-=> CHARLES ANGELICH wrote to WAYNE CHIRNSIDE <=-

 CA> I've known a few who had 'mysterious' hard drive disasters
 CA> after repartitioning with FIPS and have, therefore, never used
 CA> it myself.

 Heh, most user friendly software I've ever used and it's 
 saved me on numerous occassions but you DO need
 to read the docs. Specifically mentioned is not
 to use on Compaq's with proprietary hard drive
 "setup" partition.
 You do need to defrag first, than remove any hidden files such
 as mirror.idx that may lurk at the end of the drive.
 I suspect your acquaintances didn't read the docs
 which are in fact rather brief and concise.
 Even without Linux I've used it as a recovery tool
 with great success.
 BTW I f'ed up and forgot I'd mirrored my old DOS -Win 3.1
 partition to floppy and need not have done a complete
 reinstall when I suffered a crash and burn, oops.

 CA> If I remember correctly W31 v5.x of Inernet Explorer even
 CA> writes entries into the REG.DAT of W31 (not often done by other
 CA> software) that will cause problems. I seem to recall trying to
 CA> edit them out and finally just replacing REG.DAT with a backup
 CA> copy.

 I didn't install over Win 3.1 and thus have a 32 bit FAT
 and so most everything I do is on the new system 
 though telnet is still confined to the Pentium 1.
 I need to save some money for things like 
 NetTerm for Windows 98 to telnet.

 CA> I like W98SE on the proper hardware with enough memory for it's
 CA> use. Other people's systems are a bit bloated with far too many
 CA> useless and unused icons on their desktop making it look really
 CA> stupid (to me). No one bothers to organize their 'start' menus
 CA> so that there is no easy way to find anything (even for them).
 CA> Most spend time changing colors, desktop pix, and often (a
 CA> really bad move) animated cursors.

 I need to move on that myself real soon.
 Currently 90 percent crap and once organized It'll
 have far fewer icons and organized for simplicity
 as well as a lot less stuff  in C.
 Need to partition, with FIPS, a swap partition for Windows
 as well as a Linux partition.
 
 WC> MSDOS.SYS? Wouldn't think you'd know this one for 9x? I'll
 WC> give it a shot.

 CA> I've used W9x over the years at work and at home but not on my
 CA> personal equipment. I know a few things about W9x and am
 CA> abysmally ignorant of other things.

 Ah.

 WC> BTW were you aware that "attrib," with the comma will strip
 WC> all attributes of a named file?

 CA> No I did not. Sounds like a bug that has been elevated to a
 CA> 'feature'. ;-)

 Thought I'd pass it along as you only recently discovered CD
 was the same as PWD in Linux, it's a useful bit of info.
 
 WC> Actually you can using another switch strip all attributes
 WC> from every file on the drive with one command.

 CA> The "/s" switch?

That be the one.

 WC> I found a dialer in all that mess that works fine. Now
 WC> logging on at 50.6K. Best speed on downloading a 33 meg
 WC> file, Netscape 7.0 was 50.11KB/sec.

 CA> That's a _very_ fast dialup connect if the software is
 CA> reporting the speed accurately. I don't think I've ever seen or
 CA> heard of one that fast. You must be sitting on top of the phone
 CA> companies equipment with an 8 foot connection. :-)

 I'm within 4,000 feet of the PH. Co.
 The DL time and reported speed agree approximately offhand
 without doing the math.
 Also I bitched for months about a lousy phone line where
 it would constantly resend bad blocks on a 14,400 modem
 so they finally switched my pairs.
 Left a bad taste in my mouth though and is why I'll soon switch providers.
 I remember when I _moved_ and Verizon insisted they'd moved my
 line to my new address but didn't and only corrected the situation
 after days when I grabbed a phone, wealked over to my old residence
 and called them from my number there. Retards!
 
 CA> My only problem is satisfying my ISP for a connect. Once online
 CA> all of BasicLinux works with no problems here. ISPs aren't
 CA> regulated that I know of and can really be a pita when they get
 CA> some 'new' idea and try to implement it without sound
 CA> professional advice.

 Agreed.
 WC> Big deal, the big hurdle was the machine itself, memory is
 WC> cheap these days and I'm thinking about maxing this box out
 WC> to 256 Meg. RAM.

 CA> I'm inclined to want 512meg if I'm going to bother swapping
 CA> memory in/out but after asking about memory limits in the W95
 CA> echo and getting no replies I'm not clear as to what OS will
 CA> use 512meg and what OS will just ignore more than 256meg.

