725 

DeskTop Model 2 2150 

DeskTop Model 3 3795 

DeskTop Model 4 4495 

WYSE 

1100-1 incl. 256K w/two 360K Drives, 1 par 

& 2 ser. ports $1399 

1100-2 incl. 10 meg, 1 floppy, 256K, 1 par. & 

2 ser. ports 2599 

*Wyse Monitors & Exp. Chasis Available 

SOFTWARE 

LOTUS DEVELOPMENT CORP. 

Lotus1-2-3 $295 

Symphony 437 

ASHTON TATE 

DBasell $ 329 

DBase III 419 

PRINTER SWITCH BOX 

EXPONENT 

CentronicsTwoSwitch $ 84 

Centronics FourSwitch 110 

Serial Two Switch 75 

MODEMS 

ANCHOR 

MarkXIl $ 219 

VolksmodemXll 185 

Anchor Express Call 

HAYES MICRO 

300 BaudSmart Modem $ 189 

1200 BaudSmartModem 389 

1200BforlBMPCw/SMII 379 

2400 Baud Modem 645 

Micro Modem HE 259 

Chronograph 189 

300 For Apple lie w/Sftwr Call 

DISKETTES 

PC DISKETTES 

Sgl./Dbl.(Boxof 10) $ 16 

DbUDbl.(BoxoMO) 18 

COMPUTER CONNECTION 

Dbl./Dbl. (Box of 10) $ 16 

Sgl./Dbl. w/DiskContainer(10) 20 

Dbi./Dbl.w/Disk Container 20 

Bulk50& Up— Dbl./Dbl 1.35 ea. 

5 yr. warranty 



We Stock What We Sell! ! 

IF YOU SEE IT ADVERTISED FOR LESS, CALL 
COMPUTER CONNECTION FIRST FOR LOWEST QUOTE ! 



MAILORDER: 

1 71 21 S. Central Avenue, Unit L 
Carson, California 90746 






NO SURCHARGE FOR CREDIT CARDS 



We accept VISA, MasterCard, COD 
fw/deposit], Certified Checks or 
Wire Transfers. Minimum Shippi g 
Charge $4.00. Some items subject 
to back order. California Res. add 
GV*% Sales Tax. All returns are 
subject toa15% restocking charge 
and must be authorized by store 
manager within 10 days. Prices 
subject to change without notice. 
This Ad supersedes all others. 



ORDER LINE 
[800] 732-0304 

[Outside California] 

[213] 635-S8D9 

(Inside California) 
Mon.-Fri. 7 a.m. to 6 p.m. 
Saturday 11 a.m. to 3 p.m. 

CUSTOMER SERVICE: 
[213] 635-5065 
Mon.-Fri. 9 a.m. to 3 p.m. 



Inquiry 94 



JULY 1985 'BYTE 429 



BUILD YOUR IDEAS 

with tutsim: 

Design a real system 
model by simulation! 
TUTSIM allows you th 
power to model, con- 
duct experiments, eval 
uate strategies and 
much more. 
TUTSIM models: 

■ Control and 
Servo Systems 

■ Robotics 

■ Fluid Dynamics 

■ Batch Chemical Processes 

■ Biological Processes 

■ Thermodynamics 

Write or call for more information. 
For the IBM PC's and other micros. 
Short form $29.95 

AjpjpDfi@dl 8 

200 California Ave., #214 
Palo Alto, C A 94306 

(415) 325-4800 





VT100 $150 

* plus your 
PC, jr, XT, AT or compatible 



ZSTEMpc-VT100 Smart Terminal Emulator 

1 32-col. by windowing - no addit. hardware 

Double High Double Wide Characters 

Full VT100 line graphics. Smooth scrolling 

2-way file transfers incl. XMODEM and KERMIT 

Full keyboard softkeys/MACROS 

Speeds to 38.4KB. High Throughput 

Color/graphics, monochrome & EGA support 

International Font Support 

Single Key DOS Access 

ZSTEMpc-VT100 $150. ZSTEMpc-D200 $125. 

30 day money back guarantee. MC/VISA. 

KEA SYSTEMS LTD. 

#412 -2150 W.Broadway 

Vancouver, B.C. CANADA V6K 4L9 

Support (604) 732-7411 

Orders Toll Free (800) 663-8702 
Zstm by ICKA 



6800/6809 

Micro Modules 




OEM O8Q0/6809 MICROCOMPUTER 
MODULES for dedicated control arid 
monitoring. Interfaces for sensors* 
transducers, analog signals, 
solenoids, relays, tamps, pumps, 
motors, keyboards, displays, IEEE -486, 
serial I/O, floppy disks. 



wixtik 



IWinlek Corp. 
1801 South Street 
Lafayette, IN 47904 
317-742-8428 



Inquiry 36 



Inquiry 385 



Inquiry 381 



1 OH -> WINDOWS (for C) | 

OH->WINDOWS is a complete programl 
llibrary of window presentation and manipu-j 
[lation functions for use in C programs. 

Over 60 powerful primitives available to create, I 

fill. move, save and print windows with single I 

calls as simple as using Printf and Scanf 

Full color control and conversion for B&W| 

displays 

65 windows on four pages 

Detailed manual which fully describes all of the| 

available functions (examples provided) 

Runs on IBM. PC. XT. AT and all Compaq| 

models under DOS. 1.1. 2.X. and 3.0 

Minimum system overhead (4K-10K bytes) 

Works with Microsoft, Lattice, and C86 C | 

compilers. 

$74.95 (Visa. MC accepted) 
Demo available $5.00 
Call or Write SofTron. Inc. 
109 E. Scenic Dr. 
Pass Christian. MS 39571 
(800)824-3609 

Developed by 

CAB Concepts 



SAVE TIME AND MONEY WITH 
LOW COST PI-SWITCH BOXES. 

r-¥^ &-£ 

I -jj.fi Starting at $59.95 L^-J 

•Quickly shares your computer among 
multiple terminals, printers, moderns, etc. 
with just a flick of the wrist. 

•Compact black & beige aluminum 
enclosure features a high quality rotary 
switch with rear mounted connectors. 

•Serial RS 232 Models have fern. 25-Pin Conn. 
{Lines 1-7 & 20) 

PI-02-S switches 2 to 1 $59.95 

Pk03-S switches 3 to 1 79.95 

PI-05-S switches 5 to 1 109.95 

•Parallel models have fern. 36-Pin cent. conn. 

PI-02P switches 2 to 1 94.95 

PI-04-P switches 4 to 1 154.95 

•Dealers, schools & custom inquiries welcome. 

•One Year Warrantee, COD, VISA, M/C. 

•Shipping UPS $2.00/ea. AIR $4.00/ea 
7301 NW 41 St. 
i in/. MIAMI, FL 33166 
Lll irV (305) 592-6092 



CONVERSE ! T S COMPUTER 



Created at MIT in 1966. ELIZA has become the world s most celebrated 
artificial intelligence demonstration program. ELIZA is a non-directive 
psychotherapist who analyzes each statement as you type it in and then 
responds with her own comment or question— and her remarks are 
often amazingly appropriate! 

Designed to run on a large mainframe. ELIZA has never before been 
available to personal computer users except in greatly stripped down 
versions lacking the sophistication which made the original program s( 
fascinating 

Now, our new microcomputer version possessing the FULL power and 
range of expression of the original is being offered at the introductoiy 
price of only $25. And if you want to find out how she does it (or teach 
her to do more), we will include the complete SOURCE PROGRAM for 
only $20 additional 

Order your copy of ELIZA today and you II never again wonder how Ic 
respond when you hear someone say. Okay, let's see what this com- 
puter of yours can actually do 

ELIZA IS AVAILABLE IN THE FOLLOWING FORMATS: 

1 S'A inch disk (or the 48K Apple II, II Plus, lie or lie 
$25 for Prolected Version— $45 for Applesoft Source Version 



Please add $2 00 shipping and handling to all orders 
[California residents please add 6% sates tax) 

ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE RESEARCH GROUP 

921 North La JoHa Avenue, Dept. B 
Los Angeles. CA 90046 
-^=2 — I (213)656-7366 (213)654-2214 
MC. VISA and checks accepted 



A I 



S iESD 



Inquiry 321 



Inquiry 310 



Inquiry 40 



DOUBLE ~ 

TH E OPTION CAPAC 

OF YOUR IBfirl PERSONAL COMPUTER 



PC-XTRA 



• DIRECT EXTENSION OF 
ISM PC BUS 

• NO SOFTWARE CHANGES 

• NO HARDWARE MODIFICATION 

• STYLING CONSISTENT WITH IB 
Addali those special options that you've been! 
wanting without worrying aboul filling your' 
pfug-ln and back panel space 




DEALER INGO 

S 549 °°* F.O.B. SANTA ANA %* 

•CALIFpfiNSA RESIDE MS ADD $*e SALES TAX 

PC HORIZONS, INC. 

1701 E. Edinger, Ste. A6, Santa Ana, CA 92680 
(714) 953-5396 



maxell disks 

LIFETIME WARRANTY 



TIRED OF WAITING 
FOR SERVICE AND PRICE? 

9 out of 10 SURVEYED 
DISK BUYERS PREFERRED 

NORTH HILLS 

#1 IN SERVICE AND PRICE 

1-800-328-3472 

Formatted and hard sectored disks 
in stock-Dealer inquiries invited. 

COD, VISA, MASTERCARD 
All orders shipped within 24 hrs. 

AA4W 

NORTH HILLS CORP. 
INTERNATIONAL 

3564 Rolling View Dr. 

White Bear Lake, MN. 55110 

MN. call collect— 612-770-0485 



liil 



_^ FOR THE BEST OF US . 

■"■ THECVPHEIT 

A COMPLETE 68000 & ZBOA 
SINGLE BOARD COMPUTER SYSTEM 
WITH ULTRA-HIGH-RES GRAPHICS!! 




LOWER PRICES! NOW 1 MEGABYTE CYPHER AT $1 ,299.95 



MOTOROLA III INTEL 

; ' MOTEL COMPUTERS LIMITED 

174 9ETTY ANN DRIVE. WILLOWDALE. 

TORONTO. ONTARIO. CANADA MSN 1X6 

(410] 220-1727 



Inquiry 270 



Inquiry 252 





ESTABLISHED 1977 
Computer Systems 



Please call w/y our System Requirements so that we may 
quote the configuration that best fits your needs. 
CROMEMCO 10MHz 68000 UNIX-5 Systems 
CS-100H50X20E 2Mb ECC RAM 50Mb H.D. $13,849 
INTERCONTINENTAL MICRO SYSTEMS 12 User Hi- 
Speed 16 Bit System. Includes 1Mb Automatic Cache 
Buffer, Dual 8" Floppies. 25Mb Fixed and 25Mb 
Removable Hard Disk (Complete Back-Up in 5-Min.) 
256K Ram Per User, Turbodos 1.41, NewWord Word 
Processor, w/Spelling Checker & Merge Print $18,995 
MORROW MD3, MDT70 & HR15-XL Printer $1,595 
MORROW MD5, MDJ70 & HR15-XL Printer $2,125 
MORROW MD11, MDT70 & HR15-XL Printer $2,295 
MORROW PIVOT I & I1 1 1.5 LB Portable W/4 HR Battery 
IBM Compatability, Expansion Capability, S/W & More 
Call For Our Dual Drive Lumlcon Screen Special! 
MOTOROLA 16 User MEGAFRAME with Parallel 
Processing, UNIX System 5 & VAX 750 PWR. CALL 
PC-1 00 S-100's PC COM PA T. with Dual 5VT DRVS., P, S 
& G Ports. Clock-Cal/Batt. 8 Slots, Mono. Video CTRL, 
256K RAM, MS-DOS 2.1 & NewWordWordProc. Merge- 
Print & Spell Check $1,299 W/10Mb H.D. $1,749 

VIASYN 816/C-H40 w/ 5W'x8" FLPY'S $6,795 

VIASYN 816/10-H40 w/ Two 5'/«" FLPY'S $5,395 

CALL FOR OTHER SYSTEM CONFIGURATIONS 
ZENITH 150-PC COMPATIBLE SEE patsf 397 



S-100 Bus Boards 



If you purchased before calling us, you probably paid 
too much! We stock ACKERMAN DIGITAL, ADVANCED 
DIGITAL, CCS, COMPUPRO/VIASYN, CROMEMCO, 
ELECTROLOGICS, HUDSON, INTERCONTINENTAL 
MICRO SYSTEM, KONAN, MORROW, MULLEN 
COMPUTER, NORTH STAR, PICKLES & TROUT, 
SYNTECH DATA, TARBELL, TECMAR, TRANSEND 
A Few Of This Month's SPECIALS Are: 
COMPUPRO/VIASYN RAM 22. 256K STATIC $779 
COMPUPRO/VIASYN RAM 23, 128K STATIC $415 
DUAL NEW BOARD SPECIALS CALL 

MACROTECH 256-ST STATIC RAM $850 

MACROTECH 5 12-ST STATIC RAM $1,650 

MACROTECH ADIT-4 From 4 to 16 INTELLIGENT 
SERIAL I/O Board FROM $699 

MACROTECH MI-286 80286/Z80H DUAL PROC. $799 
MACROTECH MSR-II 1Mb DYNAMIC RAM $1,165 
SYNTECH DATA SYS - 40% OFF PRESENT STOCK 



PC-Slave Boards 



ADVANCED DIGITAL PC-SLAVE W/256K, 8 MHz 8088 
CPU, 2 S Ports, RTNX S/W-For Multi-User PC $595 
ALLOY PC-SLA VE/16 256K to 768K RAM CALL 

PC-Multifunction Boards 

We Have aGood Selection of Multifunction and Memory 
Boards for PC, XT, AT, JR, AT & T, and PC Portables 
STB BIG BYTE 384K $210 

STB GRANDE BYTE IPC- AT 2.5Mb $789 

STB RIO GRANDE I PC- AT 1.5Mb, 2 S, P, & G $659 
STB RIO PLUS IIIPC & XT 384K $299 

TECMAR CAPTAIN 384K w/Treasure Chest $220 

TECMAR JR. CAPTAIN 128K w/Treasure Chest $289 
TECMAR EXPANSION CHASSIS With 8 Slots $675 
TECMAR MAESTRO 2.5Mb $695 

TECMAR WAVE 256K Fits XT Short Slot $209 

PC-Video/Graphics Boards 

STB GRAPHICS PLUS II Wl Paral. PRT Port $240 

STB MONO PLUS II wl Paral. PRT. Port $155 

STB SUPER RES 400 16 Color Hi-Res $359 

TECMAR GRAPHICS MASTER 16 Color Hi-Res $439 
TECMAR GRAPHICS TENDER RGB/PRT. PORT $189 

PC-Scientific/Industrial Boards 

TECMAR BASE BOARD 96 Digital I/O Lines $219 

TECMAR DADIO D to A Up to 24 Devices $249 

TECMAR E+EEPROM PROGRAMMER/READER $319 
TECMAR E+EEPROM EXPANSION 192K Ext. $379 
TECMAR E+EEPROM SOFTWARE $65 

TECMAR IEEE-488 Board $249 

TECMAR LABMASTER wl TM40 PGL Option $885 
TECMAR VIDEO VAN GOGH with Software to Digitize 
TV Images $275 



PC-Data Security 



S-100 DIV./696 CORP. 

14455 NORTH 79th ST. 

SCOTTSDALE, AZ 85260 

Inquiry 308 for End-Users. 
Inquiry 309 for DEALERS ONLY 



Floppy Disk Drives 

MITSUBISHI 2894 STD. HT. 8" DSDD $395 

MITSUBISHI 2895 HALF HT. 8" DSDD $369 

MITSUBISHI 4853 HALF HT. 5V*' 96TPI DSDD 139 

TANDON 100-2A IBM-PC Compatible $115 

TEAC FD55B & MITSUBISHI 4851 5X" VbHT. $95 

Hard Disk Subsystems 

ALLOY, AMCODYNE, MAXTOR, MICROPOLIS, 
MITSUBISHI, QUANTUM, RODIME, TANDON and 
TEAC Drives. SEE PAGE fig. 

Modems 

HAYES SMART MODEM 1200, RS-232 $449 

HAYES SMART MODEM 2400, Universal $669 

PRENTICE POPCOM w/ PFS Access C150/X150 $315 
PROMETHEUS PROMODEM 1200 Hayes Compatible 
w/ Built-in PWR Supply-RS232 Stand Alone Unit $289 
OPTIONS FOR PROMODEM 1200 ARE: 
OPTION: PROCESSOR $75 

OPTION: 64K MEMORY $35 

OPTION: ALPHANUMERIC DISPLAY $79 

PROMETHEUS 1200A Apple II. Il+,lle Card w/Terminal 
Software in ROM $295 

PROMETHEUS 1200 B/PC wl PROCOM S/W $265 
PROMETHEUS 1200M MAC-PAC w/ Software $329 
U.S. ROBOTICS PASSWORD 1200 CALL 

U.S. ROBOTICS AUTO DIAL 21 2 A CALL 

U.S. ROBOTICS S-100 BOARD 300/1200 $295 

U.S. ROBOTICS PC MODEM W/Telpac Software $249 
U.S. ROBOTICS PC-MODEM With Clock-Cal./Battery, 
Printer Port, 256K & Telpac $459 



SALES 800-528-3138 

CUST. SERVICE/TECH. 602-991-7870 
TELEX 9103806778 SONEHUND 



Networking & Switch Boxes 

GILTRONIX MANUAL AND A UTOMA TIC SWITCHING 
UNITS to Fit all of Your SHARED Printer, Terminal, 
Modem, and Other Peripheral Needs. From $79 

INTERCONT. MICRO SYS. LAN-PC w/o RAM $469 
INTERCONT. MICRO SYSTEMS LANS-100 $359 

Software 

We Have Access to all Well Known Brands - ORDER 
CORRECTLY - SOFTWARE IS NOT RETURNABLE! 



Monitors & Terminals 



TATUNG CM-1322 640X200 RGB-SATISFACTION 
GUAR. It Puts Competition to Shame! $395 

TATUNG CM-1360 640X200 RGB W/GRN & AMB 
Switch PLEASE ASK ABOUT OUR "HOT SPARES" 
LOANER POLICY $419 

TATUNG CM-1370 720X480 RGB w/GRN Switch Long 
Persist Phos. Works w/ STB's SUPER RES 400 $499 
TATUNG MM-1222GIA Hi-Res 12"TTL(IBM) $119/125 
TATUNG DM-12VLG/A Hi-Res 12" Compos. $119/125 
TAXAN MONITORS Call for Low Prices 

TECMAR 640X480 RGB.GRN Switch Long Phos $519 
ZENITH ZVM123A (GRN) 122A (AMB) $85/$89 

ZENITH ZVM135 HI-RES RGB w/ Green Switch $449 
KIMTRON KT-7/PC Emulating Terminal CALL 

LIBERTY TERMINALS w/Variable Scrolling, Green, 
Amber, 14", DEC Compatibility ExtraPages of Memory, 
and Graphics Options in Stock at Unbeatable Prices. 
LINK 725 WYSE50 Compat. 14" GRN or AMB CALL 
LINK 125/PC w/PC Emulating Video & Keybd CALL 
WYSE 50/75 TERMINALS In Stock $469/$639 

ZENITH Z29/Z49 TERMINALS $619/$849 

Printers & Plotters 

BROTHER HR-10 12CPS Daisy w/ TRAC, S&P $299 
BROTHER HR-15-XL 17CPS Daisywheel S or P $359 
BROTHER HR-35 36 CPS Daisywheel S or P $699 
BROTHER M1009 50CPS Dot Matrix 6.6 Lbs. $195 
CITIZEN MSP-25 200/50 CPS 15" ULTRA QUIET $599 
COMREX 425 420 CPS DATA to 107CPS NLQ CALL 
EPSON LX80, RX100+, FX80+, FX100+.LQ1500 CALL 
HOUSTON INST. PLOTTERS & DIGITIZERS CALL 
NEC DATASOUTH DIABLO Available Upon Request 
OKIDATA New 182 Quiet 120 CPS & 60 CPS CALL 
We Also Stock OKIDATA 92, 93 & Accessories CALL 
TEXAS INSTRUMENTS 800 SERIES CALL 



Printer Buffers 



WESTERN DIGITAL WD200 wl Incrypt-Decrypt S/W - 
Absolute Security For Stored or Transmitted Files. Can 
Be User Transparent & Automatic. $139 



JOHNATHON FREEMAN UPB 64K FORMERLY TTX in 
and/or Out Serial and/or Parallel $169 

PRACTICAL PERIPH. MICROBUFFER 64K CALL 

Testing Devices & Software 

DATACOM TRI-STATE RS232 V .24 Breakout $175 
DYSAN Floppy Analyzers CALL 

FLUKE 77 DVM w/ Holster $119 

RID-DYMEK FLPY DRV DIAGNOSTIC DISKETTE $25 

Diskettes & Cartridges 

3M TAPE CARTRIDGES 300XL & 600A in Stock$29.95 
DYSAN DISKETTES Low Prices From $19:50 

DYSAN *Hard Disk Cartridges 5'//' & 8" $99/$150 

FUJI FILM FLOPPY DISKS Low Prices From $16.50 



Accounting 



CORE SOFTWARE'S FASTRAK: A DATA FLEX 
Application for all Your Accounting Needs Supporting 
All Popular Networks & Operating Systems CALL 

Spreadsheets & Integrated Pkgs. 

CALL 

$299/$429 

$319 

$129 

CALL 



ASHTON-TATE Framework 

LOTUS 1-2-3/SYMPHONY 

MDBS Knowledgeman 

MICROSOFT Multiplan 

PFS Plan 

SORCIM Supercalc-3 Better Than 1-2-3!!? $209 

Operating Systems & Utilities 

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COMPUPRO/VIASYN CPM at Affordable Prices 

CROMEMCO COMPLETE LINEat GOOD ECONOMIES 
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Language And Tools 

BD SOFTWARE "C" Compiler 8" SS SD 8 BIT $95 
COMPUTER INNOVATIONS C-86 "C" Compiler $299 
COMPUVIEW Vedit-86/Vedit-MSDOS $150/$120 

DIGITAL RESEARCH Most Products in Stock CALL 
LATTICE "C" Compiler (Ask About Options) $299 

MICROSOFT Complete Line CALL 

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ASHTON-TATE dBase II & III $275/$375 

DATA ACCESS Dataflex Multi-User BEST PRICE 

PFS File/Report CALL 

Graphics And CAD 

DIGITAL RESEARCH DR. GRAPH AND DRAW $189 
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PFS Graph CALL 

VECTRIX Graphics Systems Utilize 9 Bit Planes and 
have 384K RAM to Operate Independently of Host Video 
Controller and RAM Memory 

VECTRIX VX/PCA 512 Colors/Pallette of 4,096 $1,995 
VECTRIX VX384A Stand Alone RS232 Co-proc. $3,395 
VECTRIX VX1301 13" RGB Analog Monitor $1,295 
VECTRIX VX1901 19" RGB Analog Monitor CALL 

VECTRIX VX/PCB 512 Col./Pall. of 16,800,000 $2,595 
VECTRIX VXTB 11"X11" Graphics Tablet $895 



Communications 



MYCROFT LABS MITE AND MITE PLUS From $79 
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PFS Access CALL 

Word Processors 

MICROPRO WORDSTAR, Etc. CALL 

NEWSTAR NEWWORD w/ Money Back Guar. $129 
OASIS THE WORD PLUS Spell Check, CP/M86 $89 
PFS WRITE/PROOF CALL/CALL 



Power Solutions 



SAFT SPS1000VA/SINE 1 mSEC Switch CALL 

SOLA MINI UPS 750 Watt Sine Wave HIGH INRUSH 
(4500 Watt) 100% Batt. Op. w/o Switch-Over CALL 
TRIPPLITE BC-425-FC 425 Watts 15-20 Minutes $449 
TRIPPLITE ISOBAR Line Suppressor-Filters from $40 
TRIPPLITE SB-1000 Watt w/80 Amp/Hr. Battery $695 

Mainframe & Drive Enclosures 

INTEGRAND 1100 7 Slots and 2 X 8" Drives $475 

JMR 1H5 5'A" H.D. Cabinet $189 

MESA POWER SYSTEMS 5401 5V<" Hard Disk $209 
MICROWARE 511001 Dual Hor. Vi Ht. 5Y«" FLPY $75 
PARA DYNAMICS 3820S PRONTO $1,150 



Chips 



We Have Some of the LOWEST PRICES in the Nation!! 
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FULL DEALER SUPPORT 

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All merchandise new. Advertised prices are cash prepaid only. MC, Visa & 
P.O's from qualified firms - add 3°/o. Wires, COD's ($5 mln. fee) with 
Cashiers Check/MO, & APO's accepted. Shipping: minimum $4 first 3 lbs. 
Tax: AZ RES ONLY add 6% sales tax. All returns subject to20% restocking 
fee. Retail prices slightly higher. 





SPECIAL DISKETTE OFFER 



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LYBEN COMPUTER SYSTEMS 

1250-E Rankin Dr., Troy, Ml 48083 
Phone: (313) 589-3440 



DATALIFE • THE NAME IS THE PROMISE 
THE WARRANTY IS THE PROOF 



Inquiry 217 



MDMMASttK 

One-of-A-kind Data 
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$175.00 




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California (800) 423-0320 
outside (800) 482-DATA , 

C.D.A. INTERNATIONAL SOFTWARE CORP. 

(818) 986-3233 Telex: 215666 



Macintosh 7 * 




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512K 
$1995 

/ MJdnio»h It i iradcmif k llctmtd 
to Apple Com paler. Inc. 



Call for prices on other Macintosh products. 

I PCS LIMITED 

OUT5IDETEXAS, ORDERS ONLY, CALL 1-800-436.5150. 

7801 N. Um, H-aOO, Austin, Ttxw 78752 

AJiiollif or tabued a>Ppar1(M4iui4eT<iav 

rafl (512) 4514333. A . »,,_ u «. *n-» a 
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Inquiry 74 



Inquiry 278 



I.B.M. Compatible 




Case $ 


65J00 


Motherhood (25SK RAM space, 




RAM not included) 


280.00 


Color Graphic Adapter 


150J00 


floppy Disk Driver Controller Card 


75.00 


Plotter (4 colors) 


495.00 


Computer (1 DD Drivers, Color Graphic Adapter, 




256K RAM Case, Keyboard and 135 JV Power Supply) ISOOM 


Keyboard 


100.00 


APPLE Compatible 




Z 80 Card 


40.00 


80 Column Card 


50.00 


l.C. Tester 


125.00 


Pal Writer Card 


299.00 


Gmphic Pad Card (includes graphic program) 


220.00 


Prom 8200 Programmer (Fast Universal Type 




Eprom & Prom Programmer) 




Tor Epmm: 2716-27512; 2516-25512; (No Adapter Needed) 




For Prom: 63xx, ffixx, USxx, 18Sxx, 24Sxx, 28Sxx, 




82Sxx, SISxx, 




Include RS'232 Interface IC's Available 


CALL NOW (312) 280-7610 




Telex 280208 HFFMN INT CGO 




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HOFFMAN INT'L 




600 N McClurg Ct. Ste. 309A 




Chicago, Illinois 60611 






HAYES 1200 $399 

HAYES 1200B S379 

VOLKSMODEM 1200 S189 

ANCHOR MARK XII $225 

MARK X 300 $ 99 

PASSWORD 1200 $229 

COURIER 2400 S479 

CERMETEK 1200 <J439 

CERMETEK 1200PC S349 

CERMETEK 2400 <I489 

CERMETEK SECURITY . . . $599 



3535 Roundbottom Rd. Cinti., OH 45244 







Osborne 




As available only! Very limited quantity. 






Important: 
Always call to 
check availa- 
bility before 
ordering. 


To fix yourself, 
or for parts. 
Complete, but 
known not 
working. 


Guaranteed for 30 
days. May be new 
or telurb., depen- 
ding on avail. 
Exch/ Outright 
Repair 






Main Board OS-1 


$49 


$79 


$159 




Main Board Exec. 


$159 


$139 


$299 




Battery Pack, 40 Watt 





— 


$49 




Double Density Kit ** 
"" Includes board, cable 


S79 

, documentation & disk 




5" CRT (Grn/White) 


$9.95 


$19 


$29 




7" CRT (Amber) 


$19 


$49 


$99 




15" CRT, no case 








$85 




Drive Analog Card 


$9.95 


$29 


$59 




Drive Mechanism 





$25 


$59 




Power Supply 


$4.95 


$24 


$29 




Keyboard (No enclos.) 


$19 


— 


$99 












Shipping charged on all orders 






Computer Parts Mart 415-493-5930 
I200 Park Blvd * Palo Alto * CA 94306 



Inquiry 1 70 



Inquiry 1 18 



Inquiry 403 



Serial 4 linillH ^ Parallel 




Convert What You Have 
To What You Want! 

* RS232 Serial ' Centronics Parallel 

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UPS Snipping 13.00 



CALL (805) 658-7466 or 658-7467 
C& For FAST Delivery \ 



DATA 



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PAL EPROM 



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LOGICAL DEVICES INC. 

l4Jlu*e, RelioLMf, asub 

SEE OUR AD ON PAGE 328 



0000000 



ORDER TOLL FREE 

1-800-EE1-PROM 

(1-800-331-7766) 



Inquiry 140 



Inquiry 82 



Inquiry 2 1 5 



Announcing 4 New Collector Edition 




T 





The 4 Byte covers shown below are the newest additions to the Collector Edition 
Byte Cover series. Each full color print is 11" X 14", including a W border, and is 
part of an edition strictly limited to 1,000 prints. Each print is a faithful reproduction 
of the original Byte painting, printed on museum quality acid free paper, and is 
personally inspected, signed and numbered by the artist, Robert Tinney. A Certificate of 
Authenticity accompanies each print. 



Collector Edition Prints are carefully packaged flat to avoid bending, and are 
shipped first ckss within one week of receipt of order. The price of each print is 
$30. All 4 prints are available for only $100. 

Other Collector Edition Byte Covers are also available from Robert Tinney 
Graphics. For a color brochure, or to order one or more of the prints shown, 
please check the appropriate box in the coupon below. 




#25 Computers and the Handicapped $30 




#26 Graduation Memories $30 




Please send me the following Prints ($30). All 4 only $100. □ I have enclosed check or money order. 
QTY. TITLE & PRINT NO. AMOUNT □ Visa □ MasterCard 
$ Card No. 

- $ Exp. Date: 

* SHIP MY PRINTS (OR BROCHURE) TO: 

postage & handling $3.00 (Overseas $8.00) $ Name: 

TOTAL* Ajdress: 

□ Please send me your color brochure. 



City: _ 

State: . 



_Zip:_ 



Mail this coupon to: 

robert tinney graphics 



to* i 



1864 N. Pamela Drive 

Baton Rouge, LA 

70815 



orfo! 



€ *n 



m*Z** 



o ayti 



$04 



"i/bj 



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We 



o r 



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PRODUCTS. 
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210) 

2102 

21021-4 

21021-2 

2111 

2112 

2114 

2114-25 

2114L-4 

2114L-3 

21141-2 

2147 

5101 

TM34044-4 

TM34044-3 

TM34044-2 

MK4118 

TMM2016-20 

TMM2016-15 

TMM2016-10 

HM6116-4 

HM6116-3 

HM6116-2 

HM6116LP-4 

HM6116LP-3 

HM6116LP-2 

2-6132 

HM6264P-15 

HM6264LP-15 

HM6264LP-12 



TNI402? 

UP 6 4 if 

MM5280 

MK4108 

MM5208 

4)16-20 

4116-15 

4116-12 

2118 

4164-25 

4164-20 

4164-15 

41256-20 

41255-15 



1702 

2706 

2758 

2716 

2716-1 

TM32516 

TM32716 

TM32532 

2732 

2732 A-4 

2732 A-35 

2732 A 

2732 A-2 

2764 

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TM32564 

MCM68764 

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27128-45 

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27256-25 



STATIC RAMS 




256x4 


450m 




1.90 


IK x 1 


450ii 




.79 


IK x 1 


450u 




.89 


IK x 1 


250m 




1.29 


256x4 


450m 




2.29 


255x4 


450n 




2.29 


IK x 4 


450n 




.99 


1Kx4 


250n 




1.10 


IK x 4 


450n 




1.20 


IK x 4 


300n 




1.30 


IK x 4 


200m 




1.40 


4K x 1 


55u 




3.95 


256x4 


450n 


CMOS 


3.90 


4K x 1 


450n 




2.95 


4K x 1 


300m 




3.45 


4K x 1 


200ii 




3.95 


IK x B 


250n 




8.95 


2Kx8 


200n 




2.49 


2KxB 


150n 




2.99 


2Kx8 


100m 




4.49 


2Kx8 


200m 


CMOS 


2.49 


2Kx8 


150u 


CMOS 


2.99 


2K x 8 


120m 


CMOS 


5.49 


2K x 8 


200ii 


CMOS 


2.99 


2K x B 


150m 


CMOS 


3.49 


2Kx8 


120m 


CMOS 


6.49 


4KxB 


300m 




29.95 


BKxB 


150m 


CMOS 


7.95 


BKxB 


150m 


CMOS 


8.95 


8Kx6 


120m 


CMOS 


10.95 


)YNAMIC 


:rams 




4K x 1 


250m 




1.45 


4K x 1 


300m 




1.95 


4Kx1 


300m 




1.95 


BK x 1 


200m 




.49 


8Kx1 


250m 




.49 


1BK x 1 


200m 




.79 


1BK x 1 


150m 




.99 


1BK x 1 


120m 




1.49 


16Kx1 


150m 


5v 


3.95 


64K x 1 


250m 


5v 


1.50 


64Kx1 


200m 


5v 


1.75 


B4K x 1 


150m 


5v 


2.00 


256x1 


200m 




7.95 


256x1 


150m 




8.95 



EPROMS 



256x8 
IK x 6 
IK x 8 

2Kx8 
2K x 8 
2K x 8 

2Kx8 
4KxB 
4Kx8 
4KxB 
4Kx6 
4Kx8 
4KxB 
BKxB 
BKxB 
8K x 1 
BKxB 
BKxB 
8Kx8 
16Kx8 
16Kx8 
16K x 8 
32Kx8 



1 m 

450m 
450m 
450m 
350ms 
450m 
450m 
450m 
450tt 
450m 
350m 
250m 
200m 
450m 
250m 
200m 
450m 
450m 
350ns 
250m 
300m 
250m 
250m 



5v 
5?' 
5v 

5v 
5v 
2!» 
21v 
21» 
2J» 
5v 
5v 
5v 
5v 
5v 
5v 
5v 
5v 
5v 
14v 







74LSOO 




1 


1 74L800 


.23 


74L8125 


.48 


74L8260 


.58 


■ 74L801 


.24 


74L8126 


.48 


74L8268 


.54 


■ 74L802 


.24 


74L8132 


.58 


74L8273 


1.45 


■ 74L803 


.24 


74L8133 


.56 


74L8276 


3.30 


I 74L804 


.23 
.24 


74L8I38 
74L8137 


.36 
.96 


74L8279 
74L8280 


.48 
1.95 


1 74L805 


■ 74L808 


.27 


74L8I38 


.54 


74L8263 


.88 


I 741809 


.28 


74L8139 


.54 


741.8290 


.88 


1 74L8I0 


.24 


74L8145 


1.15 


74L8293 


.88 


■ 74L811 


.34 


74L8147 


2.45 


7418295 


.98 


■ 74L8I2 


.34 


74LSI48 


1.30 


74L8298 


.88 


■ 74L8I3 


.44 


74L8I61 


.54 


74L8299 


1.70 


■ 74L814 


.58 


74L8163 


.54 


74L8323 


3.46 


■ 74L815 


.34 


74L8154 


1.85 


74L8324 


1.70 


■ 74L820 


.24 


74L8155 


.88 


74L8362 


1.25 


■ 74L821 


.28 


74L8156 


.88 


74L8363 


1.25 


■ 74L822 


.24 


74L8157 


.64 


74L8363 


1.30 


■ 74L826 


.28 


74L8156 


.58 


74L8364 


1.90 


■ 74L827 


.28 


74L8180 


.86 


74L8365 


.48 


1 74L828 


.34 


74L8161 


.64 


74L8368 


.48 


1 74L830 


.24 


74L8I62 


.88 


74L8367 


.44 


1 74L832 


.28 


74L8I83 


.64 


74L8368 


.44 


1 74L833 


.54 


74L8184 


.68 


74L8373 


1.35 


1 74L837 


.34 


74L8185 


.94 


74L8374 


1.35 


1 74L838 


.34 


74L8168 


1.90 


74L8377 


1.35 


■ 74L840 


.24 


74L8188 


1.70 


74L8378 


1.13 


■ 74L842 


.48 


74L8I89 


1.70 


74L8378 


1.30 


■ 74L847 


.74 


74L8170 


1.46 


74L8386 


1.85 


■ 74L848 


.74 


74L8173 


.88 


74L8386 


.44 


■ 74L849 


.74 


74L8174 


.54 


74L8390 


1.15 


■ 74L85I 


.24 


74L8176 


.54 


74L8393 


1.15 


■ 74L864 


.28 


74L8181 


2.10 


74L8396 


1.15 


■ 74L865 


.28 


74L8169 


8.90 


74L8399 


1.45 


■ 74LS63 


1.20 


74L8190 


.88 


74L8424 


2.90 




.38 


74L819I 


.88 


74L8447 


.36 


■ 74LS73 


■ 74L874 


.34 


74LS192 


.78 


74L8490 


1.90 


1 74L875 


.38 


74L8193 


.78 


74L8824 


3.95 


1 74L878 


.38 


74L8194 


.68 


74L8640 


2.15 


74L878 


.48 


74L8195 


.68 


74L8B45 


2.15 


74L883 


.69 


74L8196 


.78 


74L8688 


1.65 


74L885 


.88 


7418197 


.78 


74L8869 


1.85 


74L886 


.38 


74L8221 


.88 


74L8670 


1.46 


74L890 


.64 


74L8240 


.94 


74L8674 


9.60 


74L891 


.88 


74L8241 


.98 


74L8682 


3.16 


74L892 


.54 


74L8242 


.98 


74L8663 


3.15 


74L893 


.54 


74L8243 


.98 


74L8664 


3.15 


74L896 


.74 


74L8244 


1.26 


74L8686 


3.15 


74L896 


.86 


74L8245 


1.46 


74L8888 


2.36 


74L8107 


.38 


74L8247 


.74 


74L8689 


3.15 


74L8109 


.38 


74L8248 


.98 


74LS783 


23.95 


74L8112 


.36 


74L8249 


.98 


81LS95 


1.45 


74L8113 


.38 


7418251 


.68 


8IL896 


1.45 


74L8114 


.38 


74L8253 


.58 


811897 


1.46 


74L8122 


.44 


74L8257 


.68 


8IL898 


1.45 


74L8123 


.78 


74L8258 


.58 


25L8252I 


2.75 


74L8124 2.85 


74L8259 


2.70 


25L82569 


4.20 



3.95 
2.49 
5.90 
2.95 
3.95 
3.95 
6.95 
3.95 
3.95 
3.95 
3.95 
5.95 
8.95 
4.25 
4.95 
7.95 
9.95 
17.95 
19.95 
B.95 
9.95 
10.95 
24.95 



6500 



We will try to BEAT 
All Competitor's Prices 

CALL for Quote! 



