1255 lines
39 KiB
Plaintext
1255 lines
39 KiB
Plaintext
FIDONEWS -- 07 Oct 85 03:02:43 Page 1
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Volume 2, Number 34 7 October 1985
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+----------------------------------------------------------+
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| / \ |
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| - Fidonews - /|oo \ |
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| Fido and Fidonet _`@/_ \ _ |
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| Users Group | | \ \\ |
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| Newsletter | (*) | \ )) |
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| ______ |__U__| / \// |
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| / FIDO \ _//|| _\ / |
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| (________) (_/(_|(____/ |
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| (jm) |
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+----------------------------------------------------------+
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Publisher: Fido 107/7
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Chief Procrastinator: Thom Henderson
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Review Editor: Andy Foray
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Fido Utility Review Editor: Ben Baker
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Regional Bureau Chiefs: Network hosts everywhere
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Fidonews is published weekly by SEAboard, Fido 107/7. You
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are encouraged to submit articles for publication in
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Fidonews. Article submission standards are contained in the
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file FIDONEWS.DOC, available from Fido 107/7.
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Disclaimer or don't-blame-us:
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The contents of the articles contained here are not our
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responsibility, nor do we necessarily agree with them;
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everything here is subject to debate. We publish EVERYTHING
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received.
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NEC SCHMEC
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The NEC v20 and v30 chips certainly seem to have hit a
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responsive cord. I guess there's a lot of appeal to the
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idea of boosting the speed of your computer for only a few
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dollars.
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I can well understand it. When I first started working on
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the PC I found it annoying that system response time didn't
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get any better after five o'clock. A salesman for one of
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our clients would claim that a major advantage of using a PC
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was "consistent performance". Our usual response was,
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"Yeah, consistently bad."
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These days I just suffer along, and keep a book handy for
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those long compiles. It's still nothing like having a
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Honeywell 6640 at your beck and call, but I've gotten used
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to it.
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FIDONEWS -- 07 Oct 85 03:02:46 Page 2
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Oh, it's not all bad, by any means. At least I own my own
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hardware now. I no longer have to worry about moving all my
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stuff every time I change clients. Still, it could be
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faster.
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By all appearances I'm not the only one who feels that way.
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There certainly seems to be quite a market for "accelerator
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boards". Greater speed also seems to be the main reason
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people want AT's. And now all this fuss over the NEC chip.
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It's understandable. An old maxim among programmers states
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that "there's no such thing as enough." Everybody will
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always want more speed, more memory, more disk space. Any
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time you put a limit on anything, someone will hit that
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limit and complain about it.
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A side note and example: We once worked on a project where
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there was supposed to be an exceptions table. The client
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said to allow room for ten exceptions, since he'd never
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really need more than three or four, but wanted to play it
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safe. We nodded our heads, and made room for a hundred. A
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year later we were called back to expand the size of the
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table.
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As for the NEC chip, there seems to be some disagreement on
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how well it really works. I'll let you read the reports and
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decide for yourself. I also hear that Intel is suing NEC,
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claiming that it's a straight copy of the 8088. If this is
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true, then how could it be faster? Not being a lawyer, I
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don't know. I find it amusing, though. You see, a few
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years back Datapoint was suing Intel, claiming that the 8008
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was a straight copy of a Datapoint machine -- the exact same
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logic circuitry, just etched on a single chip. (I've since
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heard it rumoured that they settled out of court.)
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People will always want more, and vendors will always claim
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to give it. There will always be a faster machine, a bigger
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disk, and so forth. As my partner keeps reminding me, if
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you don't want your equipment to become obsolete in a month,
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you're in the wrong business.
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FIDONEWS -- 07 Oct 85 03:02:47 Page 3
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============================================================
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NEWS
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============================================================
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THE COMPUTER UNDERGROUND
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pre-publication preview
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This is a pre-publication, and off-the-wall review of the
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the hottest and most realistic treatment of computer crime
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(mainly getting unauthorized mainframe access) I've seen.
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Not only do they have the logic of how to do it, they have
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sample program listings!!!. Most stuff came from pirate BBS
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systems.