 Think per manual this machine only supports 256 Meg., I'm happy...
 for now ;-)
 
 CA> The most recent discussions about BL2 on the elist revolved
 CA> around MSWord support. MSW isn't even compatible with other
 CA> versions of MSW. 
 
This I know, marketing instead of competence :-(

 CA> I think the consensus is that RTF is more
 CA> likely to be compatible but even that is not 100% and has
 CA> limitations.

 Not all that familiar with RTF.

 WC> What I'm going to be doing in the next few weeks is
 WC> checking out USB CD-ROM read-writers.

 CA> You may want to verify that you have USB 2?

 I'll check first of course, I always do which is 
 why I've never had hardware problems when hooking
 up new stuff.

 WC> There's a German fellows release that employs Dillo
 WC> graphical browser and the above refered to word processor
 WC> on a Redhad small footprint, 350 Meg, installation.

 CA> You might want to ask Steven Darnolds on the survpc elist about
 CA> Dillo. He has recently been looking at various Linux browsers
 CA> and might have a more objective opinion as to it's
 CA> usefulness/speed/etc.

I looked at the screen shots, impressive to say the least.
Source code just over 300K and binary about 200K!!!
 
 CA> My 2 cents fwiw is that the 'best' Linux is the one that most
 CA> of the people you know use. 
 
I find the more different types of software I use the more
I learn about the basics which often transfers to 
new software... well except for COBOL perhaps ;-)
I hated english in school and hate it worse as a programming
language!

 WC> I've now 2 decent machines so no problem. Likely though
 WC> I'll try relocating that fast UART to my working 486 board
 WC> way down the road when I've the time to play and try to
 WC> install a sufficiently versitile Linux on it and what will
 WC> become it's 325 meg drive when I replace the NEC's current
 WC> one.

 CA> An internal modem would save you much grief in that regard (my
 CA> 2 cents).

Financial resources limited and I do want to try doing something
relatively ambitious that used to be a snap.
If I blow it no loss.

 CA>> Keep in mind recent Linux, Windows, and others are being
 CA>> written for 2ghz machines now with installed memory on
 CA> video cards that can be 32 meg just for the video.

 WC> Not worried, 8 Meg on my video card will do for now and if
 WC> not I'll disable the onboard in CMOS and use up a slot.

 CA> My brother has 8 meg on his video card and it seems to be
 CA> sufficient for his uses. Streaming video is 'iffy' but I
 CA> suspect that is the combination of winmodem and a poorly
 CA> configured OS.

Opps, misspoke myself, THIS machine has an 8 Meg card, the H.P.
has a 32 :-)

 WC> I'll NEVER be running Win XP having seen that crud on my
 WC> landladies computer.

 CA> I won't say never but I will say I will be kicking and
 CA> screaming all the way to the end before using XP on anything
 CA> ever.

 The troubleshooting tool for XP is a .50 caliber Desert
 Eagle.

 WC> NS 7.0, 33 Meg., at 50K DL came down in an an hour 50
 WC> minutes approximately.

 CA> So my 2 hours was close. :-)

Yup.

 WC> Software modem works great but takes an unacceptably long
 WC> time to initiate logon, some 30 seconds :-( OTOH
 WC> downloading MultiMail for 9X was a few seconds.

 CA> Winmodems are not desirable but yes, they do seem to work on
 CA> newer hardware.

Yup.

 WC> Anyway that's another thing, Netscape does have a dialer
 WC> for 9x I can download but I'll have to look into the matter
 WC> of it accessing the soft modem driver.

 CA> It should work. I think the winmodem 'looks' like a real modem
 CA> to most (if not all) Windows software.

 WC> Hopefully it'll be supported, Rockwell HCL something or
 WC> other software modem. Need to see if this modem is
 WC> supported in Linux and if there's a readme in the .tgz

 CA> This is confusing (to me). Rockwell had a combo hard/soft modem
 CA> years ago that would even work for DOS. It had drivers for both
 CA> DOS and Windows. I had the impression Rockwell abanadoned that
 CA> design in favor of the winmodem (Windows only) and the little
 CA> bit I've read about Linux lead me to think Linux was only
 CA> attempting to support the latter (DOS compatible Rockwells) and
 CA> not the winmodems?

Not a clue as yet but if I run into difficulty there's the 
Linux supported software modem sitting in this machine unused.
I'd install 98 over 3.1 if the disk had the space for it here
and avail myself of that modem both in Linux and Windows
on this machine. 
Once I slap a real drive in this machine that'll be 
taken care of and I do believe I'll make it FAT 16
and keep 3.1
Still telneting off the NEC and surfing off the H.P.
Hey if I remove the base from this monitor I can fit 
both machines on that cart!
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