Common knowledge says, that it is possible to speed-up installation process of big programs by copying installation disks on hard-drive. It's good think to do, because when you speed-up installation two times (by this trick), you can save up-to half an hour. (Yes. There are programs, which took 60 minutes to install.) 35 seconds package ÍÍÍÍÍÍÍÍÍÍÍÍÍÍÍÍÍͼ Version 1.02 The ultimate floppy-disk caching program 35sec disk accelerator is able to read floppy disks completely on background. It is nice feature, which can save you lot of time. Computer is slowed down only by some 10%, difference is unnoticeable (when not running benchmarks). You can even remove floppy from drive (if disk is error-free). You can work on it, and it is as fast as ram-drive. You can even make changes on it. Than you can write memory image onto floppy, you can decide to discard changes, can make copies of that disk, everything completely on background. When there are some problems with reading floppy, remember to leave it inserted in drive. When 35sec is not able to read something (it will tell you after reading), you should leave floppy inserted. BIOS may still be able to read that data. Be sure to retire such floppies, as they became slow and unreliable. 35sec.com - kernel ÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÙ 35sec.com should be loaded from your autoexec.bat file. It is resident and takes about 3KB of RAM. It may be loaded high by your memory manager in order to save memory. 35sec.com contains kernel, which is responsible for doing all low-level operations. This kernel provides services to other programs from 35sec package. Interface between 35sec.com and other programs is described in 35tech.txt. If you decide to use that interface, please let me know. Note, that you can't distribute 35sec along with your own programs (see 35lic.txt). 35cache?.com - cache interfaces ÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÙ After loading 35sec.com, you need some program to call its services. You can select from 3 versions of this program (called 35caches.com, 35cacheo.com and 35cacheb.com). All these shells should be loaded from autoexec.bat. They have all same keyboard controlls - they differs only in responses they give to you. 35cacheb.com - gives information by beeps. Problem about this is, that it may be hard to recognize what information does it want to give you. Generally, two same beeps mean that something is O.K. and accepted, two (or more) different beeps mean that something went wrong. It is the smallest one. 35caches.com - gives information in text form only. Window in center of screen pops up informing you on what happend. Then, you are expected to press Alt-RShift to continue. The message pops up even if you are in graphics mode (and you will not be able to see it), so this is not recommended to install when you use graphics mode application frequently. 35cacheo.com - gives information by beeps and in text form. Text message appears after you press report last message (^^C) combination (see below), so there are no problems with graphics modes. Buffer selection Deselect ÚÄÄÄÂÄÄÄÂÄÄÄÂÄÄÄ ÂÄÄÄ ³1 ³2 ³3 ³4 ³ ³0 ³ ³ ³ ³ ³ ³ ³ ³ ÀÂÄÄÁÂÄÄÁÂÄÄÁÂÄÄÁ ÁÄÄÄÁ ÀÂÄÄÁÂÄÄÁÂÄÄÁÂÄÄÁ ³Q ³W ³E ³R ³ ³ ³ ³ ³ ³ B: ÀÂÄÄÁÂÄÄÁÂÄÄÁÂÄÄÁ ³A ³S ³D ³F ³ ³ ³ ³ ³ ³ A: ÀÂÄÄÁÂÄÄÁÂÄÄÁÂÄÄÁ ^ ^ ^ ^ ³ ³ ³ ³ ³ ³ ³ ÀÄ Write whole memory image onto floppy ³ ³ ÀÄ Write chaged parts of memory image onto floppy ³ ÀÄ Assign buffer to drive ÀÄ Read buffer from drive ÀÂÄÄÁÂÄÄÁÂÄÄÁÂÄÄÁ ³Z ³X ³C ³V ³ ³ ³ ³ ³ ³ ÀÄÄÄÁÄÄÄÁÄÄÄÁÄÄÄÁ ^ ^ ^ ³ ³ ³ ³ ³ ÀÄ Report last message (not in 35cacheb) ³ ÀÄ Report progress of current operation (not in 35cacheb ÀÄ Free buffer Commands are Ctrl-Alt-Letter followed by buffer number (if required). For Ilustrative pictures, install ANSI.SYS device driver and view 35OLD.txt (situation before 35sec installed) and 35HELP.txt (situation with 35sec installed). Compatibility ÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÙ When MS-Windows are loaded, it is not possible to load disk images (35sec reports 'Not enough XMS' error). 35sec requires some XMS memory manager to be installed. When used with disc caches, load 35sec *before* that cache. If you load 35sec after really intelligent cache (like hyperdisk), be sure to flush its buffers before reading floppies using 35sec. This program requires 386+ Installation ÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÙ Copy all files to hard-drive. Install 35sec.com and one of 35cache?.com in autoexec.bat file. 35sec.com should be installed before any disk-caching program but after XMS memory manager. Registration ÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÙ After 21 days evalution period, you must register. Registration means, that you will send me $10 and I will send you registered copy of 35sec accelerator. Note for people from Czech republic: Vzhledem k tomu, ze od nikoho z vas neocekavam, ze mi poslete deset dolaru, bude bohate stacit, kdyz mi poslete stopadesat korun, nejlepe slozenkou na nize uvedenou adresu. Comments ÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÙ Any comments are welcome, even from non-registered users. This is version 1.0 of software, so there may be some bugs in it. Please report me, if you find one. This software is not compatible with Windows, now. I see a way, how to make it compatible with Windows, but I don't know, if it is worth doing. If you are Windows user, and you like this product, please mail me. If you are user of registered copy, and you want Windows compatible version, I promise that I'll write it. My adress is: Pavel Machek Volkova 1131 198 00 Praha 9 - Cerny Most Czech republic Phone: +42-2-866 233 E-mail: machek@troja.fjfi.cvut.cz