3 CHEERS FOR `OLD' TECHNOLOGY
USERS SAY KAYPROS MAY BE SLOW, BUT THEY DO THE JOB

Dear Judi and Frank, I'm one of the many computer enthusiasts who remained behind when the great rush of high technology swept you into the IBM compatible zone. Locally there are some 25 to 100 CP/M users content with the utility derived from KayPro portable computers.

To fight hardware obsolescence and maintain our KayPros, we bought the still operable units of those who changed to MS DOS IBM compatibles. Many in our users group bought used KayPros for $100 to $300 and are using them for word processing, resumes, small business accounting, tax preparation and more. They entered the world of personal computing at ten cents on the dollar.The great field of public domain software plus old Perfect Writer, Perfect Calc and Perfect Filer, along with the availability of Wordstar Version 4 for CP/M, keeps us going.

Our 64K of RAM sounds puny, but we can add 1000K more with an addon board. Our machines are slow, but they get us where we want to go.

All of which is apropos of nothing, I suppose, except to remind folks of their roots, where it all started, a simpler and gentler beginning. Long live CP/M! Content in Columbus, OH

Dear Happy, You'll get no argument from us! But we'll explain some history for readers not old enough at computing to remember CP/M or KayPro.

The KayPro was one of the first early, nearly portable computers, and one of the cheapest. KayPro grew so quickly that for a year they stored inventory in a rented circus tent. The father-son team who started it were forced into retirement by execs with white shirts and MBA degrees, but the KayPro computer and company survived!

Dear Frank and Judi, Here's something to pass on to readers. After searching for weeks for a way to transfer my Apple II files to a Mac, I found it in my Macintosh manuals.

Mac utilities include the Apple File Exchange (AFE). It reads ProDOS (Apple II) and MS DOS (IBM compatible) files. The manual isn't as specific as it should be. You begin by printing the ProDOS file to a 3.5-inch disk as a text file (ASCII). Then Mac reads the disk via AFE.

I found out the hard way that it doesn't transfer a large data base file in its entirety, but only the part that "prints" to the text file. I then must go back to the ProDOS file, print out the missing parts and go through the AFE to patch them into the first transfer.

Manasquan Park, NJ, tinkerer

Dear Tink, Thanks for the tip. The moral here for all readers is: Even if all else doesn't fail, read your manuals!