Re: [Q] Why Apple2 when we have PC?

[mportune@telerama.lm.com (Matt Portune)]

Ron Kneusel (rkneusel@post.its.mcw.edu) wrote:
> use a PC or Mac?"  Use the machine that is right for the task.
> Sometimes that is a 48k Apple ][+, sometimes it is a Pentium
> or PowerPC, and sometimes it is a Cray.

exactly!

> Try doing sophisticated curve fitting on an Apple II.  You will see 
> that it doesn't work, or if it does then it takes far too long.  
> Now, try running statistical models involving 500+ Meg of data on 
> a ][+.  New technology is necessary.  You wouldn't expect the data 
> acquisition systems of the CDF detector at Fermilab (which recently 
> found the long missing top quark) to collect millions of bits of data 
> per second, and process it, with Apple II's.  The point is, use the 

the problem is, the only people stupid enough to bring up this "why use 
Apple II instead of PC" argument are the ones bragging about windows and 
their corny lil' GUI, which we II users have as well.  The things you 
stated above are perfectly true... The people asking the "PC or II" 
question don't even know what half that stuff is.

> machine that is right for the task.  On the other hand, who would use 
> a $2000 Pentium system to collect temperature readings and similar 
> information for their backyard weather station?  Or use that machine 
> as a dedicated "chart recorder" of sorts with the simple addition of 
> an A/D card?  The Apple II is an amazing little machine that is 

hehehe you'd be surprised.  Makes me sick just thinking about it.  Some 
people I know are using p90's with 1.2 gig drives and 16 megs of RAM to 
type papers under WordPerfect in DOS.  Now... explain that one.  hehehe :)

> capable of far more than its designers believed, but in the end, it 
> is 1970s technology and too wimpy for a great number of real world 
> tasks.

depends what "real" means to you.

> Long live Apple II, but it's only a computer for crying out loud...

No.  It's a child to some of us.  Try to understand.  That's all I can 
ask.  If not, then maintain silence.

-- 
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 |  Matt Portune             - IIGSi -            mportune@telerama.lm.com  |   
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