crm@duke.UUCP (Charlie Martin) (12/03/84)
My wife and I are about to buy a micro; we've decided on either a Morrow
(CP/M) machine or a Sanyo PClone...
We like the Morrow for the terminal and keyboard, we like the Sanyo for
the IBM-ness and the price. What can people tell me about CP/M in the
world today (like, I looked through Byte and didn't see much mention of
it -- can software still be found for it?).
The particular things we need to do are:
- terminal stuff for BOTH unix and VM/CMS; ideally we would like to
have a 327x emulator and a vt100, but could manage with only
vt100.
- word processing. I'm writing SF and a dissertation coming up,
along with occasional tech writing etc. What experiences can
people tell me about either Morrow or IBM in this (especially in
non-WordStar?)
IN addition, we're concerned about service, especially since we have not
seen much advertizing about the Sanyo yet. Can anyone tell us about
Sanyo's support?
Thank a lot, in advance as the saying goes. Please mail responses to:
Charlie Martin
( {decvax, ihnp4, several others}!mcnc!duke!crm
or { ditto }!mcnc!rti-sel!crm )
--
What is the sound of one hand, clapping?
Toop, toop, toop.
Charlie Martin
(...mcnc!duke!crm)Alastair Milne <milne@uci-icse> (12/29/84)
> Well, about DOS, UNIX, and the p-system thats something to ponder on. > You see, I find Unix to be extremely overrated and I have been told the > p-system is not something one might be whishing for (is it a menu based > system?). DOS is not that great either but version 2.0 has nice features: > IO redirection and a hierarchical (sp?) file system - I find this to be > fully required with hard disks. I guess two people can see the same thing > and come up with very different opinions. Also IBM-PCs can run Unix and > the p-system, if you want to. Much as I like 4.2 BSD UNIX (and I like it very much), the kind of UNIX I would expect to find on something the size of a PC would be too spartan and skeletal for much interest. A powerful part of UNIX's appeal is the number of useful programs it has (another part, of course, is how the shell itself permits the programs to be related to each other). Is the p-System menu-based?? By comparison, nothing else is. A touch of a key gets you into the file handler, or the editor, or compiles (or executes) your current work file (you don't have to remember its name: the system will do that for you, and save it under that name when you're finished). But more importantly, it has memory management that permits it to run programs far bigger than the machine's capacity (eg the operating system itself). It also supports separately compiled modules very like Ada's packages, any of which can be shared by any number of programs (or other such modules); in fact, the operating system itself is constructed of these modules. Because of its organisation, the very small size of its code files, various concepts it embodies, and many other things which would turn this message into a reference manual, I still prefer the p-System over anything except full UNIX. (and xx-DOS, CP/M, and others of the same kind just don't compare). > About the Phoenix BIOS ROMs, well they are supposed to be 100% compatible > with IBM's ROMs. Phoenix sells them also as being immune from lawsuits > concerning copyright infringements so that IBM-PC clone makers don't have > to worry about lawsuits from IBM. The funny thing is that Phoenix has a > five million dollar insurance in case IBM sues. When you think about it > their allegations are probably true. In my opnion it was a smart move from > Tandy to use them. Thank you. I suspect that, if I were Phoenix, I'd have that insurance too. In the world of corporate nastiness, one never quite knows where the next blow will come from. -Alastair PS. Jose, I'm sorry not to reply to you personally, but every attempt I've made has resulted in Failed Mail messages. I seem to have no luck in getting anything out to other people on the net. Only sending to the bboards seems to work. So I'm afraid you'll just have to get this from the net. Alastair