Re: Big Apple question

[supertimer@aol.com (Supertimer)]

david@uow.edu.au (David Wilson) wrote:

>johnw@Southcoast.net (John Wolf) writes:
>
>>PC still all have DOS on the ROM, and that is why you have extended memory
>
>Very few PCs have DOS in ROM. All they have is the lower level BIOS that
>DOS can use to control disks/video/ports etc.

I think John is more likely refering to what DOS uses as opposed to what
Windows uses.  Every PC has an ASCII character set built into ROM,
just like every Apple II, but no Mac.

The Mac only has a Toolbox in ROM.

The Apple IIGS straddles both worlds, with both a character ROM and
Toolbox ROM.

Today's PCs only have character ROM.  Windows equivalent of the
"Toolbox" is loaded from disk.  John is probably wondering when PCs
are going to get the Windows equivalent of the Toolbox into ROM.

I don't think they are EVER going to do this because unlike Apple,
PC manufacturers don't own Microsoft Windows!  And I don't think
they are ever going to take out the character generator.