DISC CONTROLLERS 



1891 
1771 
1791 
1793 
1796 
1797 
2143 
2791 
2793 



. . 8.90 

. 14.90 

. 22.90 

22.90 

22.90 

22.90 

6.90 

38.90 

38.90 



2796 


. . . 38.90 


2797 


... 38.90 


6843 


. . . 33.90 


8272 


... 19.90 


M88876 ... 


. . . 22.90 


M 88877 ... 


... 22.90 


MC3470 ... 


... 4.90 


UP0765 . . . . 


.. 19.90 



CRT CONTROLLERS 



6845 . 
6847 . 
66047 
68845 
7220 . 
8275 . 



, 11.90 
10.90 

, 23.90 
18.90 
36.90 
28.90 



CRT5027 18.90 

CRT6037 28.90 

0P8350 38.90 

H046506 11.90 

MCI372 6.90 

TM89918A .... 38.90 



UV ERASERS 

QUV-T8/1 $49.95 

ECONOMY Model 



* HHS9 



' 



• Erases 15 EPROMS In 20 minutes 

• Plastic Enclosure 



6502 
6504 
6505 
6507 
6520 
6522 
6532 
6545 
6551 



6500 

6500 A 

4.90 6502A 5.90 

6.90 6520A 5.90 

8.90 6522A 9.90 

9.90 6532A 10.90 

4.30 6545A 12.90 

4.90 6551A 10.90 

990 6500 B 

9.90 65028 7.90 

6800 



1 MHz 



6600 . 

6602 . 

6803 . 

6808 . 
6609E . 

6809 . 

6810 . 

6820 . 

6821 . 
6828 . 
6840 . 

6843 . 

6844 . 

6845 . 
6847 . 
6850 . 
6852 . 
6860 . 
6662 . 
6675 . 
6880 . 
6883 . 



2.90 



68BOO 
2 MHz 



/.HU 

17.90 
12.90 
8 90 


68800 

66802 

66609 


9.90 
11.90 
11.90 


8.90 


68809E 


11.90 


2.90 
4.30 
2.90 
13.90 
11.90 
33.90 


68810 

68821 


5.90 
5.90 


68840 


18.90 


68845 

68850 


18.90 
5.90 


24.90 
11.90 


68000 




10.90 


68000-8 


34.90 


2.90 
5.90 
7.90 
10.90 
6.90 
1.90 


68047 

68488 


23.90 
18.90 


88852 

68861 

88764 


14.90 
8.90 
17.95 


21.90 


68766 


19.95 



8000 

8031 14.90 8253 8.90 

8035 5.90 8253-5 7.90 

8039 5.90 8256 4.46 

IN8-6060 16.90 8255-5 4.90 

IN8-8073 29.90 8267 7.90 

8080A 3.90 8257-6 8.90 

8085 4.90 8259 5.90 

8085A-2 11.90 8259-5 6.90 

8086 24.90 8271 69.90 

8087-3 (5 MHz).. 124.96 8272 19.90 

8087-2 (6MHz).. 199.96 8274 28.90 

8088 19.90 8275 28.90 

8089 59.90 8279 8.90 

8279-5 7.90 

8282 6.45 

8283 6.45 

8131 2.90 8284 4.90 

8155 6.90 8288 8.45 

8155-2 7.90 8287 6.45 

8156 6.90 8288 12.90 

8185 28.90 8289 44.90 

8185-2 38.90 8292 12.90 



8100 



8200 



8202 
8203 
8205 
8212 
8214 
8218 
8224 
8228 
8228 
8237 



, 23.90 

, 38.90 

, 2.90 

, 1.76 

, 3.76 

, 1.76 

, 2.20 

1.75 

3.45 

12.90 



8237-5 14.90 



8238 
8243 
6250 
6251 . 
6251A 



4.45 
4.46 
9.90 
3.90 
4.46 



8300 

8303 2.90 

8304 1.90 

8307 2.90 

8308 2.90 

8310 3.90 

8311 3.90 

8700 

6741 28.90 

8748 19,90 

8749 28.90 

8755 23.90 

80000 

60186-6 99.90 

80188 89.90 



Z-80 



Z80-CPU . . 
Z80-CTC . . 
ZBO-OART . 
Z80-0MA.. 
Z80-PI0 .. 
ZB0-SI0/0 
Z80-8I0/1 . 
Z80-8I0/2 . 
Z80-8I0/9 . 



Z-80 A 



Z80A-CPU . . 
Z80A-CTC . . 
Z80A-DART . 



Z-80 

1.95 Z80A-0MA 8.95 

1.95 Z80A-PI0 2.45 

8.96 Z80A-8I0/0 9.95 

7.96 Z80A-8I0/1 9.95 

1.95 Z80A-8I0/2 9.95 

8.95 Z80A-8I0/9 9.S5 

8.95 Z-80 B 

8.95 ZB08-CPU 7.95 

Z808-CTC 8.95 

ZB08-PI0 8.95 

2 45 ZB08-OART 18.96 

2 45 Z808 810/0 .... 28.95 

7 05 Z80 810/2 28.95 



MEMORY 
EXPANSION KIT 




4164 200ns 
9 for $15.75 



APPLE ACCESSORIES 

Parallel Printer Card 49.95 

BD-Col. card for Apple 11+... 149.95 
BD-Col. card for Apple lie. . . 1 29.95 

Dokay BD-Column for Me 69.95 

Serial Card (communication) . . . 69.95 

Clock Calendar card 79.95 

Cooling Fan 38.95 

Power Supply 69.95 

Joystick 29.95 

Joystick Adapter Apple lie — 1 4.95 

RF Modulator 13.95 

Disk Drive Full Height 169.95 

Disk Drive'/* Height 169.95 

Controller Card 49.95 

Apple Paddles 5.95 

16K Card 39.95 

1BK Bare Board 13.95 

Extend-A-Slot 34.95 

Paddle Adapple 29.95 

Koala Touch Pad 99.00 

Magic Touch Pad w/ Joystick. . . 79.95 

Keytronlc Keyboard 219.00 

Apple Keyboard (Taiwan). . 149.95 



INNOVATORS IN MICRO COMPUTER TECHNOLOCV 



VIEWMAX-80 149.95 

The right 80-column cardforyour 
Apple II+ 

• Soft video switch 

• Built-in inverse video 

• Shift key support 

• 2 year parts & labor warranty 



TERMS: Minimum order $10.0' 
For shipping and handling includ 



■•liVJli:«I»]*^X1ivtl(»T 



UPS Blue (air). For each additions 
air pound, add $1.00. California 
residents must include 6% sales 
tax; LA., S.F., S. Cruz & S. Matec 
counties include 6.5% sales fas 
and Santa Clara include 7% sales 
tax. All items subject to availability 
and prices are subject to change 
Typographical errors are not oui 
responsibility. 

No additional charge for Master 
card or Visa. We reserve the righi 
to substitute manufacturers anc 
to limit quantities. 

CALL for VOLUME Quotes 

NEW HOURS: M - F 7:30 am - 5:00 pm 

VISIT OUR RETAIL STORE 

2100 De La Cruz Blvd. 

Santa Clara, CA 95050 

(408) 988-0697 

ALL MERCHANDISE IS 
100% GUARANTEED 



Telex: 756440 




FORTRON CORPORATION 



3797 YALE WAY, FREMONT, CA 94538 



FOR YOUR IBM PC. XT. AT OR COMPATIBLES 



Power Supply Professional 

INFORMATION S. CALIF. RES. [415] 490-8171 

ORDER TOLL FREE: 
[800] 821-9771 




POWER SUPPLIES 



For PC/AT 



'_,, 



.*. 




PRICE: 
please call 



#FC 5192, 200 WATTS 

• +5V/19.8A, +12V/7.3A 
-5V/1A, -12V/1A 

• 110/230 VAC Switchable 

• Come with 4 Drives Connector 

• ©Pending 

• ONE YEAR WARRANTY 



#FC-130 40 

130 Watt power supply for 
PC/XT 



•K 



15900 



■?' 



Good for Faraday, DTC 

Megaboard, and other PC/XT 

compatibles 

Back side on-off switch 

Use cabinet FC 630 

110/230 VAC convertible 



#FC 630 A-T 




COMPUTER CHASSIS 



Splease 
call 



140 W.(MAX) 
POWER SWITCHER 

#FC 135-40 



KEYBOARD 




only 

175. 00 

[Assembled &. Fully Tested in USA] 



IBM® PC/AT identical dimension 
Heavy duty metal frame & front 
plastic panel 

Completed hardware and accessories 
Use our power supply FC-5192 



#FC-630 A-2 



gg.oo 



IBM® PC/XT identical dimension 

Righthand side on-off switch 

position 

Hardwares included 

7 & 8 slot rear panels. Good for 

0.75" or 1" apart slot connectors 



#FC-427 



Z 1 ^!"^^ 



109.oo 



tr 



-:\vffiii; 



• IBM PC/XT compatible 

• 20 million Time Life Cycle 

• Light on NUM and Caps Lock 
Keys 



#FC-630 




99.00 



Rear side on-off switch position 
Good for Faraday, DTC megaboard 
and other compatibles 
6 or 8 slot on rear panel 
Use FC-130-40 power supply 



IBM PC, XT ADD-ON CARDS 



LOW COST 



FC 230 Floppy 
Disk Controller 

• Drives 4x5*4" FDD 

• IBM fully 
compatible 

• w/cable 






89.oo 



FC 330 Hard Disk 
Controller 

• Up to 2 Hard 
Disk Drives 

• Fully Buffered 
I/O Bus 

• Built-in ECC 



219.oo 



FC530 
Monochrome 
Controller 
w/Printer port 

•8x25 Screen 

• 9 X 14 Character Box 

• 7 X 9 Character 

• TTL level of output 




129.00 



FC 730 

Multifunction Card 

• Exp. to 384K bytes 

• Serial port 

• Printer port 

• Clock/calendar 



159.oo 



Monochrome/Graphic with 
Printer Port, CT-0040 

• 80x25 Text mode 

• 720x348 Graphic mode 

• Can run Lotus 1-2-3 

• 64K Graphic Display memory 

• Monitor & printer interface 



199.0° 




FC 830 512K 
Memory Exp. Card 

• Exp. to 512K 

• Addressable on any 
64K boundary 



FC 930 RS232C/ 

Printer 

Controller 

• Programmable to 
9600 baud 

• Fully Centronics 
compatible 



FC 940 RS232C/ 

REAL TIME 

CLOCK 

• To 9600 Baud 

• Battery Back-up 




r n.'i 



M*- 



-JStrnM 



Please 

Call 

For 

Catalogue 



Color/Graphic with Printer 
Port CT-6020 

• RGB color port 

• Printer port 

• Light pen interface 

• 320x200 Line Graphic mode 

• 80x25 Text mode 

179.0° 



119.oo 

(64K on Board) 



99.00 



gg.oo 




MONITORS 



a 



Monochrome: 109. 00 

12" non-glare 

TTL level 

Hi-resolution 1000 lines, center 

800 lines, corner 

2000 characters (5x7 dots, 

80x25) 



Color: 439.°° 

14" Hi-contrast CRT 

0.39" mm dot pitch 

RGB TTL level 

2000 character (5x7 dots, 

80x25) 

Resolution 640 dots 



CABLES 




_/■"■— — < • g pin £) type to 25 pin D type for PC AT 29.°° 

Nh • Floppy Drive Cable 7. 8 ° 

%^ ^y ' j • Printer cable 25 pin D type to Centronics. . . .19.°° 
^ mJmmmm 9 RS232 to RS232 Cable 21.°° 



4164 (64K D RAM). . 13<»/9 pes. 8237 A-5 6S0/ea. 

100 pes. & up lM/ea. 8284A 2»/ e a. 

41256 (256 D RAMS). . . .S*V«a. 8284C l«Vea. 

2764 EPROM *9Vea. 74LS245 OBVea. 

TERMS: 

1. Shipping & handling charge $6.00 
minimum. Check with us for actual 
charge 

2. CA add 6.5% tax 

3. Restocking charge 15% 

4. RMA # is required for return goods 

5. Prices subject to change 



Inquiry 151 for End-Users. Inquiry 152 for DEALERS ONLY. 




51 



merican 
Semiconductor^ 

>fwttrs. ( uiHjimnuts. UanttCii 



AA CIA H T 0T 

^ ■ **^ OKI I WAT 



128K 
41256 



NAT | HIT 



CDC DRIVES 89. 

80287 forat 175. 

8087 Math Coprocessor 99. 

AT TURBO KITS CALL 

1 mb 1/2 Winchester ... 399. 

AT-20 mb Hi Speed 475. 

EPSON FX-1Q0 499. 

COLOR CARDS 180. 

HAYES 1200B 395. 

AT360K 1/2 Height 135. 

800-237-5758 

SALES EXT. 501 

Vendor Una 

813-949-3193 Add 3<H 




Save on 

top quality 

3M Diskettes 



5Va" 
5Va" 




DOUBLE BUM 

DOUBLE W'.vri 
SOFT SCCTOR 



$-| 77 

$239 



SOLD IN BOXES OF TEN ONLY 

3V2" 3M diskettes are also available 

tremendous selection of software 
books, accessories and supplies 

UP TO 50% OFF! 
Software for IBM PC 



dBase III 349 

Framework. . 349 

Home Acct. Plus . . 85 
" w/Uitralile 169 



Multimate 269 

Symphony 429 

Wordstar 2000 .299 
WordstarProPac .259 



ABOVESOFTWAREAVAILAflUlN OTKfR FORMATS. CALL FORAVAILABILITVANOPFIICE. 

$2.00. Cdflornta 



Piicos subject to changi without m 



a lor our lr«a catalog. 



ABC data products 

P.O. BOX 18720, SAN DIEGO, CALIFORNIA 921 IS 

619-203-5400 £J 800-854-1555 




Mini-Tester Monitors 1 

7 Most important RS-232 Lines I 




2 color LED's clearly display status of TD. 
RD, RTS, CTS. DSR. CD and DTR. Pocket 
size, 1 male & 1 female connector, requires 
no power. May be left in permanently. 
Satisfaction guaranteed. ORDER NOW! 
New low price of S34.95. All cash orders 
postpaid (IL res. add 6% sales tax). FREE: 
Newly revised illustrated catalog of RS-232 
interface and testing equipment. Phone: 
815-434-0846. 



( 



&H elect rnnics 

miM MANUFACTURING COMPANY 

P.O. Box 1008B, OTTAWA, IL 61350 



Inquiry 29 



Inquiry 13 



Inquiry 46 



# 



MSDOS/CPM86 



FREE LQP PRINTER 

VIVITAR TRANSTAR 1 20 
RETAILS FOR S599.°° 



■ 



USlI 



ZiSSSLV 



EAGLE PC-2 FEATURES: 

• 128Kb RAM expandable 
to 51 2Kb 

• (2) 320Kb Floppy Disks 

• Monochrome Monitor 

• Eagle Writer, Eaglecalc 
MS-DOS, CP/M-86 

• One Year Warranty 
ListiSa^gS. 1 * SALE $1488. 00 * 

800-62^2001 
716-325-5530 

OFFICE EQUIPMENT BROKERS 

215 ALEXANDER STREET ^"" 

ROCHESTER. NEW YORK 14607 ■■■ 



REMINDER (follow-up system) 

• Professionals and managers, insure that no 
important commitment or action date will be 
overlooked. Map out future work flow for your- 
self and staff. 

• REMINDER prints out your daily to-do list. 
What you didn't do today carries over into 
tomorrow's list. Repetitive to-dos are automati- 
cally rescheduled. You never have to rewrite the 
text of message. 

• Enter items in up to 30 custom categories and 
as far ahead as 1999. No limit on entries. 

• Toll-free number answers user questions. 
Runs on all IBM PCs or compatibles. 

• Price $99. 30-day money back guarantee. 




CAMPBELL SERVICES, INC. 
21700 Northwestern Hwy., Suite 1070 

Southfield, Ml 48075 
(313) 559-5955 Toll-free: (800) 521-9314 




Real-Time Multitasking Executive 



■ No rayalties 

■ Source code included 

■ Fault free operation 

■ Ideal ior process control 

■ Timing control provided 

■ Low interrupt overhead 

■ Inter-task messages 

Options: 

■ Resource Manager 

■ Buffer Manager 

■ Integer Math Library 



■ Language Interfaces: 

C Pascal 

PL/M Fortran 

■ DOS File Access : 

CP/M-80 
IBM PC DOS 



AMX for 8080 $ 800 US 

8086 950 

6809 950 

68000 1600 

Manual (specityprocessor) 75 



J* KADAK Products Ltd. 



(604) 734-2796 

Telex: 04-55670 

206-1847 W. Broadway, Vancouver, B.C., Canada V6J VY5 



Inquiry 146 



Inquiry 71 



Inquiry 202 



15Y 2 " Printer 

Tractor/Friction 

150-170 CPS 



249 



00 



This Heavy Duty Business Printer 
includes downloadable characters, 
Bit image graphics, near letter 
quality, 136-250 columns, plus 
multiple pin tractor for smooth error 
free paper feed. List S899. Sale 5249. 
(Add Si 7. 50 Shipping) 

PROTECTO 

22292 N. Pepper Rd.. Barrington, IL 60010 

312/382-5244 

UV Lnvr Our Customers 



NEW LOCKIT II 



Password Protected Subdirectories 
Hides files-makes files Read-Only 
Runs on any PC or compatible 
with Hard Disk under DOS 2.0 or 
Higher- 
Easy to use - only $79.95 



LOCKIT I 



Password Enabled Boot-up 
For IBM PC or PC/XT 
Optional Hard-Disk-Only Boot. 
Invulnerable! $129.95 



PC RESET/QUICKON 



Reset without turning off power 
Eliminate turn-on & Reboot wait 
Saves time, frustration & damage to 
PC & PC/XT $89.95 



Specify PC or XT, MC/VISA 

Security i6FiaggPiace 

Microsystems suite 102B 

Consultants s.l, ny 10304 

(718) 667-1019 



NEW I/O BUS 

FOR DATA ACQUISITION & CONTROL 

Now available *f| 
for IBM PC, 
XT, AT & 
Apple II. 



The Local Applications Bus, 
LAB 40, is a versatile computer 
to peripheral interface and a 
product development system. It 
is optimized for connecting 
directly to micro-processorcom- 
patible I.C.S& hybrids. Applica- 
tions: data acquisition, robotics, 
instrumentation, control, conven- 
tional peripherals. Capabilities: access up to 
64 sixteen bit ports, 8 interrupts, DMA speeds, 
more Presently available Applications modules 
include 8 & 1 2 bit high speed A/D w/program- 
mable gain. Prices for the LAB 40 developers 
kit (circuit, softwares manual) start at $200. 



(omputer/^ontinuum 

7 5 Southgate Ave. . Suite 6 

Daly City. CA 94015 (415)755-1978 




Inquiry 290 



Inquiry 316 



PURCHASE ORDERS 

& BID REQUESTS 

WELCOME 

Inquiry 90 



$ompu$ave 

Call Toll Free: 1 -800-624-8949 



ARIZONA RESIDENTS CALL (602) 967-3532 



PRINTERS 


C. ITOH 




8510 


. 294 
. 435 


1550 


A10-30. . . . 


. . 466 
. CALL 


All Other Models 


EPSON 




All Models 


CALL 


JUKI 




6100 


. 385 


All Other Models 


CALL 


NEC 




3550 


. 1067 


8850 


. 1505 
. CALL 


All Other Models 


OKIDATA 




All Models 


CALL 


PANASONIC 




1090 


.186 


1091 


. . 262 


1092 


.348 
CALL 


I All Other Models 


SILVER-REED 




EXP 400 


..234 


EXP 500 


.278 


All Other Models 


CALL 


STAR MICRONICS 




All Models 


CALL 


TOSHIBA 




P1340 


.. 548 
. 1172 


P351 


All Other Models 


CALL 


TRACTORS, SHEET FEEDERS, 


AND PRINTER SUPPLIES 


AVAILABLE FOR MOST ALL 


PRINTERS 











ANCHOR 




Volsmodem/ External 


...48 


Volksmodem 12/External. 


.184 


NOVATION 




Novation Cat/External 


..142 


Apple Cat ll/External 


.192 


Smartcat/External 


..384 


Smarlcat +/ Macintosh. . . 


.307 


1 Smartcat +/PC Internal. . 


.309 


1 Smartcat + / PC External. . 


.318 


All Other Models 


CALL 


QUBIE 




PC212AS/IBM Internal... 
212A/IBM External 


2^o 


.2" 


12 



SUPER SPECIAL 



HAYES SMARTMODEM 1200 

• Auto Dial ^fyrT^J ^ • Auto Answer 

• 1 200 Baud ^] ^ • External 

HAYES SMARTMODEM 1200B/IBM-INTERNAL $334 

For All Other Models And Modem Software... Call 



BOARDS 



AST 

Six Pac Plus 255 

Mega Plus II 255 

All Other Types CALL 

HERCULES 

Color Card 144 

All Other Types CALL 

MICROTEK 

All Types CALL 

ORANGE MICRO 

Grappler + 71 

Buffered Grappler + 137 

All Other Types CALL 

PARADISE 

Multi Display Card '....285 

Modular Graphics Card 258 

All Other Types CALL 

QUADRAM 

Quadboard W/64K 260 

Quad 512+ W/64K 225 

All Other Types CALL 

STB 

All Types CALL 



TERMINALS 




CALL 



• External Printer Buffers 

• Power Surge Protectors 

• Houston And Other Plotters 

• Kurta And Other Digitizers 

• 2 And 4 Position Switch Boxes 

• Key Tronic And Other Keyboards 

• All Types of Standard Cables 

• Disk Drive Cleaning Kits 

• Printer And Other Stands 



ORDER LINE HOURS: MONDAY- FRIDAY 

8AM-6PM/ SATURDAY 9 AM -2PM 



Send Orders & Payments to: CompuSave, 3010 S. 48th St., Suite 8, Phoenix, AZ 85040 
For Customer Service & Other Information Call Mon-Fri: (602) 967-3533 

Prices reflect a cash discount of 3% to 5%. Prices and availability are subject to change without 

notice. Merchandise is shipped in factory cartons with manufacturer's warranty. Minimum shipping 

charge is $4.00. Pay by wire, cashier's check, money order, or charge. Business or personal checks 

delay shipment 2 weeks. CompuSave is a Division of Adlanko Corporation. (85-7) 



ACCESSORIES 


CHIPS 




4164 Ram Chips 64K 


...17 


8087 Coprocessor Chip. . . 


..139 


DISKETTES 




Maxell MD1 (Qty 50) 


...74 


Maxell MD2 (Qty 50) 


...94 


Verbatim SS/DD (Qty 50).. 


.80 


Verbatim DS/DD (Qty 50).. 


.109 


Bulk, IBM -AT, Macintosh. 


CALL 



COMPUTERS 



ALTOS 

586-20 Multiuser 5332 

All Other Models CALL 

APPLE 

lie W/64K/1 Drive 858 

lie Professional 1430 

lie And Macintosh CALL 

IBM 

PC W/256K/2 Drives 1772 

XT And AT. CALL 

ZENITH 

All Models CALL 



DISK DRIVES 



FLOPPY AND HARD DRIVES 


FOR ALL APPLE 


IBM AND 


COMPATIBLES 


Alpha Omega 


• IOMEGA 


Apple 


• Micro Sci 


Cogita 


• Rodine 


Gamma 


• Seagate 


Hitachi 


• Tandon 


IBM 


• Teac 


Mitsubishi 


• Matsushita 



LOW PRICES CALL 



MONITORS 



AMDEK 




310A-Amber 


...142 


Color 300 


.... 208 


! Color 500 


.... 303 


All Other Models 


. . . CALL 


PRINCETON 




MAX 12-Amber 


...169 


HX 12-Color 


....469 


All Other Models 


. . . CALL 


QUADRAM 




Amberchrome-Amber. . . 


...158 


All Other Models 


. . CALL 


TAXAN 




420-Color 


.... 395 


440-Color 


.... 545 


• All Other Models 


...CALL 


ZENITH 




ZVM 122-Amber 


85 


ZVM 123-Green 


85 


All Other Models 


. . . CALL 



WE ACCEPT MAJOR 
CHARGE CARDS 





CHOICE OF MAJOR OEM MANUFACTURERS, UNIVERSITIES, 
RESEARCH LABS ETC. A THOROUGHLY FIELD PROVEN DESIGN. 
WHnv ' n ■-«■»* ■= *" H | GH VOLUME PRODUCTION ENGINEERED. 



• FULL IBM PC-XT* COMPATIBILITY! 

• FULL MEGA-BYTE RAM CAPACITY 
ON MOTHERBOARD! 



DEALERS AND OEM MANUFACTURERS 
QUANTITY DISCOUNTS AVAILABLE 



Eight Compatible 
I/O Interface 
Connectors 

(Full PC compatible) 
(compatible with all 
IBM-PC* plug-in cards) 




THOUSANDS 

SOLD 
WORLD WIDE! 




Hardware Reset 

(Overcomes reset flaw 
in PC) 



Power Connector | 

(Full IBM* pinout 
compatible) j 



8088 Processor 

(Same as PC) 



Special J1 
Interface 

(Allows horizontal mount- 
ing of compatible expan- 
sion cards for easy bus 
expansion and custom 
configuring) (Board has 
62 pin gold plated compat- 
ible connector) 



8087 Numeric 
Processor 

(Same as PC) 



Peripheral 
Support Circuits 

(Same as PC) 



Extended ROM 
Capability 

(Runs all compatible PC 
ROMS) (Jumper program- 
mable to accommodate all 
popular8K,16K,32Kand 
64K ROM chips and NEW 
EE ROMS! VPP power pin 
available for EP ROM 
burning!) (External 
VPP voltage required) 



Configuration 
Switches 

(Same as PC) 



Speaker/Audio 
Port 

(Same as PC) 



Wire Wrap Area 

To facilitate special custom 
applications! 



Full Mega-Byte Ram Capacity! 
On board! 

(With parity) 

D256K Bytes using 64K chips 

a 1 Mega Bytes using 256K chips 



Mega-Board™ Triple-tested, fully 

1 socketed and assembled 

' J ^t with IC's. 



Includes highest quality PC board 
with gold plating, silk screen, 
solder mask 



Board Size 10.5 inch X 13.5 inch 



□ MEGA-BOARD™ — XT 

□ BARE BOARD KIT $ 99.95 

D ASSEMBLED AND TESTED 

SOCKETKIT $199.95 

(LESS IC'S) (FULLY SOCKETED) 
D ASSEMBLED AND TESTED — 

COMPLETE $499.95 

(INCLUDES USERS MANUAL 
AND MEGA-BIOS ROM) 
O USERS MANUAL WITH THEORY OF 
OPERATION, SCHEMATICS, BLOCK 
DIAGRAM, APPLICATION 
NOTES $ 19.95 

□ MEGA-BIOS™ ROM (2764) FULLY XT 

COMPATIBLE, MS-DOS, 

PC DOS $ 29.95 

□ HARD TO GET PARTS CALL 



FREE 
OFFER 

FREE! Displayter 

Exclusive. 

Our Commitment to 

Microcomputer 

Education! 



FREE Intel 8088 
Data Book with each 
Mega-Board™ Order! 



ORDER NOW!!! 



Fast, friendly service 



CALL 214-991-1644 




EURO 

CARD 



Immediate shipment! 
Most instock items shipped 
same or next day! 



1 Day money back guarantee 
if not completely satisfied! 



DISPLAY 

TELECOMMUNICATIONS 

CORPORATION 



4100 SPRING VALLEY ROAD 
SUITE 400 
DALLAS, TX 75234 
(214)991-1644 



TERMS: We accept cash, checks, 
money orders, or purchase orders from 
qualified firms and institutions. Prices 
and availability subject to change without 
notice. Shipping and handling charges 
extra. 



*IBM and IBM PC are trademarks of International Business Machines 

438 B YTE • JULY 1985 



©1984 Display Telecommunications Corporation 

Inquiry 1 28 



Now, the lowest 
prices ever on 

3M Scotch 

*-7: DISKETTES 

f / LIFETIME WARRANTY! 



$"|49' — $199 

j Qty.50 5 W DSDD Qty.50 



W SSDD-96TPI -» $2.29 ea. 5fc" DSDD-96TPI -> $2.85 
SOFT SECTOR ONLYI MINIMUM ORDER: 20 DISKETTES 
ADD 3% FOR ORDERS 1321331 ™P 'N FILE15 



ea. 



am; 



MMncp^m ; I ■i*/10 DISKETTES, 

U N D E R 50! IMM33B (Ell. Thru 5/30/85) 

These are factory-fresh 3M diskettes packed in boxes of 10 with 
Tyvek sleeves, reinforced hubs, identification labels and write- 
protect tabs. __ ^_ 

3.5" Ml CRO-DISKETTES— SS-135 TPI -> $2.89 ea 
LIFETIME WARRANTY ON ALL 3M SCOTCH DISKETTES! 

HOURS: 8AM-5PM Central Time, Monday-Friday 

WE WILL BEAT ANY NATIONALLY ADVERTISED PRICE 

ON THE SAME PRODUCTS AND QUANTITIES! 

DISK WORLD!, Inc. 

Suite 4806 • 30 East Huron Street • Chicago, Minos 60611 



DISK Authorized Distributor 

Information Processing 

WORLD! "— 



BASF 

QUALIMETRIC 
DISKETTES! 

LIFETIME WARRANTYI 



M |"ssd° wrV Y™* 

| Qty-20 DSDD | Qty. 20 

5V«" SSDD-96TPI -. $1.46 ea. 5%" DSDD-96TPI - $1.75 ea. 
PACKED IN CARDBOARD CASES! 

BASF QUALIMETRIC DISKETTES have a LIFETIME WAR- 
RANTY with Tyvek sleeves, reinforced hubs, user identification 
labels and write-protect tabs. 
SOFT SECTOR ONLY! MINIMUM ORDER: 20 DISKETTES 
BASF 3.5" MICRO-FLOPPIES BASF 5WHIGH DENSITY 

FOR IBM PC-AT 
SSDD-135 TPI _ $2.50 ea. DSDD-HD — $4.91 ea. 

FOR ORDERS ONLY: INFORMATION & 

1-800-621-6827 inquiries: 

(In Illinois: 1-312-944-2788) 1-312-944-2788 

HOURS: 8AM-5PM Central Time, Monday-Friday 

WE WILL BEAT ANY NATIONALLY ADVERTISED PRICE 

ON THE SAME PRODUCTS AND QUANTITIES! 



nifvK Authorized Reseller _ 

u,wn Information Processing ■ BASF 

WORLD! Meda 



Incredible value! 

Nashua, 
Diskettes 



LIFETIME WARRANTY! 



ea. 



plUb 5V4 "SSDD ^ 1 15 

I Qty.50 5WDSDD I Qty.5 

These are poly-bagged diskettes packaged with Tyvek sleeves, 
reinforced hubs, user identification labels and write-protect tabs. 
NASHUA Corporation is a half-billion dollar corporation and a 
recognized leader in magnetic media. 

SOFT SECTOR ONLY! Sold in multiples of 50 only! 
FOR ORDERS ONLY: INFORMATION & 

1-800-621-6827 inquiries: 

(In Illinois: 1-312-944-2788) 1-312-944-2788 

HOURS: 8AM-5PM Central Time, Monday-Friday 

WE WILL BEAT ANY NATIONALLY ADVERTISED PRICE 

ON THE SAME PRODUCTS AND QUANTITIES! 

DISK WORLD!, Inc. 

Suite 4806* 30 East Huron Street* Chicago. Illinos 60611 



DISK nashua 

w ' v " Authorized Distributor MAGNETIC 

WORLD! 



BETTER MODEMS 

AT LOWER PRICES! 

. . .and get 24-hour shipping 

on your DISK WORLD! orders 



1200/300 Baud 300 Baud 

Avatex Modem ^^ Avatex Modem 

$189.95 ea. J ^^ $59.95 ea. 

Avatex Modems have everything. They're inexpen- 
sive, Hayes-compatible, Auto Dial, Auto Answer and 
high quality (backed by a one-year warranty). 

Best of all, our combination includes a One-Year FREE 
subscription to MCI MAIL and special communications 
software for placing TOLL-FREE orders with DISK 
WORLD!. 

Orders received via MCI MAIL are shipped within 
24-hours (subject to product availability). 

(Cables are net included.) 

FOR ORDERS ONLY: INFORMATION & 

1-800-621-6827 inquiries: 

(In Illinois: 1-312-944-2788) 1-312-944-2788 

HOURS: 8AM-5PM Central Time, Monday-Friday 

WE WILLBEATANY NATIONALLY ADVERTISED PRICE 

ON THE SAME PRODUCTS AND QUANTITIES! 

DISK WORLD!, Inc. 

Suite 4806* 30 East Huron Street •Chicago. Illinos 60611 



Authorized Distributor 



AVATEX 



DISKETTE 
STORAGE CASES 



AMARAY MEDIA-MATE 50: A REVOLUTION 
^A IN DISKETTE STORAGE 

^B^ . Every once in a while, someone takes the 

V#U r simple and makes it elegant! This unit holds 

Sfe 50 5%" diskettes, has grooves for easy 

^^ „_f stacking, inside nipples to keep diskettes 

from slipping and severa' other features. We 

like it! fr-lfl QC +$2.00 

$ lU.aJ ea. Shpng. 

DISKETTE 70 STORAGE: STILL A GREAT BUY. 

^^K Dust-free storage for 70 5V4" diskettes. 

WW Six dividers included. An excellent value. 



$11 Q5 + S30 ° 

VDISK CADDIES * ' '^ Sh ™ 

The original flip-up holder for 10 5VT 
"diskettes. Beige or grey only.dji fjC 

f 20« Shpng. 

for orders only: information & 

1-800-621-6827 inquiries: 

(In Illinois: 1-312-944-2788) 1-312-944-2788 

HOURS: 8AM-5PM Central Time, Monday-Friday 

WE WILL BEAT ANY NATIONALLY ADVERTISED PRICE 

ON THE SAME PRODUCTS AND QUANTITIES! 

DISK WORLD!, Inc. 

Suite 4806 • 30 East Huron Street • Chicago, Illinos 60611 



DISK 
WORLD! 



DISK WORLD! 

Ordering & Shipping 
Instructions 



Shipping: 5M" & 3.5" DISKETTES— Add $3.00 per each 100 or 
fewer diskettes. Other Items: Add shipping charges as shown in 
addition to othershippingcharges. Payment: VISAand MASTER- 
CARD accepted. COD Orders: Add additional $3.00 Special Han- 
dling charge. AP0, FP0, AK, HI & PR Orders: Include shipping 
charges as shown and additional 5% of total order amount to 
cover PAL and insurance. Taxes: Illinois residents only, add 8% 
sales tax. 

Prices subject to change without notice. 
This ad supercedes all other ads. 

Not responsible for typographical errors. 
MINIMUM TOTAL ORDER: S35.0C 



FOR ORDERS ONLY: 

1-800-621-6827 

(In Illinois: 1-312-944-2788) 



INFORMATION & 
INQUIRIES: 

1-312-944-2788 



HOURS: 8AM-5PM Central Time 

Monday-Friday 

WE WILL BEAT ANY NATIONALLY ADVERTISED PRICE 

ON THE SAME PRODUCTS AND QUANTITIES! 

DISK WORLD!, Inc. 

Suite 4806 • 30 East Huron Street • Chicago. Illinos 60611 




PRINTER 
RIBBONS: 



at 

extraordinary 
prices! 

Brand new ribbons, manufactured to Original Equipment 
Manufacturer's specifications, in housings. (Not re-inked or 
spools only.) 

LIFETIME WARRANTYI 

Epson MX-70/80 . . $3.58 ea. + 25C Shpng. 
Epson MX-100 ... $4.95 ea. + 25C Shpng. 
Okidata Micro83 . . $1.48 ea. + 25C Shpng. 
Okidata Micro84 . . $3.66 ea. + 25C Shpng. 

FOR ORDERS ONLY: INFORMATION & 

1-800-621-6827 inquiries: 

(In Illinois: 1-312-944-2788) 1-312-944-2788 

HOURS: 8AM-5PM Central Time. Monday-Friday 

WE WILL BEAT ANY NATIONALLY ADVERTISED PRICE 

ON THE SAME PRODUCTS AND QUANTITIES! 

DISK WORLD!, Inc. 

Suite 4806 • 30 East Huron Street* Chicago, Illinos 60611 



The value leader in H U I w K 
Computer supplies I .,___. _. 

And accessories. I WORLD' 



ATHANA 

DISKETTES 
The great unknown! 



