Microreviews for SEPTEMBER 1996 Micropendium by Charles Good GENEVE 9640 COMPUTER by the Myarc division of Cecure Electronics Have I got a deal for you 99/4A users! How would you like to move up to 80 columns and have the pleasure of running 80 column Funnelweb? How about running modifyable disk versions of most 99/4A plug in cartridges? Would you like to get a Gram Kracker and an 80 column adapter and a fancy keyboard adapter, all wraped up into one neat hardware product. That product is the "computer on a pbox card" Geneve Computer. Geneves were out of production for several years, but now you can once again get a brand new Geneve card from the manufacturer with warranty and software (80 column word processor, advanced basic, 80 column Multiplan upgrade, cartridge converter, and DOS for only $200. Cecure has purchased all the rights and remaining hardware of Myarc Inc., and are now selling new Geneve cards with a Cecure warranty. This may be the most important and cost effective upgrade any 99/4A owner can make. For many years the Geneve has been criticized in newsletter articles because early versions of its MDOS operating system software were buggy and because of poor design that caused this 99/4A compatible computer on a card to overheat. These criticisms are no longer justified. I have been using my Geneve with a SCSI hard drive for over a year and am VERY pleased with its operation. I have figured out how to do on my Geneve everything I used to do on my 99/4A and now use the Geneve for most of my routine computing work. I prefer the Geneve over my very expanded 99/4A system for several reasons. 1- My Geneve is now very stable, much less likely to crash than my 99/4A system. There is no firehose cable or cartirdge to giggle loose and cause the computer to crash. Because extended basic is loaded into my Geneve's RAM every time I need it, I never have an extended basic crash. Because I have a SCSI hard drive and have my Geneve's MDOS on a PFM+ flashdisk I don't have to use floppy disks or a battery backed ramdisk for file or DOS storage. On my 99/4A system, failure of the battery backed ramdisk operating system is a frequent cause of system crashes. 2- Software performs better on a Geneve. Almost all 99/4A software will run faster on a Geneve because it has a faster CPU, and there is useful Geneve software that will not run on a 99/4A. For new Geneve users there is a learning curve. It took me a while to figure out how to get Funnelweb and all my favorite 99/4A applications to run on my Geneve, but now they all work from a series of menus that appear at powerup. I even figured out how to get Spell-It working nicely on the Geneve, something I could not do from ramdisk on my 99/4A. 3- A Geneve has standard technical features that are only available as expensive add ons to a 99/4A. This makes the Geneve very cost effective compared to adding the same features to a 99/4A system. The Geneve lets you a full sized full featured XT keyboard, provides an 80 column display with up to 256 colors, and gives you the ability to load and run stock or specially modified command module software from disk or hard drive. My 99/4A system can do all these things too. My 99/4A has an 80 column card (only available from Germany these days and very expensive), a pgram+ gram device for loading cartridges from disk or ramdisk (no new fully built gram devices are currently being sold), and a full keyboard interface that takes up a lot of space because I still have to use the 99/4A console in addition to the big keyboard. A Geneve costs less, takes up less space, and runs more software than my comparably equipped but somewhat less capable fully expanded 99/4A system. The old Geneve problems with MDOS and overheating are no more, at least on my system. The latest non SCSI (v2.21) and SCSI compatible (v4.00S) versions of MDOS are very stable and all the documented dos commands work properly. The only problem I have with MDOS is if I try to load a nonexistant file or save to a nonexistant path. This causes the comptuer to lock up. I have solved my early overheating problem by having Cecure install extra heat sinks. All Geneve cards now sold by Cecure include these extra heat sinks as standard equipment. I increased the cooling of my Geneve by taking the Geneve card out of its plastic clamshell and mounting it on the back half of a metal TI clamshell. This exposes all the heat generating parts directly to cooling air. I think the Geneve's plastic clamshell keeps too much heat inside. On the down side, there are a few software packages will run on my 80 column 99/4A but won't run on my Geneve. These include disk versions of some third party cartridge games and some 80 column software created specifically for the Mechatronics gram karte. I don't use any of this software, so this is no big deal to me. On the slightly down side, there are some useful applications that for some reason don't work when loaded into the Geneve's