wongl@extro.ucc.su.oz.au (Glenn N Woodland) (11/12/90)
As we are naive of computing, forgive us if the questions here are too simple. One of my friend wants to buy a PC 386 SX. A dealer offered him the following configuration: 386SX 16 MHz (20 Landmark, CHIPS & TECH chip set) Taiwanese motherboard Trident (?) VGA 512KB 16bit Card Taiwanese SVGA monitor 40MB Hard disk 1 5-1/4" FD and 1 3-1/2" FD S/P/G ports and 101 Key Keyboard The price is about US$2000 (or A$2400). Is this a fair deal? As the price seems cheaper, should my friend pay some cautions? The main usage of the computer is to run some engineering software which need more than 1MB memory and 32bit calculation. As the results will be displayed on screen using color graphics, the experiece with the Trident (?) card is also wanted. Another question is that what the respeed for a modem is necessary to connect the PC to the company's mainframe from outside for remote log in purpose and for tranferring some field data. The dealer has no idea about this neither. Please email me your answer. Thanks in advance. -Glenn wongl@extro.ucc.su.OZ.AU
wongl@extro.ucc.su.oz.au (Glenn N Woodland) (11/13/90)
Thanks for all of you replied. We are now have a clearer mind about buying a 386SX. Actually my friend checked the dealer again today, the 386SX mother is based on Chips & Tech. chip set and Phonix BIOS. And also he tested some bugs of 386 or 386SX. It passed all those tests, including running a 32 bit testing program with virtual memory management. The case is called "Baby Case" and the power supply is 110 W. One confusing thing is that although the 386SX CPU was labeled as 16MHz, the LM benchmark showed 26. When he checked with other dealers before, all the LM numbers of 16 MHz 386SXes were between 20 or 21, though they are not based on C&T chip set. Is there anything strange here? As of the price, A$2400 (or US$2000), it includes 20% sales tax and one year warranty. That's the best offer my friend found here in the Sydney metropolitan area, though he has not checked with mail order dealers as he cannot test their machines before purchasing it. About the modem, it seems that a 2400 baud modem could be a reasonable choice. But someone told us that there are two kinds, one is internal, another external. Does this mean an external modem needs its own power supply? It seems to us an internal one would be better. Is this correct? My friend hasn't checked with modem dealers and he wants to have some idea first about modem before looking around. Please reply me by email. Thanks a lot. -Glenn
ESR@SLACVM.SLAC.STANFORD.EDU (Ed Russell) (11/14/90)
In response to: >From: wongl@extro.ucc.su.oz.au (Glenn N Woodland) >Subject: Re: Wanted: Advice on Buying a 386 SX >Date: 13 Nov 90 10:41:50 GMT > > >Thanks for all of you replied. We are now have a clearer mind about >buying a 386SX. Actually my friend checked the dealer again today, >the 386SX mother is based on Chips & Tech. chip set and Phonix BIOS. >And also he tested some bugs of 386 or 386SX. It passed all those tests, >including running a 32 bit testing program with virtual memory management. >The case is called "Baby Case" and the power supply is 110 W. ----- [other stuff deleted] Did you really mean 110 W or is that a typo. If it's only 110 W I would RUN, not walk, to the nearest exit unless you never plan to run a hard disk or add anything else to the machine.
poffen@sj.ate.slb.com (Russ Poffenberger) (11/14/90)
In article <1990Nov13.104150.17179@metro.ucc.su.OZ.AU> wongl@extro.ucc.su.oz.au (Glenn N Woodland) writes: > >Thanks for all of you replied. We are now have a clearer mind about >buying a 386SX. Actually my friend checked the dealer again today, >the 386SX mother is based on Chips & Tech. chip set and Phonix BIOS. >And also he tested some bugs of 386 or 386SX. It passed all those tests, >including running a 32 bit testing program with virtual memory management. >The case is called "Baby Case" and the power supply is 110 W. > >One confusing thing is that although the 386SX CPU was labeled as 16MHz, >the LM benchmark showed 26. When he checked with other dealers before, all >the LM numbers of 16 MHz 386SXes were between 20 or 21, though they are >not based on C&T chip set. Is there anything strange here? > >As of the price, A$2400 (or US$2000), it includes 20% sales tax and one >year warranty. That's the best offer my friend found here in the Sydney >metropolitan area, though he has not checked with mail order dealers as he >cannot test their machines before purchasing it. > >About the modem, it seems that a 2400 baud modem could be a reasonable choice. >But someone told us that there are two kinds, one is internal, another external. >Does this mean an external modem needs its own power supply? It seems to us >an internal one would be better. Is this correct? My friend hasn't checked >with modem dealers and he wants to have some idea first about modem before >looking around. > >Please reply me by email. > >Thanks a lot. > >-Glenn Even though the CPU was labeled 16Mhz, this does not reflect the clock speed it is being run at. You need to check the speed of the crystal for the CPU. Many vendors "push" the CPU's at speeds faster than they are certified for. This may cause problems down the line. There have been many threads here about this and there is no real definitive answer about the drawbacks. Russ Poffenberger DOMAIN: poffen@sj.ate.slb.com Schlumberger Technologies UUCP: {uunet,decwrl,amdahl}!sjsca4!poffen 1601 Technology Drive CIS: 72401,276 San Jose, Ca. 95110 (408)437-5254
ted@helios.ucsc.edu (Ted Cantrall) (11/15/90)
>>One confusing thing is that although the 386SX CPU was labeled as 16MHz, >>the LM benchmark showed 26. When he checked with other dealers before, all >>the LM numbers of 16 MHz 386SXes were between 20 or 21, though they are > >Even though the CPU was labeled 16Mhz, this does not reflect the clock speed >it is being run at. You need to check the speed of the crystal for the CPU. >Many vendors "push" the CPU's at speeds faster than they are certified for. --------------------- The "landmark" speeds are NOT measurements of crystal frequency, but off effective computing speed. (whatever that means) My SX was advertised as a 16MHz SX but runs at 27.x MHz. Not to worry. Unless you want to worry about the *110W* power supply. -ted- ------------------------------------------------------------------------------- ted@helios.ucsc.edu |"He has showed you, O man, what is good; and what does the W (408)459-2110 |Lord require of you but to do justice and to love kindness H (408)423-2444 |and to walk humbly with your God?" Micah 6:8 (RSV)