Following on from the mass of helpful suggestions I received in response to my earlier post asking for BBS client suggestions, I
have got hold of a couple
of lantronix UDS-10 devices & have finally got my retro
286 setup to use one
with dos comms software as nice functional BBS client.
Thought I would share my setup here, as there are few
mistakes/traps to avoid & although the UDS-10 doesn't do
DNS, there is a way around that so you can
'dial' your favorite telnet BBSes using their DNS names & not have have to find their IP address to dial.
That's great you're online with the UDS-10. Are you noticing any issues with it, or does everything just work great after the initial setup?
What speed are you running at, 9600 or did you bump it up a bit faster?
Thank you for sharing that great writeup for configuring the UDS-10 for BBS telnet use! There's definitely enough to the process to make documentation like this really valuable.
Seems to top out at 19200 baud for me, anything higher
and I start running into issues with zmodem file
uploads/downloads ect.
Also there is one persistent issue that only seems to affect connections to BBSes running Mystic BBS. It is really strange but
mystic's indexed file and message readers just do not
work with this setup. Everything else is fine though...
very strange. For some reason with my setup, attempting
to browse files/message areas with the up and down keys
just does not work. I've tried several different
terminal clients and the result is the same... up/down
sometimes work, sometimes do nothing and sometimes does
an escape instead kicking you out of the indexed
reader/file browser...
Thanks and I hope this is useful for others in future.
Also worth pointing out that you can leave out tcpser if
you are happy dialing ip addresses. This setup is
described here:
https://famicoman.com/2020/08/22/get-your-vintage- computer-online-with-a-lantron
onix-uds10/
Interesting issue. Sounds like the keycodes for the arrow keys are being remapped? Maybe related to a 'doorway mode' switch or similar?
Arrow keys from terminals are shrouded in mystery - how will each
terminal act seems hard to predict. (at least I haven't entirely
wrapped my head around it)
Thanks for the link to the IP-only setup also!
Also strange that this seems to only be a problem with
BBSes that run mystic.
AFAIKT this is transmission speed issue, I am doing all
this on a 286 so even in dos my terminal software
struggles to keep up with everything leading to at times
quite severe input lag. I think that sometimes the full
ANSII escape code sequences for up/down arrow (ESC[U &
ESC[D) not being send all at once, i.e. there is a
significant delay between the transmission of the ESC
char and the rest which is probably confusing mystic.
Pretty much confirmed this in procomm plus for DOS.
Disabling the comm sofware's status bar improved
performance noticeably... and all of a sudden the arrow
keys started working correctly.
I can only imagine how bad this would be on a 8088/NECV20 machine...
I can only imagine how bad this would be on a 8088/NECV20 machine...
I have such fond memories of XT machines, but I do find using them today to be so much more painful than I remember.
Yes! After persisting with a NECv20 based retro pc build
I finally gave it up for a 286. The performance
difference between even a 'fast' XT class machine and a
slow 286 is really quite staggering.
I don't have a 286, just the fond memories of playing games on friends' 286s. I got a Book8088, fun little XT mini-laptop made new from old parts, and while I enjoy it, the limitations show up pretty often. Then the Pocket386 (386SX mini-laptop made new from old parts) came out and I realized that's probably a lot more interesting/useful for me. Maybe
I'll find an old 286 desktop someday and fill the gap between the XT and 386. :)
Also strange that this seems to only be a problem with BBSes that run mystic. AFAIKT this is transmission speed issue, I am doing all this
on a 286 so even in dos my terminal software struggles to keep up
with everything leading to at times quite severe input lag. I think
that sometimes the full ANSII escape code sequences for up/down
arrow (ESC[U & ESC[D) not being send all at once, i.e. there is a significant delay between the transmission of the ESC char and the
rest which is probably confusing mystic.
The main differences from my instructions are: 1 - Set a gateway
in the Server Setup. 2 - Set connect mode to D6 in the Channel
1 Setup. 3 - Skip setting up a remote IP and port in the Channel
1 Setup. 4 - Tcpser & a server to run it on no longer required.
To be honest the performance difference between a 286
and 386sx of similar clock speed is not much. With the
386sx you'll get more convenient memory management with
emm386/QEMM ect windows 3 & deskview will both work much
better - this is all a bit more complicated with 286
class machines & is more dependent on chipset/bios. If
you do decide to get a 286 you might want to do some
research first.
