Groups | Search | Server Info | Keyboard shortcuts | Login | Register [http] [https] [nntp] [nntps]

Groups > alt.folklore.computers > #154779

Re: Computer Products United

Show all headers | View raw

On Wed, 2 Dec 2015, chriskeegan2014@gmail.com wrote:

> As for the 80186 being inherently incompatible, this is only true if the 
> design made use of onboard peripherals (it integrated functions 
> typically found on 8088/8086 designs, though external to the 
> microprocessor). If you used the 80186/80188 and ignored the onboard 
> peripherals, there was virtually no difference between it and an 
> 8088/8086.
>
But I remember looking at the datasheet, and there seemed to be no way to 
turn off those internal peripherals.

And there is little reason to choose the 80186 unless you are using those 
internal peripherals.  The prime problem with those internal peripherals 
is that they are at the wrong address.

YOu get a minor improvement from the slightly larger instruction set of 
the 80186, but if you can use those internal peripherals, at the very 
least you can make your computer board smaller.  I don't know about the 
cost of the 80186 versus the cost of the 8086 and peripheral ICs.

If you have to duplicate the internal hardware, then the cost of the 186 
(which was probably more expensive than an 8086) and the external 
peripheral hardware probably becomes a liability.

> The Tandy 2000 was incompatible w/virtually all IBM s/w because it used 
> a graphics subsystem based on SMC chips, not the 6845 of the CGA/MDA 
> video cards. It booted MS-DOS just fine - the version that was tailored 
> for it's hardware. It was possibly the only pseudo-compatible that was 
> compatible at the BIOS interrupt and MS-DOS service call level.
>
You're confusing "IBM compatible".

Like CP/M, "PC-DOS" had a bios, so the operating system could be 
interfaced to different hardware; it was much easier to modify the
software when it's that form, than having to find  the places in the OS 
that dealt with hardware, change the code, and reassemble.

Initially, it didnt' matter what hardware was there, so long as one 
modified the BIOS.  Steve Ciarcia had an "IBM compatible" early on that
could be used with a serial terminal.  There were Heathkit and Godbout 
boards with 8088s that could run the operating system.

So initially companies took advantage of that.  Why not try to scoop the 
competition by having some advanced feature the others didn't have?  Or 
use different hardware to make a cheaper computer?  So long as the BIOS 
could be adapted, all was well.  SInce different hardware could run the 
OS, there seemed no reason to be hardware compatible.

What killed things was that not long after the IBM came out, software 
started addressing the hardware directly, so things worked faster.  And 
that was the downfall.  Since the exotic computers didn't have the 
hardware in the right place (or were the same hardware that the IBM had) 
it no longer mattered that the BIOS had adjusted to the hardware, the 
application software no longer ran on the fancy hardware.

That forced things back in line, so any computer using an 8088 or variant 
had to be identical to the "IBM PC", so all the oddball computers dropped 
away.

> The Mindset had an 80186 and was fairly compatible. How do you explain 
> that?
>
But there's a difference between "fairly" and "completely".  Initially 
"fairly" was good enough, because the BIOS was adapted to the different 
hardware, but once the applications started dealing with the hardware 
directly, it had to be "completely compatible".

> The original LittleBoard/Z80 or any that was configured the same way 
> used the serial port w/a terminal. The LittleBoard/PC could take an 8 
> bit ISA card with a plug in adapter board, and therefore output to a 
> regular monitor. It was highly compatible and based on the NEC V40. The 
> LittleBoard/186 I don't know a lot about. It's purported to boot 
> standard MS-DOS 3.? I think, but not be very compatible.
>
>
The V40 didn't have the peripheral hardware built in, so "compatibility" 
never came into the equation.

Then you get back to the Littleboard using the 186 and you say "not very 
compatible".  Yes, of course, because it used the 186.

   Michael

Back to alt.folklore.computers | Previous | Next — Previous in thread | Next in thread | Find similar | Unroll thread

Thread

Computer Products United chriskeegan2014@gmail.com - 2015-11-15 20:54 -0800
  Re: Computer Products United Bob Eager <news0005@eager.cx> - 2015-11-16 05:28 +0000
    Re: Computer Products United Huge <Huge@nowhere.much.invalid> - 2015-11-16 09:59 +0000
      Re: Computer Products United Bob Eager <news0005@eager.cx> - 2015-11-16 11:40 +0000
    Re: Computer Products United Michael Black <et472@ncf.ca> - 2015-11-16 11:35 -0500
      Re: Computer Products United Stephen Sprunk <stephen@sprunk.org> - 2015-11-16 11:23 -0600
        Re: Computer Products United scott@slp53.sl.home (Scott Lurndal) - 2015-11-16 17:27 +0000
        Re: Computer Products United Huge <Huge@nowhere.much.invalid> - 2015-11-16 18:27 +0000
        Re: Computer Products United cb@elaine.df.lth.se (Christian Brunschen) - 2015-11-16 21:48 +0000
        Re: Computer Products United Freddy1 <something@something.com> - 2015-11-16 17:38 -0500
        Re: Computer Products United Anssi Saari <as@sci.fi> - 2015-11-18 19:52 +0200
        Re: Computer Products United Jan van den Broek <fortytwo@xs4all.nl> - 2015-12-07 21:26 +0100
      Re: Computer Products United Daiyu Hurst <daiyu.hurst@gmail.com> - 2015-11-27 12:29 -0800
        Re: Computer Products United chriskeegan2014@gmail.com - 2015-12-02 11:31 -0800
          Re: Computer Products United chriskeegan2014@gmail.com - 2015-12-02 11:34 -0800
            Re: Computer Products United Michael Black <et472@ncf.ca> - 2015-12-04 00:00 -0500
              Re: Computer Products United Charlie Gibbs <cgibbs@kltpzyxm.invalid> - 2015-12-04 20:56 +0000
                Re: Computer Products United Michael Black <et472@ncf.ca> - 2015-12-04 17:12 -0500
          Re: Computer Products United Michael Black <et472@ncf.ca> - 2015-12-02 18:44 -0500
          Re: Computer Products United Daiyu Hurst <daiyu.hurst@gmail.com> - 2015-12-05 17:29 -0800
            Re: Computer Products United Daiyu Hurst <daiyu.hurst@gmail.com> - 2015-12-05 17:29 -0800
            Re: Computer Products United "J. Clarke" <j.clarke.873638@gmail.com> - 2016-01-02 08:27 -0500
  Re: Computer Products United "Rod Speed" <rod.speed.aaa@gmail.com> - 2015-11-16 17:02 +1100
  Re: Computer Products United Michael Black <et472@ncf.ca> - 2015-11-16 11:36 -0500
  Re: Computer Products United Daiyu Hurst <daiyu.hurst@gmail.com> - 2015-11-27 12:28 -0800

csiph-web