Gentlemen! I enjoyed the March issue of MacSense, as I've enjoyed your past issues. I'm writing because I would like to respond to the drivel that was passed off as an article titled "The Reality Distortion Field". Perhaps you are not aware, but this "rah-rah Windows, Apple is in the dumpster" garbage gets printed repeatedly in PC specific magazines. If the author feels it necessary to pray at the altar of Bill G., fine! But leave us REAL computer users out of it!
DOS/Windows PCs suffer from an archaic architecture, kludged and patched and hacked over the years to try to keep pace. Macs may be proprietary, but they work and work well. Let's try and leave this drivel for the PC rags, who fill pages with this kind of stuff rather than saying one harsh word about Microsoft (lest they cut advertising dollars, and they would!).
— Ray Polczynski, via America Online
As I use both platforms, I especially like your "Through the Looking Glass" column and its PC user perspective. When I used to read MacUser, my favorite column was John Dvorak's anti-editorial column. I hope you continue “Through the Looking Glass” in this vein.
— Dennis Bay, via the Internet
Mr. Chartier's article displays many of the preconceptions about Macintoshes common among PC partisans. In particular, his view of the Macintosh seems stuck in the late 1980's and early 1990's: when there was certainly a period of Macintosh overpricing; when there may not have been enough experience with Windoze for its inadequacies to become very apparent; and when Microsoft's vaporware and bloatware tendencies had not yet become as pronounced as they are now.
Chartier gives me the strong impression that ease of use and setup is somehow less-than- relevant, when it can make an enormous amount of difference to those who must use the systems. Increased ease of use and setup translates to less time wasted on a lot of non- essential details. Mr. Chartier also falls into the trap of many PC advocates, hailing select PC features as breakthroughs when those very features have been present on Macintoshes for years.
— Loren Petrich, via the Internet
I think we should all welcome Mr. Chartier and his ‘PC Perspective’ to MacSense.
I think, though, he has been reading too many Microsoft press releases and suffers from his own “reality distortion”. I will agree with Mr. Chartier that Apple has not always had the wisest marketing plan or a realistic pricing structure, but that is where we part company.
Mr. Chartier suggests that Mac users, for the past ten years, have been “contriving rea- sons” to justify the purchase of a Mac over a PC. I work as computer system maintenance for a non-profit company that cannot afford the top-of-the-line Pentiums and Power-PCs. We make do with donated SEs, Mac IIs, and 100 series PowerBooks. We also have an equal number of donated XTs, 286s, and 386s. The PCs are junk in comparison to their Mac counterparts—I would, for productivity reasons alone, trade all of my PCs for half their number in Macs. (Let’s not even talk about maintenance issues!)
Another argument of Mr. Chartier’s that I must object to is the ‘bigger is better’ assertion. Mr. Chartier implies that since there are more applications for the PC that it must be the better or more serious business tool. This is a debate for adolescent boys and has no place in a serious OS discussion. Productivity is the bottom line, is it not? With regards to Mr. Chartier’s ‘close examination’ of the list of titles ported for the Mac, I have two comments. First, any close examination of a Mac catalogue shows that barely 10% of the titles are games. Secondly, the reason most of the people I know who leave Macs in favor of PCs is because they want to be able to play more games!
Again, I would like to welcome Mr. Chartier's perspective to MacSense. However, I must respectfully request his future arguments be based a little more in fact than 'what is PC'.
— Randy Fippinger, via America Online
When PCSense debuts, I will welcome Roy's comments. In a Mac publication, however, his views are totally out of place, unneeded and unwanted.
— Don Douglas, via Helix Online
PCSense? Isn’t that an oxymoron? — Ed.
 
 
MacSense: The Macintosh E-Zine is a nice surprise. As I search for reading material that's informative, interesting and not over my head, discovering MacSense was great. Having it delivered in my eMailbox is better yet. I am rather new to the world of netting but far from new to the world. (I'd rather net than knit!) I especially liked your article about Mac problems and how to solve them. I hope that will be a regular feature. When I first got my computer I was on the phone with Apple a lot (they were wonderful and never failed me), but now I have learned to do most of my own repairs. Keep working hard on your eZine.
— Helen, via America Online.
"About this Macintosh…" is MacSense's new regular technical help and tip chapter, and will appear in each issue. And thank you, Helen, for your support! — Ed.
 