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COMPUTER UNDERGROUND has stuff on ARPANET, MILNET, VAXs,
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IBMs, Telenet, Tymnet and even a program listing for how to
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crack Dialog passwords!
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Most folks running mainframes say it can't happen to them.
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COMPUTER UNDERGROUND shows it can not only happen to them,
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as portrayed on TV, but shows how incredibly simple it is
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because of sysop stupidity/laziness.
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Even the government should read this book and give it to the
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FBI as part of its training on busting crashers and data
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pirates. The book exposes some of the weakest links in
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datacom security at major corporations.
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This book is from the same publisher who brought you how to
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get a new identity, how to make bombs in your kitchen, etc.
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Send for information to the publisher:
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Loompanics Unlmited
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P.O. Box 1197
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Port Townsend, WA 98368
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If you think this book is as dangerous and revealing as I
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think it is, you'll get your friends to read it and upgrade
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their mainframe systems.
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Get ahold of Computer Underground and show folks what is
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really going on.
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Please pass on this notice.
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We are talking really big databases here!!!
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Best, Sophie Tucker from Spiv's FidoNet in San Jose.
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------------------------------------------------------------
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FIDONEWS -- 07 Oct 85 03:02:49 Page 4
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A Modest Proposal
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Kurt Reisler
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SYSOP FIDO 109/74 & 109/483
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Recently I have been receiving a lot of inqueries
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about where to obtain copies of the latest version of FIDO.
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Although I maintain both the DEC Rainbow and the IBM PC
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versions for downloading on FIDO 109/483 (Wash-A-RUG), and I
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know that they are also available on FIDO 100/22, 101/27 and
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125/1 (of course), I would like to be able to direct these
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individuals to the nearest "distribution" nodes.
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So, I would like to propose the following. I would
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like to build a list of "distribution" nodes, their
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locations, phone numbers, and versions of FIDO that the
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maintain (ie DEC, IBM, SANYO, etc.). Those of you who are
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maintaining FIDO distributions on line, please let me know
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via FIDOMAIL, and I will compile all of this information
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into a list which can be published in the FIDONEWS, as well
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as distributed via UUCP/USENET to the rest of the world.
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So, please send the requested information to me
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(SYSOP) at FIDO 109/74 (The Bear's Den), and I will get
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started compiling this FIDO distribution list.
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Thanks - Kurt
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FIDONEWS -- 07 Oct 85 03:02:50 Page 5
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Submitted by Donald Larson, Node 115/333
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*** MORE REGARDING THE NEC V20 MICROPROCESSOR CHIP ***
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Downloaded from another Chicago BBS system
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The following note appeared recently on USENet (net.micro).
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It seems to be the best summary so far of the NEC V20/30 -
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iAPX86/88 controversy. I'm posting it in it's entirety:
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From: tweten@AMES-NAS.ARPA (Dave Tweten)
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Subject: Re: NEC V20 ---> 8088
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Date-Received: 16 Sep 85 08:45:42 GMT
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I recently bought an NEC V20 and installed it in my Z-151,
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which I am using to write this message. When I pried the
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8088 out from next to my 8087, I noticed that it too had
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been a NEC part. Contrary to earlier comments in this forum
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about NEC 8088s not working with 8087s, it had worked
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flawlessly with my 8087 for the previous year.
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Preliminary experience is that the V20 speeds up some
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programs noticably, and has no effect on others. That is to
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be expected. If a program is 8087 limited or I/O limited,
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speeding up the 8088 will do no good. It has worked at
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least as well as the 8088 for any program I have tried.
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The only "negative" effect of the V20 is it causes Zenith's
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disk-based diagnostics for CPU-board crystal frequency, and
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for floppy-disk driver crystal frequency to fail. I presume
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the tests compare crystal cycles against a wait-loop
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counter. Since the NEC V20 "waits faster" the tests fail.
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Sorry, no time yet to do benchmarks.
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From: Charles R. LaBrec <crl@Newton.Purdue.EDU>
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I haven't really heard many specifics of the NEC V20. Is it
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really a case of design stealing or just a case of
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duplicating the 8088 instruction set? Would someone care to
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enlighten me?
