From: John Kim (jokim_at_CHS.CUSD.CLAREMONT.EDU)
Date: Mon Dec 20 1993 - 21:48:48 EST
You said you wanted one of these 28 (!) messages I got regarding the TP
back. I'm presuming it's this message since it was in reply to a message
addressed to all, and it only went to me.
------------------------------
From: Sean Chou <ychou_at_uxa.cso.uiuc.edu>
Sun, 19 Dec 1993 01:50:43 -0600 (CST)
To: jokim
Subject: Re: introduction (fwd)
> Nice to see you beat me to the punch with the mail forwarding account Sean.
> Less work for me... :)
Well, it was only logical once I saw your idea. After all, I have the
same thing set up at my school account for an OS/2 user group (it's
os2ug_at_uiuc.edu in case anyone's interested).
> The guy from New Zealand (whose mail I still haven't managed to forward so I
> guess I'd better hurry before his news posting expires...) works in OS/2
> support.
Yup, he'd be great to have along the list, especially if he uses a
TP750! :)
> Have you asked for the price on the color upgrade? $2999.95. Yuck.
> Although it does put the overall price in line with the few 750C machines I
> found with the substantial "dealer markup." The dealer is supposed to
> install it so some of that price may be labor charges.
Amazing! Only IBM can get away with this and they couldn't pull it off
with anything other than the 700 series. I seriously hope they reevaluate
their position and possible leadership in the notebook area. Of
course, that may be too close to a vision for their CEO...
> I'm finding that out too. It's just that the cost of the machine makes me
> vary leery of carrying it around like a real notebook. :)
That's what insurance is for! :) I'm definately insuring my TP for
piece of mind. And it also makes you paranoid..."I know he was looking
at my TP750...I think he's gonna mug me!" :) I just try to be casual
with it....but cautious still...
> price to something more reasonable than the $3000 it is now. Maybe the
> displays they're working on that address each line individually (just like
> dual-scan, except it's 480 line scan) will do the trick.
Well, dual-scan has really impressed me. Maybe they can do something
like a tetra-scan...
> When I called around looking for my memory upgrade, prices were just above
> $50/meg which I felt was pretty reasonable for low-power laptop memory
> (based on a low of about $25/meg for standard SIMMs before the fire). This
I recall the same. I was hoping for the 16mb but the initial money
I paid for the TP alone just really set me back...
> Where'd you buy your system? Obviously not from IBM Direct, who charges
> $650 extra for the 340MB model (that's almost $4/meg, no thank you).
> If the 2.5" drives develop anything like the 3.5" drives, they should be
> dirt cheap in a year or so. I can't believe I bought a 310 MB FH SCSI hard
> disk for $650 just over a year ago (now worth less than $250 if anyone was
> willing to buy that form factor).
I imagine the market will develop somewhat similarly to the 3.5 drives
especially with this new focus on desktop-replacing notebooks. That's
one reason why I wanted a hard drive that would be easily upgradeable
as well as universally supported (I believe that IBM has passed Mac
finally in the notebook arena). Any manufacturer in their right mind
is going to make sure their products work with the IBM (hasn't it almost
always been like that barring the MicroChannel fiasco which we can
attribute to a Diamond-like refusal to distribute specs).
> I don't think we'll ever see a MO drive on a portable. A MO drive writes by
> heating up the disk surface to something like 170 degrees Centigrade so the
> magnetic particles can be rearranged. That's going to kill your battery
> real quick. A MO drive set to read-only while running off the battery
> might be feasible.
That's why I always point to flopticals. It could be cheap enough if
it were popular and it can be used in notebooks easily (I would imagine).
> I am curious if IBM is working on the smaller CD-ROM format though.
> Panasonic has a notebook out that uses it. Since most CD-ROMs don't use
> anywhere near the full 600MB capacity of the 5 1/4" CDs, this may be a new
> standard in the making (with larger CD-ROM drives capable of reading both
> formats like Laserdisc players do today).
That would be quite nice. And the best part is, we don't have to wait
for IBM necessarily...maybe another company will see the potential in
it.
-- John H. Kim | "In fact, Chicago does support security. The sec- jokim_at_jarthur.cs.hmc.edu | urity APIs are there; they just don't do anything." This mail sent by NUPop | - Brad Silverber, VP Microsoft personal systems
This archive was generated by hypermail 2.1.3 : Thu Jan 23 2003 - 09:52:16 EST