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Early IBM PC software!

MissArgent

MissArgent

Veteran Member
Joined
Oct 3, 2016
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Location
Illinois, USA
So, I'm making some final preparations to try and get at least two working TM-100-2As (Argh!) out of my parts drive pile so I can finally get my Early MDA 5150A closed up and running. I've got PC-DOS 1.0 (both the 7/1981 prerelease and final) and 2.0 media written, as well as media written for some early software like VolksWriter, EasyWriter, Microsoft Adventure and a grab bag of BASIC programs. Anyone know of any early user groups or BBS with robust software selections I could refer to for some more varied fare? I'm mostly looking for leads on stuff from within the first three years of the 5150's lifespan, ideally things designed with DOS 1.x in mind or dedicated booters. Thanks!
 
How about some classic games? Striker, Mines, Paratrooper, Robotron... I had some stock market sim back in the day too. That sort of thing is available in various abandonware sites, and some of them let you browse by year.

IBM produced software for the system, notably DisplayWrite. And Visicalc of course.
 
If you want user-group/BBS fodder, look up the "PC/Blue", "PC/Red", "PC/Green" collections and the early disks from PC-SIG - there are hundreds of them, mostly with software from 1981-1985. Of course, a lot of it is homebrew BASIC stuff and not exactly the paragon of quality, but there are a few quite interesting things to be found.
 
Unfortunately, Winworld does not have an easy way to search by date.

Vetusware has a "tree of life" that lists titles by date, but there is a lot of crap in there.
 
Trixter said:
Use mobygames to see what was available at that time period:

https://www.mobygames.com/browse/games/pc-booter/
https://www.mobygames.com/browse/games/dos/1981/
https://www.mobygames.com/browse/games/dos/1982/
https://www.mobygames.com/browse/games/dos/1983/

...then do searches online for what you're interested in.

<cough>ftp://ftp.oldskool.org/pub/misc/Software/Games/</cough>
Click to expand...

MyAbandonWare is another good site for searching for games by year: https://www.myabandonware.com/browse/year/
 
Got my hands on PC/BLUE, but RED and GREEN have been harder to find - part since the names are kind of vague and both Google and DuckDuckGo seem to think verbatim search doesn't mean verbatim search. this thread has been the only lead i've found thus far...
 
MrArgent said:
Got my hands on PC/BLUE, but RED and GREEN have been harder to find - part since the names are kind of vague and both Google and DuckDuckGo seem to think verbatim search doesn't mean verbatim search. this thread has been the only lead i've found thus far...
Click to expand...
Ah, yes, that thread had a link but it'd seem that the site simply trashed 98% of the ftp/web mirrors it once had... fantastic.
Since this is all shareware/free/PD stuff, I'm allowing myself to share a copy here: https://m.put.re/THn82onm.rar.

Someone should probably upload this to the Internet Dumpster (@Trixter: I told you I'd crib that one) ;)
While you're at it, do grab the PC-SIG diskettes; they're probably all over the place.
 
VileR said:
Ah, yes, that thread had a link but it'd seem that the site simply trashed 98% of the ftp/web mirrors it once had... fantastic.
Since this is all shareware/free/PD stuff, I'm allowing myself to share a copy here: https://m.put.re/THn82onm.rar.

Someone should probably upload this to the Internet Dumpster (@Trixter: I told you I'd crib that one) ;)
While you're at it, do grab the PC-SIG diskettes; they're probably all over the place.
Click to expand...

Thanks for the upload! Chrome OS doesn't let me download it, because it thinks it's malware. Wget doesn't care. ;) VirusTotal gives only 3 hits, so it's probably nothing. (One joke program from Panda, one undescriptive hash from Comodo and one possible boot virus from NOD32) scan result
 
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