





         ͻ
                                                                    
                                                                    
            Date:  November, 1988                        ISSUE # 2  
                                                                    
                                                                    
                                                           
                           ¿ Ŀ Ŀ Ŀ Ŀ  ¿  Ŀ  
                             Ĵ   Ĵ         
                                           
              
                                                                    
            AN MS-DOS based magazine                                
                                                                    
                                                                    
                                                                    
                                                                    
                                                                    
                        HOPE YOU HAD A NICE HALLOWEEN               
                                                                    
                                                             
                                                                
                                                                
                                             
                                                  
                                                         
                                                              
                                                            
                                                              
                                                    
                                                                  
                                                                 
                                                                
                                                                
                                                           
                                                                 
                                                 
                                             
                                                  
                                                    
                                                     
                                                        
                                                    
                                                                    
                                        Editors -->> Ron Alcorn     
                                        Editors -->> W.H. Lambdin   
                                                                    
                                                                    
                                                                    
                                                                    
                                                                    
                      Last issue of 88, see you in 89!              
                                                                    
         ͼ







         ZIP MAGAZINE, FOR HOME MS-DOS USERS                  Page 2




         ͻ
                                                                    
                              TABLE OF CONTENTS                     
                                                                    
                                  ISSUE # 2                         
                                                                    
         ͹
                                                                    
               EDITORS CORNER .............................. 3      
               FEED BACK ................................... 4      
               K-SAT BULLETIN .............................. 5      
               SEND THE CABLE BILL OF RIGHTS TO CONGRESS ... 7      
               WHO NEEDS TO PIRATE ........................ 10      
               LETTER TO THOM HENDERSON OF S.E.A. ......... 11      
               LETTER TO COLIN SAMPALEANU ................. 12      
               LETTER TO COLIN SAMPALEANU ................. 13      
               DETEAT CALL WAITING ........................ 13      
               GETTING MORE FOR YOUR MA BELL DOLLAR ....... 14      
               ATLANTA PC-EXPO 9-24-88 .................... 15      
               HARD DRIVE INFO ............................ 16      
               RAM CHIPS LIVING WITH THE CLOUDS ........... 18      
               GOLDEN RULES ............................... 20      
               TROJAN'S AND VIRII ......................... 21      
               FLOPPY DISK DRIVES GALORE .................. 21      
               GIF PICTURES ............................... 28      
               NEED A V-20? ............................... 29      
               YMODEM vs ZMODEM ........................... 30      
               PLIGHTS & PERILS OF UPGRADING 2 ............ 30      
               OPTIMIZING THE AMSTRAD PC6400 .............. 31      
               SLOW SECTORS ............................... 32      
               VGIF 3.4 ................................... 34      
               SAMSUNG MULTI-SYNC MONITOR ................. 35      
               22 NICE .................................... 36      
               KEYBOARD DRAWER ............................ 37      
               PATERSON XT BIOS FOLLOWUP .................. 38      
               PACKARD BELL 2400I ......................... 38      
               PROGRAMMERS CHALLENGE ...................... 40      
               QEDIT 2.06 ................................. 40      
               DIRECTORY MAGIC FOLLOWUP ................... 43      
               TECHNICAL DATA NEEDED ...................... 45      
               ZIP INFO ................................... 46      
               ZIP'S COVER SHEET CONTEST .................. 47      
               QUESTIONS AND ANSWERS ...................... 48      
               NEW BBS'S .................................. 50      
               FILES MENTIONED IN ZIP ..................... 50      
               FOR SALE ................................... 51      
                                                                    
                                                                    
                                                                    
                                                                    
                                                                    
                                                                    
                                                                    
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         ZIP MAGAZINE, FOR HOME MS-DOS USERS                  Page 3




                                EDITORS CORNER
                                by W.H. Lambdin

         There  are  new  BBS's supporting ZIP.  Heath Connection, and
         Beehive.  You may see ZIP on other BBS's than the ones  noted
         in  the  BBS list.  The ones noted in the BBS List, are where
         (we the editors) will upload ZIP  to.   So  if  you  need  to
         contact  one  of us, and can't get on our BBS Secret Kingdom,
         you can leave a message to Ron or myself on any of the  BBS's
         in  the  BBS list that have * or / under the area code. There
         is one thing. My name is W.H. Lambdin on all of  those  BBS's
         with  the  exception  of  Heath  Connection.  Mr.  Curl's BBS
         doesn't allow users to use their initials, so If you want  to
         drop me a note On Heath Connection, write it to Bill Lambdin.

         I want to thank the following people. Terry West, John Baker,
         and  Helenmarie  Robitille.  for allowing Ron and I to accept
         submissions  on   these  BBS's.  Strawberry  Patch,  WOW, and
         Beehive. Also thanks goes to all the people that have offered
         suggestions, and uploaded ZIP to other BBS's.

         Zip  has  had more feedback from the first issue, than I ever
         thought possible. I have found Zip on quite a few BBS's  that
         we  did  not  upload  it  to,  and every sysop has given it a
         positive review. Thank's!

         ZIP  is  currently  looking  for associate editors If you are
         interested, let us know.  Right now we need associate editors
         for C programming, or whatever  topic  you  would  choose  to
         cover. Naturally since you receive this magazine for free, we
         will  not  be able to pay you for your efforts, but you would
         gain some experience, and help others.

         You will probably  notice  ZIP  has  gone  through  a  couple
         modifications,  Hope  you like the new layout, and content of
         this second issue. This is the last issue for  1988.  If  you
         are  interested in entering the ZIP cover sheet contest, read
         the rules, and send in your entries. The next issue  of  ZIP,
         should  be  out in January. Maybe up to 10 days late, because
         we want the winning entry to appear on  this  next  issue  of
         ZIP.

         You  will  notice  the articles about Cable. Although it does
         not directly relate to MS-DOS users, but I felt it og general
         interest, and it deserved to be printed.
















         ZIP MAGAZINE, FOR HOME MS-DOS USERS                  Page 4




                                   FEED BACK

         This is some of the response we had due to ZIP's first issue.

         I liked it!  I'd like to be included in your BBS  list..  and
         receive  future  issues  to  post on my board..  I'm going to
         write a "letter to the editor".. I do take a minor issue with
         NARC 's "amazing ability " to  extract  files  separately  to
         place  in different subdirectories.. PKxarc/unpak will do the
         same thing if you tell it what to  do..  I  move  and  update
         files in other than the current directory all the time..  and
         put  pieces  where I want them without any excess motion..  I
         don't need a menu to tell me how.. HELENMARIE ROBITILLE

         Think ZIP-1 is SUPER! JOHN MEROTH

         Splendid  Job  on  the first issue.  Enjoyed it very much.  I
         printed it with my printer. I was very surprised. It came out
         so beautifully, Headers, page  numbers,  and  everything.   I
         really  appreciate  page numbers. Makes your articles easy to
         find. THANKS!!! Can't wait to get my hands on the next issue.
         Peter Brent

         I love this classy paperless magazine. Very informative. Hope
         you decide to go monthly. Everett Dennis

         GREAT JOB!!! I enjoyed the magazine, and liked the format you
         used to display the articles. JAMES MONTGOMERY

         I  WOULD  LIKE  TO  COMPLIMENT  ALL  YOU  ON  YOUR  PAPERLESS
         MAGAZINE,, IT IS GREAT, VERY INFORMATIVE AND I REALLY ENJOYED
         THE READ!!  LOOKING FORWARD TO THE NEXT ISSUE, VERY SOON.....
         CLEATIS MESSAMORE

         ZIP  IS  THE BEST UN-PAPER MAGAZINE GOING!!!  I HAVE VIEWED A
         COUPLE OF OTHERS AND THEY WERE NOT IN THE  SAME  CLASS,  WITH
         ZIP.. CLEATIS MESSAMORE

         I AM A SYSOP OF "THE SOUTHERN CROSS" BBS IN JACKSON TN. WOULD
         IT  BE  OK  IF I OFFER ZIP AS A DOWNLOAD ON MY BOARD?  I WILL
         WAIT FOR YOUR REPLY JOSEPH ELSENER

         I really like the way ZIP organizes it's BBS list.   By  area
         code, as it should be!! Michael Koss

         You  did a hell of a job with this magazine.  I printed it on
         a HP Laser Series II printer  with  a  file  called  LJBOOK21
         (which  is  on  this board) and it turns it into a half sized
         book format with printing on both sides  of  the  pages  when
         folded  in  half.   Zip  is super and I do recommend that all
         users download a copy. - Thanks a lot for all of the work.  -
         Dave Arline









         ZIP MAGAZINE, FOR HOME MS-DOS USERS                  Page 5




         After  Reading  the  volume and quality of the first issue of
         ZIP, anyone would have to like  ZIP  Magazine.   Jeff  Binder
         (ATARI ST user)

         At  last  there  is some competition for the big magazines. I
         like this magazine a lot. Very informative, and  I  love  the
         layout  of  the  articles. Editorials, then articles, Reviews
         next. I love the way you sorted the BBS list.  By  area  code
         like  it  should  be,  but  mostly  I like the clarity of the
         magazine. Correct margins, justification, and PAGE NUMBERS on
         every single page. Everything was planned  perfectly.   I  do
         miss the color, and ad's of an average magazine, but with the
         content  of this magazine I don't suffer at all. Keep up this
         kind of work, and my subscription to PC Computing is going to
         GO!! Joe Perkins


                            K-SAT NEWS BULLETIN
          VOL.2 NO.42               1988          October 10 - 14
         ------------------------------------------------------------
         Telestar  303  -  Transponder  19 - 6.2 audio K-SAT, P.O. Box
         1069, Gilroy, CA 95021; (408)  848-5558  PST  Business  Hours
         Let's   get   ahead   of  the  game  -  STAY  INVOLVED  -  Be
         Supportive!!!
         -------------------------------------------------------------
         Have you let K-Sat know the opponents of the  representatives
         running  against  those who oppose us?  VOTE FOR THE PERSON -
         NOT THE PARTY!!!!!!
         -------------------------------------------------------------
         WE CAN'T CLEAN UP WHAT WE DON'T LIKE IN EITHER  PARTY  IF  WE
         AREN'T  INVOLVED  Are  you  in touch with the local political
         offices of the party of your choice?  Do you know the  people
         in  your  political  party  who  have  something to say about
         positions on issues and candidates?  Have you talked to them?
         BECOME ONE OF THEM! Problems can't  be  fixed  if  you  don't
         have  ALL  the proper tools.  This information can be sent to
         K-Sat and made available to others in your area upon request.
         NO EFFORT ON THE LOCAL LEVEL MEANS NO FUTURE !!
         -------------------------------------------------------------
         HAVE  YOU  GOTTEN  A  COMMITMENT  FROM  YOUR  CONGRESSMAN  ON
         "SATELLITE  PUBLIC  EDUCATION  AND  INFORMATION ACT OF 1989"?
         FROM THEIR OPPONENTS?  K-SAT NEEDS TO KNOW.  This is the time
         to contact your local PBS,  taxpayer  supported  channel  and
         gather information with documentation.  Send copies to K-Sat!
         -------------------------------------------------------------
             SUPPORT THOSE WHO CONSISTENTLY SUPPORT YOU AND K-SAT
              Starion/Amway    Ye Olde Print Shoppe   Echosphere
                           OnSat Magazine       STS
         -------------------------------------------------------------
         WHERE  DOES  THE  MAYOR OF YOUR CITY STAND ON OUR ISSUES?  Is
         he/she involved in the National League of Cities' efforts  to
         solve the contractual problems arising from deregulation? Why
         not?   Let  them  know  the  person  to  contact  to get more
         information.







         ZIP MAGAZINE, FOR HOME MS-DOS USERS                  Page 6




         WHERE DOES YOUR STATE ATTORNEY GENERAL STAND ON OUR ISSUE  OF
         ANTI-TRUST?   Is  she/he  aware  that  there  are 18 attorney
         generals who are battling our issues?  Is he/she  aware  that
         there  is  a  precedent  case  involving  cable  companies as
         'public utilities'?  Why not?  Let them know where  they  can
         get more information on these issues.  GET THEM INVOLVED!!!
         -------------------------------------------------------------
         DO  YOU  BELONG  TO  A  UNION  AND/OR OTHER ORGANIZATION THAT
         TAKES POLITICAL STANDS ON ISSUES?  Are  they  satisfied  with
         the  position  of  the  various  government agencies on their
         concerns?  Are they satisfied  with  the  position  of  their
         local,  state  and  federal  representatives on their issues?
         Are they aware that their issues are affected by positions on
         seemingly unrelated issues and areas?  Have  they  ever  read
         the legislation affecting their issues - or do they just take
         the  word  of  whoever  has  their  ear  at  the  time?  MANY
         REPRESENTATIVES AT ALL LEVELS  MISREPRESENT  THE  EFFECTS  OF
         LEGISLATION   TO  GAIN  THE  SUPPORT  OF  POLITICALLY  ACTIVE
         ORGANIZATIONS.  Take the time  and  opportunity  to  get  the
         bills  that  affect  them  and teach them to read these bills
         accurately.  THEN LET THEM KNOW WHAT AND HOW  THEY  CAN  MORE
         EFFECTIVELY   MAKE   CHANGES   AND   TAKE  ACTION.   Accurate
         information is what K-Sat  is  all  about  and  then  getting
         involved and STAYING committed.  Try it !!!!!!!
         -------------------------------------------------------------
                              ZONE CO-ORDINATORS

