WAGREICH@G.BBN.COM (09/29/86)
A friend who wants to spend up to $2K on a PC with a printer that meets the following criteria (priorities): 1. It is small (in the sense that it does not take up much space in a small apartment) and is preferrably portable (in the sense that it can be put on a desk and moved). 2. It is small (in the sense that it won't take up much space) and preferrably portable. This person is not a technical type and the primary interest is in a good word processing system (that has good documentation and can be easily learned from reading the manual). This friend may want to extend the use of the PC later on for other purposes (record keeping and billing) but that is not the initial intent. A Mac 2 has been recommended to this friend. My personal preference is an IBM compatible or clone because of the wider range of software available and the longer life span. The cost is an important factor (a limit of $2K). I would appreciate any and all recomendations you can make. Please include model numbers and approximate costs. Thank you very much in advance for all the help.
asf@sbcs.UUCP (Alan S. Fink) (09/29/86)
> A friend who wants to spend up to $2K on a PC with a printer that > meets the following criteria (priorities): Change the above to "I want to spend up to 3.5K..." with the criteria that: 1) high resolution (monochrome) available 2) fast, "fashionable" cpu (68K series, 80x86) 3) Has a large (or developing) software base - especially interested in communications, accounting/billing, and languages (C, Pascal, Modula-2) 4) Is built by a company that's not likely to go out of business tomorrow. i.e. provides good support. Note: Mail order house machines are fine, just let me know who's reliable and who to avoid. Thanks in advance. Alan S. Fink UUCP: {allegra, hocsd, philabs, ogcvax}!sbcs!asf ARPA: asf%sunysb.csnet@csnet-relay.ARPA CSNET: asf@sunysb.edu
SJDMK%UNO.BITNET@WISCVM.WISC.EDU (09/30/86)
I would recommend one of the Apple // line. The Apple //c in particular.
The Apple //c's price has just been lowered by Apple Computers. You can
probably get it on sale for about $700.00. This includes a built in disk
drive and a monochrome monitor. It also has 128k.
You can get an Imagewriter // printer for about $600.00. It is very fast
and I'm very impressed with it's letter quality mode. With all the
software written for Apple and the compatability of all the different
Apple //s, your friend should have no problem using his computer for
different purposes later on.
It would cost a bit more but an Apple //gs would also be real good.
It has great graphics and sound capabilities along with alot of ways
to expand the memory. It also has expansion slots (something the //c
lacks). A //gs, 3.5" disk drive, and a color monitor is going to run
aroung $2,000.00. Add the printer and you will wind up with about
$2,500.00 but well worth it.
Both systems take up little space and both are extremely easy to use.
Steve
SJDMK@UNO.BITNET