For example I have a couple of 286 boards that should
support EMS memory in hardware, but can I find a driver
that works with either of them? no I can't.
Wolfenstein 3D on a friend's 286. I forget the specs of the machine other than being a 286, but I remember playing Wolfenstein 3D and being surprised that was possible. Seems like a 286 can do everything important. :)
To be honest the performance difference between a 286
and 386sx of similar clock speed is not much. With the 386sx you'll get
I don't think I've ever dealt with the quirks of 286 systems, and adding EMS memory etc - thanks for the tip that it can get a bit complicated.
I disagree with the previous poster's minimizing the difference between 286 and 386 systems -- I went from a 286-13 (I replaced the crystal myself) to a 386SX16, and the difference was very noticeable - moreso
then a couple of mhz more.
I disagree with the previous poster's minimizing the
difference between 286 and 386 systems -- I went from a
286-13 (I replaced the crystal myself) to a 386SX16,
and the difference was very noticeable - moreso then a
couple of mhz more.
Those were the days when incremental upgrades were
significant - that was a 19% speed increase!
All this talk of performance begs the question, what do
folks here use to benchmark and compare systems of this
age?
I disagree with the previous poster's minimizing the difference between 286 and 386 systems -- I went from a 286-13 (I replaced the crystal myself) to a 386SX16, and the difference was very noticeable - moreso then a couple of mhz more.
Similarly, I went from a 286-12 to a 386SX-16, and I thought the difference seemed a bit more than just a few mhz faster. It also
allowed running games that required a 386 - They would at least run, but wouldn't necessarily be fast. For Doom, I had to shrink the display as small as it would go, and Microsoft Flight Simulator 5.0 just didn't
have a good frame rate (it was like a slide show).
For example I have a couple of 286 boards that should support EMS memory in hardware, but can I find a driver that works with either of them? no I can't.
Interesting, how much of that speed increase was due to processor & how much to the motherboard & chipset?
I've got two 20Mhz 286 motherboards with different chipsets, one SARC the other Headland.
All this talk of performance begs the question, what do folks here use to benchmark and compare systems of this age?
I started this reply before noticing that you'd swapped TCPser out for something else. You'll need to keep in mind that any serial/tcp
something else. You'll need to keep in mind that any serial/tcp conversion is going to add latency to the stream. So does any port
extra port forwarding. I have this kind of problem on TLP. I'm using RLFOSSIL for the serial/tcp conversion, and I have inboard port
forwarding to make each node active off one outside port, which has already been forwarded to the system with node selection on it. Even running all of this on the same system adds significant overheard.
I believe all that gets in the way of ANSI detection, involving some escape sequence, it fails 50-75% of the time. Also stops file transfers
Ponder, I haven't followed this much at all, but a 286 12Mhz+ ought to be able to push 19.2k on an 8250/16450 with no fuss.
One that I have heard of is TOPBENCH (The Oldskool PC Benchmark) by Trixter: https://dosbenchmark.wordpress.com/
I watch Adrian's Digital Basement on youtube pretty regularly so I
should be familiar with some other benchmark tools but nothing else is coming to mind.
You sure they support EMS and not XMS? Back then standards were all
over the place. If I recall right, XMS is older, and if you're lucky you'll find a driver that will make XMS available as EMS.
The best performing 286 I had was a Chips n Tech chipset with a AMI NEAT BIOS on it. It was nominally a 21, there wasn't much you couldn't tweak on it, but all the way back then it was a bit like black magic.
I'm still using TCPser. I did try without using the UDS-10's build in
That fits with my observations. I think the combination of serial/tcp conversion and my comms software being a bit laggy mess up the ANSI detection. I managed to alleviate this by using door mode or something similar which disabled a few features (status bar, pop up menus ect) in my comms software & things started behaving.
for dos. I've got telix and terminate downloaded somewhere to also play
I've not been able to get anything over 19.2k to work reliably so far & I
You sure they support EMS and not XMS? Back then standards were all
Lets be clear about acronyms here as EMS and XMS tend to get mixed up.
By EMS I mean Expanded Memory AKA LIM memory which is the earlier standard developed to support apps using more than 640k on an 8088 class machine.
XMS is extended memory is available on 286+ machines with more than 1mb of memory.
