Microsoft KB Archive/102497

Third-Party Converter: Central Point Deluxe Option Board

Q102497

The information in this article applies to:

Microsoft Word for Windows, versions 1.0, 1.1, 1.1a, 2.0, 2.0a, 2.0a-CD, 2.0b, 2.0c
Microsoft Word for MS-DOS, versions 4.0, 5.0, 5.5, 6.0
Microsoft Word for the Macintosh, versions 4.0, 5.0, 5.1
Microsoft Windows versions 3.0, 3.1

SUMMARY

The Deluxe Option Board, from Central Point Software, is an MS-DOS-based program that transfers files from the Apple Macintosh environment to the MS-DOS environment.

The "More Information" section of this article contains excerpts from the "Deluxe Option Board" manual.

The products included here are manufactured by Central Point Software, a vendor independent of Microsoft; we make no warranty, implied or otherwise, regarding these products' performance or reliability.

For further information about the Deluxe Option Board, contact Central Point Software at (503) 244-5782.

Central Point Software, Inc.

15220 NW Greenbrier Parkway, #200
Beaverton, OR 97006

(503) 690-8090

MORE INFORMATION

The Deluxe Option Board turns your internal 3.5-inch floppy disk drive into a dual formatted IBM/Mac drive. To transfer data from a PC format to a Mac format, insert a floppy disk in your PC's 3.5-inch floppy disk drive, format it as a Macintosh disk, and copy a file to it. This same disk can then be inserted in a Mac to be read or copied.

The Deluxe Option Board Disk Accessory package contains everything you need for your PC to:

Exchange data with other Macintosh users if you have a supported PC 3.5-inch floppy disk drive.
Make archival backups of copy-protected PC software.
Make copies of Macintosh, Atari, Commodore, and other non-IBM disk formats (non-protected only).
Use the Track Editor to look at and edit protection schemes yourself.

The Deluxe Option Board can be thought of as a disk accessory. It adds new capabilities to your existing disk drive by acting as an auxiliary floppy controller.

The standard floppy disk controller is actually a simple computer on its own. When the PC wants some information from the disk, it asks the floppy disk controller's "computer" to get it. The information that the PC receives is only the information contained in the data fields. You have no access to the information between the data fields. Using the Deluxe Option Board, this limitation is overcome. It can access all of the information contained on the disk bit-by-bit.

With these special capabilities and special software, it is possible to simulate Macintosh 400K and 800K disk drives even though the formats are different.

The Deluxe Option Board compensates for the disk drive differences between a Macintosh and PC by basically reading and writing information faster or slower depending on the track. This control is what allows you to use your existing internal 3.5-inch floppy PC drive to read, write, format, and copy Macintosh disks.

The MCP program supplied on your Deluxe Option Board disk enables you to transfer files between the Macintosh and IBM versions of popular programs such as Microsoft Word, PageMaker, dBASE Macintosh, Microsoft Excel, and Lotus 1-2-3. MCP stands for "Macintosh Control Program," which describes what it does: MCP controls the flow of information into and out of Macintosh format.

Whenever you wish to transfer an IBM file to the Macintosh or from the Macintosh to the PC, you will use MCP. If you are copying standard IBM files, you will continue to use the standard MS-DOS commands. To make matters easy, MCP uses a series of small batch files, which makes the command format almost identical to MS-DOS.

MCP supports two Macintosh data formats: 400K (MFS) and 800K (HFS). The 1.44 megabyte high-density disk format is not supported.

MCP will determine which type of disk is in the drive before transferring any data.

IMPORTANT: Before you use MCP to transfer files between Macintosh and IBM versions, consult your software manual or contact the software publisher for their recommended method of saving and loading documents created by different software and to determine any limitations in these transfers.

Using MCP

Your Deluxe Option Board software disk includes the main MCP.EXE program plus several batch files that will execute MCP for you. The commands are almost exactly like their MS-DOS counterparts, except there is an "M" in front of each one. Here's a list of the batch files:

   Filename   Description
   --------   -----------

   MCopy      Copies files from a Mac disk to an IBM disk and vice versa
              (supports wildcards)
   MDIR       Displays all files in the current folder
   MTREE      Displays all folders on a disk
   MTYPE      Lists a file to the screen
   MFORMAT    Formats Mac 800K (HFS) and 400K (MFS) disks
   MCD        Changes the "current" folder
   MDC        Disk copies a Macintosh disk
   MDEL       Deletes files from a Macintosh disk
   MMD        Creates a new folder
   MRD        Removes a folder

TRANSFERRING FILES

Once the file has been saved in the correct format, here is a general rule of thumb for selecting which transfer method to use with MCP:

Binary

If the file is to be used on the PC, and it contains formatting information (such as a word processing document), and the file was saved in the target computer's format or a common file format, use MCOPY. This is the default method, and you don't need to do anything extra.

To copy a file from a Macintosh disk to the PC:

mcopy a: <mac_filename> c:

To copy a file from the PC to a Macintosh disk:

mcopy c:\<filename.doc> a:

Text

If the file is to be used on the PC, and it does not contain formatting information, or the program that created the data file does not support a common file format or the target computer's format, use MCOPY with a /T switch. This is useful for program source files (Pascal, C, Basic, and so forth) and data files from simple text editors.

To transfer the file as a text file:

mcopy a:<mac_filename> c:/t

Unary

If the file is to be stored (not used) on the PC, and it will be used only on a Macintosh, use MCOPY with the /U switch. This is useful for Macintosh programs and data files that are being transferred to a PC hard disk for later downloading to a Macintosh (on a network, for example).

To copy a file from a Macintosh disk to the PC using the Unary file translation:

mcopy a:<mac_filename> c:/u

Additional query words: third-party 3rd party 3rdparty textconv 1.10a 2.00a 2.00a-CD 2.00b 2.00c 6.00

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