phco@ecsvax.uncecs.edu (John Miller) (08/17/88)
I'm looking for a good low-end 386 box in the $3000-4000 range.
If you have had any experience with the following companies, please
tell me about their responsiveness to problems and about the quality
of their products: Northgate, Proteus, CompuAdd, PC Designs, Zeos,
Altec, Gateway 2000, ???
If you have any good suggestions, please let me know. I'll summarize
if there's enough response to my query.
Thanks for your help.
--
John Miller (ecsvax!phco)
Dept. of Pharmacology, Univ. of N.C.-Chapel Hill
Chapel Hill, NC 27514 (919) 966-4343dts@cloud9.UUCP (Daniel Senie) (08/20/88)
Another 386 to add to your list is the Zenith 386. The price looks outrageous until you see the Heathkit version. Go to your nearest Heath store. One of the nice things about the machine is that EVERY chip is in a socket. Heath is quite happy to give you a new chip to install if one fries. They have good diagnostics which will narrow problems down to the chip level. Building the kit takes 3 hours and does NOT involve soldering. If you can follow instructions, it is easy. The price is listed as $3349, but ask for a Heath Users Group discount (join on the spot), and it will cost $3014. The price includes machine, 1.2MB floppy, 1MB memory, Floppy / HD controller and the Z-449 video card (EGA with VGA analog and normal TTL outputs). I have one of these which I built in December. Heath has been really good about fixing problems. They gave me a replacement ROM BIOS to fix a small problem with old versions of Windows, for example, and let me put it in. (If you are timid about tampering, they'll work on it in the store). -- Daniel Senie UUCP: ihnp4!cloud9!dts Stratus Computer, Inc. ARPA: anvil!cloud9!dts@harvard.harvard.edu 55 Fairbanks Blvd. CSRV: 74176,1347 Marlboro, MA 01752 TEL.: 617 - 460 - 2686
slin@cory.Berkeley.EDU (Steven Philip Lin) (08/29/88)
In article <5607@ecsvax.uncecs.edu> phco@ecsvax.uncecs.edu (John Miller) writes: > >I'm looking for a good low-end 386 box in the $3000-4000 range. > >If you have any good suggestions, please let me know. >-- > John Miller (ecsvax!phco) Micronics Computers, Inc. makes a good 386 motherboard. They sell both AT and Baby-AT (fits in XT case) sized motherboards. They're fairly reputable and provide good technical support. I believe they were fifth in sales of all 386 manufacturers in 1987 (Compaq was first, IBM was second, Zenith was third, and some other company was fourth), ahead of big businesses like ALR, Tandy, and Wyse. Call them for a list of distributors, 800-234-4386. They are based in Sunnyvale. Disclaimer: I worked at Micronics this summer, so this isn't an entirely unbiased view. However, I did buy their computer and have had no problems with it.
bill@carpet.WLK.COM (Bill Kennedy) (08/30/88)
>In article <5607@ecsvax.uncecs.edu> phco@ecsvax.uncecs.edu (John Miller) writes: >>I'm looking for a good low-end 386 box in the $3000-4000 range. >>If you have any good suggestions, please let me know. >> John Miller (ecsvax!phco) In article <5289@pasteur.Berkeley.EDU> slin@cory.Berkeley.EDU.UUCP (Steven Philip Lin) writes: > >Micronics Computers, Inc. makes a good 386 motherboard. They sell both AT >and Baby-AT (fits in XT case) sized motherboards. They're fairly reputable >and provide good technical support. [ sales standing ] > >Call them for a list of distributors, 800-234-4386. They are based in >Sunnyvale. I got a quote today from one of their dealers. A 16MHz 4Mb/80Mb system, complete, monochrome, for $4295. That sounds high, but $1740 of that was to go from 1Mb to 4Mb RAM. Add $800 for VGA & Multisync and subtract $115 to take out the monochrome. > >Disclaimer: I worked at Micronics this summer, so this isn't an entirely > unbiased view. However, I did buy their computer and have had > no problems with it. I have three Micronics systems and the only trouble I have had with them ceased after I stopped trying to use Microport V/386. They really hum with DOS or a decent UNIX. The place I got the quote was Storage System Engineering Service 3350 Scott Blvd Building 19, Ste 1902 Santa Clara, CA 95054 (408) 727-6040, FAX (408) 727-6042 My view of Micronics is unbiased but I am a satisfied customer of Storage Systems Engineering Service. --- Bill Kennedy Internet: bill@ssbn.WLK.COM Usenet: { killer | att | rutgers | uunet!bigtex }!ssbn!bill -- Bill Kennedy Internet: bill@ssbn.WLK.COM Usenet: { killer | att | rutgers | uunet!bigtex }!ssbn!bill
