WHAT'S NEW? IMPORTANT: Caching floppy drives slows POLYCOPY's performance. If you are using SMARTDRV.EXE, use the following syntax to disable floppy caching: SMARTDRV A- B- The statement above assumes you have two floppy drives. Other cache software should have similar options if floppy caching is supported. [VERSION 3.00] - Up to 30% speed improvement. This was accomplished by doubl- ing up on the block size of each disk read or write. A very positive side effect was to reduce the XMS handles requirement by 50% over previous versions. Faster computers show the most significant improvement. For example, on a 33Mhz or faster computer 1.44MB diskettes copy in about the same amount of time as 720K's. - New simplified syntax. In earlier versions of POLYCOPY, image file syntax was a bit confusing. The new syntax vs. the old is as follows: OLD: POLYCOPY [src<:>] [tgt<:>] [/i:fspec] [/f] [/x] [/t] [/v] [/r] NEW: POLYCOPY source [target] [/f] [/t] [/s] [/r] [/x] EXAMPLES OF NEW SYNTAX: D>polycopy b: /f C>polycopy a: b: C>polycopy d:\temp\disk1 b: (default = ".FLP") C>polycopy e: disk1.flp C>polycopy /r (print registration form) As compared to the old syntax, image file handling is now much more intuitive. Simple, type SOURCE and TARGET and POLYCOPY will determine whether each is a disk or image file automatically. - Improved formatting. With the new format capability (MS DOS 4.01, 5.0 and 6.0 only), there is no longer any need for human intervention during the format operation. No doubt about it, the additional carriage returns and having to respond to "Format another (Y/N)" was a real pain. This and other such ambiguous prompts have been removed. - Reduced XMS handles requirement. This version requires half as many XMS handles as all previous version to copy the same number of cylinders. It should only be necessary to set the maximum number of available XMS handles to 64 now, rather than 128 as before. - Support for 2.88 MB floppies (untested). - QEMM Detection. Useful if you like knowing what is active during copies. - Disk counters. This version keeps track of the number of diskettes read and written, so you don't have to. The numbers appears in the following form: Source disk -------, ,------- Target disk (always "1") | | 100 percent of disk 4-1 read ==> 75 percent of disk 2-5 written ==> | | Source disk -------' '------- Target disk where the number "1" or "3" is replaced by the actual diskette currently being read or written to. - Beep tone. Using the environment variable POLYSOUND, you may now tell POLYCOPY whether or not to produce an audible beep after each diskette has been processed. It defaults to being turned on. Use the following syntax in you AUTOEXEC.BAT or from the DOS command line to turn it off always: SET POLYSOUND=OFF You may also use the "/S" command line option to toggle sound on or off. Like "/T" for toggling TrashGuard, "/S" sets sound to on if it is already off (or off it is is already on). For example, if the environment variable POLYSOUND is not init- ialized, a "/S" will turn beep sounds off -- except for warnings. - Reduced RAM overhead when copying any floppy smaller than 1.44 MB, or when the "/V" verify option is not selected. Dynamically allocated sector buffers, rather than static, make this possible. - Improved image file path correction. In previous versons if you specified an image file with a filename larger than the eight characters allowed by DOS, POLYCOPY didn't not display the truncated path as it was actually used. This primarily affects what is displayed rather than what is used. - Improved exception handling. Earlier releases attempted to format diskettes regardless of the nature of errors detected during disk writes. Now, POLYCOPY tests for specific errors. For example, if a diskette is write protected, a "Disk write protected" error will be displayed and no format will be attempted. - Input character checking. When prompted for keyboard input for things such as "press ENTER" or "(Y/N)?", this version of POLYCOPY beeps until a valid choice is selected. Older release would accept almost any character, sometimes with unpredictable results. - Converted to use DOS' built-in VERIFY capability, rather than hard-coded. This reduces .EXE size and RAM overhead, and makes POLYCOPY even easier to operate than ever. The "/V" option has been removed; however, you can turn verify on or using using the regular DOS syntax: C>verify on or C>verify off NOTE: Disk writes are much faster with write-read-verify turned off. Most of the time it is not necessary to perform this extra testing. - TrashGuard now defaults to OFF. You may still use the "/t" command