*BSD News Article 9185


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From: frank@halcyon.com (Frank Higgins)
Newsgroups: comp.unix.bsd,comp.sys.3b1
Subject: Re: Need help with AT&T UNIX PC and DOS
Message-ID: <1992Dec21.023709.2910@nwnexus.WA.COM>
Date: 21 Dec 92 02:37:09 GMT
References: <1992Dec18.162224.1@evax12.eng.fsu.edu> <1h18ilINNs4i@usenet.INS.CWRU.Edu>
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In article <1h18ilINNs4i@usenet.INS.CWRU.Edu> ptd2@po.CWRU.Edu (Palmer T. Davis) writes:
>
>In a previous article, tsai@evax12.eng.fsu.edu () says:
>>
>>     We have several AT&T UNIX PCs (PC7300) in our lab.  They have been
>>rarely used.  Recently, the chairperson wants them to run DOS and DOS
>>applications such as MATLAB.  Is anyone familier with the way to make it
>>work ?  Any help or advice is greatly appreciated.
>
>(First of all, comp.unix.bsd is the wrong group for this question;
>it really belongs in comp.sys.3b1, to which I'm redirecting followups.)
>The 7300 and 3b1 are based on the 68010, not the 8086 family.  There
>is a coprocessor board that was available (called DOS-73); if you don't
>have this board installed, you simply can't run DOS at all.  With the
>coprocessor board installed, the machine works more or less like a
>512K IBM XT with a monochrome display adapter, but DOS software has to
>be reasonably well-behaved to work.  (And you can simultaneously run
>UNIX software in other windows, a feature notably lacking on most XT
>clones....)
>
>-- PTD --
><ptd2@po.cwru.edu>   \X/   cthread.  cthread_fork().  Fork, thread, fork!

Underline "reasonably well behaved". There are debates about how much DOS
software the DOS board will actually run, but at the time I paid full
price for one of the things in the heyday of the 3B1 (pre 286, 386, 486), I
determined that there was darned little *preferred* software that would run
on it. An AT&T tech and I finally put a number to it and said that it was
about 50% compatible with the then existing DOS software. Later software
has become more elaborate, sophisticated and less likely to run on the DOS
board. What it does, it does well. What it doesn't is horrid.

Frank        

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