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I don't presume to be an engineering law expert, but by no
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strech of my imagination can I conceive to the V20 being an
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8088 carbon copy, either legal or illegal. The following
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information was gleened from Intel's "iAPX 88 BOOK" and from
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the NEC document titled "V20, uPD70108, HIGH-PERFORMANCE 16-
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BIT MICROPROCESSOR, PRELIMINARY INFORMATION", dated May
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1985.
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The time for a register-to-register ADD is quoted as
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three clocks for the 8088, two clocks for the V20. NEC's
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literature claims that is due to dual 16-bit on-chip busses
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for the V20, as opposed to a single bus in the 8088. That
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supposedly permits two-cycle register-register instructions
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(get both operands, return result), where the 8088 uses
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three (get one operand, get the other, return the result).
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FIDONEWS -- 07 Oct 85 03:02:52 Page 6
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A quick scan through the respective instruction timing
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charts indicates that the relationship holds for all trivial
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two-register instructions (this obviously doesn't apply to
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multiply and divide).
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Intel's register-register 16-bit operand, 32-bit result
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multiply is quoted at 118-113 clocks. NEC's is quoted as
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41-47. The equivalent divide times are 165-184 cycles for
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Intel and 38-43 for NEC. Yes, I too noticed that NEC claims
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to divide faster than they multiply, and I can't explain it
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either.
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NEC claims to use a separate address resolution unit on
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the chip, instead of using the arithmetic unit. Their
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effective address calculation time is two cycles for any
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mode. Intel's ranges from 5 to 12, depending on mode.
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The NEC chip has an expanded instruction set. By my
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estimation, it includes all the 80186 set plus several more.
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It has bit-field insert and extract (perhaps useful in low
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level graphics?). It can test and manipulate individual
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bits in memory. It has packed decimal string add, subtract
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and compare. It has a BCD digit rotate instruction. Those
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are the highlights (as I see them); there are several more
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instructions I haven't mentioned. There is also a complete
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8080 emulation mode which interests me not at all.
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In summary, it appears to me that if the V20 is a "pirate"
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8088, then the Z-80 was a "pirate" 8080. Is our chauvinism
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showing?
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------------------------------------------------------------
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<Additional comments, notations from another board>
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------------------------------------------------------------
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18:33:11 9/17/1985
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NEC V20 CPU chip
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Triple 8088 speed.
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The NEC V20 CPU chip is an 8088 CPU chip replacement. Speed
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improvements of 10-40% have been claimed for the chip.
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It may be that these percentage increases in speed
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understate the actual improvement attributable to the chip
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alone, since they may include disk operations or other
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operations that are not CPU-intensive.
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The program CPU.COM tests the speed of a CPU with minimal
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RAM access and no disk I/O. The speed of the CPU is almost
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TRIPLE the speed of the native Intel 8088:
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-------------------
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C>cpu
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CLOCK SPEED CHECKER (minimal RAM access), please wait...
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Execution time should be 10.00 secs if 4.77 Mhz clock & no
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WAITs on RAM access
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Actual execution time here was 03.35 seconds
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FIDONEWS -- 07 Oct 85 03:02:54 Page 7
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Effective clock speed = >.23 Mhz
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C>
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-------------------
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The above effective clock speed of ">.23 Mhz" is 14.23 Mhz.
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Evidentally the program CPU.COM did not anticipate double-
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digit clock rates.
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The above test was performed on an IBM Portable PC.
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This chip can be purchased from JDR Microdevices for about
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$20. See a recent issue of Byte for their ad.
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Zider Brothers, San Francisco.
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17:17:40 9/23/1985
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NEC V20 CPU chip
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PPC 70% speed improvement.
