WP2-05.THD (c)1989 Golden Triangle, Inc. (c)1989 Wilson Van Alst =+=+=+=+=+= Fm: Joe Turner To: all Two more questions about these little things: 1. How many single spaced pages is 32K? 2. After all the talk, is the WP2 the way to go for on-the-fly word processing? Keep in mind that by the time I get a small modem, the cables and such, the price will approach $500. Thanks, Joe T. =+=+=+=+=+= Fm: Bill Brandon [DPTRAIN] To: Joe Turner If one line = 65 characters, and one page = 54 lines, then one page is approximately 3.5K (give or take a few for control codes, blank lines between paragraphs, etc.) Thus, 32K would be about nine full single-spaced pages and part of a tenth. Whether any given machine is "the way to go" depends on so many factors, including subjective ones, that nobody can answer that question for you. You might check out the decision-making program from the recent contest. =+=+=+=+=+= Fm: Tony Anderson To: Joe Turner Well, first of all, "32K" refers to the amount of RAM space in the computer, and the user never gets to use all that space; you get to use about 29.5K of that, Actually 29,628 bytes. A "byte" is equal to a character. So you get to have a text file up to 29,628 characters or so. How many "pages" that would be depends on how many characters you have on a line, and how many lines you have on a page. Assuming 80 character lines, and printing 56 lines per page, with no blank lines, just solid text, that works out to about 6 1/2 pages. But in the real world, probably 10-12 pages, allowing for blank lines, formatting, shorter lines, etc. Apparently the WP-2 has only 22K of available RAM space in a stock machine; if you need more than that, you have to buy extra RAM modules. And "all the talk" hasn't yet settled - the machine is brand new - and folks are still trying to find out what the machine's capabilities are. It's too early to assess whether it's a winner or a clunker. =+=+=+=+=+= Fm: Joe Turner To: Tony Anderson Thanks, I looked at the WP2 this morning and it seems to be a good deal. My chief complaint with these things is that anyone who can actually use the thing needs the extra RAM and a modem. That is the minimum. If RS put together a package that had all that and a padded soft case, I think they would have a real winner in the business and journalism markets. Why can't they learn this? =+=+=+=+=+= Fm: Tony Anderson To: Joe Turner Well, looking at it from the consumer's viewpoint, we often wonder why they continue to shoot themselves in the foot, why they don't learn from mistakes, and why they don't do this, or that. What we tend to forget is that Tandy Corporation is first, and foremost, a mass marketer, like K-Mart, Target or ShopCo stores. They aren't interested in the products they sell, they're primarily interested in moving them in volume; so many units per store, per month, what's the bottom line? In such cases, they are more concerned with numbers than the actual products. If they could make a profit on air-conditioned dog houses (with appologies to Jim Baker), they would feature them in the catalog. As consumers, we tend to forget that. We also tend to forget that the "salesmen" at Radio Shack are among the lowest paid sales people in the work force, and we tend to expect them to know all about the products they sell. Point in fact, few of them have the technical background to know much more about the products they sell than the catalog number. Anybody who really knows anything doesn't hang around very long... the computer centers have long had a staffing problem - as soon as the salesman made some good contacts, he was off to greener pastures. Tandy offers "the Great American Dream", which translates out to "minimum wage, plus a small percentage of your gross sales". So it takes a real hustler to make a decent living, and in such cases they're often more interested in quantity than quality. And, as has been said, there is more money in selling the hardware, than there is in providing free support. =+=+=+=+=+= Fm: Joe Turner To: Tony Anderson Tony, you made some good points. Still, as a long time marketing professional - pharmaceuticals, consumer products, sports, banking, etc - I know that the real guys, the ones who run the companies (in this case, John Roach) dearly wish that they could have products that people want. I think one of the problems is that the mediocrity at the middle of the corporations keeps the real customer needs isolated from the real guys. And, many times, the real guys know what the problems are but they cannot intrude to the lower levels without destroying whatever spirit there is in the company. It is a strange situation. A mentor of mine, professional baseball team, Billion dollar company, etc to the tune of more than $1 billion personally - told me that in his role as Chairman of the Board he commonly disagrees with the things that are done in his company but that as long as the numbers are made he has little clout to do anything about it. In the case of Tandy, a REAL WP2, right now, could and would do the following: 1. Make millions of business people - the ones with the money - take RS seriously. Now they don't and they do not, as a rule, buy RS computers for their businesses. Too bad because no single company in the US is better positioned to make meaningful, preemptive moves in the business computer business. The introduction of the 486 will, I think, take the cream off the better/faster/sexier computer race and make lots of people realize that basic 8088's and 286's work great for businesses (see next messate) =+=+=+=+=+= Fm: Tony Anderson To: Joe Turner Yeah, I agree, quite often the company veers off in directions not really sancioned by those at the top, as the result of middle management actions. The current withdrawal of Traveling Software from portable support seems to be a case in point. It appears, from the rumors