OS/2??? Geez, IBM may still be shipping their 16-bit graphical interface product. However, I can assure you that their driver support sucks swamp water in a big way.
We know this because we have been selling an OS/2 based proprietary turn-key product for the past ten years. Two weeks ago the company finally announced a MS-Windows 2000 version at IWCE-Las Vegas. Bottomline is they lost far too many RFP (request for proposal) which significantly effected the financial bottomline of their company. One of their competitors has decided on embedded Linux - but that has not proven a balm for the blinders used by customers when it comes to specifying MS-Windows 2000 and Ms-Windows XP as the required operating system they want. However, Howard's questions were originally about which version of Micro$oft's Windows was most functional for the broadest cross-section of computing hardware. Ref: http://www.xandros.com seems to have good reviews http://madpenguin.org/Article1049.html http://www.linuxjournal.com/article.php?sid=7449&mode=thread&order=0 http://www.xandros.com/news/reviews/linux_magazine.html from my favorite Linux writer Xandros is going to be a core product in the Linux-based desktop attack onto the Micro$oft juggernot. Asia has answered with a consortium which is going to put up a lot of financial resistance to Micro$oft's strangle hold on the desktop http://www.theregister.co.uk/2004/04/05/asiapacific_govts_sign_linux_promo/ Since Micro$oft is number one in their marketplace, they only have one direction to go as the competition increases their products usefulness. my $.02 worth John Oram Day Brown wrote: > howard schwartz wrote: > > >My proud history of survpc use starts with a trusty 486 for about 10 > years, then > >a beginning 100Mhz Pentuim for another 5, running doe and win95 ( no > yelling > >please). > > > >Well I went and made an impulse buy and got an IBM 660Mhz PC with a > 13 Gig disk > >, 128megs of ram, and windows 2000 `Professional' running on it, with > an NTFS > >file system. Apparently, just under the amount of ram and processor > speed to > >make a monster like win 2000 (or XP) run at decent speeds. > > > >Survpc PC types like me are not just fond of our old hardware, but of old > >windows, dos, even unix software that we would rather keep than try > to replace. > > > >In this regard which windows might offer the best combination of > welcome new > >features and backward compatibility? Many old programs, even windows 9x > >programs, do not speak nicely to the NTFS file system, and also can not > >talk to the `hardware abstraction layer' of the newer NT based > windows, to > >access hardware directly. There are weak dos emulations, some third party > >tries at better ones (e.g., DOSBOX). > > > >Offhand I suspect win98 supports the most old hardware and software, > whereas > >the newer NT based windows offer more stability, security, faster > devices like > >USB ports, etc. > > > >What do we all think about this issue? > > > Get OS/2 warp 4. I've seen it auctioned for 20$. > It can read NTFS. There's a version of Mozilla for it, and in 32 bit > mode. The only hitch I > see is your ISP, which may be using MS-CHAP, which the OS/2 ppp driver > may not support. > However, I have seen a new downloadable ISP package for OS/2 that should > handle it. > > Or- get XANDROS. Which is what I just ordered the other day from J&R, > 75$/incl shipping. > I have run the earlier version, COREL deluxe for several years. I'd > suggest the COREL, but > it's only got netscape 4.7 on the DEBIAN 2.2.16 kernel, and wont run > recent flash crap. But > I think it also does the NTFS, and the latest XANDROS, says it does, ... > along with their own > version of WINE, and some of the COREL win 9x apps, as well as almost > any other win 9x > program you are likely to have. The other thing I liked about COREL, > which I expect to see > with XANDROS, is that it will *automatically* find and configure all > your peripherals, and > that includes the drives. You dont havta go thru the usual LINUX 'mount' > bullshit to access a > drive. And it dont tell you dont have 'permission' to access a drive on > your own computer. > > It reads & writes all of the windoz file systems, and can interpret all > of the windows file > formats for display or editing. And it's even got a damn good dos emulator. > > > > > > >
