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Mail Archives: opendos/2002/01/17/14:47:13.1

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Message-ID: <000501c19f8f$4cb11d20$c03dfea9@atlantis>
From: "Matthias Paul" <Matthias DOT Paul AT post DOT rwth-aachen DOT de>
To: <opendos AT delorie DOT com>
References: <000c01c199a2$545cbcc0$af32ed18 AT anchorageak DOT net>
Subject: Re: PCMCIA drivers for DR-DOS
Date: Thu, 17 Jan 2002 19:59:50 +0100
Organization: University of Technology, RWTH Aachen, Germany
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On 2002-01-10, John Ross wrote:

> [...] I was mildly surprised and pleased to "discover" this firm is
> offering CardWare for DOS/Windows version 6.0.012 Unicore lists the
> software for US $69.95 plus $9.95 shipping. Shipping to Canada $25,
> outside US $35.
> [...] 
> I am not connected in any fashion with Unicore or their affiliates.
> The information is offered to DOS users wanting data regarding CardWare.
> I presume others will be interested in the same information I sought.

I think some users will find this info very useful, indeed.
Thanks for taking the time to sum it up for us.

Since John didn´t mentioned it in his original post but in private
email to me, I take the opportunity here to add the link to an
OEM version of SystemSoft´s CardSoft (DOS) for some IBM ThinkPads:

(remove the possible line-wrapping)
http://www.pc.ibm.com/qtechinfo/DSHY-3NPU8M.html?lang=en_US&page=brand&brand=IBM+ThinkPad&doctype=Downloadable+files&subtype=Cat&up=unknownuser973053588

According to the PCTPCDOS.TXT (from 1999-12-20) on this page this is
the CardSoft OEM version 5.32.23.HS4.

IBM PC DOS 7 and 2000, however, ship with Phoenix CardManager Plus 3.01
from Phoenix Technologies, Ltd. as PCMCIA SS & CS driver stack.

> Users can obtain a 15 day evaluation version or purchase the software
> at http://www.tssc.de/products/cwdos/cardware_dos.htm .

What´s most interesting is that this downloadable CardWare 6.00.12
evaluation version was last modified on 2001-11-11, that is, the product
is still being (at least partially) maintained by the German company:

 APSoft
 Sonnenstrasse 26b
 D-85622 Feldkirchen
 Germany

 FreeCall: 00824672467
 Phone:    +49(89) 900 479 0
 Fax:      +49(89) 900 479 11

(Their mantra "We help computers work" reminds me of the old
Digital Research phrase "We make computers work", somehow... :-)

It seems, Unicore is only the distributor, not the manufacturer,
so for European or German users it might be cheaper to directly
ask APSoft instead of Unicore. (The TouchStone and Award marks
in the outdated docs do no longer apply.)

A few more comments on the CardWare 6.00.12 distribution:

I find it rather odd that a Win32 pre-installer is used to create
the installation floppy disks or the file set for a product which
is intended for DOS 3.2+ (DOS 5.0+) and Windows 3.1x (according to
the docs CardWare supports the 16-bit part of Windows 95/98 as well).

Further, Windows 3.1x+ is required to run the normal installer
(SETUP), which ships inside the archive.

There´s also a DOS-only installer (INSTALL), but according to the
docs this installer is out-dated and no longer being maintained.

It is possible to manually install the files; the README.TXT refers
to a CARDWARE.WRI file (Windows Write format), which describes how
to achieve this. However, the CARDWARE.WRI file is still compressed
and must be decompressed with

 EXPAND CARDWARE.WR_ CARDWARE.WRI

first. All the other files with *.??_ extension can be decompressed
with EXPAND as well:

 *.DL_  ->  *.DLL
 *.EX_  ->  *.EXE
 *.HL_  ->  *.HLP
 *.RS_  ->  *.RSC
 *.TX_  ->  *.TXT
 *.WM_  ->  *.WMF
 *.WR_  ->  *.WRI

Just for the records, the DPMS.EXE driver shipping with 6.00.12 is
Novell´s issue of DPMS 1.44 from 1995, so this is almost up to date -
a very welcome change compared to older issues of CardWare and to
the long outdated DPMS.EXE drivers shipping with some other vendor´s
products (like Stacker or PC DOS 2000). IIRC, only very few changes
are present in the Caldera DPMS 1.44 issue. I still recommend it,
because it´s newer.

It is probably interesting to compare the DOS memory footprints
of the SystemSoft´s CardSoft, Phoenix´ CardManager, and Award/
TouchStone/Unicore/APSoft´s CardWare driver suites.

The old CardWare 2.5 (the first issue which supported DPMS)
could be reduced downto a DOS memory footprint of 11 Kb with
full Plug & Play enabled. A full installation required ca. 33 Kb.

The following comparison is taken from the German book: Bernd Mielke
"PC-Card Anwender Lösungen", 1997, Franzis Verlag, ISBN 3-7723-4313-9.
The memory gain with DPMS is quite impressive, I think:

Award CardWare  CW 1.01     CW 2.00     CW 2.50     CW 2.50     CW 5.00
             1993-11-16  1994-06-01  1994-12-01  1995-08-01  1996-06-26
             ----------  ----------  ----------  ----------  ----------
DPMS             N/A         N/A        1632        1808 [1.4]  1600 [1.44]
PCSS/SSPCIC     3296        3072         688        1200        5584
PCCS           48656       57520       43552        7872       12272
PCENABLE       41552       19328       19568        2816        3024
PCDISK         20144       22304       22304       22016       11360
PCATA            N/A         N/A         N/A         N/A        4592
PCSRAM           N/A         N/A         N/A         N/A        4592
===========  ==========  ==========  ==========  ==========  ==========
Total Bytes   113648      102224       87744       35712       43024


        Phoenix CardManager 3.0   SystemSoft CardSoft 4.2.00 (1996-03-14)
                ---------------              ----------------------------
CNFIGNAM/PHOEN         448        SSTPIC95         4688              
PCMSS                 5920        CS              59200
PCMCS                35600        ATADRV          11120
PCMRMAN                  0        MTSRAM           3024
PCMSCD               18080        MTDDRV          10480
                                  CARDID          26304
=============  ================   ========   ==========================
Total Bytes          60048        Total          114816

This should give a basic overview...

Greetings,

 Matthias

-- 

<mailto:Matthias DOT Paul AT post DOT rwth-aachen DOT de>; <mailto:mpaul AT drdos DOT org>
http://www.uni-bonn.de/~uzs180/mpdokeng.html; http://mpaul.drdos.org





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