Microshpere RAM Disk

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(Profiles, December 1985)

Device

Image from David Katz	Image from David Katz
PIO Mod from my machine	Power connection to RCA plug to supply power

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Recently I installed a one megabyte RAM Disk from Microsphere, ... on one of our four Kaypro II's. They have been modified to Kaypro IV's using a Pro-8 ROM and a Plus-4 Decoder Board from MicroCornucopia, ... since I also added two more disk drives. We are very pleased with these modifications.

However, each time you use the RAM, you have to format it and load the Perfect Software system into it (unless you have the RAM always on, which could be hazardous in case of any power surges). Formatting and loading the RAM can take about ten minutes as you pip b:=a:*.*[v] each disk into the RAM. Besides the time involved, it requires your almost constant attention and you cannot do very much else during this period.

After reading several articles in KUGRAM on SUBMIT, the following series of SUBMIT files will load Perfect Writer, Perfect Calc, Perfect Filer and The Word Plus in about seven minutes.

All you must type is:

SUBMIT DISKRAM.SUB (to start the SUBMIT files)

Two Y's to format the RAM disk (when asked by the RAM disk formatting program)

SUBMIT PIPNEWTW.SUB. (when asked by the SUBMIT files)

and, of course, swap the disks. With four disk drives, you can load the CP/M disk and three of the four disks above, all at the same time.

When they are loaded, you can then swap in The Word Plus and two of your other file disks. (This step could be eliminated if you are not using a spell checker.)

This series of SUBMIT files ends up with you logged into the RAM disk, the list of files on your drive B file disk are on the screen, and you are ready to call up one of the software programs to begin work on a file on the other drive.

All this takes only seven minutes, and during this period of loading the RAM, you are now free to do other things. With a one megabyte RAM disk I still hav about 170K left on the RAM, since I leave the CP/M disk in drive A and do not load it into the RAM disk.

Some hints are as follows:

a) Make sure that your word processing program does not put in any blank lines after the carriage return following the last line in each file. Perfect Writer did this with my files and I had to eliminate these blank lines.

b) As mentioned in the KUGRAM, the carriage return after the last line is important.

c) Don't format the files, also mentioned in one KUGRAM article.

...

In the following list of SUBMIT files, the small type gives the name of the file and the large type tells what is in that file.

You could arrange these files ina different order and use different files to do different things, even with different CP/M machines and different software systems.

Put your CP/M disk (with SUBMIT.COM and the following files on it) in drive A.

a:diskram.sub
RAMDISK
SUBMIT PIPNEWB.SUB

a:pipnewb.sub
NEWPIP E:=B:*.*[V]
SUBMIT PIPNEWC.SUB

a:pipnewc.sub
NEWPIP E:=C:*.*[V]
SUBMIT PIPNEWD.SUB

a:pipnewd.sub
NEWPIP E:=D:*.*[V]
SUBMIT DISKCHAG.SUB

a:diskchag.sub
TYPE A:DISKCHAG.DOC

a:diskchag.doc

• PUT TW DISK IN DRIVE D

• PUT OTHER DISKS OF YOUR CHOICE IN DRIVES B AND C

• YOU THEN TYPE: SUBMIT PIPNEWTW.SUB

a:pipnewtw.sub
NEWPIP E:=D:*.*[V]
SUBMIT NIDIRE.SUB

a:nidire.sub
NI E:
SUBMIT NIDIRB.SUB

a:nidirb.sub
NI B:
SUBMIT DIRF.SUB

a:dirf.sub
DIR F:

RAMDISK is the file to format the RAM disk. Diskchag.sub and diskchag.doc are to allow you to swap your disks (e.g., The Word Plus) into your drives after the first three have been loaded into the RAM disk. Pipnewtw.sub is the efile to load The Word Plus from drive D.

Nidire.sub is for a directory of the disk in drive E, using ni.com, which is a better version of dir. Newpip.com is a better version of pip. Dirf.sub causes the ram disk to be drive A.

Frank Gadek
Chemistry Department, Allentown College
(Kugram, Jan-Feb 1987)