Re: [WinMac] Bleeding edge
Dan Schwartz(expresso[at]snip.net)
Thu, 14 Jan 1999 11:55:21 -0500
I'll respond inline...
At 09:38 AM 1/14/99 -0500, Thomas Case wrote:
>
>First of all, note that I am an NT user... ;-)
>
>Has anyone else noticed how the requirements to run NT in a
>successful fashion seem to include:
>
>* incessant monitoring of the latest drivers
Only if you want to fine-tune NT; and usually they get blown out anyway
when the latest Service Pack is released...
Also, the "driver snipe-hunt" isn't as bad as in windoze 95/98.
>* installing optional GUI front-ends
>* using alternate color management schemes
Huh?
>* hacking the Registry
Again, only if you want to fine-tune it. I use Sean Daily's very fine
"Optimizing Windows NT" book as a guide. Also, many third party apps and
utilities have GUI's that do the Registry tweaking to minimize the risk of
BSOD.
[A good example of this is "Tune," part of the SuperCache utility.]
>* ... etc, ad nauseam ...
>
>not to mention the need to run it on esoteric hardware (i.e. Alpha)
>as well as signing up for ultra-premium customer support services
>>from one of the country's top two premier vendors of aforementioned
>hardware.
Well, I disagree with you about the Alpha platform being "esoteric:" It is
available from over 30 vendors providing all sorts of levels of support...
And hardware price points.
And $1700 for a complete 533 mHz Alpha 164SX system certainly plants it
squarely in the face of G3 Macs as well as non-"screwdriver-job"
rePentiums. Even mid-level Alpha cloners (such as Microway, Aspen, and
Enorex) have complete systems for under $2500. [BTW, the movie "Titanic"
was assembled on about 200 Microway Alpha clones -- About half NT, and half
Linux.]
>
>In short, for successful deployment of NT, the receipe seems to be to
>do nothing short of rewriting and/or tweaking large parts of the OS as
>well as adopting a hardware platform that the designer of NT never
>intended the OS to work on, as well as to contract for far better support
>than just about all users of NT have access to.
Actually, NT was designed to be portable from the beginning, with over 95%
of the code written in C. Only the lowest level calls are CPU-specific.
When NT was originally written, it was ported to SEVEN platforms:
1) Alpha (AXP)
2) i860
3) i960
4) Sparc
5) PowerPC
6) MIPS
7) x86
Also, DIGITAL's support is (mostly) free; and always toll-free.
>
>Do I hear the words 'bleeding edge' and 'reality check' - the latter as in
>the 'desperate need for a' context?
No less "bleeding edge" than a PowerPC 750 CPU (G3) Mac...
>
>FYI, the famed David Cutler actually has had very little part in the making
>of the upcoming NT5. Maybe that's why the project isn't going anywhere.
>In either case, Cutler's back again for NT6 - as far as I have heard. Maybe
>by then the problems will be taken care of.
I'll have to verify this
>
>At least with the release of NT6 SP4 surely.
>
>Thomas Kase
>
> US-Style.com Inc., 33 south main street, #7, south norwalk, ct 06854
> phone: 203.866.4454 fax: 203.866.4546
> email: thomas@accessio.com
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