QBasic Program help for a novice.

[bluejaked48]

And when I say novice, I mean I have never used qbasic.

Ok here's the deal. We have a computer here at work that uses a DAS card to communicate with a machine we use to burnish brake pads for race cars. Yesterday the machine stopped working because the computer running it had an error in windows. Understand this is an old computer running Win. 95. And I called the card manufacturer and they don't even make that card anymore. (it uses an isa slot)

The program we use was written 10 years ago using QBasic. We have the code for the program but the issue is installing it into a new computer with a new DAS card that will be in a pci slot. The question is determining how the program communicates with the card. If we use a different card will we also have to change the code in the program to make it work? Or is it possible with a newer computer and card slot it will (in my novice terms) plug-n-play?

I would like to know where to start. This is way beyond my realm of understanding. I've never written code. I understand the theory and architecture some what but that's about it. We are located in Mooresville NC. If anyone is near by or could point us to a resource that would be great. I've searched all over the local area and the state for companies who deal with such things to no avail. I decided to post this here to help my boss out.

I may have left some details out but any questions you may have I will respond very quickly. I've got the machine running by booting the program out of DOS but it's only a temp fix. If that computer goes down then I don't have a job.

Thanks for any response. Sorry It's long winded, I'm just trying to be detailed.

Jake

[I Daniel]

This is just a wild reply.
If it runs under DOS re-installing win95 or installing win98SE or even Xp Pro should fix the WINDOWS problem but after so many years your hard-drive could start developing bad sectors and thus cause windows and other problems. So make a back-up of your program yesterday. (ie very urgent) and run scandisk/chkdsk to verify that the harddrive is still okay.

I had to do a web search 'Computer DAS card' since I've never heard of it. isa is the old 16 bit slot. Only the manufacturer of the DAS card can tell you if their new cards are downward compatible with the old cards.
If we consider the Soundblaster audio card the change from isa 16 bit to PCI slots made no difference to the user, so maybe/hopefully its the same for the DAS card.
I presume the output is a Rs323/485/etc serial port+interface to your machine. If this is the case then the Qbasic program should still run on the new card.
Try what I did in the search bar - type - Computer DAS cards. A large number of suppliers etc were listed. One of them may be close to you and could possibly furnish you with the required information. I, have here in South Africa, found some suppliers to be extremely helpful and they will even run your program to see if it will work on an upgraded PC/card, of course others are take it or leave it types with totally unqualified salesmen/technicians. This is unfortunately a worldwide attitude/syndrome.