Microbe II BBS ============== "The Microbe II BBS started as Microbe BBS a place for a friend of mine to be able to experience using a BBS and to stay in touch. It soon become a source of information for those of similar computer or technical interests. The II designation was added when the BBS moved from a TRS-80 Model 1 running dual floppies to a Model 4P that grew to 3 floppy drives and an external 20 MEG HD. 20 Meg was a lot of strage at that time. I still have a working Full size 5 MEG drive I had used. Later the BBS ran on an 8086 IBM clone,an 8088 then an 80286, an Amiga and finally grew to using a Lantastic network of computers with a W.O.R.M. drive,several CD changers, 5 computers with 9 hard drives,3 transceivers and assorted TNCs. A Sola UPS and several Everex Streaming Tape drives became part of the system. "The members laughed when AOL first started sending those floppies advertising "50,000 files online", as Microbe II BBS had over 240,000 at that point in time and all of them freeware, shareware or public domain. Several were written by the members. Multiple door programs ranging from games through standalone programs never intended to be remote accessed thanks to a utility program and amateur radio callsign lookups were added along with various batch processes to allow files to be added automatically which were obtained from a C baseband satellite feed. "A Msys radio BBS with 2 meter,220 and 440 transceivers was linked into the lan shortly there after. Licensed amatuers could enter either landline or radio BBS system and use the other system. Many different BBS programs were used over the years, including Fido, Citadel and BBS-PC. Other names escape me at the moment. Operating systems linked included DOS 3.3 , OS/2, Windows 3.11 and of course Amiga Dos. Wildcat was the last BBS software used on the landline side after the systems took a devastating lightning strike. We didn't hear the boom first, just a sound like an arc welder and the lights going out...then a terrific boom and the smell of burnt electronics. Not one of my better days in history. Fortunately nothing caught fire, they just smoldered. "After that disaster a scaled back system was used until my MIS career and second job became too demanding. I ceased operations in the Spring of 2002. The fun and experimentation of running various systems paid off in good friends and career advancement oppertunity. I've served as a network admin on a 3600 node system spanning 24 countries and currently manage IT, Telcom and network security for a defense industry company among other things. I still enjoy "playing" with computers over the last 34 years but not neccessarily enjoying all their users. :-{ I still have my TRS-80s,Amiga and other computers including an old Sperry-Univac BC/7. I now relax commuting to and from work on my ZX14 Ninja after a few years of a ZX-12R. Growing older is no excuse not to have fun! "Your website is a trip down memory lane! Keep up the good work!" - Bob Moore Phone : 717-252-4543 Place : York, PA Years : 1984 - 2002 Sysop : Bob Moore Software: Wildcat! Listed by telephone number, as they all were. A few of these boards did reach the web: see recoveries-002.txt. Source : bbslist.textfiles.com, compiled by Jason Scott ------------------------------------------------------------------ gopher://hp84.com/ | https://ge97.com/ .