From: rs.miller@pro-midnightex.cts.com (Randy Miller)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.apple2
Subject: PC-Transporter and DOS 5.0
Date: 8 Apr 92 09:18:19 GMT
Article-I.D.: crash.1992Apr08.091819.23606
Organization: Crash TimeSharing, El Cajon, CA

For some time, Applied Engineering has been unable to figure a way to use
MS-DOS 5.0 with a virtual (read small) hard drive.  Below is a workaround
that actually works!

USING A RAMWORKS CARD WITH A PC-TRANSPORTER
AS EMS MEMORY UNDER MS-DOS 5.0
There is FINALLY a method to use a RAMWORKS (or even /RAM5 on a IIGS)
as EMS memory with a PC-Transporter under MS-DOS 5.0.  As most of us
has found out, rather disconcertingly, MS-DOS 5.0 will not recognize a
small (less than 2.8 meg) hard drive.  The following is an example on
how to do it.  First, let me state that IN NO WAY AM I, RANDY S.
MILLER, RESPONSIBLE FOR ANY DAMAGE DONE TO EITHER HARDWARE, SOFTWARE
OR DATA WHILE ATTEMPTING THESE PROCEDURES.  YOU, THE END USER, ARE
ENTIRELY RESPONSIBLE FOR ANY DAMAGE DONE TO YOUR DATA OR EQUIPMENT.
PLEASE HAVE ADEQUATE BACKUPS IN CASE SOMETHING DOES "BLOW UP!!!"

For matters of expediency, I shall be using my setup on an Apple IIe
for an example.  This is how my equipment is set up:

Aux:  Ramworks 3.0 with 1 meg of memory
Slot 1:  Apricot Parallel Pro Printer Interface
Slot 2:  SMT Envoy Serial Card
Slot 3:  Empty (although the Ramworks and the No-Slot Clock I have
         installed phantom slot to here.  Once I get a new 74FS109 or
         equivalent chip, my Transwarp IIe will be residing here.)
Slot 4:  Apple IIe mouse card
Slot 5:  PC-Transporter with a 5.25 in. Transdrive and 2 AMR 3.5 inch
         drives connected.
Slot 6:  Apple 5.25 in. drive interface
Slot 7:  Sider D2 drive interface.  The card has the original 4 OS
         ROMS, with the ProDOS partition divided into a 16 meg and a
          2.5 meg partition.

The Process:

     Get out your AE Super DeskTop Expander disk and copy the
following files to create a new PC-Transporter boot disk or to the
"*"/AEPC folder on your hard drive:

ProDOS
Basic.system
Prodrive (the BINARY file only)
AEPC.System
Startaepc.system
along with all the necessary driver and config files.
Then either type or exec the following program into BASIC:

 10 D$ =  CHR$ (4)
 11  HOME : VTAB 12: PRINT "Now setting up RAMWorks III as a RAMDrive..."
 12  HOME : FOR I = 1 TO 100
 20  PRINT D$"bload prodrive"
 30  POKE 8195,0
 40  CALL 8192
 41  HOME : VTAB 12: PRINT "Now loading AmperWorks..."
 42  HOME : FOR I = 1 TO 100
 43  PRINT D$"-/mstor/mw/amperworks"
 44  HOME : VTAB 12: PRINT "Now copying /MSTOR/AEPC/RAMVOL to "
 45 vtab13: PRINT "RAMDisk as /RAM/MSDOSVOL..."
 46  & COPY("/hard2/ramvol" TO "/ram/msdosvol")
 47  HOME : VTAB 12: PRINT "Now clearing AmperWorks from Memory..."
 48 &FRE
 49HOME:VTAB12:?"Now launching PC-Transporter"
 50fori=1to10000:next
 51?d$"-start.aepc"
 save startup

While I am using the Morgan Davis Group's Amperworks utility to do the
file copy, you can just as easily the Autocopy utility from the Super
Desktop Expander disk.

Next, start up the PC-Transporter and hold down <space> as the
PC-Transporter boots.  You will now be placed in the PC-Transporter
control panel.  From here, choose to configure the PC-Transporter.
Now go to configure the card and choose to configure disk drives.
Create a drive E> partition (or whatever drive letter is shown as your
second hard drive).  When prompted for a pathname type
/volumename/foldername.../ramvol, where /volumename is the name of the
root, or */, volume, and /foldername... is the remaining pathname on
how deep you want to bury this partition.  You may want to use any
name you want for the MS-DOS partition name, but I recommend ramvol,
to avoid any confusion.  When prompted for disk size, enter the size
you want for this partition, but be sure it is less than what you have
installed on your RamWorks or your virtual hard drive.  When the
process is completed, save the new configuration, move back to the
main menu of the PC-Transporter's control panel, and reboot the
PC-Transporter.  Leave it boot DOS and get to the appropriate system
prompt (A> or A:\>, if you're using floppies to boot, or C> or C:\> if
booting from the hard drive.

Now comes the trick:  type FDISK and press <Return> to start FDISK.
When FDISK's menu comes up, choose option 5 to change to a different
hard drive.  From the menu that comes up displaying the drives
available, choose the appropriate unpartitioned drive.  Once that
drive has been chosen, press <Esc> to get back to FDISK's main menu.
>From here, choose option 1 to partition the drive.  From the
partitioning menu, choose 1 to create a primary partition.  When FDISK
asks whether you want to use the entire partition as a DOS partition,
answer N.  You will then be asked to enter the amount (in megabytes)
or percentage of the partition is to be the marked as the primary
partition.  You MUST answer this question as a percentage!  Enter a
number less than 99 and append the % sign to your response.  The drive
will whirl for a while, then FDISK will announce the drive has been
partitioned.  DO NOT ATTEMPT TO CREATE AN EXTENDED PARTITION, AS THE
WORKS WILL BE SCREWED UP WHEN YOU FORMAT THE DRIVE.  Press <Esc> to
get back out to FDISK's main menu, then press <Esc> to reboot the
system.

Once the system has rebooted and you get the command prompt (either
A>, A:\>, C> or C:\>) type format dn:, where dn is the drive letter to
format, and press <Return>.  DOS will now merrily format the drive
without any problems.  From here, you can use install your favorite
memory manager to make this drive look line EMS, reboot to ProDOS,
make the appropriate changes to the above startup program, and you are
now set.  Best of luck!
Randy Miller
(c) 1992

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