QQ0- $109 

^^ Qty.50 51/4 „ DSDD _J Qty.50 

You've used these diskettes hundreds of 
times... as copy-protected originals on some of 
the most popular software packages. They're 
packed in poly-bags of 25 with Tyvek sleeves, 
reinforced hubs, user identification labels and 
write-protect tabs. 



LFET ME WARRANTY 



SOFT SECTOR ONLY! Sold in multiples 
of 50 only. 

FOR ORDERS ONLY: INFORMATION & 

1-800-621-6827 inquiries: 

(In Illinois: 1-312-944-2788) 1-312-944-2788 

HOURS: 8AM-5PM Central Time. Monday-Friday 

WE WILL BEAT ANY NATIONALLY ADVERTISED PRICE 

ON THE SAME PRODUCTS AND QUANTITIES! 

DISK WORLD!, Inc. 

Suite 4806 • 30 East Huron Street* Chicago, Illinos 60611 



DISK 
WORLD! 



ATHANA 
Authorized Distributor MAGNETIC 
MEDIA 



Nail down 
great prices on 

MEMOREX 

diskettes! 

LIFETIME WARRANTY! 



$128S„ »$170 

I Qty. 20 DSDD | Qty. 20 

MEMOREX DISKETTES come with 
heavy, lintless paper sleeves, reinforced 
hubs, write-protect tabs and user ID 
labels. 
3 5" MICRO -FLOPPIES _._ .„_„_ nM| v , 5 V DSDD-HD 

SSDO-135TPI SOFT SECTOR ONLY! FOR IBM PC-AT 

$2.44 ea. MINIMUM ORDER; 20 DISKETTES $3.89 ea 
INFORMATION & INQUIRIES: 
1-312-944-2788 
HOURS: 8AM-5PM Central Time 
Monday-Friday 
WE WILL BEAT ANY NATIONALLY ADVERTISED PRICE 
ON THE SAME PRODUCTS AND QUANTITIES! 
DISK WORLD!, Inc. 
Suite4806« 30 EastHuronStreet* Chicago. Illinos 60611 



DISK 
WORLD! 



Inquiry 127 



JULY 1985 -BYTE 439 



DISK DRIVES 



MWM 




free Disk Tub with Every Order Over $20 — Holds 60 5Vk" Disks 



Hard Disk 

• 10 Meg Hard Disk 

* w/lBM Controller 



$499 



Apple Compatible Drives 

Micro Sci 

A-2orA-20FUllHT $ 159 

Controller 60 

ecu 

FD525ASIimlineforllE $ 129 

FD525CforllC 139 

FD555AFullyCompatibleFullHt $ 139 



Hard Disk 

lOMegw/cont. &pwrsupply $ 995 

5%" Disk Drives 
Teac 

FD55A.160K $ 99 

FD55B,360K 95 

FD55F, Quad Density 129 

All Teac's are Half Heights 

Tandon 

TM100-2,360K $ 99 

TM101-4, Quad Density 269 

Mitsubishi 

4851, 360KV2 Height $ 129 

4853, Quad Den. 1 / 2 Height 139 

Hard Disk 

10 Meg w/ IBM Controller $ 499 

8" Disk Drives 
Siemens 

FDD-100-8 Sgl Side $ 129 

FDD-200-8 DblSide 189 



Shugart 

801R,SglSide $ 349 

851R, DblSide 499 

Tandon 

848-1 E ( sgl side, 1 / 2 Ht $ 279 

848-2E ( DblSide, 1 / 2 Ht 379 

Mitsubishi 

M2894-63,Dbl./Dbl . .$ 399 

M2896-63,DbL/Dbl. 1 / 2 Ht 399 

5 Va" & 8" 
Power Supply & Cabinets 

JMR 5Va" 

SingleCabinetw/pwr $ 

Dual Thinline Cab w/pwr 

Dual Cabinet & Power 

All have 6 month Warranty 
JMR 8" 

Sgl.Cabinetw/pwr&fan $ 

Dual w/pwr for 2 thinlines 239 

Dualw/pwr&fan 279 



79 
89 
89 



229 



PRINTERS 




Epson FX-100 

• 160CPS 

• 15" carriage 

$479 



LX-80 

RX-80(120cps) 
RX-80FT 
RX-100 + 
FX-80 + 
FX-100 + 
LQ1500 



Epson 



We Will 
Beat ALL Pricing 



JX-80 



We are an Authorized Dealer 



Brother Dist. by Dynax 

HR15XL.12CPS $359 

HR25,25cps 625 

HR35, 36CPS 835 



Okidata 

OKI182 $ 229 

OKI83A on tf£ ... 535 

OKI84P „P\3N*° 669 

OKI84S *cA0a'!\r* vs 749 

OK1 192 . &&T%i I f^ U 349 

OKI193,. 585 

OKI MATE20 Color Printer 129 

Call for other Models 

A B SWITCHBOX 

Par.orser $ 69 



PRINTER INTERFACES 

Fourth Dimension 

Card &Cable(ForApple) $ 45 

Microtek 

Dumpling CX (Crappler Compatible) $ 75 

Dumpling CXexpto64K 145 

DumplingCX16Kw/16Kexpto64K . 160 

Okidata options 

Tractorfor82&92 $ 55 

Serial Interface 85 

Orange Micro 

Crappler + $ 84 

Crappler + W/16K 174 

Epson Accessories 

Epson Serial Interface $ 99 

Letter writer NCQ Kit 59 

LX-80 or FX-80 Tractor 39 




Taxan 

• 440 Ultra Hi-Res 

$519 



Amdek 

300G, Hi-ResCreen $ 125 

300A, Hi-Res Amber 134 

310A, Monochrome Amber 158 

300Hi-ResColorComp 275 

500 RGB Composite 399 

DVM Board for Apple RGB 119 

Taxan 

425COlorRCB $ 399 

440 Ultra Hi-Res 539 

Stand 

Tilt & Turn Stand $ 19 



Princton Graphics 

MAX12,MonochromeAmber S 169 

HX12,RCBCOlor 449 

SR-i2w/DoublerBoard 775 

IBM 

Monochrome Green $ 239 

ColorHi-Res 559 

zenith 

ZVM122 $ 95 

ZVM123 95 

BMC 

12AUW Hi-Res Green S 79 



Computer •&« 
Components 
Unlimited 



A California Corporation 



no Surcharge for credit cards 

AD Prices Reflect a Cash, 

Pre-paid Discount 

This Ad Supersedes All Others 



Customer service & Technical 

(213)610-0407 

Sales Desk 

(800)847-1718 

Outside California 

(213) 618-0477 

inside California 



SYSTEMS 




IBM PC 

• 256K • Two 360KTandons 
• Hercules Color Graphics 

w/ parallel port 

• Hi-Res Green Monitor 

• 10 Meg Hard Disk 



$2199 



IBM AT 

• Enhanced 

$4950 



A 



Apple 

HE CPU $ 790 

Macintosh 1895 

lie Portable 899 



Compaq 

Portable (PC Compatible) 2, 360K Drives 

256K of Memory $1845 

Compaq + w/lOMeg 3300 

Deskprol 1640 

Deskpro2 2250 

Deskpro 3 3900 

Deskpro4 call 

IBM 

PC256K,2Drives $1499 

XTW/10Meg,256K 2895 

Additional Memory64K 9 

AT Standard Config Call 

ATw/20meg Call 

Add $50 for Configurations & Testing 



MODEMS 



Hayes Modem 

• Hayes 2400 Baud 

$599 



Hayes 

Micro Modem HE $ 169 

300Baud 169 

1200B IBM internal 359 

1200 389 

2400Baud 629 

Anchor Automation 

MarkForTi $ 59 

MarkVl 300 Baud IBM 79 

Mark xii, l200Baud 219 

Mark X, 300 Baud Stand alone 149 

Expressl200 Baud 269 



Prometheus 

Promodem $ 289 

Pro 1200A Apple Intw/sw 329 

Prol200BlBMIntw/sw 299 

ProMacw/cable&sw 279 

No.ccable 12 

Alpha Disp 89 

Options Proc 89 

U.S. Robotics 

Password $ 219 



IBM & APPLE ACCY'S 



64K upgrades 

• Nine 4164, 200ns 

• 1 Year warranty 
• Nine to a Set 



$9 



APPLE EXTRAS 

ALS 

ZEngine $ 119 

CPM3.0Card 240 

ecu 

RFModulator $ 9 

Fanw/surge 34 

16K Mem. card 1 yrwar $ 45 

Micro Max 

Viewmax 80, 80 col. card $ 1*35 

Viewmax80E(FforllE)64K 120 

Micro Soft 

PremiumSoftcardllE $ 369 

SoftCard(Z80)w/64K 279 

Micro Tek 

Serial interface $ 89 



RETAIL STORES: 

11976 Aviation Blvd. 
inglewood, CA 90304 

16129 Hawthorne Blvd., Suite E 
Lawndale, CA 90260 



MAIL ORDER: 

P.O. BOX 1936 
Hawthorne, CA 90250 



IBM EXTRAS 
Ast Research 

SixPack+ W/384K $ 299 

Hercules 

Colorcard $ 149 

Graphics Card 304 

Hard Disk 

10 Meg. External w/ power supply . . . $999 

IBM 

Monochrome Adapter $ 219 

Colorcard 225 

Paradise Systems 

Multi-display card $ 329 

NewModularCard 260 

5 Pack Multifunction 160 

Quadram 

Quad Colorcard $ 199 

Quadlink 349 

64K Upgrade at upgrade 

64K of Mem. . .$9 200 ns. . .$89 

Parallel P S $ 79 

Serial 79 

ecu 

Color Graphics card $ 119 

Everex 

Graphics Edge $ 329 



Retail Hours: 

10 a.m. - 6 p.m. Mon.-Fri. 

10 a.m. - 3 p.m. Sat. 



All merchandise new. we accept MC, Visa, wire 
Transfer, coo Call, Certified Check, P.O/s from 
Qualified firms, APOaccepted. Shipping: Minimum 
S4.50 first 5 pounds. Tax: California Res. Only add 
6v?% sales tax. All returns subject to 15% restock- 
ing charge. Advertised prices for Mail Order only. 
Retail prices slightly higher. 

Prices Subject to Change. 



CCU Multifunction Card 

Par. & Ser. Ports w/64K exp 384K 

Clock, Calendar,Sftwr& Manuals . . .$ 160 

W/384K 220 

8087'S 

8087-2 $ 149 

8087-3 104 

8087-6 95 

5Va" diskettes 

CCU 

Sgl/Dbl reinforced hub. .$11 lOOforlOO 

Dbl/Dbl reinforced hub . 13 lOOforHO 

NotBulk Packed 

Dysan 

Sgl/Dbl $33 100for300 

Dbl/Dbl 39 100for370 

verbatim 

Sgl/Dbl $26 100for240 

Dbl/Dbl 36 100for340 

8" Diskettes Available — Call 

DISK ACCESSORIES 

verbatim 

8" or 5 1 /«" Head Cleaning Kit $ 9 

Flip Tub 

SVa" Holds60disks, plexiglass $ 9 



Customer Service Hours: 

10 a.m. - 4 p.m. Mon.-Fri. 

John Aurentz 

(213)618-0487 

Mail Ordef Hours: 

8 a.m. - 6 p.m. Mon.-Fri. 

10 a.m. - 3 p.m. Sat. 

(800)847-1718 (213)618-0477 

(Outsidecalifornia) (insidecalifornia) 



GlM t fafr tijfejBS 



ffl 



COMPUTER SYSTEMS 

IBM PC, XT, AT (Several Configurations Available) SCall 

IBM PC with 10 Mb Hard Disk, 256K, 360K Disk Drive 2169 

IBM PC with 256K, 2-360K Disk Drives 1589 

AST RESEARCH 

All AST Boards come with 1 year warranty 

SlxPakPlus w/64K Upgradeable to 384K, Now includes a FREE! 

copy of Borland's SIDEKICK (copiable) S. P, C 245 

SlxPakPlus W/384K fully populated 369 

I/O Pius II with Serial and Clock Calendar (parallel, game or 

second serial port optional) 127 

170 Mini w/Ser. and Clk Calendar (Short card XT size) 135 

Par./Game/Ser. Port for any AST Board (specify board) 35 

Reach Modem w/Crosstalk XVI on short XT card 415 

AST Preview Graphics card with parallel port. Hi-Res 299 

Advantage W/128K (Up to 3Mb) S, P, for AT 399 

Advantage w/3Mb 1675 

AST-5251-11 Connect PC to IBM Sys 34/36/38 699 

AST-5251-12 519 

AST-3780 579 

Colossus 67Mb Hard Disk with 60Mb Tape Back-up (Specify 

if for PC or AT) 5695 

INTEL 

All Intel Boards come with 5 year warranty. Intel Boards are 
compatible with Lotus/Symphony Bank switching Std. 

Above Board PC W/64K Upgradeable to 512K 320 

Above Board AT W/128K Upgradeable to 1.6Mb 469 

8087 Math Coprocessor up to 5MHz 109 

8087-2 Up to 8MHz 129 80287 Up to 6MHz 289 

HAYES 

Smartmodem 1200 (External) SCall 

Smartmodem 2400 (External) 629 

Smartmodem 1200B (Internal with Smartcom li) 365 

HERCULES 

Graphics Card with Parallel port 305 

Color Card with Parallel port 164 

EPSON 

ACP has the best prices on the new Epson Plus series with the 
NLQ option. All Epson printers have graphics capability. We 
stock the RX-100, FX-80 + , FX-100 + , JX-80 Color, LQ-1500, 

Spectrum LX-80 (Includes NLQ option) SCall 

Esprlnt 100cps Dot-Matrix Printer (Ser. or Par.) 199 

KEYTRONICS 

KB5151 Deluxe Keyboard SCall 

KB5150 PC Keyboard 155 

ACP 5150 Cpompatible to the KB5150 99 

QUADRAM 

Quadboard w/64K Upgradeable to 384K 239 

Quad link The Apple IBM Link 449 

Quadchrome II 14" Hi-Res Color Monitor 445 

TECMAR 

Graphics Master High end color graphics w/PC Paint 499 

Expansion Chassis Complete expansion chassis 729 

PRINCETON GRAPHICS 

MAX-12 Amber Monitor 175 

HX-12E 690x240 Color Monitor 539 

HX-12 690x240 Color Monitor 449 

SR-12 720x480 Color Monitor 619 

San Doubler 196 

TAXAN 

Taxan 440 Ultra Hi-Res 720x400 (req. Bob Board) 579 

Special Offer Taxan 440 plus Bob Board 995 

Taxan 121 or 122 Green/Amber Monitor 159 

Taxan 415 (640x260 Acorn lable but a steal while supply lasts!) 
This monitor was sold for 699. Req cable to IBM ($18) 299 

FLOPPY DISK DRIVES 

Shugart SA450 DS/DD 79 

Shugart SA350 37i" 250 

IBM PC Compatible 1 / 2 High or Full SS/DD Drive 49 

Qty 
1 2-5 

Teac 55B IBM PC type DS/DD (48tpi) 95 92 

Tandon TM-100-2 Std. Hight IBM Style DS/DD 99 97 



FLOPPY DISK DRIVES - Cont. 

Shugart SA455 IBM Style DS/DD 99 97 

Shugart 801R 8" SS/DD Supply Limited 249 239 

Shugart 851R 8" DS/DD Supply Limited 449 435 

Tandon TM-848-1E 8 M SS/DD Thinline 269 259 

Tandon TM-848-2E 8" DS/DD Thinline 369 349 

Call us for your volume disk drive requirements. We are 

direct importers on several name brands. 

ACP maintains full testing and alignment capability. If 

you are having problems with your drives, give us a call. 

APPLE FLOPPY COMPATIBLE DRIVES 

Apple II, II + , lie Compatible Drive (Vz Hight only) $115 

Apple lie Compatible Drive (72 Hight only) 125 

Macintosh Compatible Drive (Vfe Hight only) 299 

HARD DISK DRIVES 

Shugart SA604 5Mb Seagate ST506 Compatible 99 

Shugart SA712 10Mb 1 /j Ht. Low Power. (Supply Limited) ...249 

Mlnlscrlbe 3012 10Mb 72 Hight 275 

CMI Call for 10, 22, 33Mb Drives SCall 

Seagate ST212 10Mb 299 

Quantum 42Mb 1375 

Winchester Controller Same hard disk controller as used 

by IBM. Please specify your drive and we will supply 

with proper firmware. Firmware currently in stock for 

over 25 different drives. Comes with 1 year warranty 195 

HARD DISK EXPANSION 

5Mb Internal w/controller. (for PC req. added power 299 

5Mb External w/controller. PS, IBM style chassis & fan 419 

10Mb Internal w/controller (7z Ht) w/full bezel) 449 

10Mb External w/cont., IBM style case w/PS and fan 649 

20, 33Mb & up drives, please call for current prices SCall 

TAPE CARTRIDGE BACK-UP 

Excell 4500 PC Internal with 45Mb. This is the top selling 
tape back-up for the PC. It uses the Wangtek Tape 
Cartridge with controller. We are always back-ordered 

on this popular product 999 

Excell 4500 External (for XT add $100) 1199 

Excel! 4500 XT 1099 

IBM PC HARDWARE KEY VALUES 

ACP Multifunction 384K w/OK plus all the same function 

and features as the SixPakPlus .160 

ACP Color Card139 

ACPMonocard 139 

ACP Floppy Card 99 

PC Style Chassis (IBM Style chassis) 99 

PC 130 Watt Power Supply (Drops right in) 119 

IBM Style Monitor (Green w/TTL input) priced right 119 

IBM PC 256K RAM Card w/64K 69.95 W/256K 99.95 

APPLE HARDWARE KEY VALUES 

Grappler* (Most popular Printer Interface at new price) 88 

Buffered Grappler from Orange Micro 165 

Serial Grappler (Works great w/lmmagewriter) 119 

ACP 16K Buffered Serial Card 95 

ACP 80 Column Card (Super in Apple li, II + ) 69 

Kennslnton System Saver (Preferred Apple Cooler) 69 

ACP System Cooling Fan (Similar to sys saver) 30 

Apple He Keyboard (Replacement keyboard for He) 30 

Apple ll/lle Power Supply (Compatible to Apple) 60 

Apple II, II + , He Disk Controller (Compatible) 40 

ACP Parallel Interface (w/Cable II, II + , He) 40 

Crickett lie (Speech board for lie by Street Electronics) 129 

ECHO II Speech Synthesizer (Best for II, II + , He) 99 

Titan Ramcard 199 

Titan Accelerator Card 299 

ACP Extended 80 Column w/64K (for Apple He) 99 

APPLE & IBM SOFTWARE VALUES 

We stock a complete line of Apple and IBM Software titles all at 
discount prices. Call our sales desk for the current low price for 
your software needs. 

Flashcalc (Super spreadsheet formerly Visicalc APII) 79 

Wordstar (for IBM) 229 

Supercalc I (Closeout on original IBM version) 20 




10 Mb $449.00 

HARD DISK 

w/Controller for IBM PC and 

Compatibles. 

At This Price, Supply 

Is Limited. 

External Enclosure Add $195.00 



PC UPGRADE SPECIAL 

$ 10 00 

SET OF (9) 64K RAMS 

$ m mOO 



45 



SET OF (9) 256K RAMS 

PIGGYBACKS FOR AT 
128KRAMS i $5.95 




5 Mb EXTERNAL 

Sharp IBM Look-a-like w/controller 

for IBM PC. 
Sub-System Price: $429.00 

Internal w/controller 
Sub-System Price: $299.00 





DELUXE JOYSTICK 
$11.95 

Compatible w/Atari 
2600, 400, 800, 
VIC-20/64 and Apple. 
Requires optional cable 
adapter. Add $1.50 

APPLE DISK DRIVE 
$115.00 

High quality Vz high 
drive for Apple II, II + , 
lie or lie. Apple lie re- 
quires optional cable 
adapter. Add $10.00 



A. 



^©8aSiiil : 



|||||||H1| 



PiwM 



UPS POWER SUPPLY 

Back Up Power for your IBM, 
Appl« or Compatible 

UPS-PC ZOO Wans $277.00 

UPS-Xf 425 Watts 455.00 

UPS-AT 1000 Watts 975.00 

AB PRINTER SWITCH 

m AB Switch allows use of two printers with 
yourcomputersyslam. Wa slock over 15 dif- 
ferent configurations. 

AB Switch (Centronics) 559.00 

AB Switch (DB25) 59.00 

COLOR VIOEO CAROS 

Plantronics Color Pius $375.00 

IBM Color Card 227.00 

IBM Mono Card w/parallel 219.00 

STB Graphics Plus 369.00 

Paradise MuttidispUty Card 345.00 

Everex Graphics Edga 345.00 



DRIVE CABINETS 

IBM St)le Hard disk with power 

supply and fan $195.00 

Dual Hard Disk w/power aup & tan 295.00 

Dual 5V«" Full Highl vertical mount 65.00 

Dual 5tt" Full Highl horizontal mount 99.00 
Dual 5v." Thlnline w/power aup & fan 60.00 
Single 5Vt" Full Highl w/power supi tan 56.00 
Single S'A" Thlntlne w/power sup & fan 60 00 



PERSYST CARDS 

Petsyst Mono Combo — NEWI 

Persyst Color Combo — NEW! 

Persysl Bob Board 

Perayst Shortport Color 

Persyst Mini Mono 

Persysl +1 Tme Spectrum w/64K 

Persyst 192K Reinbow DEC Card 



$335.00 
335.00 
445.00 



SPECIAL BUY 

Shugart I A 40O4 14" 29UbH«rd DUk 
$499.00 



MODEM SPECIAL 

H«y*s Smart mod »m Compatible 

120O Baud. Ext«m*l. Sold for 399.00 

$219.00 



INTERSIL STD-BUS BOARDS 



TRANS1STORS/DIOOES 



ISB3101 
ISB3110 
ISB3216 
ISB3216 



ISB3330 
ISB3331 
ISB3340 
ISB34O0 
ISB3410 



280 CPU 
290 Univ. CPU 
8085 CPU 
16K CMOS HAM 
\6K Sialic RAM 
16K CMOS RAM 
ZBO PIO (D mating) 
Universal PIO 
Opto Para. Input 
Floppy Controller 
SASl (DMA) WINI Inti 

Opto-fsofnput 
SPST Relay 
OPDT Relay 
Arithmetic 

EPROM Programer 
Sync/Async 
Univ. Sync/Async 
REMDACS 
Bit WD 



CAPACITORS 



LIST ACP 

S200 S69.S5 

200 69.95 

200 79.95 

610 99.95 

200 39.95 

750 119.95 

210 49.95 

210 49.95 

300 119.95 

215 79.95 

255 99.95 

215 99.95 

270 119.95 



150 



9.95 



190 89.95 

375 149.95 

260 79.95 

245 89.95 



.OIuF DISC BYPASS CAPACITOR 
.1 uF DISC BYPASS CAPACITOR 
OIUF MONOUTHIC CAPACITOR 
I uF MONOUTHIC CAPACITOR 



100/S5.50 
100/8.50 
100/11.25 
100/14.25 



CORCOM EMI FILTER 

STD CORCOM 3 Conductor Filler $4.50 

Line Cord lor ebove — 6 fool 1.49 

ie Cord 2 Conductor — 6 foot .35 

Line Cord 3 Conductor — 6 toot .95 



MUFFIN FANS 

Ovar 10,000 In Stock 

Torin 3" TA-300 Fan NEWI $9.95 

Torln 4.66" Muffin Fan NEW! 12.95 

12VDC Fan NEWI 19.95 

Finger Guards added 1.49 

Power Cords Added 1.49 



IC SOCKETS 

SOLDERTAIL 1-99 100 

8 Ptn ST/LP $ .13 $ .10 

14PinST/LP .15 .11 

16 Pin ST/Lp .17 .12 

18 Pin ST/LP .20 .17 

20Pin ST/LP .28 .26 

22 Pin ST/LP .29 .27 

24 Pin ST/LP .29 .27 

28 Pin ST/LP .39 .32 

36 Pin ST/I.P .45 38 

40 Pin ST/LP .48 .42 

64 Pin ST/LP 3.95 3.25 

WIREWflAP (COLO) 1-99 100 

6 Pin WW/3L $ .49 $ .40 

14 Pin WW/3L .62 .49 

16 Pin WW/3L .65 .55 

18 Pin WW/3L .88 .77 

20Pin WW/3L .99 .96 

22 Pin WW/31 1.19 1.13 

24PinWW/3L 1.25 1.17 

28PinWW/3L 1.49 1.39 

40Pin WW/3L 1.89 1.75 

TEXTOOL/ZIF ZERO INSERTION 

16 Pin 56.75 24 Pin $7.65 28 Pin $8.95 

(We Stock Att Types ol Sockets) 



PN2369A 

PN918 

2N2218A 

2N2219A 

2N2905 

2N2007 

2N3055 

2N3585 

2N3638 

2N3772 



7/S1.00 2N3904 
5/1.00 2N3906 
3/1.00 TIP29A 
T1P30A 
TIP31A 
TIP32A 
1N4146 
1N751 
1N4002 
1N4004 
MPQ2232 



11/1.00 

2/1.00 
2/1.00 
2/1.25 
2/1.25 
25/1.00 
5/1.00 
12/1 00 
10/1.00 



OPTO ISOLATORS 



MCT-2 

MCT-6 

MCT-66 

MCA-255 

4N26 

4N27 

4N28 



Jumbo Red 
Jumbo Green 
Jumbo Yellow 
Mini Size Red 
Mini Size Green 
Mini Size Yellow 



4N33 
4N35 
4N37 
4N38 
TIL117 
SPX33 
4N25 



SPECIAL VALUES! 

MCM68705 EPROM 

6116/2016-l50mS 

DB-25P Male 

DB-25S Female 

2732A-2 

2716DC^»50mS 

2764-450mS 



$9 95 
10/1995 
10/17 50 
10/19.95 
10/29.95 
TO/24.50 
10/29.95 



CALL ACP FOR ALL YOUR 
VOLUME IC REQUIREMENTS 



EDGE CONNECTORS 



S-100ST 


$3.95 


$3.25 


S-100 WW 


4.75 


4.10 


44 Pi n ST 


2.75 


2.60 


44 Pin WW 


475 


4 25 


72 Pin ST 


6.50 


6.10 


72 Pin WW 


7.25 


6.95 


D-SUBMINIATURE 






1-24 


25 


DB25S (Female 


$3.10 


$2 90 


DB25P (Male) 


2.40 


2 29 


Hood $1.25 


Mtg H/W $ .99 




DE37S (Female) 


S5.95 


$5.75 


DE37P (Male) 


525 


5.10 


Hood $1.75 


Mtg H/W S .99 




DD50S (Female) 


$8.95 


$8.65 


DD50P (Male) 


6.00 


5.75 


Hood $3.25 


Mtg H/W $ .99 




(OTHER STYLES IN CATALOG) 




CENTRONICS 




IDC 36 Pin Male 




$8.95 


IDC 36 Pin Female 




9.49 


Solder 38 Pin Mate 




749 


Solder 36 Pin Female 




6.95 


(CALL TOLL FREE FOR IDC'S) 





IDC CONNECTORS 



Rt Angle Solder Header 



Ribbon Header Socket 



Ribbon Header 



Ribbon Edgecard 



Rt Angle W/W Header 



NUMBER OF CONTACTS 
10 20 26 34 40 SI 



.79 1.20 1.65 2.10 2.40 3.00 



3.10 '4.10 4.20 4.60 7.15 



NOTE: To order insert number of contacts In place of xx In ACP part number. 
ORDER QUANTITY OF 50pcs (mixed) AND TAKE AN ADDITIONAL 10% OFF. 



OKIDATA PRINTERS 



Okimata 20 Color Printer 
Plug-NPrlnt for Okidata 20 
Okidata 18 2(120cps. Graphica) 
Okidata 192 (160cps. Graphics) 
Okldafa 193 (160cps. 15" Paper) 
Okidata 92(i60cps. Graphics) 
Okidata 93(i60cps. 15" Paper) 



$139.00 
69.00 
259.00 
349.00 
549.00 
349.00 
599.00 



Okidata 84(200cps, Parallel) 

Okidata 84 (200cps, Serial) 

Tractor for Okidata 192 

Tractor forOkidata92 

2K Serial Boardfor Okidata 192/193 

2K Serial Board for Okidata 92/93 

Extra Ribbon 



44.00 
54.00 
8900 



$19 95 
39.95 
2.90 



6810 $ 2.85 

6820 3.75 

6621 2.90 

6826 14.50 

6940 12.75 

6845 11.95 



6875 
6880 
68047 



6522 
6532 
6551 



8035 $ 5.75 

8039 575 

8060A 2.95 

8085A 4.90 
80CB5A 9.95 

6086 24.50 

8067-2 129.95 

6088 17.50 

8089 86.95 

6155 875 

8156 6.75 

8165 26.95 

8202 23.95 

8203 37.95 



zeo-CPU 

Z80-CTC 
Z80-DART 

280-OMA 

Z80-PIO 

Z80-SIO/0 

ZB0-SIO/1 

Z80-SIO/2 

ZBO-SIO/9 



8243 

6250 

8251 

8251A 

8253 

8255 

8255A 

8257 



2.50 
7.50 
6.00 
2 95 
6.50 
6.50 
6.50 
650 



8259 


$ 8.75 


4017 


fiS 


8271 


69.95 


4018 


79 


8275 


26.95 






6279 


8.75 






8282 


625 






6263 


6 25 






6264 


550 






8286 


6.45 






8287 


6.45 






8266 


11.95 


4027 


.45 


6269 


44.95 






8292 


12.95 






8741 


27,95 






8748 
8749 
8755A 


24.50 
24.50 
3495 


74C00 $.29 
74C02 .29 
74C04 .29 






74C08 


35 






74C10 


35 



4 0MHz "B" 6.0MHz 



$34.95 I 
34.95 | 



DISK CONTROLLERS 



22 75 

21.50 
21.50 



1797 
2791 
2793 
2795 
2797 



$21.95 
32 95 
32 95 
32.95 
27.95 



6843 


$28.95 


8272 


1995 


1691 


695 


2143 


6.95 


9216 


12.95 



CRT CONTROLLERS 



17 95 



6845 
68B45 

6847 11.50 

46S0S 14.75 
68047 19.50 



8275 $2850 I TMS9918 $39.50 

7220 34.95 8350 39.95 

5027 1795 6545 1495 

5037 21.95 I 6002 19.95 

NEC7220 Graphics 34.95 

UARTS/USARTS 



1602B $3.95 I 
1013A 3.95 
1015A 6.75 I 



1702 (ImS) 
2708(450nS) 
2758 (5V) 
2716 (450nS) 
2716 (350nS) 
2518 (5V) 
TMS2716 
TMS2532 
2732 (450nS) 
2732 (250nS) 
2732 (200nS) 



2350 $ 

8250 

IM6402 



995 I IM6403 


$ 8.75 


ISO TMS5501 


1495 


775 I 2651 


8 95 


2732A-4 (450nS) 


$ 450 


2732A (250nS) 


695 


2732A-2 (200nS) 


895 


2764 (450nS) 


450 


2764 (250nS) 


850 


2764 (200nS) 


8 50 


TMS2564(450nS) 


9.95 


MCM68764 (450nSj 


1995 


MCM68766(350nS] 


21.95 


27128-3 (300nS) 


950 


27128 (250nS) 


15.95 


27C32 


$9.95 


27C64 


12.95 



STATIC RAMS 



2101 (450nS) 
21L02 (450nS) 
2102-1 (450nS) 
21L02-2(250nS) 
2111 (450nS) 
2112(450nS) 
2114 (450nS) 
2114L4 (450n) 
21 14L-3(300n) 
2114L-2(200n) 
2147 (55nS) 
4044.4 (450nS) 
4044-3 (300nS) 
4044-2 (200rtS) 
UPD410(100nS) 
5101 (CMOS) 



1.45 8/9 50 
.69 6/12.50 
79 6/13.30 
.89 8/13.90 



MK4118 $4.95 

TMM2016-2 (200nS) 3.10 
TMM20l6-tS(150n) 3.95 
TMM2016-1 (lOOnS) 3.00 
HM6116P-4 (200nS) 4,75 
HM6116P-3 (150nS) 3 25 
HM6116P-2 (120nS) 5 75 
HM8116LP-4 (LP) 3.60 
HM6116LP-3(LP) 3.95 
HM6116LP-2 (LP) 3.95 
Z6132 (300nS) 3295 
HM6264P-15 (150) 14.95 
HM6264LP-15 (LP) 16.95 
74S189 (35nS) 1.85 

93415 (50nS) 3 95 

93425(50nS) 3.95 



DYNAMIC RAMS 



4027 (250nS) $1.29 

1103 (SOOnS) .79 

41 16N-2 (150nS) 1.298/9.95 

41l6N-3(200nS) 1.19 8/8.25 

4116N-4 (250nS) .896/ 5.99 

4164N-150 (150n) 1.59 9/11.95 

4164N-200 (200n) 1.49 9/10.00 

4164N-120 (120nS) 6.25 

TMS4164 (150nS) 5.95 



TMS4406 (200nS) $6.95 

TMS4416(150nS) $7.75 

41256-150 (150n) 8.95 

41256-200 (200n) 7.95 

TMS4050 (300nS) 1.65 

TMS4060(300nS) 1.85 

MM5280 (300nS) 1.85 

UPD411 (300nS) 1.85 

MM5298 (250nS) 1.85 



DISK SPECIAL (ism pc osoo) 



| EACH HubRings 

PACKAGE Tyvac Cover 

OF 25 Ma i<" M| 9'. 



WOW! 

Supply Limited 



4000 $ .; 

4001 .; 

4002 .: 

4006 .; 

4007 .2 

4008 .! 

4009 .: 

4010 .: 

4011 .i 

4012 .; 

4013 .: 



4028 $ .65 


4059 $7.90 


4029 


.75 


4060 


.85 


4030 


.39 


4066 


.39 


4031 


3.25 


4069 


.28 


4032 


2.15 


4070 


.35 


4034 


1.91 


4071 


.28 


4035 


79 


4072 


.28 


4037 


1.95 


4073 


.28 


4040 


.75 


4075 


.28 


4041 


.75 


4076 


.75 


4042 


.65 


4077 


.35 


4043 


.85 


4078 


.35 


40.1.1 




4081 


.29 


4046 


.60 


4082 


.29 


4047 


.69 


4085 


.95 


4048 


99 


4066 


95 


4049 


.35 


4093 


.45 


4050 


.34 


4094 


295 


4051 


.75 


4098 


1.90 


4052 


.75 


4099 


1.85 


4053 


.75 


4501 


.69 


4055 


3.95 


4502 


95 


4056 


2.95 


4503 


.49 






CALL FOR 



4505 

4507 

4508 

4510 

4511 

4512 

4514 

4515 

4516 

4518 

4520 

4555 

4556 

4566 

80C95 

80C97 

MC14408 

MC14409 

MC14410 

MC14411 

MC14412 

MC14419 

74HC 



74C00 

74C74 $.85 I 74C161 $1.15 |74C373$2.3S 
74C85 1.89 74C175 1.15 74C374 2.35 
74C90 1.15 74C240 1.89 74C901 .59 
74C93 1.15 I 74C244 1.89 I74C922 4 45 
MORE74CINSTOCK— ALSOIN CATALOG 



LM3909 

LM3914 i 

LM3915 

LM3916 

MC4024 

MC4044 

RC4131 

RC4136 

RC4151 

CA3023 

CA3039 

CA3046 

CA3059 

CA3060 

CA3065 

CA3080 

CA3081 

CA3082 

CA3083 

CA3086 

CA3089 

CA3096 

CA3130 

CA3140 

CA3146 

CA3160 

LM13060 

LM13600 

LM13700 

LF347 

LF351 

LF353 

LF355 

LF356 

LF357 

TL071CP 

TL072CP 

TL074CN 

TL0B1CP 

TL084CN 

TL494 

TL496 

TL497 

MC3423 

MC3453 

MC3456 

MC3459 

MC3469 

MC3470 



VOLTAGE REGULATORS 



TOLL FREE 

800-854-8230 

Calif. Residents 

714-558-8813 



OUR 
POLICY 



Inquiry 1 7 



•NO surcharge for VISA or Mastercard. 
•NO sales tax. »AII shipments Insured. 
•Your card is Not charged until we ship. 
•Same day FEDEX shipment is available. 
•Volume purchasing agreements available. 
•Government agencies, corporate and 
. Institutional PO's accepted. 
•Orders subject to availability. 
•All items have manufacturer warranty. 

Some warranties up to 5 years. 
•Pricing subject to change w/o. notice. 
•Returns or cancellations may be subject 

to restocking fee. 

•ACP Retail Store pricing may vary. 
•We are not responsible for typos. 