seeger@beach.cis.ufl.edu (Charles Seeger) (08/30/88)
In article <148@carpet.WLK.COM> bill@ssbn.WLK.COM (Bill Kennedy) writes: >>In article <5607@ecsvax.uncecs.edu> phco@ecsvax.uncecs.edu (John Miller) writes: >>>I'm looking for a good low-end 386 box in the $3000-4000 range. >>>If you have any good suggestions, please let me know. >>> John Miller (ecsvax!phco) > >In article <5289@pasteur.Berkeley.EDU> slin@cory.Berkeley.EDU.UUCP (Steven Philip Lin) writes: >>Micronics Computers, Inc. makes a good 386 motherboard. They sell both AT >>and Baby-AT (fits in XT case) sized motherboards. They're fairly reputable >>and provide good technical support. [ sales standing ] Our department has just set up a PC Lab for undergraduates with 16 386 PCs. (with the processors donated from Intel - thanks!). All have Micronics motherboards. I'm not involved with setting them up, but I do know that the DMA channels failed all but the slowest speed test in Fastback. I personally wouldn't be happy with this, but perhaps we got especially cheap versions. CHECK on this before you buy. At home, I personally have a 386 motherboard from Join Data Technology. They are a Taiwan outfit. You can find there address in Computer Shopper. This board passes all the DMA tests, has a 387 socket (mine is used), uses interleaved page mode dRAMs, is XT form factor, and uses the Chips & Technology chipset. I recommend a board based on this chipset - when relocating the BIOS to RAM, it does it before the memory check (and is very fast) while the Micronics seems to do this after the memory check. So far the board works, but I've only used DOS 3.3 so far. BTW, it runs at 20/16 MHz (without a hitch) but uses a 16 MHz spec 386. That choice is up to you (i.e. whether to pay for the 20 MHz spec 386). Whatever you do, be sure to get a fast, 1:1 interleave disk controller. I have a Western Digital 1006 RAH and am happy with it. However, WD stands for "Without Documentation," so you'll have to call WD to get it. My disk is the Seagate 277R, which is OK if you're really pinching pennies. Chuck
Sorceress@cup.portal.com (08/31/88)
$1740 for 3mb of ram sounds awfully high, even at the current inflated prices. Just from the price, I would guess that you are refering to 256K DRAMs. You might want to consider using 1 MBIT DRAMs, they are a LOT cheaper.
slin@cory.Berkeley.EDU (Steven Philip Lin) (09/01/88)
In article <8612@cup.portal.com> Sorceress@cup.portal.com writes: >$1740 for 3mb of ram sounds awfully high, even at the current inflated prices. >Just from the price, I would guess that you are refering to 256K DRAMs. You >might want to consider using 1 MBIT DRAMs, they are a LOT cheaper. $1740 for 3mb of ram comes out to $16.11 per chip. While that is somewhat high, I believe the $1740 cost also includes the cost of the memory board that comes along with it (a piggy-back board for the main memory board). Furthermore, these are not just 256K DRAMs, these are 256K static column DRAMs. They are slightly faster in either row or column address acess (I can't remember which). I must disagree with the comment that 1 MBIT DRAM are cheaper. The last I heard was that they were still at least twice as much as 256K paged modem (mode, I meant). I could be wrong though. Does anyone know?
Sorceress@cup.portal.com (09/03/88)
The last 1 Mbit Static Column DRAMs which I purchased (1 month ago) cost me $34.50 each. This is just over half the cost of the same amount of storage built using 256K DRAMs.