Message-ID: <889@watdcsu.UUCP>
Date: Fri, 1-Feb-85 10:23:35 EST
Article-I.D.: watdcsu.889
Posted: Fri Feb  1 10:23:35 1985
Date-Received: Fri, 1-Feb-85 23:38:06 EST
Reply-To: haapanen@watdcsu.UUCP (Tom Haapanen [DCS])
Organization: U of Waterloo, Ontario
Lines: 55
Xref: watmath net.unix:3493 net.micro.pc:3235 net.micro.68k:549 net.micro.trs-80:257

< ... >

Subsequent to the information I received in response to my questions
abut UNIX for the PC/XT and PC/AT, I did some shopping around in
Toronto yesterday.  The amazing thing is that all these computer
stores at least now recognize the word 'UNIX'.  Not so a few years
back.

Computerland says the PC/AT is not available right now, and they don't
know when it will be.  IBM Product Centre says "Yes, they are
available, but we don't know when we will get some, or how many."
I.e., they don't have any either.  AT XENIX is supposedly having
problems, and nobody knows when it will be out.  "There's still two
months left in the first quarter..." says the IBM salesman.

Several stores offered Lisas with 15M of hard disk and SCO XENIX for
*very* good prices.  Alas, Lisa hard disks are *slow*.  However, to
quote a Lisa salesman: "The Lisa blows the PC out of the water, and is
still much faster than a PC/AT."  Right.

The Xerox store offered a Compaq Deskpro with UNIX.  "Is that XENIX,"
I asked.  "Well, what do you want, UNIX or XENIX?" I was asked.  She
had no idea what the UNIX was except that it came "directly from
AT&T".  That's the first I have heard of AT&T doing a port onto the
8086.  In any case, using an 8086 with three users did not appeal to
me.

The last, and most productive, stop was at (surprise!) the Radio Shack
Computer Centre.  Model 16Bs were being sold dirt-cheap, as they are
being replaced by the Tandy 6000.  This new machine still runs a
68000, but at 8 MHz instead of 6 MHz.  It also allows much more memory
(using 256K chips), and more serial ports.  It comes with XENIX 3.0
instead of the old XENIX 1.3.  To quote an internal document:

"After a brief appearance ... IBM has indicated that the AT is
experiencing some difficulty running XENIX 3.0 and will return
to the marketplace again 'sometime during the second quarter of
1985.'  The 6000 will come with XENIX 3.0 and the capability of
running with nine users as opposed to the AT's three."

The prices are also down --- $8000 with a 15 Meg disk (that's about
$5500-6000 US) and the 16B's can be upgraded.

Comments?


\tom haapanen		university of waterloo	      	(519) 885-1211 x2324

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linus  /		The opinions herein are not those of my employers,
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