> From: Wirt Atmar
> Subject: Re: A MacOpportunity :-)
> Date: Wednesday, May 08, 1996 1:19PM
>
> Gavin writes:
> >From today's Mercury News:
> >IBM, FIVE YEARS after first entering an alliance with Apple
> >Computer to develop new technology, has agreed to license
> >Apple's Macintosh operating system software.
>
> Or Denys could buy any of the new PowerPC Macs that also have a Pentium
> (Pentium, PentiumPro, or 586) processor in them so that they can run DOS,
> Windows 3.x, Windows 95, or OS/2, simultaneously with the MacOS. Switching
> between environments is said to be accomplished with a single keystroke.
Cut
> and paste operations go both ways and files can be shared between the two
> environments and are automatically converted in format.
>
> While the current crop of machines requires two processors in them (a 68K
or
> PowerPC processor for the Mac and an Intel processor for Windows), Apple
and
> IBM have been working for some time to create a common hardware platform
that
> will allow all of the operating systems to run (in more or less native
mode)
> on a common hardware platform.
>
> The dual processor machines available now from Macintosh do share common
RAM,
> disc, keyboard, and CRT (although it is also possible to drive two
separate
> SVGA monitors from the same video card, one for MacOS and the other for
> Windows).
>
> I have thought for some time now that mulitple operating systems on one
box
> is a good idea -- and if Apple pulls this off (and they seem committed to
it)
> in a commercially successful manner, then there is going to develop some
> substantial user pressure to have the same thing occur in all mid-range
> machines.
I wonder -- does your thinking "for some time now" extend about 15 years
into the past back to the introduction of the Dimension 68000? Dust off the
cobwebs of your memory and you'll find a 68K based system (running CP/m!)
that allowed you to load in seperate daughterboards containing either a z80,
6502, or 8086 and would allow you to boot the machine in AppleDOS, Apple
Integer DOS, Apple Pascal, TRS-DOS (and variants), or MS-DOS 2.11. I saw
one once, and IT REALLY DID BOOT my apple Pascal and TRS-DOS disks I took
with me to the store. Too bad I was still "a kid in high school" with no
money to buy one... :-)
[it did have some difficulty with my standard appleDOS disks, but then, the
apple didn't care about the sector-hole in the disk, so these might have
been physically "hard-sectored" disks, whereas nearly all other non-CP/m
systems used soft-sectored disks]
Admittedly, by today's standards a system with four seperate less-than-6-mhz
processors wouldn't even get a second glance, but remember, at the time this
was introduced these were all top-of-the-line processors. Had this system
actually taken hold, and then followed along with the hardware developments
of the 68k series, 80x86 series, z80/z800/z8000 series [had they taken
off...], and whatever the 65xx series became [* 1], I suppose today we'd be
wondering whether or not we could integrate PA-RISC daughterboards into the
system and whether they would run MPE/ix, HP-UX, or ???
Tom "I actually touched a computer from the future" Emerson
-------------
[* 1] [sorry, my apple days ended the day after high-school graduation -- I
just remember they made the 6502 faster and faster, but not more powerful.
I suppose the whole thing became eclipsed by MAC's and 680x0 series
processors, and since this was primarilly a 68k machine to begin with, it
would be a moot point]
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