Re: [NTLK] Paul's ATA drivers and registration

From: James Wages <james_at_kiramek.com>
Date: Fri Nov 09 2007 - 18:23:51 EST

On 11/10/07 12:55 AM, "Jon Glass" <jonglass@usa.net> wrote:
> Because of his new, real-life job. It's complicated, but he can't do
> this stuff any more.

While you most certainly didn't intend your statement to sound as such, it
does somewhat insult those of us who already have a "real-life job" and do
similar work as a hobby. Indeed, it would be better to say "because he has
substantially less free time now, and he does not wish to use all his free
time anymore to work on Newton programming, even as a hobby."

I can attest to the fact that none of us (who are employed, with families)
has "free time." We have to MAKE TIME for things like this. You have to
make time for your kids. You have to make time to talk properly with your
wife. You have to make time for your Newton and classic Mac hobbies. You
have to make time for church. You have to make time... well, the list goes
on. And keep in mind those non-work-related activities are possible only
when a DESIRE to make time exists. I must therefore assume that the
"DESIRE" is gone, as opposed to simply "not having any time at all." For
indeed, if he or any of us worked 24 hours a day, when would we sleep? And
if we work 12 hours a day, seven days a week, we could sleep, but when could
we relax -- such a schedule would lead to suicide. So it is very much a
"desire" issue at work here. And yes, there's a bit more to it than that...

On 11/9/07, Goodwin, Greg P. <GoodwinG@aafes.com> wrote:
> Why again is this being completely walked away from FOR GOOD?

Greg, if there is a technological reason behind it, I myself would say it is
due to the fact that ATA cards are no replacement speedwise for Linear
cards. I've tested several ATA cards and found them all to be substantially
slower than their Linear counterparts. And yes, I paid $50 for that ATA
driver too. I paid the money because I thought it would improve over time.
It didn't. Because I don't have a time machine, it would be foolish for me
to "regret" having paid that sum of money for a driver that never improved
the speed problem. But I am pleased to see that others can now obtain that
driver for free. Even so, it never made my Newton "abundantly useful" as I
thought. So I ultimately found a nice big 32MB Linear card on EBAY and
happily use that now as my main storage card.

So getting back to my point, perhaps the author of the ATA Support driver
simply could not tweak anymore speed out of it (not due to his programming
ability but just due to the nature of the protocols and electronics), and as
such felt there was really no where else to go in further "developing" the
driver.

--James Wages

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Received on Fri Nov 9 18:23:54 2007

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