OS/2 e-Zine! - Linfield's Line

Linfield's Line

- by Kevin Linfield

When I was Young...

Although I am still under 30, I have seen computers change from the Commodore PET and APPLE II to the Pentium Pro and the Power PC. I've bought a number of computers ranging from a Commodore 64 in 1983 (and the Commodore PLUS 4 which soon after died a horrible death) to my latest AMD 486DX2-66 (yes, I want a Pentium Pro, no I can't afford it!). What has happened to computers? Are we better off now or are we heading for a fall?

Memory

I currently do not own a computer with less than 12 MB of RAM. Even my 16 MB machine sometimes swaps hard when I put OS/2 through its paces. OS/2 has always chewed up RAM. The 4 MB it says on the box is for masochists only. Eight minimum, 16 is better. But it is not just OS/2. Look to Win95, Win NT, and UNIX for other examples of pigs. Only DOS still lets us get by with less than 4 MB, but even then, DOOM type games want more. My Commodore 64 had a whopping 64kB of RAM, but I played some of the best games of my life on that machine (Archon, Blue Max, Loadrunner, Paradroids, etc). I used PaperClip for my word processing (it could hold 10 pages of text max) and Pocket Planner for my spreadsheet. I think I was happy.

Storage

Ha! I used a tape drive with my Commodore 64 for the first year and then that horribly slow 180kB single sided single density floppy disk drive. Then again, with your operating system on ROM and only 64kB of RAM, how much storage do you need? My main machine now has 1.5GB of hard drive space (recently up from 500MB). OS/2 takes up a 70 MB partition (full install) plus I have most of the BonusPak and lots of commercial software that I have reviewed over the years. Not to mention games like Duke Nukem 3D of course, and data files, graphics, and junk I never even knew I had.

CPU

Well, it's nothing like my 66 MHz 486, but the 6510 ran at 1.01 MHz. Do I need to say anything else here except to note that the C64 was no speed demon?

Graphics

Hands down, my ATI Mach 32 at 1280x1024x256 kicks the C64's video chip. But in 1983, the C64's graphics were much better than the EGA or monochrome PCs. Although now I have more real estate, most programs do not take advantage of my resolution except for letting me see more at one time. DOS games still run in 320x200 low resolution so I don't think I've gained 13 years worth of technology.

Possible Reasons

So, are we better off? In many cases yes. WYSIWYG DeScribe would not be an option, and I can't imagine SLIPping onto the Internet with my 300 bps Pocket Modem. But back then, programs were written in assembler code instead of C. They had to be fast and efficient. Nowadays, if you write a bloated program (like Microsoft Word) it is up to the user to upgrade his RAM or CPU, it's not Microsoft's job to make the program better. What can we do? Not much as a consumer. Programs like Clearlook are rare, and most programs we buy are bloated. CD-ROMs allow us to store over 600MB of information so I personally don't think that any company will not take advantage of the extra space. I guess we just grin and bear it until the revolution comes.

Kevin Linfield is a Toronto based consultant and a freelance writer.

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