Path: utzoo!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!csri.toronto.edu!wayne Newsgroups: comp.os.msdos.misc From: wayne@csri.toronto.edu (Wayne Hayes) Subject: Re: OS/2 2.0 is here! Message-ID: <1991May11.223713.1938@jarvis.csri.toronto.edu> Organization: CSRI, University of Toronto References: <1991May8.224116.11897@herald.usask.ca> <5978@ns-mx.uiowa.edu> Date: 12 May 91 02:37:14 GMT Lines: 52 In article <5978@ns-mx.uiowa.edu> cmdbyk@pmvax.weeg.uiowa.edu writes: >I think we can see the fate of OS/2 if we look at its hardware analog, >the MCA machine... >technical superiority, real or imagined, is not giving IBM an overwhelming >edge in the market. >I think we can read the fate of OS/2 and Windows in the fate of the MCA >and ISA/EISA buses. OS/2 probably won't dry up and blow away. But I >doubt it will supplant DOS/Windows; in fact, I'd guess DOS/Windows will be >more popular, for similar reasons: price (do you really think Microsoft >won't compete in price against IBM?), relative ease of upgrading (you don't >have to install an OS and reinstall all your apps to install Windows), the >availability and price of add-ins (OS/2 apps are the software equivalent of >MCA cards: scarce and overpriced), and the perceived return on investment >by developers (if you wanted to make bigger bucks faster, which would you >develop, a Windows app or an OS/2 app?). There's a qualitative difference between hardware and software being successful on the market; at least as important also is IBM's handling (read marketing) of the PS/2 vs OS/2 2.0. The qualitative difference is that OS/2 will run all your DOS applications; however you're PS/2 will not handle all your old AT-bus cards. Thus OS/2 is downward- compatible with all your old software; the PS/2 is NOT downward compatible with all your old hardware. The marketing difference is that the PS/2 costs about 3 times as much as a similarly equipped clone and, from the non-technical user's point of view, no obvious added function. IBM is notorious for very terse, technical marketing, and the masses don't go for the PS/2 because (and I'm simplying this argument, to say the least ;-) they couldn't care less about the technical mumbo-jumbo in PS/2 addvertisements. (I haven't seen a PS/2 advertisement in quite a while, mind you, but that's only because I don't read the trade rags all that often.) I don't really know all that much about the hardware differences myself; I *do* know that my 386/33 at home beats the pants off my 386/20 PS/2 at work. OS/2, on the other hand, has some pretty obvious and simple to explain benefits to the end user. The end user doesn't give a damn about 32 bit flat 4 Gig address spaces, task protection, pre-emptive multitasking, and the high- performance file system. The user *does* care, and understand, the equivalent phrases "your spreadsheet will run twice as fast" (since there's no more 64K segments to worry about and a 32 bit OS makes many other tasks faster); "your machine will never crash just because FinagoCalc crashed"; and "you can now have huge disks and files with far better performance". These are obvious benefits to the end-user. *This* is why OS/2 2.0 should take the market by storm whereas the PS/2 is only just dawdling along. -- NOTICE: Due to the complexity of nearly all topics, the opinions expressed above are in continual process of formation and may be changed without notice. Wayne Hayes INTERNET: wayne@csri.utoronto.ca CompuServe: 72401,3525