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GEOS: The Graphical Environment Operating System
osnews.com — GEOS managed to offer nearly all the functionality of the original Mac in a 1 MHz computer with 64 Kilobytes of RAM. It wasn't an OS written to run on a generic x86 chip on a moving hardware platform. It was written using immense knowledge of the hardware and the tricks one could use to maximise speed.
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- fustanella, on 10/12/2007, -1/+4Loved my GEOS-based Tandy Zoomer. Pocket fun!
- texpundit, on 10/12/2007, -0/+18I ran GEOS on my Commodore 64. VERY slick and fun to play with. *thumbs up*
- josegutz, on 10/12/2007, -11/+1I was a Tandy pocket fun guilderschmidt! It was cool... Rage agianst the palm pilot and the DS is behind the atom smasher...KaaabLaaaoww!
- vonbushwhick, on 10/12/2007, -14/+0@ josegutz
WTF is a pocketfun guilderschmidt? Are you a fcking Moron? - StephenCIreland, on 10/12/2007, -0/+4the nokia 9110i ran GEOS, it was awsome, i used on until 6 months ago under terminal to admin my sun machine
- hackwrench, on 10/12/2007, -2/+1He appears to be poking fun at fustanella's post.
- laserdisc, on 10/12/2007, -0/+10GEOS on the C=64 was in my opinion one of the few programming miracles I have ever witnessed.
- morganm, on 10/12/2007, -1/+2Oh how I loved moving the cursor with a closeout Atari 2600 joystick on my C-64.
- V1ncent, on 10/12/2007, -1/+2The first computer art I ever did was in GEOS on my C64!
- EPAPRESS, on 11/09/2007, -0/+0I also have two Tandy Z-PDA Zoomers and also 2 Casio Z-7000 and 2 AST GridPad 2390!
Nice pieces of GEOS history! I was also able to run now GeoGraf on it! Works with SRAM-PCCards and wanted to see the origin AC adapter!
- adidax, on 10/12/2007, -2/+6Oh wow. I haven't heard anything about GEOS since my very first computer. A 286 running DRDos (Digital Research Dos) with GEOS running on top of it. It even had tetris! Oh how i miss the old days...
- superbenk, on 10/12/2007, -0/+4I think you're talking about Geoworks Ensemble. The original GEOS was for 8-bit computers and was one of the most amazing peices of software I've ever used (considering it's era).
- PantherX, on 10/12/2007, -0/+7Geoworks was the bomb, yo!
- adidax, on 10/12/2007, -2/+3I am. I relized that after I read the rest of the article. Oops.
- steveodigg, on 10/12/2007, -0/+2GeoWorks was awesome. It ran well on my IBM PS/1 10 MHz 286, 1MB RAM. So much better than Windows 3.0. It actually took 20 seconds for the first character that I typed to appear in Write. :(
- RedHairedMan, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1My family's very first computer ran GeoWorks. Was a 286 IIRC, and I thought it was great. I actually knew what the hell I was doing on it. As opposed to when we 'upgraded' to Windows 3.1, which just seemed to make so little sense in it's design principles.
*sighs*
*sings*Meeeeeeeemooooories - EPAPRESS, on 11/09/2007, -0/+0Then you MUST look at www.geos-infobase.de It is a paradise for GEOS 1,2,3 and 4!!!!
- gh02t, on 10/12/2007, -23/+1Uhh... interesting but front page?
- astrotrain, on 10/12/2007, -1/+33The C=64 should always be front page...;)
- Software2, on 10/12/2007, -8/+1I'm not even going to say it.
- palmer, on 10/12/2007, -2/+8More impressive is that the Atari computers had all of these hardware capabilities years earlier, in 1978. Hardware sprite overlays, redefinable character set, fine scrolling of the entire screen, instruction execution during the horizontal and vertical blanking intervals, co-processors for graphics and sound, even S-video output.
The Apples of the era didn't even have lower-case letters. - noahhoward, on 10/12/2007, -3/+2My C=64 still works... monitor is blown though. Hopefuly my parents didn't trash it when they moved.