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Further to the earlier note on the NEC V20 chip. Tested
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with the system speed test SI in the Norton Utilities
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Version 3.0 on an IBM Portable PC. Factor of 1.7 times the
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PC:
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------------------------
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C>si
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SI-System Information, Version 3.00, (C) Copyright 1984,
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Peter Norton
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IBM/PC
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Built-in BIOS programs dated Monday, November 8, 1982
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Operating under DOS 2.00
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4 logical disk drives, A: through D:
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The operating system reports 512K of memory
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A test of random access memory (RAM) finds:
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512K from hex paragraph 0000 to 8000
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32K from hex paragraph B800 to C000
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(some may be phantom memory)
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BIOS signature found at hex paragraph C800
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Programs are loaded at hex paragraph 1AF2
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following 110,368 bytes of system memory
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Computing performance index relative to IBM/PC: 1.7
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C>
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-----------------------------------
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Zider Brothers, San Francisco.
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17:21:44 9/23/1985
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NEC V20 CPU chip - Pfaster286
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Incompatible with Pfaster286 board.
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FIDONEWS -- 07 Oct 85 03:02:55 Page 8
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According to a telcon with Phoenix Software Associates, the
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NEC V20 chip is incompatible with their Pfaster286
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coprocessor board.
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The Pfaster286 software uses the PUSHA (Push All)
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instruction to determine if the chip in use is the 80286 or
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the 8088. The 8088 gives an error if this instruction is
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attempted. But the NEC V20 has implemented this instruction
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(80186 instruction set) and gives no error. A revision to
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the software (or hardware?) will be coming Real Soon Now.
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Zider Brothers, San Francisco.
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-------------------------------------------------------------
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Just thought I'd add some further wood onto the fire
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regarding the NEC V20. Although I do not support the issue
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of hardware piracy, if the information above regarding
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instruction set and architecture is correct, I must admit
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that I too fail to see how one could claim it as a copy.
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Instruction set compatability has been around since the
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System 360 series came out.
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Also, regarding the issue of selling below cost as a method
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of attempting to destroy competitors was discussed in the
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last issue. Although I can't prove that it applies in this
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case, Japanese firms tend to make decisions based on long
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term planning. Although any chip is expensive while a firm
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is "ramping up", the cost is driven down by high demand and
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improvements which cause higher yields. American history in
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chip building bears this out. Zilog introduced the Z-80
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series at about a tenth of the Intel product cost and
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managed to survive over the long run.
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Although I'm not trying to create a war, I would really like
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to find out the straight story from someone who is more of a
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student of MPU architecture and associated micro-code
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regarding the issue of whether the V20 is an illegal copy or
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not. Please feel free to enter any and all rebuttals in this
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forum or on Node 115/333 directly (312-397-6888) or via
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Fidomail.
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Donald Larson
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Sysop
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Node 115/333 Attache Node
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------------------------------------------------------------
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FIDONEWS -- 07 Oct 85 03:02:57 Page 9
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PRIVATE or PUBLIC
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An ongoing debate
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by Karl Schinke,
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(sysop of The Wizards Tower, 107/16)
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There has been a debate here at The Wizard's Tower, and
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on other boards, Fido and non-Fido, as to whether to be
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public, private, semi-private or whatever.
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The question is this: we as Sysops of our boards are
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responsible, and may in fact be legally liable, for the
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content of our boards.
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As much as we may desparage the current legal thinking,
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it seems real enough that we have some obligation to keep
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our boards legal.
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The problem, of course, is that there is no known way
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for a program to sieve the messages and files on a board for
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their content, to determine if they represent "shady"
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activities, so the Sysop must manually scan the stuff
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periodically.
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But even then, what do you do? You kill the message,
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remove the file, etc. but by then, damage may have been
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done, and you, dear sysop, have been unwitting accessory to
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whatever. And what recourse do you have?
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I spoke to my lawyer when I started the board. He
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suggested posting a disclaimer (which we did) and close
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scrutiny (which we do), but didn't think the disclaimer
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would actually hold up in court, if it came to that.
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We here at "The Tower" do not have a terrific answer to
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share with you, but a policy which has (so far) seemed to
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work: we register our users.
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We don't care what username people log in with, thereby
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preserving anonymity from other users, but we require that
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users register their real names, addresses, and vox phone
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numbers with us before they may download or leave messages.
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The questionnaire explains the policy, and promises not
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to use the information (sell a mailing list) or disclose it
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to other users.
