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Cromemco RDOS
The Cromemco 4FDC floppy-disk controller is designed to interface both 5.25- and 8.0-inch floppy disk drives to the S-100 computer bus used in Cromemco and other IEEE 696 computers. It also contains an RS-232 serial I/O channel with software-selectable baud rates from 110 to 76,800. In addition, it has a 1 KB resident 2708 ROM containing Cromemco's RDOS, the resident disk operating system. The 4FDC was designed to drive Persci 277 8-inch single-density floppy drives. These drives were interesting in two respects: * They used a fast voice coil actuator and not a stepper motor to position the drive read write head. * The data separator electronics were on the drive itself. Due to the second fact, an unmodified 4FDC can not be used with 8-inch drives that don't have single-density data separators on the drive electronics. Later Cromemco disk controllers such as the 16FDC and 64FDC contained both single and double density data separators and the 64FDC also supplied write ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Cromemco 4FDC Color Adjusted
Cromemco, Inc. was a Mountain View, California microcomputer company known for its high-end Z80-based S-100 bus computers and peripherals in the early days of the personal computer revolution. The company began as a partnership in 1974 between Harry Garland and Roger Melen, two Stanford Ph.D. students. The company was named for their residence at Stanford University ( Crothers Memorial, a Stanford dormitory reserved for engineering graduate students). Cromemco was incorporated in 1976 and their first products were the Cromemco Cyclops digital camera, and the Cromemco Dazzler color graphics interface - both groundbreaking at the time - before they moved on to making computer systems. In December 1981, ''Inc.'' magazine named Cromemco in the top ten fastest-growing privately held companies in the U.S. In 1987, it was acquired by Dynatech Corporation of Boston. Early history The collaboration that was to become Cromemco began in 1970 when Harry Garland and Roger Melen, gradua ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Read-only Memory
Read-only memory (ROM) is a type of non-volatile memory used in computers and other electronic devices. Data stored in ROM cannot be electronically modified after the manufacture of the memory device. Read-only memory is useful for storing software that is rarely changed during the life of the system, also known as firmware. Software applications, such as video games, for programmable devices can be distributed as ROM cartridge, plug-in cartridges containing ROM. Strictly speaking, ''read-only memory'' refers to hard-wired memory, such as diode matrix or a #Solid-state ROM, mask ROM integrated circuit (IC), that cannot be electronically changed after manufacture. Although discrete circuits can be altered in principle, through the addition of Jump wire, bodge wires and the removal or replacement of components, ICs cannot. Correction of errors, or updates to the software, require new devices to be manufactured and to replace the installed device. Floating-gate ROM semiconductor ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Boot Monitor
In computing, booting is the process of starting a computer as initiated via hardware such as a physical button on the computer or by a software command. After it is switched on, a computer's central processing unit (CPU) has no software in its main memory, so some process must load software into memory before it can be executed. This may be done by hardware or firmware in the CPU, or by a separate processor in the computer system. On some systems a power-on reset (POR) does not initiate booting and the operator must initiate booting after POR completes. IBM uses the term Initial Program Load (IPL) on someE.g., System/360 through IBM Z, RS/6000 and System/38 through IBM Power Systems product lines. Restarting a computer also is called ''rebooting'', which can be "hard", e.g. after electrical power to the CPU is switched from off to on, or "soft", where the power is not cut. On some systems, a soft boot may optionally clear RAM to zero. Both hard and soft booting can be initi ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
