Ron's Week'n'ADAM March 1, 1998


You just never know who might be listening. Adamites following
this broadcast address (coladam-list@calum.csclub.uwaterloo.ca) 
now know that Jorge is in Uruguay and knows enough about ADAM's 
interaction with a UNIX server to be able to send a message to 
us. (And they said it couldn't be done!) Feel free to introduce 
yourselves. Jorge seems to be able to read the ADAM list, 
although a reply sent to the e-mail address he gave me could not
be delivered for reason "relaying denied". Not sure what that 
means.  At any rate, I'm sure he'll be happy to hear from us.
It's been an interesting night here in the 'snakepit'. There was
the message from Jorge, and another from an Amstrad enthusiast 
in Great Britain who hastened to assure me that Amstrads were 
still very much in use here.  Later versions that the one David 
Cobley (dcobley@island.net) just donated to my collection, but 
Amstrads nevertheless. The sysop on Compuserve in charge of
the Amstrad Forum couldn't understand why I would want such a
machine. I explained it to him. Now he knows. But that's off-
topic here.   More to the point is something that I've been want-
ing to do for some time. 
We have a fair number of new ADAM owners (or older ADAM owners
who've returned to say hello), and it's possible that some of 
these newcomers might not be aware of how much the Coleco ADAM 
computer progressed after it was orphaned by its maker. In short 
there are products that most of us take for granted which these 
people might not know about.

At the risk of boring the old hands, I'm going to provide some
information for those who might not have it.

The following items of hardware became available for the ADAM.
Some of them are still available if you know where to look.

 1)     Hard disk drive, both MFM and IDE types, 20 and 40 MEG 
        size. The controller cards for both models are in short 
        supply and are difficult to find. But they are out there.
        Standard MFM hard drives such as the ST502 are used. For-
        matting and partitioning software is available for MFM 
        types. The hard drive typically provides up to 10 logical 
        disk drive areas (1 or two Meg each, depending on total 
        hard drive size) for EOS storage, and 5 logical
        drives for TDOS formatted storage.

 2)     Memory expanders providing additional RAM. Sizes range 
        from 64k to 1 meg. (64k, 256k, 512k, 768k, and 1024k). 
        Depending on the software being used, memory expanders 
        can be used either as contiguous RAM for BASIC programs, 
        RAM disk, extra software workspace, or printer spooling.

 3)     Parallel printer support enabling the use of an Epson
        compatible 9 pin or 24 pin dot matrix printer with the 
        ADAM.

 4)     Serial ports to interface ADAM with various external 
        devices at speeds of up to 19,200 baud. 

 5)     A MIDI Interface designed to allow connection of standard
        MIDI devices such as an electronic piano keyboard or MIDI
        sequencer.  Permits the production and use of MIDI stand-
        ard files in MF0 or MF1 format. Software utilities and 
        drivers to provide for use of MIDI song files within 
        BASIC programs are also available.

 6)     An X10 Home Automation control unit, programmable using 
        ADAM software to allow the automatic switching on and of 
        or dimming of various lights, switches, and appliances 
        on a pre-scheduled  basis.

 7)     A sound digitizer cartridge that enables input of audio 
        feed from a taped source and production of a digitized 
        sampling for use within BASIC or machine language 
        programs.

 8)     80 column display units converting the standard 32 column
        ADAM video display to 80 columns. This conversion is poss-
        ible under CP/M only. 

 9)     Disk drives improving on the 160k storage capacity of the
        original Coleco disk drive. Drives capable of storing 
        360k 720k (3-1/2 inch) and 1.2 Meg (5-1/4 inch) and 1.4 
        Meg (3-1/2) drives have been produced.

 10)    External clock and time/date keeping hardware to allow time
        keeping functions such as file date stamping on the ADAM.

 11)    Multi function cards designed to occupy one or more of
        ADAM's expansion slots to provide a combination of funct-
        ions such as parallel printer port, serial ports, and/or 
        hard drive IDE interface.

