Path: utzoo!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!mailrus!cornell!rochester!uhura.cc.rochester.edu!akk2 From: akk2@uhura.cc.rochester.edu (Atul Kacker) Newsgroups: comp.sys.ibm.pc Subject: Re: TOPS, PCs & MACs Message-ID: <852@ur-cc.UUCP> Date: 13 Feb 89 13:32:40 GMT References: <1765@cps3xx.UUCP> <914@stech.UUCP> Reply-To: akk2@uhura.cc.rochester.edu (Atul Kacker) Distribution: usa Organization: University of Rochester Lines: 51 In article <914@stech.UUCP> sysop@stech.UUCP (Jan Harrington) writes: > How does the PC TOPS Flash Card compare to a PC/Appletalk card? > >Use either one. Both support the TOPS software. Flash Card may be >cheaper. The last time I checked, the Apple PC/Appletalk card did not allow you to have two serial devices in addition to the card. The card took over one of the serial interrupts. So, if like me you already have a modem on one serial port and a mouse on the other, you can't use the Apple PC/Appletalk card. This is stated very clearly (hah) on page 110 of their manual. I feel that this should be on the box so that the user is aware of it *BEFORE* they buy the card. On the other hand, the TOPS FlashCard coexists just fine with two other serial devices. In fact that's what I have on the machine I am using now. One other point. The software from TOPS will work on *any* AppleTalk card, while the software from Apple will *only* work with Apple's PC/AppleTalk card. Case in point - Apple's PC AppleShare client software. >NETPRINT will take non-postscript output and make it postscript before >sending it to the printer. If you've got an application that generates >its own postscript (e.g., PageMaker, Word, Works, Word Perfect), then you >don't need it. Just substitute the port on the Appletalk board for the >printer port. However, for applications that don't generate postscritp, >you will need it. I'm not very sure about this. My understanding was that NETPRINT was required if you wanted to print to a networked printer, even if your application program generated PostScript output. >> Can MS-Word and a fully configured TOPS network node reside in 640K? >> > Yes. MS-Word, maybe, but not much else. The other programs that I know will not work with a fully configured TOPS node are Lotus Agenda and PC-TeX. TOPS does not currently allow you to put their memory resident software anywhere else in expanded or extended memory. There are some cards that do work with TOPS to give you some additional memory just above 640K that TOPS will use. One such card is called HYCARD from RYBS Electronics I believe. These cards will not give any added functionality on some machines. TOPS FlashCards come with a program that you can run on your machine to see if purchasing a HYCARD would be in order. -- Atul Kacker | Internet: akk2@uhura.cc.rochester.edu | UUCP: {ames,cmcl2,decvax,rutgers}!rochester!ur-cc!akk2 -------------------------------------------------------------------------------