Path: utzoo!attcan!uunet!ginosko!uakari.primate.wisc.edu!ames!pacbell!att!chinet!mcdchg!ddsw1!ddsw1!point!wek
From: wek@point.UUCP (Bill Kuykendall)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.ibm.pc
Subject: Re: Is the XT dead?
Message-ID: <[2225.2]comp.ibmpc;1@point.UUCP>
Date: 29 Sep 89 13:00:05 GMT
References: <1989Sep27.104957.24581@cs.dal.ca> <8778@galbp.LBP.HARRIS.COM>
Lines: 34

>Are 8086/8088-based machines obsolete? Nearly so? How long have they got?

I will quote Bill Gates: "If you want to be compatible with the new software
and operating systems of the near future, don't buy anything less than a
386SX."  I would go a step further and recommend the 386DX with 32-bit bus. 
While the new software and OS's will run on the SX, anything that loads the
machine at all will be painfully slow on a 16-bit bus.

On the other hand, I belong to a user group that still has a tenacious core
of users who keep improving Z80 (CP/M) machines and refuse to move on. 
Their argument is that the old machines refuse to stop doing what they bought
them for every time Microsoft introduces something new.

Indeed, the XT's now run the largest library of software known to exist for
any computer ever built to date.  And while that library has begun to grow
at a slower rate, and may even be overtaken in size by some other
architecture, the software that runs today will not be changed by events in
the OS/2 world.

So the first question is not, "What machines should I buy", but "What do
these machines need to be able to do now and in the next 5 years?"  If you
can answer that question with today's software, an XT is a very reasonable
solution for you.  If not, you should consider a 386.

>So, my point here is (I guess) that the price gap is very close. The
>difference in an XT and an AT is negligible. XT's won't drop out of
>existence any time soon because of the number of price-sensitive persons

I would agree that AT's are better XT's for the small price difference. 
They are every bit as obsolete as XT's though.  Buy them for their speed if
the price makes sense, but not for their compatibility.

Bill Kuykendall
...ddsw1!point!wek