seth@gn.ecn.purdue.edu (Madison MadMan Miles) (06/11/91)
First of all, I want to thank all the people who helped me with my decision about which UNIX to buy. However, I found out a couple of things the hard way the no one told me. After all the mail that people sent me about their opinion on which UNIX is the best to buy for home, I made a decision and bought one. I bought Dell's SYS V ver 4. Mainly because of the reason the several people said good things about them, and the info they sent me was very thorough and complete. Or at least that's what I thought. I decided to purchase Dells UNIX. I got it in the mail today. But to my surprise, It was on a 150 meg tape. Along with one 3.5" disk for installation. And yes, I don't own a tape drive, and no noone rents them. I called Dell, and they told me that this is the only way that they are packaging the software. MY choice, buy a tape drive or return UNIX. Well, I finially decided to buy a tape drive from them for $799 I bought it from them, because I'm not an expert on tape drives and there are a lot of different types out there. Anyway, to make a long story short, instead of getting a great operating system for $995, like they advertise, I'm having to pay $1800. Don't get me wrong, but I think that what I'm getting from Dell seems like a great version of UNIX, but I was mislead in what I had to pay for what I got. No where in the information that I was given was I ever told what system I need. I was expecting 50 disks in the mail and instead I just got 1 tape. If you have 8 megs RAM minimum 150 megs hard drive space 150 meg tape drive and VGA Now if you have all that and are looking for UNIX then Dell is great. For $995, it has everything that SCO and ESIX have, and you don't have to pay for extra add on like you do for SCO and ESIX. Dell comes with all the things that one will ever need. It even says that it is BSD compatible, but I'll wait to believe that when I see it. However, If you don't have a 150 meg tape drive or 8 megs RAM, then don't buy Dell, or upgrade your system. No where in there information do they tell you about what system you need, or what media is comes on Also, the only manual you'll get from Dell is a small although well written installation manual. Everything else, you have to buy from them separately. They do have a good selection of manuals, but I bet the prices will be bad, but this is unconfirmed. Now don't get me wrong, I'm not trying to trash Dell or there products. They are a very friendly company, and there UNIX products seems to be one of the best on the market, but just be careful when you see that low $995 price. There's a big catch to it, and they know it. I just hope that a few more of us know it now. All responses welcome. Madison Miles seth@gn.ecn.purdue.edu
jca@pnet01.cts.com (John C. Archambeau) (06/11/91)
seth@gn.ecn.purdue.edu (Madison MadMan Miles) writes: >First of all, I want to thank all the people who helped me with my >decision about which UNIX to buy. However, I found out a couple of >things the hard way the no one told me. >Anyway, to make a long story short, instead of getting a great >operating system for $995, like they advertise, I'm having to pay >$1800. Don't get me wrong, but I think that what I'm getting from >Dell seems like a great version of UNIX, but I was mislead in what >I had to pay for what I got. No where in the information that I was >given was I ever told what system I need. I was expecting 50 disks in >the mail and instead I just got 1 tape. >If you have 8 megs RAM minimum >150 megs hard drive space >150 meg tape drive and VGA If you bought Dell's SysV/386 R4, I'm not the least bit surprised that you got it on tape. If you were to buy it on disks, you would end up with a wooden pallet full of disks. There's a reason that SysV R4 isn't distributed on disks, and that's because it is huge. The only vendor to my knowledge that is distributing their SysV R4 on disk is UHC and you get a lot of disks, on the order of 50 if I'm not mistaken for the complete system. It is just cheaper for the Unix vendor to distribute the OS on tape than disks. This is also the reason why very soon you'll only be able to buy Sun software (OS and various software products that Sun puts out) on CD ROM. It's cheaper to mass produce CD ROM disks than it is to have tapes cut at the factory. You could have returned Dell Unix and gotten ISC or another flavor that is available on disk since Dell did give you that option. I personally think you have nothing to complain about. // JCA /* **--------------------------------------------------------------------------* ** Flames : /dev/null | What to buy? ** ARPANET : crash!pnet01!jca@nosc.mil | EISA or MCA? ** INTERNET: jca@pnet01.cts.com | When will the bus wars end? ** UUCP : {nosc ucsd hplabs!hp-sdd}!crash!pnet01!jca **--------------------------------------------------------------------------* */
jgay@digi.lonestar.org (john gay) (06/11/91)
From article <1991Jun10.222841.24729@gn.ecn.purdue.edu>, by seth@gn.ecn.purdue.edu (Madison MadMan Miles): [a lot of stuff about dell unix requiring a tape drive for installation deleted] Well, to semi-defend Dell... I knew that Dell Unix only comes on a tape. I am not sure where I read this. Either in a review or in the dell brochure that I was sent. I don't have unix running at home (yet) (work is an apollo workstation) and have never seen the Dell Unix distribution (only Interactives, but that was about 2 years and another company ago). Maybe they (dell) could make clearer a minimum configuration to install their unix - assuming that it is not in their brochure, but they do have the 30 day money back policy... and I could probably find someone with a tape drive (not to mention I would hate to sit through a 4-6 hour install with a huge number of floppies). john gay. -- john gay. jgay@digi.lonestar.org Like Thoreau, I rejoice that there are owls. Part of the reason is that owls eat mice, and thus make a certain number of cats unnecessary, which is always a plus. Jeff Duntemann, Dr. Dobb's June '91
pbash@csn.org (Paul Bash) (06/12/91)
seth@gn.ecn.purdue.edu (Madison MadMan Miles) writes: >First of all, I want to thank all the people who helped me with my >decision about which UNIX to buy. However, I found out a couple of >things the hard way the no one told me. >After all the mail that people sent me about their opinion on which >UNIX is the best to buy for home, I made a decision and bought one. >I bought Dell's SYS V ver 4. Mainly because of the reason the several >people said good things about them, and the info they sent me was >very thorough and complete. Or at least that's what I thought. I >decided to purchase Dells UNIX. I got it in the mail today. But to >my surprise, It was on a 150 meg tape. Along with one 3.5" disk for >installation. And yes, I don't own a tape drive, and no noone rents >them. I called Dell, and they told me that this is the only way that >they are packaging the software. MY choice, buy a tape drive or return >UNIX. Well, I finially decided to buy a tape drive from them for $799 >I bought it from them, because I'm not an expert on tape drives and >there are a lot of different types out there. >Anyway, to make a long story short, instead of getting a great >operating system for $995, like they advertise, I'm having to pay >$1800. Well, this is my two cents worth being a reasonably satisfied Dell SVR4 user. For your $995 you got a *good* UNIX but not a great one. I'd venture to guess that most SVR4 systems from any distributor aren't great at this stage of SVR4's development. In general, the number of things that don't quite work as documented are surprising. Given that, and comparing prices with SVR3 systems configured with the same options (TCP/IP NFS, development tools, X11R4, documentation tools, DOS MERGE, etc) I have to admit I feel it was a pretty good deal. Its just not quite ready for the faint at heart, although most things work as advertised. In fact, in the last three months I've been running Dell's offering, I've only experienced kernel panics twice and they were both while running questionable programs under DOS MERGE. As for the lack of information on the requirements of the system, I had the advantage of following this newsgroup for several months before I bought it and had a pretty good idea of what was required (i.e. graphics limited to