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From: net@uwmacc.UUCP (jeff kesselman)
Newsgroups: net.micro.pc
Subject: Re: MS/PC DOS?
Message-ID: <412@uwmacc.UUCP>
Date: Sat, 25-Oct-86 02:23:28 EDT
Article-I.D.: uwmacc.412
Posted: Sat Oct 25 02:23:28 1986
Date-Received: Sat, 25-Oct-86 07:25:44 EDT
References: <985@husc2.UUCP> <394@catnip.UUCP>
Reply-To: net@uwmacc.UUCP (jeff kesselman)
Organization: UWisconsin-Madison Academic Comp Center
Lines: 23
Keywords: MS-DOS, PC-DOS

In article <394@catnip.UUCP> ben@catnip.UUCP (Bennett Broder) writes:
>There is little if any difference between MS-DOS and PC-DOS.  They are
>both the same OS, but PC-DOS is supported by IBM instead of Microsoft
>or another hardware vendor.
>
>I have only found one real difference:
>
>* PC-DOS comes with BASIC and BASICA, which utilize the cassette
>  basic ROMS on real IBM PCs and ATs.  MS-DOS comes with GWBASIC,
>  which is self-contained.  BASICA leaves a trife more, and BASIC
>  leaves substantially more free memory for your BASIC code and variables
>  than GWBASIC.

There is one, very large and very important difference that I am aware of.
MS-DOS and PC-DOS store their hard drive's directories in different
sectors on the disk. If you mix the two, you can end up writing files with
one right over the directory of the other, or vice versa. Bad news.

In general, they are about the same, and as long as you just stick to one
or the other, you're fine. (Floppies seem to be data compatable, as each
can find files written by the other.)

Jeff Kesselman