regnery@wpi.wpi.edu (George Regnery) (05/01/89)
OK, time for my $.02 on Tandy products. I have a CoCo 2B, Multipak, RS232 interface, Speech pak, RS disk drive controller and a custom made power supply and case for 2 full height disk drives I bought used, and Symphony 12 music synthesizer. I have a UNIQ4 1200 baud hayes compatible modem, and a DMP-130 printer. I do like Tandy products, and I feel that in some senses they are superior. I used to have a 300 baud modem Ib. I bought it 5 years ago for $100- about the going rate for 300 baud modems then. However, the IB did have an extremely strong carrier detect- over long distance lines it could pick up extremely weak carriers my friends modem's couldn't pick up. I used to have a CGP-115 graphics printer. Here was a printer I got for $119- all I needed to do was print program listings out so I could proofread them for errors, etc. The program also did have nice color printing- I got a screen dump program for it on the CoCo. Although the small paper wasn't ideal, on a high school student's budget who got money from mowing lawns, it served my needs. After I got a full time job, I got a DMP-130A. That is a nice printer- the NLQ mode is excellent, and I still use it today in college, with my CoCo for term papers. Why will I not get an MS-DOS machine? Well, for a couple of reasons. One is the cost. A base machine costs $500 minimum, then you have to get a monitor. Usually the low end machines come with only CGA, which isn't worth anything really, so you have to buy an EGA upgrade. Then to run mathematics programs, you have to purchase a math coprocessor. For a lot of machines, to use an external modem, you have to get some kind of interface board. Another reason (oh God, here come the flames. Well, I get out of school May 5 anyway) is that I can not stand MS-DOS. I like UNIX and OS-9 infinitely better. I like the logic behind UNIX (pipes, filters, etc. Also, speed). UNIX may be hard to learn, and MS-DOS may be more user friendly. However, in my book, userfriednliness times versatility equals a constant. A CoCo III may not be a superior computer- certainly the software support isn't extensive, but OS-9 beats MS-DOS (if you know what you are doing. Certainly OS-9 is not an ideal operating system for someone who has never used a computer before, they'd be lost in an instant). However, if you buy the disk drive system from Tandy, and The CoCo iii, you can hook it up to a TV (although you really need a monitor). You don't need to get a coprocessor, better graphics board, in some cases a joystick card, or a RS232 card- altohugh the CoCo "bit banger" isn't great). The graphics are built in. You may need a multipak later, although it is only necessary for MIDI, speech pak, Orch-90, etc. On my very limited budget, an MS-DOS machine certainly doesn't fit my needs. I have had good luck with Tandy so far- nothing has broken. Also, accessories for the CoCo are cheaper when ON SALE. I got a multipak for $70, speech pak for $30, and the RS-232 pak for $20. Also, why did IBM make the sound so awful (well, nonexistent actually) on the PC? Tandy PCs have 3 voices, I noticed, but IBM has only one. My watch makes more interesting sounds than most PCs. The CoCo has 4 voices built in, and for $69 from Speech Systems, you can get 12 voices, in Stereo. MIDI interfaces go for abut $150. Coco sound with no hardware mods is actually fairly good. Accessories for the CoCo are always cheaper, even things that do EXACTLY the same thing on the PC. Things like Tetris, other games and the C compiler are all cheaper for the CoCo. I can have a fairly extensive CoCo system within my small budget. -- George M. Regnery ! Worcester ! "I function as a channel through regnery@wpi.wpi.edu OR ! Polytechnic ! which music emerges from the chaos regnery@wpi.bitnet ! Institute ! of noise." --Vangelis (composer of CompuServe: 73300,3655 ! (Worc, Mass.) ! Albedo 0.39 and Chariots of Fire)