Path: utzoo!censor!geac!maccs!cs4g6ag From: cs4g6ag@maccs.dcss.mcmaster.ca (Stephen M. Dunn) Newsgroups: comp.sys.ibm.pc Subject: Re: Is this a good idea? Message-ID: <25FFCEAE.7045@maccs.dcss.mcmaster.ca> Date: 15 Mar 90 17:19:41 GMT References: <16785@orstcs.CS.ORST.EDU> Reply-To: cs4g6ag@maccs.dcss.mcmaster.ca (Stephen M. Dunn) Organization: McMaster University, Hamilton, Ontario Lines: 39 In article <16785@orstcs.CS.ORST.EDU> kleinj@jacobs.CS.ORST.EDU.UUCP (Justin the Blue) writes: $It seems that, at a new/used computer store just down the street from me, an $IBM PC with 128Kb storage has just come on sale. The package includes DOS $1.1...and they say that's about it. (Complete system hardware, anyway...) $That, and two SSDD diskdrives. $Now, my question is, what with the dearth of software it comes with, is it $worth my plunking down $250 for? How availible is other languages for $it? Will I have to get a DOS upgrade (I would imagine so) and how much $will this cost? I would at least like BASIC for it...where, and how much? I'd strongly advise against it, as it has many, many deficienties (not to mention its performance): - 128K memory is not enough! You'll need an absolute minimum of 384K, and even that won't run most applications - even 512K is too little for some programs! - virtually all programs require DOS 2 or higher. DOS costs somewhat over $100 in Canada; I don't know what the price is in the States. - single-sided disk drives are useless; DOS 2 and higher can read and write single-sided diskettes, but nobody (at least, nobody major) distributes software on single-sided diskettes any more, since the software requires DOS 2 or higher and therefore the system must be able to read double- sided media (besides which, can you imagine a package that requires, say 10 DSDD diskettes on SSDD? Yuck!) So if you do go for it, you'll have to add 384K or 512K of memory to it (and if it's a really old machine, you'll need a separate board to do this), you'll have to replace the disk drives, and buy DOS. If you want a hard drive, you may well have to replace the ROM BIOS as well, since really old PCs don't have the BIOS support for hard drives. And what do you have once you've done that? A horribly underpowered machine. It isn't worth doing unless it's a game machine for your kids, and even then it's very questionable. You should be able to get a cheap XT clone, new, for about what you'll end up spending to make this thing usable. -- Stephen M. Dunn cs4g6ag@maccs.dcss.mcmaster.ca = "\nI'm only an undergraduate!!!\n"; **************************************************************************** "So sorry, I never meant to break your heart ... but you broke mine."