LM108AH 


$3.95 


LM300H 


.99 


LM301N 


.35 


LM304H 


1.89 


LM305H 


.95 


LM306H 


4.75 


LM307N 


40 


LM306CN 


.65 


LM310CN 


1.65 


LM311CN 


.62 


LM312H 


1.75 


LM318CN 


145 


LM318H 


155 


LM319N 


1.19 


LM320(se 


sVRs) 


LM324N 


.55 


LM339N 


.95 


LM340 (see Vfls) 


LM346N 


.95 


LM356CN 


65 


LM359 


1.75 


LM360N 


295 


LM370N 


495 


LM373N 


395 


LM376N 


3 75 


LM377N 


190 


LM380CN 


.85 


LM380N 


1.05 


LM361N 


159 


LM382N 


135 


LM383N 


195 


LM384N 


1.75 


LM3B6N 


.89 


LM387N 


1.29 


LM389N 


1.15 


LM392N 




LM723N 


.46 


LM723H 


55 


NE531 


2 85 


NE555 


35 


NE556 


.65 


NE556 


1.49 


NE561 


23.50 


NE564 


2.85 


LM565 


95 


LM566 


145 


LM567 


65 


NE570 


365 


NE571 


2 90 



NE590 


S2.45 


NE592 


2.70 


LM709N 


.55 


LM709H 


190 


LM710 


68 


LM711 


.75 


LM715 


3.95 


LM723N 


55 


LM723H 


.75 


LM733 


98 


LM739 


185 


LM741CN 


33 


LM741H 


40 


LM741N 


29 


LM747 


.65 


LM748 


55 


LM1014 


1 15 


LM1303 


1.90 


LM1310 


1.45 


MC1330 


1.85 


MC1349 


1.85 


MC1350 


1.15 


MC1358 


1 65 


MC1372 


6.75 


LM1414 


1.55 


LM1558H 


299 


LM1B0O 


2 35 


LM1B12 


8 10 


LM1630 


3.40 


LM1871 


5 45 


LM1872 


5 45 


LM1877 


320 


LM1889 


1.90 


LM1898 


1.70 


ULN2001 


1.95 


ULN2003 


1 49 


XR2206 


3 75 


XR2207 


2.90 


XR220B 


2.40 


XR2211 


375 


LM2877P 


200 


LM2878P 


225 


LM2900 


.83 


LM2901 


99 


LM2903 


.69 


LM2907 


2.45 


LM2917 


2.85 


LM3900 


.55 


LM3905 


1.15 



7805TAISO 

8. 12. 15. 24V. 
78L05. 12. 15V .65 

78M06C 1 .89 

78MG/79MG 1.49 

78H05KC 8.75 

7805K Also 

12. 15. 24V 
7905T Also 

B. T2. 15, 24V 



.69 



1.29 
.79 



1.39 



7905K Also 
12. 15. 24V.. 

79L05. 12. 15 V 75 

LM309K 1.25 

LM317H/K 1.25/3 85 

LM323K 4 85 

LM337K 3.75 

LM339K 6.75 

LM350T 4.55 

LM350K 4.75 



SPECIAL PURPOSE CHIPS 



34702 
5016 
6116 
5307 
MC4024 



95H90 
76477 
76468 
76489 
AY38910 
AY38912 
SSI-263 
Votrax 
Dtgilalker 
LM13600N 
TR1863 5V UART 



58174 $11.25 


5832 


3.75 


AY52376 


11.50 


AY53600 


11.50 


2513-001U 


9.50 


2513-002L 


9.50 


UPD7201 


27.95 


3341 


4.50 


11C90 


13.25 


MC15906 


2.95 



36.95 
39.95 
3495 



DATA ACQUISITION 



ADC0800 $14.95 
ADC0804 3 45 
DAC0806 1.90 



3V4 H DISKETTES 

VERBATIM 52501 SS/DD 
VERBATIM 550-01 DS/DD (IBM) 
MAXELL MD-1 SS/OD (All) 
MAXELL MO-2 DS/DD (IBM) 
MAXELL DISKS lor AT (96tpl) 
DYSAN 104/1D SS/DD (All) 
DYSAN 104/2D DS/DD (IBM) 
ACP SS/DD (All) 
ACP DS/DD (IBM) 
3V4" DISKETTES 
VERBATIM 3V>- MF350 (MAC) 
MAXELL 3VS" MICRODISK (MAC) 
9" DISKETTES 
VERBATIM 8" SS/DD 
VERBATIM 8" DS/DD 
DYSAN 6" SS/DD 
DYSAN 8" DS/DD 



24.95 
46.95 
27.95 
34 95 



26.95 
38.95 
3295 
49.95 



5Vt" DISK 
TUB 

S8.95 



3W DISK 
TUB 

$14.95 



HEAD CLEANING 
KIT— 5V«" or I 

S9.95 



ADC0817 $9.75 
DAC08O0 4.75 
DAC060B 2.85 
DAC1020 7.95 
DAC1022 5.85 
LF353N 1.99 



I406L6 $1.95 
1406LB 2.85 
DAC100 7.95 
DAC08 7.95 
DAC01 6.95 
LF13201N 1.99 



EXPANSION MEMORY 

64K UPGRADE sef 9 $10.00 
256KRAMS $45.00 

CABLES/ACCESSORIES 

IBM PARALLEL (Shielded) $29 95 

IBM SERIAL (Shielded) 24.95 

KEYBOARD EXTENSION 9.95 

RS232 GENDER CHANGER Male-Male 14 95 

RS232 GENDER CHANGER Female-Female 14.95 

NULL MODEM ADAPTOR 14.95 



"Va'DISK drive 

IBM PC® 

Comp. DS/DD Disk Orlve 



*89 9 



HITECH SPECIALS 

AMD7910 

300/1200 BAUD MDDEM IC 



*19 9 



7400 
7401 
7402 
7403 
7404 
7405 
7406 
7407 
7406 
7409 
7410 
7411 
7412 
7413 
7414 
7416 
7417 
7420 
7421 
7422 
7423 
7425 
7426 
7427 
7428 
7430 
7432 
7437 
7438 
7439 
7440 
7441 
7442 
7443 
7444 
7445 



74LS02 

74LS03 

74LS04 

74LS05 

74LS06 

74LS09 

74LS10 

74LS11 

74LS12 

74LS13 

74LS14 

74LS15 

74LS20 

74LS21 

74LS22 

74LS26 

74LS27 

74LS26 

74LS30 

74LS32 

74LS33 

74LS37 

74LS38 

74LS40 

74LS42 

74LS47 

74LS48 

74LS51 

74LS54 

74LS55 

74LS73 

74LS74 

74LS75 

74LS76 

74LS78 

74LS83 

74LS65 

74LS66 

74LS90 

74LS92 

74LS93 

74LS95 

74LS96 

74LS107 

74LS109 

74LS112 



7446 $ 
7447 

7448 
7450 
7451 
7453 
7454 
7459 
7460 
7470 
7472 
7473 
7474 
7475 
7476 
7479 
7480 
7482 
7483 
7485 
7486 
7489 
7490 
7491 
7492 
7493 
7494 
7495 
7496 
7497 
74100 
74107 
74109 
74118 
74121 
74122 



74123 $ 

74125 

74126 

74128 

74132 

74138 

74141 

74142 

74143 

74144 

74145 

74147 

74148 

74150 

74151 

74152 

74153 

741S4 

74155 

74156 

74157 

74158 

74159 

74160 

74161 

74162 

74183 

74164 

74155 

74156 

74167 

74170 

74172 

74173 

74174 

74175 

74LS00 

74LS113 $ .38 

74LS114 .39 

74LS122 .45 

74LS123 .95 

74LS124 2.75 

74LS125 .49 

74LS126 .49 

74LS132 59 

74LS136 .39 

74LS136 .59 

74LS139 .59 

74LS145 1.19 

74LS148 1.38 

74LS151 .55 

74LS153 .55 

74LS154 1.49 

74LS155 .69 

74LS156 .69 

74LS157 .69 

74LS158 .69 

74LS160 .89 

74LS161 .69 

74LS162 .69 

74LS163 .69 

74LS164 .69 

74LS165 .90 

74LS166 1.90 

74LS168 1.15 

74LS169 1.15 

74LS170 1.40 

74LS173 67 

74LS174 .67 

74LS175 .67 

74LS181 1.95 

74LS190 .85 

74LS191 .85 

74LS192 .76 

74LS193 .78 

74LS194 .69 

74LS195 .69 

74LS196 .79 

74LS197 .79 

74LS221 .69 

74LS240 .95 

74LS242 .95 

74LS243 .95 

74LS244 1.25 

74LS245 1.45 



74176 $ .69 

74177 .69 

74179 1.34 

74180 .75 

74181 1.75 

74182 1.15 

74184 2.25 

74185 2.25 

74190 .87 

74191 .87 

74192 .67 

74193 .67 

74194 .67 

74195 .67 

74196 .75 

74197 .86 

74198 1.15 

74199 1.15 
74221 1.19 
74251 75 
74273 1.65 
74276 189 
74279 .75 

74283 1.40 

74284 2.90 

74285 2.90 
74290 1 .49 
74298 1.49 

74365 .55 

74366 .55 

74367 .55 

74368 .55 
74390 1.45 
74393 1.33 
74490 2 25 



74LS247 

74LS248 

74LS249 

74LS251 

74LS253 

74LS257 

74LS348 

74LS259 

74LS260 

74LS261 

74LS266 

74LS273 

74LS275 

74LS279 

74LS283 

74LS290 

74LS293 

74LS295 

74LS298 

74LS324 

74LS347 

74LS348 

74LS352 

74LS353 

741S363 

74LS385 

74LS366 

74LS387 

74LS368 

74LS373 

74LS374 

74LS375 

74LS377 

74LS385 

74LS366 

74LS390 

74LS393 

74LS395 

74LS399 

74LS424 

74LS668 

74LS670 

81LS95 

81LS96 

81LS97 

81LS98 

25LS2521 

25LS2569 



74S00/PROMS* 

74S158 $.99 

74S160 2.49 

74S1B1 1.89 

745174 1.19 

745175 1.19 
74S188- 1.49 

745194 1.49 

745195 1.49 
74S19C 1.49 

745240 1.99 

745241 1.99 

745242 1.99 

745243 1.99 

745244 1.99 
74S251 119 
74S253 
74S2S7 
74S2S8 



74S00 $.29 


74S74 $.55 


74S02 


.29 


74SB5 1.69 


74S03 


29 


74SB6 .55 


74S04 


45 


74S112 ,SS 


7 4 SOS 


.45 


74S113 .55 


74S08 


,39 


74S1I4 55 


74SOG 


.39 


74S1242.89 


74S10 


.35 


74S1321.39 


74S11 


35 


74S133 45 


74S15 


.35 


74S134 .50 


74S20 


.35 


74S135 .89 


74S22 


.35 


74S136 1.39 


74S30 


35 


74S138 .89 


74S32 


45 


74S139 .89 


74S38 


69 


74SU0 .55 


74S40 


39 


74S151 .99 


74S51 


as 


74S153 .99 


74S64 




74S157 .99 


74S65 


.39 





CALL FOR 74HC 



74S260 $1.19 
74S280 1.95 
74S287- 1.05 
74S28B' 1.95 

745373 2,09 

745374 2.09 
74S387' 1,95 
74S47T 5 95 
74S472" 4.95 
74S473* 4.95 
74S474' 4.95 
74S475* 4.95 
74S570' 2.95 
74SS7T 2.95 
74S572* 4.95 
74S573' 4.95 

745940 2.49 

745941 2.49 






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FM1 



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Fie tail 



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California Digital 

17700 Figueroa Street • Carson, California 90248 



F10 DAISY WHEEL PRINTER 



6 



W 



LETTER 
QUALITY 





J 




The TEC F-10 Daisy Wheel printer is the perfect answer to a rea- 
sonablly priced 40 character word processing printer. While this 
printer is " extremely" similar to C.ltoh's F-1 0/40 Starwriter printer. 
Legal counsel for the C.ltoh Company have advised us that we 
should refrain from referring to the TEC printer as a Starwriter. 
This 40 character per second printerauto installs with Wordstar and 
Perfect Writer. Features extensive built-in word processing func- 
tions that allow easy adaptability and reduced software complexity. 
Industry standard Centronics interface provides instant compatibil- 



ity with all computers equiped with a parallel printer port. The TEC 

F-1 accepts paper up to 1 5 inches in width. 

These printers were originally priced to sell at over $1400. Through a 

special arrangment California Digital has purchase these units from 

a major computer manufacturer and is offering these printers at a 

fraction of their original cost. 

Options available include tractor feed, buffered memory and an 

assortment of printer cables for a variety of computers. 



10 MEGABYTE 
WINCHESTER 

SPECIAL 



California Digital has re- 
cently purchased several 
thousand 10 Megabyte 
Winchester disk drives. 
The manufacturer has 
asked us not to advertise 
their name. Please tele- 
phone for details 



MEMORY 



4164 S?r c 250ns 



I "f Ml 1 II » b 



Quantity 
100 



*& 



DYNAMIC MEMORY 



4164150ns.64K128refresh 

41256150ns. 256K 

4116150ns.16K 

4116 200ns.16K 

4128 for IBM/AT 

DP8409dynamiccontroller 



ICM-4164150 
ICM-41256150 
ICM-41161S0 
ICM-41 16200 
ICM-4128150 
ICT-8409 



STATIC MEMORY 



21L02 200ns. 1K static 
21L02 450ns. 1K static 
2 11 2 450ns. 2K static 
2114 300ns. IK x 4 
4044TMS450ns.4Kx1 
5257300ns. 4K xl 
6116 P4 200ns. 2Kx 8 
6116 P3150ns 2K x 8 



2708 450ns.1KxB 
27T6 450ns.2Kx8 
2716TMS 450ns. Tri-vollage 
2732 450ns. 4Kx 8 
2764 350ns. 8Kx 8 
27128 350ns. 16Kx 8 



ICM-21L02200 
ICM-21L02450 
ICM-2112450 
ICM-2114300 
ICM-40444SO 
ICM-5257300 
ICM-6116200 
ICM-6116150 

EPROMS 

ICE-2708 

ICE-2716 

ICE-2716THS 

1CE-2732 

ICE-2764 

ICE-27128 



1.31 

2.29 
8.95 
1.75 
1.75 
8.95 
39.00 



2.99 
1.95 
3.49 
2.50 
3.95 
4.55 



495 
4.50 

7. '15 
-5.50 
595 



8.50 
1.65 
1.65 
8.75 
35.00 



3.25 
2.25 
3.85 
4.35 



4.25 

7.65 
3.75 
5.75 
7,35 



1.45 
8.35 
29.00 



2.75 
1.75 
2.99 



•J. 55 
3.97 

7.25 
3.55 
6.25 
6.95 




Shugart 

4 WINCHES 





These ""6. 7 Megabyte drives 
are new units recently re- 
leased by the Shugart division 
of Xerox. The Shugart 604 is 
fully 506 industry compatible. 
Each drive is tested before 
shipment and is supplied with 
a 90 day warranty. SHU-604 

Five Inch Winchester Hard Disk Drives 

FUJITSU M2235AS 27 Meg. 899 859 

RODIME RO-208 53 Meg. 1589 1493 

MAXTOR XT1 01 40 140 Meg. 3895 3785 

SHUGART 712 13Meg.V 2 Ht 495 465 

SHUGART 604 6.7 Meg. 99 89 

TANDON 502 10 Meg. 419 395 

TANDON503 19 Meg. 695 675 

SEAGATE 225 25 Meg. 695 625 



four Choice 

TEAC 55B 55F 



'48TPI-96TPI 



One Two Ten 

Five Inch Double Sided Drives 

TEACFD55B half height 119 115 109 

TEAC FD55F 96 TPI, half ht. 119 115 109 

CONTROL DATA 9409 PC 169 159 155 

SHUGART SA455 Half Height 119 115 109 

SHUGART SA465V 2 Ht.96TPI 119 115 109 

TANDON 100-2 full height 149 145 139 

TANDON 101-4 96TPI full ht. 299 289 279 

MITSUBISHI 4851 half height 139 135 129 
MITSUBISHI 4853 96/TPIV2 Ht. 155 149 139 

MITSUBISHI 4854 8" elec. 295 285 275 

QUME 142 half height 219 205 199 

Eight Inch Single Sided Drives 
SHUGART 801 R 

SIEMENS FDD 100-8 119 115 109 

TANDON 848E-1 Half Height 369 359 349 

Eight Inch Double Sided Drives 
SHUGART SA851R 495 485 475 

QUME 842 "QUME TRACK 8" 319 319 313 
TANDON 848E-2 Half Height 459 447 435 
REMEX RFD-4000 219 219 209 

MITSUBISHI M2896 63 V 2 Ht. 459 449 409 



Shipping: First five pounds $3.00, each additional pound $.50. 
Foreign orders: 10% shipping, excess will be refunded. 
California residents add 6V 2 % sales tax. • COD's discouraged. 
Open accounts extended to state supported educational institu- 
tions and companies with a strong "Dun & Bradstreet" rating. 



California Digital 

1 7700 Figueroa Street • Carson, Calif omia 90248 



s coLORt*CO\ COMPUTER PLOTTER 

MONITOR *** . _ _ A 




The NEC JC-1401D is a 13" medium/high resolution RGB monitor 
suitable for use with the Sanyo MBC-5507555 or the IBM/PC. The 
monitor features a resolution of 400 dots by 240 lines. Colors available 
are Red, Green, Blue. Yellow, Cyan, Magenta, Black and White. 
These monitors are currently being used in applications far more 
critical than microcomputers. 

The NEC monitor carries the Litlon-Monroe label and was originally 
scheduled (or use in their "Office of the Future" equipment. A change 
in Monroe's marketing strategy has made these units excess inven- 
tory which were sold to California Digital. We are offering these prime 
"new" RGB monitors at a fraction of their original cost. Sanyo com- 
patible NEC-1401/S; IBM/P/C Computer compatible NEC-1401/PC 

MONITORS 



BMC l2Agrcon phosphor 15 MHz composil video 

BMC 12" high resolution. 20MHz 

Amdek 300G 12 green phosphor 

Amdek 300 A 12 amber phos . hi -re solution 

Amdek 3 1 A designed for IBM/ PC, amber 

Zenilh ZVM122 Amber Phosphor 12' 40^80 column switch. 

Zenith ZVM123 green phosphor 12 -JO/80 column switch 

NEC JB1201 greenphosphor I8MH2. composil video. 

NEC JBi260CornmerCiafgrade composil 

Conrac 9 "open frame reauiteshorz sync & 12v supply. 

COLOR 

NEC JC1401D Medtum/High 13" RGB 

BMC AU9J9iUColorcompositvideownh sound 

BMC 9 1 9 1 M RGBdesigned tor use withlhe IBM •omputer. 

NECJC1203DM, RGB color monnor 

NECjCl215colOrcomposit. 

Zenith ZVM135 RGB & composile suitable lor IBM PC 

Amdek Color I, 13 "composrt video 

Amdek Color 11-, 13'RGBhi/resoiution 

Amdek Color 111 - . 1 3" RGB. medium resolution 

Princeton HX-12 RGB IBM/PC compatible 



BMC-12A 

BMC-12EN 

AMK-300G 

AMK-300A 

AMK-310A 

ZTH-122 

ZTH-Z123 

NEC-JB1201 

NEC-JB1260 

CON-BW9 



76.91 
119.00 
12895 
138 95 
158.95 

89.95 

89 95 
159.00 
119.00 

5900 



NEC-1401/X 


259.00 


BMC-9191 


23895 


BMC-9191M 


379.00 


NEC-1203 


699.00 


NEC-JC1215 


339 00 


ZJ-H-Z13S 


475.00 


AMK-100 


299 00 


AMK-200 


419.95 


AMK-300 


359.95 


PRN-HX12 


478.95 



PRINTERS 



MATRIX PRINTERS 

Slar Gemini- 1 0X 120 char/sec 

StarGemini-15X. lOOchar./sec. 15" paper. 

Star Gemini Delta 10, 160 Char/sec 

Toshiba P 1351. 1 92 char/sec letter quality 

Okidata82A senalS parallel^' paper 

Okdaia92A parallel interlace. 16O char/sec 

Okidata83A & parallel IS" paper 

Okidata84A & parallel 1 5" paper 

Epson LX-80 10'' 120 Char/sec 

Epson FX80FT, 10" 160 char. /sec withgraphtrax 

Epson FX 100FT 15" 160 char/sec with graphtrax 

Epson LQ1500, 15" corespondence quality 

Epson JX80 Color pnnler 

Prownter 851 paralteOVz" paper 

Prownler II, parallel 15" paper, graphics 

Oalaproducts B-600-3. band printer 600 LPM 

Printromx P300 high speed printer 300 lines per minute. 

Printronix P600 ultra high speed 600 lines per minute 



STR-G10X 

STR-G15X 

STR-D10 

TOS-1351 

OKI-82A 

OKI-92A 

OKI-83A 

OKI-84A 

EPS-LX80 

EPS-FX80 

EPS-FX100 

EPS-LQ1500 

EPS-JX80 

PRO-8510P 

PRO-2P 

■PS-B600 

PTX-P300 

PTX-P600 



249.00 
365.00 
359.00 
1495,00 
29900 
379.00 
549.00 
92900 
239.00 
399.00 
599,00 
1079.00 
57900 
329.00 
599.00 
6985 00 
3995 00 
5795 00 



499 00 
1659 00 
1659 00 
1 599.00 
689 00 
319 00 
42900 
1569 00 
76900 
39900 
699.00 
395.00 



WORD PROCESSING PRINTERS 

Slarwnter FlO parallel. 40cliar/sec PRO-ROP 

NEC8810 55 chai/second. serial interlace NEC-8810 

NEC8830 55char/sec, pari interface NEC-8830 

NEC3550 popular printer designed tor the IBM/PC NEC-3550 

NEC2050 designed for BM/PC 20 char/sec- pari NEC-2050 

Sil ver Reed EXP500. I4char/sec pari interface SRD-EXP500 

Silver Reed EXP550 17 Char/ sec par I interlace SRD-EXP550 

Diablo 630 40 char/sec serial DBL-630 
Diablo 620. proportional spacing, horz.fi. vert tab. 20 cps DBL-620 

Juki6100. 18 char/sec JUK-6100 

Juki 6300, 40 char/sec JUK-6300 

Comrex CR2. 5k butfer, proportional spacing, par 1. CRX-CR2P 

TERMINALS 

Freedom 100. splilscreen, detachable keyboard LIB-FlOO 495.00 

Qume 102 green phosphor terminal QUM-102 539.00 

Ampex Dialogue 125 green screen, APX-D125G 675 00 

Ampex Dialouge I75 amber screen, two page, lunc. keys APX-D175A 71900 

Wyse 50. 14" green phosphor WYS-50 59500 

Wyse 300. Eight color dspiay. split screen WYS-300 1 1 59.00 

Zenith 29 lermmat. VT52 compahbie. detatch.ble keyboard ZTH-Z29 76500 

Televideo 910 Plus, block mode 7VI-910P 575.00 

Televideo925. detachable keyboard. 22 lunction keys TVI-925 759 00 

Televideo 950. graphic char.. split screen, 22 tunc 7V1-950 950.00 

Televideo970. 14" green, t32 cofumn, European TVI-970 1095. 00 




The Comrex Comscriber I is the ideal solution to make 

short work of translating financial and numeric data into 

a graphic presentation. 

Many ready to run programs such as Lotus 1-2-3, 

Visi-on and Apple business graphics already support 

this plotter. 

The Comscriber I features programmable paper sizes 

up to 8V2 by 120 inches, 6 inch per second plot speed 

and 0.004" step size. 

Easy to implement Centronics interface allows the 

Comscriber i immediate use with the printer port of 



most personal computers. 

The Comscriber I is manufactured for Comrex by the 
Enter Computer Corporation. The plotter is marketed 
by Heath Kit and also sold under Enters own "Sweet P" 
Label. This is your opportunity to purchase a graphic 
plotter which was originally priced at $795 for only 
$219. 

Also available is a support package which includes 
demonstration software, interface cable, amulticolor 
pen assortment and a variety of paper and transpa- 
rency material. 




MODEL 40 



Wgnnnn; 



2400 BAUD 

An exciting new modem from the telecommunication experts at Fu- 
jitsu. Reliable 2400 BPS communication over public phone lines. 
Automatically selects 2400 or 1200 baud depending incoming termi- 
nal speed. Integral speakerallowsmonitoring call progress. Will work 
in full and half duplex as well as simplex modes, both Synchronous 
and Asynchronous communication protocols are available. Switch 
selectable test modes available for digital loopback, analog loopback, 
as well as remote loopback. Four microprocessor design assures 
reliable operation over noisy phone lines at both 1 200 and 2400 baud. 
Switch selectable Bell 212A or CCITTV.22 compatible. Sleep mode 
can be enabled through the use of the DTR line. 

The Team 212 A offers all the features of the Hayes Smart Modem 
1 200 for a fraction of the price. Now is your opportunity to purchase a 
1200 baud modem at the price of a 300 baud modem. 
California Digital is so confident of your complete satisfaction that we 
will allow the return the Team 212A and apply the full credit towards 
the purchase of any other modem. 



ANCHOR AUTOMATION 




The Teletype Mode) 40 CRT terminal iscontinuous heavy duty communication equipment 
that have recently come off lease from a Cado Computer customer. It is seldom that 
California Digital becomes involved in Ihemarketing of USED products but we fait thai this 
peripheral represented such an exceptional value that we had to offer this equipment to 
our customers 
Our engineering staff has fully tested every Model 40 terminal before Shipment. 




The Anchor Automation Mark VI is a 300 baud direct connect modem 
that plugs into any slot of your IBM/PC. This modem suppoits auto 
answer and aulo dial capabilities. Other features include telephone 
number storage, send / receive text files, single key-stroke dialing 
along with many other functions provided on disk. The Mark VI was 
originally priced at over $300. 

Fu|itsu2400/I200buadautoeveiythmg 
Team 1200 Hayes Compatible 
CTS 212AH 1200 baud, aulo dial 

Terminal soltware lor CTS 212AH 
Prometheus 1200 super lealures 
Promelheus t200B mlemal PC 
Signalman Mark 12. I200baud. Hayescompatible 
Signalman Mark VI, 300 baud mtomal PC 
Signaiman Mark 1 , direct connect with lerminal cable 
Hayes Smart Modem 1200 baud, auto answer, aulo dial 
Hayes 1200B lor use with the IBM/PC. J200baud 
Hayes Smartmodem. 300 baud only, auto answer, auto dial 
Hayes Micromodem II, 103 Apple direct connect 
Hayes Chronograph, time & date 
Pennl300/1200 industrial quality 
Universal Data 103LP. line power, answer Songmate 
Universal Data 202. 1200 baud, hall duplex only 
Universal Dala2t2LP. full 1200 baud duplex, line power 



FUJ-1935D 


519-00 


TEM-SM1200 


229.00 


CTS-212AH 


299.00 


CTS-212SFT 


3500 


PRM-P1200 


3 1 9.00 


PRM-P1200B 


27900 


SGL-MK12 


23900 


SGL-MK6 


6900 


SGL-MK1 


7500 


HYS-212AD 


429 00 


HYS-1200B 


39900 


HYS-103AD 


229 00 


HYS-MM2 


27900 


HYS-CHR232 


199 00 


PEN-12AD 


495.00 


UDS-103LP 


169 00 


UDS-202LP 


219 00 


UDS-212LP 


359.00 



DUALTEAC 

SUBSYSTEM 

The dual Teac subsystem features your choice of 
two FD55B (48 tpi) or two FD55F (96tpi) 5Va' dou- 
ble sided disk drives. Also supplied within the sub- 
system is 50 watt power supply and a four foot 
shielded signal cable. 

Return of a \ 

Smash Hit Sellout 

DRAGON 

99 





Compatible with most Radio Shack Color Computer software. The world famous Dragon 
computer is now available in the United States. Manufactured by the Tano Corp. under 
license of the British Broadcasting Company. The Dragon comes complete with 64K Byte of 
memory, serial modem port along with a Centronics printer interface. This unique micro- 
computer features Motorola's advanced 6809E microprocessor and comes standard with 
Microsoft Color 8asic, data base manager, and a complete word processing package. The 
computer outputs color composite video along with RF. video that allows the unit to be used 
in conjunction with any color television. This is the Ideal fow cost computer to be used with 
any diaj up information system such as the Source. Western Union s EasyLink or any other 
time share service. 



TOLL FREE ORDER LINE 

(800) 421-5041 



TECHNICAL 4 CALIFORNIA 

(213)217-0500 




(0 I s " 



.2 co 

5>o 



o *™ 
-S CM 



— "O 



-£ CO 



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a in 



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— x 2* 

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cr x •= to 

r- © « £ 

- o o 









Monitor Mover 
Gives Back the Desk 




• Models to fit most CRT's 

» Rotates 360° on base 

» Adjustable height 

» Support tray swivels and tilts 

> Holds up to 50 lbs 

» Clamp, screw and wall mountings 

Lirflfekllillll 

P.O. Box 8056 

Grand Rapids, Ml 49508 

(616) 241-4040 



EPROM 

PROGRAMMER 



APROTEK 1000 
ONLY 



-a a- $265 00 

cl Id 



COMPLETE WITH 
PERSONALITY 
MODULE 
117 AC POWER-RS232 
-6 BAUD RATES - HANDSHAKE TO HOST 
ALLOWS READ, WRITE, VERIFY & COPY 

Gomes complete with CPM, IBM and Apple 
BASIC Driver Program Listings. Driver Programs 
oo Disk only, $20.00. 

Programs the following 5 Volt 24 or 28 pin 
devices: 2716 series through 27256, 25xx series, 
68764 plus others. Please Specify Personality 
Module desired with order. Additional Personality 
Modules only $15.00 ea. Full 1 year warranty. 

TO ORDER: CALL 1-800/962-5800 OR WRITE 



APROTEK 

1071-AAVENIDAACASO Add 

CAMARILLO, CA 930 1 $ 4.0 Shipping-USA 

Info: (805) 987-2454 VISA or MC Add 3% 



(HayesCompatible) MUUtlVI $179 

COMPLETE KIT $120 

(including case, 

components, I.C.) ' «r>-^ 




•10 DAYS MONEY BACK GUARANTEE 



(Allow 3 Weeks Delivery) 

IBM-xt or APPLE lie $21 Oea 

{98% compatible, new or replacement) 

MOTHERBOARD 

{64 K, no Rom. Tested. 30 days guarantee) 

FOR IBM: 'Control Card .... $70 

'Printer or Game Card $35 

'Color Graphic Card $ 1 20 



Ttent) 

1 



BEST PRICES FOR APPLE/IBM CARDS 

Write for Price List — Dealer Welcome 

CONCORD Technology Inc. Ph.: (604) 879-3555 
47 W. Broadway, Van., B.C. Canada V5Y 1P1 



Inquiry 213 



Inquiry 38 



Inquiry 105 



Your I.C. Connection 
(213) 516-7018 



DYNAMIC RAMS 




4164-150NS 


1.59 


41256-150NS 


5.69 


STATIC RAMS 




6264LP-150NS 


9.99 


6116P-3 (150NS) 


2.27 


6116LP-3(150NS) 


2.59 


| EPROMS 




2716-450NS 


2.79 


2532-450NS 


3.59 


2764-250NS 


3.89 



MANY OTHERS IN STOCK 
CALL FOR SPECIAL PRICES 

• Low, low prices 

• Top Quality Parts 

• Wide Selection 

• Fast Delivery 



INTERNATIONAL. 



13760 Grammercy Place 
Gardena, CA 90249 
TLX: 664747 HYEXIM FAX: (213) 217-0363 



Inquiry 144 



POWERFUL MICROCONTROLLER 
SYSTEM w/BASIC MONITOR 

a 




4015 Board System Featuring: 

- Intel's Powerful 8052-BAS1C Microcontroller 

- Up to 32K EPROM Programmability (2764/128) 

- Up to 24K RAM (8K RAM provided) 

- 2/8255, 1/8155 I/O chips, & 8741 option 

- Auto Baud/RS232C/10MHz crystal 
-5V2" x HVi" PCB 

- S389 assbl'd/tested 4015 board +$10 P&H 

For further info on 4015 & other micro's, Contact: 

Tech Star Laboratory 

1701 N. Greenville Ave; Suite 709 

Richardson, TX 75081 

(214) 680-2304 



Computer 
System Sale 



Lowest Price Computer 
System in the U.S.A. 



$ 449 



OO 



Includes Atari 800XL 88K Computer, 
1 27K Disk Drive, 20 CPS Letter Quality 
Printer, Beginners Basic Book, and 
more. List S852.90. 

All for only $449°° 
152K System $499°° 

312/ 382-5050 

• Over 1000 programs available • free catalog 



COMPUTER DIRECT 

22292 N. Pepper Rd„ Barrlngton, IL 60010 

We Love Our Customers 



Inquiry 291 




AMBEF 


□ Eliminates strobe. 


D Ideal for word processing 


flicker, and eye fatigue 


and programming, yet 


□ Made with Lead/Stron- 


fast enough for games 


tium impregnated glass 


and graphics 


that stops X-ray 


□ Warranted for one full 


emission 


year against manufactur- 


G Available in slow decay 


ing defects or tube 


green or medium decay 


failure 


"European Amber" (the 


□ Comes with a 30-day 


standard in Europe) 


money back guarantee 


□ High-contrast double 


□ Easily installed (comes 


dark face glass that also 


with premounted 


cuts U.V. radiation 


hardware) 


□ Tube face is etched to 




stop glare 




Now. you can easily up- 


Call now to order your Soil- 


grade your monitor to ex- 


View'" CRT from Lang- 


ceed European standards for 


ley-St. Clair — $99.95 


persistence and color with 


Plus $7 for packing and 


the installation of a Lang- 


UPS Shipping ($17 for Over- 


ley-St. Clair Soft-View'" 


seas, Parcel Post or UPS 


CRT! Available for the TRS- 


Blue Label). Add sales tax 


80,™ TeleVideo/" Kaypro,'" 


whereapplicable. Visa/Mas- 


Heath.*" DEC™ Zenith,™ 


terCard orders welcomed. 


IBM PC,™ Apple 111™ and a 




wide variety of other 




monitors. m 




TO nnnCD. •^•l.anglBY-St. Cleir 

lUUnUCn. * Inslrumentitlon Systems. Inc. 


CALL 800 


132 W. 24th St. 


221-7070 


NewYork. NY 10011 

In New York call 212 989-6876 



MetalCE-31 




Powerful Real Time 8031 Emulator 
That Runs on your IBM PC 

The MetalCE series of emulators provide 
full speed, real time, transparent in-circuit 
emulation capability for either the 8031, 
8032 or 8344. Many unique features are 
provided including over 16,000 hardware 
breakpoints. MetalCE emulators simply 
connect to your IBM PC or compatible 
through an RS232C interface. Each 
MetalCE emulator includes an advanced 
menu driven host interface. Prices start at 
under $1,500.00. A Demostration Package 
is available for $35.00. Call toll freefor more 
information: 1-800-METAICE. 

MetaLink Corp. 

33 W. Boxelder Place 

Chandler, AZ 85224 

1-800-METAICE In AZ (602) 926-0797 



Inquiry 230 



RAM 
Memory Expansion Kit 

4264/4164 Compatible 
Fits Major PC Brands 

SYVipP' 09 " 




FACTORY DIRECT 
HIGHEST QUALITY! 



MICRON DRAMs 


LIST 


OUR PRICE! 


9 64K DRAMs 
9 128K DRAMs 
9 256K DRAMs 


S 25. 
S359. 
S369. 


$ 20. 
$125. 
$149. 


150 ns Access Time 



MICRON 

■ technology, inc. 



Marketing Department 
2805 E. Columbia Rd. 
Boise, Idaho 83706 

(208) 386-3900 TWX 901-970-5973 
IMMEDIATE SHIPPING! 

VISA, MasterCard, Certified Check, 
COD & Money Orders 



Inquiry 353 



Inquiry 24! 



COASTLINE COMPUTERS 




COASTLINE OFFERING A 2% DISCOUNT 
CHECK OR MONEY ORDER - WE JUST 

IBM PC 

• 2 MPI Full Hight Drives 

• 256K Memory 

$1549 

IBM PC 



800-2284615 

Please call collect if 800 number not in service. 

213-329-4828 



1956 W. 153 St., Gardena, CA 90247 

WHEN PREPAYING WITH CASHIERS 
LEFT THE COMPITITION BEHIND! 

IBM PC 



• 2 Drives, 256K Memory 

• Color Card and HX12 



$2100 



IBM XT 



• 1 Drive, 10Mb Hard Disk 

• 128K Memory, 100% IBM 




2 Vz High Teac 55B's 
256K Memory 
Color Graphics Board 
Green 12" Monitor 



$2695 



$1699 

IBM PC 

2 Teac 55B Vz High Drives 
256K Memory 
8087-2 Math Chip 
OKI 192 Printer 
All Cables Included 

$2195 



WE WILL NOT BE UNDERSOLD BY ANYONE - CALL US TODAY!!! 



COMPAQ Portable 

2 Drives & 256K 

$1959.00 


COMPAQ Desk Pro 2 

2 Drives, 256K, Grn Monitor 

$2299.00 


COMPAQ Plus 

Portable with Hard Disk 

$3395.00 


INTEL Math Coprocessor 

8087-3 for PC & Compatibles 

$109.00 


AST SIXPAC + 

Comes with 384K, Clock Calendar, 
Par/Ser Port, Plus Software 

$299.60 


PRINCETON GRAPHICS 

HX-12 Color Monitor 

$439.00 


IBM CABLE 

\ Computer to Par Printer 
6 Foot Long 

$12.50 


BMC 

. 13" Amber Monitor 

$89.00 


IBM DOS 2.1 or 3.1 

IBM PC & XT Operating System 

$54.99 

DOS 3.1 Latest Version - Call 


QUANTITY ORDERS 
Call for Bigger Discounts 

Corporate & School Accts 

Call for Information 
Dealer Programs Avail - P.O.s Expedited 


Star Micronics 

GEMINI 

SG-10 Printer 

Lowest Price - Call 


CAL DEK 10 Meg 
INTERNAL HARD DISK 

For PC or Compatible 
Comes w/Drive Controller 

Jj> D4'4'. YjVJ (120 day warranty) 


DRIVE CONTROLLER 

PC Compatible Card 

$69.00 


OKIDATA 192P 

160 cps for IBM PC 

$369.00 


KEYTRONICS 

5151 Keyboard 

$179.00 



Mail Orders To: 1956 W. 153 St., Gardena, CA 90247. Terms: Visa, Mastercard, COD;s and Wire Transfers. No surcharge for credit cards. 
UPS, Federal and Emery shipping available. Calif, residents add 6Vz% sales tax. Prices subject to change without notice. Not responsible for typos. 

