Re: Macs with PC cards

[jmclean@chem.ucsd.edu (James Mclean)]

Brad Shue says:
> 2)  I have also found that Mac people always complain that they are
> running out of memory when running several applications. I think the PCs
> manage memory much better considering I can have 4 modem applications open
> under Windows 3.11 along with my PPP software on a 386DX with 4 Meg of
> RAM all sharing a 14.4 modem.  From what I have been told, most macs would
> need at least 16 meg to do this.
It's true.  Programs on a Mac only get one chance to grab memory, when they
start up.  Although how much they take can be user controled, it's a bit of
a pain, and people therefore usually have each program set to grab enough
memory to deal with the worst case.  As I understand it (although I could
be wrong), PC programs can get more memory from the OS on the fly.  They
therefore don't have to stake out a large claim when they start up, and
conflicts are less likely.
   More recent versions of the Mac OS allow programs to temporarily get
some memory from the OS, but it's sort of a band-aid approach.  So from the
perspective of using computers in the classroom (gee, I worked in the list
topic!), if you expect to have them running multiple programs at once,
going PC may reduce the memory needs.

Paul Camp says:
> Remember the latest Microsoft Word 
> fiasco? A lot of people retreated to the previous version for 
> performance reasons.
Does this refer to Word version 6?  Now I understand!  I was just now
talking with some PC folks, me saying that Word 6 was very slow, and them
saying they'd never noticed it.  Thanks.

-- 
--James McLean
jmclean@chem.ucsd.edu
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