Newsgroups: comp.sys.mac.advocacy
Subject: Re: Why Macs are better (and the others aren't) (long)
From: feijai@endor.byu.edu (Sean Luke)
Date: 3 Oct 92 13:55:24 -0700
Reply-To: sean@digaudio.byu.edu

In article <1992Oct2.182038.4669@times.aux.apple.com>  writes:
>feijai@endor.byu.edu (Sean Luke) writes:
>>WHAT?  NeXTs all come with NeXTSTEP free.  And a keyboard.
>
>Not if you buy that at my (former) university's computer store, they
>don't.


John, I don't know who you talked about at your university's computer  
store, but they clearly didn't know what they were talking about.  Just so  
everybody at c.s.m.a knows, All NeXTS come with NeXTSTEP for free.   
PERIOD.

What the bookstore said is something like saying that when you buy a new  
Mac, you have to get the Mac ROMs seperately.  It's BALONEY.  Please don't  
continue to spread it.





>Even if we are, of course, that _still_
>means that I'm happily running 12 _MacOS_ apps at the same time
>without any preemptive multitasking. So much for the original claim
>that you need a NeXT to run stacks of applications.

I assume you're attacking the need to have a preemptive multitasking  
system, not attacking the need for a NeXT here.  I don't know what kind of  
monster machine you're running, but it's hardly ordinary.  You might do  
well to look around you out there at Apple.  Whatever Taligent is cooking  
up will be, at its very base, a preemptive multitasking object-oriented  
operating system.  From trade rags, it sounds like Apple intends to use  
the PowerPC, running Taligent, to eventually displace Macs in the long  
run.  Apparently there are those at Apple who disagree with you.




>> I just want to see how fast Apple's new QuickDraw will be.
>
>As do I -- QD GX looks pretty nice, and I hope it's fast. But, at
>least for me, DPS offers very little additional power for a
>tremendous speed penalty. I don't do much DTP, and what I've done
>(ACM newsletters, self-published business cards, my Masters thesis)
>is easily done on the Mac with very few problems with display
>inaccuracies or the like.

Use what you need.  There are few who need the power of higher-end  
machines.  But as applications become more sophisticated, more people will  
have a use for power.  The argument you make against NeXT is the same  
argument PC users make against the Mac:  "It's cute, but who needs all  
that?"  People in c.s.m.a dismiss this argument, when PC users come on, as  
ignorance.  With all due respect, NeXT do this as well.

Do you use NeXTs?  It really does sound like you've had limited experience  
with them.  You say DPS has a "tremendous speed penalty".  This sounds  
like you've only seen old '030s or machines without much memory.  You  
imply that NeXT's terminal windows don't scroll quickly, but I'm scrolling  
big stuff on a terminal here on a NeXT, and I can't figure out why you  
would say such a thing.  You don't know what the Processes panel looks  
like on the NeXT--something like not knowing where the Chooser is on the  
Mac.  I would use a NeXT more before making such abrupt statements about  
them.  A lot of what you're saying about them is, frankly, misleading.

--

Sean Luke
Brigham Young University		Nepotism:  It's a relative thing.
sean@digaudio.byu.edu  
NeXTmail and nifty Mac stuff welcome