DELL's GPX 34010 based board or 640x480 VGA. Period. Only ADAPTEC 1542B SCSI controller, only Wangtek 5150 or Archive 2150S 150M SCSI tape). Since I was putting my system together from scratch for Dell's UNIX, it was no problem. In fact, everything has worked flawlessly in this respect. It was pretty clear to me going into it that they only intended to support the hardware configurations they sold under their own name, so I understood I was trying to circumvent this by piecing together a similar configuration through other vendors. To Dell's credit, this has *never* been an issue when dealing with tech support. I've always made it clear that I did not own Dell hardware when dealing with them and they've always, in this respect, been very cooperative in handling problem reports. The first person I spoke with at Dell, when I questioned the restricted hardware requirements, even suggested that I buy their supported tape drive, use it to install the system, then return it for a full refund under their 30 day satisfaction guarantee. Do you know any other company that would give this kind of advice (crazy as it was)? Given all of that, I have to admit some things have really been bothering me. Not only that, I'm going to vent a little steam here. 1) The system has been shipping since (I think) last November. They recently shipped an update tape to address a number of problems. While the tape was pretty cheap at $50, they still have the *stupid* lack of support for Super-VGA graphic modes under X. I have a 1024x768 256 color graphics rig (NEC 4D, STB PowerGraph VGA) coasting along at 640x480 16 color waiting for these guys to get their act together. Give me a break! If Thomas Roell can produce his *configurable* X server on his own time, surely these people can do it with all of Dell's resources. Excuse me if this is a little abrasive, but this is a pet peave of mine (and kudos to Thomas). 2) Some of the X clients provided (X.desktop in particular) still have major problems. Anyone who tried to use them would see what I mean. For example, the X.desktop scrolling of icons within a window is broken. Period (i.e. the icons very obviously overlay one another producing a mess on-screen). Why wasn't this fixed on the update tape? 3) BSD compatibility is pretty poor. Maybe this is a problem in general with SVR4 but its something that anyone considering the system should consider. If you want BSD (or SUN) compatibility, look elsewhere. Paraphrasing a Dell employee, "whoever wrote this stuff has never worked with BSD". Compatiblity did improve on the recent update tape, but not greatly. 4) Modem support is, at best, strange. Carrier Detect must be forced high. If you don't do this in the modem's non-volatile memory, you won't be able to use the modem. I pointed out to Dell's tech support that this presents a problem for those of us using AT-bus internal modems. Let's say I have an internal modem that doesn't have CD forced high. If your UNIX device driver won't talk to it unless CD is high, how do you expect to tell it to force it high (if you don't have external switches). Sounds like catch-22 to me. The answer I got from Dell's tech support was that, obviously (??), you just have to force CD high. When I pointed out that this was impossible, given the fact I couldn't write to the modem, I was told that this was "how it works" and that getting the development group to change it to work otherwise would be difficult since "they are pretty busy". Luckily, I was able to boot MSDOS and run Telix to change the modem settings. Hmm. the whole point of going to UNIX was to get away from "limited" os's like MSDOS. 5) Major support is done through support contracts (at $500/yr for the unlimited user version I have). I have no problem with paying extra for preferred support. I didn't pay because I feel I can wait a little extra time to get answers to problems and that I can figure out the RTFM problems by myself by Reading The ****ing Manual. I've been relying on email to support@uudel.dell.com for problem resolution and it has worked reasonably well (kudos to Steve Blair for his enthusiastic help). What bothers me is that several of the points raised in this posting were raised in email to Dell and were apparently ignored. I understand that uucp mail can be unreliable, but this has happened more than once and always when I'm asking tough questions. I feel if I dropped my $1295 for the unlimited version and I'm prepared to be patient for answers, I should at least get some kind of response. I've been waiting 3 weeks or so since my last email and still no response. -- ---------------- Paul Bash pbash@csn.org
