Re: why did apple go mac?

[wbdesnoy@acs5.acs.ucalgary.ca (Byron Desnoyers Winmill)]

frankc (frankc@srv.net) wrote:
: How much did you pay for your last system?

Too much, but that is the price of every Mac.  ;-)

: > If you choose transition hardware, you are left with a comprimise.
: What is transition hardware?  What compromise are you referring to?  The ability to
: use two types of memory?  The ability to use either ISA or PCI cards?

I was refering to any hardware which combines two types of memory, or two types of
expansion slot.  There will usually be limits to how many of which type can be used, and
that becomes expensive if you invest a lot of money into particular components.  This
could range from an abnormal amount of high capacity SIMMs.  Try using sixteen, 4MB, 30
pin SIMMs in a modern computer.  That is what I have sitting in my Quadra (with another
16MB of the same in an SE/30).  What if you used an EISA expansion card, say for video
or SCSI?  The upgrade paths for either of those have long since passed.  Similarly if you
have a large number of ISA cards.

: > Grabbing computer parts from the thrift store doesn't help either,
: > because the stuff is always behind the times.

: Do not confuse obsolescence with not being able to run Windows.

Who cares about Windows?  I play with Apple/Atari/Macintosh exactly because not enjoyment
can be extracted from Windows.

Now what I was refering to was the ability to use old parts with new parts.  Most of the
cards in thrift store computers are going to be ISA.  Most of those cards are nothing
fancy, so you probably won't want to waste your slots on them.  RAM is only useful for
older machines.  Which is fine for me because I like playing with older machines, but not
okay for upgrading.

: > While the cases were good until recently, the only valuable parts today are the chip
: > RAM from 8088's and 286's (to upgrade the Apple's and Atari's of this world).

: I can put SIMMs in a Mac Plus and Mac SE.

Sorry, forgot about that one.  :-)

: > If I ever feel the need to do something serious on the hardware level, then it
: > will be either on an Apple II/II+ or an XT.  I have reasonable documentation
: > for either machine, thus a reasonable chance of understanding it.  It is an
: > understanding of how a machine works which gives me satisfaction.

: I understand where you are coming from here.  With the advent of Windows the people
: that thought they knew what was going on with DOS were lost in the windowing
: environment.  I myself can whip out a fully graphical DOS application, but the crap
: that you have to go through to program a Windows app sucks.  I prefer Unix X
: programming to that junk.

Ah, the bad old days of DOS.  But at least DOS was mostly easy to understand, and much
easier to program for (particularly if you liked breaking rules).  Unix is nice to use,
but nothing that many competent users will understand even a fraction of.  So we are
left with the older machines.  If we want to be realistic, and avoid making a career
out of it, that is.

: Now if you look at the low level of a 386 motherboard compared to an 8088 motherboard
: they are not very different.

I will learn about the 8088 before even thinking about the 386!

Byron.