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Path: utzoo!mnetor!genat!clunk!bvax!da
From: da@bvax.UUCP (Dave Sellers)
Newsgroups: comp.terminals
Subject: Re: HDS terminals
Message-ID: <316@bvax.UUCP>
Date: Fri, 13-Nov-87 08:07:34 EST
Article-I.D.: bvax.316
Posted: Fri Nov 13 08:07:34 1987
Date-Received: Sun, 15-Nov-87 15:39:54 EST
References: <7@bbking.PRC.Unisys.COM>
Organization: Bell Canada, Toronto, CANADA
Lines: 40
Summary: HDS TERMINAL - reliability (fixed?)


There has been a lot of talk re the reliability of the HDS terminals on
the net over the last week. I was the person here at Bell Canada that
recommended that we purchase HDS terminals, and, I think we now have
about 800 of them and plan to purchase hundreds more.

Yes there has been problems with them. The problems were with the fly-back
unit that burned up after about 9 months of continous service. The supplier
tells me the trouble was with the manufacturing of these units in Japan.
I'm no expert, but they said it is difficult to make these units for the
HDS because of the technique that is required to get the very large display
on the terminal. It puts a heavier load on the fly-back or something and if
the manufacturing proccess is not done just right and the materials used
are not the best, they break down.

For those who don't have an HDS, some of the best features of the HDS are:
- the large 15" display that when put in 132 column mode looks close to
the standard character size of a VT100 (and the screen is not cleared when
you toggle back and forth).
- two communications ports and a printer port are available.
- 8 pages of memory, up to 8 windows, 4 view ports.
- 55 (110 shifted/unshifted) user-defined non-volatile soft keys that can
be down loaded if required.
- multiple character sets.
and simultaneous multiple computer communications. (doesn't flow-control off
the other system.)
Just to mention a few. The users just love them!

Back to reliability. The HDS people said that they have now resolved the
fly-back problem by changing the commpany doing the manufacturing and
re-engineering the unit. They have made these changes and now call the
terminal the HDS2000. Lets hope it is fixed (they haven't lied before).

In summary, I haven't found a terminal that can do what these can at the
same $$$$ value. I think others on the net will support this.

Dave Sellers

Dave's Data Centre (DDC)
"No job is too tough if you pay us enough"