sblair@upurbmw.dell.com (Steve Blair) (06/12/91)
|> Maybe they (dell) could make clearer a minimum configuration to install |> their unix - assuming that it is not in their brochure, but they do have |> the 30 day money back policy... and I could probably find someone with |> a tape drive (not to mention I would hate to sit through a 4-6 hour install |> with a huge number of floppies). -- After Madison's posting yesterday, I checked our info server, affectionately known as: info@dell.dell.com, and discovered that if one is to send email to it, ommitted was *any* reference as to what type of media our O/S comes on. As of last night, it now properly reflects that we release on 150Mb tapes, w/ 2 boot/system floppies. Apologies to anyone this may have confused; it was *not* intended to cause undue hardship to anyone who is a current, or potentially future customer. I also asked Madison to give me details about his order, sales rep, etc. so that we can clarify in their minds this problem; thus it would affect no one else in the future. I'll work up a "minimum configuration", and add it to our info server... Steve Blair DELL UNIX DIVISION sblair@upurbmw.dell.com ================================================================ *Notice: "/earth is 98% full, please delete anyone you can...." -anonymous @dell.com
jde@everex.uucp (-Jeff Ellis()) (06/13/91)
In article <1991Jun11.123605.12138@crash.cts.com> jca@pnet01.cts.com (John C. Archambeau) writes: >If you bought Dell's SysV/386 R4, I'm not the least bit surprised that you got >it on tape. If you were to buy it on disks, you would end up with a wooden >pallet full of disks. There's a reason that SysV R4 isn't distributed on >disks, and that's because it is huge. The only vendor to my knowledge that >is distributing their SysV R4 on disk is UHC and you get a lot of disks, on >the order of 50 if I'm not mistaken for the complete system. Esix 4.0.3 Rev A is shipped on 5.25", 3.5" or 60 meg tapes. It is a lot of disks for the systems but some people can buy if they had to add the price of a tape drive to the price of 4.0. -- Jeff Ellis ESIX SYSTEM/V UUCP:uunet!zardoz!everex!jde Internet: everex!jde%zardoz.uucp@ics.uci.edu
klg@tc.fluke.COM (Kevin L. Gross) (06/14/91)
In article <1991Jun11.123605.12138@crash.cts.com> jca@pnet01.cts.com (John C. Archambeau) writes: >If you bought Dell's SysV/386 R4, I'm not the least bit surprised that you got >it on tape. If you were to buy it on disks, you would end up with a wooden >pallet full of disks. There's a reason that SysV R4 isn't distributed on >disks, and that's because it is huge. The only vendor to my knowledge that >is distributing their SysV R4 on disk is UHC and you get a lot of disks, on >the order of 50 if I'm not mistaken for the complete system. There are more like 93 (1.44) disks total, but I don't consider that a large problem. I didn't have a tape drive, and what with all the problems I'm having trying to find one, that would have stopped me cold. The disks are laid out well and you probably wouldn't want to use all of them anyway, there are many subsets of disks for various portions of network, comm, and GUI's. In any case, it only takes a couple of hours to install the entire set...OK, maybe three hours. The choice is what's important here, isn't it? -Kevin -- -Kevin L. Gross klg@Fluke.COM Disclaim THIS: "I wouldn't do that, mister...Old Zeek's liable to fire that sucker up." - Gary Larson
larry@nstar.rn.com (Larry Snyder) (06/17/91)
