From: siegel@world.std.com (Rich Siegel)
Subject: Re: Apple A/UX FAQ List (1/2)
Keywords: FAQ A/UX
Organization: GCC Technologies
Date: Tue, 29 Sep 1992 14:22:21 GMT

In article <1143@jagubox.gsfc.nasa.gov> you write:

> o       Daystar Digital.
>         Daystar used to be at the forefront of the accelerator market.
>         With their Accelerator and PowerCard line, you were able to
>         bump you Mac to IIfx levels. And Daystar provided A/UX drivers
>         for these cards. In fact, the 50MHz versions required a A/UX hardware
>         modification (for reliable floppy disk access) that was provided
>         free and upon request. Now it appears that they are no longer
>         providing drivers for these older cards for A/UX 3.0 although
>         they do have 2.0 drivers. Instead, they suggest upgrading to
>         their PowerCache cards, which they do have drivers for. It seems
>         hard to believe that the kernel has changed _that_ much between
>         2.0 and 3.0 that Daystar couldn't make the minimal changes required.
>         This has all the smell of a quick way of making a few more bucks.
>         What a shame!

This is not a fair conclusion, and you do DayStar a grave disservice.

They're in a particularly cutthroat segment of the Mac hardware market
(disk drives being pretty much the only thing worse). To stay alive, 
it's necessary that they focus on advancing the state of the art and
providing faster accelerators at lower costs - after all, people want
something for nothing. They've been very successful at this: the original
PowerCard 030 cost $7,000 for the 50 MHz version, and the latest universal
PowerCache 030 costs less than $1500 for the 50MHz version, and due to
their work it is about 15 to 20 percent faster than the old PowerCard,
and considerably more compatible.

Their "failure" to not provide A/UX 3.0 drivers for the old PowerCard
isn't indicative of a insidious plot to screw customers or make extra
bucks - in fact, you'll find that their upgrade policy is pretty 
reasonable. (You apparently didn't bother to find out what the
upgrade policy *was*, or if you did, you didn't post it.) The reason
they're not providing an update is simple: the number of people who
1) were using DayStar PowerCards with A/UX 2.0, and 2) upgraded to
A/UX 3.0, is so small that they cannot afford the engineering time
required to do the work required, -particularly- if a hardware
revision to the board is needed.

>hard to believe that the kernel has changed _that_ much between
>2.0 and 3.0 that Daystar couldn't make the minimal changes required

What grounds do you have for making this statement? Do you have the
source to the A/UX kernels involved? Do you have the source to DayStar's
drivers? Do you have their PAL equations and PROM code for their board?

I'm not associated with DayStar except as a satisfied customer - I paid
$4K for a PowerCard 030 way back when, and I paid $2K for a PowerCache
030 for my IIci, and yet more for a SCSI PowerCard and FastCache 040.
They don't may me to be a happy customer, and I don't get commission
when they sell accelerator boards.

By impugning their reputation in this fashion, you give people an
incorrectly negative preconception of an excellent company, one
that is -still- at the forefront of the accelerator market.

R.
-- 
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
Rich Siegel                              Internet: siegel@world.std.com
Software Engineer & Toolsmith
GCC Technologies

It's not just a job, it's an adventure.








-- 
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
Rich Siegel                              Internet: siegel@world.std.com
Software Engineer & Toolsmith
GCC Technologies
Newsgroups: comp.unix.shell,comp.sys.hp