RAM directly from my SCSI hard drive but do work just fine from floppy or from the Geneve's internal ramdisk. TIPS has trouble loading in graphic files directly from SCSI. The TI Writer formatter doesn't like reading in text files directly off of my SCSI hard drive. Sometimes TI artist graphics act funny. I can view any kind of file directly on my SCSI drive but I can't do a file string search. In each of the above cases, the solution is to use a batch file to download the needed file from my SCSI hard drive to the Geneve's internal ramdisk, and then run my software application. This takes little extra time and works very reliably. You can start using a stock Geneve right away with your existing Pbox and TV or monitor by pulling the 32K and fire hose cards out of the Pbox and inserting the Geneve card. This immediately gives you the equivalent of a 99/4A that is equipped with an 80 column adapter, a pgram+, and an AT keyboard interface. Cecure doesn't include the required XT or XT/AT switchable keyboard in their basic price. They will sell you a keyboard for $25. You can not use many of the common store bought "AT only" keyboards. For best results I don't recommend a TV or TI color monitor with a Geneve, although these can be used with your 99/4A's rf modulator or monitor cable if you are only running 40 column software designed for the 99/4A. If you want to run 80 column software you need better video. I have an 80 column "Amega compatible" color monitor, the Magnavox 8CM515. Amiga/Geneve compatible color monitors are no longer in production and used ones are hard to find these days, but you can get supurb 80 column resolution using a cheap monochrome monitor with your video showing up in shades of amber or green monochrome. You need the type of monochrome monitor that has a one pin "video in" jack similar to the video in jacks on VCRs. Such monochrome monitors are commonly available at used computer stores for $20 or less and work very well with most Geneve and 99/4A software, particularly high resolution 80 column software. You need a special monitor cable with 80 column monitors. Cecure sells Geneve monochrome video cables for $5. If you want to upgrade further I recommend extra video ram so you can access all the features of 80 column Funnelweb and extra heat sinks if you don't already have them so that the Geneve card stays cool. Cecure's new Geneves. Cecure can install both these items. Without the extra video ram you can still run 80 column Funnelweb, but your text buffer size will be 64K instead of 128K. I also recommend battery backed ramdisk(s) or a hard drive system for seamless no disk day to day computer operation. A hard drive is better. I am delighted with the slick operation of my SCSI interface card and "inside the P-box" low power hard drive system I obtained from Bud Mills Services. In addition to the above, my very expanded Geneve is equipped with a DSDD floppy disk controller, additional cpu RAM (available in different formats from Cecure and from Bud Mills Services), a PFM+ flashdisk so that I can automatically boot my SCSI MDOS without a floppy or battery backed ramdisk, and a RAVE speech card. To summarize, this is what an instant 80 column 99/4A compatible Geneve upgrade will cost: $200 for a new Geneve card with software, $25 for an XT/AT keyboard, $5 for a monochrome monitor cable, and $20 or less for a monochrome monitor. --------------------- MYMENU2+ by Jim Uzzell of DDI Software Here is something you can use with the enhanced extended basic that comes standard with your Geneve. MYMENU2+ is the most extensive and useful application software written in Myarc Advanced Basic (aka Geneve extended basic) that I have ever seen. It contains a whole bunch of useful applications, some with features not found in other Geneve or 99/4A compatible software. And because most of these applications are written in advanced basic they are easily user modifiable. I like MYMENU2+ so much that I have my Geneve set up to automatically boot the program every time I select advanced basic from my custom Geneve startup menu. From the MYMENU2+ display I can from a menu run all the other advanced basic programs on my hard drive. MYMENU2+ is the only Geneve software that can do this. Here is what you get with MYMENU2+, all in memory and either simultaneously displayed on screen or available from a command menu: a calendar display of the current month; a display of reminders for the current day, a time-of-day display, a file manager somewhat similar to Funnelweb's "disk review", a text processor with many many printout options, a four function calculator, a spreadsheet, a label printer that can use TIPS graphics, a disassembler, a sophisticated floppy disk formatter, and an easy to use system for backing up an HFDC hard drive. The startup 80 column screen of MYMENU2+ is just packed with information. The volume or current subdirectory name is shown (you can alter the advanced basic