- slantyyz, on 10/12/2007, -2/+1@palmer
I thought s-video on TVs didn't get popular until S-VHS came out in the late 80s. - palmer, on 10/12/2007, -0/+2On TVs, yes, it wasn't until SuperBeta came out that separated Y/C video hit the TV market (the S stands for "separated", not "super"). But there were some monitors in the '80s that handled it, specifically the JVC-made Commodore 1702. The 1702 was legendary, a hugely popular and well made monitor. I still own two of them to use as broadcast monitors for video editing. The 1702 has separate RCA jacks on the back for luma and chroma.
The Atari 8-bit was a product of a different era, when designers were forward-thinking and given free reign to make the best product they could imagine. It's too bad that the brainwashed consumers did not take time to compare the capabilities of the computers available; kids came home from school and said, "We use Apples at school," so parents rushed out to buy them without regard for their comparatively stunted capabilities. The IBM PC was outdated and outclassed the day it hit the market, but with that nameplate, it didn't matter. - khiddy, on 10/12/2007, -0/+2I used both GEOS on the C64 and GeoWorks Ensemble on the PC/XT that my parents had. GEOS on the C64 gave the full WIMP experience, including desktop publishing (to Apple LaserWriters, even!). The buy-in for GEOS ($50) was cheap, as was the hardware that it ran on.
On the PC/XT, GeoWorks Ensemble was not as rewarding. There were few applications that shipped with the standard install, and most of them were eye-candy. However, it did eke a few more years of life out of the XT before I could afford a real Macintosh...
Those were the days, man! - Namco, on 10/12/2007, -1/+2"My C=64 still works... monitor is blown though. Hopefuly my parents didn't trash it when they moved."
Bust out the TV adapter and hook it up to your TV!!
- cosmicrob, on 10/12/2007, -1/+5I remember GEOS on a Commodore 128.. used a joystick to move the cursor and required infinite patience for the constand disk swapping. But the draw program and word processor were way cool at the time.
- desktopmonkey, on 10/12/2007, -1/+7That's a nice throwback. I remember joining AOL and having to install GeoWorks Ensemble to run it. Yes, I said I joined AOL! Hey, it was the early 90's! I had a Prodigy account too!!!
- astrotrain, on 10/12/2007, -1/+8GEOS was the .... back in the golden days of the C-64... using a combination of 1541 and 1581 drives to allow GEOS to run Word Processing, and Graphics Editors, was amazing for the time.
Along with GEOS was the Grandfather of the Internet... Quantumlink :)- ClayRobeson, on 10/12/2007, -0/+3Huzzah for Quantum Link! I miss those days...
- Battlecry, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1I also miss Quantum Link... Spent many an hour in Club Caribe and RabbitJack casino :)
- Amigaice, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1I used our Commodore Club Account. I met a lot of people in that club.
Anyone have the Ram Upgrade to run Geos faster. I think it ran pretty fast with that.
I remember wanting CMD 20meg Hard Drive. Those where the days.
- drysz, on 10/12/2007, -1/+4With the Ram expander, GEOS ran very nicely on the C64.
- joshaidan, on 10/12/2007, -1/+4I once found a floppy that said, "GEOS" on it for the C64 I owned at the time. Wasn't sure what it was, so I put it in and after 15 minutes or so of loading I had a GUI... which would load stuff off the floppy again every five or so minues, causing me to sit there and wait.
Things were fun back then!
Brian. - Sirocco, on 10/12/2007, -2/+23GEOS > Vista
- KrocCamen, on 10/12/2007, -2/+6If Vista were released the same time as GEOS, it would require a C128 (twice the speed of the C64), a 512 KB RAM expansion and two 1581 Floppy drives, minimum.
If GEOS were released at the same time as Vista, it'd do everything Vista does, on an 800MHz PIII, with 64MB of RAM and an 8MB VGA.
- KrocCamen, on 10/12/2007, -2/+6If Vista were released the same time as GEOS, it would require a C128 (twice the speed of the C64), a 512 KB RAM expansion and two 1581 Floppy drives, minimum.
