16 Jun
2000
16 Jun
'00
8:08 p.m.
On Fri, 16 Jun 2000, Tony Duell wrote:
I don't either, really, except the people have come to expect laser
formatting, photographs, etc. I guess you *could* do it with an Apple II,
hell, I could do it with a TI 99/4A if necessary. And I could rub two
sticks together to light my next bbq, instead of lighter fluid and
matches. It would be fun to try once, that's about it.
I am not sure what that difference is.... They're
both single-processor
von Neuman computers, aren't they?
I really don't understand why people insist on replacing perfectly good
computers just because there's a new model out. I do know that my
original PC/XT will, once I've replaced the dead chip on the floppy
controller, still run my EPROM programmer, read 8" disks, test cables,
and do all the other things that I've modified it for over the years.
Just as my MINC will carry on logging data (as will my HP71 + HP3421), my
PERQ will still display bitmapped images at a good speed, etc. They do
the jobs they were designed to do, they still do them. And until I need
to do jobs that can't be done on those machines _at all_, I see no reason
to 'upgrade' (meaning : replace a perfectly working, well understood,
reliable system with a new kludge).
If it does what you want it to do, keep it. An original PC/XT wouldn't
meet many of my needs right now, so I wouldn't use one except in an
emergency.
does yeoman service running my Syntauri
synthesizer) and the
PowerComputing PowerCenter 240 that I do most of my "real work" on. And,
no, I'm not going back to the Apple II and a dot-matrix printer to do my
newsletters on, or surf the Net.
I see nothing wrong with printing newsletters on a dot matrix printer.