Profile for mikeg

Contact	About me
Email: michael@lewisgilbert.co.uk ICQ: AOL: Yahoo:	Username: mikeg Realname: Mike Gilbert About me: Homepage: http://www.lewisgilbert.co.uk Face/Logo: Comments posted: 100 (show all)

All comments

On STD defends A5 concept:

Having just opened this week's CTO, there's a full page ad in there for the EZ30D, which appears to be the beast in question. Full details are linked from [link] People will possibly be pleased to know that it has a Transmeta Cruse processor. Running that at 800MHz to emulate an Intel processor and then running VA on top seems interesting. The 2.5 hour battery life is a serious concern; I expect 4/5 hours on current generation Intel kit, so the lower powered Crusoe should run for longer, I would have thought. This figure is for the beast as supplied, rather than as running VA. mikeg on 06/08/04 10:35AM [ Reply | Permalink | Report ]

On Again with the laptops:

Spriteman: as far as Apple iBooks go, I don't. A truly horrible prettified GUI locking you out of BSD is not my idea of fun computing. And I've been down the road of selling Macs because they weren't Windows. And been absolutely stitched up like a kipper and left hanging out to dry when the support suddenly disappeared. I happily sell FSC kit. It works, and is well built. If it goes wrong, a Siemens bod goes and fixes it. So it runs Windows, but that's what my customers want. I can sell a naked server for under 500 quid, though, if you want to run BSD on it. mikeg on 08/12/03 10:17PM [ Reply | Permalink | Report ]

On Again with the laptops:

"Picking equipment of the highest specification" is meaningless twaddle. Big numbers don't make it quality product. Consumer laptops have higher specification than business product, when you look at the raw numbers. They also have worse warranty, lower battery life and a lower build quality. When I drop a laptop, I don't want to have to put in an insurance claim, I want to go "whoops", pick it up and keep working. In addition, MS is awfully keen on system builders, 'cos they get a lot more dosh per licence. ( mikeg on 08/12/03 07:36AM [ Reply | Permalink | Report ]

On Again with the laptops:

Why is anyone of the opinion that an unbranded cheapo clone PC is a suitable platform to carry a RISC OS brand? For years, one of the main arguments in favour of Acorn product has been the low TCO, rather than a low purchase price. Now, unless weird things have happened, none of the people listed in the article actually make laptops. If there's one thing experience has taught me (and I mean experience of selling a lot of RISC OS and Windows boxes going back a very long time) it's that saving a few quid on the tin costs a packet in the long term. Further, the spec today on Mr Cheapy boxes is not going to be the spec in 2 weeks. Anyone considering the purchase of a portable device to run RISC OS would do themselves a lot of favours by actually considering VRPC as an emulator, rather than being persuaded that the various badgers have got some magic power which makes their boxes in some way special. I'd concur with RComp that Centrino makes a lot of sense. Certainly, we're selling a lot more of them than trad portables, despite a pricepoint about 35% higher. It's the ability to use them continually for 3.5/4 hours (doubled with a second battery) that is the most important feature. As far as it goes, I'll quite happily sell people VA5k or VARPC, and have. However, the current badger craze is not helping anyone in the long term. More to the point, calling an Intel CISC-powered device a "RiscBook" is sailing very close to the wind when it comes to being economical with the truth. mikeg on 07/12/03 10:52AM [ Reply | Permalink | Report ]

On AdvantageSix launches new VirtualRPC based PC :

mavhc: The Fujitsu hard discs thing is unrelated to any problem you might be having. The fault was a Cirrus chip frying, not the drive disappearing. And, from memory, Scenics have never had Fujitsu drives in 'em. mikeg on 09/10/03 10:24PM [ Reply | Permalink | Report ]

On AdvantageSix launches new VirtualRPC based PC :

mavhc: Dunno what model of Scenics you've got. The late blue-front ones suffered from crowded cases, which made taking the HDD out a pig. I've sold hundreds, and am not aware of any noticeable level of hard drive failure. Even if I was, it'd be the warranty engineer who'd replace the drive, not us. And as he comes with the sale for 3 years, you mudt have quite old boxes ( mikeg on 08/10/03 11:44PM [ Reply | Permalink | Report ]

On War game Freeciv goes SDL:

chocky; it wasn't a complaint, just a comment. I've got SparkFS 1.28, which is v. old. If that's the issue, I'll get it sorted. mikeg on 04/07/03 6:45PM [ Reply | Permalink | Report ]

On War game Freeciv goes SDL:

Finally got round to unpacking it and having a go tonight, but discovered that a bunch of files have broken names. I'll go and get it agin. Some names seem to have been cropped, and are cropped in the archive when I look at it. Specifics are data/deluxe/theme_orders_buttons.spec and .png, for example, which only exist as data/deluxe/theme_orders_button, twice in the archive... mikeg on 03/07/03 11:58PM [ Reply | Permalink | Report ]

On Wakefield show news:

imj> Purchasing a new machine with a new OS and new software for it is helping the platform as a whole. ROL stated publicly that they were not or could not going to develop a version of RISC OS which was independent of the Acorn chipset. So Castle have acquired one. Okay, so the RO4 and Select toys aren't in there, which allows you to bitch about its being out of date. Looking at my web logs, three times as many hits are coming from RO3.7 as RO4. Dunno what drobe gets... But that important thing is the break with the reliance on an old and slow chipset. Omega does not do that. Alpha is not a RISC OS hardware product, and will have serious failings due to the way the emulation works. Rather than bitching about Castle or whatever, I think we need to welcome the apparent thawing of ROL's attitude, and hope that they can work with Castle to produce Select for Iyonix. mikeg on 10/05/03 11:31PM [ Reply | Permalink | Report ]

On Wakefield show news:

MD want a thousand pounds for a nameless clone 2GHz celery portable? Is this delivered and VAT inc, does anyone know? I'm saying "nameless clone" because I'm assuming they haven't actually designed and built it, but got a badger unit from wherever. I mean, look at: [link] for a major manufacturer's equivalent home machine. mikeg on 10/05/03 7:42PM [ Reply | Permalink | Report ]

On Wakefield show news:

imj: If MD, ROL and VA have tied up an exclusive on a VARPC (or whatever) bundle, I'll be very cross indeed. Especially as the odds are very in favour of it being a cheap and nasty clone thing, probably with NiMH and a five minute battery life. OTOH, if Aaron and Paul M are actually in it for sales, then I'm fairly certain I can shift a few units. And I really can't understand what Castle have done to you. Iyonix is out there, working and being enhanced. Software is being upgraded, released and whatever to run on it. According to iconbar's photo gallery, it's there and working, but looks like a motorbike. But it doesn't quite work yet. So it isn't, despite Julian Z's protestations, in production and available. mikeg on 10/05/03 4:22PM [ Reply | Permalink | Report ]

Search the archives

Today's featured article

The new apple of my eye
Would you swap your dusty Acorn for a polished Apple computer? Martin Hansen has been checking out the world of Steve Jobs and his range of shiny kit.
 15 comments, latest by adh1003 on 6/1/09 1:06PM. Published: 17 Nov 2008

Random article

Printer admin tool updated
NoButton 2.1 correctly displays selected printer icon
 Discuss this. Published: 20 Feb 2007

Useful links