Anyhow I'm currently using EMM286 which emulates EMS/LIM but is quite slow as it copies memory around to simulate how the EMS page frame works. Hardware support would improve performance a bit, but it's not a big deal for me at the moment.
Makes me wonder if you could get Win3.11 to run on that thing, however slowly. So far as I was able to tell Memory access was the biggest Sp> issue.
Am running Win3.11 on my 286 right now. With trumpet winsock you can even run early telnet clients on it (one of which which I am using to write this message).
If this is the thing you're running ProComm on I'm not surprised it struggles. Win would put to much phutz between the terminal and actual serial port. Straight DOS software ought to do MUCH better.
Procomm for windows using a serial port is a disaster on
my 286. It can do telnet over tcp/ip with trumpet
winsock however, and is actually Ok, but the screen
updates are a bit slow. It does do a better job of
ANSI/ASCII than MTCP's telnet client & that's one of the
reasons I keep using it.
Procomm for windows using a serial port is a disaster on my 286. It can do telnet over tcp/ip with trumpet winsock however, and is actually Ok, but the screen updates are a bit slow. It does do a better job of ANSI/ASCII than MTCP's telnet client & that's one of the reasons I keep using it.
As nice as it is to have computers that last a bit longer, being able to run newer software (a 10 year old computer in 2024 is a lot more usable than a 10 year old computer was in 1994!) - I do miss the huge jumps in capabilities that we used to see with upgrades. It was exciting!
I haven't actually tried mTCP's telnet client, so I'm a bit ignorant on the topic. I'm curious if you've tried the jhpyle fork of mTCP with enhanced telnet capabilities?
https://github.com/jhpyle/mTCP
It says it supports sixel graphics which caught my attention right away! (though I haven't tried it)
Not sure if you've mentioned what video card you have in this thing... depends just where the bottleneck is though, something like an ET4000 might help, seeing as the system doesn't have to spend as much time servicing the video, but if its a rendering problem, it's probably
pretty much what it is.
Yup got an ET4000 so my setup is probably as fast as its going to get in windows.
Originally had a trident 9000 or something like that, I can't remember the exact model number. I was a bit skeptical about the forum posts & web pages that said the ET4000 was unusually fast for an ISA video card - that was until I got hold of one. They really do perform surprisingly well.
Trident, Oak, I'm sure there's another one... S3 they were all pretty similar you could find some performed better than others but usually within cooee of each other. Tseng Labs in general, and especially the ET4000 were head and shoulders better than anything else, right up until 3D became a thing. I think the ET6000 was meant to be the 3D card for them, and it was a slug, they ended up selling their IP to ATI/AMD.
The sixel graphics thing is interesting I will have to
take a look, do you know of any BBSes/Door games that
have/use sixel graphics?
On my BBS, Another Millennium, another.tel there is the astronomy picture of the day viewable as sixel, and a small photo gallery with a few photos
So Tseng lost the 3D race to ATI/Nvidia just like so many others. Was the other one you were referring to Paradise or maybe Cirrus Logic? They made VGA cards as well. Cirrus Logic vesa local bus cards were supposed to be quite decent performers, I wonder if they made any ISA vga cards??
Tseng Labs in general, and especially the ET4000 were head and shoulders better than anything else, right up until
Yeah, the ET4000 was a beast of a card for the time.. Sold lots of those bad boys.! #0-;
i have a few mobos of the 286 that can support 16 mb i have one comming in today!Am running Win3.11 on my 286 right now. With trumpet winsock you can run early telnet clients on it (one of which which I am using to writ this message).
Woot, never had near that kind of memory available on any 286, I suspect largest supported configurations would've been ~4Mb. Only had 256k
SIPPS in one, I think I tried some 4Mb SIMMS in adapters but it wouldn't recognise them.
If this is the thing you're running ProComm on I'm not surprised it struggles. Win would put to much phutz between the terminal and actual serial port. Straight DOS software ought to do MUCH better.??
I haven't actually tried mTCP's telnet client, so I'm a bit ignorant on the topic. I'm curious if you've tried the jhpyle fork of mTCP with enhanced telnet capabilities?
https://github.com/jhpyle/mTCP
It says it supports sixel graphics which caught my attention right away! (though I haven't tried it)
Yeah, the ET4000 was a beast of a card for the time.. Sold lots of those bad boys.! #0-;
I saw a few 3000s kicking around, but they were few and far between. They were pretty impressive also..
mary4 wrote to Vorlon <=-
Yeah, the ET4000 was a beast of a card for the time.. Sold lots of those bad boys.! #0-;
i have a couple of them! they are bad ass as fuck cards so fast!
