I/O Board
COVOX AND PCS
While reading about PCS (Antic, October 1987), I recognized Patrick McShane's name and CAMLU. In the fall of 1986 I enlisted the help of Covox's Kevin Gevatosky to help me over some programming hurdles. I was trying to control our Omnibot 2000 robot strictly by voice commands, using the Covox VoiceMaster and an Atari 800 with a homemade robot interface. Gevatosky was most generous with his time.
McShane's CAMLU project was indeed responsible for some changes in the Covox software and he deserves a lot of praise for his creative approach to computer education. And Covox should get credit for unusually responsive customer support for its product.
East Amherst, NY
ANTIC WRITER FIX
I was fuming over the problems with Antic Writer (July 1987)-printer timeouts and having to use a FIX XL translator disk on my 800XL-until I discovered a fix! I am in fact writing this letter with Antic Writer, and it will print without the translator disk.
Chico, CA
Bob Hardy 's program was optimized by Antic Technical Editor Charles
Jackson.-ANTIC ED
COACHWARE FOUND
In the October, 1987 I/O Board, football coach Jerry Culver asked for help finding software to draw play diagrams with his Atari 800XL for saving to disk and printing. Suncom's Animation Station graphics tablet and software (Reviewed in Antic, November 1987-ANTIC ED) does this job, as well as many other specialized tasks.
Suncom Sales Manager
PCS SCHOOL FOLLOW-UP
The students and staff of PCS School for Advanced Learning would like to thank you for your wonderful article, Maverick Atari School (Antic, October 1987).
We received over 80 calls about our program from all over the United States. As a direct result of your article and subsequent calls, we're currently signing licensing agreements to set up PCS Schools in other cities and states. In fact, we've already opened a second school in Boise.
Because of the article, the Nampa enrollment jumped to 85 students, and the new school also doubled enrollment. B. Dalton bookstore, which normally carries five issues of Antic each month, has sold over 125 copies in Nampa alone. And I understand that Boise sellers have done as well.
Before I even received my copy, I got a call from a total stranger who had read about our "drooling over having a hard drive" for our 1040ST He said he liked what he'd read and sent us an Atari 20Mb drive. This is nothing short of a miracle.
Also, we plan to manufacture the MCU (Motor Control Unit) for home and school use. It's affordable and foolproof, and software is included. This is remarkable when you realize that it's designed completely by kids.
The time is right and our nation is ripe to see this type of facility available everywhere. If it weren't for your article, these developments couldn't be possible. I am forever in debt to Antic magazine.
Headmaster
PCS School
1020 W. Finch Drive
Nampa, ID 83651
(208) 465-5443
CASSETTE A-ROGUE
Cassette Owners: Here's all it takes to get A-Rogue (Antic, May 1987) working perfectly on your tape. Just change the "D:" to "C:" in the following lines: 110,1600, 1612,1615 and 1650 in Listing 1 and line 70 in Listing 2. Also be sure that you use different cassettes for the program, the character set, and any games you save.
Moreno Valley, CA
IT'S POSSIBLE
I had to write and say how impressed I was with Graphics Impossible (Antic, October 1987). Nearly two years ago I attempted something similar. I tried to get more colors on the vertical level, but I couldn't get the DMA timing right. There's still a problem when changing something at the far right side of the screen, though-but, for example, take the listing GRAPHDEM.BAS, and add these lines:
This adds nine more NOPs, making the Graphics mode change farther to the right of the screen. Instead of having a "clean" mode change, there are jagged lines at that point.
I look forward to more Antic exchange programs from England's Page 6 magazine.
Sacramento, CA
SOFSEL HARTECH PRICES
In two recent New Products descriptions, Antic printed wrong prices for products we saw at the June 1987 Consumer Electronics show.
Hartech's (October 1987) Atari-look pocket calculators actually sell for $5.95. The correct price of the DMP 2000 printing model is $24.95 and the databank DB 2100 is $21.
The right prices of Star Soft games from TDC (November 1987) are: Pirates of the Barbary Coast, $24.95; Aliants, $29.95; Sprong and Space Lobster, $14.95 each; Disk 50, $19.95.
Antic welcomes your feedback, but we regret that the large volume of mail makes it impossible for the Editors to reply to everyone. Although we do respond to as much reader correspondence as time perm its, our highest priority must be to publish I/O answers to questions that are meaningful to a substantial number of readers.
Send letters to: Antic I/O Board, 544 Second Street, San Francisco, CA 94107.