ajparent1/kb1gmx wrote:
There are two forms of CP/M experience:
Small, slow and cramped typical of early floppies of 120 and 241K size.
High performance using fast large media (hard disks, IDE, CF, SD). [snip]
That's a good summary of CP/M usage, Allison. It mirrors my experience as well.
Early on, CP/M computers with primiive software and floppy disks really slowed software development. But that's all I had; I didn't know any better. It sure as heck beat a CPU manufacturer's development system with paper tape and a teletype! So I was in heaven. :-)
As better CP/M editors, debuggers, assemblers, and compilers were developed, it became much easier to develop code. Things like the SLR180 assembler and Turbo Pascal were great productivity tools.
Then hard drives and higher CPU clock speeds were added, and the computer's speed no longer limited your productivity; the only limit was YOUR speed and creativity!
For me personally, the PC was a setback. It put me back at the bottom of the learning ladder. It was much slower than my Z80 system (a Heath H89 at the time), and its byzantine architecture made it much harder to use. I tried, but by the late 1980's I gave up. PCs basically became an appliance; a platform to run someone else's hardware and software. My time and talents went into other hobbies (electric cars), and in continuing to develop new applications for 8-bit microcomputers professionally; areas where I felt I could still accomplish something.
After I retired, I felt a need to get back to when computers were FUN. Something a beginner could learn and understand, and build and create useful things themselves. It givee me a sense of accomplishment you can't get by buying everything and running someone else's software.
My hope for the Z80MC is to get it to the point where *it* can be a good platform for developing vintage hardware and software. Done right, it's going to be easier to use it than try to do it on a PC! You can be running your CP/M programs even before the PC finishes booting. :-)
Thus, I'm hunting around for a video/terminal application. That's the obvious missing link.
Lee Hart
--
A designer knows he has achieved perfection not when there is
nothing left to add, but when there is nothing left to take away.
-- Antoine de Saint Exupery
--
Lee Hart, 814 8th Ave N, Sartell MN 56377, www.sunrise-ev.com
Lee Hart