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View Full Version : How to get Wordstar onto an IMSAI

Floppies_only
May 30th, 2008, 05:46 PM
Gang,

I'm interested in running a word processor on an IMSAI, and I was hoping that you guys could tell me what's needed. I'd like to know if running Wordstar over CP/M is the only word processing option on the IMSAI, and what kind of disk drive(s) to look for.

I know, I don't ask for much. (You see, me and a buddy have a plan to sneak into the Lost Ark warehouse (http://www.sullivanclinton.com/gallery/albums/album06/Raiders_Of_The_Lost_Ark_Government_Warehouse_new.j pg) and help ourselves to all the neato stuff that we just know is in there :)

Can you use a Lear Seigler terminal on an IMSAI?

Sean
RichCini
June 1st, 2008, 01:52 PM
Gang,

I'm interested in running a word processor on an IMSAI, and I was hoping that you guys could tell me what's needed. I'd like to know if running Wordstar over CP/M is the only word processing option on the IMSAI, and what kind of disk drive(s) to look for.

I know, I don't ask for much. (You see, me and a buddy have a plan to sneak into the Lost Ark warehouse (http://www.sullivanclinton.com/gallery/albums/album06/Raiders_Of_The_Lost_Ark_Government_Warehouse_new.j pg) and help ourselves to all the neato stuff that we just know is in there :)

Can you use a Lear Seigler terminal on an IMSAI?

Sean

You can actually do this without a floppy drive. What you need is a dual-port serial card -- one for the console and one to connect to a host PC to act as the floppy. Then, use the Altair Peripheral Emulator quoted in this thread...http://www.vintage-computer.com/vcforum/showthread.php?p=61204.

I contacted Frank and he made a special version for me so it would match my console card and memory configuration.

Once you get that running, you can download WordStar from the Walnut Creek CP/M CDROM. WCCDROM isn't available any more but I'm sure there's a mirror on-line somewhere. You can convert the files to Intel HEX and then load them into the APE disk using the tools provided from Frank.

I actually use both APE and my CompuPro disk system to move programs from CP/M archives like WCCDROM and CPMUG.