Sub-Etha Software sold a product called InfoPatch. It would take a stock TRS-80 Color Computer Infocom text adventure game and patch it to work on the CoCo 3 using the 80 column screen. As a bonus, it would speed up disk access by setting it to 6ms step rate.
I cannot find any master copies or documentation for this product, but I know we sold it. Here is what I wrote in my 1993 Middle America Fest trip report (from my book CoCoFest Chronicles).
**Sub-Etha Software **— There we were with our normal line of software including MiniBanners, CheckBook+, InfoPatch, N*Johnson Software, Carl England Utilities, and the new OSK products such as Etha-GUI and the new Write-Right “what you see is what you get” word processor which was the big hit for us. (Joel, you did a g…
Sub-Etha Software sold a product called InfoPatch. It would take a stock TRS-80 Color Computer Infocom text adventure game and patch it to work on the CoCo 3 using the 80 column screen. As a bonus, it would speed up disk access by setting it to 6ms step rate.
I cannot find any master copies or documentation for this product, but I know we sold it. Here is what I wrote in my 1993 Middle America Fest trip report (from my book CoCoFest Chronicles).
**Sub-Etha Software **— There we were with our normal line of software including MiniBanners, CheckBook+, InfoPatch, N*Johnson Software, Carl England Utilities, and the new OSK products such as Etha-GUI and the new Write-Right “what you see is what you get” word processor which was the big hit for us. (Joel, you did a great job on this and I think you left many people quite impressed!)
– CoCoFest Chronicles, page 48.
I also mentioned it 1993 2nd Annual “Last” Chicago CoCoFest report:
Oh, just to get a fair plug in…”the same old stuff” includes MiniBanners, CheckBook+, Etha-GUI, and the recent InfoPatch which converts old CoCo 1/2 Infocom text adventures to run in 80 columns on a CoCo 3. We also had Carl England’s disk utilities and some old N*Johnson software. We promise MORE NEW ITEMS for the next Fest!
– CoCoFest Chronicles, page 65.
Here is text from an ad for the product:
InfoPatch by Terry ToddPatch classic Infocom(tm) text games to run on 80 columns,upper/lowercase, 6ms disk on CoCo 3.RS-DOS Req: CoCo 3, Infocom Disk..........$ 9.95
It was still being advertised in 1995. From the Spring 1995 FARNA catalog:
As I go through my Sub-Etha archives, I find this ad copy from 1993 which notes this patch did not work on Seastalker:
NEW! InfoPatch - Clever hack which patches old CoCo 1/2 Infocom text adventures (like The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, Zork, and others) to work in 80 columns, double speed more on a CoCo 3. (Does not work with Seastalker!) See Adventure Survivors newsletter.Req: CoCo 3, Disk Drive, Infocom Game Disk ........................ $ 9.95
And, it appears we launched this product in 1992. From that edition of the “What is Sub-Etha Software” flyer:
A few Sub-Etha ads ran in the Underground and just in time for the ’92 Atlanta CoCoFest Terry would return (but Mark would not be able to attend). **Terry’s new offering was InfoPatch – a program to modify Infocom text adventures to run in 80 columns on a CoCo 3. ** This was also the show that gave life to the “PVC Nightmare” which spawned from the lack of fancy backdrops. Terry and I set out to a late-night hardware store and bought tubing which we hacked up in the parking lot with a newly acquired saw (to make it fit into my Honda) and would later reassemble in the show area and drape a background from it. It was very unstable, but, then again, the same is often said about us. This was our first ‘Fest with a full booth!
– What is Sub-Etha Software flyer, October 1994.
We sold many copies of it. Did you buy one? If so, any chance you could find it and send me a disk image of it? While the source code is likely lost forever, I’d really like to get this item preserved in the Color Computer Archive site.
Thank you for your attention to this matter.