- Blazer, on 10/12/2007, -0/+7I actually used GEOS, especially GeoWrite to do reports for class. It was nice since it was a WYSIWYG editor. I still have the floppies and my Epyx Fastload cartridge :)
- EbenieRosa, on 10/12/2007, -1/+8Finally an OS I can run on my computer1
- jdrift, on 10/12/2007, -1/+10The first computer that I owned was a Commodore 128, which came loaded with GEOS
and related software. I frequently used its word processor, and marvelled at the possibilities of the GUI, but mostly booted into C-64 mode for such great games as Wasteland, Neuromancer, and Impossible Mission 2 ("Stay a while, stay forever!").- spyrochaete, on 10/12/2007, -1/+9DESTROY HIM, MY ROBOTS
- ApplePenguin, on 10/12/2007, -1/+1What about Jump Man or Pole Position?
- Amigaice, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1Jumpman Jr!!! Only game I had for 2 years worth playing. Didn't have a Disk Drive yet just a tape drive. Jumpman Jr was on a Cart.
- joeyGibson, on 10/12/2007, -0/+4I also ran GEOS on my C64 way back in the early 80's. I had a 1541 drive and a but I also had a MOUSE! Hoo hoo. GEOS was the only software I can remember that would even notice the mouse, so it was fun to play with it.
- palmer, on 10/12/2007, -2/+0That 1541 drive: What a POS! About three feet long, taking what, 15 minutes to load a 32K game? Unreal.
- threemagic, on 10/12/2007, -0/+2yeah but it made music! you could run a program that would make the drive head move back and forth and played a tune.
- duke, on 10/12/2007, -3/+1Hint - you may need to turn off scripts to read this - it has a bunce of flash-based pop-ups that get in your way.
- PaulRay, on 10/12/2007, -1/+4I had GEOS which I ran (walked?) on my Commodore SX-64.
Yes Portable AND GUI!! The Future Lives! Lived... You know what I mean.
It was slow, but Oh So Cool!
Ah, the 80's
http://oldcomputers.net/sx64.html- SanTe, on 10/12/2007, -0/+3> It was slow, but Oh So Cool!
And heavy. Maybe not Osborne or Compaq heavy but it was still a luggable.
And a 5 inch screen. At least it was color. =)
C=64 games were great fun. I'd *love* to have a newly designed C=64 portable with a modern screen, like a tablet PC but a little smaller. Fitting in the cartridge port or a 5.25" floppy drive would be problematic though. Maybe jettison those altogether and run the C=64's OS in emulation mode, and run programs/games off a USB thumb drive.
I'd buy that. =)
- SanTe, on 10/12/2007, -0/+3> It was slow, but Oh So Cool!
- Grig, on 10/12/2007, -2/+12GEOS - BAH! I was using the C-64 long before GEOS. I had to write my own word processor to write my school reports on, and I had to walk to school, 30 miles and uphill both ways.
- tjthayer, on 10/12/2007, -2/+7@astrotrain
Actually, the Internet was around long before Quantumlink, but Quantumlink did spawn Q-Link, which spawned AOL.
I had my first online "affair" back on Quantumlink in the 80's. She was "16 years old and lived in Virginia Beach". Her name was Cyndi. Of course, now that I'm older and wiser, I realize that "Cyndi" was more likely "Bill", and was 30, overweight, hairy, lived in his mom's basement and played D&D between episodes of Star Trek.
But, I still have fond memories of Bill, uh, I mean Cyndi...- wwaller, on 10/12/2007, -2/+7This post freaks me out...My dad, Bill, was in his 30's living in Virginia Beach in 1987...using Q-Link pretty frequently.
Chilling mental image that is. - EbenieRosa, on 10/12/2007, -12/+1lma ABAHJHDSJHHFHKHVH LzOLOLOLOLOLOLOLolololololololololololololololololololololololololololol at WWMAleterr!!! LOMASo
- Molly, on 10/12/2007, -3/+2If you guys make a video post of that i will mail you both 20 bucks.