code to get the program to start at any desired drive or directory) along with the drive designation (DSK1, WDS1, SCS1, etc) the total number of sectors and the number of sectors free and used on that drive. You see how much memory is identified by FREESPACE 0 through 4 and how much total memory system is allocated to advanced basic. The software reads the Geneve's clock and gives you a continuously updated current time display and a picture of the current month's calendar with the current day of the month highlighted. You see four 20 character text lines of reminder notes for the current day. These notes are read in from a DV80 text file that includes notes for the entire month and which can be updated using any word processor. The MYMENU2+ calendar and reminders notes do the same thing that John Johnson's public domain software REMIND ME does. Some users will choose to set up their Geneve so that the MYMENU2+ startup menu with its calendar information appears on screen automatically each time the Geneve is booted. You also get at MYMENU2+ startup a file listing of the floppy drive or hard drive directory you configure into the program. For each file you are told its name, size in sectors, type, and whether it is protected or not. If subdirectories are present beyond this level you are so informed. Each file or subdirectory has a letter of the alphabet next to it. Select the letter next to a file and if the file is a PROGRAM or IV254 runable from advanced basic the file will run. MYMENU2+ is the only software I know that will create a menu and let you automatically run advanced basic programs from that menu. On my Geneve's hard drive I put all my advanced basic runable software in the sub directory first read by MYMENU2+ when I go to advanced basic from my custom startup menu. If you type a letter next to a DISPLAY or INTERNAL file of any size and the file can be viewed on screen or dumped to a printer. If you type the letter next to a subdirectory name you go to that subdirectory and can run advanced basic programs from there. You can print a current directory listing in either normal sized print or in superscript with tiny line feeds designed to fit onto 3.5 inch labels. The label includes the volume name and current date. All of the following applications can be run from the MYMENU2+ startup menu: "Load ASM" which allows you to load and run object code files that can be executed from the advanced basic environment. You have to know the path name of the file you want to run. You can't just put the cursor next to an object code file name and run it. Also, you need to know if the file runs directly from a CALL LOAD or whether it needs to be CALL LOADed and then CALL LINKed to. "Calc" which is the four function calculator written in basic that was published in Micropendium several years ago. A little window appears within the MYMENU2+ startup menu with the calculator in the window. When you exit the calculator the window disappears and the startup menu is restored. "MYFORMAT" which is a floppy disk formatter with lots of options. You can set the skew and interlace of the formatted disk. The only other Geneve application that lets you configure these parameters is the quick disk copy program hypercopy. Myformat also has an optional timed disk test cycle which you can experiment with to determine which skew and interlace settings give the fastest read/write results. You can also use the test cycle to identify your fastest and slowest floppy drives with respect to read/write speed. "BKUP" can be used to back up the entire contents of your HFDC controlled hard drive. It doesn't work with SCSI drives. BKUP will create a series of batch files that can be used to back up your entire hard drive and squeeze the maximum number of unarchived hard drive files onto the fewest number of disks. BKUP makes batch files for backing up and later restoring the entire hard disk directory structure. It also tells you how many floppy disks to format prior to backing up your hard drive. Once these batch files are produced by BKUP you exit to MDOS and run the first batch file. You will be told to insert disk 1, then disk 2, etc. of the disks you were told to have preformatted until your whole hard drive is backed up. Later if you have to reinitialize your hard drive, you run another batch file and insert your backup disks 1,2,3, etc when told on screen by the restore batch file. Your entire hard drive with all its directories and subdirectories will be restored. "QLABEL" prints text and graphics on 3.5 inch labels. This is an excellent very user friendly utility! You can have up to 7 lines of text in your choice of printer fonts (condensed, emphasized, etc) with a TIPS graphic on the left side. The graphic is optional. You need a set of TIPS graphic files if you want a graphic, but you don't need to know the names of the TIPS files or the graphics within the files. Just tell QLABEL where the TIPS files are located (eg. DSK1. or SCS1.TIPS.). QLABEL will tell you the names of the graphics you may chose within the TIPS file. Your label design, with selected graphic image will appear on screen for your approval prior to printing. You then tell the computer how many of these labels to print. This little utility is a great way to make practical use of your collection of TIPS graphic files. "DDI DISM" lets you disassemble any page of the Geneve's memory or EA5 programs loaded into memory. You can also disassemble the DSR of any card in your PE box by specifying Geneve memory page BA and the appropriate CRU address. The disassembly can be veiwed on screen or sent to a printer or disk file. Disassemblies sent to a printer can eat up lots of paper printing only on the left side of the page, so one of the printer options lets you print the disassembly to a disk file that you can later, using software provided with MYMENU@+, print out in multiple columns. This saves lots of paper. The main menu gives you these choices: disassemble opcode, display hex data, read ascii text, read with offset >60, BL and BLWP branches, REF/DEF table, and restart. "DDI WORD" is a basic word processor (written in basic and with only basic editing capabilities) with very full featured printout options. It is an 80 column line oriented word processor without word wrap. Type in a line of text and press to put that line in the text buffer, then type and the next line, etc. Any additions deletions or corrections to one line do not automatically affect any of the other lines of your document. There are no tab settings. If you want lines consistantly shorter than 80 columns this has to be taken care of manually as you enter each line. Margins can be created at the time of printout. The fact that I am writing the MYMENU2+ part of this microreview using DDI WORD means it is a usable word processor, but it doesn't approach the Funnelweb editor for ease of use. The following options are available from the DDI WORD menu: add text, delete line, insert line, change line, move line, change word (like TI Writer's "replace string"), print file, save file, load file (appends the file to the contents of the edit buffer), display buffer (after you have loaded a file), kill file (delete any disk file), restart (clears edit buffer), and exit. As you edit or display the contents of the edit buffer line numbers are displayed. Working on existing text is done based on these text line numbers. The really cool thing about DDI WORD is the variety of printout options. When you select print file you are presented with these choices: emphasized, double width, near letter quality, proportional, double strike, italics, condensed, superscript, and end. You can select as many as you want (for example emphasized + double width + double strike for really big dark text) with "end" as your last choice. These same printer choices are also available in Qlabel. Printer codes for these features can be altered in DDI WORD's advanced basic code if needed. I found that only NLQ had to be changed from the defaults to make it work with my ancient Star SG10 printer. After selecting a printer font you are given these additional selections: -Length of File Lines. This is the maximum length of any text line in your document. -Printer line length 80/132 or 136. If you select 132 then you will automatically use "condensed" print even if you did not select condensed from the previous menu. -Line spacing x/216. This determines line feed spacing. If you accept the default of 36 then normal pica sized text will print out double spaced. Using tiny line spacing and condensed or superscript font you can print tons of text on a single sheet of paper. -Page length. How many lines of text per page. -Left and right margins. You need to plan the line length of your text as you create text in order to utilize these margins properly. -Number of columns. Thats right! DDI WORD will print your text in parallel columns. This feature works great! The only thing you have to plan is the length of your file lines times the number of columns cannot exceed the printer line length. A file line length of 40 (as you create the text) and a printer line length of 132 will give you lots of room for 3 parallel columns of text. (40x3=120 which is less than 132). There are other columnizers, notably one created by Jim Peterson. But I like DDI WORD best for printing columns because the function is built right into the word processor. DDI WORD's combination of user selected printer fonts and line feed spacing plus the ability to generate multiple columns of text give the user tremendous control of the printed product. The only thing you can't get in your printout with this word processor is right justification. "MYPLAN" is a spreadsheet. It can be up to 18 columns and 18 rows, a total of 324 cells. Each cell can have a maximum of 28 characters of text or numerals, but only 13 of these will show in a printout. You get an