450 BYTE • JULY 1985 Inquiry 79 



ORDER TOLL FREE o00-22o"4b 1 5 FOR SPECIALS YOU WONT BELIEVE 



HAYES MODEM 

1200 Baud Internal Modem 
w/SmartCom 1 Software 

«tQQQ nn 2400Baud 

q>OOy.UU $639.00 


ANCHOR MODEM 

Mark 12 
External 1200 Baud Modem 

$219.00 


ANCHOR MODEM 

Volksmodem 12 
300 - 1200 Baud Modem 

$189.00 


AMDEK MONITOR 

Color 710 
Superior RGB Resolution 

$559.00 


AMDEK MONITOR 

310A Monochrome 

$159.00 


PRINCETON GRAPHICS 

HX-12 (Hi Res Color) $439.00 
MAX-12 (Mononchrome) $ 169.00 
SR-12 & Scandouble Call 


BMC MONITOR 

Color Monitor 

$189.00 


TAXAN MONITOR 

Model 122 

$139.00 


GORILLA MONITOR 

Green Monitor 

$89.00 


DRIVES (IBM Compatible) 
TEAC 55B $95.00 
MPI B-52 $75.00 
TANDON 100-2 $119.00 


DISKETTES 

DYSAN DS/DD $29.95 
COASTLINE DS/DD $19.95 


DISK CLEANERS 
HEAD CLEANERS 

CALL 


OKIDATA PRINTER 

192P (160cps) 
Streamline, Near Letter Quality 

$369.00 


GEMINI PRINTER 

SG 15 (lOOcps) 

$389.00 


JUKI PRINTER 

6100(18cps) $389#0 

6300 Call 
Juki Tractor $129.00 


MEMORY UPGRADES 

64K $9.25 
128K $18.00 


DEALERS NOTE 

1000 pes 4164 $ .80 ea. 
5000 pes 4164 $ .75 ea. 


HERCULES 

Color Card w/Par. Port $169.00 
Monocard $309.00 


INTERFACE 

Techmar Graphics Master $449.00 
Quadram Color I $199.00 


AST SIXPAC 

Par./Ser. Port Exp to 384K 

$239.00 


QUAD BOARD 

with Game and 64K 

$249.00 


MATH COPROCESSOR 

Intel 8087-2 

$95.00 


VOLT GUARD 

Surge Protector 

$39.00 


Paradise Graphics Card $ 2 5 9 

Persyst bob card $359 

Taxan Monitors. Call 


IBM PC's 

Quantity Orders Welcome 

CALL 


IBM PC's 

Barebone Available 

CALL 


CALL FOR LATEST 
PRICE CHANGES 



The Only Friend You need When Buying a New PC 
Is Coastline Computers. Call Today! 

800-2284615 

Please call collect if 800 number not in service. 

213-329-0825 



COASTLINE COMPUTERS 



/ 




Inquiry 79 



1956 W. 153 St., Gardens CA 90247 

IULY 1985 •BYTE 451 



|*U*CO™ is the best thing to happen 

to personal computing 

since the invention 

of the personal computer! 



1*11*00 is an idea whose time has come. 

riTCO is the International Union of Computer Owners, an organization designed to protect 
the interests of personal computer owners and users against those who would take their 

money...and then deliver less than they promised. 

Here's an overview of some of the vital services l*U*CO provides: 



1. Access to the lowest priced, reputable vendor for 
nearly every computer related need; and, 

2. Protection from the rip-off artists, vaporware 
specialists, false advertisers and other creepy, crawly 
creatures who have been attracted to the computer 
industry by the scent of your money; and, 

3. Constantly updated information on software, 



hardware and peripheral releases, upgrades, bug 
reports, bug fixes, reviews, letters to the editor and 
other data individually tailored to your needs through 
the exclusive l*U*CO COMPUTER REGISTRY™; and, 
4. Finally, a chance to get even with those characters 
out there who promised a lot, took your money.. .and 
than delivered less than they promised. 



|*U*CO™: 

a lynch mob 

with a purpose. 

Every computer owner has been ripped off 
at least once. 

Or maybe a dozen times or more might be a 
more appropriate number. 

In any event, we've all been victimized by 
the computer industry. 

And it wasn't accidental. 

Today"s computer industry is filled with 
hypesters, rip-off artists, vaporware 
specialists and other s whose sole function 
in life is to part you from your money by 
delivering a little less than you bargained 
for ...or by charging you more than you would 
otherwise have to pay. 

The rip-off might have been a computer that 
wasn't quite as -compatible" as advertised. 
Or it could have been a well-known computer 
that was to be delivered at the same time that 
"hundreds" of programs would be available 

with it if you consider the same time to be a 

year-and-a-half later. 

Or the rip-off might be in the form of 
measures taken by certain manufacturers 
and software publishers to limit sales of their 
products through "authorized" dealers only. 

This is, of course, designed (they say) to 
get you better service. 

But it's also a neat way to keep prices 



artificially high by restricting competitive 
forces in the market place. 
The number of ways you're being ripped off 
grow everyday, as greed becomes the major 
motivating factor in the computer 
marketplace. 

Possibly, you've been had by a software 
manufacturer who continuously upgrades 



But when the workers organized, they got a 
lot of power. 

Even automobile owners learned the lesson 
a long time ago. Back when the early drivers 
got tired of dirt roads, they organized the 
American Automobile Association. ..and 
that's part of the reason the United States is 
laced with an incomparable highway and 



their software...charging you a pretty penny street system today. 



for the elimination of bugs which shouldn't 
have been there in the first place I 

In a few cases, it's nothing more complex 
than a vendor who takes your money and 
simply takes their time in delivering. 
If they ever get around to delivering at all. 

In any event, the computer industry just 
isn't the friendly place it used to be, when 



Needless to say, the computer industry 
knows the value of organization as well. 

Computer manufacturers, software 
publishers and others eager to get as much 
as they can from you have formed various 
associations to acheive such lofty goals as 
making sure that they can' be held 
responsible when their products don't work or 



everyone was trying to help each other learn t0 P revent V ou f rom C0 Py' n 9 the software V ou 



about their machines. 

Today's computer market has been an 
invitation to be ripped off. 

Until now, that is. 
I*U*C0 
means protection. 
|*U*CO™ subscribes to some very ancient 
wisdom: there's strength in numbers. 

Labor unions learned the lesson a long time 
ago. 
The individual worker had no clout. 



licensed" from them ...so they can sell you a 
back-up disk. 

In short, everyone seems to have learned 
the benefits of getting organized and gaining 
power. 

Except the personal computer owner and 
user. 
And that's why there has to be an l*U*CO™. 



452 B YTE • JULY 1985 



|*U*CO™ Is designed to be what 
every collective organization is: a 
means to protect the special 
Interests of its own members! 

And, in this case, the members are the 
victims ...the people who own and use 
personal computers. 

The people who until now have been 
powerless. 
First of all, 
l*U*CO™ 
means low prices. 
The first benefit an 1*11*00™ member gets is 
the opportunity to save money. 

Lots of it. 

While certain manufacturers of software, 
peripherals and hardware are trying hard to 
crack down on what they call the "grey 
market" (thus keeping prices higher than 
they should be), l*U*CO™ will maintain a 
database of every mail-order advertisement 
that appears in the major national computer 
magaazines. A similar database will also be 
kept for selected major retail markets, so 
you can take advantage of special sales and 
the like. 

When you want the lowest price on 
something, just (electronically) mail your 
shopping list to riTCO™. 

Within a day, you'll get the three lowest and 
most recently quoted prices. ..and, quite 
possibly, special prices that haven't been 
advertised anywhere! 

I*U*C0™ protects you. 

Of course, buying by mail or from a supplier 
you don't know can get you more than low 
prices. 

It can get you problems in delivery, service 
and general dissatisfaction with the product 
you bought. 

So, along with the low price quotations, you 
also get l*U*CO™ member evaluations of the 
product and the vendor and a bibliography of 
reviews, letters to the editor, articles and 
other information that just might convince 
you not to spend the money in the first place. 
(Remember, most sellers are pretty 
restrictive about returns, particularly 
software returns. ) 



So, as an l*U*CO™ member, you get: 
1 . The lowest posssible prices. 

2. An assessment of both the product 
and the vendor. 

3. Information on the actual use value 
of the product. (An awful lot of prod- 
ducts sound better in their advertis- 
ing than they are in reality. That's 
why so few companies offer a 
money-back guaranty.) 

Continuing protection 

from IHTCO™: 

the Computer Registry™. 

As an riTCO™ member, you can also 
become part of our exclusive Computer 
Registry™. 

You simply register the appropriate 
information about all the hardware, software 
and peripherals you own with riTCO™. 

Then, as updates are announced, bugs 
discovered or fixed and so on, you 
automatically get this information as part of a 
customized and individualized monthly 
bulletin. 

No more finding out a year after the fact 
that you're still using Version 1.00 and 
everyone else has Version 9.4! Or, you 
might find out that the problem you thought 
was yours alone is actually widespread. 

(As a personal note, you'll find that this 
riTCO™ service is invaluable. 

In the past few weeks, I found out that a) 
the ROMS in my Anadex printer have been 
upgraded, b) there's at least one 
undocumented bug in running MacPaint with 
the 51 2K upgrade, c) the ROMS in my 
IOMEGA Bernoulli Box were upgraded, and 
d) [best of all] MicroPro knew of a bug in 
Infostar 1.6 which they didn't tell anyone 
about for 18 months!) 

In none of these instances did the 
manufacturer tell the consumer. 

As an l*U*CO™ member, you could get 
this information on a customized and 
individualized basis, each and every month 
for every piece of hardware, software and 
peripheral equioment you own or acquire. 



I*U*C0™: 
the Iron fist. 

The best part of l*U*CO™ has been saved 
for last. 

Yes, riTCO™ will help you get the lowest 
prices on everything you want to buy for your 
computer. 

And riTCO™ will give you solid 
information on the integrity of products and 
vendors. 

Finally, if you choose to become a part of 
riTCO's™ exclusive Computer Registry™, 
you can also stay current with the products 
you own or acquire. 

But with l*U*CO™, 
you also get power! 

But, more importantly, your membership in 
riTCO™ gives you the power of belonging 
to a community...a community of personal 
computer owners and users who need to 
protect their rights. 

For instance, a group of software 
publishers managed to get the Louisiana 
legislature to pass a law "legalizing" the 
non-warranties they provide with their 
software. (You know, "this software is sold 
without any guaranty that it will work." Just 
pay your money and take your chances.) 

|*U*CO™ 
will fight for you! 

|*U*CO™ will fight that kind of nonsense by 
lobbying against it, organizing PAC's and, in 
general, by doing what every other special 
interest group does: fight for its own special 
needs and interests. 

As one person, there is little you can do 
when you're ripped off by a vendor. The 
powers that be.. .such as the FTC. .don't pay 
much attention to one person. 

But when a special group like l*U*CO™ has 
a lot of members which can be translated 
into publicity and political pressure, you'd be 
surprised what can be done. 

There's a lot more to the l*U*CO™ story. 
More than we can afford to tell here. 
Complete information costs only $ 1 .00. 
So, fill in the coupon below. 



Free! 

A guide to your legal rights as a 

personal computer owner! 

Send a dollar for more information on ril'CO™ membership and we'll include FREE a guide 
to your legal rights (and obligations) as a personal computer owner. 

This synopsis, written by an attorney who also happens to be an electrical engineer will 
give you helpful information on questions such as using copy programs for making your own 
back-up copies, how to complain effectively and other issues which affect you as a 
personal computer owner. 

Ifs a slim volume, to be sure, because unless you 're both rich and tough, you're 
going to learn that you havenl got all that many rights. 



International Union of Computer Owners, Inc. 
30 East Huron Street 
Chicago, Illinois 60611 

YES, I'm tired of being ripped off. Enclosed Is 
$1.00. Please send Information on |*U*CO™ 
I understand that I am under no obligation to 
enroll as a member. 

Please print all information! 

Name 

Company 

Address 

City. 



State 



ZIP 



Make of computer:. 



Inquiry 187 



JULY 1985 -BYTE 453 



IBM PC 

256k, 2 floppies (360k) 



IBM PC 20 MB 

256k, 1 or 2 floppies (360k) 
20 MB Hard Disk (auto boot) 



IBM PC 10 + 10 

256k, 1 or 2 floppies (360k) 
10 MB HD& 10 MB Tape Backup 



IBM PC 10 MB 

256k, 1 or 2 floppies (360k) 
10 MB Hard Disk (auto boot) 



EXCLUSIVELY FOR IBM PC 



IBM PC 30 MB 

256k, 1 or 2 floppies (360k) 
30 MB Hard Disk (auto boot) 



IBM PC 20 + 20 

256k, 1 or 2 floppies (360k) 
10 MB HD& 10 MB Tape Backup 




IBM XT 

256k, 2 floppies (360k) 



IBM XT 20 MB 

256k, 1 or 2 floppies (360k) 
20 MB Hard Disk 



IBM XT 10 + 10 

256k, 1 or 2 floppies (360k) 
10 MB HD& 10 MB Tape Backup 



IBM XT 10 MB 

256k, 1 or 2 floppies (360k) 
10 MB Hard Disk 



IBM PC 30 MB 

256k, 1 or 2 floppies (360k) 
30 MB Hard Disk 



IBM XT 20 + 20 

256k, 1 or 2 floppies (360k) 
20 MB HD& 10 MB Tape Backup 



IBM AT 20 MB 

512k, 1 or 2 floppies 
(360k/1.2 MB). 20MBHD 



IBM AT 40 MB 

512k, 1 or 2 floppies 
(360k/1.2 MB), 40MBHD 



Call for the latest prices for your custom 
configuration. All systems are configured 
and tested at no extra cost and come 
only with Compumail's 90 day warranty. 



IBM AT 80 MB 

512k, 1 or 2 floppies 
(360k/1.2 MB), 80 MB HD 



IBM AT 140 MB 

512k, 1 or 2 floppies 
(360k/1.2 MB), 140 MB HD 



• PRICE WAR • ouusLAST 



WITH YOUR BEST QUOTES 



PRINTERS 



EPSON FX-80+ . . . $339 FX-100+ . . . $459 

LX-80/HI80/JX-80 $219/$359/$469 

LQ-1500 Par/Ser $939/5989 

Tractor FX-80/LX-80/LQ1 500. . .$50/$60/$70 
LQ Sht Fdr Single Bin/Dual Bin ... . $450/5750 
LX-90 w/IBM Interface Cartridge 

& Tractor $279 

S0-2000 CALL 

OKIDATA OKIM ATE 20-IBM Plug & Print . . $199 
182-P/182-IBM . . $219 192-P/192-IBM . $329 
193-P/193-IBM . . $479 84-P/84-IBM . . . $629 
192 Tractor ... $70 84 Sheet Feeder . . . $390 

TOSHIBA 1340P (80 column) $529 

TOSHIBA 351 P (132 column) $1099 

351 Tractor/Sheet Feeder $170/$790 

JUKI 6100(18 cps). 13 "wide $349 

JUKI 6300 (40 cps), 16" wide $679 

6100/6300 Tractor /Sht Fdr . . . ,$140/$240 
5510P (1 60cps) . . $369 5510 Color Kit . . $140 

BROTHER HR-15 XL (20 cps) Too low to Quote 
HR-15 Tractor/Keyboard/Sheet 

Feeder : ,$110/$160/$190 

HR-25 (23 cps) . . $449 HR-35 (36 cps) . . $649 
Tractor/Sheet Fdr lor HR-25/35 . $120/$200 
HR-10 ( 1 2 cps) w/Tractor . . .Too low to Quote 
TWINRITER 5 Dot Matrix & Daisy Wheel. 

140/36 cps CALL 

TWINRITER 5 Tractor/Sheet Feeder . . .CALL 
2024L LQ/Graphics-24 pin, 160/80cps. .$899 
2024L Cutsheet Feeders-Narrow $220 

Wide $290 

C. ITOH 8510-BPI. $289 8510-SEP. . .$359 

8510-SCP $439 8510-SCEP. .$419 

1550-EP $419 1550-SEP...$499 

1550-SCP $579 1550-SCEP..$559 

Y10-20-P $399 A10-30-P . . .$449 

F-10-40-P $849 F-10-55-P ..$999 

F10/A10 Tractor/Sheet Feeder. . .$180/$490 
ALL NEW MODELS CALL 

QUME LetterPro 20P (20 cps) $399 

20P Tractor/Sheet Feeder $140/$380 

SPRINT1140+ $1299 

SPRINT 1155+ $1419 

SPRINT Interlace Module: IBM Par $80 

SPRINT Tractor/Sheet Feeder. . ,$210/$690 

PANASONIC KX-P3151 LQ 22 cps $479 

KX-P1090/91/92/93..$189/$269/$359/$529 

STAR MICRONICS NEW 10" & 15" MODELS 

SG-10/15"120cps $239/$389 

SD-10/15 160cps $349/$459 

SR-1 0/15 200 cps $499/$599 

Power Type $329 SB-10 CALL 

NEC PINWRITER P-2/P-3 $499/$699 

Sheet Feeder P-2/P-3 $350/$420 

SPINWRITER 
2050/3550/8850 . . . .$649/$999/$1399 
Tractor/Sheet Feeder $190/$790 

DIABLO 630 ECS/IBM $1699 

630 API $1529 

Advantage D-25 . . . $549 Series 36 . . . $729 
DATAPRODUCTS Makers of IBM Color Printer 

8052 (Same as IBM ColorPrinter) $1 199 

8072 (Same as 8052 at twice the speed) . $1599 

KENSINGTON Universal Printer Stand 
W/Purchase of any Printer $15 



FLOPPY/HARD DISKS MULTI-FUNCTION CARDS 



TEAC Half Ht FD 55B-DSDD. . 'REDUCED'. -$9fr- 
TANDON 100-2 Full Ht DSDD. . 'CALL" .-$99- 
HARD DISKS for IBM PC/XT 
10 MB Int. 'CALL -W89- 10 MB Ext. -CALL -$?29- 
20 MB Int. 'CALL .-$675- 20 MB Ext 'CAU_-$8?5- 
33 MB Int 'CALL' 4^&-33 MB Ext. CALL-$448&- 
44 MB Int. •CAl± , -$W9&- 44 MB Ext CALL $4S9S- 

70MBInt CALL 70MBExt CALL 

140 MB Int . . . .CALL 140 MB Ext . . . .CALL 
BACKUP for IBM PC/XT 
10 MB Int. CALL-4499- 10 MB Ext. -CalLt$669~ 
20 MB Int. 'CALI/4&9£- 20 MB Ext TJALL-$f4^- 

40 MB/60 MBInt/Ext CALL 

HARD DISKS FOR IBM PC AT 

20 MB Int CALL' -$649-40 MB Int 'CALL -$1399- 

80 MB Int CALL 140 MB Int CALL 

TALL GRASS NEW PC/T FORMAT DRIVES/BACKUP 
25MBw/60MB.$2599 35MBw/60MB.$3399 
50 MB w/60 MB. $4299 80 MB w/60 MB. $5499 

Controller $140 Cartridge (60 MB) $40 

EVEREX 10 MB/20 MB Int. ' REDUCED' -$599/ $749- 
IRWIN MAGNETICS TAPE BACKUP 
10 MB Int. 'CALLT$$4&-10 MB Ext. CALLr$689~ 
20 MB Int. , CALL , 4S29- 20 MB Ext. CALL-479&- 
PWR SUPPLY 130/150 Watts $99/$129 



MONITORS 



PGS MAX-12E/HX-12/HX-12E . $169/$419/CALL 
SR-12 . . . $549 SR-12 w/Sioma 400 .. . $999 
TAXAN COMPOSIT 1 1 5 Green/1 1 6 Amber. . $129 
MONO 121 Green/122 Amber (1000x360). $139 
COLOR 41 1 (510x260) . $349 425 (640x262). $449 

COLOR 440 (720x400) $519 

W/Persyst Bob Brd $849 

AMDB( 300G/300A/310A (M). . $139/$149/CALL 

COLOR 300/500/600 $239/$349/$419 

710 . . $499 With Tecmar Graphics Master. . $919 
QUAORAM AMBERCHROME (720x350). .$169 

ROLAND MB-142 14" Mono B/W $299 

TECMAR Color. .$529 w/Graphics Master. .$949 
TILT/SWIVEL Monitor Pedestal 
W/Purchase of any Monitor $25 



AST SIXPAK 0-K $239 384K. .$299 

ORCHID Blossom 0-K . . . $179 384K . . $239 

PARADISE 5-Pack 0-K ... $159 384K . . $219 

TECMAR Captain 0-K . . . $179 384K . . $239 

BT6 Plus w/64k $199 384k . . $249 

IDS B-512 0-K $199 512k.. $279 

P/S/G Porls. Clock/Cal & disk emulation 

QUADBOARD 0-K r$?49-i / 384K.r$279 - 

Silver Quadboard: 0-K to 640k . 7. CALL 

Gold Quadboard: Multifunction & Color. . . .CALL 

PERSYST Multifunction & Color or Mono, from $329 
RAM installation (1-8 sets) & test board ...... $20 

CALL FOR CURRENT PRICES 
QUANTITY DISCOUNTS AVAILABLE 

OEM - WHOLESALE * RETAIL 



DISPLAY CARDS 



EVEREX Graphics Edge Best Price Ever 

AST Monograph Plus w/clock. Par & Ser Rxts. $399 

AST Preview for Mono Graphics CALL 

PERSYST BoB Brd . . $349 w/TAXAN 440 .. $849 
Short-Port Color. . . $159 Mini-Mono . . . CALL 
ColorCombo: Multifunction & Color, .from $329 
Mono Combo: Multifunction & Mono, .from $329 

QUAORAM Quadcolor I or II . . $209 Both . . $398 
Gold Quadboard: Multifunction & Color. . . CALL 

STB's Chauffer CALL 

RftRADISE Modular Brd . . $259 Modules . . CALL 

IDS B-450 Mono, Color & Printer Port $249 

TECMAR Graphics Master $439 

w/Amdek 710 $919 

HERCULES MonoGraphics. .$289 Color. .$149 

GENOA Spectrum BEST PRICE 

MYLEX Chairman $399 

SIGMA COLOR 400 . . $479 w/PGS SR-12 .. $999 

I CALL FOR OUR WEEKLY 
UNADVERT1SED SPECIALS | 



SUPER SPECIALS 



|$1000 + SINGLE ORDER ENTITLES YOU TO THESE SPECIAL PRICES 



JUKI 6100/6300 $339/5659 

OWOATA 192/193/84 P or IBM. . $319/$469/$599 

BROTHER HR-1 5/25/35 CALL/$435/$629 

TOSHIBA 1340 P $499 

PGSMAX-12E....$159 HX-12 $399 

ROUND MB-142. 14" Mono B/W & Reverse. .$279 
EasyData 1 2B 300/1200 Bd Int w/Crosstolk . . . $185 
HAYES 1200Bw/sft. . .$319 1200Ext. . ,$339 
Signalman MK Xll/Signalman Express. .$219/$249 
BECOMP Intellimodem ST/XL/XT . $279/$309/$349 



MYLEX Chairman $379 

IDS B-450 Mono, Color & Printer Port $229 

PARADISE 5-Pack + 384k RAM $199 

BT6PLUS + 384k RAM $229 

IDS B-512 + 384k/512k $235/$255 

ORCHID PCturbo w/640k $769 

Floppy Drive Controller for IBM PC/XT $99 

KEYTRONIC Deluxe Keyboard KB5151 . . . .$155 

POWER DIRECTOR P2/P12 $79/$119 

PWR SUPPLY 130/150 Watts $89/$119 



COMPANY POUCY: Min. onier $100. Prices & avatia&Bly subject to change. V\fe ship UPS only. Sripara/hancSng changes vary. 
Prices reflect cash discount on prepaid orders. Add 1% for COD orders, 3% for MC/V1SA & 5% for AMw. COO requires cashiers 
check. AH merchandee sold ts new and all sates are final. Refused shipments subject to 20% charge (Min $50). Products shipped in 
factory cartons come with manufacturer warranty. For others, inducing IBM systems, call tech support for return auth. # for warranty 
repairs. Non-defective Items returned as defective subject to 10% service charge (Min. $50). Not responsible for hardware or software 
compatibility of any product. No open acct PO's or foreign orders. No showroom, demonstrations or walk-in sates. Personal or company 
checks take 3 weeks to dear, FOR ADVANCE PAYMENTS or PICKUP: PLEASE CALL FIRST FOR WORKDROER #. 



MODEMS 



EasyOata 12B 300/1200 Bd Int w/softWOTB . . $199 

HAYES 1200 B w/SmartCom II $339 

HAYES 1200 Ext. w/o Software $359 

Smartcom II . . $90 NEW 2400 Baud Ext . . CALL 

POPCOM C-100/X-100 $269/5289 

AST Reach! 1 200 Bd short card w/Crosstalk. $379 

PROMETHEUS PRO MODEM 1200 Ext. . . .$279 
For 1200 Ext: Alphanum Display/Comm 

Buffer CALL 

PROMODEM 1200 B Int w/MITE software. .$249 

QUADMODEM II shortcard w/Crasstalk XVI. .CALL 
2400 Bd Upgrade Kit for QuaduxxJem II . . . CALL 

Ven-Tel Half Card w/Crosstalk XVI .... $369 
1200 Plus Ext w/o software $339 

ANCHOR Volksmodem 12 $179 

Signalman MK XII $229 

Signalman Express $259 

BIZCOMP Intellimodem 
ST/XL/XT $289/$319/$359 

CALL for VOLUME Quotis 



MISC. ADD ONS 



MK RAM Set. .$10 10+ Sets. $9 50+.. $8 
256KRAMSet..$45 10+ Sets. .$43 50+. .$40 
8087 5mhz for IBM PC. . . REDUCED'. . tW5- 
B0287-3 5mhz for IBM AT. . . "REDUCED" . .t$239- 
ORCHID PC turbo w/128k. -$599-|640k. -$?99- 
QUARAM QUADsprint ^ $499 

CABLE Parallel. 6ft... $20 Serial. 6 ft . . , $25 
Keyboard Extension, 6 tt $10 

MAXELL MD-2 DSDD Box of 10 $22 

10+ Boxes $19 

FLOPPY Controller $109 

FLOPPY Controller w/P. S & G Ports 

& Clock/Cal $199 

COMBINED FLOPPY/HARD DISK Controller. . CALL 

MOUSE SYSTEMS PC Mouse $139 

IBM's original PC Keyboard CALL 

KEYTRONIC Deluxe Keyboard KB 5151 . . . $165 
QUAORAM Microlazer 8k Par to Par $129 

COMPUTER ACCESSORIES P2(5) $89 

POWER DIRECTOR P12(6). .$129 P1-2-3. $299 

KENSINGTON Master Piece (5 outlets). . . .$89 

PC Keyboard Storage Drawer $89 

STANDBY PWR SUPPLY w/surge protection 
200/300/800 Watts $269/$359/$699 

KOALAPAO w/PC Design $89 

KENSINGTON Universal Printer Stand ... .$20 
TILT/SWIVEL Monitor Pedestal $30 

PWR SUPPLY 130/150 Watts $99/$129 



CREDIT CARDS 



COMPU 



406-C CONSTITUTION AVE., CAMARILLO, CA 93010 



805-987-7015 



WHEN ORDERING PLEASE REFER TO AD #B800 



454 BYTE • JULY 1985 



NOW C HERE! 

CROSS SOFTWARE 
for the NS32000 



Also Available for IBM PC 
INCLUDES: 

• Cross Assembler * 
* Cross Linker * 

* Debugger * 

• N.S. ISE Support * 

* Librarian * 

• Pascal Cross Compiler * 

• C Cross Compiler * 

U.S. prices start at $500 



SOLUTIONWARE 

1283 Mt, View-Alviso Rd. 

Suite B 

Sunnyvale, Calif. 94089 

408/745-7818 * TLX 4994264 



Inquiry 334 



■n j IW ppsi 



COmE TO US FOR YOUR 

ASTRonomrcAL compuiinG nEEDs 

FORTH, the programming language 

created by astronomers. 

Fast - Compact - Quick debugging 

now available for most micros arri DEC minis 

• Our GEnERAL ASTROnOJDY UTILITY does sidereal 
lime, coord male con versions, precession, etc 

• The EPHETT1ERIDE PROGRAm will let you locale 
Comet Haley quickly! 

■ We have CATALOGS too the YBS ( 9000naked-e\}e 
stars), the RI"1GC (galaxies), the GVCS ( variable stars), 
and the SAO {260.000 star's) In popular disk formats. 

• And we customize programs for photometry, 
spectral analysis and image processing 

Write today torour Iroe catalog . All sof twar-e has a 
JO-daj/ money-back guaran tool 

UniFIED SOFTWARE SYSTEms 

P 0. Box 2644, new Cartx>!lton. HTID 20784 
(30 1 ) 552-9590 




■« & ll I ONLY 

^mrm public domain 

SOFTWARE 

is uncopyrighted, so no license fees to pay to anyone!. 
Thousands of useful dbase, spreadsheet, word processors, 
games, utilities and business programs you can copy yourself 
(rom our User Group rental libraries. Join hundreds of 
companies and users enjoying a wealth ol inexpensive 
software! 

RENTAL LIBRARIES FOR CP/M 
SIG/M UG (New Jersey Area Computer Club) 

2l6DiskSides S125.00 

CP/M UG (New York Area Computer Club) 

92 Disk Sides $4500 

PICONET (Bay Area User Group) 

34 Disk Sides S25 00 

KUG (Charlottesville Kaypro User Group) 

39 Disk Sides $45.00 

NATIONAL EPSON UG 

34 Oisk Sides S40.00 

PD DIRECTORY CATALOG OISK 

SPECIAL SALE— Includes CP/M, SIG/M UG & PNET . . $5 00 pp 

RENTAL LIBRARIES FOR IBM PC DOS 

PC-BLUE (NYACC) 

110 Disk Sides $135.00 

IBM-PC SIG (Santa Clara Group, others) 

300 Disk Sides $325.00 

RENTAL LIBRARIES FOR COMMODORE 64 

28 DiskSides $2500 

PD DIRECrORY DISK S12.00 pp 

Rental Is lor 7 days after receipt. 3 more days grace lor return Use your 

credit card — NO DISK DEPOSlTi Most formats available —even 

Apple! Specitiy Soltware also available lor sale;$6 00 per disk full 

24 hr.. 3 minute info, recording 

(619)727-1015 

NATIONAL PUBLIC DOMAIN RENTAL CENTER 

I 1533 Avohill Dr., Vista, CA 92083 

(619)941-0925 Orders 



Inquiry 2 58 



Hello, Gemini Printer Users: 

You do not need to buy a 
new printer to obtain N.L.Q. 
(near letter quality) printing 
capabilities. 

We are offering to you an 
easy-to-install kit for your 
Printer: 

PRICE $57.50 

To Order: Call or Write 

ESP CORPORATION 

7900 N. Tamiami Trail 

Sarasota, FL 34243 

(813)355-6797 

When ordering we need the 
Model # and Serial # of your 
printer. 
Personal Check and COD's 
accepted — No Credit Cards 
4-6 weeks delivery 



DISK DRIVES 

Half Height 
IBM Compatible 

ONE YEAR 
WARRANTY 

40 tr. DS/DD $89.00 

80 tr. DS/DD $99.00 

1.2 meg. floppy CALL 

Enclosures and mounting kits 
Special bracketed pair pricing 

IN + 2 DAY 
STOCK * SHIP 



fP ALLIED MICRO DEVICES 

2809 Boardwalk, Ann Arbor, Ml 48104 

(313) 996-1282:TX 2907707 AMEL 

*Manuf actured by SANYO 



Inquiry 23 



The worlds fastest, most powerful 
8080 relocating macro assembler 

SIRMAC 5 ^ 5 



". . in two words, I'd say speed & flexibility", 

Edward Joyce, Nov. 84, Microcomputing 

This is what they said about 
Z80ASM, our Z80 assembler. Now 
the same features and performance 
are available in our Intel Mnemonic 
product. SLRMAC is compatible 
with M80 in .8080 mode with many 
extensions. Too many features to list. 
To order or find out more about our 
complete family of development 
tools, call or write: 



-S" L R Systems 

1622 N. Main St.. Butler. PA 16001 
(800)833-3061 • (412)282-0864 
Telex 559215 SLR SYS 



Inquiry 363 



Inquiry 142 



Inquiry 406 






W 




•(gkROSE DATA SWITCHES 

SHARE computers, printers, 

any parallel or serial device 

(C*j ELIMINATE cable swapping 

"■ INEXPENSIVE way to network 

* COMPATIBLE with 

all computers. 

Businesses, Schools, Homes 
WE ALSO OFFER: 
Data Bullers, Line Drivers, 
Modems, Protocol Converters, 
Parallel - Serial Converters, 
Cables, Computers, Printers, 
Disk Drives, and more. 
AUTOMATIC - CARETAKER is ideal for a business or 
school to share a printeror modem among many computers. 
Operation is fully automatic with no software required. 
Parallel or Serial 4 channels -$295 8 channels - $395 
MANUAL - HARDSWITCH is operated with the (lip of a 
switch. 2:2 and 2:4 models allow simultaneous commun- 
ication. 

Serial 1:2 -$59 1:4-$ 99 2:2 - $109 2:4 -$169 

Parallel 1:2 -$99 1:4 -$159 2:2 -$189 2:4 - $279 
LED and spike protection on serial models add $20. 
CODE ACTIVATED - PORTER connects one computer to 
multiple peripherals. Asoftwarecodeselectsthe peripheral. 
Parallel or Serial 4 channels - $295 8 channels - $395 
Buller option 64K-$100 256K-$250 
REMOTE - TELEPATH connects multiple computers to 
multiple peripherals. Aselector at each computer or terminal 
chooses up to 4 peripherals and displays busy status. 
4:4 -$495 4:8 -$795 selector - $39. 

ROSE ELECTRONICS (713) 240-7673 

P.O. BOX 742571 MC & VISA Accepted 

HOUSTON, TX 77274 Dealer Inquiries Invited 

CALL US FOR ALL YOUR INTERFACE NEEDS 



■tm 



FoxBASE 

Interpreter/Compiler 



I dBASE II® source compatible 

I Runs 3-20 times faster than 

dBASE II 
I 8087 coprocessor support 
I 14 digit precision 
I Up to 48 fields per record 
I Full type-ahead capabilities 
I Provides compact objectcode 

and program security 
I Twice as many memory variables 

as dBASE II 



FOX SOFTWARE INC 

1 3330 Bishop Road, P.O. Box 269. 
Bowling Green, OH 43402 
419-354-3981 



OK-WRITER 



LETTER QUALITY 

Enhancement for 

Okidata ML82A/83A 

Dot Matrix Printers 

• Easy to install - 

• Plug- in module 

• Letter Quality: 30 cos 

• Draft Quality: 120cps 

• 10712, 17 cpi 

• Full dot addressable graphics 

• Front panel access to all features 

• Proportional spacing, bold, double 
width, under tin ing, self -test. etc. 

• Serial and parallel interfaces retained 

• HELP mode; Diagnostic HEX dump 

• And many other features 




O 



RAINBOW TECHNOLOGIES INC 



17971-E Skypark Circle, Irvine, CA 92714 

(714) 261-0228 Telex 386078 
UK Distributor: X-DATA (0753) 72331 



Inquiry 407 



Inquiry 1 54 



Inquiry 300 



4164 MK 2 8SIS MIC 9/10.50 



41256 



W i.iT 



5.25 



STATIC RAMS 



2101 
[ 5101 
. 2102-1 

2102L-4 

2102L-2 

2125 

2111 

2111L 

2112 

2114 

2114-25 

2114L 4 

2114L-3 

2114L 2 

2114L 15 

TC5514 

2141 

2147 

2148 

TMS4044-4 

TMS4044 3 

TMS4044-2 

TMS10L44 2 

UPD410 

MK4118 

TMM201 6-200 

TM(V1201 6-150 

TMM2016-100 

HIM61 16-4 

HM61 16 3 

HM6116-2 

HM6116LP 4 

HM6116LP-3 

HM6116LP-2 

TC5516 

TMS4016 

Z 6132 

HM6264P-15 

HM6264LP-15 

HIM6264LP-12 

LP- Low powei 



256x4 
256x4 
1024x4 
1024x1 
1024x1 
1024x1 
256x4 
256x4 
256x4 
1024x4 
1024x4 
1024x4 
1024x4 
1024x4 
1024x4 
1024x4 
4096x1 
4096x1 
1024x4 
4090x1 
4096x1 
4096x1 
4096x1 
4096x1 
1024x8 
2048x8 
2048x8 
2048x8 
2048x8 
2048x8 
2048x8 
2048x8 
2048x8 
2048x8 
2048x8 
2048x8 
4096x8 
8192x8 
8192x8 
8192x8 



(450ns) 
(450ns)(cmos) 
(450ns) 
(450ns)(LP) 
(250ns)(LP) 
(45ns) 
(450ns) 
(450ns)(LP) 
(450ns) 
(450ns) 
(250ns) 
(450ns)(LP) 
(300ns)(LP) 
(200ns)(LP) 
(150ns)(LP) 
(650ns)(cmos) 
(200ns) 
(55ns) 
(70ns) 
(450ns) 
(300ns) 
(200ns) 
(200ns)(LP) 
(100ns) 
(250ns) 
(200ns) 
(1 50ns) 
(100ns) 
(200ns!(cmos) 
(150ns)(cnios) 
(120ns)(cmos) 
(200ns)(cmos)(LP) 
(150ns)(c:mos)(LP) 
(120ns)(cmos)(LP) 
(250ns)(cmos) 
(200ns) 
(300ns)(Qstiit) 
(150ns)(cmos) 
(150ns){cmos)(LP) 
(120ns)(cmos)(LP) 
Qstnt Quasi- Si 



1.95 

3.95 

.89 

.99 

1.45 

2.95 

2.49 

2 95 

2.99 

8 9.95 

8 10.95 

8 12.95 

8 13.45 

8 13 95 

8 1995 

4 95 

2 95 
4 95 
4 95 
3.49 
3.99 
4 49 

4 95 

3 95 
9 95 
325 
3 75 
4.75 

3 69 
3.95 

5 95 
3.95 

4 25 

6 95 
9 95 
6.95 

3495 
9.75 
9.95 

10 95 



EPROMS 



1702 
2708 
2758 
2716-6 
2716 
2716 1 
TMS2516 
TMS2716 
TMS2532 
2732 
2732A-4 
2732A 35 
2732A 
2732A-2 
2764 
2764-250 
2764 200 
TMS2564 
MCM68764 
MCM68766 
27128-45 
27128 30 
27128 
27256 
5V Single! 



