From: linstee@dutecaj.et.tudelft.nl (Erik van Linstee)
Subject: Re: How to make OS/2 look bad ...
Organization: Delft University of Technology, Dept. of Electrical Engineering
Date: Sat, 07 Nov 1992 20:31:22 GMT

rsrodger@wam.umd.edu (Robert Stephen Rodgers) writes:

>In article <1992Nov07.131316.20096@donau.et.tudelft.nl> linstee@dutecaj.et.tudelft.nl (Erik van Linstee) writes:
>>1. Try OS/2 one a 486/33 with 4Mb of memory.


>	Note that this is still significantly more machine than the 
>	recommendation from IBM--they recommend a "minimum" of
>	a 386SX-16 (that being the lowest 386 chip) with 4 megs.

Well, not entirely. Though a 486/33 is indeed more powerful than a
386SX-16. With 4Mb however, the performance is entirely dictated
by the harddrive, since swapping is the major effort to be made.
In fact, a 386SX-16 with 6-8Mb might very well outperform a
486/33 with 4Mb

>	If IBM wanted to get rid of this type of crap, they'd 
>	be smart enough to change the label on the box from four
>	to eight (although even six would be satisfactory)..


Agreed, however, when people test software that needs MSDOS 3.3 or
up and 256k of memory, you never see them try it with 256k.
In that light, it seems very silly to do so with an OS which you
can expect to rely heavily on memory.


>>2. Observe that OS/2 has not removed Windows 3.1 of your disk
>>and than find it odd, because OS/2 has its own windows environment,
>>so you would expect OS/2 to remove everything from your system
>>it doesn't need.


>	Affirm.  This is just plain stupid.  I know that I 
>	sure as hell don't want OS/2 erasing things I have around..


>>3. Mention that everything is very slow, opening a window takes
>>about 5 seconds, but add, this is due to memory problems because
>>of the 4Mb being a minimum and 16Mb would be much better.



>	See above.  This is a legitimate complain against
>	IBM's corporate IQ.  Claiming 4 megs as the minimum
>	for OS/2 is like claiming that the minimum for 
>	Windows 3.0 was an 8088 and CGA.

Nice analogy. Point 3 is even more stupid if you consider the fact
that it is suggested that 4Mb is not enough and 16Mb would be
much better. First it is rather an overkill, increasing memory by
a factor of four will get every memory hogg out of trouble, and
second, this may easily lead people to believe you NEED 16Mb to
make OS/2 go. In fact, saying 4Mb is not enough but 6Mb will be
is a more powerful statement, since it says you *only* need 2
additional Mb to improve performance a lot.




>>6. Expect that since OS/2 provides windows and DOS emulation
>>it also accepts the device drivers of those platforms.



>	A big problem with OS/2 is not only that it is 
>	starved for applications, but also that it is 
>	anemic when it comes to the hardware support it
>	provides next to it's nearest competitor (which 
>	will go unnamed).  All I can say is, my Dismond 
>	SS24x running on an ISA 386SX-20 w/4 megs under
>	that unnamed entity VAMPS my friends same card
>	with a 486DX2(66) with 8 megs running OS/2. 

Of course, but OS/2 still is a relatively new product and
I would think new drivers is only a matter of time, now
OS/2 has proved to be a sensible product (at least to
people who know their business :-)).



-- 
Erik van Linstee   |   Delft University of Technology   |   I'll be back ... 
----
   We are god, 'cause only we can create the idea of his existence
   in our holy brains...  (Yello)
Newsgroups: comp.os.os2.advocacy