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Unregistered users may read public messages, list the
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files directory, etc... basically snoop around, and decide
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whether they like the place before registering.
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Initially, this was all we did. But we determined, by
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spot-checks, that some users were lying- gave non- existant
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addresses, phone numbers of people who didn't know a
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computer from a cigarette machine, and so forth.
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Consequently, we altered our policy to a verification
|
|
scheme, we call registrants by voice phone.
|
|
The premise, of course, is that if anyone misbehaves,
|
|
we've "got their number" and can point the fickle finger.
|
|
So far, all our users have been well behaved. Of course,
|
|
since the vast majority of BBS'ers are honest, well behaved
|
|
people, they may have been anyway. We can't actually tell
|
|
if we discouraged any "unwelcome guests".
|
|
A few one-time callers have left messages to sysop with
|
|
scatological or otherwise disparaging comment, but in the
|
|
main, folks seem to go along with us. The one problem, of
|
|
course, is the trouble we have of making those darn phone
|
|
calls!
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FIDONEWS -- 07 Oct 85 03:02:59 Page 10
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If anyone has an idea how we can protect ourselves
|
|
without all this hu-hu, please drop us a line, or a rebuttal
|
|
in this newsletter.
|
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------------------------------------------------------------
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FIDONEWS -- 07 Oct 85 03:02:59 Page 11
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Corporate Nets and Nodes
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As many of you realize, Fido has spread far beyond the
|
|
wildest imagination of any of the original planners whose
|
|
intent was to develop a hobbiest network. Fido and FidoNet
|
|
have caught the attention of many Fortune 500 Corporations.
|
|
Some are obvious from the nodelist and others are buried
|
|
under disquised names, some have 1000 series private nets
|
|
and others are out there doing their own thing.
|
|
|
|
Since the beginning of nodelist administration in St. Louis I
|
|
have attempted to keep records of the corporations that have
|
|
obtained Fido. We would like to share this list with our
|
|
users with the intent that perhaps we can obtain more
|
|
information for our database. If you have information on
|
|
these or other Fortune 500 Fido's that you would like to
|
|
pass on to 1/0 I would appreciate the data.
|
|
|
|
The list I currently have, which is not all verified, is as
|
|
follows:
|
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|
|
3M
|
|
Bendix
|
|
Boeing
|
|
COMPAQ Computer
|
|
CONTEL
|
|
Department of Commerce
|
|
Dupont
|
|
Environmental Research Laboratory
|
|
GMCC
|
|
General Motors
|
|
Georgia-Pacific
|
|
Grumman
|
|
Honeywell
|
|
Hughes Aircraft
|
|
Internal Revenue Service
|
|
L5Net Gateway
|
|
McGraw Hill and BYTE Magazine
|
|
Mountain Bell (or whatever their new name is)
|
|
NASA
|
|
NOAA
|
|
National Park Services
|
|
Phoenix Software
|
|
Southwestern Bell Telephone Co.
|
|
TWA
|
|
US Professional Golfers Association
|
|
USRobotics
|
|
Ziff-Davis and PC-Week
|
|
|
|
plus many many more which I don't know about...
|
|
|
|
We would like to hear from our Corporate Fido's. Please
|
|
send a message to Ken Kaplan at 1/0 (314-576-2743).
|
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|
|
Thanks for your support and keep spreading the word,
|
|
|
|
Ken Kaplan
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FIDONEWS -- 07 Oct 85 03:03:01 Page 12
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FidoNet Administrator
|
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National Net (1/0)
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------------------------------------------------------------
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FIDONEWS -- 07 Oct 85 03:03:01 Page 13
|
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Tom Jennings
|
|
Fido 125/1
|
|
30 Sept 85
|
|
|
|
NEC 'V' Series Processors: A review
|
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|
|
|
I purchased a NEC V30 (the 8086 replacement; the V20
|
|
is the 8088 replacement) this past month, and was a bit
|
|
disappointed with the results I got.