 
I don't have any real loyalty to the Apple product. To illustrate the point, I have recently begun to look at Windows '95. It seems to me that many of the programs that I use now are also available on the Windows side, too. The only thing that stops me is that I have considerable expenditure in the Mac as it is now. To make a long story short, I would definitely consider buying a Mac clone. I was one of the first to buy a Mac Plus here in Manitoba—and it was $4,000 Cdn. at the time. Imagine what I could buy with that same $4 G's today!!!
— Brian Cochrane, via the Internet.
Though I've had a Macintosh on my desk since my SE in '88, I consider my loyalties to Apple to be as firm as their loyalties to me—tenuous at best and self-interested at all turns.
As the proud owner of a Centris 610—discontinued a mere three months after my purchase— I've had to rely on third parties to configure a system that could at least keep up with today's computing demands. When I bought my Centris I was reentering the computer world after having used my SE for primarily word processing—I was blinded by a love for the Macintosh and trusted Apple to sell me a product I would love as well. Apple suckered me by selling me a computer that offered a vast improvement over my older unit but was hideously unprepared to keep up with the prevailing trends in computing.
Don't get me wrong: I love the Macintosh. But the affair is with the OS, not the hardware. I hope that Apple is considering that as they pay less and less attention to CURRENT Mac owners in favor of winning over NEW owners, they are potentially losing one of their most potent marketing weapons: happy Mac owners who spread the word.
— Greg May, via Internet.
As far as Mac clones are concerned, I believe the only way that Apple will be
able to pry existing PC owners away from the WinTel camp is to offer PC owners FREE sidegrades from their existing PC software to the Mac equivalents. I know that if I were a PC user, I would be reluctant to make the switch if I had to repurchase a Mac compatible word processor, spreadsheet, database, etc. The cost could easily be greater than the cost of the hardware.
This will have to be a promotion held in conjunction with the software vendors, with each subsidizing the cost of the program. Though the costs may be high initially, just consider the many benefits. I think that the user base of Macintosh (and clone) computers would multiply significantly, easily benefitting the software vendors in the long run.
— Barry Caplan, via the Internet.
 
 
Global Village's Teleport Gold II is a horrible modem, particularly the Performa model, which is bundled with the Performa PowerMacs.
The reason why is that these modems do not perform error correction or data compression (that's MNP 1-5 and v.42) in hardware (they do it using a Macintosh extension). This prevents them from making reliable 14,400 baud connections (This is similar to how a GeoPort behaves, and you know what gems they are). On the first Gold II's shipped and ALL of the Performa Gold II's, the Global Village software doesn't even have the data compression or error-correction support. They are only available to consumers as part of a $25 upgrade. However, the documentation makes practically no mention of this at all.
The v.32 modem standard is the 14,400 baud standard; that's true enough. But the fact is that you cannot maintain a reliable 14,400 baud connection without using error-correction. Some Gold II's don't offer this feature at all, while others offer an inferior software-only version.
Sure, you can make a 14,400 connection... but overall, you'll get far better, faster, and more reliable connections with virtually ANY other 14,400 modem. Here's a quote directly from AOL Tech Support:
"We have had a lot of trouble getting reliable connections with the
Teleport Gold II: something that works in one place doesn't work in
another, or works one time and doesn't work another time. Apparently,
the TP Gold II uses the Rockwell Protocol Interface (RPI), which
substitutes software for hardware error correction. America Online
will not function reliably at higher speeds without hardware error
correction. While we do definitely support RPI modems, we cannot
guarantee their reliability at speeds beyond 2400 bps."
Well, I hope you get the idea. In my opinion, the modem is a piece of junk, in a very cute box with a very cute manual.
— Marshall Goldberg, Forum Consultant
Mac Multimedia Forum on America Online
 
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