Prices & Rants(was: Future Computing Trends. Still is, I gu

From: jpero_at_cgo.wave.ca <(jpero_at_cgo.wave.ca)>
Date: Sun Feb 22 12:02:34 1998

> <Snip>
> > The oldest part is toshiba 1.44 I have no idea
> > how old but I think it was about 5 years old. Hard to find a good
> > floppy drive that will last that long now. But tell me if there is
> > one out there that good and costs $40 and I will take it!
>
> What's happening to prices? Just returned from a show...Mitsumi FDD's, $16,
> sound cards $12, speakers $10...cases $18!!!
>
> > Only problem with disposeable PC if the makers gives us the >machines
> > too non-standard and hard to expand n' upgrade
> ...a la Packard Bell...but now it seems EVERYONE is making purpose-designed
> motherboards and cases. The best thing about keeping older PC's going (just
> to keep this on track) is interchangability of parts: P/S, for example.
> What's gonna happen to us electronically challenged types when the HP
> Pavilion P/S smokes -- am I going to go, hat in hand, to HP for another --
> at their prices?
>
Manney and other disbelieving guys...

Missed my point; I prefer to buy quality one if I can find one and
that floppy example is what I'm driving at.

Mitsumi and Epson floppy drives are junk. I had too many of those
fail before year is up and use was not that heavy. Panasonic and few
Teac is just o. k. but not on my esteemed list. Also those cheapo
stuff that you have shown these prices, that is also junk unless it
uses ESS chipset for sound cards. Cases for 18? That is not what I
like about these. The chassis is not as rugged (I can crush one in
my hands) and not precise as I like when fitting parts into it and
very scary sharp edges. Those cases is hard on hard drives as
vibrates too much due to too flexiable sheet metal and naturally
more noisy. PSU have cheap parts inside and fan will fail inside. I
do have bunch of PSU's with failed fans and all of them are sleeve
bearing type, very doubtful of finding one with ball bearing fans
stuff there. Same with CPU heatsink with fan. I had few 10 to 15
dollar range thingy fail on me in a row and currently using a tall
heatsink without fan. Original the last in series, heatsink fan
failed within a month and using a PSU ball bearing fan with paper to
direct airflow on bare heatsink and similar fan is inside that PSU.
Smooth and very quiet, no failure for last 2 years of 24 hours use.

Add extra 10 to the $15, extra 20 to $30 and extra 50 for $100 to
individual parts so on and you get a wonderful stuff in a box and
keep cheap users happy and worry free for years to come.

The worry about the disposeable machines if they went too far on cost
and used too cheap stuff in it there will be too much problems.
So this would be fad thing in next 2 years and gone like the PCjr and
VLB thing. This have happened already to PB and most of PB users
who got one for first time and upgrades come around discovered
everything to their distaste then swore off PB next time around and
stick to good stuff. IBM machines are not that bad now that they're
using ATX boards. Many machines including Dell, Micron, GW2K etc are
on the ATX buswagon now and that means any guys who prefer their own
boards could swap out their boards for specific ones.

Aceropen stuff is not too bad too even their cases are on par with
Elan Vital cases.

Jason D.
email: jpero_at_cgo.wave.ca
Pero, Jason D.
Received on Sun Feb 22 1998 - 12:02:34 GMT