 12)    Various cartridges designed to fit in the Colecovision 
        game slot and to provide file keeping and file mainten-
        ance functions such as file copying, RAM disk access, 
        and printer interface software.

Looking around my room here, these are the items that I see. By
no means do I have everything ever produced for the ADAM, but I 
believe I'm close.
There was available at one time a voice synthesizer for the ADAM,
produced I think, by Orphanware or Eve Electronics, (not sure 
which). There is also a mouse available, but difficult to find.
In terms of software, the lineup is equally impressive. Again,
I'm not going to produce an all-inclusive list here. If anyone 
would like to add to it under both hardware and software head-
ings, please feel free to do so.

Software:

 1)     A choice of wordprocessing programs and utilities  to 
        either enhance or to improve upon the capabilities 
        offered by SmartWriter.  Most notable of these operating 
        under EOS is Speedywrite which is in my view a much 
        better wordprocessor than Smartwriter for the 40 column 
        environment. It offers features that SmartWriter does
        not including centering of text, the ability to move 
        quickly around a long file, and the ability to generate 
        macro's and specialized character sets. A small pocket 
        Data base program is also included.

 2)     Some impressive graphics and drawing software. Most note-
        able among these is PowerPaint, which provides a graphics
        environment that enables production, display and/or 
        printing  of impressive graphics screens for the ADAM. 
        Clip art programs are available along with utilities that 
        enable the inclusion of graphics files in BASIC and 
        machine language programs.

 3)     Updated communications software that takes advantages of 
        the newer hardware available for the ADAM such as faster 
        external modems and 80 column displays. 

 4)     Improved data base and spreadsheet programs that allow
        maximum use of the 64K environment for data keeping and 
        numerical calculation needs.

 5)     Several improved versions of SmartBASIC, the most notable
        of which is SmartBASIC 1.x, a BASIC interpreter that 
        allows access to all modes of ADAM operation and use of 
        new post-market devices developed for the ADAM.

 6)     Fonts, Clip Art, and RLE files for use within ADAM's 
        graphics programs. These items can be loaded into Power-
        paint and used as required.

 7)     Z80 assemblers and disassemblers that operate both under
        CP/M (TDOS) or under EOS. These utilities enable the 
        production of Z80 code for ADAM and the development, 
        testing, and debugging of complex software programs.

 8)     Several file management utilities designed to facilitate
        maintenance and organization of user data on disk, data 
        pack or hard drive.  Files can be renamed, copied, moved,
        or deleted. Media can be formatted, crunched or initial-
        ized, individual blocks of code on a storage media
        can be read, written two, copied or moved. 

 9)     Commented disassembly listings of major items of ADAM
        software are available to provide the user with much 
        needed information about the operation of ADAM EOS 
        environment. Various instructional texts produced by 
        hobbyists who know ADAM well are available.

 10)    Graphics printing software is available that enables the
        user to manipulate graphics images and combine them with 
        other images thereby producing sophisticated and attract-
        ive pages, whether they be for newsletters, instructional
        material, program documentation, or whatever purpose.

 11)    There is a complete suite of sound recording and playback
        software designed for use with the MIDI interface. The 
        software is capable of using either ADAM's own 3 voice 
        sound chip, or a MIDI device if one is present.

 12)    Games have been written and distributed by talented ADAM
        hobbyists. They continue to be available in sufficient 
        quantity and quality so as to keep ADAMites entertained.

 13)    Through CP/M and TDOS, a very large number of software
        programs available on other CP/M machines are also 
        available to ADAM.  Much work has been done to install 
        these programs specifically for ADAM and to ensure that 
        appropriate overlays have been developed.  These
        programs, range in type from Data base (DBASE II) to
        Spreadsheets (SuperCalc), to Word Processing (Wordstar 4),
        to languages (Forth, Microsoft BASIC, TurboPascal, C, 
        Fortran, Cobol), to many popular utilities required for 
        file housekeeping under CP/M.

This then, is a generalized list of products that are available
for the ADAM.  I've no doubt omitted something. Feel free to fill
in the blanks.

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