Micro Five system / Microdata connection

[g-wright at att.net]

-------------- Original message from jim s <jwstephens at msm.umr.edu>: -------------- 


> g-wright at att.net wrote: 
> > 
> > 
> > Well I have a 1000 here and not sure which CPU it has but it is a CPM/ MPM 
> > mutliuser system. It has no slots. The serial IO board is on top of the 
> Mother board 
> > making it hard to find the CPU. 
> > 
> > I also have a Micro V, Microstar system that uses a 8085 CPU not sure if there 
> > related. They certenly have a close name. Just 2 8" floppies. 
> > 
> > - Jerry 
> > 
> > Jerry Wright 
> > g-wright at att.net 
> > 
> Micro V and Micro 5 were all the same. They started with an 8086 with 2 
> users capability and expanded to a better basic and hardware and the 
> 8085 when it came out. 
> 
> They could have run CPM but they had their own O/S that they sold for 
> business purposes. 
> 
> For what it's worth they were financed by Ken Allen among others, who 
> also was a founding backer of Microdata in 1968 or 69. I don't recall 
> exactly when they were founded but it was in the 80 to 85 time frame. 
> I'll ask some of the culprits at a reunion coming up and try to post 
> more accurate info. 
> 
> There was a special agreement between Microdata and Micro V not to sue 
> over the "Micro" in the name, due to the close relation. There was no 
> other connection other than the founders that I know of of a business 
> nature. Soon after the founding of Micro V, Microdata was acquired by 
> McDonnell Douglass and began to change to other identities (MDCSS and 
> Novadyne eventually) away from Microdata. 
> 
> One of the original engineers is John Pitcher, who originally was from 
> Microdata. The first President was Cliff Myers. Both were key players 
> at Microdata and there is a strong geographic relation to Microdata as 
> well as the people being from there. 
> 
> I believe that John Pitcher has a system he saved which has all the 
> software on 3 1/2" floppies, and should probably try to get it to save 
> away, since he had most of the software on that format which is much 
> easier to handle than the original 8" systems. 
> 
> Jim 

Thanks Jim,   for the info.  this is the first I have seen so far.

It would be nice to come up with any info or OS for these. I dug  out my 1000
and it boots  StarDos.  I have looked for years for info on either machine and/or 
the OS.    Not much is out there.

- Jerry

Jerry Wright
JLC inc
g-wright at att.net