- Swampthing, on 10/12/2007, -0/+3Technically, that's incorrect. America Online was the spawn of PeopleLink, which was a brand name that QuantumLink used for the PC end of their C64 online service. QuantumLink did not spawn Q-Link, it WAS Q-Link.
I personally spoke with Steve Case many times when he was simply a troubleshooter for Q-Link... long before the whole company became AOL. Funny how things change, yet stay the same.
- wwaller, on 10/12/2007, -2/+7This post freaks me out...My dad, Bill, was in his 30's living in Virginia Beach in 1987...using Q-Link pretty frequently.
- HCviolence, on 10/12/2007, -1/+3Old school....... I remember playing around with Geopaint for hours.
- illicium, on 10/12/2007, -2/+1Anyone remember the GlobalPC? That thing ran GEOS.
- mortrek, on 10/12/2007, -1/+2"Good software does not come from being given unlimited resources; just take a look at the hardware requirements for modern PC games, for graphics that were reproducible (until recently) on a 300 MHz, 4 MB VRAM Playstation 2."
While I agree with the first part, honestly the PS2 has always and will always look bad. It started out ahead of the PC and quickly fell behind, especially considering its extremely low resolution. PCs have to deal with running a fully featured underlying OS as well as multiple abstraction layers for every little thing the game does.
* If you wanna see an efficient OS, check out Contiki. It doesn't have the features of GEOS but it doesn't have such a large footprint either...- KrocCamen, on 10/12/2007, -2/+1True, but then look how much was done with a 33 MHz, 3MB RAM PS1. It was pushed to its absolute limit, and did unimaginable things for the hardware when it was originally released. It is that restriction of hardware that pushed innovation on the console.
- KeiichiMorisato, on 10/12/2007, -3/+3Argh!
I was looking forward to reading up on the history of this OS--I remember its accomplishments while I was playing around with my Atari XL/MegaST/TT.. ah the good old days.
However, I was disappointed by the poor writing style; enough to quit reading the drivel after a couple of pages.
:(- KrocCamen, on 10/12/2007, -2/+1Let's see your attempt then.
- paulhruby, on 10/12/2007, -0/+4I remember running GEOS on my C-64 with Dual 1541's Commodore Mouse....
AND
my FLEXIDRAW LIGHT PEN....
It was amazing 1980's drawing on the screen fun.....haha
Blew all my paper route money on that thing!
I bet you wish you had one.....haha- mjpatey, on 10/12/2007, -1/+1I always wanted a light pen!!! Never got one, so I'm jealous.
- corsa, on 10/12/2007, -0/+2I remember my freshman year in college, my roommate bought a brand new Mac to replace his Apple IIe, and I bought GEOS and a Commodore mouse for my C=64. Man, was he surprised when I pulled up GeoPaint, which looked very similar to his MacPaint, but I could draw in COLOR. :)
- CiXeL, on 10/12/2007, -1/+1wow what an incredibly unlucky guy. everything he seemed to get into and achieve something collapsed right after he got really into it. i think if that happened to me id just wind up killing myself out of frustration.
- mjpatey, on 10/12/2007, -0/+5GEOS on C64 was cool! Almost Apple LISA cool.
- andrewwl, on 10/12/2007, -7/+1I can't even read this f'ing article without osnews ad crud all over my screen.
- mehigh, on 10/12/2007, -0/+3Maurice Randall released a Geos update too. It runs on the C=64 and C=128. It was called Wheels. Man, i even went online with Wings until 2001. He is working on Wheels SC now. A multitasking version for the C=128 with SuperCPU.
You guys should also check Wings OS, the most advanced Commodore OS. It's unix based and it supports preemptive multitasking. Read the specs here :D http://wings.webhop.org/- vawksel, on 10/12/2007, -3/+0I don't get it... It requires a much ugpraded C64/128 system to run this thing, even some very modern hardware to get it to run well! So whats the point then?
Why not just say: WiNGs requires a Dell or Homebuilt PC running in WinXP mode and a Intel compatible super CPU 2.0ghz+ with at least 512 megabytes of RAM. Additionally a boot drive with a capacity of at least 8 gigabytes is needed to hold the operating system. For faster performance a Western Digital Raptor HD, and/or extra 1 gigabyte ram is suggested. For super performance a dual-core intel duo 2 processor will really show off this OS.
