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Emulation of x86 PCs of former East Germany?

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First post, by Jo22

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Hi everyone,

I'm wondering if something like this already exists.
Maybe in form of a partial emulation in obscure emulators of Soviet PCs.

Especially emulation of one of these are interesting, since they used to run MS-DOS*.. errr.. I mean the totally original DCP OS (Disc Control Program)..: 😉

Robotron A7150 (aka CM 1910)
https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_7150

Robotron EC 1834
https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/EC_1834

DCP
https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Disk_Control_Program

https://www.robotrontechnik.de/index.htm?/htm … puter/a7150.htm

https://www.robotrontechnik.de/index.htm?/htm … puter/a7150.htm

They also used eastern equivalents of "our" components, which sometimes (okay, almost always) were better in terms of specs than what the IBM PC had to offer.

Like U80601 (8086) vs 8088, the NEC CRTCs vs that limited Motorola CRTC (640x480@8c vs 640x200@2c)..

Anyway, I'm just curious. Since these PCs have some unique differences.
The BIOS design, the high-level-only compatibility to CGA, that obscure expansion slot replacement to ISA and so on..

(*They also ran SCP, CP/K and MUTOS, BOS)

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Reply 1 of 5, by TheMechanist

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that would kick ass 😀 but I don't think so ... I had some computer lessons back in the days on a PC1715 (which is Z80) .. and later a picture of a EC1834 on the wall 🤣 ... at least for KCs there are some emulators available ...

Unchained demo group
swap42

Reply 2 of 5, by VileR

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How about https://a7100emulation.hpage.com/neuigkeiten.html ? Not the a 7150 maybe, but the older and more idiosyncratic model I guess.

[ WEB ] - [ BLOG ] - [ TUBE ] - [ CODE ]

Reply 3 of 5, by TheMechanist

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VileR wrote on 2021-03-18, 18:03:

How about https://a7100emulation.hpage.com/neuigkeiten.html ? Not the a 7150 maybe, but the older and more idiosyncratic model I guess.

https://a7100-emulation.gitlab.io/html/news.html
wow, that's cool ! and from the screenshots - gfx power 😀 ... it's itching in the fingers to do some demo coding 😀

Unchained demo group
swap42

Reply 4 of 5, by VileR

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TheMechanist wrote on 2021-03-18, 19:44:

https://a7100-emulation.gitlab.io/html/news.html
wow, that's cool ! and from the screenshots - gfx power 😀 ... it's itching in the fingers to do some demo coding 😀

I'll be sure to keep an eye open for the upcoming 7100KMH, then 😀
That video board sure has nice mono graphics at 640x400 in 4 shades. But I wonder what the speed is like, and if it has an MC6845-equivalent (or something more advanced) to do interesting tricks with.

Actually, forget about demos - the real cool thing about it is that East German version of Castle Adventure! Those ancient, humble freeware creations really wound up everywhere.

[ WEB ] - [ BLOG ] - [ TUBE ] - [ CODE ]

Reply 5 of 5, by Jo22

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Thank you very much for the links!

The emulator comes with source code, even.
If my coding skills were a little bit better, I would try porting it to Win32s (or Win16).

The older A71xx series is (was) more sophisticated than the 1834, even.
It's BIOS was more intelligent, for example.

But to the defense of the 1834, its existence
made DCP more compatible to normal PCs.
Imagine, a Schneider Euro PC from W.Germany running a copy of DCP.
So that's kind of an interesting combination if we think of it. 😃

Some background information can be found here:
http://oldcomputer.info/pc/A7150/index.htm
http://oldcomputer.info/pc/EC1834/index.htm

"Time, it seems, doesn't flow. For some it's fast, for some it's slow.
In what to one race is no time at all, another race can rise and fall..." - The Minstrel

//My video channel//

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