256x8 

1024x8 

1024x8 

2048x8 

20.18x8 

2048x8 

2048x8 

2048x8 

4096x8 

4096x8 

4096x8 

4096x8 

4096x8 

4096x8 

8192x8 

8192x8 

8192x8 

8192x8 

8192x8 

8192x8 

16384x8 

16384x8 

16384x8 

32768x8 

ill Supply 



(1ljs) 
(450ns) 
(450ns)(5V) 
(650ns) 
(450ns)(5V) 
(350ns)(5V) 
(450ns)(5V) 
(450ns) 
(450ns)(5V) 
(450ns)(5V) 
(450ns)(5V)(21V 
(350ns)(5V)(21V 
(250ns)(5V)(21V 
(200ns)(5V)(21V 
(450ns)(5V) 
(250ns)(5V) 
(200ns)(5V) 
(450ns)(5V) 
(450ns)(5V)(24 pi 
(350ns)(5V)(24 pi 
(450ns)(5V) 
(300ns)(5V) 
(250ns)(5V) 
(250ns)(5V) 
21V PGM Program 



PGM) 
PGM) 
PGM) 



4.50 
3.95 
5.95 
2.95 
3.50 
4.95 
4.95 
7.95 
4.95 
3.95 
4.95 
4.95 
6.95 



PGM) 10.95 

4.25 

4.95 

6.95 

10.95 

i) 24.95 

l) 42.95 

7.50 

7.75 

7.95 

12.95 

it 21 Volts 



CRYSTALS 



DYNAMIC RAMS 



TMS4027 

2107 

MM5280 

TMS4050 

UPD411 

TMS4060 

MK4108 

MM5298 

4116-300 

4116-250 

4116-200 

4116-150 

4116-120 

' 2118 

I MK4332 
4164-200 
4164-150 
4164-120 
MCM6665 
TMS4164-20 
TMS4164 15 



4096x1 

4096x1 

4096x1 

4096x1 

4096x1 

4096x1 

8192x1 

8192x1 

16384x1 

16384x1 

16384x1 

16384x1 

16384x1 

16384x1 

32768x1 

65536x1 

65536x1 

65536x1 

65536x1 

65536x1 

65536x 



4164 REFRESH 65536x1 



TMS4416-20 

TMS4416-15 

41128-150 

41256-200 

41256-150 



16384x4 

16384x4 

131072x1 

262144x1 

262144x1 



5v=Sinyle 5 Volt Supply 

Z-80 
2.5 MHz 



(250ns) 
(200ns) 
(300ns) 
(300ns) 
(300ns) 
(300ns) 
(200ns) 
(250ns) 
(300ns) 
(250ns) 
(200ns) 
(150ns) 
(120ns) 
(150ns)(5v) 
(200ns) 
(200ns)(5v) 
(150ns)(5v) 
(120ns)(5v) 
(200ns)!5v) 
(200ns)(5V) 
(150ns)(5v) 
(150ns)(5V)(REF 
(200ns)(5V) 
(150ns)(5v) 
|150ns)|5v) 
(200ns)(5v) 
(150ns)(5v) 
REFRESH Pi 



6500 



1.99 

1.95 

1 95 

1.95 

1 95 

1 95 

.49 

.49 

8 6.95 

8 6.95 

8 8.95 

8 10.95 

8 12.95 

4.95 
9.95 

9 10.50 
9 13.50 

3.95 
4.95 
4.25 
4.95 
RESH) 8.95 
8.95 
9.95 
13.95 
5 25 
5.50 
1 Rofn 



• •••HIGH-TECH**** 

27256 $12.95 

• 32K x 8 EPROM 

• SINGLE 5 VOLT SUPPLY 

• SINGLE LOCATION & 

HIGH SPEED PROGRAMMING 

• 250ns ACCESS TIME 

• •••SPOTLIGHT**** 



ORDER TOLL FREE 

800-538-5000 
800-662-6279 

(CALIFORNIA RESIDENTS) 



6800 



Z80-CPU 


2.49 


280-CTC 


2.95 


Z80 DART 


7.95 


Z80 DMA 


8.95 


Z80-PIO 


2.95 


Z80-SIO 


9.95 


Z80-SIO 1 


9.95 


Z80 SIO 2 


9.95 


Z80-SIO 9 


9.95 



4.0 MHz 



Z80A-CPU 
Z80A-CTC 
Z80A DART 

Z80A-DMA 
280A-PIO 
Z80A-SIO 
Z80A SIO 1 
Z80A-SIO 2 
Z80A SIO 9 



2.95 
3.95 
8.95 
9.95 
3.95 
10.95 
10.95 
10.95 
10.95 



6.0 MHz 



Z80B CPU 
Z80B-CTC 
Z808 PIO 
Z80B DART 
Z80B-SIO 
Z80B SIO 2 



8.95 

9.95 

9.95 

19.95 

29 95 

29.95 



ZILOG 



Z6132 

. Z8671 



34.95 
39.95 



1.01V 


IHz 


68000 8 


39.95 


6502 4.95 1 
65C02(CMOS)12.95 I 
6504 6.95 M 


6800 
6802 
6803 


2.95 
7.95 
19.95 


6505 
6507 


8.95 I 
9.95 I 


6808 
6809 


13.90 
8.95 


6520 
6522 
6532 


2.95 I 
5.49 ■ 
9.95 H 


6809E 

6810 

6820 


8.95 
2.95 
4.35 


6545 
6551 


9.95 ■ 
9.95 ■ 


6821 
6828 
6840 


2.95 
14.95 
12.95 


2.0 MHz } 


6843 
6844 


34.95 
25.95 


6502A 


5.95 ■ 


6845 


12.95 


6520A 


5.95 ■ 


6847 


11.95 


6522A 


9.95 ■ 


6850 


3.25 


6532A 


11.95 I 


6852 


5 75 


6545A 


12.95 ■ 


6860 


7.95 


6551A 


11.95 ■ 


6875 


6.95 






6880 


2.25 


3.0 MHz 


6883 
68047 


22.95 
24.95 


6502B 


8.95 jm 


68488 

6800 1 
68B00 


19.95 




MHz 


UARTS 


10.95 


AY5-1013 


3 95 ■ 


68B02 


11.95 


AY3-1015 


6.95 ■ 


68B09E 


11.95 


PT1472 


9.95 I 


68B09 


11.95 


TR1602 


3.95 I 


68B10 


5.95 


2350 


9 95 H 


68B21 


5 95 


2651 


8.95 1 


68B40 


19.95 


IM6402 


7.95 ■ 


68B45 


19 95 


IM6403 


8.95 ■ 


68B50 


595 


UPD7201 


19.95 1 






INS8250 


10.95 ^H 


. G8B00 


2 MHz 




32.768 KHz 

1.0 MHz 

1.8432 

2.0 

2.097152 

2.4576 

3.2768 

3.579545 

4.0 

4.032 

5.0 

5.0688 

5.185 

5.7143 

6.0 

6.144 

6.5536 

8.0 
10.0 

10.738635 
14.31818 
15.0 
16.0 
17.430 
18.0 
18.432 
20.0 
22.1184 
24.0 
32.0 



1.95 

3.95 

3.95 

2.95 

2.95 

2.95 

2.95 

2.95 

2.95 

2.95 

2.95 I 

2.95 

2.95 

2.95 

2:95 

2.95 

2.95 

2.95 

2.95 

2.95 

2.95 

2.95 

2.95 

2.95 

2.95 

2.95 

2.95 

2.95 

2.95 

2.95 



r GENERATORS^ 
BIT RATE 



MC14411 

BR1941 

4702 

COM5016 

COM8116 

MM5307 



11.95 
11.95 
12.95 
16.95 
10.95 
10.95 



FUNCTION 

I MC4024 3.9 

LM566 1.4 

1 XR2206 3.7 

I 8038 3.9 



CRT 
j CONTROLLERS 



6845 

68B45 

6847 

68047 

HD46505SP 

MC1372 

8275 

7220 

CRT5027 

CRT5037 

TMS9918A 

DP8350 



12.95 
19.95 
11.95 
24.95 
15.95 
6.95 
29.95 
39.95 
19.95 
34.95 
39.95 
49.95 





DISK 








CONTROLLth: 


8200 


1771 


15.95 






1791 


23.95 


8202 


24.95 1 


1793 


23.95 


8203 


39.95 ■ 


1795 


23.95 


8205 


3.50 ■ 


1797 


23.95 


8212 


1 80 ■ 


2791 


39.95 


8214 


3.85 ■ 


2793 


39.95 


8216 


1.75 II 


2795 


39.95 


8224 


2.25 1 


2797 


39.95 


8226 
8228 


1.80 ■ 
3.49 ■ 


6843 
8272 


34.95 
19.95 


8237 


13.95 ■ 


UPD765 


19.95 


8237-5 


15.95 ■ 


MB8876 


29.95 


8238 


4.49 1 


MB8877 


34.95 


8243 


4.45 ■ 


1691 


7.95 


8250 


10.95 ■ 


2143 


7.95 


8251 


3.95 ■ 
4.49 ■ 






8251A 






8253 


6.95 ■ 






8253-5 


7.95 ■ 
4.49 ■ 
5.25 ■ 
7.95 ■ 






8255 

8255-5 

8257 


r KEYBOARD 
CHIPS 


8257 5 


8.95 I 


AY5-2376 


11.95 


8259 


6.90 ■ 


AY5-3600STD 


11.95 


8259-5 


7.50 ■ 


AY5-3600PRO 


11.95 


8271 


79.95 ■ 
19.95 ■ 






8272 






8274 


39.95 ■ 






8275 


29.95 H 
6.95 M 






8279 


r CLOCK 


8279-5 
8282 


7.95 ■ 
6.50 ■ 


CIRCUITS 


8283 


6.50 ■ 


MM5314 


4.95 


8284 


5.50 B 


MM5369 


1.95 


828G 


6.50 ■ 


MM5369-EST 


1.95 


8287 


6.50 ■ 


MM5375 


4.95 


8288 


14.95 ■ 


MM58167 


8.95 


8289 


49.95 ■ 


MM58174 


11.95 


8292 


14 .95 MB 


MSM5832 


3.95 



CRYSTAL 




OSCILLATORS 




1.0MHz 7.95 


8.0 


7.95 


1.8432 7.95 


10.0 


7.95 


2.0 7.95 


12.0 


7.95 


2.4576 7.95 


15.0 


7.95 


2.5 7.95 


16.0 


7.95 


4.0 7.95 


18.432 


7.95 


5.0688 7.95 


20.0 


7.95 


6.0 7.95 


24.0 


7.95 


6.144 7.95 







^ 



74LS00 



74LS00 
74LS01 
74LS02 
74LS03 
74LS04 
74LS05 
74LS08 
74LS09 
74LS10 
74LS11 
74LS12 
74LS13 
74LS14 
74LS15 
74LS20 
74LS21 
74LS22 
74LS26 
74LS27 
74LS28 
741. S30 
74LS32 
74LS33 
74LS37 
74LS38 
74LS40 
74LS42 
74LS47 
74LS48 
74LS49 
74LS51 
74LS54 
74LS55 
74LS63 
74LS73 
74LS74 
74LS75 
74LS76 
74LS78 
74LS83 
74LS85 
74LS86 
74LS90 
74LS91 
74LS92 
74LS93 
74LS95 
74LS96 
74LS107 
74LS109 
74LS112 
74LS113 
74LS114 
74LS122 
74LS123 
74LS124 
74LS125 
74LS126 
74LS132 
74LS133 
74LS136 
74LS137 
74LS138 
74LS139 
74LS145 
74LS147 
74LS148 
74LS151 
74LS153 
74LS154 
74LS155 
74LS156 
74LS157 
74LS158 
74LS160 
74LS161 
74LS162 
74LS163 
74LS164 
74LS165 
74LS166 
74LS168 
74LS169 
74LS170 
74LS173 
74LS174 
74LS175 
l 74LS181 



.25 
.25 



.25 
29 

.25 
29 
29 



35 
39 
.39 



.55 
.89 



.39 

.39 

.39 

.39 

.45 

.79 

2.90 

.49 

.49 

.59 

59 

.39 

.99 

.55 

.55 

1.20 

2.49 

1.35 

.55 

.55 

1.90 

.69 

.69 



.69 

65 

.69 

.65 

.69 

.95 

1.95 

1.75 

1.75 

1.49 

.69 

.55 

.55 



.89 
79 
.79 



.79 
79 



95 
99 



75 



.59 

.59 



.69 



.89 



74LS189 8.95 
74LS190 
74LS191 
74LS192 
74LS193 
74LS194 
74LS195 
74LS196 
74LS197 
74LS221 
74LS240 
74LS241 
74LS242 

74LS243 .99 

74LS244 1.29 

74LS245 1.49 
74LS247 
74LS248 
74LS249 
74LS251 
74LS253 
74LS257 
74LS258 

74LS259 2.75 

74LS260 .59 

74LS261 2.25 

74LS266 55 

74LS273 1.49 

74LS275 3.35 

74LS279 .49 

74LS280 1.98 
74LS283 
74LS290 
74LS293 
74LS295 
74LS298 

74LS299 1.75 

74LS322 5.95 

74LS323 3.50 

74LS324 1.75 

74LS348 2.50 

74LS352 1.29 

74LS353 1.29 

74LS363 1.35 

74LS364 1.95 
74LS365 
74LS366 
74LS367 
74LS368 

74LS373 1.39 

74LS3 74 1.39 

74LS375 .95 

74LS377 1.39 

74LS378 1.18 

74LS379 1.35 

74LS385 3.90 

74LS386 .45 

74LS390 1.19 

74LS393 1.19 

74LS395 1.19 

74LS396 1.89 

74LS399 1.49 

74LS424 3.95 

74LS447 .95 

74LS490 1.95 

74LS540 1.95 

74LS541 1.95 

74LS624 3.99 

74LS640 2.20 

74LS645 2.20 

74LS668 1.69 

74LS669 1.89 

74LS670 1.49 

74LS674 14 95 

74LS682 3.20 

74LS683 3.20 

74LS684 3.20 

74LS685 3.20 

74LS688 2.40 

74LS689 3.20 

81LS95 1.49 

81LS96 1.49 
25LS2518 4.13 
25LS2521 2.80 
25LS25383.74 
25LS2569 2.80 

26LS31 2.19 

26LS32 2.19 



.45 



IB 1224 S. Bascom Avenue, San Jose, CA 95128 
800-538-5000 • 800-662-6279 (CA) • (408) 995-5430 
FAX (408) 275-8415 • Telex 171-110 



e Copyright 1985 JOR Microdtvlco 



RETAIL STORE - 1256 S. BASCOM AVENUE 
HOURS: M-W-F, 9-5 TU-TH, 9-9 SAT, 10-3 

PLEASE USE YOUR CUSTOMER NUMBER WHEN ORDERING 
TERMS: Minimum order $10.00. For shipping and handling include 
$2.50 for UPS Ground and $3.50 for UPS Air. Orders over 1 lb. and 
foreign orders may require additional shipping charges - please 
contact our sales department for the amount. CA. residents must 
include 6% sales tax, Bay Area and LA residents include 6M«. All 
merchandise is warranted for 90 days unless otherwise stated. Prices 
are subject to change without notice. We are not responsible tor 
typographical errors. We reserve the right to limit quantities and to 
substitute manufacturer. All merchandise subject to prior sale. 



456 BYTE • JULY 1985 



HM6264P-15 8 « mc 9.75 



Si fi i 



39.95 



74S00 



74S00 
| 74S02 
74S03 
74S04 
74S05 
74S08 
74S09 
74S10 
74S11 
74S15 
74S20 
74S22 
74S30 
74S32 
74S37 
74S38 
74S40 
74S51 
74S64 
74S65 
74S74 
74S85 
74S86 
74S112 
74S113 
74S114 
74S124 
74S132 
74S133 
74S134 



7400 
7401 
7402 
7403 
7404 
7405 
7406 
7407 
7408 
7409 
7410 
7411 
7412 
7413 
7414 
7416 
7417 
7420 
7421 
7422 
7423 
7425 
7426 
7427 
7428 
7430 

I 7432 
7433 
7437 
7438 
7439 
7440 
7442 
7443 
7444 
7445 
7446 
7447 
7448 
7450 
7451 
7453 
7454 
7460 
7470 
7472 
7473 
7474 
7475 
7476 
7480 
7481 

i 7482 



35 
.35 
.35 



.35 
.35 
.35 
.35 
.35 
.35 
.40 
.88 
.85 
.35 
.35 



.50 
.50 
.50 
55 
2.75 
1.24 
.45 
.50 



.19 
.19 
.25 
.29 
.29 



.35 
.49 
.25 



.35 
.29 
.29 
.29 



29 
.45 
.29 



.49 
.65 
.69 
.69 
.69 
.69 
.69 



23 
.23 
.23 
.35 
.29 
.34 
.33 



74S135 
74S138 
74S139 
74S140 
74S151 
74S153 
74S157 
74S158 
74S161 
74S162 
74S163 
74S168 
74S169 
74S174 
74S175 
74S180 
74S181 
74S182 
74S185 
74S188 
74S189 
74S194 
74S195 
74S196 
74S197 
74S201 
74S225 
74S226 
74S240 
74S241 



.85 

.85 

.55 

.95 

.95 

.95 

.95 

1.95 

1.95 

1.95 

3.95 

3.95 

.95 

.95 

11.95 

3.95 

2.95 

16.95 

1.95 

6.95 

1.49 

1.49 

1.49 

1.49 

6.95 

7.95 

3.99 

2.20 

220 



7400 



7483 

7485 

7486 

7489 

7490 

7491 

7492 

7493 

7494 

7495 

7496 

7497 

74100 

74105 

74107 

74109 

74110 

74111 

74116 

74120 

74121 

74122 

74123 

74125 

74126 

74128 

74132 

74136 

74141 

74142 

74143 

74144 

74145 

74147 

74148 

74150 

74151 

74152 

74153 

74154 

74155 

74156 

74157 

74159 

74160 

74161 

74162 

74163 

74164 

74165 

74166 

74167 

74170 



.59 

35 

2.15 



.50 

.35 

.65 

55 

.70 

2.75 

1.75 

1.14 

30 

.45 

.45 

.55 

1.55 

1.20 

.29 

45 

.49 

.45 

.45 



.45 

.50 

.65 

2.95 

4.95 

2.95 

.60 

1.75 

1.20 

1.35 



.65 

.55 

1.25 

.75 

.65 

.55 

1 65 

.85 

.69 

.85 

.69 

.85 

.85 

1.00 

2.96 

1.65 



TRANSISTORS 



2N918 

MPS918 

2N2102 

2N2218 

2N2218A .50 

2N2219 .50 

2IM2219A .50 

2N2222 .25 

PN2222 .10 

MPS2369 .25 

2N2484 

2N2905 

2N2907 

PN2907 

2N3055 

3055T 

2N3393 

2N3414 

2N3563 

2N3565 

PN3565 

MPS3638 .25 

MPS3640 .25 

PIM3643 .25 

PN3644 .25 

MPS3704 .15 

MPS3706 .15 



.25 



.50 



.25 
.50 
.25 



.69 
.30 
.25 
.40 
.40 
.25 



2N3772 

2IM3903 

2N3904 

2N3906 

2N4122 

2N4123 

2IM4249 

2N4304 

2N4401 

2N4402 

2N4403 

2N4857 

PN4916 

2N5086 

PN5129 

PN5139 

2N5209 

2IM6028 

2N6043 

2N6045 

MPS-A05 

MPS-A06 

MPS-A13 

MPS-A55 

MPU-131 

TIP29 

TIP31 

TIP32 



1.85 
.25 



.75 
.25 
.25 
.25 
1.00 
.25 
.25 



74S244 
74S251 
74S253 
74S257 
74S258 
74S260 
74S273 
74S274 
74S275 
74S280 
74S283 
74S287 
74S288 
74S289 
74S299 
74S301 
74S373 
74S374 
74S381 
74S387 
74S399 
74S412 
74S470 
74S471 
74S472 
74S474 
74S570 
74S571 
74S573 
87S181 
87S185 



74172 
74173 
74174 
74175 
74176 
74177 
74178 
74179 
74180 
74181 
74182 
74184 
74185 
74189 
74190 
74191 
74192 
74193 
74194 
74195 
74196 
74197 
74198 
74199 
74221 
74246 
74247 
74248 
74249 
74251 
74259 
74265 
74273 
74276 
74278 
74279 
74283 
74284 
74285 
74290 
74293 
74298 
74351 
74365 
74366 
74367 
74368 
74376 
74390 
74393 
74425 
74426 
74490 



CMOS 



2.20 

.95 

.95 

95 

95 

.79 

2.45 

19.95 

19.95 

1.95 

3.29 

1.90 

1.90 

698 

7.35 

6.95 

2.45 

2.45 

7.95 

1.95 

2.95 

2.98 

6.95 

4.95 

4.95 

4.95 

2.95 

2.95 

9.95 

16.25 

16.95 , 



.89 
.89 



1.15 

1.75 

.75 

2.25 

.75 

2.00 

2 00 

2.99 

1.15 

1.15 

.79 

.79 

.85 

.85 

.79 

.75 

1.35 

1.35 

1.35 

1.35 

1.25 

1.85 

1.95 

.75 

2.25 

1.35 

1.95 

1.25 

3.11 

.75 

2.00 

3.75 

3.75 

.95 

.75 

.85 



65 

.65 

.65 

2.20 

1.75 

1.35 

3.15 

.85 

2.55 



4000 
4001 
4002 
4006 
4007 
4008 
4009 
4010 
4011 
4012 
4013 
4014 
4015 
4016 
4017 
4018 
4019 
4020 
4021 
4022 
4023 
4024 
4025 
4026 
4027 
4028 
4029 
4030 
4034 
4035 
4040 
4041 
4042 
4043 
4044 
4046 
4047 
4048 
4049 
4050 
4051 
4052 
4053 

| 4060 
4066 
4068 
4069 
4070 
4071 
4072 
4073 
4075 
4076 
4077 
4078 
4081 
4082 
4085 
4086 

| 4093 
4094 
4098 
4099 
14409 
14410 
14411 
14412 
14419 
14433 
14490 
4502 
4503 
4507 
4508 
4510 
4511 
4512 
4514 
4515 
4516 
4518 
4519 
4520 
4521 
4522 
4526 
4527 
4528 

> 4529 



.39 
.39 
.69 



.79 
.29 
.65 
.29 

1.65 
.45 
.69 
.79 
.39 

1.95 
.85 
.75 
.75 
.69 
.85 
.79 
.85 
95 
.69 
.35 
.35 
.79 

1.99 
.79 
.89 



.29 
.29 



.59 

.29 

.29 

.29 

.95 

.95 

.49 

2.99 

2.49 

1.95 

12.95 

12.95 

11.95 

12.95 

7.95 

14.95 

4.95 

.95 

.65 

1.25 

1 95 

.85 



1.25 

1.79 

1 55 

89 

.39 

.79 

4.99 

1.25 

1.25 

1.95 

1.19 

2.95 



4531 

4532 

4538 

4539 

4541 

4543 

4553 

4555 

4556 

4558 

4560 

4569 

4581 

4582 

4584 

4585 

45151 

4702 

4724 

74C00 

74C02 

74C04 

74C08 

74C10 

74C14 

74C20 

74C30 

74C32 

74C42 

74C48 

74C73 

74C74 

74C76 

74C83 

74C85 

74C86 

74C89 

74C90 

74C93 

74C95 

74C150 

74C151 

74C154 

74C157 

74C160 

74C161 

74C162 

74C163 

74C164 

74C165 

74C173 

74C174 

74C175 

74C192 

74C193 

74C195 

74C200 

74C221 

74C244 

74C373 

74C374 

74C901 

74C902 

74C903 

74C905 

74C906 

74C907 

74C908 

74C909 

74C910 

74C911 

74C912 

74C914 

74C915 

74C918 

74C920 

74C921 

74C922 

74C923 

74C925 

74C926 

74C927 

74C928 

74C929 

74C930 

80C95 

80C96 

80C97 

80C98 



.95 

1.95 

1 95 

1.95 

2.64 

1.19 

5.79 

.95 

.95 

2.45 

4.25 

3.49 

1 95 

1.95 

75 

75 

12.95 

12.95 

1.50 

.35 

.35 

.35 

.35 

.35 

.59 

.35 



1.29 
1.99 

.65 
65 

.80 
1.95 
1.95 

.39 
4.50 
1.19 
1.75 

.99 
5.75 
2.25 
3.25 
1.75 
1.19 
1.19 
1.19 
1.19 
1.39 
2.00 

.79 
1.19 
1.19 
1.49 
1.49 
1.39 
5.75 
1.75 
2.25 
2.45 
2.45 
39 

.85 

.85 
10.95 

.95 
1.00 
2.00 
2.75 
9.95 
8.95 
8.95 
1.95 
1.19 
2.75 
17.95 
15.95 
4.49 
4.95 
5.95 
7.95 
7.95 
7.95 
19.95 
4.95 

.85 

.95 

.95 
1.20 . 



HIGH SPEED CMOS 

A ni;w family ol high spiMid CMOS lo<jic liNitunng 
tlit:s|>i;tid ol low power Schotlky (8nstypic;ilc}iit« |)r»p- 
ii()iition cliHiiy). combined with the ;idvant;icjt;s of CMOS 
v*;ry low power consumption, superior noise immunity . 
and unproved output drive 

74HC00 

74HC: Op«:r;it(.- at CMOS logic levels and ,irn ideiil 
, all- CMOS desitjn; 



74HC00 

74HC02 

74HC04 

74HC08 

74HC10 

74HC11 

74HC14 

74HC20 

74HC27 

74HC30 

74HC32 

74HC51 

74HC74 

74HC75 

74HC85 

74HC86 

74HC93 

74HC125 

74HC132 

74HC138 

74HC139 

74HC151 

74HC153 

74HC154 

74HC157 

74HC161 

74HC164 

74HC166 

74HC174 



.59 
59 



79 
.59 
.59 
.59 



.85 

1.35 

.69 

1.19 

1.19 

1.19 

.99 

.99 

.89 

.89 

2.49 

.89 

1.15 

1.25 

2.95 

.99 



74HC175 

74HC193 

74HC194 

74HC195 

74HC238 

74HC240 

74HC241 

74HC242 

74HC243 

74HC244 

74HC245 

74HC251 

74HC257 

74HC259 

74HC273 

74HC299 

74HC367 

74HC373 

74HC374 

74HC393 

74HC4017 

74HC4020 

74HC4024 

74HC4040 

74HC4049 

74HC4050 

74HC4060 

74HC4511 

74HC4538 



.99 
1.25 
1.04 
1.09 
1.35 
1.89 
1.89 
1.89 
1.89 
1.89 
1.89 
.89 
.85 
1.39 
1.89 
4.99 
99 
2.29 
2.29 
1.39 
1.99 
1.39 
1.59 
1.39 
.89 
.89 
1.29 
2.39 
2.29 



74HCT: Direct, drop 
can be intermixed with 



74HCT00 



74HCT00 

74HCT02 

74HCT04 

74HCT08 

74HCT10 

74HCT11 

74HCT14 

74HCT20 

74HCT27 

74HCT30 

74HCT32 

74HCT51 

74HCT74 

74HCT75 

74HCT85 

74HCT86 

74HCT93 

74HCT125 

74HCT132 

74HCT138 

74HCT139 

74HCT151 

74HCT153 

74HCT154 

74HCT157 

74HCT161 

74HCT164 

74HCT166 

74HCT174 



.69 
.69 
.69 

69 
.69 

69 
.89 

69 
.69 



69 

.85 

.95 

1.49 

.79 

1 29 

1 29 

1 29 

1 15 

1 15 

1 05 

1.05 

2.99 

.99 

1.29 

1.39 

3.05 

1.09 



in replacements forLSFI Land 
74LS in the same circuit 



74HCT175 

74HCT193 

74HCT194 

74HCT195 

74HCT238 

74HCT240 

74HCT241 

74HCT242 

74HCT243 

74HCT244 

74HCT245 

74HCT251 

74HCT257 

74HCT259 

74HCT273 

74HCT299 

74HCT367 

74HCT373 

74HCT374 

74HCT393 

74HCT4017 

74HCT4020 

74HCT4024 

74HCT4040 

74HCT4049 

74HCT4050 

74HCT4060 

74HCT4511 

74HCT4538 



1.09 
1.39 
1.19 
1.29 
1.49 
2.19 
2.19 
2.19 
2.19 
2.19 
2.19 
1.09 
.99 
1.59 
2.09 
5.25 
1.09 
2.49 
2.49 
1.59 
2.19 
1.59 
1 79 
1.59 
.99 
99 



BSPECTROIMICS 
CORPORATION 

EPROM ERASERS 



PE-14 
PE 14T 
PE-24T 
PL 265T 
PR.125T 
> PR-320T 



Cnpncity Intensity 

Chip |uW Cm') 

9 8.000 

9 8.000 

12 9,600 

30 9,600 

25 17.000 

42 17.000 



S83.00 
S119.00 
S175.00 
S255.00 
S349.00 
S59500 



IC 
SOCKETS 



1-99 100 
.13 .11 



.13 



8 PIN ST 
14 PIN ST 
16 PIN ST 
18 PIN ST 
20 PIN ST 
22 PIN ST 
24 PIN ST 
28 PIN ST 
40 PIN ST 
64 PfN ST 4.25CALL 



.30 
.30 
.40 



ST = SOLDERTAIL 



8 PIN 
14 PIN 
16 PIN 
18 PIN 
20 PIN 
22 PIN 
24 PIN 
28 PIN 
40 PIN 



WW .59 
WW .69 
WW .69 
WW .99 
WW 1.09 
WW 1.39 1.28 
WW 1.49 1.35 
WW 1.69 1.49 
WW 1.99 1.80 



.52 



.98 



INTERFACE 



8T26 

8T28 

8T95 

8T96 

8T97 

8T98 

DM8131 

DP8304 

DS8833 

DS8835 

DS8836 

DS8837 

DS8838 



1.59 

1.98 

.89 

.89 

.89 

.89 

2.95 

229 

2.25 

1 99 

.99 

1.65 

1.30 



INTERSIL 



ICL7106 

ICL7107 

ICL7660 

ICL8038 

ICM7207A 

ICM7208 



9.95 
12.95 
2.95 
3.95 
5.59 
15.95 



DATA ACQ 1 



9000 



ADC0800 

ADC0804 

ADC0809 

ADC0816 

ADC0817 

ADC0831 

DAC0800 

DAC0806 

DAC0808 

DAC1020 

DAC1021 

DAC1022 

MC1408L6 

MC1408L8 



15.55 
3.49 
4.49 

14.95 
9.95 
8.95 
4 49 
1.95 
2.95 
8.25 
7.95 
5.95 
1.95 
2.95 



9304 


95 


9316 


1.00 


9328 


1.49 


9334 


2 50 


9368 


3.95 


9401 


995 


9601 


75 


9602 


1.50 


9637 


2.95 



L 96S02 1.95 ( 



SOUND 
CHIPS 

76477 3.95 

76488 5.95 

76489 8.95 
SSI-263 39.95 
AY3-8910 12 95 
AY3-8912 12.95 
MC3340 149 
SP1000 39.00 



OPTO-ISOLATORS 



EXAR 



XR2206 
XR2207 
XR2208 
XR2211 
XR2240 



3.75 
3.75 
3.75 
525 
3.25 



4N26 
4N27 
4N28 
4N33 
4N35 
4N37 
MCT 2 
I MCT-6 



1.00 MCA 7 



110 
G9 
1.75 
1.25 
1.25 
1 00 
1.50 



MCA 255 
IL-1 
I LA 30 
ILQ 74 
H11C5 
TIL 11 1 
TIL 113 



4 25 
1 75 

1 25 
1.25 

2 75 
1 25 
1 00 
1 75 



WW=WIREWRAP 



VOLTAGE 
REGULATORS 

TO 220 CASE PACKAGE 
7805T .75 7905T .85 

7808T .75 7908T .85 

7812T .75 7912T .85 

7815T .75 7915T 85 

7824T .75 7924T .85 

TO-3 CASE PACKAGE 

7805K 1.39 7905K 1.49 

7812K 1.39 7912K 1.49 

7815K 1.39 7915K 1.49 

7824K 1.39 7924K 149 

TO-92CASE PACKAGE 
78L05 .69 79L05 79 

78L12 .69 79L12 79 

78L15 .69 79L15 79 

OTHER VOLTAGE REGS 
78M05C 5volt '/amp TO 220 35 



LM323K 
LM338K 
78H05K 
78H12K 
78P05K 
k UA78S40 



! Copyright 1985 JDR Mlcrodevl 



Dear Sirs; 

I just purchased the RP-525 Aut o-Eprom 
Programmer for the Apple lie. I want to 
thank you for a well-made and useful 
product . The instruotion is easy to read 
and understand as is the operation of the 
programmer. Again, thank you for a fine 
product . -Pout It Pogrf 



Svolt 3;imp TO 3 
Acfj. 5amp TO-3 
5v»lt 5amp TO-3 
12volt5amp TO 3 
5v»lt 10i«ii|> TO 3 
FAIRCHILD DIP 



4.95 
3.95 
9 95 
9.95 

14.95 
1.95 . 



LM301 


.34 


LM301H 


79 


LM307 


45 


LM308 


69 


LM308H 


1 15 


LM309H 


1.95 


LM309K 


1 25 


LM310 


1 75 


LM311 


.64 


LM311H 


.89 


LM312H 


1 75 


LM317K 


3.95 


LM317T 


1.19 


LM318 


1.49 


LM318H 


1 59 


LM319H 


1.90 


LM319 


1.25 


LM320 se 


e7900 


LM322 


1.65 


LM323K 


4.95 


LM324 


.59 


LM329 


.65 


LM331 


3.95 


LM334 


119 


LM335 


1.40 


LM336 


1.75 


LM337T 


1 95 


LM337K 


3.95 


LM338K 


3.95 


LM339 


.99 


LM340 see7800 


LM348 


.99 


LM350K 


4.95 


LM350T 


4.60 


LM358 


.69 


LM359 


1.79 


LM376 


3.75 


LM377 


1.95 


LM378 


2.50 


LM379 


4.50 


LM380 


.89 



LINEAR 

NE570 



LM380N-8 1.10 



LM381 

LM382 

LM383 

LM384 

LM386 

LM387 

LM389 

LM390 

LM392 

LM393 

LM394H 

LM399H 

NE531 

NE555 

NE556 

NE558 

NE564 

LM565 

LM566 

LM567 



1.60 
1.60 
1.95 
1.95 

.89 
1.40 
1.35 
1.95 

.69 
1.29 
4.60 
5.00 
2.95 

.34 

.65 
1.50 
2.95 

.99 
1.49 

.89 



NE571 

NE590 

NE592 

LM709 

LM710 

LM711 

LM723 

LM723H 

LM733 

LM741 

LM741N-14 

LM741H 

LM747 

LM748 

LM1014 

LM1303 

LM1310 

MC1330 

MC1349 

MC1350 

MC1358 

MC1372 

LM1414 

LM1458 

LM1488 

LM1489 

LM1496 

LM1558H 

LM1800 

LM1812 

LM1830 

LM1871 

LM1872 

LM1877 

LM1889 

LM1896 

ULN2003 

XR2206 

LM2877 

LM2878 

LM2900 

LM2901 

MPQ2907 

LM2917 

MC3487 

LM3900 

LM3905 

LM3909 

LM3911 

LM3914 

LM3915 

LM3916 

MC4024 

MC4044 

RC4136 

RC4151 

LM4250 

LM4500 

RC4558 

LM13600 

LM13700 



3 95 

2.95 

250 

98 

51) 
75 



35 

40 
69 

.59 
1.19 
1 95 
1.49 
1.69 
1.89 
1.19 
1.69 
6.95 
1.59 

.59 

.69 
69 

.85 
3.10 
2.37 
8.25 
3.50 
5.49 
5.49 
3.52 
1.95 
1.75 
1.29 
3.75 
2.05 
2.25 
85 
1.00 
1.95 
2.95 
2.95 

.59 
1.25 

.98 
225 
3.95 
3.95 
3 95 
3.95 
4.50 
1.25 
3 95 
1.75 
3.25 

.69 
1.49 
1.45 



H = TO 5 CAN, K=TO-3. T TO-220 

RCA 



CA3023 
CA3039 
CA3046 
CA3059 
CA3060 
CA3065 
CA3080 
CA3081 
CA3082 



TL494 
TL496 
TL497 
75107 
75108 
75110 
75150 
75154 
75160 
75188 
75189 



TL066 
TL071 
TL072 
TL074 
TL081 
TL082 
TL083 
TL084 



2.75 

1.29 
1.25 
2.90 
2.90 
1.75 
1.10 
1 65 
1.65 



CA3083 
CA3086 
CA3089 
CA3096 
CA3130 
CA3140 
CA3146 
CA3160 
CA3183 



4.20 
1.65 
3.25 
1.49 
1.49 
1.95 
1.95 
1.95 
4.95 
1.25 
1.25 



Tl 



75365 
75450 
75451 
75452 
75453 
75454 
75477 
75491 
75492 
75493 
75494 



Bl FET 



1.19 
2.19 
.79 
1.19 
1.19 
2.19 



LF347 
LF351 
LF353 
LF355 
LF356 
LF357 
LF411 
LF412 



1.55 
.80 
2.99 
3.49 
1.30 
1.15 
1.35 
1.19 
.99 



39 
1.29 



2,19 
60 
1.00 
1.10 
1.10 
1.40 
1.29 
1.99 



Inquiry I97 



JULY I985 -BYTE 457 



FEMALE SOLOER CUP 



2.25 



MALE SOLDER CUP 



BARGAIN HUNTERS CORNER 

DYNAMIC RAMS 
4164 z*** $-99 

ICO PIECE MINIMUM 



ea. 