         If  you  can't  be  involved  every  night  and  want to stay
         involved and updated regularly - help your zone  coordinators
         and   state  coordinators  get  you  a  copy  of  the  weekly
         newsbulletin.  This is an organization that can  only  do  as
         much  as  you  support and pay for.  These coordinators can't
         afford the paper and postage to reach  you  all.   They  need
         your  help.   They can also help you more effectively if they
         have your input and need you to  pay  for  the  call  by  YOU
         calling  them.   DON'T  LEAVE  IT  UP  TO  SOMEONE  ELSE! The
         following are your  zone  coordinators:  Eastern  Time  Zone,
         Northern  Division;  Dennis  Delanoy,  P.O.  Box 66, Chenango
         Bridge, N.Y., 13745, (607) 772-9571  and  Southern  Division;
         Tom  Witherspoon,  4705 Princess Anne Lane, Jacksonville, FL,
         (904) 389-2128; Central Time Zone,  NortherN  Division;  Joan
         Conley,  4425  State  Rd.,  Medina, OH, 44256, (216) 239-1851
         and Southern Division; Louann Pehle, 2102 Clearfield  Circle,
         Richardson,  TX,  75081,  (214) 235-8509; Mountain Time Zone;
         Shirley Johnson, 7204 S.  Yarrow St., Littleton,  CO,  80123,
         (303)  973-8201;  Pacific  Time  Zone, Northern Division; Rod
         Ochs, P.  O.  Box 13500,  Spokane,  WA,  (509)  928-8376  and
         Southern   Division;   Keith  Tomzack,  9910  Rosedale  Hwy.,
         Bakersfield, CA, 93312,(805) 589-9430: Hawaii; Ed Brady, 2141
         Como Mai Dr., Pearl City, HI, 96782, (808) 456-2187  and  Pat
         Sullivan, Box 1323, Keaau, HI, 96749, (808) 966-9073: Alaska,
         David  Sovik,  1508  E.   41st Ct., Anchorage, ALaska, 99508,
         (907) 563-6268 and Larry Buzzell,  4523  N.   Riverside  Dr.,








         ZIP MAGAZINE, FOR HOME MS-DOS USERS                  Page 7




         Juneau,  Alaska, 99801, (907) 789-2230.  If you want the name
         and phone number of your state  coordinator,  these  are  the
         people  to  contact.   Also,  please  be  aware that there is
         usually a need for people to be 435's and Co-435's.   If  you
         can help in this way, let these people know.
         -------------------------------------------------------------
            THE ONLY PEOPLE WHO CAN HELP US IS US - HANG IN THERE!!
         -------------------------------------------------------------
                  SEND THE "CABLE BILL OF RIGHTS" TO CONGRESS

         CALLS FOR :
                    LOWER RATES
                    MORE SERVICE
                    GREATER CITY CONTROLS
                    NO COST EXTRA HOOK-UP

               S I G N      T H E      P E T I T I O N      A N D
            " T A K E    A    B I T E    O U T    O F    C A B L E "
                T H E I R   P R I C E S   A R E   A   C R I M E

                        CABLE SUBSCRIBER BILL OF RIGHTS

         This  petition  is  a CALL OF ACTION to the 101st Congress to
         re-visit the cable Deregulation Act of 1984 and amend  it  so
         as to bring effective competition in and out of cable areas.

         We  believe  he cable systems are operating without effective
         competition and are therefore afforded monopoly status by the
         Deregulation Act of 1984.

         We believe that  alternative  technologies  should  be  given
         enhanced status to effectively compete in cable areas.

         We  believe  that  where a single cable system exists without
         25%  penetration   by   alternative   technologies   (dishes,
         wireless,  pc, smatv telco, etc.) cities should be allowed to
         oversight the rates,  channels,  and  service  in  a  "public
         utility status".

         We  believe  that  where  a  cable  system has public utility
         status the operator should  not  have  a  financial  interest
         either  direct  or  indirect  in  more than 5 of the channels
         selected for the system.

         We believe that the subscribers 1st Amendment rights  are  of
         greater  concern  than  the  cable  companies  therefore  all
         editorials or issues of controversy initiated over the  cable
         by  the  cable  owner  or cable industry are answerable on an
         equal access bases.

         We believe that local broadcast, and C-span 1  and  2  should
         receive first priority placement on cable channels.









         ZIP MAGAZINE, FOR HOME MS-DOS USERS                  Page 8




         We believe that multiple hook-ups to cable by a subscriber in
         their home should not cause an additional fee (like telephone
         jacks).

         We believe that cable programming should be made available on
         a nondiscriminatory bases to alternative technologies through
         third party non cable distributors for competitive delivery.

         We  believe  that  undisclosed gifts of cable programming and
         services to appointed or elected officials constitutes unfair
         influence and should be illegal.

         We believe that cable systems operating as  "Public  Utility"
         status  must  spend  a  designated  percentage  of profits to
         expand their area of services into unserved areas rather than
         to buy other systems or invest in ownership of channels.

         We  support   association   of   states   Attorney   Generals
         investigation  into antitrust activities by cable and believe
         this should be investigated by the U.S. Attorney General  and
         the Federal Trade Commission.

         We  the  people  call  on  our  Representatives  in the 101st
         Congress to re-codify these  rights  by  amending  the  cable
         Deregulation Act of 1984.
         _____________________________________________________________
                 Check appropriate box if you wish a newsletter
         _____________________________________________________________

         1.________________________ __________________________ _______
           Name(printed)            Signed                     Check

           ______________________ _____________ _________ ____________
           Address                City          State     Zip

         2._______________________ ___________________________ _______

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         3._______________________ ___________________________ _______

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         6._______________________ ___________________________ _______








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         Signature collected by Name__________________________________

         Address___________________________ Signed____________________

         Date Submitted____________________


                         "You May Reproduce This Form"
         Submit To: K-SAT Broadcasting, P.O.Box 1069, Gilroy, Ca 95021



         Received   Via   Satellite  K-SAT  Broadcasting  PAD  Service
         10/25/88 Telstar 303 Transponder 19 6.2 Audio

         EDITOR'S NOTE: A friend of mine, (Darrel  Toepfer)  submitted
         an  arc  file with this text and a lot more. The arc file was
         104K. If you would be  interested in  reading  more  on  this
         topic, please send a disk, and a self addressed mailer to me.
         My  adress  is  later  in  the  magazine. I will send you the
         complete text  un  modified  as  soon  as  possible.  I  have
         modified  this  text  a little to make it fit in the margins,
         and taken out blank lines. the text  is  exactly  as  it  was
         submitted.

















         ZIP MAGAZINE, FOR HOME MS-DOS USERS                  Page 10




                             WHO NEEDS TO PIRATE?
                                by W.H. Lambdin

         When  I was in the Commodore area, almost everyone I knew was
         a pirate. Let me tell you, Pirates are easy to spot,  because
         they  always  have  500  or  so  diskettes of software. These
         Pirates have the latest programs, Sometimes a year before the
         package is available for sale.

         Since  I  have upgraded to an MS-DOS computer, I have came to
         notice one thing very important. I can  no  longer  use  this
         rule  of thumb to see who pirates, and who doesn't. 500 disks
         are  a lot of diskettes to have filled up. The Big difference
         is the PD and Shareware areas.

         In the MS-DOS area, there are PD and shareware utilities like
         Fastbac, Telix, Galaxy, Q-Edit, and Thousands of other titles
         that  appear in the PD and ShareWare markets. The programs in
         ShareWare are commercial quality. I have to say Telix is  the
         best Terminal program I have ever seen.  Commodore's  PD  and
         ShareWare  markets  are  almost  non  existent.  If  you  got
         ShareWare, you were lucky to get it to work at all.

         I was in the process of building my computer, but with all my
         free  cash  going  into  my computer. I had to stay away from
         Commercial software because of the cost.   $500  for  a  Word
         Processor! I started calling BBS's and trading diskettes with
         the  Sysop's through the mail. In eight months, I have filled
         up 60 disks of PD and ShareWare programs. All of these  files
         are arced. I have no idea how many diskettes it would take to
         hold all of these programs. Most of this is as good or better
         than commercial programs.

         I  saw a friend demo WordStar. I liked the power and features
         it had, but it's buffer was small, but  it  could  have  very
         large  text  files  by  swapping  the  buffer  in and out. In
         ShareWare, I found Galaxy. A  word  processor  with  WordStar
         commands,  But  it  has pull down menus, and a 400K buffer if
         you are using a computer with 640K.   That  Friend  now  uses
         Galaxy because it is faster, and has such a large buffer.

         I also found a  spreadsheet  Program  Turbo  Calc  8.1.  This
         spread  sheet  has built in help, and the size is 8192 by 256
         cells for data. On 640K systems,  this  spread  sheet  leaves
         400K free for Data.

         Well  PIracy is wrong, and also illegal. But with the quality
         and quantity of ShareWare that is  available.  who  needs  to
         pirate? NO ONE!!!!












         ZIP MAGAZINE, FOR HOME MS-DOS USERS                  Page 11




                        LETTER TO THOM HENDERSON OF SEA
                                by W.H. Lambdin

         This  is  an  exact  copy  of  the  letter  I wrote to System
         Enhancement associates.

         Dear Mr. Henderson

         What  did  you  think you would actually gain by lodging that
         court suit against Phil Katz? Apparently you expected to have
         a monopoly on this type of utilities, but you  never  dreamed
         that the PC-users would be against you. What your company has
         done  it too low a blow for words. If you had copyrighted the
         arc name, just discuss your complaint with the authors of the
         offending programs, and ask them to change  the  name.  There
         was no need to take people to court.

         After  all  who in their right mind would think Mr Katz stole
         your program. Mr Katz's archive program was about four  times
         as fast as that hippo you call arc.

         Of course you know that a lot of BBS's around the country are
         banning SEA's programs. I am very glad they are opposing your
         unjust oppression to other authors of archive programs. I had
         been  thinking  of  registering list 6.2A, but I am not going
         to. I feel the only way to reprimand your company, for unjust
         measures, is to hurt you in the cash department. I will never
         register any program that SEA designs, Nor will I use it.   I
         intend  to  publish this letter in the next issue of ZIP. Ron
         alcorn and I are the co-creators of ZIP. If you haven't heard
         of ZIP, well it is on several BBS's around the country  under
         the  name  ZIP-1.arc.   It  was  made  with  PKPAK if you are
         interested. Read the article below. That is what I said about
         SEA in the first issue of ZIP.

         I don't think your company will ever regain  the  respect  it
         once had, unless you undo this dirty deed.

                                   Sincerely


                                 W.H. Lambdin
                                 P.O. Box 328
                           East Bernstadt, Ky. 40729
                                (606) 843-6207

         Below this letter, I enclosed a printed copy of my  editorial
         I  wrote about this subject in the first issue of ZIP. I felt
         there was no need to reprint that editorial  from  the  first
         issue.











         ZIP MAGAZINE, FOR HOME MS-DOS USERS                  Page 12




                          LETTER TO COLIN SAMPALEANU
                                By W.H. Lambdin

         I  like  to  register  ShareWare programs that meet my needs.
         Galaxy, and Telix to name two  such  programs.  I  have  been
         treated  very nicely by OmniVerse (Creators of Galaxy), but I
         have not had any service from Mr. Sampaleanu.

         I have been using  Telix  for  about  8  months  now,  (since
         version  2.12.) In July I downloaded telix 3.0. I think it is
         the best terminal program around.

         After I finished building my computer, and I had  some  extra
         money. I sent a check for $35 on August 19th 1988 to register
         Telix.  I  also  sent  $49.95  to  Omniverse  the same day to
         register Galaxy 2.3. I also wrote a letter to Mr.  Sampaleanu
         telling  him  how  well  I  liked  Telix,  I also sent a self
         addressed stamped envelope. As of October 16th,  I  have  not
         heard  one  word from Mr. Sampaleanu, and I am quite agitated
         at him.

         Relating   my   occurences  with  omniverse,  I  received  my
         registration copy of Galaxy 2.3 in about two weeks.   In  the
         space of two months, I have helped beta test version 2.4, and
         received the final release version 2.4 of Galaxy.

         Unless  Mr  Sampaleanu  starts giving registered users of his
         terminal program some service and satisfaction, he  is  going
         to loose a lot of customers.

         If  I had this to do over, I would not register Telix. I also
         recommend  that  if you use Telix, Do not register it till Mr
         Sampaleanu starts treating his customers  with  respect,  and
         dignity they deserve.

         UPDATE:  On  October  22 nd, I finally received my registered
         copy of Telix 3.10. Enclosed with the two  diskettes,  was  a
         note  apologizing for the long delay.

         Why  couldn't  he write a note to me a month ago, and explain
         the situation.  If you order an item, and it is back  ordered
         for  30 days, the company is obligated to write you a letter,
         and give you the choice of a refund, or waiting for the item.
         A law of this sort needs to  be  enforced  in  the  ShareWare
         area.  It is my opinion that to wait two months and four days
         is too long to wait  for  an  item,  without  even  a  letter
         explaining the situation.

         Of course I may never receive any notices to update Telix  to
         later  versions  after  Mr.  Sampaleanu  reads  this. If this
         happens,  I  will  just  use  unregistered  copies  of  Telix
         updates.

         Telix is the best terminal program in the Share Ware  market,







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         and it deserves to be registered, but Mr. Sampaleanu needs to
         change his way of supporting this terrific terminal program.


                      AN OPEN LETTER TO COLIN SAMPALEANU
                          by Helenmarie B. Robitille

         Dear Mr. Sampaleanu:

         I really enjoy your  telecommunications  package,  TELIX.  In
         fact,  I  liked  it  so  much  I  went through the trouble of
         registering my copy.. back in August. I attributed  the  lack
         of  response  to the amount of time it takes to get mail from
         Vermont to Ontario: It seems to go by foot. However, the time
         span from August to the present seems a bit  unreasonable  to
         wait to receive my "registered copy" of Telix.

         I  have  discovered , by way of QNet mail, that you intend to
         "hold" all registrations until the new release of Telix 3.10;
         this was fine by me, since I was hoping that  the  Compuserve
         bug would be fixed in the new release. That was a month ago..
         I  now  have  my  copy  of Telix 3.10.. I got it from a sysop
         friend of mine, "hot off the presses". But  I  still  haven't
         seen  my  registered  copy.  I  don't mind the opening screen
         telling me to register.. I always could patch the program  to
         get  rid  of  it.  But  it  is  an  irritation knowing you've
         registered  your  copy,  and  have  plugged  the  program  to
         everyone  you  know,  and  still  Telix  treats  you  like  a
         stranger.

         Is there any news about when the registrations will  ever  be
         released?  Or  will  we  have  spent  our money in vain? This
         experience has  definitely  discouraged  me  from  supporting
         shareware in the future.

                                   Sincerely
                            Helenmarie B. Robitille


                              DEFEAT CALL WAITING
                             by Cleatis Messamore
                            (written by Ron Alcorn)

         Here is what Cleatis tells you to do if you have call waiting
         and call BBS's.  He has tried some programs on BBS's that say
         they  will defeat call waiting, but these program do not work
         for him.  But what he discovered himself works just fine. For
         instance, below is an example of an ordinary dialing string.

