Re: FW: OS/400 upgrades for CISC (fwd) -- MIDRANGE-L


---------- Forwarded message ----------
Date: Mon, 21 Apr 1997 02:22:46 -0400 (EDT)
From: Neil Palmer <neil@systemetrix.ca>
To: John Carr <74711.77@CompuServe.COM>
Subject: Re: FW: OS/400 upgrades for CISC

Dave - you'r eforgetting that a lot of people with shiny black boxes are
CISC too (200/236/300/310/320/20S/30S) - HOWEVER John is 100% right !
I have a CISC 200 on V3R2 and wouldn't want IBM to spend any more money
developing software enhancements for it.  It's runs, it's stable, and if I
want new features I'll upgrade to a RISC box (which we plan to do in the 
near future).  Your major investment is in your application software, not
your hardware (as directions in pricing over the last several years have 
shown).  Your software from a S/38 that is almost 3 decades old STILL runs
today on a RISC AS/400 - and all you need do is save it from a S/38 and
restore it to a new AS/400.  NO ONE ELSE in the industry provides this sort
of protection for your software investment.  It's not about protecting your
hardware investment, even though IBM has done that many times with the AS/400
by introducing new features that run on older hardware (new DASD, Tape, 
IOP's,, Integrated Fax Adapter, FSIOP/IPCS etc.).
IBM's investment MUST be in the new product.  If a few old AS/400 user's are
going to be obstinate and move to something totally ridiculous like NT, 
which will cost them FAR more than moving to a RISC AS/400, just because of
their perception that IBM 'abandoned them' - well so be it - you can't please
all of the people all of the time.  But as those migrating to NT to run
their mission critical applications show, you sure as hell can fool some of
the people some of the time !     ;-)



On 20 Apr 1997, John Carr wrote:

> Message text written by INTERNET:MIDRANGE-L@midrange.com
> 
> 
> Dave Mahadevan said;
> 
> <snip>
> 
> > The point I am trying to make to all the
> >people with the shiny black boxes is the gray boxes will remain there
> >and if the manufacturer doesnt feel like supporting it, they will do a
> >cost benefit analysis and may move (could be RISC or nowadays it points
> >to NT !).
> 
> Dave you have got to be kidding.   If I'm using a software package on the 400 
>to
> run my business,
>  I'm going to the RISC box.    Even if I'm buying for the first time with no
> prior software running , there is still good reasons to go to the RISC box(in
> light of total ownership cost, and Neils forwarding of the RPMark95 stats etc.
> etc.). 
> 
> What conscience do you think WinTel has about 16 bit apps having to be 
>rewritten
> and re-bought to take advantage of 32 bit technology?    If Microsoft was in
> this position what do you think he would do?
> 
> I think Chris has a point when he said  { I don't think the numbers are all 
>that
> relevant. After all, I would guess that there are more 486s installed than
> Pentiums, but that wouldn't stop me from calling the 486 "dead". } 
> 
> Do you think that Windoz 3.1 should still be supported by Microsquash ?  They
> didn't even fix the bugs when it WAS supported(Thats right they were
> undocumented Features).
> 
> Going along with the NT "threat" idea for a moment,  I am personally very 
>happy
> that IBM is spending every dime & every developer to make V4Rx the best yet,
> and that It's Java(etc,etc)  compliant and that it will really SCREAM
> (RPMark95).  And I own a CISC box.   The future of the AS/400  is VERY VERY 
> important to me.   That future is NOT CISC period.   I'm just happy that I 
>have
> a very easy migration path. 
> 
>  Remember 80 - 88 was the SYS/38,   88-97 was CISC,   97-?? is RISC  and in 
>each
> case it was a Save/Restore.   I think HP would have liked that when moving 
>their
> software base to 64 bit.  and DEC would have loved to have moved PDP-11's that
> easily onward. 
> 
> Not having a migration path to a Bigger/Faster/Better  future would have been 
>a
> problem.  V3R2 is very stable, just stay on it as long as you like.  But most
> AS/400 customers , I think,  if givin a choice wouldn't want IBM to make
> everything on V3R7(V4R1) backward compatable to V3R2.  They  would rather have
> the limited engineering talent & development dollars spent on the Future not 
>the
> past.
> 
> BUT  Thats just my opinion.   I'm probably wrong as usual.  
> 
> John P. Carr   CDP
> EdgeTech Inc. 
> 
> 
> 
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