Hmm ..Some Tandy 1000's used IBM DOS and all the plain versions of Mode.com for IBM DOS v 3.2 were about 18Kb except for one Tandy special one that about 40Kb in size.
Technically if you upgrade to 3.3 from 3.2 and keep the original Mode.com it should work fine (is not like going from DOS 3 to DOS 4, etc). Curious about how big the Mode.com file you have...

Added: what DOS are you running: MS or IBM ?

tandy dos is specific to the tandy line.
if you change it, whatever you use may have issues with using certain programs like setupsl.com for the 1000sl, you may have a setupsx ? these interact with and make use of the eeprom.
tandy dos will also fail to boot on a non tandy machine.
they aren't the same, and individual files may not be interchangeable. make backups and system floppies before changing OSes.

Much similar issue with Hyperion portable. I know this as I tried standard microsoft DOS on it, almost works but not perfect. Drives in it is not standard either.
Same issue but not as bad with Zenith's Eazy PC which I had as well, was a poorly understood gift that I didn't appreciate.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hyperion_(computer)

Cheers,

Horun wrote on 2020-10-20, 01:16:

Hmm ..Some Tandy 1000's used IBM DOS and all the plain versions of Mode.com for IBM DOS v 3.2 were about 18Kb except for one Tandy special one that about 40Kb in size.
Technically if you upgrade to 3.3 from 3.2 and keep the original Mode.com it should work fine (is not like going from DOS 3 to DOS 4, etc). Curious about how big the Mode.com file you have...

Added: what DOS are you running: MS or IBM ?

I'm running MS-DOS 3.2 from the original Tandy 1000SX disks (the d1000sx.zip file — I'm not sure I'm allowed to post the link to the file).

mode.com is around 44 kb.

I might have phrased my question poorly — I was wondering whether I could take installation disks from later models and use them or if there ever was an official procedure for an update.

Technically as far as I understand, Tandy's mode tv is nothing more than running mode co40 (switching to 40 columns) and mode 200 (reducing the number of scanlines). That kind of explains why I can't stay in this mode if the app doesn't support 40 columns, I guess? There is also a speed utility specifially for Tandy 1000SX that supposedly should switch between 4 and 7MHz (similar to mode fast/mode slow).

Cobra42898 wrote on 2020-10-20, 03:16:

tandy dos is specific to the tandy line. if you change it, whatever you use may have issues with using certain programs like set […]
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tandy dos is specific to the tandy line.
if you change it, whatever you use may have issues with using certain programs like setupsl.com for the 1000sl, you may have a setupsx ? these interact with and make use of the eeprom.
tandy dos will also fail to boot on a non tandy machine.
they aren't the same, and individual files may not be interchangeable. make backups and system floppies before changing OSes.

No, 1000SX doesn't have DOS in ROM and there is no setup utility.

BTW, I've also exchanged EzCap158 for EzCap159 and got somewhat better results in many cases.

Here's Street Rod in EzCap158.
Here's Street Rod in EzCap159.

Colors are a lot brighter now. You can actually tell green and yellow in California Games logo from white, but green and yellow look alike in this case. Text gets color artifacts in graphics, though.

Here's Alley Cat in CGA

Cyan is greener than it should be, and magenta is more purple than pink.

Here is 8088MPH.

You can tell Tandy can't perfectly emulate IBM CGA (mostly in higher-res pictures), but the overall picture is quite nice.

158 is a UVC device while 159 is not, and supposedly even has different firmwares. I'm going to test it under Windows later — maybe there's a way to control color space there.