         ATDT 1 555 555 5555         (the spaces are for clarity only,
                                     although  with  most  modems this
                                     string would work even  with  the
                                     spaces included)








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         To  defeat call waiting, Cleatis says to do this, see example
         shown below.

         ATM1DT 1 555 555 5555 *70

         OR

         ATM1DT*70 1 555 555 5555

         Cleatis actually did not give an example, so it is either one
         way or the other.  So give both a try.

         He says that this appears to do the trick every  time  or  at
         least on the S.C. Bell Systems.  He has had success with this
         string  on  both of the modems he owns.  If this doesn't work
         for you, then he says that that some  modems  may  require  a
         pause before and after the *70.  See example below.

         ATM1DT 1 555 555 5555~*70~

         If  you  are  wondering  what  call waiting does to you, then
         listen closely.  If you are connected to a BBS and receive  a
         call,  you  will get knocked off line.  And when this happens
         you might get slightly  upset.   Reason,  what  if  you  were
         downloading  a  300K  file  and just lacked 5K to go and here
         come a incoming call?  You  would  probably  go  through  the
         ceiling  I  would  imagine.   Supposedly  when  making a long
         distance call, the call waiting is  suppose  to  be  disabled
         anyway so that this won't occur.  But this may be true or not
         true  depending on the long distance companies that are being
         used.  But when making a local call, call waiting  will  most
         likely bite you at any time.

         This  is  to  Cleatis  personally.   If I have misinformed or
         explained something incorrectly Cleatis, please correct me.

         If anyone else has a trick to accomplish the same thing, then
         please let us know about it so that we can inform the public.


                     GETTING MORE FOR YOUR MA BELL DOLLAR
                              By Dana G. Robitille

         It's  a  little after 1:00 A.M. and my body thinks it is 6:00
         A.M. Zip and the rest of you who suffer under the  relentless
         [TAX]  placed  upon  you by MA BELL may be interested in this
         tax avoidance scheme which we  encourage  our  Long  Distance
         Users to participate in.

         Observing  from  our own experience that it takes at least an
         hour to download a disk of files (at 1200 baud) at a cost  of
         at  least  $8.00  (AT&T)  (more on instate service) we had to
         come up with some way to ease the pinch on  our  budget.   We
         found by asking certain boards we traffic with that they were







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         willing  to  send us files we requested if we would send them
         the media and a donation to cover postage in this way it  may
         have  taken  a  little  longer  to get the files but with all
         costs taken into consideration it usually ran us $1.00 a disk
         which is a lot better than the $8.00 that Ma  Bell  gets,  to
         download  the  same  amount  of  information or programs.  We
         found some boards  requested  a  handling  charge  and  would
         supply  the  disks for about $4.00 a disk which both was half
         the amount Ma Bell would get  and  helped  out  those  boards
         financially.

         When  we  set  up our board our experience with files by mail
         led us to encourage our Long Distance users  to  Download  by
         mail.   On  our  board  there are other incentives also.  The
         RATE program we use credits points in favor of the  user  for
         leaving a message or comment requesting files and the program
         does  not take into account files/programs downloaded through
         the mail.  The user who uses this system increases his online
         efficiency leaving more  of  his  time  allotment  for  other
         aspects  of  BBSing  such  as  getting more involved with the
         message base  and  conferences.   A  user  logging  messages,
         composing  replies  offline  and  coming  back  on  to upload
         messages and replies can be more effective and cut his online
         time by at least 75%.  Though greater savings can be obtained
         using such programs as Relay Mail  most  users  increase  the
         volume  of  their  BBS  transactions  once  the Phone bill is
         brought into manageable limits.

         The user then is rewarded by maintaining  a  higher  security
         level, shorter but more productive online time, and less cost
         in  obtaining public domain or shareware programs the user is
         interested in.


                            ATLANTA PC-EXPO 9-24-88
                                 by Ron Alcorn

         Well  it  wasn't much to begin with.  All the vendors weren't
         there as advertised.  Which made  quite  a  few  people  very
         upset,  plus  the  fact that it cost around 10 bucks.  I just
         wonder how many times people pay for something and don't  get
         what they paid for, don't you just hate that.

         The main attraction is you were looking over top of the crowd
         would be of course, the clone making Chinese in a far corner.
         Nothing hi-tech, but  they  were  selling  clones  one  after
         another.   They  had  the best prices of anyone there.  I did
         have my complaints, the salesmen would speak to you for about
         30 seconds, then walk off and start to talk to someone  else.
         Not  only did they do me that way about 4 times, but everyone
         else that walked along.  I don't believe they liked  it  when
         you  start  asking too many questions, sort of like the stuff
         they were selling was hot.  Maybe  that  was  why  they  were
         cheaper than everyone else.  No, I'm not accusing anyone.







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         To  the  most  disappointment,  I  would assume, would be the
         Macintosh users.  And good reason too, there was only 1 booth
         for the Macintosh.  And contained in this one booth  was  one
         plain  old Macintosh computer.  Now back to what we love, our
         IBM/MS-DOS computers.

         My main disappointment was that about 80% of the booths  were
         software  and  it  was old software mostly.  About 20% of the
         software booths were just people  selling  PD  and  Shareware
         stuff  (most  of time this is the good stuff anyway, but they
         had too much to choose from making people get lost quick).

         As far as the other 20%, were booths with  computers.   These
         computers  didn't  amaze  me  either,  my 16 Mhz 286 was more
         powerful than anything they had to offer.  I was expecting  a
         few  386's,  but  I  couldn't  find  one there at all.  There
         weren't even any VGA setups, except the Chinese clone  makers
         had a Sigma VGA setup.

         Well  the  rest  of  the  nitty  gritty  stuff was electronic
         gadgets and books.  No good cheap books and the gadgets  were
         so  old  that  they  were  covered  with  dust.  I mean these
         gadgets looked like third hand stuff.

         They  only  thing  I bought was a Key Supply 101 keyboard for
         $42 bucks.  This was a good deal because  it  had  dual  mold
         injected  keys,  meaning the letters are not painted on, they
         are molded.  These type keys will never wear off.   Plus  the
         keyboard's  F11  and  F12  keys  give  off the AT scan codes,
         meaning you can program them to your delight.

         Well  so  much  for the PC-Expo, maybe next year, but I doubt
         I'll go unless much improvement is to made and  the  time  is
         right so that I can make the trip.


                                HARD DRIVE INFO
                                by W.H. Lambdin

         A lot of people like to add hard drives to their system,  and
         there  are  a  lot of benefits, but to some people, setting a
         hard drive up is a hard task.

         When people buy a hard drive, most of the time they just  get
         the    physical    drive,   controller,   and   instructions.
         Unfortunately the instructions hardly ever explain how to  do
         a  low  level  format,  set  the hard drive in partitions, or
         transfer the system to the hard drive.

         LOW LEVEL FORMAT. This is the first step to setting your hard
         drive up. There are quite a few low level format programs  in
         the public domain. Here is the way I like to low level format
         a  hard  drive. Load debug from your dos disk, and enter this








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         command.  G=c800:5.  This loads, and executes the  low  level
         format  software  in  the Hard drive controllers Bios.  After
         you have entered this command, the software will ask you some
         questions. such as the interleave you want, and the number of
         tracks, and if you wish to lock out questionable sectors. You
         can find the settings in the manual that comes with the  hard
         drive.   This command with debug will not work in every case,
         but from my experiences, it has worked successfully 4 out  of
         5 times. If you enter this command, and nothing happens, turn
         off  the  computer  and reboot.  In this case, use Hdinit, or
         some other low level format program.  It should take 12 to 15
         minutes to low level format a 20 meg hard drive.  After  this
         has completed, proceed to step two.

         PARTITIONS.  A lot of people like to set up their hard drives
         in partitions. Partitions allow people to break  hard  drives
         down  into  separate  logical drives. There is a program that
         comes with dos. (Fdisk). This program will only  take  a  few
         seconds  to  partition a hard drive. Personally, I like my 32
         meg drive in one partition. It is easier for me to find  what
         I am looking for. You may have a different point of view.

         FORMAT: Now you are ready to format your hard drive with  the
         format  command.  If you are like me, I like to boot from the
         hard drive.  If you  want  to  format  the  hard  drive,  and
         transfer  the  system  at the same time, use format with this
         parameter.  Format c:/s. This procedure should take about the
         same amount of time as it took to do the  low  level  format.
         After  this step is complete, it is time to start copying the
         files you want on the hard drive. Remember, to add a line  to
         your  autoexec.bat  similar  to  this. path = c:\;c:\dos;etc.
         This command tells the system where to look for  command,com,
         and  other  files you want in the path. Note if you have more
         than one partition, you will have to  format  each  partition
         separately.

         SUB  DIRECTORIES. Before I go into sub directories, your hard
         drive is completely ready to go. Sub directories, are easy to
         make, but some people never bother, because they  think  they
         can  only  use  the main (or root directory).  If you use sub
         directories, the root directory will be  much  cleaner.   The
         root  directory  can hold a maximum of 512 directory entries,
         and sub directories can hold a maximum of 512 files. You  can
         also  have  several  levels of sub directories. If you are in
         the root directory, you can make a sub directory this easily.
         md dos.  this  will  create  a  dos  directory.   I  use  sub
         directories  so  I  can  have all me files organized, all the
         pctools  files  in  the  pctools  directory,  Telix  terminal
         program  in  the  telix  directory, dos for my dos files, and
         miscellaneous utilities. Sub directories are nice because you
         don't have to search an extremely large directory. About now,
         you are wondering how to  move  around  in  sub  directories.
         cd\dos  will  move  to the dos dir, cd\ will take you back to
         the root directory.  If you want to remove a  directory,  you







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         need  to  log  in  the directory, then delete the files, then
         move out, and use rd\directory name you wish to delete.

         I hope  you  have  found  this  article,  both  helpful,  and
         informative.


                       RAM CHIPS LIVING WITH THE CLOUDS
                                 by Ron Alcorn

         Don't take me seriously, ram chips aren't living with clouds,
         but  their prices are high as the clouds.  Let me give you an
         idea, just in case you know nothing about the prices  of  ram
         chips here lately.

         A  little  over  a  year ago, I could buy one 4164K (120 nano
         second) chip for a buck and a half.  I  could  also  buy  one
         41256K  (120 nano second) chip for three bucks and a half. So
         one could  possibly  buy  640K  of  memory  for  around  $100
         dollars.   But  on  the  average one could buy 640K for under
         $150 dollars, that is if you got it thru mail order  discount
         stores.   Now  it  costs around $12 dollars for a 41256K (120
         nano second) chip and $4 for a 4164K (120 nano second)  chip.
         Which  would  cost  under  $300 bucks.  But at this price you
         would be facing a long hard look  thru  computer  mail  order
         magazines  for  the best memory chip prices.  And there would
         be a slight chance that they may not even have the memory  in
         stock.   Word  is out that memory chips are scarce, let alone
         it being ridiculously  priced.   Can  you  just  imagine  the
         profit  being made.  One small chip for $12 dollars, come on,
         lets get real congressmen.  Oh don't  worry,  I'll  tell  you
         where  they  fit  in  here  shortly.   I'll  give you another
         example of the price boom.  I bought a 1 MEG 9 x 1 SIM module
         (100 nano second) for $260 bucks a year ago.   Now  it  would
         cost  me  around $600 dollars.  But it isn't going to cost me
         anything, I'll not be  buying  anything  until  sanity  comes
         about.   The  only people I see buying memory at these prices
         are big business companies.  Of  course  they  were  probably
         already paying way too much to begin with.

         What  I'm  about  to tell you is only what I have heard. It's
         probably true anyway, although rumors are usually a lie.  But
         this  one  is right in front of our noses, so there is no way
         one could say that memory is cheap.   There  has  been  a  so
         called  tariff placed on several incoming types of chips from
         foreign countries.   A  tariff  is  a  tax  being  placed  on
         incoming  foreign  items.   In  this case a tariff is an over
         priced tax, I mean way over priced.

         I'll explain what I think the reason for the  tariff  is  and
         tell  you  why  it  hasn't  helped anyone.  Congress seems to
         think that they would be nice for a change by trying to  help
         out  American  chip manufacturers.  As you already know, they
         wanted to place a tariff on incoming foreign chip sales. Well







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         they did and it stunned us heavily.   They  actually  thought
         that  if  the  tariff was put into effect, that American chip
         manufacturers could  get  back  in  to  the  market  race  by
         lowering  their  prices cheaper than the foreign competitors.
         Well this done nothing  but  straight  out  back  fire.   The
         American  chip  manufacturers  have jacked their prices up to
         the same price that foreign chips are being  sold  for.   And
         even in some cases they are still being sold at higher prices
         than  the  foreign  competitors.  Greed, greed, greed, that's
         the flat out reason.  Looks like they could open  their  eyes
         and  sell  a whole lot cheaper.  If they did that, they would
         probably have more business than they  could  of  ever  hoped
         for.  And with such demand these days, you know they would of
         made lots  and  lots of money.  Maybe what I am saying is too
         simple, congress has to add  a  blue  million  terms  in  the
         contracts.  So maybe American companies are forced to sell at
         the  price  of the lowest foreign cost.  Na, there is no way,
         if they did, well elephants and donkeys  the  congress  shall
         be.   They  have  been  stuck in their ways for so long, they
         ended up sinking in a hole as deep as it is to China. And  do
         you  ever  think  it  is possible to dig a hole to China? Let
         alone making your way back to the top of the hole.   Only  if
         donkeys  and  elephants  both can fly!  And not only fly, but
         fly very very very high.  Ha!Ha!  Not a chance!

         Now you have a slight idea of what has been going on. Several
         people in the  public  would  like  for  this  tariff  to  be
         abolished,  ZIP,  BAM,  BOOM,  DESTROYED,  get  the  picture.
         Something needs to be done,  at  least  I  would  assume  the
         majority  of the public is against the tariff.  Well what can
         we  law abiding citizens do? I will give you a few hints, but
         I will need your suggestions and ideas.  To start off, a good
         thing  would  be  to  call  several computer stores that sell
         memory chips in one way or the other.  Ask them if they would
         be interested in writing a letter.  Contained in this  letter
         would  be  some  statistics on memory chips prices before the
         tariff, the prices in between, and the prices as of the  date
         they  write  the  letter.  Also the problems encountered with
         the price increase.  Things such as availability,  have  they
         been easy or hard to get in stock? How much business has been
         lost  percentage  wise?   And any other complaints they would
         have about the price increase.  Also spread the  word  around
         to your friends and BBS's as much as possible.

