Path: utzoo!attcan!uunet!unsvax!uns-helios!alfter
From: alfter@uns-helios.nevada.edu (SCOTT ALFTER)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.apple2
Subject: Re: Some observations
Message-ID: <2219@unsvax.NEVADA.EDU>
Date: 29 Oct 90 18:00:15 GMT
References: <139800045@uxa.cso.uiuc.edu>
Sender: news@unsvax.NEVADA.EDU
Reply-To: alfter@uns-helios.uucp (SCOTT ALFTER)
Organization: Univ of Nevada System Computing Services - Las Vegas
Lines: 43

In article <139800045@uxa.cso.uiuc.edu> wogg0743@uxa.cso.uiuc.edu writes:
>It occurs to me that we may possibly be panicking too soon on the subject
>of the Apple II's "death."  After all, whether Macintosh Inc. discontinues

I haven't heard anything concrete about the II's demise, so I'm going
to keep plugging along.  (Maybe not just "plugging" along--there's a
whole bunch of stuff I'd like to get.)

>came out.  You can get a scanner for the II line that (on a GS) will do high
>speed Optical Character Recognition.  Third party hardware companies are still

So far as I know, the OCR software is still in beta-test.  The
"Vitesse ambassador" in our local user group was going to demonstrate
the software at the last meeting, but he wasn't able to attend.  BTW,
the software is supposed to be able to work on the IIe, as well--same
as the Quickie, for which 8-bit software was released not too long ago.

>So what we should do (IMHO) is stop harassing Apple so much about a decision
>that I suspect (fatalistic me) is irreversible and instead work on making
>sure that third party software/hardware producers know that there is still
>money to be made catering to our needs.

I just got a RamWorks III.  Are any of the rest of you doing your
part? :-) BTW, can I have somebody's opinion regarding the Zip Chip
vs. TransWarp III?  So far as I know, the Zip Chip doesn't take a
slot, but reliability isn't what it could be.  The TransWarp III takes
a slot (though it's supposed to work in the otherwise useless slot 3),
but can be expanded to go beyond its present (7-8 MHz) clock rate.
It'll be a while before I get an accelerator (I need to let my credit
card recover from the cost of the RamWorks :-) ), but I'll be in the
market for an acelerator in the future.  Also, I've seen an
"InnerExpress" advertised that is supposed to increase the speed of
Ingenuity's (ST-506) hard disks.  Is this a new controller to replace
the original?  If it is, could you grab any issue of
_Computer_Shopper_ and build an RLL or MFM (which one?) drive to plug
into this card?  It'd be a whole lot cheaper than SCSI, if it would
work.

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
Scott Alfter                             _/_
                                        / v \ Apple II:
Internet: alfter@uns-helios.nevada.edu (    ( the power to be your best!
   GEnie: S.ALFTER                      \_^_/