<3
--mary4 (Victoria Crenshaw) the 286 enthusiast
mtcp alone is really nice. i typed this message on mtcp
on my 10MHz 286 i got from VCF SW
How cute.
Yeah, the ET4000 was a beast of a card for the time.. Sold lots of
those bad boys.! #0-;
i have a couple of them! they are bad ass as f**k cards so fast! <3
Note: this message is aimed at guiding you and is not a personal attack
on you. I have only spotlighted the swearing that is in most of your messages.
Note: this message is aimed at guiding you and is not a personal de> > attack
on you. I have only spotlighted the swearing that is in most of your messages.
I agree, its not nessary (the foul words) to the extent its being used. The conversations can be just as engaging without them.
webcomic) and wasn't bothered about it at all. if we're going to complain about what others on fsxnet are saying i'd much rather complain about the queerphobia i've experienced in my very first week here!
Re: Re: Using Dos Comms Software with Lantronix UDS-10
By: Vorlon to mary4 on Sat Jun 22 2024 11:23 am
Note: this message is aimed at guiding you and is not a personal attack
on you. I have only spotlighted the swearing that is in most of your
messages.
Howdy, I was on the verge of writing something similiar.
I agree, its not nessary (the foul words) to the extent its being used.
The conversations can be just as engaging without them.
if we're going to complain about what others on fsxnet are saying
i'd much rather complain about the queerphobia i've experienced in
my very first week here!
Oh thats a bit surprising & disappointing if that has happened. I've been following a few of the fsxnet boards pretty closely for several months & have not noticed any queer/transphobic comments myself. Folks here are generally pretty good about this. Would you mind pointing out the problematic messages?
If you and mary4 didn't publicly post that you are that way, then no one would have known, or frankly given a crap about it.
Yeah, 99% of other messages in FSX net have no one swearing, yet this person's messages 99% of the time contain it.
For everyone else. I swear myself in real life, but not when around other people or interacting online. For starters it show's a lack of courtsey
i don't think i should have to! i think the problem is overanalyzing one harmless thing and then when pointed out with an actual harmful thing now everyone wants to hear what i have to say
this whole discussion is a bit ridiculous i think and i just want people to stop jumping at someone's throat because they're excited about retro hardware and used expletives to express themselves lol
Its sounding like a smokescreen for being called out over poor language choices.
following a few of the fsxnet boards pretty closely for several months &
have not noticed any queer/transphobic comments myself. Folks here are
i don't think i should have to! i think the problem is overanalyzing one harmless thing and then when pointed out with an actual harmful thing now everyone wants to hear what i have to say
this whole discussion is a bit ridiculous i think and i just want people to stop jumping at someone's throat because they're excited about retro hardware and used expletives to express themselves lol
someone mentioned they have a "fucking" 10mhz 206. I wasn't trying to jump down anyone's throat (and I don't really see how it would have appeared that way). I also don't see how that would be in any way interpreted as a transphobic comment or anything like that.
I'll discourage swearing for the sake of swearing here.
Spec
*** THE READER V4.50 [freeware] --- SuperBBS v1.17-3 (Eval) *
Origin: A camel is a horse designed by a committee. (21:3/101)
I would also... except F*** is my favorite word...
That's awesome, I've looked at mtcp a bit but I haven't been using it. The 286 from VCF SW sounds exciting! That was the recent VCF SW (2024)? How was it? I've never been to a vintage computing event, VCF SW looks like it would be pretty huge!
Mary mary quite contrary?lol
There's something odd going on. I see you replying to a message I'm yet
to see here.
Note: this message is aimed at guiding you and is not a personal attack
on you. I have only spotlighted the swearing that is in most of your messages.
then let me add my two cents: i picked up on it simply as a mannerism (a "typing quirk" so to speak if you're of the persuasion of a particular webcomic) and wasn't bothered about it at all. if we're going to complain about what others on fsxnet are saying i'd much rather complain about the queerphobia i've experienced in my very first week here!
Yeah, 99% of other messages in FSX net have no one swearing, yet this person's messages 99% of the time contain it.