         These  are  a  few  problems  that  will  get in the way. For
         instance, what do we do with the  letters.   Should  we  mail
         them   to   our  congressman,  mail  them  to  a  well  known
         organization that has some say so.  And when  decided,  could
         we  be sure that whomever got the letters, would show or send
         them to the correct person or place.

         So  this  is where ZIP needs your help.  There is information
         here in ZIP where we can be contacted.  We need the  public's
         answer  on  the  best thing to do.  Once we have come up with







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         our solution, then we will take action.   Besides  calling  a
         business, you also should write a letter yourself.  The more,
         hope  we  can  have.   I  have  been  calling  the complaints
         letters, I guess they could be called the  start  of  a  huge
         petition.   At  least  I  hope  it  will  become huge so that
         something can be done about the crisis.  Just  call  it  what
         ever you want, what ever it is called, there is one objective
         in mind.  Terminate operation memory chip tariff!

         Just  to  remind  you,  please  send us your ideas!  Once the
         final decision has been made what to do, ZIP will publish the
         results as soon as the decision has been made.  And  when  we
         pass  around  ZIP  to  the public, and everyone is ready.  We
         will start the operation and hope that we will succeed.

         If you think that what I have said is a little too  much  and
         that  I  should  give some time for the memory prices to come
         down, then feel free to say so.  I  know  that  what  I  have
         mentioned above would be a lot of work, but those prices kind
         of  tick  me  off.   If  you  think  we  should do absolutely
         nothing, then let us know and we will leave  things  as  they
         are  now.   Thanks  for  reading  this  whether  you agree or
         dis-agree  with this article that I have written.  And before
         you tell me, I know, I probably flew the coop,  and  the  bad
         part about  it  is  that  I  know  it.  What kind of guy am I
         picking on myself, well enough of being a bad comedian.


                                 GOLDEN RULES
                                by Robert Jones

         Please think about these golden rules when you are online. If
         everyone  would  follow these rules, the BBS's would be a lot
         better for everyone.

         1. Always read the rules the BBS lives by.
         2. Never  disconnect  from  a  BBS  by  just dropping carrier
            unless it is an accident, or absolutely necessary.
         3. Never  use  any  foul  language  in messages or while
            talking to the sysop. Remember you are in reality a  guest
            of the sysop's home, so mind your manners.
         4. Don't be a leech. Remember if you download files, remember
            to upload a file every now and then.
         5. Take  part  in  the message base.
         6. Don't hog the system by staying on longer than  necessary.
            Other's are wanting to get on too.

         These are my opinions, but I think if the users would show  a
         little  more  courtesy, BBSing would be much nicer for all of
         us.











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                              TROJAN'S AND VIRII
                                     by ?

         Are trojan's and virii as prevalent as people claim they are?

         I  have been downloading files from BBS's for a lot of years,
         and I have never gotten a virus, or even a trojan. I have run
         across several harmless practical jokes such as FLIP,  DRAIN,
         and DRIP. These are harmless practical jokes. I have heard of
         virii  that  screw  up the FAT table, infect command.com, and
         also the hidden files.

         I have never seen one, much less been affected  by  one.  Nor
         have  I  known  anyone  that has been affected by one. I just
         think  Virii  are  figments  of   the   commercial   vendor's
         imagination.  Apparently the commercial vendors are trying to
         scare prospective buyers away  from  the  PD  or  Share  ware
         market's.

         There is no way I intend to pay $400 or more for a commercial
         package when I can find one as good or better on BBS's.

         If  you  know  of any trapped specimens of trojan's or better
         yet virii, write a short article in ZIP, and I will try it. I
         will be waiting.

         I am very well known in the PC-community,  and  you  probably
         have  a  utility that I wrote. So I asked Mr.  Lambdin to let
         my article be incognito. Thanks.

         EDITORS NOTE. these two small articles were mot uploaded to a
         BBS, they were messages on a BBS I call. If you wish to write
         small articles in messages instead of uploading a text  file,
         this is perfectly acceptable. W.H. Lambdin


                          FLOPPIES DISK DRIVES GALORE
                                 by Ron Alcorn

         What  I  intend to do for you is to inform you of the various
         kinds of drives.  I'll let you know how they perform and  how
         well  built  they  have  been  made.   Also  I'll give you an
         average price for  each  type  of  drive  from  the  Computer
         Shopper advertisements.  The prices that I have shown you are
         just  off  the  top  of my head, but I assure you that if you
         look hard enough thru the Computer Shopper that you will find
         a better price than what I have shown to you.  If  you  can't
         find a lower price, then let me know and I'll try to find one
         for you in the latest Computer Shopper.

         NOTE:  As  you  will see below, I have rated all Teac's to be
         the best.  Besides what you read below, you will notice  that
         if  you look in the Computer Shopper, Teac's are the least of
         drives to be listed in a repair list of a repair company.  So







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         using logic assumption, I would assume that this drive is the
         most reliable and durable  of  them  all.   Among  the  other
         drive's  I  reviewed,  on  the  average, they are all equally
         listed in the repair listings.  Also if you notice, companies
         that sell Teac's plus other brands of drives, the  Teac  will
         almost always be the most expensive drive.

         BRAND              SPECS              COST             RATING
         -------------------------------------------------------------
         Teac 5 1/4" - 360K $85 ***** Toshiba 5 1/4" -  360K  $75  ***
         Fujitsu 5 1/4" - 360K $75 ****+ Mitsumi 5 1/4" - 360K $70 *

         Teac           5 1/4" - 1.2 MEG        $100            *****
         Mitsubishi     5 1/4" - 1.2 MEG        $100            ***
         Sony           5 1/4" - 1.2 MEG        $100            **

         Teac           3 1/2" - 720K           $100            *****
         Toshiba        3 1/2" - 720K           $90             ****

         Teac           3 1/2" - 1.44 MEG       $125            *****
         Toshiba        3 1/2" - 1.44 MEG       $125            ***

         *****  -       The best!
         ****   -       Better than average.        /              \
         ***    -       Average.                   (  + = 1/2 STAR  )
         **     -       Below average.              \              /
         *      -       It stinks!
         -------------------------------------------------------------

         TEAC 5 1/4" 360K

         This  drive  is built sturdy, and has a nice sleek attractive
         design.  It has neither a glossy nor a flat  dull  color,  it
         has  a  sculptured ergonomic look.  The quality of this drive
         is excellent.  I have five of  these  drives,  well  actually
         three,  two of them are old single sided drives.  Everyone of
         them has worked perfectly, except for one.  The one  bad  one
         would  read and write just fine, but the motor's on the drive
         stopped turning just here recently.  Nothing to worry  about,
         because  the  drive  was still in warranty.  I've come to the
         conclusion that it  had  probably  been  damaged  during  the
         shipping and handling process.  Also I have a friend that has
         two of them, and they both have been operating just perfectly
         well  for  him.   He  has been very satisfied with them.  One
         little feature I almost forgot to tell you about, is that  it
         is  very  easy  to  insert  a  disk  in the drive.  The drive
         opening is V-shaped, so this helps the disk  to  go  in  very
         smoothly.

         Here  are  some  features  not  commonly  thought  of.  These
         drive's don't have a spring so that the disk comes flying out
         when you open the drive door.  This  is  just  a  fifty/fifty
         feature,  some  people  like it, and some don't.  Also Teac's
         don't prevent you from closing the drive door when a disk  is







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         not  inserted.  But this is nothing to worry about, the heads
         don't touch at all.  I only know of two brands of drives that
         keep you from closing the drive door without a disk inserted.
         They are Fujitsu and Mitsubishi.  If these drives  would  let
         you close the drive door with out a disk, then I would assume
         that  the  heads would probably touch.  I suppose this is why
         this feature is installed on those two brands of drives.  One
         disadvantage comes to mind with that feature.   What  if  one
         was  in  a hurry and thought that a disk had been left in the
         drive.  You start to turn the drive door  down,  and  without
         noticing  a  disk wasn't inserted, you quickly turn the drive
         door, so possibly you might just might break it.  Teac's  are
         also  a  little  louder than other drives, but they aren't as
         loud as some off brand types.  Don't get me wrong, it is  not
         a  loud drive, it just makes a little more noise than some of
         the other drives. If you want reliability at it's best,  then
         buy  any  type  of  Teac  floppy  drive.   Also Central Point
         Software recommends that Teac's be the first choice  when  it
         comes  to  using  their  Copy  II PC Deluxe Option Board than
         other type drive.

         TOSHIBA 5 1/4" 360K

         This drive is nothing fancy, but it gets the job  done.   The
         drive  is quiet, but could be built a bit sturdier.  The face
         plate is a flat black, leaving it with a poor appearance. The
         face plate also has too much molded design in it, meaning  it
         is  anything  but  smooth.   This drive has the spring loaded
         feature, so when you open the drive door it  spits  the  disk
         out,  not  all  the  way,  just  half  way.   Looks  are  not
         everything, but they are nice to have.

         I didn't have much experience with these drives but they have
         never failed me. I sold the two of them I had with a computer
         that I sold.  So far the customer has had no complaints  what
         so ever.  My only complaint other than what I have said about
         it,  is  that  the drive should let you insert the disks with
         out having to exactly line the disk up.

         I would only recommend this drive if you use your computer on
         a less than regular basis.  Meaning you just turn it on a few
         times a week.  If you use your computer  excessively  then  I
         feel  that these drives would probably not hold up very well.
         But for the home user that does not use their  computer  much
         and are on a low budget, then this might be the drive you.

         FUJITSU 5 1/4" 360K

         Among  all the other drives, this one gets my vote for second
         place.  First of all it is extremely quiet,  the  most  quite
         drive  I have ever heard.  It's face plate design is a glossy
         black and it has a smooth finish.  The drive  door  latch  is
         locked  in  the up position when no disk is inside the drive.
         Meaning you can not close it until you  put  a  disk  in  the







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         drive.   The drive is not a cheaply built, but it should have
         a bit more sturdiness.  The drive  opening  is  alright  when
         inserting  a  disk.  Some drives such as the Mitsumi's have a
         problem getting the disk in easily.

         The drive is very well suited for  the  home  and  should  be
         sufficient   enough  for  businesses  also.   It  is  not  an
         expensive drive, so it should fit in the budget if  your  are
         money  tight.  As much as I have seen the drive in action, it
         has performed as it should, so you should be  satisfied  with
         it.

         MITSUIMI 5 1/4" 360K

         Ughhhh!   That's right!  This drive is so terrible, it is not
         even fit to be called a disk drive.  There isn't  hardly  one
         good  thing  about this stinking drive at all. To begin with,
         the face plate is ugly as a rusty old primer painted car that
         is about 30 years old (I know, I'm exaggerating, but  if  you
         are going to dog this drive, why not do it right).  The drive
         light  indicator  takes a magnifying glass to look at, and if
         you can't find your magnifying glass, just go flip the  light
         switch  off so you can see it in the dark, that is if you are
         lucky enough so that it is night instead of day.  Moving  on,
         as if the appearance of the drive has just urged you to march
         on,  it  does have one feature that you can't complain about.
         There is a metal shield around the drive and it is about  the
         cheapest  name  brand  drive  you  can buy.  Now back to it's
         awesome features.

         Here is where the Mitsumi will  drive  you  nuts.   You  have
         about  a  20%  ratio  of  successfully  formatting or copying
         disks.  Nearly every time you go to format a disk, the  drive
         will  start making a ZZZZ-ZZZZ-ZZZZ sound around track 36 and
         on up.  As a matter of fact, anytime you hear that sound,  go
         ahead  and  grit  your  teeth  cause you can count on it that
         something has gone wrong.  Oh there is nothing wrong with the
         disk, is is just the drive.  When it comes to formatting, you
         will end with as low as 5K up to 35K bad per disk.

         I have talked about this drive constantly criticizing it.   I
         may  be wrong, it could be just that the drive had a bad read
         or write head, or the heads were out of  alignment.   I  have
         run software tests on the drive and it always checked out OK.
         The  RPM  speed  was  within  tolerance,  but I had no way of
         checking  the  drive  alignment  other  than  but  eye.   You
         shouldn't  test a drive's alignment by your eye, but I had no
         other way to test the alignment.  I figured  since  that  the
         drive was not reliable at all, is must be so out of alignment
         that  surely you could see it with the naked eye.  Although I
         noticed nothing wrong, testing the alignment with my  eye  is
         about  as  safe  as  walking  across  a  6 lane highway while
         wearing a blind fold.  The drive was new, so  you  can't  say
         that age had caught up with the drive's performance.







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         TEAC 5 1/4" 1.2 MEG

         Do you ever hear the problem of people saying they get a disk
         that  had  been copied on a 1.2 MEG drive and then their 360K
         drive will not read it properly.  Well  I  can  HONESTLY  say
         that  I  have  had no such trouble with transfers between the
         Teac 360K, Fujitsu 360K, and the Teac 1.2 MEG drives.   Other
         than the disk capacity this drive has, it is exactly like the
         Teac 360K drive, so refer to the article above.

         MITSUBISHI 5 1/4" 1.2 MEG

         This  drive  is about the same as the Teac 1.2 MEG, except it
         sort of looks and sounds like the Fujitsu 360K  drive.   This
         is  one  of  the  drives  that prevents you from shutting the
         drive door without having a disk inserted.  As far as reading
         and writing 1.2 MEG's it has performed as it should.   And  I
         can  also  say  that  this  drive  has  had no trouble at all
         between the Teac 360K and Teac 1.2 MEG drives, or at least it
         has done well with what little transfers  I  have  done.   At
         first the disk drive wrote 360K formatted disks horribly, but
         come  to  find  out  the controller was flaky.  Since the new
         controller has been installed, the drive seems fine.

