[WinMac] Re: NT Services for Mac vs. Dave & PC MacLan?

Dan Schwartz(expresso[at]snip.net)
Sun, 07 Mar 1999 11:58:12 -0500

        Tim, you nailed it on the first count: Lack of support from MIS guys
towards Macs! :)

        However, I take issue with NT's SFM (Services for Macintosh) having many
bugs: Most all of them have been nailed with NT4/SP4. In fact, some of the
bugs boomerang back to System 7 and early versions of Open Transport. When
it comes to storing and sharing many thousands of dual fork Mac files
transparently (such as a "Font Folio" volume) I feel a LOT more confident
storing them on an NTFS volume with dual streams than on an HFS volume...
And even over an HFS Extended volume.

        Where SFM *really* comes in handy is on two counts:

        1) On NT workstations (running NT/Server with SFM), because it makes them
visible in the Chooser;

        2) On the Macs, I like to keep them "lean and mean" with as few Extensions
and Control Panels as possible. I use a small utility, CheckTicks, to
estimate how much (many) CPU resources a particular CDEV &/or INIT takes up
[CheckTicks makes 10,000 GetNextEvent calls and totals up how many
60/second "ticks" it takes to execute this loop.] Running DAVE adds to the
load on the MacOS, since it binds NetBIOS into the IP stack.

        About 2 months ago, I tried the demo of DAVE 2.1 on 3 Macs, and had
crashes on all three... Traceable back to DAVE 2.1. The Macs were an
8500/180e and G3 desktop running 8.5.1, and a Quadra 650 running 7.6.1 & OT
1.3. Again, I stress that the fewer "accoutrements" one adds to System
7/MacOS, the better - Both in terms of speed and stability.

        Cheers!
        Dan

PS: Want to have some fun? Add Adobe Type Reunion v1.2 to a Mac, and watch
the speed cut in HALF! (You can find the older ATR on a Photoshop 3 or
PageMaker 6.0 CD.)
...DLS

At 08:36 AM 3/7/99 -0500, Tim replied to Adam:
>> I've read so many posts on WinMac regarding recommendations to use Dave, PC
>> MacLan and other additional networking software. I don't understand why
>> this is necessary.

        [cut]

>> Why is Dave, PC MacLan or any additional networking software necessary when
>> AppleTalk, NT and Novell have all of this already built-in?
>
> There are a couple of reasons.
>
> First, NT's Services for the Macintosh requires additional
>administration to install and configure that many NT Administrators
>aren't willing to do. It also isn't perfect and has many bugs.
>
> Second, Dave works over TCP/IP. Most third party servers
>only use the AppleTalk protocol for Macs. For me that is a huge
>advantage because I can get into the NT servers at work from home
>across the internet. Without Dave I can't do that.
>
> Third, if you are not running a dedicated server one of those
>products is less expensive than a server OS.
>Tim Scoff, MCSE
>casper@nb.net
><http://www.nb.net/~casper/>

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