pbash@csn.org (Paul Bash) writes: >Well, this is my two cents worth being a reasonably satisfied Dell SVR4 >user. For your $995 you got a *good* UNIX but not a great one. I'd venture >to guess that most SVR4 systems from any distributor aren't great at this >stage of SVR4's development. In general, the number of things that don't >quite work as documented are surprising. Given that, and comparing prices >with SVR3 systems configured with the same options (TCP/IP NFS, development >tools, X11R4, documentation tools, DOS MERGE, etc) I have to admit I feel >it was a pretty good deal. Its just not quite ready for the faint at heart, Dell's package includes the most for the price - how many of the other vendors throw in Merge, Motif, and a good selection of the GNU software all compiled and ready to run for 995 (1295 unlimited users)? -- Larry Snyder, NSTAR Public Access Unix 219-289-0287/317-251-7391 HST/PEP/V.32/v.32bis/v.42bis regional UUCP mapping coordinator {larry@nstar.rn.com, ..!uunet!nstar.rn.com!larry}
jdi@sparky.Franz.COM (John D. Irwin) (06/18/91)
In article <1991Jun17.000740.24248@nstar.rn.com> larry@nstar.rn.com (Larry Snyder) writes: >Dell's package includes the most for the price - how many of the other >vendors throw in Merge, Motif, and a good selection of the GNU software >all compiled and ready to run for 995 (1295 unlimited users)? (I'm starting to think that Larry has a couple thousand shares of Dell stock he's worried about... :-) For another opinion, I've just just bought ESIX SVR4 for about $500. I did this by buying a friend's copy of ISC 2.0 (comments on the legal- ity of this -> /dev/null please), then taking advantage of ESIX's upgrade offer. If you can provide ESIX with the boot disk from your current Unix of any flavor (except probably Coherent, etc), you can get SVR4 for $395. This price includes: -- base system, SCSI support, TCP/IP, SLIP, X11, C compiler, 2 user license, complete on line manual pages, all on about 80 (!) floppies and does not include: -- bound documentation (I was able to get the individual books I needed from a local bookstore for a lot less than the $300 ESIX wanted for the whole set) All of the bound documentation is from AT&T, and most of it is replicated in the on-line pages. -- Motif or OpenWindows (I'd rather ftp the XView library from MIT) -- precompiled GNU tools (again ftp from the net is simple) I have never seen DELL Unix, so I cannot compare the two. I'm sure DELL is an excellent product, however I didn't have the extra $500 lying around. -- John
evan@telly.on.ca (Evan Leibovitch) (06/19/91)
In article <1991Jun14.155802.4815@tc.fluke.COM> klg@tc.fluke.COM (Kevin L. Gross) writes: >In article <1991Jun11.123605.12138@crash.cts.com> jca@pnet01.cts.com (John C. Archambeau) writes: >>If you bought Dell's SysV/386 R4, I'm not the least bit surprised that you got >>it on tape. If you were to buy it on disks, you would end up with a wooden >>pallet full of disks. There's a reason that SysV R4 isn't distributed on >>disks, and that's because it is huge. The only vendor to my knowledge that >>is distributing their SysV R4 on disk is UHC and you get a lot of disks, on >>the order of 50 if I'm not mistaken for the complete system. >There are more like 93 (1.44) disks total, but I don't consider that a >large problem. I didn't have a tape drive, and what with all the problems >I'm having trying to find one, that would have stopped me cold. I have received my first copy of ESIX R4 on tape media. The package is four floppies and a single 60Meg tape. ESIX is also available on 5.25 and 3.5 inch floppies. According to my info, here's the tally on 5-inch media (I may be off slightly because the figures below are for the international version, and doesn't include the data encryption software): Base set (no development sys): 59 disks Development system: 11 disks Graphics I (Open Look): 19 disks Graphics II (Motif): 7 disks -- Evan Leibovitch, Sound Software, located in beautiful Brampton, Ontario evan@telly.on.ca / uunet!attcan!telly!evan / (416) 452-0504 "MS-DOS 4.0 was a ... learning experience" - Bill Gates, introducing DOS 5
bill@unixland.natick.ma.us (Bill Heiser) (06/20/91)