|
|
|
|
The V20 is actually an 8088 pin compatible 80188
|
|
minus the onboard IO devices, and V30 ditto 8086. The
|
|
instructions marked "Enhanced" in the NEC documentation are
|
|
the new, Intel, 8018x instructions; the ones marked "Unique"
|
|
are unique to the NEC series. I have not compared clock
|
|
cycles V30 vs. 80186, etc, but I would bet they are the
|
|
same.
|
|
|
|
I was told of wondrous speed increases, though the
|
|
range was given as "5 - 80%", which of course means down in
|
|
the 5% range is what you get; this is of course what I
|
|
found.
|
|
|
|
I have a Multibuss based machine running an Intel
|
|
SBC86/12A processor card, which uses an 8086, and modified
|
|
to run at 7.3MHz. I run MSDOS 3.05 on it. I use it for all
|
|
my work, including compiling Fido, documentation, etc. I use
|
|
the Lattice compiler, which is a fine program though on the
|
|
slow side. I figured that if I could get a real life 20%
|
|
speed increase I'd be very happy.
|
|
|
|
It is not possible to do "seat of the pants" testing
|
|
with something like this; you have to set up SOME sort of
|
|
test. I did all testing on an empirical basis. I do not
|
|
use the Seive of Erasthenes, bubble sorts, or other arcane
|
|
things day to day. I edit, compile, and other things like
|
|
most everyone else.
|
|
|
|
One thing I do not do is use spreadsheets or other
|
|
"math intensive" programs. The V series chips will NOT
|
|
necessarily speed up programs that use (or could use) the
|
|
8087 coprocessor. You will hear that the V series chips are
|
|
substantially faster doing "math" than the Intel parts.
|
|
This is absolutely true, however, you will rarely see the
|
|
advertised speed increases supposedly possible.
|
|
|
|
The reason for the less than advertised speed
|
|
increase is that even in a program such as a spreadsheet,
|
|
the number of non-math instructions (jumps, logical
|
|
operations, bit testing, register and stack manipulation,
|
|
etc) that any CPU does far outnumbers the math type
|
|
instructions (multiply and divide mostly). Even if multiply
|
|
and divide took zero time, your programs would not take zero
|
|
minutes to execute.
|
|
|
|
This is not to say that there are not isolated
|
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FIDONEWS -- 07 Oct 85 03:03:03 Page 14
|
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|
|
incidents; this means that plugging in this chip, or any
|
|
other real or fictional device, will not get you monstrous
|
|
speed increases.
|
|
|
|
The tests I did are admittedly systems oriented
|
|
tasks, though they are very applicable to estimating the
|
|
performance you will get in normal, daily use. The tests are
|
|
as follows:
|
|
|
|
|
|
(a) Fido Compile. This consisted of a Lattice compile of
|
|
a number of Fido BBS modules, ones that it was convenient
|
|
(and easily repeatable) to cause a recompile. (I use a MAKE
|
|
type system, and I need to fool it.) This test was the "all
|
|
around" test; Lattice seems to spend less than 1/4th its
|
|
time doing disk IO, mostly it seems to be "working" with the
|
|
program source in memory. Lattice is a predominantly compute
|
|
bound program.
|
|
|
|
(b) LISTGEN NODELIST.256. This is definitely compute
|
|
bound; compiled BASIC string manipulation.
|
|
|
|
(c) ZAPLOAD FIDO_FID.EXE F FOO.HEX . ZAPLOAD is a
|
|
program that generates Intel HEX format. (ASCII
|
|
representation of a file.) It should be IO bound, but is not
|
|
due to poor programming. (What can I say?)
|
|
|
|
(d) SCAVENGE A: SCAVENGE reads all blocks of a disk and
|
|
maps out bad sectors. My A: is a 10 meg hard disk, an
|
|
extremely fast one. This is definitely IO bound, with very
|
|
optimal drivers. This is a "control" test, and should not
|
|
vary, since the speed of executions is limited by the disk
|
|
not the processor.
|
|
|
|
(e) Assemble the Multibuss BIOS. The BIOS of my
|
|
Multibuss box is about 20 .ASM source files. MASM.EXE is
|
|
very definitely compute bound. (Which by the way is the
|
|
worst assembler anyone will ever see. It should be IO
|
|
bound!)