line parameter, or the "TrashGuard=" environment variable, to turn TrashGuard back ON. - Enhanced error recovery. In earlier versions, a bad destinate disk caused POLYCOPY to halt a duplication session. This has been changed now to give you the option to make additional copies, thus saving valuable time. - Force drive type option. In rare cases, such as with on systems with more than two floppy drives, it is necessary to force POLYCOPY to treat a floppy drive as a particular type. If POLYCOPY has trouble determining the correct drive type, use the "/DT=n" parameter to force a type. The drive type codes are (n=1...5): 1 = 360K, 2 = 1.2M, 3 = 720K, 4 = 1.44M and 5 = 2.88M IMPORTANT: Use this option very carefully. Under normal circumstances use should not use this option. [VERSION 2.81] - Version 2.80 has a bug that keeps it from creating the ORDER.FRM file, which is now corrected. - Fixed a cosmetic problem that occurred if the SOURCE and TARGET drives were not the same. The statement, "Writing to TARGET disk in drive...," shows up on the wrong line. [VERSION 2.80] - Corrected pointer problem that's been generating 90% of QEMM and other TrashGuard errors. Now you can truely use POLYCOPY and QEMM safely and reliablly together. Just don't forget to increase the number of handles to 128 (see below). [VERSION 2.70] - Read/Write elapsed time display. After a comlete disk read or write the elapsed time for the process is displayed in the form [XXm XXs], where 'm' is for minutes and 's' seconds. - TrashGuard RAM validation protection. Some EMM drivers, such as QEMM, can make dangerous modifications to DOS RAM without warning if they are not configured properly for your system. A change to a single byte will not affect most programs noticably; however, when you're copying diskettes a single byte error cannot be tolerated. Enter TrashGuard. TrashGuard does exactly what it's name implies, it guards against trashed data. An advanced 32-bit CRC algorithm is used to detect changes to diskette data while it is stored in RAM. - Verify option. In verify mode POLYCOPY does in verify mode is to read each track written to disk and compare every byte to insure an absolutely accurate write. - No more erroneous "Drive not supported or is not a floppy drive" errors. If you get this error now chances are it is legitimate. - Extended drive letters. This version supports any floppy drive letter -- including virtual drives. Letters such as those assigned by MicroSolutions' CompatiCard IV (i.e. E: F:). - DiskDUP (Copr. (C)1990 R. MacClean) image file compatibility. This version allows you to restore from DiskDUP's image files that are not compressed. - Tested with fast, single-pass copies on 600 rpm high-speed floppy drives. [VERSION 2.60] - Store to and restore from diskette image files. These disk images may be archived for modem transmission or simply stored on you hard drive for diskette recreation without the need for an original. NOTE: The image files POLYCOPY creates are completely compatible with those used by the PC Magazine utility pair 2FILE/2FLOPPY (C)1991 Ziff Comm. Co. - DOS 5.0 compatibility - Added "/u" parameter to the DOS FORMAT shell when DOS 5.0 is detected. - Added "/x" parameter to disable XMS memory usage. This is primarily for testing and comparisons, but may also prove useful if you have XMS problems and don't want to go to the trouble of removing your HIMEM.SYS driver. - Removed disk status check when "/f" forced format parameter is specified. This eliminates the long pause associated with cross-formatted diskettes, but only if "/f" is specified. - Fixed bug that occurred when insufficient XMS handles resulted in a switch to DISK producing a corrupt target. It is still recommended that you install: "DEVICE=C:\DOS\HIMEM /NUMHANDLES=128" for the best possible performance (HANDLES=128 for QEMM). - Added "/r" parameter so POLYCOPY can now generate its own registration form. Use the following syntax to print a POLYCOPY registration form: C>polycopy /r > prn [VERSION 2.22] - Earlier versions skipped side one of the last track on high density diskettes. This has been corrected. [VERSION 2.21] - Fixed bug that occurred when copying multiple, different disks. The first disk always copied fine, but the program didn't reliably free up XMS and RAM prior to starting another disk. [VERSION 2.20] - XMS memory support! [VERSION 2.12] - Gives "WARNING!" rather than error when user attempts to make the default drive equal to either the SOURCE or TARGET drive. [VERSION 2.11] - Corrects formatting problem, "bad parameter," for DOS versions less than 4.0. [VERSION 2.10] - Multiple disk drives supported.