#: 9874 S1/General Interest
    20-Mar-91  17:03:20
Sb: #9865-#OS-9/OS-9000 Features
Fm: David L. Kaleita 72657,2775
To: William Verthein 76557,3623 (X)

William, I WAS planning on using OS-9000 for use in talking to the GM MAP
network (their world-wide factory network) by writing a driver,  but  my
company just announced that they are just about to go under and... well, I
jumped ship and am starting work with a NEW company in a week which does
military work. I may still do that MAP network stuff for GM though, but on a
contract basis directly with GM. In the meantime, I'll be using OS-9000 at home
for my own computing pleasure.

I got the full-blown "PRO" version, which sells for $995 directly from
Microware. The RAVE "DevPak" is another $750.

By the way, RAVE stands for "Real-Time Audio/Video Environment" and provides a
very elaborate set of tools for developing real time applications which use
sound and/or graphics.

Now for the down side: The present releases for PC/OS-9000 and RAVE require a
very specific hardware configuration for your PC. First of all, your maching
MUST be a 386 or 486 and have more than 640K of RAM. You MUST have at least one
hard drive with a decent amount of free space on it. If your hard drive is
SCSI, your controller card MUST be an Adaptek #1540. If you plan on ever
running RAVE, your system MUST have an ATI VGA Wonder card with 512K of video
RAM. And although the VGA Wonder+ card has a mouse port and comes with a bus
mouse, you cannot use it. Instead, you must have a SERIAL mouse connected to
COM1: or COM2: (Microware recommends the Logitech 3-button serial mouse for
best results). Presently, PC/OS-9000/RAVE does not support any sound cards, but
rumour has it that a driver for the Creative Labs' Sound Blaster card is
forthcoming.

I thought I had all of the above basis covered when I bought my machine, but
alas, I wasn't aware of the Adaptek SCSI requirement and ended up with a card
by Always Technology. I'm now trying to sell it back to my dealer so I can but
the Adaptec. 

So so far, although I've had the stuff since last Friday, I still can't install
it on my machine.  

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