- vawksel, on 10/12/2007, -3/+0I don't get it... It requires a much ugpraded C64/128 system to run this thing, even some very modern hardware to get it to run well! So whats the point then?
- jaseo, on 10/12/2007, -0/+2Loved GEOS on my C64. Very fun with multiple drives (even a 1581 - woo hoo!).
- thexder, on 10/12/2007, -1/+0I beta tested AOL 1.0 under Geoworks Ensenmble.
- bcorder, on 10/12/2007, -0/+3I loved Geoworks Ensemble. reinstalled it so many times (after i screwed up the computer for no good reason). still remember the serial number 20 years later... the moon shot they had as a background was one of my favs.
- daball99, on 10/12/2007, -0/+2I still have Geoworks II running on an old 486 box. Still works great! I read the part about Balmer saying that Microsoft would have to crush them. What a Knob! Microsoft could use some guys that know how to write tight code. BTW my old 486 has 8 megs of ram and Geoworks smokes.
- tomzo, on 10/12/2007, -0/+2I used both GEOS and Q-Link on my C-64 during the late 1980s. I used my trusty joystick as a mouse and it worked quite well. I had a Commodore dot matrix printer and used it for college papers and the like. As others noted, one of my roommates (from a family with greater means than mine) had a Mac and my little C-64 worked every bit as well as his 128 kb Mac did back then. I even used to do rudimentary research on Q-Link for papers when I was too lazy to go to the library - although the connection fees were enough to make all but the quickest research out of the question!
- troub, on 10/12/2007, -0/+2I loved Geoworks for the PC also. My first computer was actually a display model that had both Windows and GeoWorks on it (the store didn't usually do that). I tried them both, and without any preconceived anti-MS prejudice ended up using Geoworks almost exclusively, even launching DOS games from there (or exiting and clean-booting for the DOS4GW or whatever--Doom, etc.)
Theeeennnn, the Windows games started trickling in, and with Windows 95 that was it. I still have my Geoworks box, disks, and manual on my bookshelf.
daball
"BTW my old 486 has 8 megs of ram and Geoworks smokes."
Mine had 4. - kludger, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1Who else had the mouse that plugged into the joystick port? I remember buying that thing at a computer show in Toronto one year - changed my life it did...C=64 + GEOS + mouse = way ahead of its time.
Printing on the old Commodore printer from geoWrite brought you right back to reality, though. I remember printing out school papers during dinner. I'd start printing, head upstairs to eat, and keep coming downstairs every few minutes to make sure the sprockets hadn't torn. - fquednau, on 10/12/2007, -0/+2Sweet!! So, about 20 years later I have the chance to get the C64 emulator and the geos disk image and have it all running within 10 minutes. Fascinating, melancholic, full circle. Just now it costed me nothing, back then it was several hundred Deutschmarks. Plenty of money for an eleven year old, LOL!
- Sefirosu, on 10/12/2007, -0/+4Still have it, even though the box and the materials show their age it still worked last time I checked. I made all my school work on this thing back in the day, it was pretty good for the time.
However, that this was notorious for it's way too good copy protection starting with version 2.0 on the C64. The Apple II version had this part removed (I didn't know that up until recently), but on the C64 all apps were keyed to your boot disk and you had two of these. One of my fabulous (ahem) 1541 drives went out of alignment at some point and almost trashed one of my boot disks, but I wasn't that lucky with a few work disks, some of them became unusable.
You can get an actual copy of GEOS these days "freely", although they state that it is still commercial software, it has been released here:
http://cmdrkey.com/cbm/geos/geos1.html - threemagic, on 10/12/2007, -1/+2AmigaOS put everything to shame (still does): multitasking in 256k!
- Namco, on 10/12/2007, -0/+2I had a used C64 in '86. What was cool about that era was that everyone was moving on to C128s, Amigas, Tandys, etc... and C64 stuff could be found for relatively cheap. I found GEOS in the electronics department at Target and picked it up, I think it was ~$50. I tell ya, it breathed new life into my C64. There was just so much there and it really got me used to a the graphical interfaces that I'd use later in life.GEOS Paint was awesome. Bought a mouse to plug in the joystick port and I was all set.
