Date   : Thu, 25 Aug 2011 01:02:33 +0100
From   : pete@... (Pete Turnbull)
Subject: Tube ROM

On 24/08/2011 23:04, J.G.Harston wrote:
> Rick Murray wrote:
>> Here's a question then - was there ever something non-Beeby (and not
>> FileServer) that ran on a Beeb+CoPro combo? I'd imagine you might be
>> able to run some sort of baby Unix sort of arrangement on it? You know,
> 
> With the Z80 CoPro you can run CPM

I've done a fair amount of Z80 development work on one, some of it 
within the last decade (well, almost).

I have a Z80, 6502, 32016, ARM, and M512 and Turbo units.  And a couple 
of relatively useless Torch Z80s, which use the Tube hardware on the 
Beeb side, but a Torch-designed Tube interfqce on the Z80 side, based on 
an 8255 or something similar.  Unfortunately they don't quite do the 
system calls properly so they're not 100% compatible with some Acorn 
ROMs (ie won't work in some Beebs) and also aren't quite compatible with 
CP/M because the memory map is wrong.  There are Torch-compatible 
versions of some things, and some CP/M stuff runs, but an awful lot of 
real CP/M software doesn't.

> With the Cumana Unicorn 68000 systems you can run real 68K unix.
> With the Dragon and similar 6809 CoPro systems you can run OS-9 and

Never had either of those, though I did have a Dragon until a few years 
ago, and would have liked to run OS-9.  It's a nice O/S.  What does the 
interface between Beeb and Dragon look like?

-- 
Pete                                           Peter Turnbull
                                               Network Manager
                                               University of York