Path: utzoo!attcan!uunet!cs.utexas.edu!tut.cis.ohio-state.edu!ucbvax!pro-grouch.cts.com!rmichel
From: rmichel@pro-grouch.cts.com (Russel Michel)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.apple
Subject: ROMDISK cards
Message-ID: <8910230227.AA25208@trout.nosc.mil>
Date: 23 Oct 89 00:47:46 GMT
Sender: daemon@ucbvax.BERKELEY.EDU
Organization: The Internet
Lines: 44

>There USED to be a few memory cards which supported a ROMDISK option on
>their card - I think with some sockets.  Are these boards still for sale,
>and has anyone contacted them to see if they will be coming out with some
>roms?

One of the cards which could use ROMs as a GS ROMDISK was the AST RAMStakPlus.

It has four sockets for 27xxx EPROMs or 28xxx EEPROMs.  Use of EPROMs required
the use of an EPROM programmer ("burner") to put the desired code on the
chips,
after using the ROMDISKFILES SETUP routine supplied with the card.  EEPROMs
can
be programmed by the card itself.  I bought a set of 28256 EEPROMs and loaded
them with ProDOS8 w/ Bird's Better Bye, BASIC.SYSTEM, and a tiny APPLESOFT
program which asked if I wanted to enter BASIC, QUIT to ProDOS, or (in those
p days) startup ProDOS16 from disk.  It worked like a champ.  Startup
time from ROMDISK was insignificant; ProDOS was up and my little menu program
was running before the monitor was warmed up.  I stopped using the RAMStak's
ROMDISK though, after I acquired a RAMKeeper. (two ROMDISKs cannot be used)

I have no idea if there are any other similar boards.  AST no longer makes the
RAMStakPlus (or any other Apple II products), but there are still cards
available, as I recall recently seeing them advertized in one of the
fine-print
ads in the back of InCider.

I called AST shortly after I purchased the card to see if they were going to
produce any pre-propgrammed ROMs for use on their card; their reply was that
they designed the card for the end user to do it himself as he so desired,
which satisfied me. (After all, I managed to do it successfully; if I can,
even
a monkey could do it!)

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