- jayunit, on 10/12/2007, -0/+2Yay GEOS on C64! Yay insanely-slow 1541 drive :) But, most of all, yay for the computer I cut my teeth on that taught me hand-coding 6510 asm for speed and got me into software development where I am today. heart heart heart for all the memories
- Glidedon, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1C-63 refurb from Comb liquidators $99
Commodore modem from Comb liquidators $39
CompuServe Account 20057899
Telnet
GEOS priceless ! - gklinger, on 10/12/2007, -0/+2The Commodore community is alive and well. If you're looking to relive your youth or perhaps you're just curious you could download a free emulator and some games or even connect to the recently revived and completely free Quantum Link (seriously).
Commodore Emulator:
http://www.viceteam.org/
Commodore 64 Games:
http://www.c64.com/
Info about Quantum Link Reloaded and BBSes:
http://www.petscii.com/
Active Communities:
http://jledger.proboards19.com/index.cgi
http://www.lemon64.com/
I know I post these URLs whenever a Commodore-related story pops up so I apologize if you've seen them before. My goal is to help people reconnect with their geeky roots and to have a little fun in the process. - Glidedon, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1Hey,
Just Noticed the Submitter
Hi Eugenia
Long Live BEOS (News) - spriggig, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1We had this on the shelf at the original Fry's Electronics in Sunnyvale back in the day. Most people wanted MS-DOS, WordPerfect and Lotus 123. I also sold a new-fangled device called an "inkjet" printer by HP--24 pin dot-matrix printers beat the pants off them print quality-wise and were cheaper so few people bought the HP DeskJet.
- gavdana, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1I ran GEOS on my IIc - it was a great OS.
- Noloco, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1I got the Commo hooked up in the room. :D Heh needed some nostalgia the other day. Man it's so good to see someone writing about Geos..I used to mess with Geos...It was one of my first gui os. Enjoyed messing with that dam thing heh.
- Ratteler, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1I got ya all beat.
Commodore 64 with 1 meg and internal Mystic Jim RTC mod.
2 MB 1750 Mod.
40MB CMD-HD Hard drive
16MB RAMlink with 1750 plugged in.
1351 Mouse
Swiftlink 232.
I actually beta tested most of that stuff.
I also had half a dozen other Commodores from a PET to a C128.
I would multitask by runing several machine at the same time off a composite switchbox.
ALL FOR THE LOVE OF GEOS!!!!
Last time I wrote any serious code was in GeoProgrammer. The Assembly package for GEOS.
I still have 2 C128's, 2 1571's a 128D, and a bunch of C64s.
Then I went Amiga. - liquidated, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1Geoworks was my first computer company gig way back in the day! Going to work at the office at Shattuck in Berkley then the less cool building in Alameda, next to good old Spectrum Holobyte :) Man, those were the days. Great bunch of guys and super talented. Adam, Chris, Kate, Shawn, and the rest of the guys on the "laundry" super secret mailing list, you guys rocked!
- EPAPRESS, on 05/17/2008, -0/+0You worked at Shattuck Avenue by Geoworks? Great!
We at http://www.geos-infobase.de are searching for OS/90 aka PC/GEOS Beta aka GeoDOS!
I have four pictures for you:
1 - The Softworks (1983/84, later Berkeley Softworks, later Geoworks)
2 - Shattuck Ave. BERKELEY via Virtual Earth
3 - Atlantic Ave. ALAMEDA
4 - Geoworks BETA with Open Look GUI
Link 1:
http://www.airsetpublic.com/files/The%20Softworks. ...
Link 2:
http://www.airsetpublic.com/files/Shattuck2.jpg?i= ...
Link 3:
http://www.airsetpublic.com/files/GEOWORKS%20Alame ...
Link 4:
http://www.airsetpublic.com/files/OS%2090.jpg?i=lR ...- EPAPRESS, on 05/17/2008, -0/+0CORRECTION of the LINKS!
