Path: utzoo!attcan!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!mailrus!csd4.csd.uwm.edu!uakari.primate.wisc.edu!ames!sun-barr!oliveb!3comvax!bridge2!ngg From: ngg@bridge2.ESD.3Com.COM (Norman Goodger) Newsgroups: comp.sys.mac Subject: Re: Printer advice needed Message-ID: <891@bridge2.ESD.3Com.COM> Date: 1 Sep 89 17:50:44 GMT References: <36400005@hpindwa.HP.COM> <3943@phri.UUCP> Reply-To: ngg@bridge2.3Com.com (Norman Goodger) Organization: 3Com Corp., Mt. View, CA Lines: 46 In article <3943@phri.UUCP> roy@phri.UUCP (Roy Smith) writes: > What I want to know is why anybody would buy an SE? For $800 or so >(after the $300 price drop) more than a Plus you get exactly the same >processor, an expansion slot that will probably never be used, and the >ability to have an internal hard drive (convenient, but certainly not >something which improves the machine substantially). With the new SEs, you >also get a marginally better floppy drive (BFD). Get a Plus and use the >money you save over the SE to buy a good printer, more memory, and/or a >bigger/faster disk drive, any of which will substantially improve the >system. >people spec SEs because they want "something better than a Plus" but don't >really have any idea what the differences between the two machines are. >Considering that it probably costs Apple about the same to make a Plus and >an SE, they must be really raking it in on the SE. No wonder they want to >loose the Plus, but it's a product that is too successful for its own good. What amazes me is your ignorance...Sure you sight the differences between the 2 machines, but you ignore the facts that these differences are significant. The Power supply. I know people who have gone thru 3-4 Plus power supplies at an average cost of $120-180. The SE power supply is much more robust and is far less prone to failure than the Plus Power Supply. The Direct bus slot. You state that this is rarely used, where you been? There are a number of accelerator cards that will significantly enhance the performance of the SE that install in minutes, easily and safely with high reliability versus the similiar units for the Plus that are hard to install and are prone to be somewhat unreliable because of the way they attach to the processor. These cards also seem to be cheaper for the SE. THere are also ethernet cards, Color cards, internal modems...This slot-contrary to your opinion is used A LOT! The SuperDrive. Again you say (BFD) obviously you do not care about reducing backups from perhaps 50-800K disks to perhaps only 30 HD disks, you do not need to read other disk formats. While this differences are minimal to you, this can be useful to quite a few others I'm sure. Recommending a Plus to me is not doing anyone a favor, the SE is also faster than the Plus, though not greatly, it is noticable. I think over the long run the SE is a far better investment than getting a Plus anyday.. -- Norm Goodger SysOp - MacInfo BBS @415-795-8862 3Com Corp. Co-SysOp FreeSoft RT - GEnie. Enterprise Systems Division (I disclaim anything and everything) UUCP: {3comvax,auspex,sun}!bridge2!ngg Internet: ngg@bridge2.ESD.3Com.COM