41256 150ns 
$5.50 ea. 

SPECIALS END 7/31/85 



HARD TO FIND 
"SNAPABLE" HEADERS 

Can easily be snapped apart to make 
any size header, all with .1" centers 

1x40 STRAIGHT LEAD .99 

1x40 RIGHT ANGLE 1.49 

2x40 STRAIGHT LEAD 2.49 

| 2x40 RIGHT ANGLE 2.99 

SHORTING BLOCKS 

_,_ SPACED AT .1" CENTERS 

Si \ IDEAL FOR DISK DRIVES 

OR ANY .1" HEADER 

5/1.00 , 



DIP 
SWITCHES 



4 POSITION 

5 POSITION 
I 6 POSITION 

7 POSITION 
I 8 POSITION 
l 10 POSITION 1.29 



.90 
.95 



RF 
MODULATOR 

(ASTECUM1082) 

QUANTITIES LIMITED 

♦ PRESETTOCHANNEL3 

- USE TO BUILD TV- 
COMPUTER INTERFACE 

- 5 VOLT OPERATION 



$6.95 




EDGECARD 
CONNECTORS 



S-100 ST S-100 

S-100 WW S-100 
72 PIN ST 
72 PIN WW 
62 PIN ST IBM PC 
50 PIN ST APPLE 
44 PIN ST 
. 44 PIN WW 



3.95 
4.95 
6.95 
7.95 
4.95 
4.95 
2.95 
4.95 . 



1 



36 PIN CENTRONICS 

IDCEN36 RIBBON CABLE MALE 8.95 

IDCEN36 F RIBBON CABLE FEMALE 8.95 

k CEN3G SOLDER CUP MALE 7 95 



DIP CONNECTORS 



DESCRIPTION 


ORDER BY 


CONTACTS 


8 


14 


16 


18 


20 


22 


24 


28 


40 


HIGH RELIABILITY TOOLED 
ST IC SOCKETS 


AUGATxxST 


.99 


.99 


.99 


1.69 


1.89 


1.89 


1.99 


2.49 


2.99 


HIGH RELIABILITY TOOLED 
WW IC SOCKETS 


AUGATxxWW 


1.30 


1.80 


2.10 


2.40 


2.50 


2.90 


3.15 


3.70 


5.40 


COMPONENT CARRIES 
(DIP HEADERS) 


ICCxx 


.49 


.59 


.69 


.99 


.99 


.99 


.99 


1.09 


1.49 


RIBBON CABLE 
DIP PLUGS (IDC) 


IDPxx 




.95 


.95 








1.75 




2.95 



EMI FILTER 




• MAJOR MANUFACTURER 




• LOW COST -^ 


~^> 


• FITS LC-HP BELOW ^fS 


v -7 


$4.95 \g 


y 


LINE CORDS 




LC-2 2 COMDUCTOR 6 ft 


.39 


LC-3 3 COMDUCTOR 6 ft 


.99 


LC-HP 3CONDUCTOR WITH STANDARD 


FEMALE SOCKET 6ft 


1.49 


LC-CIR CIGARETTE LIGHTER 




PLUG WITH 6 FOOT CORD 


2.95 


MUFFIN FANS 




4.68" SQUARE 


14.95 


3" SQUARE 


14.95 







RESISTORS 

' < WATT 5% CARBON FILM 

ALL STANDARD VALUES 

FROM 1 OHM TO 10 MEG OHM 

50 PIECES SAME VALUE .025 

100 PIECES SAME VALUE .02 

1000 PIECES SAME VALUE .015 





BYPASS CAPS 




.01 ,/f DISC 


100 


S6.00 


.01 ,/f MONOLITHIC 


100 


S12.00 


.1 ,/f DISC 


100 


S8.00 


1 ,/f MONOLITHIC 


100 


S15.00 





1N751 
1N759 
1N4148 
1N4001 
1N4004 
1N5402 
KBP02 
KBP04 
MDA801 
MDA980-1 
MDA980-2 
„ VM48 



DIODES 

5.1 VOLT ZENER 
12.0 VOLT ZENER 
(1N914ISWITCHING 2 
50PIV 1A 1 

400PIV RECTIFIER 1 
200PIV 3A 
200PIV 1 5A BRIDGE 
400PIV 1 5A BRIDGE 
50PIV 12A BRIDGE 
50PIV 12A BRIDGE 
100PIV 12A BRIDGE 
DIP-BRIDGE 



FOR ORDERING INSTRUCTIONS SEE IDC CONNECTORS BELOW 



TO-220 
TO-220 
TO-3 
TO-220 
TO 3 



HEAT SINKS 

SCREW ON 
CLIP ON 
SCREW ON 
INSULATOR 
INSULATOR 



1.00 
1.00 
1.00 

.25 

.45 

.55 
1.39 
1.95 
2.25 

.35 J 



35 
.35 



10 1.00 
10 1.00 



SWITCHES 

SPDT MINI TOGGLE ON-ON 
DPDT MINI-TOGGLE ON-ON 
DPDT MINI-TOGGLE ON-OFF-ON 
SPST MINI-PUSHBUTTON N.O. 
SPST MINI-PUSHBUTTON N.C. 
BCD OUT 10 POSITION 6 PIN DIP 



1.25 
1.50 
1 75 



1.0, /I 

6.8 

10 



100 
220 



CAPACITORS 

TANTALUM 

15V .40 .47//I 35V .50 

15V .70 1.0 35V .45 

15V .80 2.2 35V .65 

15V 1.35 4.7 35V .85 

35V .40 10 35V 1.00 



50V 
50V 
50V 
50V 
50V 
50V 
50V 
50V 
50V 
50V 
50V 



DISC 

.05 560 

.05 680 

.05 820 

.05 001,;1 

.05 .0015 

.05 .0022 
.005 



50V .05 
50V .05 



.05 
.05 



.01 
.02 



50V 
50V 
50V 
50V 
50V 
50V 
50V 



50V .07 
12V .10 



MONOLITHIC 

50V .14 .1n ! 50V .18 

50V .15 .47//! 50V .25 

ELECTROLYTIC 



10 

47 

100 

220 

470 

2200 



RADIAL 
25V 
35V 
50V 
50V 
35V 
16V 
35V 
25V 
16V 



COMPUTER 
GRADE 

L 44,000,/t 30V 3.95 



1//I 

4.7 

10 

10 

22 

47 

100 

100 

220 

330 

500 

1000 

2200 

6000 



AXIAL 
50V 
16V 
16V 
50V 
16V 
50V 
1 5V 



35V .25 

25V .30 

16V .• 

16V .■ 

16V .) 
16V 

16V .; 



LED DISPLAYS 



HP5082-7760 

MAN- 72 

MAN-74 

FND 357(359) 

FND-500I503) 

FND 507(510) 



CA 
CC 
CC 
CC 

CA 



43" 
3 



1 29 
S9 
39 

1.25 

1.49 
1.49 



. TIL 31 1 4x7 HEX W LOGIC .270" 9.95 J 



DIFFUSED LEDS 






1 99 


100-up 1 


JUMBO RED 


TT,. .10 


.09 


JUMBO GREEN 


Tl'., .18 


.15 


JUMBO YELLOW 


TI'j .18 


.15 


MOUNTING HDW Tl 1 . .10 


.09 f 


MINI RED 


Tl .10 


.09 


MINI GREEN 


Tl .18 


.15 


MINI YELLOW 


Tl .18 


.15 


RECT RED 


2x5mm .25 


.22 1 


RECT GREEN 


2x5mm .30 


.27 1 


RECT YELLOW 


2x5 mm .30 


27 A 



D-SUBMINIATURE 



DESCRIPTION 


ORDER BY 


CONTACTS 


9 


15 


25 


37 


50 


SOLDER CUP 


MALE 


DBxxP 


1.19 


1.59 


1.90 


2.85 


4.25 


FEMALE 


DBxxS 


1.50 


1.85 


2.25 


3.90 


5.25 


RIGHT ANGLE 
PC SOLDER 


MALE 


DBxxPR 


1.65 


2.20 


3.00 


4.83 




FEMALE 


DBxxSR 


2.18 


3.03 


3.00 


6.19 




WIRE WRAP 


MALE 


DBxxPWW 


1.69 


2.56 


3.89 


5.60 




FEMALE 


DBxxSWW 


2.76 


4.27 


6.84 


9.95 




IDC RIBBON CABLE 


MALE 


IDBxxP 


2.95 


3.90 


4.75 


6.95 




FEMALE 


IDBxxS 


3.25 


4.29 


5.25 


7.95 




HOODS 


BLACK 


HOOD-B 






.99 






GREY 


HOODxx 


.89 


.99 


.99 


1.09 


1.19 



MOUNTING HARDWARE-$1.00 

FOR ORDERING INSTRUCTIONS SEE IDC CONNECTORS BELOW 





TEXTOOLZERO INSERTION FORCE 
SOCKETS AND RECEPTACLES 




SCREWDRIVER CLAMP 
ECONO 2IF 



LEVER CLAMP 
ZIF SOCKET 



WW RECEPTACLES 
ZIF RECEPTACLE 



TYPE 


CONTACTS 




14 


16 


24 


28 


40 




ECONO ZIF 




4.95 


6.75 


7.75 


9.95 




ZIF SOCKET 


4.95 


4.95 


5.95 


6.95 


9.95 




ZIF RECEPTACLE I 8.25 


8.75 


9.75 


10.56 


12.75 









IDC CONNECTORS 



DESCRIPTION 


ORDER BY 


CONTACTS 


10 


20 


26 


34 


40 


50 


SOLDER HEADER 


IDHxxS 


.82 


1.29 


1.68 


2.20 


2.58 


324 


RIGHT ANGLE SOLDER HEADER 


IDHxxSR 


.85 


1.35 


1.76 


2 31 


2.72 


3.39 


WW HEADER 


IDHxxW 


1.86 


2.98 


3.84 


4.50 


5.28 


6.63 


RIGHT ANGLE WW HEADER 


IDHxxWR 


2.05 


3.28 


4.22 


4.45 


4.80 


730 


RIBBON HEADER SOCKET 


IDSxx 


.79 


.99 


1 39 


1.59 


1 99 


2.25 


RIBBON HEADER 


IDMxx 




5.50 


6 25 


7.00 


7.50 


8.56 


RIBBON EDGE CARD 


IDExx 


1.75 


2 25 


2.65 


2.75 


3.80 


3.95 



ORDERING INSTUCTIONS: INSERT THE NUMBER OF CONTACTS IN THE POSITION MARKED "xx" OF THE 
. -ORDER BY" PART NUMBER LISTED. EXAMPLE A W PIN RIGHT ANGLE HOLDER STYLE WOULD BE IDHlOSR 




RIBBON CABLE 



CONTACTS 


SINGLE COLOR 


COLOR CODED 


V 


10' 


V 


10' 


10 


18 


1 60 


.83 


7.30 


16 


.28 


2.50 


1.00 


8.80 


20 


.36 


3.20 


1.25 


11.00 


25 


45 


4 00 


1 32 


11.60 


26 


.46 


4.10 


1.32 


11.60 


34 


.61 


5.40 


1.65 


14.50 


40 


.72 


6.40 


1 92 


16.80 


50 


.89 


7.50 


2 50 


22.00 



IB 1224 S. Bascom Avenue, San Jose, CA 95128 
800-538-5000 i 800-662-6279 (CA) • (408) 995-5430 
FAX (408) 275-8415 • Telex 171-110 



RETAIL STORE - 1256 S. BASCOM AVENUE 
HOURS: M-W-F, 9-5 TU-TH, 9-9 SAT, 10-3 

PLEAS£ USE YOUR CUSTOMER NUMBER WHEN ORDERING 

TERMS: Minimum order $10.00. For shipping and handling include 
$2.50 for UPS Ground and $3.50 for UPS Air. Orders over 1 lb. and 
foreign orders may require additional shipping charges - please 
contact our sales department for the amount. CA. residents must 
include 6% sales tax, Bay Area and LA residents include 6Vj%. All 
merchandise is warranted tor 90 days unless otherwise stated. Prices 
are subject to change without notice. We are not responsible for 
typographical errors. We reserve the right to limit quantities and to 
substitute manufacturer. All merchandise subject to prior sale. 



-' Copyright 1985 JDR Mlcrodtvlcei 



458 BYTE • JULY 1985 



IBM PC PROTOTYPE CARD 



WITH DEC0DIN6 LAYOUT 



$29.95 



WIRE WRAP 
PROTOTYPE CARDS 

FR-4 EPOXY GLASS LAMINATE 
WITH GOLD-PLATED EDGE-CARD FINGERS 



IBM 



BOTH CARDS HAVE SILK SCREENED LEGENDS 

AND INCLUDES MOUNTING BRACKET 

IBM PR! WITH *5V AMD GROUND PLANE .... $27.95 

IBMPR2 AS ABOVE WITH DECODING LAYOUT $29.95 



DISK DRIVES 

TANDON 




IBM PR2 




TM 100-1 5* 4" IFOR IBM1SS DO 
TM 100-2 5 V (FOR IBM) OS DD 


$119.95 
$99.95 


MPI 




MPI-B52 5'.T{FOR IBMIDS DD 


$89.95 


TEAC 




FD-55B Vi> HEIGHT DS DD 
FD-55F Vj HEIGHT DS QUAD 


$89.95 
$99.95 


SHUGART 




SA 400L 5V:»" (40 TRACK) SS DD 
SA460 S'/i" (80 TRACK) DS QUAD 


$199.95 
$199.95 


8" DISK DRIVES 




FD100-8 BY SIEMENS. SHUGART 801 EQUIV 

SS DD $129.00 

FD200-8 BY SIEMENS. SHUGART 851 EQUIV. 

DS DD $180.00 




DISK DRIVE 
CABINETS 



CABINET #1 

• Fitsonefullheight5' j 

• Color matches Apple 

CABINET #2 



$29.95 

disk drive 



S79.00 



S-100 



P100-1 
P100-2 


BARE - NO FOIL PADS 

HORIZONTAL BUS 


S15.15 
$21.80 


P100-3 


VERTICAL BUS 


$21.80 


P100-4 


SINGLE FOILPADS PER HOLE 

APPLE 


$22.75 


P500-1 


BARE - NO FOIL PADS 


$15.15 


P5003 


HORIZONTALBUS 


$22.75 


P500-4 
7060-45 


SINGLE FOIL PADS PER HOLE 

FOR APPLE IIdAUXSLOT 


S21.80 
$30.00 




GENERAL PURPOSE 






22/44 PIN EDGE-CARD (.156" SPACING) 




P441-1 


BARE - NO FOIL PADS 4.5" x 6.0" . . . 


. S9.45 


P441-3 


VERTICAL BUS 4.5" x 6 0" 


S13 95 


P441-4 
P442-1 
P442-3 


SINGLE FOILPADS4.5"x 6.0" 

BARE - NO FOIL PADS 4.5" x 9.0" . . . 
VERTICAL BUS 4.5" x 9.0" 


S14.20 
S10.40 
S14.20 


P442-4 


SINGLE FOIL PADS 4.5" x 9.0" 

36/72 PIN EDGE -CARD (.1" SPACING) 


$13.50 


P721-1 


BARE - NO FOIL PADS4.5"x 6.0" . . . 


. $9.45 


P721-3 


VERTICAL BUS 4.5" x 6.0" 


$13 25 


P721-4 
P722-1 
P722-3 
P722-4 


SINGLE FOIL PADS 4.5" x 6.0" 

BARE - NO FOIL PADS 4.5" x 9.0" . . . 

VERTICAL BUS 4.5" x 9.0" 

SINGLE FOIL PADS 4.5" x 9.0" 


$14.20 
. $10.40 

$14.20 
. $15.15 


BARE GLASS BOARDS EXTENDER 


NO EDGE-CARD FINGERS OR FOIL CARDS 


P25x45 
P45x65 
P45x85 
P45x170 
i P85x170 


2.5" x 4.5" S2.40 IBM 
4.5" x 6.5" S4.70 APPLE 
4.5" x 8.5" $6.20 MULTIBUS 
4.5" x 17.0" $11.35 
8.5" x 17.0" $18.95 


$45.00 
S45.00 
$86.00 



JFORMAT-2 $49.95 

SUPPORT FOR QUAD DENSITY DRIVES 
FROM TALL TREE SYSTEMS 

PLEASE INCLUDE SUFFICE NT AMOUNT FOR SHIPPING ON ABOVE ITEMS 



TANDON TMI 00-2 



- Fits one full height 5' //'disk drive 
» Complete with power supply, switch, 

line cord, fuse and standard power 

connector 
■ Please specify Grey or Tan 

CABINET #3 $89.95 

• Fits two half height 5' /'disk drives 

* Complete with power supply, switch, 
line cord, fuse and standard power 
connectors 

8" DISK DRIVE CABINETS 
ALSO AVAILABLE-PLEASE CALL 

PLEASE INCLUDE SUFFICIENT 
AMOUNT FOR SHIPPING ON ABOVE ITEMS 



SWITCHING 
POWER SUPPLIES 

PS-IBM $99.95 

* FOR IBM PC-XT COMPATIBLE 
» 130 WATTS 

* + 5V@15A, +12V(fM.2A 
-5V@ .5A, -12V @.5A 

* ONE YEAR WARRANTY 

PSA $49.95 

■ USETOPOWERAPPLETYPE 
SYSTEMS 

* +5V@4A, +12V@2.5A 
-5V @ .5A, -12V @ .5A 

* APPLE POWER CONNECTOR 

PS-3 $39.95 

^^ «ASUSEDIN APPLE Ml 

..^tffH&CW**^ *+5V@4A, »12V@2.5A 
*^rV5i3rC'Mi^^ " 5V @ - 25A . - 1 2V @ .30 A, 
, & i ^=i=—- ' . 1 5.5" x 4.5" x 2", .884 LBS. 




WIRE WRAP WIRE 

PRECUT AND STRIPPED 

Note: 1 inch of insulation is stripped on 
1 each end. A 3.5" wire has only 1.5" of insu- 
lation. 

LENGTH QUANTITY 

(INCHES) 100 500 1000 



$m 



TRANSFORMERS 

FRAME STYLE 



12.6V AC 2 AMP 4.95 

12.6V AC CT 2 AMP 5.95 

12.6VACCT 4 AMP 7.95 

12.6V AC CT 8 AMP 10.95 

25.2VACCT 2 AMP 7.95 

PLUG CASE STYLE 



25 


1.60 


4.70 


8.20 


3 


1.60 


4.70 


8.20 


3.5 


1.65 


5.00 


8.90 


4 


1.75 


5.40 


9.60 


4,5 


1.80 


575 


10.30 


5 


1.85 


6.10 


11.00 


5.5 


1.90 


6.50 


11.75 


6 


2,00 


685 


12.50 


6.5 


2.30 


7.80 


14.30 


7 


2.40 


8.20 


15.05 


7.5 


2.50 


8.55 


15.85 


8 


2.60 


8.95 


16.60 


8.5 


2.65 


9.30 


17.40 


9 


2.70 


9.80 


18.15 


9 5 


2.80 


10.00 


18.95 


10 


2.90 


10.50 


19.70 



12V AC 
12V AC 
12V AC 
12V AC 



250ma 
500ma 

1 AMP 

2 AMP 



3.95 
4.95 
5.95 
6.95 



DC ADAPTER 

6, 9, 12V DC SELECTABLE WITH 
i UNIVERAL ADAPTER 8.95 



PS-ASTEC $19.95 

* CAN POWER TWO 6V«" FDDS 
. +5V@2.5A, f12V@ 2A 

-12V @ .1A 
. 5V@5AIF *12VISNOTUSED 

* 6.3"x4.0"x1.9" 



MICROCOMPUTER 
HARDWARE 
HANDBOOK 

FROM ELCOMP $14.95 

O ver800 pages of manufacturer's 
data sheets on the most commonly 
used IC's 

• TTL - 74, 74LS & 74F 

• CMOS 

• Voltage regulators 

■ Memory- RAM, ROM. EPROM 
. CPUS -6800, 6500, Z80, 
8080,8085 & 8086 8 

• MPU Support & Inter-face. 
6800. 6500, Z80, 8200. etc. 



V/SA 



PRECUT ASSORTMENT 
IN ASSORTED COLORS $27.50 

100ea: 5.5". 6", 6.5". 7" 
250ea: 2.5". 4.5". 5" 
500ea: .3", 3.5". 4" 

SPOOLS 

100 feet $4.30 250 feet $7.25 
500 feet $13.25 1000 feet $21.95 
Please specify color: 
Blue, Blaclt. Yellow or Red 



GE NICKEL-CADMIUM 

RECHARGABLE BATTERIES 

NI-CAD CHARGER PACKAGE 

PRICE INCLUDES CHARGER (WALL PLUG), 
BATTERIES. & MODULAR BATTERY HOLDER 




AAA CELLS 


QTY. 2 


$11.71 


AA CELLS 


QTY. 2 


$11.71 


C CELLS 


QTY. 2 


$13.21 


D CELLS 


QTY. 2 


$13.21 


9 VOLT 


QTY. 1 


$13.21 


BATTERIES ONLY 


AAA CELLS 


PKG. 2 


$6.07 pr. 


AA CELLS 


PKG. 1 


33.03 ea. 


C CELLS 


PKG.1 


S3. 78 ea. 


D CELLS 


PKG. 1 


$3.78 ea. 


9 VOLT 


PKG. 1 


$7.57 ea. 



ORDER TOLL FREE 



(CALIFORNIA RESIDENTS) 



20 MHz DUAL TRACE 
OSCILLOSCOPE 



UNSURPASSED QUALITY AT AIM UNBEATABLE PRICE 

. BAND WIDTH- DC: DC TO 20MHz <-3db) 

AC: 1 0Hz TO 20MHz (-3db) 
> SWEEP TIME- .2 ^rSEC TO .5 SEC/DIV ON 20 RANGES 

• VERT./HORZ. DEFLECTION: 5mVTO 20V/DIV ON 20 RANGES 

• COMPLETE MANUAL AND HIGH QUALITY 

HOOK-ON PROBES INCLUDED «*?OQQQC 

* INPUT IMPEDANCE: 1 MEGOHM ^OiJiJ.iJO 
*TVVIDEOSYNC FILTER 1A/ITU DDnoCC 

• X. Y AND Z AXIS OPERATION WITH PROBEb 

* 110/220 VOLT 50/60Hi OPERATION 

• COMPONENT TESTER «-•■■■ si mi- %/f- a r» 

* LP CONSUMPTION-19 WATTS FULL OnJb YbAK 
« BUILT IN CALIBRATOR WARRANTY 

* AUTOMATIC OR TRIGGERED TIMEBASE 




OK INDUSTRIES 

EX-1 IC EXTRACTION TOOL 

• ONE PIECE METALCONSTRUCTION 

• EASILY EXTRACTS 8-24 PIN DEVICES 
•LOWCOST S2.19 

EX-2 IC EXTRACTION TOOL 

■ EXTRACTS 24-40 PIN DEVICES 

• HEAVY DUTY METAL CONSTRUCTION 

• GROUND LUGS FOR MOS EXTRACTIONS 
« EASY ONE HAND OPERATION $12.74 

IC INSERTION TOOLS 

INS-1416 for14-16 pin IC's $5.15 

MOS-1416 for14-16pinlC*s S10.92 
MOS-2428 for 24-28 pin IC's $10.92 
MOS-40 for40 pin IC's S12.43 

MOS series insertion tools have metal constuction 
and include grounding lug for CMOS applications. 

BW-630 WIRE WRAP GUN 

• BATTERY POWERED-USES 2 NI-CAD 
C CELLS(NOT INCLUDED) 

• POSITIVE INDEXING 

• ANTI-OVERWRAP DEVICE $41 .55 

WSU-30 WIRE WRAP TOOLS 

• WRAPS, STRIPS, AND UNWRAPS 

• WSU-30M WRAPS AN EXTRA TURN OF 
INSULATION 

WSU-30 S8.84/WSU-30M $10.14 
WIRE WRAP TERMINALS 



u 



r 

w 

INS-1416 INS-2428 



WWT-1 
WWT-2 
WWT-3 
| WWT-4 
INS 1 



SLOTTED 
SINGLE SIDED 
IC SOCKET 
DOUBLE SIDED 
INSERTION TOOL 



25/S7.06 

25/S4.25 

25/S7.06 

25/2.80 

$3.64 



WIRE DISPENSER 

* WITH 50" ROLL OF WIRE 

■ BUILTINPLUNGERCUTSWIRE 
» BUILT IN STRIPPER STRIPES 1" 

• REFILLABLE 

WD-30 $6.50 WD-30TRI $9.50 

Specify Blue, white. With 50' of each: 
Yellow or Red Red. Blue and White 

SOCKET-WRAP ID.™ 

• SLIPS OVER WIRE WRAP PINS 

* IDENTIFIES PIN NUMBERS ON WRAP 
SIDE OF BOARD 

. CAN WRITE ON PLASTIC; SUCH AS IC tt 




•INS 


PARTtf 


PCK. OF 


PRICE 


8 


IDWRAP08 


10 


1.95 


14 


IDWRAP14 


10 


1.95 


16 


IDWRAP16 


10 


1.95 


18 


IDWRAP18 


5 


1.95 


20 


IDWRAP20 


5 


1.95 


22 


IDWRAP22 


5 


1.95 


24 


IDWRAP24 


5 


1.95 


28 


IDWRAP28 


5 


1.95 


40 


IDWRAP40 


5 


1.95 



PLEASEORDER BY NUMBER OF 
PACKAGES (PCK. OF) 



»- S ' 



MULTIMETER PEN 




AUTO RANGING, POLARITY & DECIMAL! 



■ LARGE 3V4 DIGIT DISPLAY 

• DATA HOLD SWITCH FREEZES READING 

• FAST. AUDIBLE CONTINUITY TEST 
. LOWBATTERYINDICATOR 
. OVERLOAD PROTECTION 

• ONLY1W x 6'/." x V." 

• DC VOLTS .1mV-500V 

• AC VOLTS 1mV-500V 

• .1 OHM-20 MEG OHMS 

• WEIGHS ONLY 2.3 OUNCES 

• LOW PARTS COUNT-CUSTOM 80 PIN LSI INSURES RELIABILITY 

• INCLUDES MANUAL. BATTERIES. SOFT CASE. 2 PROBE TIPS. 
AND ALLIGATOR CLIP 



ONLY 
$49.95 



Copyright 198S JOR Mlcrodtvicct 



Inquiry 198 



JULY 1985 -BYTE 459 



TEAG-FD55B SK 



$89.95 MPI-B52 



DS/DD FULL HT. 
FOR IBM PC 




EPROM PROGRAMMER 

FOR APPLE COMPUTERS 



RP525 
$79.95 



* DUPLICATE OR BURN ANY STANDARD 
27xx SERIES EPROM 

* EASY TO USE MENU-DRIVEN SOFTWARE 
INCLUDED 

t MENU SELECTION FOR 2716, 2732, 2732A. 
2764 & 27128 

* HIGH SPEED WRITE ALGORITHM 
► LED INDICATORS FOR ACTIVITY 

* NO EXTERNAL POWER SUPPLY REQUIRED 



DISK DRIVES 

FOR APPLE COMPUTERS 



^- \ 






' ® ^^=a 


(JO ;j 



BAL-525 
$119.95 



• Vi HEIGHT-ALPS MECHANISM 

• 100% APPLE COMPATIBLE 

• FULL 1 YEAR WARRANTY 




BAL-500 
$139.95 



* TEAC MECHANISM- DIRECT DRIVE 

* 100% APPLE COMPATIBLE 

* FULL 1 YEAR WARRANTY 




MITAC 

AD-1 

$129.95 



* FULL HT.SHUGART MECHANISM 

* DIRECT REPLACEMENT FOR APPLE 
DISK II 

* SIX MONTH WARRANTY 



DISK DRIVE ACCESSORIES 



DISK CONTROLLER CARD 
L APPLE lie ADAPTOR CABLE 



$49.95 
$19.95 J 



NEW FOR APPLE He 

MITAC 

AD-3C 

$139.95 

100% APPLE lie COMPATIBLE, 

READY TO PLUG IN W/ SHIELDED 

CABLE & MOLDED 19 PIN CONNECTOR 

FAST, RELIABLE SLIMLINE 

DIRECT DRIVE 

SIX MONTH WARRANTY 



'i£^ \ 


mitmc 






— 1 


IHi 


■ 


X] 







DISK DRIVES FOR IDM 



TEAC 

FD55B 

$89.95 



TANDON 

TM100-2 



DISKETTE FILE 



$99.95 
MPI 

MODEL B52 

$89.95 





IBM ACCESSORIES 

MAXIMIZER $259.95 

SIGMA MULTIFUNCTION CARD 

HAYES SMARTMODEM $419.85 

1200BFORIBM 

PRINTER CABLE $19.95 

PARALLEL 6' SHIELDED CABLE 

KRAFT JOYSTICK $39.95 



« BMC MONITOR STAND 

MODEL PA-900 

| TILTS AND SWIVELS 
TO PROVIDE 
OPTIMUM VIEWING 
ANGLE, REDUCES 
OPERATOR FATIGUE 

FACTORY SPECIAL $14.95 



ORDER TOLL FREE 



; i ifli-fc ifliU 1 1 



800-662-6279! 



16K RAM CARD $39.95 

BARE PC CARD AND INSTRUCTIONS $9.95 

• 2 YEAR WARRANTY 

• EXPAND YOUR 48K APPLE TO 64K 

• USE IN PLACE OF APPLE LANGUAGE 
CARD 



$8.95 



APPLE ACCESSORIES 



VIEWMAX-80 
VIEWMAXSOe 
GRAPHMAX 
THUNDERCLOCK 
KRAFT JOYSTICK 
POWER SUPPLY 



$159.95 
$129.95 
$129.95 
$129.95 
$39.95 
$49.95 



IF PURCHASED 

WITH 50 DISKETTES 

OR MORE 



$9.95 IF PURCHASED ALONE 

HOLDS 70 5Va" 
DISKETTES, 
WITH ROOM 
TO SPARE 




NASHUA DISKETTES 

5Va" SOFT SECTOR 
DS/DD WITH HUB RINGS 

BULK PACKAGED IN FACTORYSEALED BAGS 
OF 50. INCLUDES DISKETTE SLEEVES AND 
WRITE PROTECTTABS. IDE AL FOR SCHOOLS. 
CLUBS, AND USERS GROUPS. THIS IS A 
SPECIAL PURCHASE. SO QUANTITIES ARE 
LIMITED. THERE IS A 5 YEAR WARRANTY. 

$.89ea $.95ea. $.99ea. 

QTY250 QTY100 QTY50 

NASHUA DISKETTES WERE JUDGED TO HAVE 

THE HIGHEST POLISH AND RECORDED 

AMPLITUDE OF ANY DISKETTES TESTED. 

(SEE "COMPARING FLOPPY DISKS", BYTE 9/84) 



VERBATIM DATALIFE DISKETTES 

SS/DD SOFT SECTOR $29.95 

SS/DD 10 SECTOR HARD $29.95 
DS/DD SOFT SECTOR $34.95 

IBM COMPATIBLE 
POWER SUPPLIES 



130 WATT 
$99.95 



:<0 






XT COMPATIBLE 

* +5V@ 15A. +12@4.2A 
-5 @ .5A. -12 @ .5A 

* UPGRADE YOUR PC. POWERS HARD DISK 

* POWER CABLES FOR 4 FDDs 

* ONE YEAR WARRANTY 

* SWITCH ON SIDE (FITS IBM CASE) 

100 WATT 
$89.95 

* SWITCH ON REAR 

* FOR USE IN OTHER 
IBM TYPE MACHINES 

* AVAILABLE IN 100W 
OR 130W VERSIONS 

* 90 DAY WARRANTY 

130 WATT MODEL 




IB 1224 S. Bascom Avenue, San Jose, CA 95128 
800-538-5000 • 800-662-6279 (CA) • (408) 995-5430 
FAX (408) 275-8415 • Telex .171-110 



Copyright 1985 JDR Microdevlce* 



RETAIL STORE - 1256 S. BASCOM AVENUE 
HOURS: M-W-F, 9-5 TU-TH, 9-9 SAT, 10-3 

PLEASE USE YOUR CUSTOMER NUMBER WHEN ORDERING 

TERMS: Minimum order $10.00. For shipping and handling include 
S2.50 for UPS Ground and $3.50 for UPS Air. Orders over 1 lb. and 
foreign orders may require additional shipping charges - please 
contact our sales department for the amount. CA. residents must 
include 6% sales tax. Bay Area and LA residents include 6 Wo. f 
merchandise is warranted for 90 days unless otherwise stated. Prices 
are subject to change without notice. We are not responsible for 
typographical errors. We reserve the right to limit quantities and to 
substitute manufacturer. All merchandise subject to prior sale. 

APPLE IS A TRADEMARK OF APPLE COMPUTER CO. 



460 BYTE- JULY 1985 



Inquiry 199 



UNCLASSIFIED ADS 



NEEDED: Computer (Apple, IBM. compatible), 
printer, and monitor to help nonprofit adoption 
organization find good homes for orphaned hard- 
to-place children. Will provide certified tax- 
deductible receipt. Children's World. 931 1 Farralone 
Ave. Chatsworth. CA 91311. (818) 709-4737. 

WANTED: Nonprofit educational organization seeks 
tax-deductible donation of IBM System/34 and pe- 
ripherals. John B. Ellison. International Correspond- 
ence Institute, c/o Division of Foreign Missions. 1445 
Boonville Ave. Springfield. MO 65802. 

WANTED: Nonprofit organization serving southeast- 
ern Kentucky area seeks tax-deductible donation of 
IBM computers, hardware, and public-domain soft- 
ware for youth rehabilitation program. Kentucky 
Youth, c/o Bob Rains, 520 Beach St., POB 173, 
Benham. KY 40807. 

WANTED: Eastside Mental Health (a nonprofit organ- 
ization) seeks tax-deductible donation of IBM PC or 
Macintosh, peripherals, printer, monitor, terminals, 
public-domain software, etc., for applied research 
with the chronically disturbed. Will pay shipping. 
Debbie Bertram. Eastside Mental Health. 1605 1 16th 
Ave. NE. Bellevue. WA 98004. (206) 455-4357. 

NEEDED: Nonprofit Costa Rican educational founda- 
tion seeks donation of disk-based microcomputers 
(Heath H-89 or similar) to teach programming to 
poor students. Will pay shipping. FILEC, POB 2911, 
San lose 1000. Costa Rica. 

WANTED: Nonprofit environmental education center 
seeks tax-deductible donation of a computer (pref- 
erably IBM-compatible) and printer for use with 
school groups and in our office. Montclair State Col- 
lege. New Jersey School of Conservation, RD #2. 
Box 272, Branchville. Nj 07826. (201) 948-4646. 

WANTED: Information on operating microcomputer 
equipment in the marine environment. Can a com- 
puter survive fog. dampness, humidity, and salt air 
if kept dry and at a moderate temperature? Alan 
Born. POB 272. Tiburon, CA 94920. (415) 924-6352. 

WANTED: Nonprofit community organization needs 
tax-deductible donation of computers, printers, ter- 
minals, and public-domain software to assist in ADM 
and training. R. Hankins, PCr Inc.. 160 Milagra Dr., 
Pacifica, CA 94044, (415) 355-8000. 

WANTED: lax-deductible donation of peripherals, 
printers, monitors, disk drives, memory expansion, 
etc., for the TRS-80 Model I, Certified receipts fur- 
nished: will pay reasonable shipping. Pirchei 
Agudath Israel of Kew Gardens Hills. 144-19 70th 
Rd„ Flushing, NY 11367. 

WANTED: Christian academy seeks tax-deductible 
donations of Apple lie computers with minimum 
64K. disk drives, 80-column card, and monitor for 
high school math and science classes. Cheswick 
Christian Academy, 1407 Pittsburgh St., Cheswick, 
PA 15024, (412) 274-4846. 

WANTED: Nonprofit organization seeks tax- 
deductible donation of IBM PC. 2 56K to 5 1 2 K RAM, 
two 360K disk drives or 5- or 10-megabyte hard-disk 
drive, and monochrome monitor for running high 
school track meets. Massachusetts State Track 
Coaches Association, c/o Edmund N. Delgado, 28 
Warbler Lane. West Yarmouth. MA 02673, (617) 
394-7571. 

WANTED: Information and equipment for an old 
Ohio Scientific Challenger IP 8K microcomputer 
used in school. We need manuals, ideas for use. and 
public-domain software. Jeffrey Branzburg, Castle 
Hill JHS. 1560 Purdy St., Bronx, NY 10462. 

WANTED: Casio PB-700 user in Australia wishes to 
correspond with users in America or anywhere 
about starting a users group. Terry Gill. 35A Kent 
St., Regents Park. New South Wales 2143. Australia. 

NEEDED: My Access-Actrix monitor is missing dots. 
Need schematic or other service assistance. L. 
Rogers. 313 South Ravinia. Dallas. TX 75 211. (214) 
339-7007. 

NEEDED: Manuals, schematics, etc.. for Seattle Com- 
puter Products 8086 CPU and CPU Support Board 
(SCP-200 and SCP-300). Also information on 8087 
accessory board. Willing to pay.. Stephen Hathaway, 
86 Parsons St.. Northampton. MA 01060. (413) 
586-4 341. evenings. 

NEEDED: User-written scientific applications software 
in Applesoft and Apple Pascal. Statistics, plotting, 
data logging, modeling, etc. Peter Petokas, POB 16, 



Little York, NY 13087. 