I've been hearing, that the decision to terminate portable support was made by a middle-management type, based on two factors; 1) When they recently withdrew their advertising from Portable 100 magazine, then started up again, there wasn't much immediate response from the new advertising, and 2) When they mailed out a recent new catalog, to the same mailing list they had mailed a previous catalog to, they did not sell as much from the new catalog as they had from the old. (!) On the latter, it would seem logical that a certain percentage of customers had already bought products from the first catalog, and would not have been interested in buying the same, or similar products from a second catalog. In any event, there have been at least two, maybe three times in Tandy's computer history that they could have cornered the market, or could have seized a "lock" on a major portion of the market, and let it slip through their fingers. Most computer pundits agree that there was a window just prior to IBM entering the market, where Tandy had a major market share, and rather than agressvely pursuing that market, they pulled back, retrenching to a storefront operation; "Here they are, come get them if you want them" attitude. The second window occurred after Big Blue legitimized the market, when Tandy decided to go their own way, following their own standard, and continuing to make everything proprietary, and incompatible with everything else. The third window appeared with the introduction of the Model 100, and their failure to react quickly to market demand to make the machine more useful, and more commercially viable. The "portable" concept was breakthrough, but failure to provide full-line support was devastating. The Model 100 was viewed with tunnel vision, and many of the folks at Tandy never envisioned many of the wonderful things we can do with them today. Their intruduction of the TDD was a case in point... their first order from Brother Industries in Japan was for only 50,000 units, which were virtually an immediate sell-out. They had to reorder immediately, and wait for several months for the second shipment to arrive. They were also lax in providing or supporting third-party support, not even implementing their Express Order system until the third year after introducing the Model 100, which provided a mass market outlet for third-party support, and which could have significantly entrenched the portables before other companies realized what had happened. I do not see Tandy agressively marketing computers nowdays, even though they still command a significant share of the market through the sheer size of their distribution channel. It's as if they are satisfied to sell X number of units a month, as that meets their sales goals, and that's all they want. =+=+=+=+=+= Fm: Jim Scheef To: Tony Anderson I always enjoy your observations about Tandy and their computer efforts as you have been closely involved for some time. Since this looks like a good thread, I'll tack my two cents on and address comments from several people. People seem to be putting the same blinders on reguarding the WP2 as many di with the original M100. This is a capable machine that is just waiting for software! As to the modem issue, I think Tandy knew exactly what they were doing when they left out the modem chip (no foot shooting here!). They are offering the WorldPort modem in both the 1200 and 2400bps flavors and I would bet that the 2496 fax modem will be availableearly next year - probably with te software on a ROM card. Rather than leaving the WP2 a modemless machine, Tandy has left the choice of a modem to the user. And, of course, at the same time they kept the base price of the machine down by about $50. A savings for those who don't need it and at over $300, the machine would not have the same mass appeal. Since the WP2 uses a Z80, a RAM or ROM-card based BASIC interpreter should be a natural for a third-party entrepreneur. There should probably be two versions, one to accept M100 programs and the other more CP/M or GW-BASIC compatible. It should be apparent by now that I think the machine will a winner. It's real competition is the Z88 which has programing capability (even an assembler) built in. But given the WP2's lower price, and the British ineptitude at marketing computers in this country, there won't be any contest. =+=+=+=+=+= Fm: Tony Anderson To: Jim Scheef Good continuing input, Jim. Now that you mention it, a WorldPort would be a good choice for a modem, and would give the user a choice of faster speeds, rather than being locked into 300 baud, which many users feel is now archaic; and in fact, many BBS's no longer support 300 baud. Looks like, at around $300, the WP-2 is ideally positioned to capture a good chunk of the portable text-intensive market - there is a recent report that there is even an ongoing thread over on one of the Mac forums, since their own "portable" is so cost-prohibitive. Personally, I'm both surprised, and pleased to see something introduced at less than $999.00! They may have a winner, based on price alone. The general impression around T/RS is that the Model 100 family was used about 84% for text processing/input, and the WP-2 seems aimed right at that market. =+=+=+=+=+= Fm: Stan Wong To: Joe Turner The WP-2 appears to be aimed more at the electronic typewriter crowd. It's good for writing (and formatting) whilst traveling and then to print finished documents when you get to a printer. You can transfer files out to PCs but then you loose all your formatting information. I just bought one and I think it may be useful. At least for $300 I can't lose too much if I'm wrong. # Starting message #: 189408 Starting date: 31-Oct-89 14:29:10 Participants: Joe Turner 71250,3540 Tony Anderson 76703,4062 Jim Scheef 76137,757 RANDY HESS 73267,552 Stan Wong 70346,1267 Bill Brandon [DPTRAIN] 76701,256