on screen display of either 2 or 4 columns at a time, your choice. The two column display with 13 characters visible per cell is easier to read. In the four column mode you only see 7 characters and numbers beyond the range of +- 1000 are displayed in scientific notation. Formulas can include column sum and row sum as well as plus minus multiply divide and exponents and are entered using a syntax defined in the documentation. There is excellent error trapping to tell you if your formula syntax is incorrect. There are a number of print options. The most useful is printing the entire spread sheet's columns and rows. This can be done 9 columns at a time using any dot matrix printer that supports compressed print and 132 characters per line (almost all do). It takes two sheets of paper to print out all 18 columns, but you can selectively print only the 9 columns beginning at the cursor position. Such a printout can also be directed to a disk as a DV80 file with no control characters. Functions are available from the keyboard with the F1 to F9 keys, or with the CTRL key and a number key. You need the included keyboard overlay strip to tell you which keys to press, since there is no on line help. Available functions include: Load spreadsheet file, Save spreadsheet to a disk file, Dump sheet (a long vetical list of each cell and its contents), Print sheet 9 columns at a time, 2 or 4 column view toggle, Home to cell A1, Page display left, Page display right, Clear a single column, Clear the entire spread sheet, Edit the entire 28 characters in a cell, Copy one cell to another cell location, Text entry, Numeric/formula entry, Exit the spreadsheet and return to the MYMENU2+ main menu, and of cource Compute spreadsheet. Computation time is seconds to minutes depending on the complexity of the spreadsheet. Because the Geneve is fast, computation time is faster than it is for any non Multiplan spreadsheet ever written for the 99/4A. In fact, computation time may be faster than Multiplan on a 99/4A. MYPLAN is not as good as Multiplan. Calculation speed is slower than with Multiplan, and unlike Multiplan you are limited to a relateively small number of rows and columns and you don't get an 80 column screen display. In its favor, MYPLAN is very easy to use, in part because it is always conveniently available from the MYMENU2+ main menu. MYMENU2+ is commercial and only available from DDI Software. The software and on disk documentation come on a DSSD disk and costs $30. After finishing this review I sent in my money to purchase my review copy. I consider this money well spent. ------------------------- RAVE SPEECH SYNTHESIZER ADAPTER CARD by the Rave division of Cecure Electronics. This device is the only way to add speech to a Geneve system. You just unscrew your 99/4A speech synthesizer box, remove the circuit board and plug it onto the Rave card. Then you plug the Rave speech card into your pbox. Thats all there is to it! There are no CRU switches to set, no special software to load, nothing complicated at all. This setup makes your Geneve 100% compatible with all 99/4A software that uses speech. This software includes command module games, TEII speech, extended basic speech, and TI's "Text to Speech" software. The Rave speech card also works on 99/4A systems, allowing a 99/4A user to move the speech circuit board into the pbox. As of this writing Cecure has purchased the entire inventory of the Rave company, and has the speech card on sale for $30 plus shipping. The original price was $50. I hope this price is still valid by the time you read this. Every Geneve owner should have speech. Here is one potential Geneve and 99/4A speech application. I have written a small TI extended basic program that utilizes TI's "Text To Speech" software to allow both Geneve and 99/4A computers to speak any DV80 text file. Just start my program, input the path of the desired text file when asked, and listen to the computer speak the file to you. The trick is to convert the text file to all upper case, since TEII speech and extended basic "Text to Speech" only speak words spelled in upper case. My program does not work in advanced basic because Text to speech doesn't work in the advanced basic environment. Send me $1 and I will send you my program on a SSSD disk together with the necessary Text To Speech files. -------------------- ACCESS: Cecure Electonics (Rave Speech Adapter, new and used Geneve computers, Geneve compatible keyboards and monochrome monitor cables) P.O. Box 2. Muskego WI 53150. Credit card order only phone 800-959-9460 (note those last four digits). Information and technical help phone 414-679-9918. DDI Software (aka Jim Uzzell, source of MYMENU2+). HQ Airsouth. PSC 813 Box 105. FPO AE 09620. Charles Good (text file speaker software). P.O. Box 647. Venedocia OH 45894. Phone 419-667-3131. Email good.6@osu.edu (now my preferred address). Visit the Venedocia Ohio Home Page at http://www.bright.net/~cgood