> > I for one would use a QuBide with another IDE slot on it. > > Do not forget that it has an Ethernet port on it, flash rom plus more > bells and whistles than your average coffee maker :-) In terms of software drivers, what would Ethernet require to connect to other computers on a network? Would one driver be it (i.e. largely device independen to use QL-speak) or would it need various drivers depending on what it was hoping to connect to?
What I'm getting at (not being familar with PC networks) is would you need a driver to access Ethernet in general (or another QL on ethernet), another driver to access a PC over a network, another driver to talk to a printer hub, another to talk to a Mac etc etc. I am still smarting a bit from other QL hardware like Aurora which for all their promised merits (no blame fired at anyone here) were not fully usable until the drivers eventually came along (thinking of Aurora 256 colours which were not fully supported until Marcel took the law into his own hands). You can probably see what I'm hinting at, if drivers are an issue, and we were asking Quanta to assist with development costs, need this only apply to the hardware or do we need to think of the software costs too. -- Dilwyn Jones
