Path: utzoo!attcan!uunet!cs.utexas.edu!tut.cis.ohio-state.edu!dendrite.cis.ohio-state.edu!pollack From: pollack@dendrite.cis.ohio-state.edu (Jordan B Pollack) Newsgroups: comp.sys.laptops Subject: Re: a) Need advice; b) Zenith SupersPort Message-ID: Date: 24 Oct 90 21:07:15 GMT References: <538.27255841@venus.ycc.yale.edu> Sender: news@tut.cis.ohio-state.edu Reply-To: pollack@cis.ohio-state.edu Organization: Ohio State Computer Science Lines: 26 In-reply-to: obrien@venus.ycc.yale.edu's message of 24 Oct 90 14:00:49 GMT (A vanilla supersport will not run windows; you need a 80286 chip) I fought with Zenith for an entire year over their advertising the Supersport 286 machine as 640 by 400. The resolution is NOT available in any graphics mode! Windows runs at CGA 640 by 200, with rectangular pixels and fonts as ugly as sin. The screen and the video-chip and the computer memory SHOULD allow it to be with custom machine-level register programming, but this hasn't been done, and won't be done because the way the video chip is wired into the motherboard design makes it IMPOSSIBLE. I finally "upgraded" (e.g. swapped and paid) to a 286e. Toshiba double-scan machine, the 1200XE, does have a Windows driver, and is lighter to boot, but doesnt admit a floating point chip, which might be useful for windows. I've heard that the 1200XE's are in good supply now, since the introduction of lighter machines with a VGA screens, such as the TI/Sharp/compuadd (or the Zeos that someone just recommended). If you can afford a VGA laptop, get it, since many nice programs outside of windows cannot take advantage of the non-standard screen. -- Jordan Pollack Assistant Professor CIS Dept/OSU Laboratory for AI Research 2036 Neil Ave Email: pollack@cis.ohio-state.edu Columbus, OH 43210 Fax/Phone: (614) 292-4890