Yeah, that's a setup I used for a while, sort of a poor man's tablet/clamshell 'convertible. ;-) No problem extending the cable to around 2 feet.
Never did use the disk drives very much although I did install a second one; even today while playing with Will's dump program it's so simple to plug in the cable to the PC, select download or upload on the PC and either BASIC F3 (SAVE) to com: or TEXT F2 (LOAD) from com:, not to mention being able to print on the PC and send/receive over the Internet. Question for the experts: I have "COM:88N1E" stored in one of the BASIC function keys; I don't suppose there's a way to do that for TEXT? Back in the day IIRC the DVI and the M100 were both around $800; probably still have the receipts somewhere; don't know what that'd be today.. And yes, the Model T and NEC BASICs are remarkably versatile, especially considering the size constraints. Definitely unique and, I don't know, friendly in a way... m ----- Original Message ----- From: B 9 To: [email protected] Sent: Friday, October 28, 2022 12:39 AM Subject: Re: [M100] Notoriously S.L.O.W BASIC posted - help speeding it up appreciated On Thu, Oct 27, 2022 at 8:51 AM MikeS <[email protected]> wrote: It might not be so bad on a 200 but my main annoyance is having to scroll up and down on the M100's 8 line screen; as a matter of fact the larger screen was the main reason I bought a DVI when they came out. When they came out? I wonder if they were more expensive when they were new or now that they are rare and "vintage". Is that a picture of your Disk/Video Interface setup? Looks nifty! For a lot of stuff in the old days I actually used GWBASIC or TBASIC to program on a PC; except for screen printing and graphics they're almost completely compatible and with a few conditional lines many programs could be run and tested on both the PC and the M100. There's something I didn't know! I've been surprised at how capable the Model T's 8-bit BASIC is. Was it the last one Microsoft made? Given what I had expected after seeing the Apple ][ and C64, it's quite a bit more advanced. (For example, ON COM GOSUB). And I read that the NEC 8201A version of the DVI allowed not only color graphics, but extended the BASIC language with graphics commands that I think may be from GW-BASIC. I can understand that some folks want to relive the total experience of doing everything on the old hardware [...] Sure, and there's nothing wrong with reliving the past. But, that's not me. I didn't get to experience the M100 when it was current. This is my first time around with this technology, so part of the fun is trying to see what it was like back then. I know, it's sort of like people who go camping for a week to get in touch with their primitive hunter-gatherer ancestors. Not likely to be terribly accurate, but still, it's fun. Nevertheless, for just noodling around while relaxing on the couch not much can beat the M100. I'm beginning to learn that! I still haven't got a true Model 100. I only have a Tandy 200 because my neighbor was throwing it away and wondered if I could use "an old laptop". I had no idea what it was. But, given my experiences so far, maybe I should look into getting the real thing some day. —b9
