XPost: comp.sys.cbm, rec.games.video.classic   
   From: payton@paytonnospambyrd.com   
      
   "Joel Koltner"  wrote in message    
   ews:13hpvp7lo2l50ec@corp.supernews.com...   
      
   > Apple DOS also beats the pants off of what came stock with the C64 for   
   > accessing disk drives -- by the time C64's started to dwindle in popularity,   
   I    
   > don't think there was anyone left who *didn't* have a FastLoad-type   
   cartridge,    
   > was there?   
      
   The C64's slow disk access had nothing to do with the DOS, but was a   
   side-effect of an industrial engineer getting too happy with the cutting knife   
   and removing a motherboard trace that the Kernal programmer was depending on.    
   Before the error was caught    
   over 100,000 boards had been produced and the Kernal programmer had to   
   scramble to fix the Kernal in both the C64 and the 1541 to work without the   
   trace and all of the boards had to have the updated Kernal retrofitted.    
   Commodore fixed the problem with    
   the C128 and 1571 drive which has incredibly fast disk access.  On the 128,   
   the only reason to use a fastload cart was to make the 1541 faster.  JiffyDOS,   
   which is practically standard equipment on a C64/C128 these days (much like   
   ProDOS is practically    
   standard equipment on an Apple II these days) not only speeds up the disk   
   access, but gives you the kind of command line flexibility enjoyed be any   
   modern CLI.   
      
   --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05   
    * Origin: you cannot sedate... all the things you hate (1:229/2)