|
|
|
|
|
|
I performed these five tests first with the 8086
|
|
installed, then after replacing the 8086 with the V30. No
|
|
other changes were made. Timing was done by a special
|
|
program that keeps a millisecond counter that I use for
|
|
general benchmarking, and is highly accurate and repeatable.
|
|
here are the results:
|
|
|
|
TEST 8086 V30 Change
|
|
(a) Compile Fido BBS 43:10 40:53 5.5%
|
|
(b) Listgen 04:23 04:08 6.0%
|
|
(c) Zapload 08:36 08:42 -1.1%
|
|
(d) Scavenge 04:14 04:14 0%
|
|
(e) Assemble BIOS 05:23 05:07 5.2%
|
|
|
|
|
|
The results are pretty clear, and are verifiable.
|
|
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|
|
FIDONEWS -- 07 Oct 85 03:03:05 Page 15
|
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|
|
SCAVENGE is SCAV23X.COM, LISTGEN is John Warren's program,
|
|
ZAPLOAD should be out there somewhere, Lattice and MASM you
|
|
can find.
|
|
|
|
I cannot account for the ZAPLOAD test. It should
|
|
not have slowed down. It may be an anomaly.
|
|
|
|
Anyone who uses MASM knows that it is terribly slow,
|
|
and for some unknown reason compute bound. (An assembler?!)
|
|
It is written in Microsoft Pascal, so I guess that's it.
|
|
|
|
An 8087 will NOT speed up when using the V30/V20
|
|
series. It runs at its own clock rate.
|
|
|
|
------------------------------------------------------------
|
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FIDONEWS -- 07 Oct 85 03:03:05 Page 16
|
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|
|
Robert Lederman
|
|
Met-Chem Fido 16/42
|
|
|
|
|
|
NEW FIDO SYSOP UTILITIES FOR YOU
|
|
---=----=-----=---------=---=---
|
|
|
|
I have written two pretty slick Fido SYSOP utilities that
|
|
can save you an enormous amount of time in maintaining your
|
|
system. Come and get 'em!
|
|
|
|
SHUFFLE redirects files and their corresponding FILES.BBS
|
|
entries among download directories. SHUFFLE also permits
|
|
rudimentary editing of file entries a la EDLIN, and will
|
|
incorporate "orphan" files into FILES.BBS. I think SHUFFLE
|
|
is far superior to similar programs available elsewhere.
|
|
|
|
READQUES reads ANSWERS.BBS (or ANEWUSER.BBS if the bug in
|
|
Fido 11 is ever fixed), displays the caller's statistics
|
|
from USER.BBS along with the questionnaire responses, and
|
|
prompts the sysop to upgrade the caller's access or mark
|
|
that record for deletion. Admitting new users to semi-
|
|
private systems is now a breeze.
|
|
|
|
Both programs can be used either locally using ANSI.SYS or
|
|
remotely using ANSI/VT100/VT52 emulation. This is key for
|
|
people like me who live far away from the Fidos they
|
|
maintain.
|
|
|
|
You can get SHUFFLE (v1.3) and READQUES (v1.1) by calling
|
|
the Met-Chem BBS at 203/281-7287 (2400/1200 baud).
|
|
|
|
Robert Lederman
|
|
sysop, 16/42
|
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FIDONEWS -- 07 Oct 85 03:03:07 Page 17
|
|
|
|
============================================================
|
|
COLUMNS
|
|
============================================================
|
|
A long time ago... on a node far, far away (from PDPvax)
|
|
|
|
XXXXX XXXXXX XXXX
|
|
X X X X X
|
|
X X XXXXX X
|
|
X X X X
|
|
X X X X X
|
|
XXXXX XXXXXX XXXX
|
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|
|
X X XX XXXXX XXXX
|
|
X X X X X X X
|
|
X X X X X X XXXX
|
|
X XX X XXXXXX XXXXX X
|
|
XX XX X X X X X X
|
|
X X X X X X XXXX
|
|
|
|
|
|
The even further adventures of Luke Vaxhacker Episode n+2
|
|
|
|
The Milliamp Falcon hurtles on thru system space...