         SONY 5 1/4" 1.2 MEG

         I don't have too much information about this  drive,  because
         all  the  experience  I have had with this drive was about an
         hour.  But here is what I found  out  about  the  drive.   It
         looks  fine,  but  it  sounds horrible, not loud, but sort of
         like it is eating the disk.  Although this sound wasn't nice,
         it read my 360K disks as it should.   I  tried  formatting  a
         double  sided  double  density (360K) disk as a 1.2 MEG disk.
         This is where this drive falls short in my opinion.  With all
         the other 1.2 MEG drives tested, they would format the  DS/DD
         disks  good  up until it got around in the upper tracks, high
         60's and on up.  And even some cases format them all the way.
         Well this Sony started screwing up around  in  the  30's.   I
         know  one  is suppose to use double sided high density disks,
         and I do normally, but I think this is a good  quick  way  to
         test how well the drive can read and write.

         TEAC 3 1/2" 720K

         No  need  to do a lot of repeating of text, so the this drive
         and the one's to follow will be quick to the point.

         The drive looks good, reads and writes good, and looks  nice.
         One  important  feature  that  I should point out, is that it
         copies copy protected disks just  fine  when  using  software
         that  works  with  3  1/2"  drives.   It falls in to the same
         category as the Teac 5 1/4" 360K  when  it  comes  to  sound.
         Works perfect and that about sums this one up.








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         TOSHIBA 3 1/2" 720K

         Well  this  one has the same features as the Teac 3 1/2" 720K
         except it is a little quieter and the drive  light  indicator
         is  to  small.   This drive copied copy protected disks also,
         but not as good as the Teac.  You may have to try to copy the
         disk a few more times than the Teac, but eventually you  will
         get a good copy.

         TEAC 3 1/2" 1.44 MEG

         This drive has the same features as it's little 720K brother.
         It  writes  720K  disks  just fine and they transfer to other
         drives with no problems at all (some drives will not do  this
         as good), whether the transfer is taking place with a 1.44 or
         720K  drive  makes  no  difference.   This drive is smart, it
         knows whether you have a 720K disk inserted  or  a  1.44  MEG
         disk  inserted (some other drives don't know the difference).
         If you see a another hole in the disk just  opposite  of  the
         write  protect  hole,  then you know the disk is high density
         media.

                            Drill hole here Ŀ(Pertains to text below)
         Example:         Ŀ             Ŀ
                             ߳                ߳
                          Ŀ              Ŀ
                                        
                          1.44 MEG             720K

         And when it comes to 1.44 MEG mode,  again  it  is  flawless.
         Take  note here to this nice little trick that I do.  Take an
         ordinary 720K disk, and place a 1.44 MEG disk on top  of  it,
         looking  at  the  hole  on the left side (refer to diagram if
         necessary) and with a pencil trace the hole so that you  have
         made  a  little black box on the 720K disk.  Now take a drill
         bit (I use a 1/8" drill bit) and drill a hole thru the middle
         of that little box you drawed.  Try as best  as  you  can  to
         center it, if the drive won't format the disk, try making the
         hole  a  little  bigger toward the direction needed.  Also if
         your drill press or your old Black and  Decker  drill  has  a
         speed  adjustment,  put  it  on the slow speed.  Reason being
         that since the disks are plastic, at high speeds the  plastic
         tends  to  melt  and  stick  to  the  drill bit.  And if this
         happens, then you may ruin a disk.  So be very  careful  when
         attempting  this  procedure.   I can tell you that out of all
         the disks I have done this way, only  2  have  not  formatted
         correctly.   To be on the safe side do one disk first, format
         it and see what goes.  If it is OK, then try modifying a  few
         more  disks, and if they are OK, then you can probably always
         trust this little trick.  Sure beats the heck out  of  paying
         over  4  bucks  for  a  high density 3 1/2" disk.  Instead of
         being over 4 bucks, for me it is a buck and a  bit  of  time,
         much better for the budget.  I can't recommend this trick, so








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         this  is  AT  YOUR  OWN RISK.  But I can assure you that this
         trick has worked just fine for me.

         TOSHIBA 3 1/2" 1.44 MEG

         Well this drive is going to take  some  explaining,  so  hold
         your  horses.   First of all, it does not know the difference
         between a DS/DD and DS/HD disk media.  In other words, if you
         go to format a DS/DD disk, it will format to 1.44 MEG,  which
         there  is  no problem of the media being bad.  But if you try
         to format the disk as a 720K, no  way.   It  will  read  720K
         disks and write 720K disks, but it is not reliable.  Although
         the  reading  is  more  reliable  than the writing, but don't
         trust transfers using  720K  disks.   Also  since  the  drive
         doesn't  know  the  difference between the disks, you have no
         way of knowing what type disks you have laying around. Unless
         you go ahead and do the trick as I mentioned above, or  write
         on  the  disk  if it is 720K or 1.44 MEG, or run CHKDSK or of
         the like.  Everything I have mentioned in this  paragraph  is
         from my experience from using the drive on an AT computer.

         Now  for when you use the drive on a XT computer.  If you use
         the drive as drive A or B, then the drive will work just fine
         as a 360K drive except of course it is on 3 1/2" media.  Even
         though it is  a  360K,  it  will  read  and  write  the  720K
         formatted  disks,  but not the 1.44 MEG disks.  The 720K will
         also work just fine as long as your create  a  logical  drive
         using  the DRIVER.SYS driver.  The physical (main) drive will
         be a 360K, and the logical drive (same  physical  drive,  but
         using another drive letter) will be the 720K drive.

         TO CLEAR THIS UP.

         Everything  you  have  read  is from my experiences.  You may
         have run in to a better or worse situation, but I  hope  that
         you   have  found  my  information  to  be  helpful  and  not
         misleading.  In any way, I am not responsible if I have  lead
         you to a purchase and you end up not being happy.  But I have
         given you my opinions as what I consider to be of importance.
         Some  things could have been explained more, but don't worry.
         On what little I missed out on or didn't  explain  thoroughly
         enough,  will be followed up in the next issue of ZIP if need
         be.  And if you need to ask some questions, just  leave  some
         messages  on  the BBS's that are listed in this magazine that
         have a * or / beside them.  So stay tuned for the next  issue
         of  ZIP  to  see your questions get answered.  Whether I know
         the answer or not, your question will still get published  so
         that  others  can  send ZIP some information in order to help
         you.












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                                 GIF PICTURES
                                by W.H. Lambdin

         What do you think about the GIF format of pictures  available
         on a lot of Bulletin Board's around the country?

         I  think  they should become the standard graphic format, for
         three important reasons.

         1.  There are programs around  to  display  gif  pictures  on
         virtually every computer that has a wide base of users. There
         are gif decoders for MS-DOS machines, Atari ST's, Atari 8 bit
         computers, Commodore 64's, Amiga's, and quite a few more. The
         reason  this is important is because it means, you can view a
         graphic on a 64, when the  graphic  was  created  on  an  IBM
         compatible,  or  Amiga.   The C-64 will obviously not display
         the graphic to it's full potential, but the graphic  will  be
         displayed to the best of the 64's ability.

         2.   The  graphics  are  compressed  by  the  LZW compression
         technique to keep the graphic's from being extremely large in
         size (LZW compression is the same as squashing in arc files.)
         The  largest  GIF  picture  I have seen was 169 K. However, I
         have seen GIF pictures as small as 3 to 8K.

         I have a GIF of Leonard McCoy (The  doctor  from  the  series
         Star  Trek).   This  graphic  is only 8K in size.  It has 256
         colors, and the graphic looks very life like.   If  you  like
         graphics,  and  you  have never looked into GIF graphics, you
         don't know what you are missing.

         3.   Gif   has   very   impressive   resolution   and   color
         capabilities.    Gif  has  a  maximum  of  16,000  by  16,000
         resolution with a  maximum  amount  of  16  million  possible
         colors.  There  are  no  computer's on the horizon capable of
         this resolution or colors. So I guess Gif graphics  are  here
         to stay.

         A  lot of BBS's have the graphics with .gif as the extension.
         The reason they aren't in  arc  files  is  because  they  are
         already  compressed  to  the  maximum,  and ARC isn't able to
         compress them any more.  On average,  GIF  pictures  compress
         anywhere  from  0%  to 3% when you put them in arc files.  So
         arcing them, is counterproductive because the files  will  be
         larger  in size because of the ARC header, and it takes extra
         time after you get them to un arc them.

         Gif pictures were invented by Compuserve, a  few  years  ago,
         and  with  the  introduction  of  affordable  digitizers, GIF
         pictures have really blossomed. GIF is  my  favorite  picture
         format, I think you will agree.










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                                 NEED A V-20?
                                by W.H. Lambdin

         Are  you using an XT or clone, and want more power and speed?
         But you don't want to shell out big bucks to  upgrade  to  an
         AT?

         I  would recommend for you to change your processor, not your
         computer.  There is a processor that  directly  replaces  the
         8088  chip, and costs less than $20. JDR is one business that
         sells these chips.

         All you need to do is remove the 8088 chip from the socket on
         your motherboard, and put this chip in it's place. There  are
         warnings  about  installing  this chip yourself.  1 point the
         notch on  the  chip  in  the  same  direction  the  8088  was
         pointing.  2 be sure to take your time, and don't bend any of
         the pins.  3 Be sure to buy the same speed V-20 as  the  8088
         you  are  replacing.   Aside  from  the  warnings  above, the
         procedure is straight forward.

         This chip will dramatically increase the power and  speed  of
         your  computer.   From  my experiences, it will speed up your
         computer by 50 to 80 %. On my old XT compatible, my  Norton's
         SI rating jumped from 2.1 to 4.0.

         There  are  no disadvantages of changing processors. The V-20
         not only speeds up your computer. It lets you run  some  CP/M
         programs  with  a  CP/M emulator found on several BBS's (v-20
         80).  You can also run some 80286 programs.  as long as  they
         are  not in protected mode, or too large for the XT's memory.
         On top of all these extra advantages, the V-20 is  100%  8088
         compatible.

         There  are two producers of V-20's, Intel, and Nec. I had one
         made by Nec.

         I recommend V-20's because you get  a  faster  computer,  and
         also some CP/M and 80286 compatibility!

         If you you have an 8086 processor instead of an 8088, You can
         buy  a  V-30.   it  has the same features I described, but it
         directly replaces the 8086 processor.

         There are a lot of  people  claiming  V-20's  only  speed  up
         computers  by a marginal amount. This chip only increases the
         speed of the processor. Yes it can increase the speed of  the
         processor  by  as much as 50 to 80 %. It did on my old 10 mhz
         8088.












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                               YMODEM vs ZMODEM
                                by W.H. Lambdin

         How many of you like me, have heard this statement? Zmodem is
         faster than Ymodem.

         When I first started using my 2400 baud modem with Telix 2.12
         I  called  A  BBS that ran PC-Board 12.1.  After I filled out
         the questionnaire, it asked what protocol I wanted to use.  I
         chose Xmodem CRC. Then the BBS reported Ymodem is faster.   I
         checked  to see if I had ymodem support. Telix had ymodem, so
         I changed my default protocol to Ymodem.   The  BBS  reported
         Zmodem is faster, but Telix 2.12 offered no Zmodem support.

         After  I  received  Telix 3.00 I started using Zmodem.  I had
         heard Zmodem was supposedly 10 to  15%  faster  than  Ymodem.
         This  claim  has  turned  out  to  be false.  The average CPS
         (characters per second) under perfect conditions  Ymodem  was
         233, and Zmodem was 235. Under average conditions, the CPS is
         227 for Ymodem, and 227 for Zmodem. Exactly the same speed.

         If  you are comfortable with Ymodem, there is no need for you
         to use Zmodem.  Personally I like Zmodem better because it is
         more user friendly.  Downloading with Zmodem, it reports  the
         number  of bytes to expect, bytes received, amount of time it
         will take to download the file, and  time  remaining.   I  am
         talking  about  Telix  3.00 because it is what I use.  Ymodem
         only reports the number of bytes received, and elapsed  time.
         Unless you use Ymodem batch.

         There  is another reason I like Zmodem over Ymodem is because
         Zmodem can be used to send single files or  batch  transfers.
         You don't have to specify the protocol for batch transfers or
         single  files  like you do with Ymodem.  This is the reason I
         switched to zmodem.

         There is one thing about Zmodem. With this protocol,  I  seem
         to  have  less  bad  blocks  than I did when I used Ymodem. I
         don't know why.

         These  are  the  facts,  I  have  compiled.   If  your's  are
         different, I would love to hear from you.


                  PLIGHT'S AND PERILS OF UPGRADING. PART TWO
                                by W.H. Lambdin

         This  is  a continuation from part one published in the first
         issue of ZIP.  Part one took you to where I had  ordered  the
         hard drive controller. The perils continue!

         I had ordered an AT RLL hard drive controller from IDS.  Part
         #  WD  10003.   First it was back ordered for two weeks. When
         they finally received the card, it had gone up  in  price  by







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         another $25.  A total of $130, and my old XT controller.

         I  canceled  the  order,  and asked them to send me a refund,
         because  I  knew  a  place  that  sold  an  RLL  hard   drive
         controller,  that  supported  a  1  to 1 interleave. I called
         Lucky computer, and asked to speak to a salesperson.

         I told the salesman I was interested in the  adaptec  AT  RLL
         hard  drive  controller,  that sold for $149.  I explained my
         present system configuration.  When I explained  that  I  was
         using   a  Seagate  ST238R,  a  30  meg  RLL  drive  with  65
         millisecond access time, He reported the  drive  (because  of
         it's  access  time)  would  be  too  slow  to use at a 1 to 1
         interleave.  If I used this controller, It would have  to  be
         set  to  a  2  to  1  interleave,  or  even  better  a 3 to 1
         interleave.

         About this time, I was getting desperate, and I noticed  they
         sold  an  AT  hard  drive controller for $110.  I asked if it
         supported  RLL Drives, the Salesman answered yes. I asked the
         salesman if I could return the controller  if  it  failed  to
         work  with  my  hard  drive, and he reported yes, if I paid a
         restocking fee.

         After installing the hard drive controller card,  I  was  not
         able  to boot my computer unless I removed my Multi I/O card,
         because both the hard drive controller,  and  the  multi  I/O
         card  try  to control the floppies. The terrible part of this
         situation is that neither card has  jumpers  to  disable  the
         floppy controller. And I am using  my  computer  without  the
         multi I/O card.

         With  this  AT  RLL  controller,  my hard drive is at a speed
         almost unbelievable. The Speed has  jumped  from  137  K  per
         second, to 244.5K per second.  A vast improvement.  Two weeks
         after I set my hard drive up, I reinitilaized the hard drive,
         but  at  a  2  to 1 interleave. Now my ST238R is operating at
         354.4K per second!!

