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From: hrh@well.UUCP (Harry Henderson)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.ibm.pc
Subject: Re: IBM PS/2
Message-ID: <3735@well.UUCP>
Date: Wed, 12-Aug-87 14:16:32 EDT
Article-I.D.: well.3735
Posted: Wed Aug 12 14:16:32 1987
Date-Received: Sat, 15-Aug-87 01:30:29 EDT
References: <1338@dataio.Data-IO.COM>
Reply-To: hrh@well.UUCP (Harry Henderson)
Organization: Whole Earth 'Lectronic Link, Sausalito, CA
Lines: 38

>
>	o Why are the control and caps lock keys swapped? ARGG. Who designs
>	  those silly keyboards? I use 4 different keyboards on a daily
>	  basis, and three of them are IBM (the other's a VT100)!

Can't think of any good reason. The old position for Ctrl allowed you
to reach many more keys with the same hand. Who designs the keyboards?
Maybe concert pianists with long fingers.
>	o The thing seems to always boot up with numlock on.

Now this makes more sense. It comes up with numlock on because you can
now use the numeric keyboard solely for entering numbers, and use the
separate pad for all cursor movement functions.
>	o If you follow the directions on installing MSDOS, you wind up
>	  with only 32 mb of disk, instead of the available 40.

That limitation is built into MS-DOS itself.

>	o I don't mind switching to 3.5" disks. However, IBM comes out
>	  with two flavors (1.44mb and .72mb). Yuk! Why not just the 1.44?
>	  Why don't all PS2's come standard with 1.44? Then us software
>	  vendors could distribute on 1.44s, instead of always the lowest
>	  common denominator. Here we are with the 1.2mb/360kb problems
>	  all over again, and this time from day 1!

Distribute on 720K disks. They can be read by the 1.44 mb. I have
found that 1.44MB capacity is only marginally useful on my Model 50
because it refuses to format most name-brand 2MB unformatted capacity
disks. I guess it only works reliably with the very expensive ($4-5
each) IBM 1.44MB disks. Anyone know of a cheaper brand that works
reliably on the PS/2?




-- 
The opinions expressed are my own, but you're welcome to share them.
Harry Henderson (freelance technical editor/writer).