Geobook NB-60 & NB-80 owners (by 2 users)

This is one of the reasons I took mine back, besides personal reasons.
Here are a list of shortcomings that I found made it impractical for me:

1. The amount of RAM allocated is too small. (Refer to 2)
2. Web Pages of complexity and number, kill the cache(RAM) and error
out.
3. Brother wants $100.00 for 4 MB FlashRam, $199.00 for 10. (At these
prices, I could add memory chips or a whole Hard Drive considerably
larger than 10 mb)
4. Speed. Yes, I know I said it worked fast enough, but that's from its
RAM. Anything not in it (from floppy) works considerably slower.
5. Glidepad started showing lack of durability. Initially it was better
than the display model, but that's self-explanatory. With a little use,
this one started getting "difficult" to use and unresponsive.
6. Limited viewing from the screen...only head on viewing possible. If
you run your finger across the screen, you can see a multi-color swirl
follow behind your finger..like a bad touch screen implementation.
7. If you're used to the desktop, then you need to adapt to the new UI
which is completely unintuitive and runs counter to any industry
standard implementation of CUA. Window controls belong at the top, not
at the bottom where you seldom venture.
8. Lack of Multi-tasking. What good is it to write a letter, close the
app, launch the addressbook, check an address in the addressbook, close
that app, and then have to reopen the WP app, renavigate to the
document you want, and then reopen it? If defies productivity, and
seems bent on single task accomplishment, only.
9. File Manager completely confusing. They changed the way we like to
work in GEOS/NewDOS (whatever it's called.)
10. Price point. To make this machine more likely to handle what you'll
need while surfing the web or doing what you expect to be able to do in
a GEOS environment, you need to upgrade to the higher flashRam. That
done, you've just narrowed the price advantage to almost nill between
this and a regular notebook.

I think it still has usefulness.. just not for the GeoHolic, in its
present incarnation.

Lee

--


GEOS developer, programmer, consultant.
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It seems it would be conceivable, since you can access dos on one. I
understand that the zip driver eats up some precious on-board memory though.
Any word from the true geos-hackers?

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huh? How does this differ from the RAM allocated in NDO?

(in response to points 3 & 4) Yes, that is why several of us have
advocated an LS-120 to replace the floppy drive.

h-m-m-m, this is disturbing, is QA a problem here?

you are describing a typical passive matrix screen Lee, they all
have these characteristics.

Well, I hardly think that Brother built this machine for GEOS users
like you and I Lee. Nor should they. There are not enough of "us"
to create a viable market. This machine is a good fit for first time
computer buyers who have never purchased a home computer before, and
there are plenty of those people around.

It sounds to me like what you want is a laptop. No problem, save up
the bucks and buy one, it would be the right tool for you.

First of all, see my point above. However, I'm losing you Lee.
I am not sure I understand your technical points here. I have
NDO98 and use it on a 486-66 PC with 20MB of RAM. When I fire up
Skipper, it runs OK (for me), but it in no way can compare to my
Netscape Navigator access on my 686-200mhz PC. When I have run
Skipper on my 386-25mhz with 4MB of RAM, it just c-r-a-w-l-s, and
yes, it frequently errors out on some pages. The web has become
an unwieldly, resource-hogging, ungodly monster. Even my Windows
based 686 PC has trouble on some web pages.

My point is, that your critique of the GeoBook's internet performance
is actually focused on GEOS itself. In particular, we are bucking
up against the handle and global heap limitations that are inherent
in GEOS. I agree that this has become a problem, but besides
revising the entire kernel, what else can be done? Like I said,
the web is a monster! I don't know if GEOS is the right tool to
try to tame it. Just my opinion.

Duane

***I agree, but I wish there was a way for New Deal to market to those
Brotherworks 98 owners. New Deal will do everything BW98 will do plus about
10X more. I would also like to see New Deal come with a Windows95 installer
like BW98.
Perhaps in the future versions. . .
***

Might it not be possible to launch NDO'98 from a zip drive, after booting up
the GeoBook? Or, can the floppy drive be replaced with an LS120 drive?

Chip Blank
GUI
GeoGrafix

I agree, but I wish there was a way for New Deal to market to those
Brotherworks 98 owners. New Deal will do everything BW98 will do plus about
10X more. I would also like to see New Deal come with a Windows95 installer
like BW98.
Perhaps in the future versions. . .

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