🚀 go-pugleaf

In article <5806@killer.DALLAS.TX.US> elg@killer.DALLAS.TX.US (Eric Green) writes:
>in article <360@elan.UUCP>, jlo@elan.UUCP (Jeff Lo) says:
>
>Nit #1: First you say:
>> haven't tried this yet). Mass storage is on a 256 MB removable erasable
>> optical disk! Jobs said that the removable media goes for ~$50. The display
>
>Then you say:
>> All in all, the machine looked good and fast, although I wonder about
>> the fact that several desirable things were not mentioned, i.e., color
>> monitors, X-Windows, some kind of floppy drive for software distribution,
>                                    ^^^^^^^^^^^^
>
>One question: Why the hell have a floppy drive when you have a 256MB
                       !!!! very mature...
>removable erasable optical disk? AND, why the hell have a typical SCSI
>tape drive for archival purposes, when you have a 256MB removable
>optical disk? 

   Because, as was pointed out by an earlier poster, since there is
   but one optical platter, and you take it out to archive it, what 
   do you intend to run your machine on?  Or perhaps you prefer swaping
   platters (like to old single floppy machines).  at 8MB a swap, thats
   only 32 swaps.  Besides, what it you only want to mail a 10K file
   to a friend.  256MB (and $50) seems like overkill to me...

>I suspect that the optical drive is there as a
>replacement for the traditional floppy drive or streaming-tape
>cartridge; it's too slow to use as primary data store. I suspect the
>typical NeXT installation will look much like the typical Sun
>installation (file servers, and "nearly-diskless" nodes), except for
>user files on the optical drive (heck, it's no speed demon, but it's
>faster than a floppy.)

   No, wrong, incorrect.  Read any one of the 3 or 4 detailed
   postings.  The optical is PRIMARY storage.  And no, NeXT
   instillations will be quite disk-full, as a 330MB and 660MB
   normal hard drive is a reasonably priced option....

>Nit #2: Bemoaning "No X windows!" is silly. From what I hear,
>X-windows is slow, clumsy, huge, and, generally, Typical University
>Software ("Free software that's too expensive to use"). The NeXT
>windowing system looks a lot more user-friendly, and probably is
>faster, more compact, and more efficient.

   From what you heard, eh?  Well, perhaps X may be desirable 
   because there is a huge amount of work being done on it in
   the academic world, and there is a substantial amount of
   software running under X.  Perhaps X may be desirable to 
   allow transparent (kindof) interaction with those obsolete
   Suns and Apollos and SGI and Multiflows, etc. lying around
   that run X.  Furthermore, while X is big and rough on the 
   programmer, a whole buch of companies have decided that it
   is the way to go, companies that don't think that it is
   "too expensive to use".  Little companies like DEC and IBM
   and Sun...

>About the color monitor: I've seen rumours that they're "working on
>it." In any event, color is mostly useful for CAD/CAE applications,
>while from looking at the software packages included, the NeXT
>workstation seems targetted at academia. I see no real problem (I'm
>typing this right now from a window on a monochrome system, although
>it's an Amiga, not a NeXT).
>
   Well YOU don't see a problem, but I see a bunch of people
   screaming.  Chemists like to have a different colour for
   each element when they model molecules, for example.  As
   you point out, NeXT is for academia.  Well the academia
   here at Georgia Tech seems to want colour.  Perhaps you
   could convince them otherwise...

   Indeed, the single largest complant that people here have
   had with NeXT is lack of colour support.

   Besides...colour sure looks good...;-)

>--
>Eric Lee Green    ..!{ames,decwrl,mit-eddie,osu-cis}!killer!elg
>          Snail Mail P.O. Box 92191 Lafayette, LA 70509              

   I can see now that the disinformation and ignorance surrounding
   the NeXT machine is going to follow it a bit longer...

	ken seefried iii	...!{akgua, allegra, amd, harpo, hplabs, 
	ken@gatech.edu		inhp4, masscomp, rlgvax, sb1, uf-cgrl, 
	ccastks@gitvm1.bitnet	unmvax, ut-ngp, ut-sally}!gatech!ken

	soon to be open: ...!gatech!spooge!ken (finally ;'})