         On September 29th, I received my AT multi I/O  card.   I  now
         have my AT compatible at full speed. I like the AT compatible
         much more than I ever liked the XT compatible. Now the CPU is
         three times as fast as the XT (The XT compatible had a 10 MHZ
         V-20  too),  and  the hard drive is 2.6 times faster. Not bad
         after all the perils!


                         OPTIMIZING THE AMSTRAD PC6400
                                 by John Baker

         I  made  the leap from 8 bit CP/M to 16 bit MS-DOS by getting
         an AMSTRAD computer.  When I first received  my  computer,  I
         was very satisfied and impressed with it's apparent speed and
         ease  of  operation.   As I began to take notice of other DOS







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         machines, my perception of speed changed.  The  computer  was
         still  by  far the easiest one I ever had to use, but the GEM
         screen updates, and program execution seemed  to  be  getting
         slower by the day!  I know it wasn't, but it seemed that way.
         So  I  enlisted  the help of a couple  of  friends  who  have
         much  more  MS-DOS  experience  than myself.  They came, they
         saw,  and when they left, I had a speed demon compared to the
         computer I used to have!

         First   we   backed  up  the  hard drive using a nice program
         called ARCHIVE.  This was  so  the GEM desktop utilities  and
         programs  could  be  restored  to  their proper places.  Then
         using  a newly purchased edition of MS-DOS 3.3, we  proceeded
         to replace the dual DOS system on the AMSTRAD.  The procedure
         started by running FDISK, then on to a FORMAT  C:/S.    After
         all  this  was  done,  the  backup files were restored to the
         disk.  All except the  old  DOS  3.2  and  DOSPLUS  files  of
         course.

         Now the boot.  Unbelievable as it may seem GEM runs twice as
         fast!    All   the programs I could not run before, work now!
         Why did all this improvement happen?  I  figure  it  was  two
         things.   First  the  AMSTRAD  supplied  DOS  3.2 is not very
         compatible. (DOS+ from DRI, supplied also,  was  even  less!)
         Also  the dual operating systems on one hard drive might have
         been confusing some programs that accessed the system  tracks
         for system configurations.

         So, if you have an AMSTRAD PC6400, 1512,  or  1640  and  find
         yourself wanting faster GEM and more compatible DOS.  Replace
         your  old  AMSTRAD DOS 3.2 with MS-DOS 3.3.  You'll think you
         have a speed demon too.

         There are other enhancements I have found too.  Look for more
         articles  in  ZIP's  coming  issues  to  see how to make your
         system run better than new, without replacing it. PC. Whether
         it be an AMSTRAD or whatever, there are  ways  to  make  your
         system run better than new without replacing it.


                                 SLOW SECTORS
                                BY W.H. Lambdin

         Have  you ever been plagued by slow sectors? Slow sectors are
         sector's on the hard drive that format  good,  but  gradually
         get  worse,  till  you  can't  load or copy the programs that
         reside on them.

         I  would  rather  have bad sectors locked out than these slow
         sectors, because a sector that has  been  locked  out  is  no
         threat to normal operations of a hard drive.

         How do you find out which sectors are slow before the  sector
         gets  so  bad  that you are unable to load or copy files that







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         reside on these slow sectors? There is one  file  on  several
         BBS's  called  DTST.  THis file check's for sectors that read
         slower than they should. Execute it like this  dtst  and  the
         drive you wish to check. It will check the sectors in reverse
         order,  and  any sectors it finds slow it will report in this
         format. 13756 3 SLOW. The first number is the sector  number.
         I do not know what the second number represents.

         Finding  the  slow  sectors  with this program is easy.  This
         program only gives you the sector number. How do you find the
         cluster that contains the slow sector? I use the disk  editor
         in PC-Tools 4.22 to view the questionable sector. The cluster
         number  should  be  close to the sector number. Press F4, and
         PC-Tools will tell you what file has the slow sector in  it's
         chain  of  sectors.  If there is a file on a slow sector, you
         will have to copy that file  to  a  floppy,  or  another  sub
         directory  before  locking  out  the  cluster.  Now erase the
         file, and exit PC-Tools. Now you are ready to  lock  out  the
         cluster.

         Locking  out  slow  sectors.  Unfortunately PC-Tools does not
         have an option to lock out sectors. You need to use  DT  from
         the  Norton  Utilities, or something similar. If you have DT,
         use this syntax. dt/c(cluster number).  After  this  step  is
         complete,  the  slow sector can not be used by dos unless you
         format your hard drive after locking the cluster out. I  have
         heard  that there is supposedly a way to lock out sectors via
         a disk editor. If you know of such a method, let me know.

         I usually run DTST about once  a  month  to  check  for  slow
         sectors. So far on my 30 meg RLL drive, I have locked out two
         clusters.  I would rather lock out 4K instead of having the
         drive struggle when trying to read them.




























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                                   VGIF 3.4
                                by W.H. Lambdin

         Vgif is a program to display gif pictures. Vgif is written by
         Bob Montgomery.  Mr Montgomery asks that  if  you  like  this
         program, to send a $10 donation to register your copy.

         You  must  have  an  EGA, or VGA card with 128K video memory.
         Before you can use this utility.

         When you run this program, it will read in all of the picture
         names that end with .gif, and display a menu.  Cursor  around
         the menu, and press return to view a picture.  If you want to
         view  one  picture one after the other, tag the ones you wish
         to see with the space bar, and press F2. Here if you have  an
         EGA card, it will display a slide show, one picture after the
         other.   This  program  displays them in the order you tagged
         them.  If you have a VGA card, there is no slide show.  press
         return when you wish to view the next graphic. If you tag one
         by mistake, press the space bar again to un tag it.

         For people that have adult graphics, and small  children,  it
         has  an  option  to  prevent the kid's from viewing the adult
         graphics.  Rename the adult graphics to have an extension  of
         .adu  or  whatever you choose. When vgif is run, it will only
         show the graphics that have gif as the  extension.   To  view
         the  adult  graphic's,  type  this on the command line.  Vgif
         *.adu.  This command will only display the adult graphics  in
         the menu.

         Commands.

         While in the menu, if you wish to get some info on a specific
         graphic,  place  the  moving  bar to the graphic you want the
         info about then press F3. This will read  in  the  info,  and
         report  the  resolution  like this.  320X200X256.  THis means
         320 by 200 resolution, in 256 color mode.

         Commands while a graphic is being displayed.

         G this will take a four pass picture and transform it into  a
         one  pass picture. Do not use this command if you are viewing
         a  VGA  picture  on  an  EGA   system,   because   when   the
         transformation takes place, it will loose the extra colors it
         had for VGA mode.

         I opposite of above. Same warning.

         F  Keys.   With the function keys, you can change the colors,
         and tint.  I like to modify the pictures slightly, because  I
         like  a  dark  screen  for  text, and the graphics need to be
         brightened to look more lifelike. It is a mess to continually
         change the brightness control on  my  monitor,  brighter  for
         graphics,  and  darker  for  text.  After I have modified the







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         pictures, I use G above to save the picture.

         This is not all the commands available, just the ones I use.

         I don't know when Mr.  Montgomery  is  going  to  release  an
         update to this program, but supposedly he is going to support
         other picture format's in the near future.

         If  you  need  a utility of this type, I say it is well worth
         the download. There are lots of gif displayers, but this  has
         the  fastest  display  routine  I  have  seen,  and  the most
         features.

         The reason I did not give it 5 star's is because of a bug  on
         VGA cards and monitors. This bug occurs if you display an EGA
         graphic  made  in  low resolution mode.  The graphic does not
         cover the screen. It comes down from the top, and only covers
         3/4 th's of the screen.

         UPDATE: VGIF 3.6 is out, and the slide show routine has  been
         fixed for VGA systems.

         Rating ****


                          SAMSUNG MULTI-SYNC MONITOR
                                by W.H. Lambdin

         I bought this monitor for my AT compatible earlier this  year
         from  USA  Flex.  For $429.  Model No.  CN4551.  This monitor
         usually appears on the back cover of Computer  Shopper.  List
         price unknown.

         This  monitor  has  a  tilt and swivel base.  and it also has
         almost all of the features you  will  ever  need.   with  the
         exception  of  horizontal adjustable width.  Although it does
         have two settings, it needs to be adjustable. On bright color
         backgrounds, there is a slight haze over the screen. I  don't
         know if this is caused from the monitor over scanning, or the
         non glare screen.

         This  monitor  will  work with the following modes.  MDA, MGA
         (hercules), CGA, EGA, PGA, and VGA. It's  top  resolution  is
         800  by  600.  Color's  maximum  of  64  colors  in  TTL mode
         unlimited in analog mode.

         I compared this  monitor  to  the  monitor  that  became  the
         standard  (NEC  multi-sync).   This  monitor  compared almost
         identically with the NEC except for the haze mentioned above,
         and the colors were not as true as the colors on the NEC.

         If you want to buy a multi-sync monitor, and you  don't  want
         to spend $550 or more, I would highly recommend this monitor.








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         The  haze is not really a flaw, but it just makes the text on
         some backgrounds look a little fuzzy. You would never  notice
         it  unless you have the NEC, and this Samsung monitor sitting
         side by side (like I did.)

         Rating ****+


                            22NICE v121 from SYDEX
                                 by John Baker

         If  you  made  the jump from 8 bit to 16 bit like I have, you
         moved from CP/M to MS-DOS.  You may have some  favorite  CP/M
         programs  you  miss that MS-DOS does not have.  In my case, I
         use a CP/M computer to operate a bulletin board.  I wanted  a
         way  to edit and assemble my BBS programs on the DOS machine.
         22NICE turned out to be just what the doctor ordered.

         22NICE is a program that will let  your  computer  emulate  a
         CP/M   2.2  environment.   It  will  run  all  standard  CP/M
         programs, 8080  or  Z80.   NICE  will  emulate  the  original
         machine's  terminal  and  keyboard for you.  The most notable
         terminals are H19, ADM3A (C128's & Xerox), Osborne  and  many
         more.   Keyboard  emulation  for  all  the  terminals is also
         available.  All of  22NICE's  functions  will  work  with  or
         without a V20 or V30 chip.  It works in a way that is totally
         different  from  other emulators.  22NICE has a device driver
         that you load via your CONFIG.SYS file.  This driver is  very
         compact  and  will  take  only 3K or so of system memory. The
         other component in the emulation system is the GENCOM program
         to install the CP/M programs.

         You can install a CP/M program as one file or as the original
         file plus a loader program.  The  loader  created  by  GENCOM
         (the  install  program)  is  only  363 bytes.  I usually have
         GENCOM link the loader to the CP/M COM file so I won't  waste
         a disk block.  The resulting file(s) will run strait off your
         DOS  prompt as long as the 22NICE device driver was installed
         during boot.

         GENCOM is where my first  and  only  misgiving  about  22NICE
         crops  up.   To  install a program with it, you must type all
         the parameters on the command  line.   This  method  is  very
         effective,  but  easy  to  mess up.  I find myself typing the
         command line three or four times  before  I  finally  get  it
         right.   This  is  a  minor concern, because you only have to
         install your CP/M programs once.  But a menu system would  be
         nice  to  say the least.  The shortcomings of GENCOM are more
         than made up in the 22NICE emulator itself.

         The device driver for 22NICE is called 22RES, and  is  loaded
         upon  boot.   If  it's  an unregistered package, you'll get a
         message and a prompt to  print  a  registration  form.  After
         that,  a  message  about your system's V20 status, and that's







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         all.  From there on, you never see or hear from 22RES  again.
         But believe me your DOS now has a few extended commands. User
         areas  for one.  You can now change user areas just as you do
         in  CP/M.   A  dozen  or  so  terminal  emulations  are  also
         available  to you.  Not to mention the ability to run Z80 and
         8080 CP/M software.

         The emulator has run everything I put to it so far.  It  will
         not  route  I/O  from  programs that used other than standard
         BDOS or BIOS calls.  Programs like IMP,  BYE5  and  the  like
         will  not  work.   No problem tho, MS-DOS has great modem and
         BBS programs.  Where 22NICE works best is  applications  like
         DBASE,  WORDSTAR,  and  assemblers  like  M80  and  MAC.  The
         emulation will be quite slow without a V20 or 30 chip.

         Without a V20 or 30 chip programs will run at less than  half
         the  original machine's speed.  With the CPU replacement, the
         22NICE emulator will run CP/M  programs  at  twice  to  three
         times  their  original  speed!  To assemble a 140K BBS source
         with M80 took the following times.

                     Standard 8086 at 8 Mhz  -- 15 mins.
                     Original Xerox at 4 Mhz --  6 mins.
                     V30 at 8 Mhz            --  2 mins.

         As  you  can  see,  the  V30  greatly  improves  the speed of
         emulation.  Actually the processor is not emulated with a V30
         chip, the code runs directly!  A V20 or V30 chip  will  be  a
         necessity  if  you  plan  to  use  22NICE a lot like I do.  A
         V20/30 will also improve the speed of your  computer  running
         8088  and  8086 code too.  My machine's Norton SI rating went
         from 1.9 to 4.0 when I installed the V30.

         So, if you miss some of those CP/M programs, or if  you  want
         to  do  CP/M  software  development  on  your  DOS machine, I
         recommend  22NICE.   It's  invisible,  easy  to  use  as  the
         original  CP/M  programs  were (hehe) and works like a charm!
         Other than the complicated command line from GENCOM,  I  have
         no  complaints.   22NICE is an excellent program, best of all
         you can try it for free by just downloading it from a BBS. If
         you like it as I have, you won't mind sending  the  requested
         $30 registration fee to SYDEX.


                                KEYBOARD DRAWER
                                BY W.H. Lambdin

         Keyboard Drawer. $24 bought from Compuadd.

         This has been a great investment for me, because my  computer
         desk  is  only 19.5 inches deep. This is not near enough room
         for my computer's case, and a full size keyboard.

         I was afraid my keyboard would be damaged, so I  ordered  one







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         of  these  keyboard drawers.  Now I have the case and monitor
         sitting atop the keyboard drawer.  When I want the  keyboard,
         I  just  slide  it out, and when it is not in use, it is back
         under the case out of the way.  If you have a situation  like
         I described, I would highly recommend you buy one.