You worked at Shattuck Avenue by Geoworks? Great!
We at www.geos-infobase are searching for OS/90 aka PC/GEOS Beta aka GeoDOS!
I have four pictures for you:
1 - The Softworks (1983, later Berkeley Softworks, later Geoworks)
2 - Shattuck Ave. Geoworks in BERKELEY via Virtual Earth
3 - Atlantic Ave. Geoworks in ALAMEDA
4 - Geoworks BETA with Open Look GUI
Link 1:
www.airsetpublic.com/files/The%20Softworks.jpg?i=CmOWJHEGVSNU
Link 2:
www.airsetpublic.com/files/Shattuck2.jpg?i=KjDFVIyhARSG
Link 3:
www.airsetpublic.com/files/GEOWORKS%20Alameda5.jpg?i=kgQjeNvpREcO
Link 4:
www.airsetpublic.com/files/OS%2090.jpg?i=lRDJoUFCVrUL
- EPAPRESS, on 05/17/2008, -0/+0CORRECTION of the LINKS!
- EPAPRESS, on 05/17/2008, -0/+0You worked at Shattuck Avenue by Geoworks? Great!
- buckrogers1965, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1I ran GEOS 128 from a battery backed CMD RAM drive on a C128. The RAM drive was only 1MB, but plenty big enough to hold GEOS 128, all my applications and all my data files. I archived everything off to a 1581 hard drive for back up.
Man that thing was smoking fast for everything I did with it back then. It would boot to the starting screen in a few seconds from the RAM drive. I could have expanded the RAM drive to 16MB and added a 20 MB SCSI drive, but didn't have the money to do that at the time. And I had a light pen that drew on the screen, a drawing pad, an optical mouse, micro switch joy sticks, that thing was decked out.
I would print out reports for college, with space left in for diagrams and charts, tape in the charts and graphs and then zerox my reports and hand them in. One of my teachers asked me what computer I was doing the report on and I told them a Commodore and they looked at me like I was lying to them.
I used a flash drive to grab a snapshot of system RAM for games and the like and would load nearly any game instantly off the 1581 data files. Some of these games had taken minutes to load off of it's 1541 disk.
I also remember wasting months on elite and mule video games. The Simon voice sounded like a russian with a heavy accent, but was understandable. The only thing that sucked about the system was that it only supported a few colors, so not very good for looking at color pictures.
I went from C-128 running GEOS to a 386 dual booting Windows 3.1 and Linux back in 1993. I stopped dual booting after a year or so. The other IBM computers before that just didn't have the features to get me to switch. But I kept that C-128 and used it a lot for games until I moved in 1998 and didn't have the time or money to move everything. Now I wish I could have taken everything with me.
I still think that if Commodore had come out with a computer based on the 20MHz 6510 based super CPU, stereo sids, a couple of digital to analog converters and a pallet of 256 colors out of a possible 65,000 for just a hundred or so dollars more than the C-64 that they would have had a real winner. I think they were afraid of competing with their Amiga market.
Those were the days. - bdbr, on 10/12/2007, -0/+0I have a 386SX laptop under the desk that still gets occasional use, running DOS & GeoWorks Ensemble. We use it as a serial terminal to hook to routers (since our corporate laptops don't have serial ports, and not everyone has a USB dongle).
- EPAPRESS, on 11/09/2007, -0/+0I am a GEOSUser: GEOS 64 ans 128. GeoWorks Ensemble 1.1, 1.2Pro and 2.01. NewDeal Office 97 and 2000 / Breadbox Ensemble / Zoomer, GeoBook, OmniGo 100/120 / Look also here: www.geos-infobase.de
I am searching for BETA of GEOS aka OS/90 and GeoDos and also some GUIs...I have PM.GEO (Presentation Manager GUI for GEOS)...I need CUA and OpenLook GUI...any help possible? I have some nice gifts for you! Breadbox LLC plans to release a new software version of GEOS in 2008!!! Greetings from Freiburg, Germany! Manfred P.S. GEOS rocks!!!
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