Xref: utzoo comp.sys.mac:21556 comp.misc:3761
Path: utzoo!utgpu!water!watmath!clyde!att!osu-cis!tut.cis.ohio-state.edu!rutgers!mailrus!ames!vsi1!ubvax!ardent!kmw
From: kmw@ardent.UUCP (Ken Wallich)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.mac,comp.misc
Subject: Re: NeXT press release (very long but interesting)
Message-ID: <645@ardent.UUCP>
Date: 14 Oct 88 20:23:09 GMT
References: <5423@juniper.uucp> <72886@sun.uucp> <635@ardent.UUCP> <73003@sun.uucp>
Reply-To: kmw@ardent.UUCP (Ken Wallich)
Followup-To: comp.misc
Organization: Ardent Computer
Lines: 59

Let's move this to comp.misc, if Mac owners are interested, they can follow
it there.

>Well, I never thought of it that way.  Maybe your right.  I guess it all
>depends on how you look at it.  For example, leaving out a few words you
>could have either:
>
>       "The Optical Disk combines ... laser technology with ... Winchester
>       (magnetic) technology."
>
>or:
>
>       "The Optical Disk combines removability and reliability and ...
>       read/write/erase capabilities ...."
>
>So either it's a hybrid of the two technologies or its just optical
>technology that has the same features as magnetic technology.  Isn't
>English fun?

And leaving out a few words from the last paragraph it says:

So [...] it's [...] just optical technology that has the same features as
magnetic technology.  I don't see your point.  Besides, you are taking a
phrase from someone who simply put what he saw and heard into his own words,
not the official words from NeXT.

English is fun, but by leaving out words, words that add MEANING to a phrase,
you aren't finding dual meanings, you are simply building a phrase that
contains the ambiguity that was never there, or intended to be there.

The press release says:

"To break through these restrictions, NeXT  used a new storage technology 
called magneto-optics to create a  removable, read/write/erasable 256
Megabyte Optical Disk as the Computer System's standard mass storage
device."

I *would* like to know exactly what 'megneto-optics' means, but otherwise it
seems clear, there is one disc, and it contains 256Meg of removable storage.
I don't see any ambiguity, only a question of exactly what type of a
mechanism is involved in putting that much data onto compact removable media
reliably and quickly.  There is not even a hint that we are talking about 
some sort of hybrid with part magnetic and part optical technology.

I have problems with the NeXT box having only one form of storage that
comes standard, and having that also be the only backup medium.  I suppose he 
missed the disc swapping that we had to do on the original 128K mac before 
the external floppy was ready, and decided that no one would mind, it would 
make them feel like it was a real 'steve' product.  Of course, I'd be putting
one of those old reliable 300 meg Winchesters on mine, since I don't trust
this megneto-optics stuff yet :-).

Anyway, followups to comp.misc.  This really doesn't belong here.


-- 
Ken Wallich 			 	
Ardent Computer Corp		kmw@ardent.com
Sunnyvale, California, USA      "chance is the fools name for fate"