         There  is two problems with this drawer, it makes the monitor
         about 4 inches higher than it was before,  and  the  keyboard
         cable  occasionally hang's, and will not let the drawer slide
         in and out smoothly. I got around the keyboard hanging up  by
         taping  the  cable to the top of the drawer, and just give it
         enough slack to open smoothly.  If  the  height  would  be  a
         problem,  Compuadd  also  sells a keyboard drawer that mounts
         under the desk counter.

         This keyboard drawer does not take the place  of  a  keyboard
         cover,  because  both the front and back are open.  So if you
         like to protect your keyboard, you will still need  to  cover
         it.

         Rating ***+


                        PATERSON TURBO XT BIOS FOLLOWUP
                                 by Ron Alcorn

         I made a mistake when I said that this BIOS would handle 720K
         drives  automatically.   You  do  have  to use the DRIVER.SYS
         setup in the CONFIG.SYS file.   What  you  end  up  doing  is
         creating  a  logical  drive.   This new logical drive will be
         treated as a 720K drive.  And the actual physical drive  will
         be  treated as a 360.  Although there are now 2 drive letters
         for one drive, either will both read and write 360K or  720K.
         It  is  just  that  you  have to do the format on the logical
         drive.  I am very sorry if this caused any problems.


                         PACKARD BELL 2400 BAUD MODEM
                                by W.H. Lambdin

         Packard  Bell  2400I  internal  modem  for  IBM  compatibles.
         Operates at 300, 1200, and 2400 baud. Bought  for  $146  from
         Mid  West Micro Peripherals. Comes with Procomm 2.42 terminal
         software.

         This modem does not have any mode of error  correction  built
         into  the  hard ware, such as MNP or ARQ. This means that you
         will not be able to use protocols such  as  1K  Xmodem  g  or
         Ymodem  G  batch.   These protocols are the fastest protocols
         because the terminal program does no error checking, but rely
         on the error correction routines built into the modems. These
         protocols  are  for  the  modems  with  the  built  in  error
         correction.








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         This  modem  is  virtually  100  % Hayes compatible, with the
         exception of the command to turn up or down the volume of the
         speaker. This modem however has a speaker volume  control  on
         the  card  plate.   This  card  has  two  phone jacks, but it
         doesn't matter which jack you use for the line.

         I have used the following terminal programs with this  modem.
         Procomm  2.42,  Telix  2.12,  and Telix 3.00. I have only had
         very little trouble with this modem. It occurred when  I  was
         trying  to  call  a  friends BBS that ran at 300 baud using a
         commodore  1650  clone  modem.   The  1650  modem  alternates
         between originate, and answer mode. I do not know if 300 baud
         with  this modem does not work, or it was because of the 1650
         clone.  Who cares, no one would call a BBS at 300  baud  when
         you have 2400 baud.

         I  have  only  used two 2400 baud modems. Kiss 24HC, and this
         Packard Bell 2400I. I would recommend this Packard Bell  over
         the Kiss 2400HC because the Packard Bell is almost 100% hayes
         compatible,  where  the  Kiss 2400HC is only 85 to 90 % Hayes
         compatible.

         Rating ****+






































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                       PROGRAMMER'S CHALLENGE DEPARTMENT

                As  an  editor  of this magazine I will be challenging
         you, the programmer or user, to make or find a  program  that
         is  better  than  the one(s) I will be discussing.  Usually I
         will only be discussing one or two programs a month.   Reason
         being  is that I'll only be picking what I consider to be top
         quality programs that are the best in their category.

                Also you, as a programmer, are welcome to  send  in  a
         challenge yourself.  If you write a program that you think is
         better  than  anyone  else's,  send  it  to  us along with an
         article, not a document, about your program showing  off  its
         features  so that we can place it here in this department for
         others to know about.  This may help you make some  money  if
         your  program  is  Shareware,  the  news  could travel around
         pretty fast on BBS's.   Along  with  the  reception  of  your
         program  and  article,  you  will get a reply from me in this
         department, whether it be compliments, comments, suggestions,
         or criticism.  So don't complain  about  what  I  might  say,
         because  you can clearly see what all possible statements can
         be made toward your program.  Remember,  if  you  send  in  a
         program  and article, it would seem that you are confident in
         what you do. Also all statements are toward your program, not
         you.  I would not want to  offend  any  person  and  start  a
         argument. Don't let these statements scare you off, I'm not a
         bad  guy,  I  just  try  to  give  the public a general view.
         Everything I will be saying will be my opinions only,  unless
         I  actually  run  tests  to  get  true  statistics about your
         program.

                Reader's please send in your responses to me.  Let  me
         know  if  you  think  my  choices are good or bad. It doesn't
         matter to me if  you  agree  or  dis-agree  with  me  because
         everyone has there own opinion.


                                  QEDIT 2.06
                                 by Ron Alcorn

         This  is  a great editor for programmers!  As matter of fact,
         it is good for editing ordinary text files of most any  kind.
         Whether  it  be  Batch,  C,  Pascal, or Assembly.  Also it is
         better than any mini-word processors you will ever find.  But
         is wasn't designed to be a word processor.  It  was  designed
         to be a programmers editor.  I'll get quick to the point with
         this great editor.  Here are some of it's great features.

          1 - Program is under 49K.

          2 - Uses all available memory, so you can have some very big
              files in memory at one time.

          3 - You can  edit as many files you want at one time as long







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              as they will fit in memory.  To give you  an  example  I
              have  loaded  in  as  many as 20 files in memory with no
              problem at all.  I see no  need of having  20  files  in
              memory, but if you need such requirements, then they are
              there waiting for you.

          4 - This editor comes with the key commands being Word  Star
              compatible.   But  you  if you hate Word Star keys, then
              you can define the keys to your little hearts desire.

          5 - Full  color  support.   You  can  change  the  color  of
              anything  that  you want to.  Menus, menu borders, text,
              cursor line, blocks, messages,  errors,  command  lines,
              and highlighting.

          6 - Macros are available.  So create them for what ever your
              need  may  be.   I have even seen a macro for QEdit on a
              BBS that said it would shell to  dos  and  compile  your
              program and hop back in to QEdit at the press of a  key.
              So this macro stuff must be pretty powerful.

          7 - All the blocks  command are there.  You can mark by line
              or cursor.  Marking text with QEdit is very nice, as you
              are marking text or lines, the color changes of what you
              have marked.  But if you don't like the block text color
              to  change,  then this is available also.  You can copy,
              move,  print,  save,  load/insert,  unmark,  format, and
              delete blocks. There is also a scratch buffer.

          8 - Printing  options  are available.  You can  print blocks
              or the text as a whole.  You can define  page  size  and
              left margins.

          9 - Word wrap and right margins are available.

         10 - You can  undelete  lines.   You  can  also  restore  the
              current cursor line in case you screwed it up.

         11 - Search and search/replace options.

         12 - Shell to DOS.

         13 - As  I said you can  have several files  in memory at one
              time.  And you can also have up to 8 different files  on
              the  screen  at  one  time.   You  can  shrink  and zoom
              windows.  Swapping thru windows can be a breeze.

         14 - Auto indention if you want it.

         15 - Commands to  insert  current  time  or  date  at  cursor
              position in to the text.

         16 - The  setup  program will let you do all  the configuring
              you will ever need.  Even your own pop up help screen.







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         17 - You can define the screen size.

              80 x 43, 80 x 50, 80 x 25, 132 x 66

              Even  an  odd  size  such  as  110 x 38, as long as your
              graphic card has options necessary and the  screen  mode
              is  active before you load QEdit.  The only I have tried
              is 80 x 25 and 80 x 43, so the  other  may  or  may  not
              work,  but  since  the program is so good, I assume they
              would  work.   Do  the screen defining through the setup
              program also.  The setup program is amazing!

         18 - Status  line  informs  you of line and  column  position
              of the cursor, whether word wrap, auto indent, or insert
              mode is on, the file name along with path, and amount of
              memory that is free.

         19 - You  can  load  files  in  easily,  even  wildcards  are
              supported.  Here is a small DOS command line example.

              Q WORK.ASM T*.C TERM*.PAS

              If  you  just type Q, it will ask you for the file name,
              if you don't know the file name, then just press  return
              and  it  will  show  you  a list of files in the current
              directory.  Place the cursor on the file to load or  the
              directory to log in to.  Very simple.

         20 - If you have a small memory, then QEdit has pop  up  drop
              down  menus to make things even easier.  All command are
              not  in the pop up menus.  For one reason they all won't
              fit.   But  all  commands  can be made available through
              various key combinations.

         QEdit  even  has  much  more  to  offer.  But I think this is
         enough for you to consider trying this fantastic program.   I
         loved it so much I registered mine as one should.  And I have
         to  admit  I  have  not been disappoint one bit.  If you take
         your time with the manual, I think you will find it simple to
         use.  But if  you  know  Word  Star  already,  then  you  can
         probably  master  it  in  a very short time.  If you need any
         help setting up this program, just  leave  me  a  message  on
         BBS's that carry ZIP Magazine.

         OOPS!  I FORGOT SOMETHING!

         IT IS FAST!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

         I  have  found only one program faster the Qedit's search and
         replace.  This was the Galaxy word processor, but I doubt  if
         you  will  find any thing faster than either one of these two
         programs.  But QEdit will load in  a  file  faster  than  any
         thing  I  have  ever  seen or used.  You are getting close to








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         lightning with QEdit, so don't burn  your  self  or  get  too
         amazed by its powerful configuration and ease of use.


                           DIRECTORY MAGIC FOLLOWUP
                                 by Ron Alcorn

         I  got caried away with telling you everything that I thought
         was good about Directory Magic and forgot to tell you what it
         lacked.  So here is a list of what it needs.

          1 - Full  color changes, it  has some but you can not define
              the color of tagged files and the command menu box.

          2 - The space bar should be used to TAG/UNTAG files.

          3 - There  should be a DOS command line in case you  need to
              format a disk.  Also this  would  add  a  shell  to  DOS
              feature.   To  do this, all you would have to do is type
              COMMAND.COM at the DOS command line.

          4 - Have a directory tree so that you can change directories
              easily.  Don't list the directories in the list, have  a
              separate screen.  For example, press TAB and the screens
              would  toggle between file list and directory tree.  And
              if it had this feature, then have a command to create  a
              file  to  store  the  directories, so that the directory
              tree would come up instantly without having to  read  in
              all   the   directories.    This  would  make  directory
              selection very simple and easy.  I know  that  Directory
              Magic  has a separate program to do this, but I prefer a
              program to be a  whole  and  when  configured,  have  no
              configuration  files,  modifying  the  program itself is
              much nicer I think.  One nice program this is like this,
              is an editor called Q-Edit.

          5 - Have  wildcard  TAG/UNTAG  options  and  also  TAG/UNTAG
              invert.  Invert would tag the untagged files  and  untag
              the tagged files.

          6 - Full mouse support.

          7 - Options  to  ARC  tagged  files and go inside an archive
              and  view  and  extract tagged files.  But since BUERG'S
              NASTY move, I guess we could forget this!  But  I  would
              much rather wait for Phil Katz's new compression program
              and  have  Directory  Magic support it and throw Buerg's
              ARC out the door.

          8 - When tagging files it should tell you how many files are
              and tagged the total size of the tagged files.

          9 - Memory  resident  option so you can hot key it to pop up
              over any program.







         ZIP MAGAZINE, FOR HOME MS-DOS USERS                  Page 44




         10 - Be able to define your own program to edit  and/or  view
              files.   Currently  control V is used to view files.  If
              you didn't define a program to  view  a  file,  then  it
              would  use  it's  regular  default view command.  To add
              the editor, use control E.  If this was  not  installed,
              then  control E  would  view  a  file with  the built in
              default view command instead of loading the editor.

         11 - Run batch files

         12 - If loading program, it should ask for program options.

         13 - Have enter to view all files except run  BAT,  EXE,  and
              COM,  files.   And if you need to view a batch file, you
              could press control V to view it.  Also  if  the  cursor
              was  on  a  sub-directory,  it  would  change  into that
              subdirectory.

         And if Directory Magic had all of  these  features,  I  would
         consider  it  the closest thing to being perfect.  I left out
         one of the commands in the last issue of ZIP,  control  V  is
         used  to  view a file.  Sorry for leaving that out.  Remember
         that if you can find a DOS shell as  SIMPLE  and  COMPACT  as
         Directory Magic, then let ZIP know about it and we'll give it
         a run down to see how it compares.




































         ZIP MAGAZINE, FOR HOME MS-DOS USERS                  Page 45




                             TECHNICAL DATA NEEDED
                                by W.H. Lambdin

         I have been stumped by this question, for a long time. Anyone
         that has a clue, please let me Know.

         How can Ymodem or Zmodem transfer ascii files faster than arc
         files?

         I  have  downloaded  arc  files at 2400 baud, and the fastest
         rate  I  have  ever  seen is 235 Characters per second,  then
         download an ascii file, and it get as high  as  239  and  240
         CPS. What gives here? In my opinion, they should be the  same
         speed.

         if  you  have  an  answer  to  this question, you can write a
         message to me on any of the BBS with the / or * under the BBS
         area code. If you prefer to write directly to me, my  address
         is below

                                 W.H. Lambdin
                                 P.O. Box 328
                           East Bernstadt, Ky. 40729

         -------------------------------------------------------------

         I  received  one  reply  to  the Path extension question that
         appeared in the last issue of ZIP.

         Donald R. Kelley says to use the shell command in your config
         sys file. this is supposed to work in version 3.2 of  dos.  I
         use  MS-DOS  3.3,  and  this  does  not  work correctly on my
         system.

         Mr. Kelley also sent a printed 4 page article  that  explains
         the  use  of  the  path command, and a way to expand the path
         buffer beyond 127 bytes. This article will appear in the next
         issue of ZIP.























         ZIP MAGAZINE, FOR HOME MS-DOS USERS                  Page 46




                                   ZIP INFO
                         by W.H. Lambdin & Ron Alcorn

         This is ZIP.  A paperless magazine.  All submissions will  be
         printed,  unless  you  ask us not to.  We will not modify any
         text you submit except for  spell  checking.   So  the  views
         expressed  here  do  not necessarily reflect the views of the
         editors.