In article <20019@franz.Franz.COM> jdi@sparky.Franz.COM (John D. Irwin) writes: > >If you can provide ESIX with the boot disk from your current Unix of >any flavor (except probably Coherent, etc), you can get SVR4 for $395. . . . >I have never seen DELL Unix, so I cannot compare the two. I'm sure DELL >is an excellent product, however I didn't have the extra $500 lying around. > Does the ~$1K DELL product come with an unlimited user license, as opposed to the 2-user license on the $395 ESIX product? I think if you compare apples to apples, they are almost the same price. The DELL product does come with more stuff though, so again, that offsets the comparison. -- bill@unixland.natick.ma.us ...!uunet!think!unixland!bill OR ..!uunet!world!unixland!bill heiser@world.std.com Public Access Unix 508-655-3848(2400) 508-651-8723(HST) 508-651-8733(PEP-V32)
larry@nstar.rn.com (Larry Snyder) (06/22/91)
bill@unixland.natick.ma.us (Bill Heiser) writes: >Does the $1K DELL product come with an unlimited user license, as >opposed to the 2-user license on the $395 ESIX product? I think if you 1295 unlimited / 995 limited >compare apples to apples, they are almost the same price. The DELL not really considering that Dell SVR4 comes with DOS support (what is that - another $300 for ESIX SVR4 users? And don't forget the fact that if you want VPIX with ESIX SVR4 you need to find another vendor - so in case of problems - the VPix vendor can blame it on the UNIX - and visa-versa -- Larry Snyder, NSTAR Public Access Unix 219-289-0287/317-251-7391 HST/PEP/V.32/v.32bis/v.42bis regional UUCP mapping coordinator {larry@nstar.rn.com, ..!uunet!nstar.rn.com!larry}
bill@unixland.natick.ma.us (Bill Heiser) (06/23/91)
In article <1991Jun21.184627.2681@nstar.rn.com> larry@nstar.rn.com (Larry Snyder) writes: > >not really considering that Dell SVR4 comes with DOS support (what >is that - another $300 for ESIX SVR4 users? And don't forget the >fact that if you want VPIX with ESIX SVR4 you need to find another >vendor - so in case of problems - the VPix vendor can blame it on >the UNIX - and visa-versa Good point. What does DELL come with, DOS-MERGE or some such thing, or is it VP/ix? I have VP/ix for my ESIX 3.2 system, but don't even have it installed right now. I'm NOT impressed. I'd rather keep the kernel size down so I only have the stuff installed that I really need. -- bill@unixland.natick.ma.us ...!uunet!think!unixland!bill OR ..!uunet!world!unixland!bill heiser@world.std.com Public Access Unix 508-655-3848(2400) 508-651-8723(HST) 508-651-8733(PEP-V32)
larry@nstar.rn.com (Larry Snyder) (06/23/91)
bill@unixland.natick.ma.us (Bill Heiser) writes: >In article <1991Jun21.184627.2681@nstar.rn.com> larry@nstar.rn.com (Larry Snyder) writes: >> >>not really considering that Dell SVR4 comes with DOS support (what >>is that - another $300 for ESIX SVR4 users? And don't forget the >>fact that if you want VPIX with ESIX SVR4 you need to find another >>vendor - so in case of problems - the VPix vendor can blame it on >>the UNIX - and visa-versa >Good point. What does DELL come with, DOS-MERGE or some such thing, >or is it VP/ix? DOS-Merge -- -- Larry Snyder, NSTAR Public Access Unix 219-289-0287/317-251-7391 HST/PEP/V.32/v.32bis/v.42bis regional UUCP mapping coordinator {larry@nstar.rn.com, ..!uunet!nstar.rn.com!larry}
sblair@upurbmw.dell.com (Steve Blair) (06/24/91)
In article <1991Jun23.032722.20468@unixland.natick.ma.us>, bill@unixland.natick.ma.us (Bill Heiser) writes: |> Good point. What does DELL come with, DOS-MERGE or some such thing, |> or is it VP/ix? We sell(*bundled in the price of our V.4*(!!)) DOS/Merge. No extra charge. Period. -- Steve Blair DELL UNIX DIVISION sblair@upurbmw.dell.com ================================================================ *Notice: "/earth is 98% full, please delete anyone you can...." -anonymous @dell.com
bill@unixland.natick.ma.us (Bill Heiser) (06/25/91)
In article <22202@uudell.dell.com> sblair@upurbmw.dell.com (Steve Blair) writes: > >We sell(*bundled in the price of our V.4*(!!)) DOS/Merge. No extra >charge. Period. How does DOS/Merge compare to VP/ix in usability (compatibility) with a variety of DOS apps? How about in CPU/resource utilization? How about in use of DOS apps from remote terminals? -- bill@unixland.natick.ma.us ...!uunet!think!unixland!bill OR ..!uunet!world!unixland!bill heiser@world.std.com Public Access Unix 508-655-3848(2400) 508-651-8723(HST) 508-651-8733(PEP-V32)