> etc, etc, etc. It has always amazed me that, since the advent of PA-RISC, HP seems to consider the 3000 line to be problem and an embarassment. Of course they are keeping as quiet as possible anything related to the success of the 3000 -- they don't want to send what they apparently consider to be mixed signals to the marketplace. That might lead to (hold onto your hat) people buying 3000s. I have always believed if IBM had the engineering brilliance to accomplish what HP has that their sales and marketing people would have put all competitors out of business. What better protection of your proprietary system investment than to be able to convert it to Unix if you ever need to? Instead, HP considers their engineering accomplishments at both the hardware and operating system levels a deep, dark, secret. On numerous occasions we have talked to HP shops who called in their HP rep to order an upgrade of their existing 3000 machine. After the sales rep got done selling them Unix, Unix, Unix, the poor confused customer placed all upgrade plans on hold. We have seen this time and again over the years. Of course, if there is a business reason for doing any of this, it would seem to lean in the direction of promoting the system that allows you to get the biggest profit marging from the same hardware, and everyone knows which one that is. If the best Unix system is good, and the best proprietary system is good, isn't the fact they both come from the same company good as well? Is the fact they are both the same box bad? I'm no marketing person, but couldn't all this be translated into a coherent strategy that promotes each platform based on the strenghs of both? Is there a synergy here? If so, why hide it? -- Israel Frankel Business Solutions, Inc.