🚀 go-pugleaf

In article <1992Apr11.135421.2898@arizona.edu> rempe@iridium.tucson.az.us writes:
[ ]
>> >
>> >What about SLIP?
>> 
>> Hmm...you need to have a dedicated line for the most part. Appletalk will
>> work remotely in a portable way. However, your point is well taken.
>> 
[ ]
>
>Why do you say that you need a dedicated line?  It is nice to have a dedicated  
>line for SLIP but not necessary at all.  I don't have a dedicated line for my  
>2400bps SLIP link, I bring it up when I need to send mail or read news.

Dedicated was perhaps the wrong word. Where I work in order to get a uucp
connection I need to dedicate a phone line at home to my NeXT. If I also
wanted a SLIP connection to our Unix network I would also have to have a
phone line dedicated to that at work. That means 2 phones lines, 2 modems,
etc...The costs are adding up. Moreover I doubt that 2400 baud is fast
enough to work with. For example, try running X over your SLIP connection.
With remote Appletalk I can dial into any number of places and simply drag
an icon to a printer,etc...I think Apple is way ahead in this area. Just
my 2 cents. The NeXT is concentrating on bringing more mips,etc...at the
same price when they should be concentrating on their unique environment,
lowering the entry level price,etc...This mission critical stuff, targeting
Sun( which is on the way down),etc...will do them great harm. The real
competition comes from micros.

Why can I get a voice answering machine, fax, modem, software,...on a card
for $400 which does not require a dedicated line( i.e. it can distinguish
between data and voice) for a $1000 colour PC when I had to pay $1300 for
a piece of junk from Neuron?

Anyway, I'm becoming convinced that NeXT is on the wrong path and this could
have very unpleasant consequences for those of us who love the computer.

Philip McDunnough
philip@utstat.toronto.edu [Next mail ok]