File exchange between DOS and CP/M.
The king is dead! Hurrah, long live the king! With the introduction of MS/PC-DOS in 1981, the slow demise of CP/M also began. In the mid-1980s, a software branch developed that dealt with the exchange of files on diskette between CP/M and DOS. In this phase of transition to DOS, many people still had countless disks and programs from the CP/M era. These had to be reusable, the results of countless working hours were stored on them.
Besides the exchange of files, the emulation of CP/M from DOS computers also played an important role.
The following are the most important companies that played a major role during this time.
- Sydex, USA ............. 22Disk, 22Nice
- Micro Solutions, USA ... UniForm-PC, UniForm, UniDOS
- XenoSoft, USA .......... XenoCopy-PC
- Generics, Germany ...... SuperCopy
- FBN, Australia ......... PC-Alien, PC-Eighty, Bee-Alien
The Babylonian confusion with the CP/M disk formats! While PC/MS-DOS has only 8 disk formats, 22Disk (v1.45) supports 546, SuperCopy 3.40 and PC-Alien 1.4 about 300 different CP/M floppy disk formats! Almost every CP/M computer has its own floppy disk format! What a madness!
Sydex, USA
22DISK
Don't be surprised about the version date of 22DISK v1.45. After a very very long time, Chuck Guzis (Sydex) has been persuaded by the members of the "Vintage Computer Federation" (VCF) to sell current license versions. But this offer was only valid in August 2020! I was in the lucky position to buy one of these versions.
So far, I have mainly worked with UniForm-PC. But lately I have been using 22DISK more and more often. The advantage here is that you can switch between the different CP/M versions (/MOR1, /BEE2, /MM1, /KAY2, /EPS1, ...) very quickly via the command line. I have also had no problems with formatting so far.
Finally I formatted a floppy disk for the Microbee format (/BEE2, DS:DD:48) with 22DISK on my 286AT (with CompatiCard I) and then copied files and programs. Then I selected the appropriate format on my Kaypro 10 with UniForm and was able to access the disk and files without any problems. Only the terminal control had problems, well a Kaypro is not a Microbee!
Generics, Germany
SuperCopy
FBN, Australia
PC-Alien
PC-Eighty
Bee-Alien
Besides the program PC-Alien and PC-Eigthy FBN Systems has also released the program Bee-Alien. With Bee-Alien CP/M and DOS floppy disks could be read on a Microbee computer. But this is another story.
Manuals
- PC-Eighty: Test report / APC 12/1986
- Bee-Alien: Manual