cos842x@vaxc.cc.monash.edu.au (10/31/89)
Re: MAC Clones etc... ( a personal comments!) . I have heard a saying somewhere, it goes: "Today computer engineers are born from the DEC PDP11 and/or the APPLE II.." I am one of them. But I still think APPLE stinks!!! The MAC is a very good system, in software term. In hardware term it's horrible, all those wasted and duplicated address space. I think APPLE had destroyed the "computer club" trust and share of system design and development that gave birth to the APPLE II. In another word they were money hungry ( not a bad thing! I admit, but they went far beyond..). I have heard that the real problem with a 100% MAC clone is not so much the hardware or the firmware (i.e ROM).I would say the 256k word ROM can be functionally duplicated. The hardware, in today advanced technology there is no problem. The real problem is the "MAC look and feel" and you guess it! The big and long corporate arm of APPLE had started a suit againts MICROSOFT (ha! ha!). How convenience! APPLE who had work quite closely with MICROSOFT on many products, now turned around and suited their friend . This legal suit is nothing but to set a precedent in court over the issue of "Look and feel". If APPLE wins, they would have succeded in damaging a good part of computer development. I wonder, do you remember the CPM "A>" prompt? Someone can make quite a bundle taking people to court over that, in today's many operating system. The HKK and TAIWANESE should have been credited for their contribution (for better or worst). With the increased availability of cheap compatible system, more tinkering and program writting by many more people, many good programs and ideas are conceived. "Noone is perfect, including APPLE, but they think they are!?" -------------------------------------------------------------------------- Pan. (Not a great fan of APPLE, but I do appreciate their system.)
alex@grian.cps.altadena.ca.us (Alex Pournelle) (11/01/89)
Well, I use a Mac Clone every day. It runs PageMaker, Crystal Quest (including sound effects !?), Sound Manager, Aask, many inits, Suitcase, ATM, just 'bout everything but TOPS and LL-Mac. It's about 1.05 times the speed of an SE, self-boots from the hard-disk, reads/writes Mac disks faster than an SE and has 1Meg. IT'll have 4 megs in a coupla days, and $100 from now it'll run the speed of the Portable. And I have about $1000 invested in it. You could have a 4-meg system with a decent hard drive for under $3K, including that speedup. Ditto the price for a portable Mac compatible, with hard-drive. It says "Atari 520ST" and "Spectre GCR" on it, but I love it. Alex Pournelle "Dave Small isn't Ghod, but he's apprenticing..."
d88-jwa@nada.kth.se (Jon Watte) (11/03/89)
In article <1989Nov1.023933.27253@grian.cps.altadena.ca.us> alex@grian.cps.altadena.ca.us (Alex Pournelle) writes: >Well, I use a Mac Clone every day. It runs PageMaker, Crystal Quest >(including sound effects !?), >Sound Manager, Aask, many inits, Suitcase, ATM, just 'bout everything So, are you telling me that they've gotten around to playing sampled sound now, or is there just the tone-sythesizer ? >It says "Atari 520ST" and "Spectre GCR" on it, but I love it. Yeah, right, and it runs Background Print and has built-in networking, and allows for two screens, and MPW runs smooth as silk on it and... Or ? Have you tried any of these things ? Adding a LaserWriter ? Does it hve SCSI ? These are the things I'm interested in in the Mac. Please clarify, anyone who knows ! h+@nada.kth.se == h+@proxxi.se -- This .signature is longer than 4 lines. If you'd like to see it in whole, please send a note to me. I'm h+@nada.kth.se and also h+@proxxi.se 8')