I don't recall Motorola or GE ever supplying SW on 8" floppies.
Somewhere around I have some 12" (I think) floppies - maybe larger.
I recall Motorola having 5/25", then 3", then CDs.

Ahhh yes. The BC101. That was the 5th generation.
Many people don't realize that 101 was binary for V (5).

Bearcat, Bearcat II, BC-III, BC-IV, BC-101. (The Electra days)

I believe I still have at least one of each of the above.

Then they jumped from 5 to 210 then started appending letters. :-\

My favorite of the era? BC300. The BC100 (no letters) was a close second
- a portable scanner that needed no crystals! And 16 channels? WOW! (or
was it 10 channels?)

Joe M.

On 4/18/2020 2:27 PM, clive frazier via groups.io wrote:
> Joe:
>
> Software use to come on 8 inch floppies. The computer booted up using
> paper tape read through the teletype machine.
>
> Having a 10 MEG hard drive was a luxury. People questioned the need for
> such a large hard drive. It fit in a 19 inch rack. You would NEVER need
> that much storage space.
>
> And DOS was the operating system.
>
> And the first Bearcat scanners that had push-buttons to program in the
> frequency were a great step ahead of crystal controlled scanners.
>
> Clive, K9FWF
>
>
>
> On Friday, April 17, 2020, 01:16:12 PM CDT, Joe M. <mch@...> wrote:
>
>
> One thing Jim didn't mention is the learning curve. A brief anecdote:
>
> Back in the 80s, I learned radio programming on GE software (anyone
> remember them?). Then when GE's delivery times got ridiculous (more than
> a whole year from order to delivery - REALLY!) I had to learn Motorola
> software. You would think programming one brand vs another would be
> simple. NOT SO! It was almost like learning from scratch again.
> Software came on 5.25" floppy disks back then. (anyone remember those?)
>
> A few key concepts for Motorola:
> A "mode" is what most call a "channel".
> A "codeplug" is what most call a "file" or "programming".
> CG (Channel Guard) became PL (Private Line). (both are just CTCSS)
>
> I won't even get into "templates". I'm sure Jim knows those too well.
>
> So I can appreciate the fact that even Jim knows Motorola (assuming)
> software, Sentinel is a completely different animal.
>
> This is also true with scanner software from different authors. That is
> why I have such little input on scanner SW recommendations and "which is
> best". The "best" is what you know for the most part. That's not to say
> it is the best overall, but it is the best *for you*.
>
> Joe M.
>
> On 4/17/2020 1:58 PM, Jim Walls wrote:
>  > On 04/17/2020 10:38, Bernie Burawski wrote:
>  >> You are right that the scanners are getting more difficult to program,
>  >> but you then have to study the directions carefully; I just don't like
>  >> to have to read a long narrative and study the procedures until I feel
>  >> comfortable programming. Scanning is getting more and more complicated
>  >> and that won't change,.
>  >
>  > That is a true statement.  Scanners are more complicated because the
>  > radio systems are more complicated.  If you think that programming your
>  > scanner is hard, try real radios.  I run a regional trunked system for a
>  > living, and writing codeplugs for various radios is a major part of my
>  > job.  The only advantage that we have is that we have KNOWN CORRECT
>  > information - as opposed to what scanner users often have, which is only
>  > partially right (or in many cases, flat out wrong) information on
>  > frequencies, talkgroups, etc.  When I bought my SDS100, I programmed the
>  > system I run into it first from what RadioReference had, but then spent
>  > hours fixing it.  For me that was largely academic since I have multiple
>  > radios on the system, but it helped me learn the Sentinal software and
>  > the scanner.
>  >
>
>
>
>
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