FOR SALE: Davong 5-megabyte hard disk with con- 
troller for IBM PC: $325. Colby PC-1 portable with 
power supply, amber monochrome display, and 
keyboard: install your own PC board, drives, and 
display adapter to create portable machine: brand 
new: $650. Buyer pays shipping and COD charges. 
Tom Guyton. 12 Harned Ct.. Odessa. TX 79762. 

FOR SALE: Microvox text-to-speech voice synthesizer 
expertly assembled from Micromint kit; will connect 
to any computer with RS-232C (with RTS input) or 
Centronics-compatible parallel I/O: $200. Includes 
Realistic Wedge speaker. Hans Raillard. 6400 Lone 
Pine Rd.. Sebastopol. CA 95472. 

FOR SALE: Various S-100 components and disk 
drives including CPU boards, memory boards, 
floppy-disk controllers, and landon 848-1 disk 
drives. Richard Whiteman. 635 Holman Ave.. 
Athens, GA 30606. (404) 546-8814. 

FOR SALE: Tl 99/4 A peripheral-expansion system, 
disk-controller card, disk drive, memory-expansion 
card (32K RAM): $400. All items are new. Dave 
Watters. 3901 Torrington Ave.. Parma, OH 44134. 
(216) 845-9669. 

FOR SALE: Atari 850 interface. Bit 3 80-column card, 
and more: $300. Sonam Gyato. (201) 868-9695. 

WANTED: Tl 99/4As. KIM-ls. Altair 8800/A/Bs. and 
similar machines for community project. Nothing 
elaborate or expensive. Also need The First Book of 
KIM and Machine language Programming for the 8008. 
Dr. I. R. Johnston. Edon Institute. POB 22 58. 
Saginaw, Ml 48605. 

TRADE: Physics student with Tl 99/4A computer 
seeks working or nonworking stand-alone disk drive 
and compatible dot-matrix printer with interface in 
exchange for public-domain BASIC/Extended soft- 
ware. Will pay postage. Dennis Hothem, 1218 10th 
Ave. Belle Fourche. SD 57717. (605) 892-3752. 

FOR SALE: Viewmax-80 for Apple 11. new. Best offer. 
John Chen. Rt. 8. Box 483. Caldwell, ID 83605. 

FOR SALE: BYTE. November 1977 through May 
1980: $2 per issue. Digital Group 4-port parallel I/O 
board: $20. Digital Group dress cabinet for 9-inch 
monitor: $10. Digital Group keyboard: $60. Buyer 
pays shipping. Harold Frye. 15 51 5th Ave. SW. 
Rochester. MN 55902, (507) 289-0247. 

FOR SALE: Tecmar 1 st Mate for IBM PC XT or com- 
patible. 64 K, clock/calendar, serial port, parallel port. 
Brand new. $275. N. D. Diamantides, 2517 14th St., 
Cuyahoga Falls, OH 44223. 

WANTED: Public-domain or non-copyrighted CBIOS 
to interface CP/M 2.2 to a North Star single-density 
micro-disk system running on a SOL terminal com- 
puter. Most interested in the source code for the 
deblocking and disk-access routines. David J. 
Mankoff, 3 Skyvue Ct., South Setauket, NY 1 1 720, 
(516) 736-3631. 

FOR SALE: "'IUbeless 'terminal" Synertek KT3-3/40 
with 24 by 40 display. RS-232C-compatibleoutput. 
and optional Micro-Verter MVX-500 that transmits 
UHF signal on UHF 14-17. Best offer. Al Safer. 77 
LaBelle Circle. Chicopee. MA 01020. 

FOR SALE: HP 86A with 512 K. HP 8291 3 A monitor, 
two HP 91 30 A 5 [ /4-inch drives. HP 82905 printer. 
Also. HP 98 1 6S with 768K. HP 9 1 2 1 D dual 3 '/i-inch 
drives, large keyboard. HP 82905B printer, and 
more. Make offer. John Blair, POB 164, Swan Lake, 
MT 59911, (406) 886-2370. 

WANTED: If you own an Atari or Apple computer and 
want to join the National Software Consortium, con- 

UNCLASSIFIED ADS MUST be noncommercial from 
readers who have computer equipment to buy. sell or trade 
on a onetime basis. All requests for donated computer 
equipment must be from nonprofit organizations. Programs 
to be exchanged must be written by the individual or be 
in the public domain. Ads must be typed double-spaced, 
contain 50 words or less, and include full name and ad- 
dress. This is a free service: ads are printed as space per- 
mits. BYTE reserves the right to reject any unclassified 
ad that does not meet these criteria. When you submit 
your ad (BYTE. Unclassified Ads. POB 372. Hancock. 
NH 03449). allow at least four months for it to appear. 



tact National Software Consortium, c/o S. Mikutel. 
95-18 Ashbourn Dr.. Burke. VA 22015. 

WANTED: Correspondence about Japanese com- 
puting scene. Keiko Orata. Nishi-tsutsuji 1-24-1. 
Chofu City. Tokyo 182. Japan.- 0424-85-0860. 

FOR SALE: DECwriter IV (LA34). lightweight desktop 
terminal. I year old, original carton with documen- 
tation, extra ribbons, 4 5 cps, 7 by 9 dot matrix, 
variable pitch, plain paper or preprinted forms, 
RS-2 32C interface, used less than 20 hours: $895 
or best offer. Mike Kwiatkowski. 136 Lyndale Ave.. 
Baltimore. MD 21236, (301) 665-6261. 

WANTED: New or used tractor feed for a Brother 
HR-1 printer. J. Fears. 665 Sapphire Lane. 
Stevensville. MT 59870. 

FOR SALE: Sanyo 1000 8-inch disk-controller board, 
cable, and card guide. Data General "Dasher" print 
head, new. Motors for same. John Johnson, 707 
Edge Hill Rd., New Bern. NC 28560. (919) 638-6976. 

FOR SALE: BYTE, 1979 (volume 4) to present. $2 per 
copy. David Moore. 2031 Maine. Quincy, IL 62301. 
(217) 228-1792. evenings. 

FOR SALE: BYTE. October 1975, March 1976. July 
1976 through December 1984 (except August 1980). 
Kilobaud. January 1977 through March 1978: Creative 
Computing. March/ April 1975 through September/ 
October 1978; Interface Age. July 1976 through May 
1978. Other publications available. Make offer. Steve 
Baylus. 12212 Old Creedmoor Rd., Raleigh. NC 
27612. (919) 781-0605 or 848-3018. 

FOR SALE: "rWo Tektronix 4054 graphics computers 
with 19-inch screens and i^-inch tape drives: $3000 
each or best offer. Tektronix 4631 hard-copy unit: 
$700. Tim Zeisloft. 2161 Shattuck Ave. #210, 
Berkeley. CA 94704. (415) 849-0629. 

FOR SALE: G1M1X #39 mainframe, two 8-inch floppy 
drives, one 5-inch floppy, 5-megabyte hard disk. 
340K static RAM, intelligent I/O processor, other I/O 
boards, Privac hi-res graphics, Meta-Labs Z80 CP/M 
board, Windrush PROM burner, Z19 terminal 9511. 
and more. Asking $7500. Will sell separately. Dick 
Bartholomew, 4849 Bethlehem Pike. Telfor. PA 
18969. (215) 257-3992. 

FOR SALE: 'IWo leleVideo 92 5 terminals: $500 each, 
'lwo S-100 systems with Advanced Digital Super Six 
SBC (6-MHz Z80. I28K RAM. 4K ROM), dual 8-inch 
Mitsubishi DS/DD floppy drives. Integrand 7 slot, 
wood-grain cabinet, all manuals: $1750 each. Phil 
Erwin Jr.. 2 101 A Mona Ct.. Lexington, KY 40503, 
(606) 299-4096. 

FOR SALE: 8K RAM for Radio Shack PC-2 or the 
Sharp PC-1 500 pocket computer. Asking $50. Also, 
seek I6K RAM with battery backup for same ma- 
chines. Interested in starting a users group for 
pocket computers. Robert Lerner, 2 3 Mayer Dr.. 
Suffern. NY 10901. 

FOR SALE: BYTE, number I through September 
1980: all in excellent condition (missing numbers 6 
and 8. 1977: numbers 4 and 5. 1978: and number 
7. 1980): $300. Negotiable. Jack Molinelli. 499 Hard- 
ing Rd.. Fair Haven. NJ 07701, (201) 842-7036. 

FOR SALE OR TRADE: Heathkit H-14 printer with 
many features: $300. Donald Mayes. Apt. #3, 8515 
Greenwood Ave., Takoma Park, MD 20912, (301) 
589-4190 or (202) 282-0585. 

FOR SALE: Mindset computer with expansion unit 
purchased new September 1984. Includes parallel 
card, mouse, Quadchrome HX-12 color monitor. All 
original manuals. Wiil guarantee operation. $2750 
or best offer. S. Adams. (212) 675-6707. 

WANTED: Anyone wanting to sell a Sinclair ZX80 or 
ZX81 in working condition. I'm interested in parallel 
processing for music applications. Chris Schaefer. 
2140 Harvard St.. Palo Alto. CA 94306. 

FOR SALE: Tl 99/4 A with original packing. Good con- 
dition. Seller will pay postage. $110. Mike Busing. 
1129 Harter Blvd.. Anderson. IN 46011, (317) 
642-9063. 

FOR SALE: Heath H-89 computer, 64K. three disk 
drives, three SIO ports, CDR DD controller. 
Cleveland Codonics graphics board, and more. 
$1800 for the works. Tom Dorsett, East 2726 Golden 
Rd.. Spokane, WA 99208. (509) 466-0585. 

FOR SALE: TRS-80 Model 12. Daisy Wheel Printer II. 
excellent condition: asking $4000. Charles Den- 
nison. 14 Landover Dr., Coatesville. PA 19320, (215) 
384-1869, after 6 p,m. 



JULY 1985 'BYTE 461 



BOMB 



BYTE's Ongoing Monitor Box 



ARTICLED PAGE ARTICLE AUTHOR{S) 

1 9 Microbytes staff 

2 39. 406 What's New staff 

3 48 Ask BYTE Ciarcia 

4 65 Book Reviews , Wilke. Cass. 

Rogers. Cox. 
Avila 

5 106 Programming Project: 

New Perspective on Nearby Stars. .Webster 

6 119 Liquid-Crystal Displays 

for Portables Adler 

7 129 Product Description: 

The GRiDCase Malloy 

8 141 Ciarcias Circuit Cellar: Living 

in a Sensible Environment Ciarcia 

9 163 Programming Insight: 

Travesty Revisited Lesser 

10 171 Programming Insight: Real-Number 

Formatting on Your Apple Daviduck 

1 1 179 Updating the Oldest Science Genet 

12 192 Microcomputers iri NASA's SIR-B. . .Wilton 

1 3 203 Comet Lines in FORTRAN Dixon 

14 215 Tracking Earth Satellites Weiss 

15 227 Automating a Telescope Boyd 



ARTICLED PAGE ARTICLE AUTHOR(S) 

16 239 Astronomical Computing 

with Micros Bochonko, 

Peters 

17 252 Texas Instruments' Pro-Lite 

Professional Computer Grehan. White 

18 258 NCR Personal Computer Model 4. . Holden 

19 265 Monitoring Halley's Comet Mosley 

20 269 Space-Flight Simulators Bernar 

2 1 279 MaxThink Hershey 

2 2 287 The Anchor Automation 

Signalman Mark XII Modem Kinal 

23 309 Computing at Chaos Manor: 

Come to the Faire Pournelle 

24 341 BYTE West Coast: 

SNOBOL and Icon Shapiro 

2 5 353 BYTE U.K.: Starlit Spectrum Pountain 

26 363 BYTE Japan: Peripherals. 

Chips, and New Computers Raike 

27 367 According to Webster: Start-up. . . .Webster 

28 385 Mathematical Recreationsr Parsing 

and Solving Linear Equations Kurosaka 

29 393 BYTELINES Libes 



)uly BOMB Results 

HOME RUN WON 

The first in the series from Ciarcias Circuit Cellar on how to "Build the 
Home Run Control System" placed first in April. It introduced a project 
for energy management, convenience, and security for the home or 
factory. Jerry Pournelle's "Over the Moat" captured second place. His 
battles with the flu, construction, and computer-type issues continue in 
the saga of Computing at Chaos Manor. And whether it's new or not, 



"What's Not" did win third. In fourth, and the winner of the $100 prize, 
is John K. Stevens's theme article on a model of circuitry entitled "Reverse 
Engineering the Brain." And in fifth place is "The Quest to Understand 
Thinking." Roger Schank and Larry Hunter will half the $50 bonus. 
Congratulations to all. 



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462 BYTE • JULY 1985 



READER SERVICE 



Inquiry No. 



Page No. 



405 1ST PLACE SYSTEMS 422 

2 3-M COMMERCIAL OFFICE .... 217 

8 800 SOFTWARE 294 

9 AST. RESEARCH 19 

10 A.S.T. RESEARCH 19 

11 AB COMPUTERS 164 

12 AB COMPUTERS 165 

13 ABC DATA PRODUCTS 436 

14 ACS INTL. INC 61 

15 ADDMASrER CORP. .428 

16 ADFEK 55 

17 ADVANCED COMP. PROD. 442. 443 

19 ADVANCED LOGIC RESEARCH . . 60 

20 ADVANCED LOGIC RESEARCH . . 60 

22 ALF PRODUCTS. INC 82 

23 ALLIED MICRO DEVICES 455 

' AMBER SYSTEMS 224, 225 

29 AMERICAN SEMICONDUCTOR . 436 

30 AMPERE INC 30 

31 AMPEX CORP. 62. 63 

32 AMPRO COMPUTERS INC 173 

33 ANCHOR AUTOMATION 233 

34 ANCHOR AUTOMATION 233 

35 APPARAT INC 426 

• APPLE COMPUTER INC. ..... Cll. 1 

36 APPLIED I 430 

37 APPLIED SOFTWARE TECH 93 

• APROTEK 159 

38 APROTEK 449 

39 ARK ELECTRONICS PRODUCTS. 135 

40 ARTIFICIAL INTL.RESRCHGRP. . 430 

41 ASHTONTATE .94. 95 

3 ASIA TECH. SERVICES INC 369 

• AT&T COMMUNICATIONS 373 

• AT&T INFORMATION SYS 64 

42 ATKINS ASSOCIATES 270 

43 AVOCET 138. 139 

45 AWESOME TECHNOLOGY INC. 424 

46 B&B ELECTRONICS 436 

• B&C MICROSYSrEMS 426 

47 BASF SYSTEMS 118 

48 BAY TECHNICAL ASSOC 23 

49 BDF PRODUCTS 330 

50 BDT PRODUCTS 330 

51 BELLSOFT INC 267 

52 BINARY TECHNOLOGY 426 

53 BITTNER ELECTRONICS 426 

54 BLAISE COMPUTING INC 368 

55 BORLAND INTL 41 

56 BORLAND INTL 41 

57 BORLAND INTL 43 

58 BORLAND INTL 43 

59 BORLAND INTL 45 

60 BORLAND INTL 45 

61 BORLAND INTL 47 

62 BORLAND INTL 47 

63 BUSINESS TOOLS INC 221 

• BYTE BACK ISSUES 420 

• BYTE IBM GUIDE 360 

• BYTE SUBSCRIBER MESSAGE . . 404 

• BYTE SUBSCRIPTION SERVICE .212 

• C WARE/DESMET C 299 

65 C ITOH DIGITAL PRODUCTS. ... 38 

66 C. ITOH DIGITAL PRODUCTS .... 38 

67 CALIF. COMPUTER COMPONENT310 

68 CALIF! COMPUTER COMPONENT310 

• CALIF DIGITAL 444.445 

69 CALIF. MICRO HOUSE 122 

70 CALIF 1 . SCIENTIFIC SFTW 426 

71 CAMPBELL SERVICES 436 

72 CAPITAL EQUIPMENT CORP. ... 336 

74 C.D.A. INTL. SOFTWARE 432 

75 CDR SYSTEMS 428 

76 CHORUS DATA SYSTEMS 321 

77 CHRISLIN INDUSTRIES. INC. ... 390 

4 CHUNG YU ELECT. 369 

78 CMA MICRO COMP. DIV 100 

79 COASTLINE COMPUTER . . 450. 451 

• CODEX CORPORATION 167 

81 COGITATE 428 

82 COGITATE 432 



Inquiry No. 



Page No. 



83 
85 
87 



90 
91 
92 
93 

94 

291 
96 
98 
99 
403 
101 
102 
103 
104 
105 
106 
107 
108 
109 
110 

112 
113 
114 
115 
395 
396 
397 
398 
118 
119 
120 

121 
122 



124 
125 
126 
127 
128 
129 
130 
131 

133 
134 

135 
136 
137 

138 
139 
142 
143 
144 
145 
399 
146 
147 



COLLEGE SOFTWARE 426 

COMMODORE BUSN. MACHINES12. 13 
COMP. COMPNTS. UNLTD 440, 441 
COMPAQ COMPUTER INSERT 32 A-L 

COMPETITIVE EDGE 96 

COMPUMAIL 454 

COMPUSAVE 437 

COMPUSERVE 339 

COMPUTER AFFAIRS INC 198 

COMPUTER CHANNEL 334 

COMPUTER CHRONICLES 400 

COMPUTER CONNECHON .... 429 

COMPUTER CONTINUUM 436 

COMPUTER DIRECT 449 

COMPUTER HUT OF N.E 317 

COMPUTER MAIL ORDER 236. 237 

COMPUTER MART 219 

COMPUTER PARTS MART 432 

COMPUTER WAREHOUSE 278 

COMPUTER WAREHOUSE 278 

COMPUTERBANC 74 

COMPUTRADE 404 

CONCORD TECHNOLOGY INC. . 449 

CONROYLAPOINTE 116. 117 

CONROY-LAPOINTE 116. 117 

CONROYLAPOINTE 116. 117 

CORVUS SYS. INC 319 

COSMOS 185 

CRANE ASSOCIATES 422 

CUESTA SYSTEMS 188 

CUSTOM COMP. TECH 416 

CUSTOM COMP. TECH 417 

DAC SOFTWARE INC 303 

DATA SPEC 86 

DATA SPEC 86 

DATA SPEC. 96 

DATA SPEC 96 

DATABROKERS 432 

DATASOUTH COMP. CORP. .... 352 

DAYNA COMM 102. 103 

DICK SMITH ELECTRONICS. . . .383 

DIGIFLEX COMPANY 302 

DIGITAL RESEARCH 223 

DIGITAL RESEARCH INSERT 128 A-L 
DIGITAL RESEARCH COMPUTERS71 
DISCOUNT COMPUTER CENTERS 186 

DISKETTE CONNECTION 397 

DISKS PLUS 426 

DISKWORLD!. INC 419 

DISKWORLD!. INC 439 

DISPLAY TELECOMMNTNS 438 

DIVERSIFIED COMPUTER SYS. . 424 

DOKAY COMP. PROD. INC 434 

DOW JONES NEWS RETRIEVAL 140 

DOW JONES SOFTWARE 238 

DUAL SYSTEMS CORP. 213 

DWIGHT CO.. INC 424 

DYNATECH 314. 315 

DYNAX. INC -137 

ECOSOFT 16 

ELEXOR INC 428 

ELLIS COMPUTING INC 69 

ENERTRONICS 355 

ENERTRONICS 357 

ESP CORPORATION 455 

EVEREX SYSTEMS 366 

EXIM INTERNATIONAL 449 

EXPRESS BUSINESS SOFTWARE 243 

EXPRESS SYSTEMS 200, 201 

EXSEL INC 436 

FACIT AB 311 



Inquiry No. 



Page No. 



148 FIDELITY-FIE 346 

149 FLAGSTAFF ENGINEERING .... 202 

150 FLAGSFAFF ENGINEERING .... 202 

151 FORTRON. INC 435 

152 FORTRON. INC 435 

153 FOX AND GELLER 388 

154 FOX SOFTWARE INC 455 

400 FUTURE COMPUTING 273 

155 GENERAL DYNAMICS 316 

156 GENERAL SOFTWARE 78 

157 GENERAL TECHNOLOGY 361 

158 GENESTTECH 78 

159 GENESTTECH 78 

160 GIFFORD COMP. SYS 5 

161 GOLD HILL COMPUTERS 178 

162 GOLDEN BOW SYSrEMS 82 

163 GTEK INC 92 

164 H&ECOMPUTRONICS 123 

165 HANZON DATA INC 18 

166 HARMONY VIDEO & COMP 68 

167 HAYES MICROCOMP. PROD ... 313 
5 HEH JEOU ENTERPRISE 369 

168 HERCULES COMPUTER TECH. . 375 

169 HERCULES COMPUTER TECH. . 377 

170 HOFFMAN INTL 432 

171 HOLMES & COMPANY 128 

172 HOOLEON COMPANY 97 

173 HOOLEON COMPANY 97 

174 H0US1ON INSrR/BAUSCH&LOMB209 

175 IBM-(ISGI SERVICES 125 

176 IBM CORP. 28,29 

177 IBM CORP. 174, 175 

386 IBS CORP 97 

387 IBS CORP. 97 

180 IC EXPRESS 398 

181 ILAR SYSTEMS. INC 52 

182 ILAR SYSTEMS. INC 52 

183 IMSI . 190. 191 

185 INFOCOM 160.161 

184 INFOSCRIBE 182 

187 INTERNATIONAL UNION OF 
COMPUTER OWNERS INC. 452. 453 

188 INTEGRAND 232 

189 INTERCONTN. MICRO SYS 115 

190 INTERCONTN. MICRO SYS 115 

191 INTERFACE INC 199 

192 INTERFACE INC 199 

• INTERFACE TECH CORP. 286 

194 IOMEGA 51 

195 IADE COMP. PROD. . 446. 447. 448 

196 IAMECO ELECTRONICS . . 276. 277 

197 JDR MICRODEVICES INC. . 456. 457 

198 JDR MICRODEVICES INC. . 458. 459 

199 JDR MICRODEVICES INC 460 

200 IEDEN 343 

201 JUKI INDUSTRY OF AMERICA . . 264 

202 KADAK PRODUCTS 436 

385 KEA SYSFEMS LTD. 430 

203 KIMTRON CORP. 197 

204 KRUEGER TECHNOLOGY INC . . 421 

205 KRUEGER TECHNOLOGY INC. . . 421 
207 LABORATORY MICROS YS 16 

• LANGLEYST. CLAIR 449 

209 LARK SOFTWARE 326 

210 LATTICE. INC 342 

211 LEO ELECTRONICS 424 

212 LEVEL 5 RESEARCH 322 

213 LINTEK INC 449 

214 LOGICAL DEVICES 328 

215 LOGICAL DEVICES 432 

• LOGICSOFT INSERT 96 A-B 



TO GET FURTHER information on the products advertised in BYTE, either 
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Inquiry No. 



Page No. 



216 LOMAS DATA PRODUCTS 211 

393 LUCKY-GOLDSTAR INT'L 384 

217 LYBEN COMP. SYS 432 

218 LYCO COMPUTER 285 

• MACMILLAN BOOK CLUBS .... 337 

219 MANX SOFTWARE SYS. 53 

220 MARK WILLIAMS CO 75 

221 MARTIN MARIETTA/IT SFTW. . . 325 

222 MARVEL SOFTWARE 348 

223 MARYMAC INDUSTRIES INC. . . 424 

224 MASTERBYTE COMP. OF NY . . 402 

225 MAXELL DATA PRODUCTS 7 

226 MAXI-SWI1CH COMPANY 396 

227 MAYNARD ELECTRONICS 15 

• MCGRAW-HILL BOOK CO 399 

228 MEGATEL COMPUTER TECH. . . 398 

229 MERRITT COMP. PRODUCTS ... 422 

230 METALINK CORP 449 

231 MF| ENTERPRISES INC 91 

404 M.H.I 172 

232 MICRAY ELECTRONICS 166 

271 MICRO CITY 302 

233 MICRO DATA BASE SYS 162 

234 MICRO DESIGN INTL 297 

235 MICRO MART, INC 72. 73 

236 MICRO PRODUCrS. INC 423 

238 MICROCOMPUTER ACCESSORIES . 226 

239 MICROCOMPUTER ACCESSORIES . 226 

240 MICROGRAFX 35 

• MICROMINT INC 379 

241 MICRON TECHNOLOGY 449 

242 MICROPROCESSORS UNLTD ... 422 

243 MICROSCRIBE 347 

388 MICROSCRIBE 422 

245 MICROSHOP 425 

246 MICROSHOP 425 

• MICROSOFT CORP 121 

• MICROSOFT CORP 205 

• MICROSOFT CORP 207 

237 MICROSOLUTIONS 24 

247 MICROSTUF. INC 327 

248 MICROWAY 22 

249 MICROWAY 396 

250 MICROWAY 403 

141 MIDWESr COMPUTER & VIDEO . 344 

25 1 MIDWESr MICRO-PERIPHERALS . . 34 

• MIX SOFTWARE 235 

392 MODULAR CORP. 234 

252 MOTEL COMPUTERS LTD. 430 

253 MOUNTAIN VIEW PRESS 84 

254 MTI SYSTEMS CORP 30 

256 NANTUCKET 49 

257 NANTUCKET 49 

258 NATL PUBLIC DOMAIN SFTW. . . 455 

259 NATIONAL INSTRUMENTS 136 

402 NBS. INC 324 

260 NEC INFORMATION SYS CHI 

• NORTH HILLS CORP. 424 

• NORTH HILLS CORP 430 

261 OKIDATA 292, 293 

262 OLDEN 50 

263 OPTO-22 359 

264 OPTO-22 359 

265 ORCHID TECHNOLOGY 347 

266 ORION INSTRUMENTS 275 

267 ORYX SYSTEMS 304. 305 

268 ORYX SYSrEMS 304. 305 

269 ORYX SYSFEMS 304. 305 

270 PC HORIZONS, INC 430 

272 PACIFIC EXCHANGES 428 

273 PARAGON COURSEWARE 387 

274 PARAGON COURSEWARE 387 

275 PC NETWORK 246, 247 

277 PCS LIMITED 418 

278 PCS LIMITED 432 

389 PEACHTREE TECHNOLOGY INC.170 

390 PEACHTREE TECHNOLOGY INC.170 

279 PERCON 422 

280 PERSOFT INC 8 

281 PINNACLE SYSTEMS. INC. ...... 362 

282 PRINCETON GRAPHIC SYS 99 



JULY 1985 -BYTE 463 



READER SERVICE 



Inquiry No. 



Page No. 



283 PRINCETON GRAPHIC SYS 345 

284 PRINTERLAND 272 

285 PRIORITY ONE 427 

286 PROGRAMMER'S SHOP 308 

287 PROMETHEUS PRODUCTS 17 

288 PROMETHEUS PRODUCTS 17, 

289 PROTECTO 422 

290 PROTECIO 436 

292 OIC RESEARCH 274 

293 QUADRAM CORP. 56, 57 

294 QUADRAM CORP 183 

• QUAID SOFTWARE LTD, 134 

295 QUALITY PRINTERS 426 

296 QUANT SYSTEMS 424 

297 QUBIEJ 36, 37 

298 OUBIEJ 349 

299 RADIO SHACK CIV 

300 RAINBOW TECHNOLOGIES .... 455 

301 RATIONAL SYSTEMS 370 

302 READIWARE SYSTEMS INC 386 

303 RELATIONAL DATABASE SYS. . . 263 

304 ROGERS LABS 428 

305 ROLAND CORP. 90 

407 ROSE ELECTRONICS 455 

306 S-100 DIV. 696 CORP. 86 

307 S-100 DIV. 696 CORP 397 

308 S-100 DIV. 696 CORP. 431 

309 S-100 DIV. 696 CORP. 431 

310 SAB-LINK. INC 430 

311 SAFEWARE 426 

312 SAMS. HOWARD W. & CO 301 

313 SAMSUNG ELECT. DEVICES ... 268 



Inquiry No. 



Page No. 



314 SATELLITE SOFTWARE 250 

• SCOTTSDALE SYSTEMS 79 

316 SECURITY MICROSYS CONSULT.436 

317 SEMIDISK SYSTEMS 329 

408 SILICON SPECIALTIES 214 

409 SILICON SPECIALTIES 214 

• SILVER FOX 4 

319 SLICER COMPUTERS 26 

406 SLR SYSTEMS 455 

186 SMART SOFTWARE 392 

320 SOCIETY-APPLIED LRNGTECH. . . 98 

• SOFTLINE CORP. 87 

321 SOFTRON INC 430 

322 SOFTSTYLE INC 364 

323 SOFTWARE BOTTLING 70 

324 SOFTWARE GALORE 18 

325 SOFTWARE GALORE 18 

326 SOFTWARE LINK. THE 289 

327 SOFTWARE MASTERS 98 

328 SOFTWARE SERVICES 424 

329 SOFTWARE SOLUTIONS INC. . . 333 

331 SOLA ELECTRIC 31 

332 SOLUTION SYSTEMS 312 

333 SOLUTION SYSTEMS 312 

334 SOLUTIONWARE 455 

335 SONY CORP. OF AMERICA . .80. 81 

• SOURCE TELECOMP. CORP. ... 320 

337 SPECTRUM SOFTWARE 133 

401 SPRUCE TECHNOLOGY CORP. .323 

339 STAR MICRONICS 189 

340 STARBUCK DATA CO 424 

341 STB SYSTEMS 88. 89 



Inquiry No. 



Page No. 



342 
343 

344 

345 
346 
347 
348 
349 
350 
351 
352 
353 
6 

355 
356 



357 

359 
360 
361 
255 
362 
363 
364 
7 
365 



STRIDE MICRO 290 

STRIDE MICRO 291 

SUMMIT SOFrWARE TECHN. INC 380 
SUNNYVALE COMMUNICATIONS389 

SUNTRONICS CO. INC 416 

SUPERSOFT 83 

SYSTAT INC 131 

TALLGRASS TECH 20, 21 

TATUM LABS 428 

TATUNG 32 

TATUNG 32 

TAXAN CORP 351 

TECH STAR LABORATORY 449 

TECHNICS DESIGN CO 369 

TEKTRONIX INC 335 

TELEBYTE TECHNOLOGY INC. . . 68 

TELEVIDEO SYSTEMS 340 

TEXAS INSTRUMENTS II 

TIGERTRONICS 432 

TINNEY. ROBERT GRAPHICS. . . 433 
TINNEY ROBERT T-SHIRTS .... 283 
TOSHIBA AMERICA INC . . 168. 169 

TRANS WORLD AIRLINES 381 

TRANSEC SYSTEMS. INC 100 

TURBO POWER SOFTWARE ... 372 

U.S. ROBOTICS 67 

U.S. SERVEX 222 

U.S. POSTAL SERVICE-ZIP + 4.371 

UNIFIED SOFTWARE SYS 455 

UNISOURCE 25 

UNITRON INC 369 

VENTEL INC 27 



Inquiry No. 



Page No. 



366 VERTEX SYSTEMS 54 

367 VERTEX SYSTEMS 54 

372 VIA WEST 54 

373 VIASYN 101 

374 VLM COMPUTER ELECTR 422 

375 VOCS 422 

376 WALLING COMPANY 428 

377 WALON1CK ASSOCIATES 52 

378 WAREHOUSE DATA PRODUCTS 300 

379 WATCOM PRODUCTS INC 298 

380 WINTEK CORP. 59 

381 WINTEK CORP. 430 

382 XEROX CORP. 76, 77 

384 YETIWARE 428 

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661 683 

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669 d9l 

670 692 

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789 811 

790 812 

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792 814 



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Article No. 


! 


2 


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Excellent 


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29 


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41 


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53 


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61 


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6 


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42 


46 


50 


54 


58 


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66 


70 


74 


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86 


90 


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Fair 


3 


7 


ii 


15 


19 


23 


27 


31 


35 


39 


43 


47 


51 


55 


59 


63 


67 


71 


75 


79 


83 


87 


91 


95 


99 


Poor 


4 


8 


12 


16 


20 


24 


28 


32 


36 


40 


44 


48 


52 


56 


60 


64 


68 


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84 


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92 


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100 


Article No. 


26 


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36 


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40 


4] 


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Excellent 


101 


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41 


145 


149 


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Good 


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42 


146 


150 


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Fair 


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Poor 


104 


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156 


160 


164 


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172 


176 


180 


184 


188 


192 


196 


200 



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I purchased this copy by □ Subscription □ Newsstand, computer store, or bookstore 



I 


23 


45 


67 


89 


111 


133 


!55 


2 


24 


46 


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90 


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156 


3 


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5 


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6 


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9 


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163 


10 


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54 


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98 


120 


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164 


II 


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90 


121 


143 


165 


12 


34 


56 


78 


100 


122 


144 


166 


13 


35 


57 


79 


101 


123 


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14 


36 


58 


80 


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146 


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15 


37 


5 


81 


103 


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147 


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16 


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60 


82 


104 


126 


148 


170 


7 


3 


61 


83 


105 


127 


149 


171 


8 


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62 


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19 


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63 


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20 


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64 


86 


108 


130 


152 


174 


21 


43 


65 


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22 


44 


66 


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110 


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95 


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■96 


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98 


220 



221 243 

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n j 


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28^ 


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3 30 



331 353 375 

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341 363 385 

342 364 386 

343 365 387 

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347 1W 301 

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349 371 393 

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351 373 395 

352 37.1 30h 



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■118 


440 



441 463 485 


507 529 


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.142 464 486 508 530 


552 574 


443 465 487 


509 531 


553 575 


444 466 488 


510 532 


554 576 


445 467 489 


511 533 


555 577 


446 468 490 


512 534 


556 578 


.147 469 491 


513 535 


557 579 


448 470 492 


514 536 


558 580 


449 471 493 


515 537 


559 581 


450 472 494 


516 538 


560 582 


451 473 495 


517 539 


561 583 


452 474 496 


518 540 


562 584 


453 475 497 


519 541 


563 585 


454 476 498 


520 542 


564 586 


455 477 499 


521 543 


565 587 


4 56 4 78 500 


522 544 


566 5*8 


457 ^79 501 


523 545 


567 589 


4 58 480 502 


524 546 


568 590 


459 481 503 


525 547 


569 591 


460 482 504 


526 5-18 


570 592 


461 483 505 


527 549 


571 593 


462 484 506 528 550 


572 594 



595 


617 639 


596 


618 640 


597 


619 641 


598620642 


599 621 643 


600 622 644 


601 


623 645 


602 


624 646 


603 


62 5 64 7 


604 626 648 


605 627 649 


606 628 650 


607 


629 651 


608 630 652 


609 631 653 


610 632 654 


611 


633 655 


612 


634 656 


613 


635 657 


614 


636 658 


615 


637 659 


616 638 660 



661 683 

662 684 

663 685 

664 686 

665 687 

666 688 
667689 

668 690 

669 691 

670 692 

671 693 

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673 695 

674 696 

675 697 

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677 699 

678 700 

679 701 

680 702 

681 703 

682 704 



705 


727 


74 


706 728 750 


707 


729 75! 


708 


730752 


709 


731 


753 


7i0 732 


754 


711 


733 


755 


"12 


734 


756 


713 


735 


757 


714 


736 758 


715 737 


759 


716 738 760 


717 


739 


761 


718 


740 762 


719 


741 


763 


720 742 


764 


721 


743 


765 


722 


744 


766 


723 


745 


767 


724 


746 768 


725 


747 


769 


726 748 770 



771 793 

772 794 

773 795 

774 796 

775 797 

776 798 

777 799 

778 800 

779 801 

780 802 

781 803 

782 804 

783 805 

784 806 

785 807 

786 808 

787 809 

788 810 

789 811 

790 812 

791 813 

792 814 



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the Spinwriter 

eir 

The Spinwriter 
elf is a compact 
and durable 
letter quality 
printer. And it's 
the lowest priced 
Spinwriter® ever. 
But don't let the 
price fool you, it's 
still a Spinwriter. 

Spinwriter 
printers are most 
preferred. 

Spinwriter is the #1 name 
in letter quality printers 
for PC's. In fact, Popular 
Computing, Creative 
Computing and 
Datamation all 




You can 
control many 
functions with 
the touch of 
a finger. 




ranked Spinwriter as the 
#1 letter quality printers 
for business. 

The reasons? 

One is print quality. 
Spinwriter print quality is 
unsurpassed. 

Another reason is 
Spin writer's legendary reli- 
ability Many Spinwriter 
printers go years without 
needing service. 

And there's versatility. 
Spinwriter printers offer 
you over 70 different type 
styles. And more forms 
handlers than anyone else. 

Find out how clever an 
e-l-f can be. 

See your dealer for a 
Spinwriter elf demonstra- 
tion. You'll find the elf can 
Drint an average letter in 
ess than a minute. You'll 
find it comes standard 

with a sheet guide. 




Makes popular 
software look even 
better. 




Not only is the print quality 

attractive, so is the price- 

$545. for plug-compatible IBM 

PCjr, model; $595. for model compatible 

with all other PC's. 



Spinwriter is a registered trademark and Spinwriter elf is a trademark of NEC Corporation. 



And you'll find a control 
panel that lets you change 
type pitch and form length 
at the touch of a finger. 

So see your dealer about 
the Spinwriter elf today. 
And you'll know you've 
found the right printer. 
For more information call 
1-800-343-4418. (In MA 
call 617-264-8635). And 
see why so many PC users 
are saying, "NEC and me." 



NEC, 

AND 
ME 



f m 



NEC Information 
Systems, Inc. 
Department 1610 J 
1414 Mass. Ave. JM 
Boxborough, 
MA01719 
Inquiry 260 



IT'S 
ONLY 

4</2 LBS. 





The Tandy 200 is the 
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Meet the new generation of port- 
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Comes with Six 
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i 



jpgw 



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as a personal appointment cal- 
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You can even write your own 
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Adopt One Today! 

Step up to the powerful soft- 
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Radio /hack 

The Technology Store ™ 

A DIVISION OF TANDY CORPORATION 
Inquiry 299 



Prices apply at Radio Shack Computer Centers and at participating Radio Shack stores and dealers. Multiplan/TM Microsoft Corp.