Charging for ML64

[Bieb]

I've heard that in the past Microsoft charged for MASM.  If, indeed, they put in the extra effort to go and rewrite all the HLL constructs for 64 bit, might they go back to this tradition?  How much did MASM used to cost?

[pbrennick]

Bieb,
I remember paying $95.00 for MASM5.1 back in 1990 or '91, can't remember which.

Paul

[Vortex]

It looks like that they will charge also for the next release, the 64-bit version.

[Xor Stance]

Hi, why wouldn't Microsoft will let the license for ML at EULA but FREE download. I don't think ML is available for purchase, I can search and download it whatever ver  :green But I want MS to give ml to hutch.

[hutch--]

Like Paul, I paid for all of my versions of MASM while it was a commercial product. I keep the last box parked on the top of my monitor as a momento. Still have all of the original disks and I have a working installation of the 1990-1 MASM 6.0 archived as it was a very nice DOS version to use and ran without hassles in ordinary DOS without expanded memory and other irritations.

In win32 I mainly use 6.14 because it is super reliable and there is no mad rush to get a later version as 6.14 has the capacity to use macros for the SSE2 instructions. Anyone who desperately needs them can grab a later version as they are easy enough to get legally. If Microsoft allow a later version to be distributed at some stage, it will make a few things easier to do but its no big deal.

[Kestrel]

I remember paying $95.00 for MASM5.1 back in 1990 or '91, can't remember which.

a long time ago...

Although I already copied MASM6, but I still paid NT$2200 (US$1 = NT$32) buy Student version, only for  "Manuals" by original manufacturer.

Today, Microsoft open it, free charge for every programmer, the "MASM6 Manuals" in many web .

[nasm64developer]

> I have a working installation of the 1990-1 MASM 6.0

That I can easily top.  :-)

.\v100
 52,736 ASM.EXE
 13,824 CREF.EXE
 67,584 MASM.EXE
.\v100\ASM
 6,579 EXMP1M.ASM
 5,620 EXMP1S.ASM
 2,014 EXMP2M.ASM
 1,860 EXMP2S.ASM
.\v100\BAT
   136 $$EDASM.BAT
   139 $$EDMASM.BAT
   621 $ASML.BAT
   613 $EDASM.BAT
   613 $EDMASM.BAT
    22 $LINK.ARF
   614 $MASML.BAT

.\v300
77,362 masm.exe

.\v400
85,566 masm.exe

.\v510
110,703 masm.exe

.\v510a
124,448 masm.exe

Plus the whole 6.00...8.00 lineage, of course.

And yes, I do have the original install disks for v1.00.

[hutch--]

 :bg

n64,

You appear to have been round for a very long time. I consider I was blessed by having missed the old versions even though I used to write DOS com files that looked like assembler dumps. The help files for 6.00 had a lot of backwards compatible 5.1 stuff in it which I never bothered to learn as 6.00 was a very well behaved version for DOS files.

[GregL]

I also bought MASM 5.1 around 1990. I bought a couple of books and I learned 16-bit assembly language with it. The MASM source code published in PC Magazine at that time was also very helpful in learning assembly language. I also programmed in QuickBASIC and C at that time but I liked MASM the best. When 32-bit Windows came along I had read that MASM could be used with it, but I thought that it was extremely difficult to do so. I think that's what Microsoft wanted us to think. There was next to no information about using MASM with 32-bit Windows when Windows 95 came out. I remember one book about it, but it was so lousy, I was not able to grasp the concept of programming 32-bit Windows in MASM from it. In the mean time I programmed in Visual BASIC, PowerBASIC and C. At work I was pretty much forced into using VB, but C and PowerBASIC were more my style so I used them for my own programs. I learned C++ but I didn't like it, I just don't care for OOP much. I didn't do anything with MASM until a couple of years ago when I found a link to MASM32 in the PowerBASIC Forum and I took a look at it. After looking at some of Iczelion's tutorials, I was really surprised that it was not that difficult, and that having learned Win32 programming in C and in PowerBASIC, it was actually pretty easy to write Win32 programs in MASM.

If Microsoft developed MASM into a stand-alone product again, I would buy it, if it had significant improvements over what is available now.

[Farabi]

I guess it all common. Charge for a software. Imagine if a good programmer did not have pay for his good work, there would be no one creating something.

I think RadAsm or any other IDE with MASM is a perfect pair for student. If I have money I will ask the author to permit me to sell the offline edition.