For everyone else. I swear myself in real life, but not when around other people or interacting online. For starters it show's a lack of courtsey towards someone else.
it was FUCKING AMAZING!!!!!! :DD there was so much cool
stuff there!! i bought 2 286 machines from there! <3
I met many youtubers there and many people locally who
has computers!! it was HUGE too it has many machines
there and spanning like 2-4 buildings 2 buildings whas
for machines on tables alone i saw amigas and PC XT 286
and even silicon graphics machines and even 5 lisas!!
usagi electric was there!
It does get wearing after a while. If you're using it for effect on occasion well and good, but no need for excessive use.
I would also... except F*** is my favorite word...
Fork? Fortescue?? :P
Oh geez that's already two more 286 machines than I have and I am
JEALOUS!
That sounds wonderful. I knew it was big but that really does sound massive. Five Lisas in one place is something I for sure would not have expected! And you can't keep those Amiga demo people away from a gathering these days, they're everywhere! (and we love them) ;)
Oh geez that's already two more 286 machines than I have and I am
JEALOUS!
buildings 2 buildings whas for machines on tables alone i saw amigas and PC XT 286 and even silicon graphics machines and even 5 lisas!! usagi electric was there!
I am so jealous! It sounds like you had a great time!
Those XT 286 machines a super rare... I'd love to get hold of one, but
it would cost a small fortune & they don't exactly come up for sale
often - It was basically luck on my part that I managed to get hold of
an IBM 5160 complete with working green screen monitor from a local seller.
ill stop swearing. i am just excited about vintage computing. im sorry
Personally I like seeing someone get excited about vintage computing, especially when they have the good taste to realize how awesome 286 PCs are..
Though in saying that, I am eying up 386DX40 motherboard on ebay... I
did own a 386DX40 for quite a while growing up so I wouldn't mind giving it another spin for nostalgia's sake.
Probably wouldn't be on interested if I could get fastish 286 with
decent EMS support (i.e. with NEAT chipset) so I can do fun things with desqview.. but those don't appear often & seem to go for a small fortune on ebay when they do. That or get one of the very rare EMS boards that
can do full LIM 4.0 & backfill memory - also so I can do fun things with desqview.
If you and mary4 didn't publicly post that you are that way, then no
one would have known, or frankly given a crap about it.
(i never said anything about who mary4 is beside their typing
mannerisms)
i know we like to live in the past around these parts but don't ask
don't tell was repealed in 2011
Yeah, 99% of other messages in FSX net have no one swearing, yet this
person's messages 99% of the time contain it.
It does get wearing after a while. If you're using it for effect on occasion well and good, but no need for excessive use.
For everyone else. I swear myself in real life, but not when around
other people or interacting online. For starters it show's a lack of
courtsey
Its rare I break out the swearing, usually something has to have gone catastrophically wrong, like I've stuck my foot in the lawn mower again. (Side note: I've never stuck my foot in the mower). Or something equally painful and depressing. Otherwise you devalue the use of the word
anyways.
I'll discourage swearing for the sake of swearing here.
Note: this message is aimed at guiding you and is not a personal
attack on you. I have only spotlighted the swearing that is in most of
your messages.
ill stop.. im sorry! >-< ill stop swearing. i am just excited about vintage computing. im sorry again. i mean no harm
You can be all excited until the sun comes up in the morning #-).yay! <#
We all get excited about our "reto" hobbies and computers. That is why we are here. I was just asking for the comminities sake that you refraim
from the swearing part.
system) there is new EMS boards being made by lo-tech
I suspect thats another bios bug. Maybe I should look for another
20Mhz 286 board.... or consider using a different bios.
Do you use desqview on you 286es? How do you have it setup?
Unless something has changed recently, the lo-tech EMS boards don't support backfill memory. Also my current 286 hates 8 bit cards, I
suspect thats another bios bug. Maybe I should look for another 20Mhz
286 board.... or consider using a different bios.
Do you use desqview on you 286es? How do you have it setup?i just use freedos 1.3 command.com
Sysop: | Immortal |
---|---|
Location: | Spanish Fork, UT |
Users: | 16 |
Nodes: | 10 (0 / 10) |
Uptime: | 20:27:24 |
Calls: | 560 |
Files: | 3,435 |
Messages: | 103,380 |