Specifications

3 - 2
OPERATION WITH DOS
The Little Board/286 and its ROM-BIOS have been designed to allow the use of IBM PC-DOS,
Microsoft MS-DOS, or Digital Research DR-DOS, versions 2.x or 3.x, and PC-DOS or MS-DOS
version 4.01, as the board's operating system. Throughout this chapter, the term "DOS" will be
used to refer to any of these operating systems, except in cases where a difference in operation
exists.
Caution
Many variations of MS-DOS exist which have been customized
for operation on specific computer systems. These cannot be
expected to function properly on the Little Board/286, and
should not be used. Use "IBM PC-DOS", or use the "generic
IBM compatible" version of MS-DOS supplied directly by
Microsoft on an OEM basis, if you do not choose to use the DR-
DOS operating system supplied by Ampro.
When used with DOS, the standard AT devices are available, including keyboard port, speaker
port, parallel printer port, serial ports, programmable timer, DMA controllers, interrupt controllers,
and battery-backed clock (with internal CMOS RAM). In addition, the optional Ampro
MiniModule/VGA, MiniModule/EGA, MiniModule/CGA, and MiniModule/LCD onboard display
controller modules offer the most popular PC- and AT-compatible video modes: VGA, EGA,
CGA, MDA, and Hercules monochrome graphics on CRT, LCD, or electroluminescent (EL)
displays.
The board's two 8250-based RS232C serial ports are normally supported by DOS as the "COM1"
and "COM2" ports. The Parallel Printer port is normally the DOS "LPT1" device. These devices,
as well as the keyboard and speaker ports, are supported by the ROM-BIOS in an AT-compatible
manner.
The DOS and ROM-BIOS time-of-day clocks are supported in the usual manner. They are
initialized automatically by the ROM-BIOS to the value stored in the onboard battery-backed
clock on system reset or powerup.
DOS version 3.2 (or later) is required for operation with 80-track (720K) mini- or micro-floppy
drives. DOS version 3.3 (or later) is needed for use with 1.44 megabyte microfloppies, and with
the optional Ampro Solid State Disk support utilities. DOS version 3.x is required for SCSI hard
disk usage under the board's ROM-BIOS and SCSI support software. In addition, support for hard
disks larger than 32 megabytes is available under DR-DOS version 3.4 (or later), or under MS-
DOS or PC-DOS versions 4.0 (or later).