From: alex@laos (Alex D. Nghiem)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.next.advocacy
Subject: NeXT vs 486 sales
Keywords: lab, students, 486, sales, NeXT
Date: 21 Jul 92 22:17:06 GMT
Reply-To: alex@pencom.com
Organization: Pencom Software

> Path:  
pensoft!uudell!news.dell.com!swrinde!zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu!cs.utexas.edu!to 
rn!newshub.ccs.yorku.ca!nuntius
> From: DJLYNCH@VM2.YorkU.Ca (Donal Lynch)
> Newsgroups: comp.sys.next.advocacy
> Subject: NeXT vs 386 in ed. lab?
> Message-ID: <1992Jul20.163208.22231@newshub.ccs.yorku.ca>
> Date: 20 Jul 92 16:32:08 GMT
> Sender: news@newshub.ccs.yorku.ca (USENET News System)
> Organization: Calumet College, York University
> Lines: 50
> X-Useragent: Nuntius v1.1b2
> 
> I'm in the position of having to make a recommendation on machines to
> purchase for a simple course support lab to be up and running by
> September.
> 
> While I know what I would like to buy, I would like to get the opinions
> of people who may be running a similar lab.
> 
> The lab is supposed to support between 120 and 130 first year students
> that are taking first year college/faculty of arts courses.  The students
> will be using the machines to do word processing, spreadsheets, and maybe
> some database stuff. We would like the students to use email to submit
> their work to their instructors.
> 
> We have about $40,000 (Canadian) to spend on the lab. The furniture and
> network cabling/concentrators are in. We use ethernet 10-Base-T, and will
> be running Novell for our PCs and Macs.
> 
> NeXT info:  The current campus price for the NeXT station 8mb/250mb HD,
> mono monitor is around $4500 (cdn), including a 10-Base-T e-net card.  I
> haven't got a price on the NeXT station that will act as a server, but I
> figure somewhere around $8000.  This means that I can set up about 7
> workstations with the necessary software, (I'm including the
> word/spread/database software in the price).
> 
> PC info:  If the choice is PCs I would go with Dell 333P (386-33) with
> 8mb/80 mb HD, 14" SVGA colour monitor for about $3300 with
> word/spread/database software, OS/2 and e-net card.  Since we already
> have a 486 to act as a server for the Novell, I don't have to purchase a
> server.  As for email, we can use some sort of shareware POP client
> running off a campus/college POP server.  This means that I can get about
> 12 machines for the money.
> 
> Next year we should have approx. another $40,000 to spend, but the number
> of students will probably rise to approx. 220.
> 
> I use students to run and maintain the labs.  While they all have strong
> PC/Mac backgrounds none of them have any NeXT experience, and only one of
> them has ever used unix.  I'm in the same boat as the students.  I have
> unix experience as a user, and administer a Mac running A/UX (which
> really doesn't count), but that is it unix-wise.
> 
> This is the NeXT advocacy list.  Advocate! Tell me why I should go with
> NeXT (or why not)!
> 
> Any help greatly appreciated.
> 
> 	Donal
> -----------------------------------------------------------------------
> Donal Lynch, Project Coordinator			djlynch@vm2.YorkU.Ca
> Calumet College, York University			(416) 736-5098

Donal:

You should go with the NeXT, since the students have Mac experience already --  
there are more similarities than differences between a NeXT and a Mac.  The  
NeXTs offers a host of features, including:

* cost -- dollar for dollar, you cannot find a better machine for improved  
productivity (see below for more details)
* easy setup -- it takes about 10 minutes to unpack a machine and get it up and  
running
* LOTS of bundled software and lots of free software
* great mail program -- this is one of the most overlooked advantage of a NeXT  
machine: the ease of the mail program is simply indispensable in a corporation.   
We use it to send ad layouts, spreadsheets, source code, etc. by simply drag  
and drop: no more uuencode, tar and compress!
* built-in networking and good system administration tools

Additionally, these are the things which you can find for the various uses:

* word processing -- WordPerfect can share files with the PC and Mac versions  
(the NeXT can read DOS and Mac disk without problems)
* desktop publishing -- Frame is in its third release and RightBrain has just  
released PasteUp, which promises to outdo Quark Express
* graphics design -- there are many drawing packages, including Draw, Adobe  
Illustrator (the best implementation on any platform), Create, etc
* spreadsheet -- NeXT has Improv, which is superior to 1-2-3 and can read 1-2-3  
files
* DOS emulation -- SoftPC allows you to run virtually any PC program at the  
speed of an AT.  With the 3.0 enhancements, it should be even faster
* Mac emulation -- Executor allows you to currently run the major Mac packages,  
such as Excel and Word.  By the end of the year, Abacus expects to release a  
product that allows you to run any Mac software
* scientific work -- Mathematica exists and there are some more math packages  
being ported
* documentation preparation -- the Digital Librarian (bundled) is useful for  
indexing large documents, and there are software packages which can optical  
character recognition (OCR)

NeXTSTEP 3.0 offers Novell and Appletalk compatability, which is useful if the  
company decides to purchase PC's and Macs in the future.  There are some more  
advantages (such as a great development environment) but that doesn't apply  
here, since the students don't seem to be programmers.


Best regards,


Alex Duong Nghiem          Phone: (512) 343-1111
Pencom Software            Fax:   (512) 343-9650    
9050 Capital of TX Hwy N.  Mail:  alex@pencom.com
Suite 300                  Mail:  co-Xist_support@pencom.com
Austin, TX 78759           Mail:  co-Xist_info@pencom.com
USA
                           ****************************
                           * NeXTMail gladly accepted *
                           ****************************
Newsgroups: comp.sys.next.advocacy