         If you want to send us a submission, upload it to one of  the
         BBS's  with  a  *  beside  it.  You can also send them to the
         Secret Kingdom (606) 878-9500.  This BBS operates at 300  and
         1200  Baud.   We  are  the sysops of this BBS.  It's hours of
         operation is from 6pm to 10 pm EST.  Monday through Thursday.
         We will be adding BBS's where you  can  download  the  latest
         volume,  and also upload your submissions.  When you upload a
         submission, use ZIP as the extension.  We would appreciate it
         if all submissions were just ascii, and margins set at 10  on
         the left, and 10 on the right.  This isn't demanded, it would
         just  be  easier  on  us.  If you want to submit programs you
         have written, send them along in an arc file with your  Text.
         We  will check all programs.  If they prove to be unsuitable,
         we  will  reject  them.   (you  know  Trojans,  and   harmful
         programs.)

         If  you  submit  a  review,  follow the examples here. If you
         think it is a very good program, give 5 stars.  If you  think
         it  is  sloppy,  give  it  one  star.   If you think it falls
         between grades, use a plus as this.  ***+ This means a rating
         of 3 1/2 stars, or a little better than average.

         We will not make you run from place to place in order to read
         one article.  When we start an article, it will be printed in
         it's entirety before another article will  be  started.   All
         the  advertisements will be found in the back. I like to read
         the articles with as little trouble  as  necessary,  and  the
         same  goes  for  ad's.   We will have advertisements, but the
         editors  take  no  responsibility  in  what   you   may   see
         advertised, so buy at your own risk.

         ZIP  is  being  written  on AT compatible's using Galaxy 2.4.
         Galaxy is written by Omniverse incorporation. If you want  to
         find a great free ware word processor, give Galaxy 2.4 a try.
         I like it so much, I registered my copy.

         In order for this magazine to survive, it will need help from
         it's  readers.   If  you  wish to correct us on something, or
         write an article or review  for  ZIP,  please  send  us  your
         responses.  Any  help  would  be greatly appreciated.  If you
         wish to reprint an article or review from ZIP, feel  free  to
         use  it  any  way you wish, we only request that you give the
         author credit, and report that the article appeared in ZIP.









         ZIP MAGAZINE, FOR HOME MS-DOS USERS                  Page 47




                           ZIP'S COVER SHEET CONTEST

         ZIP  Magazine is holding a cover sheet contest.  What we have
         in mind is for you to design  a  cover  sheet  for  ZIP.   We
         currently  have  one, but we would like to do something for a
         reader of ZIP.  The winner would receive 6 issues  of  ZIP on
         disk.   They would be shipped to his door free of charge.  If
         interested please read the rules below:

         1 - One person can send in as many  cover  sheet  designs  as
             they want to.  Absolutely no limit at all.

         2 - Use valid IBM characters that are displayable.  Including
             graphics characters above code 127.  Example: ۰

         3 - Be sure not to use codes that would affect some printers,
             I can't show you actual examples, but I'll give  you  the
             ASCII codes that should not be used.  Examples: 12, 8, 7,
             usually  most  of  the codes below 32 have some effect on
             different brands of printers.

         4 - Use no ANSI color codes or anything out of the ordinary

         5 - Be sure that it will fit on a regular 8 1/2" x 11"  sheet
             of  paper.   With  a  top and  bottom margin of 6, a left
             margin  of 10, and the right margin set at 70. Exactly 54
             lines.

         6 - Things it should include are listed below

                ZIP Magazine
                Issue #
                Date, Year
                Designed by Your Name
                Editors, Ron Alcorn & W.H. Lambdin
                (The editors names  don't  necessarily  have  to  look
                like  what  I  have  shown you, just as long as we are
                mentioned on the cover sheet)

         7 - Have entries sent in by December 31st.

         8 - Send entries to either the Secret  Kingdom  or  World  Of
             Wonder's BBS's or you can mail them to the address below:

                Ron Alcorn
                147 Foster Heights Rd.
                London, KY  40741
                Phone Number:  (606) 878-9500
                (If you feel you need to call, then please do so,  but
                don't call during the Secret Kingdom BBS hours)

         9 - If entries are sent thru the  mail,  then  send  them  on
             a disk or a printed copy.








         ZIP MAGAZINE, FOR HOME MS-DOS USERS                  Page 48




                             QUESTIONS AND ANSWERS

         Q: In the article (PLIGHT'S AND PERILS  OF  UPGRADING),  W.H.
         Lambdin  mentioned  interleave  of  3 to 1 on the hard drive.
         Could you please explain this?  Dave Richardson,  Cincinnati,
         Oh.

         A:  Interleave  of  3  to  1  means  the hard drive reads one
         cluster, skips three clusters then it read's another cluster.
         W.H.L.

         Q: In the Narc 2.1 article, Mr  Lambdin  was  mentioning  the
         power  and  features of this program to unarc arc files.  Why
         take the time and space to review a slow program  like  Narc,
         when  PKXARC is so much faster?  Dave Richardson, cincinnati,
         Oh.

         A: I intended to point out that NARC was a  good  replacement
         for  beginners that are uncomfortable with PKXARC's commands.
         W.H.L.

         Q: Are Generic  disks  trustworthy?   I  see  generic  disk's
         selling  as  low  as  19  to  29  cents  each.   paul  adams,
         Lexington, Ky.

         A: I have been buying generic disk's for approximately  three
         years. So far, the ratio.  is 200 good disk's to one bad one.
         Generic's in my opinion are as good a  quality  as  the  name
         brand ones. W.H.L.

         Q:  How do you upload or download from the W.O.W.  BBS posted
         in the first issue of ZIP? George Guccia, Millville, NJ.

         A: I apologize for any inconvenience this has caused  anyone.
         WOW  runs  on  a  CP/M  computer, and the download and upload
         routines have not been incorporated into the software yet. So
         until this is completed, you exit  to  CP/M  level  with  the
         files  command,  then type zmd s filename.ext to download. To
         upload put an r in place of the s.  This BBS  only  uses  128
         byte xmodem (checksum), 128 byte Xmodem (crc), and Ymodem. If
         you  want  to force ymodem on downloads, use this syntax. zmd
         sk filename.ext. W.H.L.

         Q: I would like to carry future issues of ZIP on my BBS. What
         do I need to do? George Guccia, Millville, NJ.

         A: Anyone that wants to support ZIP, is  welcome  to  do  so.
         Full  freedom  to downloading ZIP, and passing it around. The
         BBS's noted for supporting ZIP are the BBS's we usually call.
         If you want to continue supporting ZIP,  you  are  more  than
         welcome.   The  reason  I  said  we would be adding BBS's was
         because we had not had time to talk to sysop's of the  boards
         we call when the first issue was nearing completion.  Through








         ZIP MAGAZINE, FOR HOME MS-DOS USERS                  Page 49




         friends,  ZIP has found it's way to at least 20 BBS's that we
         did not upload it to. W.H.L.

         Q: ZIP is a catchy name for this magazine.  What  caused  you
         to name it ZIP? Rick Mays, Mobile, Alabama

         A:  About  three  months ago, Ron and I decided to start this
         magazine, but we had a bit of trouble thinking of a name  for
         it.  We  called  it  ZIP for three reasons.  This magazine is
         being transferred at baud rates up to 19,200. The issues  are
         released  the  same  day  they  are  complete (no three month
         delay). Lastly like you said, it is a catchy name. W.H.L.

         Q: What type of articles do you  want  people  write?  Review
         software, Articles, or what? Charles Thompson, Phoenix, Az.

         A:  We  would  appreciate any articles or reviews that anyone
         wishes to write, as long as they relate to MS-DOS or  IBM/DOS
         computers. W.H.L.










































         ZIP MAGAZINE, FOR HOME MS-DOS USERS                  Page 50




                                   NEW BBS's

         318 457-1538 Toepfer's Electronics BBS. Baud 300-2400 Running
         *   M&M   BBS   on  a  C-64.  24  hours  of  operation.  Free
             Registration. Storage 2 meg. Files for C-64,  and  MS-DOS
             computers.  Member  of  KSAT  QDP.  Home  BBS of Citizens
             aligned for Better television. SYSOP Darrel Toepfer

         609 327-5553  UNION LAKE BBS. Baud 300 - 2400. Running on  an
             8088 machine.  Free Registration.  Storage 32 meg.  Sysop
             George Guccia

         802 748-8449  HILLTOPPER.  Baud 300 - 2400. Running TPBoard v
             4.2  on  a  16  mhz  80286  machine.   Storage  146  meg.
             FidoNet # 1:132/401.0 in Saint Johnsbury, Vermont.  Sysop
             Brian McQuade

         802 888-7218  BEEHIVE. Baud 300 - 9600 with US  Robotics  HST
         *   9600.   Running  PC-Board  12.1  on  an  80286   machine.
             Storage  80 meg with another 80 meg on the way. Has quite
             a  few forum's for writers, and items for sale ETC.  Will
             soon have relay mail with Terry  West's  BBS  (Strawberry
             Patch).   Files  for  MS-DOS. No download ratio, but uses
             point system.  30 minutes access on  first  Call.   Sysop
             Helenmarie B. Robitille.


                            FILES MENTIONED IN ZIP

         First column is the name of the program, second column is the
         name  they  will  be  listed  by  on Secret Kingdom BBS, Last
         column is the author of the program.

                Archive    Fastbac.arc   Colossus
                Coretest   Core28.arc    Core International
                Dtst       Dtst10.arc    Samuel H. Smith
                McCoy      Mccoy.gif     Unknown
                NARC       Narc24.arc    Infinity Design Concepts
                PKXARC     PK361.exe     Phil Katz
                Procomm    Procomm.arc   Data Storm
                           Procomm2.arc
                           Procomm3.arc
                           Procomm4.arc
                           Procomm5.arc
                Telix      Telix212.arc  Colin Sampaleanu
                Telix      Tlx300-1.arc  Colin Sampaleanu
                           Tlx300-2.arc
                V-20 80    V2080.arc     unknown
                Vgif       Vgif34.arc    Bob Montgomery
                Vgif       VGIF36.arc    Bob Montgomery











         ZIP MAGAZINE, FOR HOME MS-DOS USERS                  Page 51




                                   FOR SALE

         For  sale:  One  tractor  feed  adapter  that  works with the
         Commodore  MPS  803  printer. Working condition.  $ 10.  W.H.
         Lambdin  #5

         For sale: One basic 7.0 basic compiler for the Commodore 128.
         It  is  by ABACUS. Original disk, and manual. Originally sold
         for $60. Make offer. W.H. Lambdin  #5

         For Sale: I have PD and  shareware  programs  to  sell.  Send
         $1.50 for complete list on Diskette. Please explain the media
         you  need  the  list  on.  I can supply almost any format you
         need. W.H. Lambdin, P.O. Box 328 East Bernstadt, Ky. 40729 #5

         For sale: if you would rather not download this magazine, you
         can  subscribe  to  ZIP.  I  can support any type of diskette
         media. 5 1/4 360K, 5 1/4 1.2 MEG, 3 1/2 720K, 3 1/2 720K (PS2
         format), and 3 1/2 1.44 MEG. If you are interested, the rates
         will be $1.50 per issue on 5 1/4 format, and $2 per issue  on
         either  3  1/2  format.   If  you subscribe, and need it on 3
         1/2's be sure to specify which format you need. W.H. Lambdin,
         P.O. Box 328, East Bernstadt, Ky. 40729.  #5

         FOR SALE:

         Commodore 1581 3 1/2" 800K drive               $ 150
         Commodore 1571 5 1/4" 360K drive               $ 130
         Minimodem-C (Hayes/1670 Switchable for C-128)  $  60
         RS-232 Vic 1011-A interface (For C-64/C-128)   $  15
         Koala pad (For C-64/C-128)                     $  20
         2 Abacus 128 CAD programs (C-128)              $  25

         Approximately  150  Commodore  64/128  magazines, I will take
         what I consider a descent price, so state your offer.

         Leave a message on any of the BBS's that support ZIP Magazine
         or call 606-878-9500.  Be patient if you leave a message on a
         BBS, it may take me from 1 to 2 weeks to answer your message.
         Also  make  sure  that  you  do not call within the operating
         times of the Secret Kingdom BBS.  Or you can write to:

         Ron Alcorn
         ATTENTION:  ZIP MAGAZINE
         147 Foster Heights Rd.
         London, KY  40741

         FOR  SALE:  DMP  105  Printer. This is in good working order,
         but is well used.  Asking $100.

                                       John Baker
         Ph. Voice:  (606) 878 7597    P.O. Box 283
         Data: (606) 864 8862          Lily, KY 40740








         ZIP MAGAZINE, FOR HOME MS-DOS USERS                  Page 52




         If  you  have an Item you want to buy, sell or Trade.  ZIP is
         accepting ad's. The ad's will cost 5 cents per word, and your
         ad will run for three issues. If  you  are  interested,  send
         your  ad's and money to cover them to W.H. Lambdin, P.O.  Box
         328 East Bernstadt, Ky. 40729.

         When  you  are calculating the cost for your ad, do not count
         your name, and address, or the Ad's heading.

         The ad's will be like the BBS list. Only the  new  ad's  will
         appear  in  the  pages  of  ZIP,  and  the ad's from previous
         issues will be a separate file in the ZIP arc file.

         PLEASE INFORM US ON WHAT YOU THINK ABOUT THIS IDEA BELOW.

         Do you think ZIP  Magazine  should  include  text  snap  shot
         screens when reviewing a program?  What this would do is give
         you  a  good indication of what the program looked like.  The
         only thing, of course, would be that color would not show up.
         If you would like ZIP to offer this, a small problem comes to
         mind. The example screen would not fit in the margin area, so
         do you think we should disregard the margins when inserting a
         screen snap shot or include a file with all the  screen  snap
         shots.  If we include an extra file, then within ZIP Magzzine
         itself, it would say see SNAPSHOT.TXT file.

         PLEASE INFORM US ON WHAT YOU THINK  BE  LEAVING  MESSAGES  ON
         BBS' THAT CARRY ZIP MAGAZINE ON A REGULAR BASIS.

         At  the  last  minute, we just got a new BBS that will accept
         ZIP submissions and carry the latest ZIP Magazine.  This  BBS
         being Toepfer's Electronics BBS, so we thank Darrel Toepfer!
