From: pss1@kepler.unh.edu (Paul S Secinaro)
Subject: Re: DIR
Organization: University of New Hampshire  -  Durham, NH
Date: Thu, 13 Aug 1992 13:10:28 GMT

In article <vf5ma!-@lynx.unm.edu> kholland@hydra.unm.edu (Kiernan Holland) writes:

>It is not the speed that counts, but what you can do with it. 
>Most PC users like yourself buy a 486-50 then go waste all your 
>CPU time on Wordperfect or a BBS program. Whata waste.
>
>Only PC users are dumb enough to have such a money-wasting hobby
>as a BBS. Tell me what else you can do that is really useful. 
>Oh, you can play wolfenstien 3-D at 4 times the pace. 
>Or you can view GIF's, neat. *NOT*

I think you really need to think carefully about what you've just said
here.  Do you really mean to suggest that A) only dumb people would
run a BBS and B) the only useful things you can do on a PC are games
and GIFs?


>I have an Amiga 3000, which i bought for 2300 dollars. 
>If you add the price of a Progressive Peripherals '040 
>board,  you get $3800. Besides, I would get a 25mhz synchronous
>bus and faster claculations instantly. you would still need a 
>faster bus, faster rams, and a 256K CPU cache.

I'll say it again: for $3800 you can get a 486DX2-50 EISA system with
8MB and a 300 meg SCSI hard disk. (and a 256K cache also).  That
sounds pretty competitive to me.


>PC's look a lot better to other users, but in reality there are a 
>lot of drawbacks of PC's. For one, who can you trust??  How many 
>companies have your bought from that just did not deliver a 
>working computer system? How long did you wait to get your system?
>How much money did you shell-out in addition to the system cost? 

Granted, you have to be careful, but there are a few good vendors who
are still competitively priced (Dell, Gateway, Zeos, etc.)  From what
I've been reading here on *.advocacy, CBM isn't exactly the most
universally respected and trusted company either.

>Even on a 486 Windows is as slow as a turtle.

This is not my experience.

>And did MSDOS 5.0 set the world on fire? Ha ha ha ha, ya right.
>Only silly PC users can get excited about shit. 

Only the silly ones do.  The rest of us yawned at MS-DOS 5.0 also.

>Then you have the part about programming. ALl your compilers 
>are likely to take up 10-40 megs of hard drive space, full-fledged
>if you choose. These same compilers may be badly coded and may need 
>all that storage for the many poorly written functions written 
>to make you programs fast, or slow if you want to be realitic.

Poorly coded compilers?  I suppose you have seen all the source code?

>Do these PD libaries come on compact disc for under 60 bucks?
>How protective are PC PD-programmers? How many really care about your 
>registration?  How many would deliberately 
>imbed a virus in your registered software?
>Can anyone get access to these libraries easily? 

Sorry, but this just sounds like a lot of FUD (Fear, Uncertainty, and
Doubt) to me.

>Then there is graphics boards. Whenever it comes to graphics 
>boards on the PC's, you can really never be sure if your software 
>will work with the board. Usually, you'll upgrade to windows and 
>search all over hell to find a windows driver for your card.

Right.  The only thing you'll have to search all over hell for is a
graphics card manufacturer who DOESN'T include a Windows driver (at
the very least).  I haven't found one yet.

>You might even have to buy the driver extra from the company you got 
>your card from. Then there is the question of resolution. 
>If your monitor is 640x480 and your card is 1024x768, there is no way you 
>can display 1024x768, it is physically impossible.

Oh, and I suppose Amigas can display 1024x768 NI on a 640x480 monitor?
Physically impossible is correct.  And the laws of physics also apply
to other computers.

 On top of that 
>your card must support those resolutions, and must have enough ram to 
>use those modes.                 

Yep.  Them pesky laws of physics again.

There's about a zillion other things here I could reply to, but I
don't have the time.  I'll just say that many of the things you
mention aren't big problems in the real PC world, though they make
good FUD.

Paul

-- 
Niven's Law #14:   There exist minds that think as well as you do, but
                   differently.
Niven's Corollary: The gene-tampered turkey you're talking to isn't
                   necessarily one of them.