|
|
|
|
Con Solo finished checking the various control and
|
|
status registers, finally convinced himself that they had
|
|
lost the Bus Signals as they passed the terminator. As he
|
|
returned from the I/O page, he smelled smoke. Solo wasn't
|
|
concerned--the Bookie always got a little hot under the
|
|
collar when he was losing at chess. In fact, RS232 had just
|
|
executed a particularly clever MOV that had blocked the
|
|
Bookie's data paths. The Bookie, who had been setting the
|
|
odds on the game, was caught holding all the cards. A
|
|
little strange for a chess game...
|
|
|
|
Across the room, Luke was too busy practicing bit-slice
|
|
technique to notice the commotion.
|
|
|
|
"On a word boundary, Luke," said PDP-1. "Don't just hack
|
|
at it. Remember, the Bytesaber is the weapon of the Red-eye
|
|
Night. It is used to trim offensive lines of code. Excess
|
|
handwaving won't get you anywhere. Listen for the Carrier."
|
|
|
|
Luke turned back to the drone, which was humming quietly
|
|
in the air next to him. This time Luke's actions
|
|
complemented the drone's attacks perfectly.
|
|
|
|
Con Solo, being an unimaginative hacker, was not
|
|
impressed. "Forget this bit-slicing stuff. Give me a good
|
|
PROM blaster any day."
|
|
|
|
"~~j~~hhji~~," Said Kenobie, with no clear inflection.
|
|
He fell silent for a moment, and reasserted his control.
|
|
|
|
"What happened?" asked Luke
|
|
|
|
"Strange," said PDP-1. "I felt a momentary glitch in the
|
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|
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FIDONEWS -- 07 Oct 85 03:03:09 Page 18
|
|
|
|
carrier. It's equalized now."
|
|
|
|
"We're coming up on user space," called Solo from the
|
|
CSR. As they cruised safely thru stack frames, they emerged
|
|
in the new context only to be bombarded by freeblocks."
|
|
|
|
"What the..." gasped Solo. The screen showed clearly:
|
|
/usr/alderaan: not found "It's the right inode, but it's
|
|
been cleared! Twoie, where's the nearest file?"
|
|
|
|
"3 to 5 there's one..." The Bookie started to say, but
|
|
was interrupted by a bright flash off to the left.
|
|
|
|
"Imperial TTY fighters!" Shouted Solo. "A whole DZ of
|
|
them! Where are they coming from?"
|
|
|
|
"Can't be far from the host system," said Kenobie. "They
|
|
all have direct EIA connections."
|
|
|
|
As Solo began to give chase, the ship lurched suddenly.
|
|
Luke noticed the link count was at 3 and climbing rapidly.
|
|
|
|
"This is no regular file," murmered Kenobie. "Look at
|
|
the ODS directory structure ahead! They seem to have in a
|
|
tractor beam."
|
|
|
|
"There's no way we'll unlink in time," Said Solo. "We're
|
|
going in..."
|
|
|
|
TO BE CONTINUED???
|
|
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FIDONEWS -- 07 Oct 85 03:03:10 Page 19
|
|
|
|
============================================================
|
|
NOTICES
|
|
============================================================
|
|
|
|
The Interrupt Stack
|
|
|
|
|
|
27 Oct 1985
|
|
2 AM - Change from Daylight Savings Time to Standard
|
|
time. You should change your system clock before mail
|
|
hour this date.
|
|
|
|
27 Nov 1985
|
|
Halley's Comet passes closest to Earth before perihelion.
|
|
|
|
24 Jan 1986
|
|
Voyager 2 passes Uranus.
|
|
|
|
9 Feb 1986
|
|
Halley's Comet reaches perihelion.
|
|
|
|
11 Apr 1986
|
|
Halley's Comet reaches perigee.
|
|
|
|
19 May 1986
|
|
Steve Lemke's next birthday.
|
|
|
|
24 Aug 1989
|
|
Voyager 2 passes Neptune.
|
|
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|
|
If you have something which you would like to see on this
|
|
calendar, please send a message to Fido 107/7.
|
|
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