Re:Apple is just Microsoft with better marketing
by hga on Friday April 30, 2010 @11:09AM
(#1308334)
I don't agree with the above analysis, I prefer:
IBM doomed OS/2 with their earlier promise to MIS managers (as they were called then) that the PC-AT would be the last personal computer they'd have to buy for a long time.
Microsoft correctly hated the diversion of effort and compromises needed to get it to run on the 286 (which was truly awful when not being just a fast 8086) and didn't stop their Windows effort and at some point started up NT (well, we know the point, when DEC killed the Prism project, I just don't remember its relation to the other events).
This all came to a head when the 386 was the standard minimum CPU in a machine. OS/2 did not run competitively on it, Windows 3.0/1 could take significant advantage of it, was less complicated and imposing and I'm sure cost a lot less. And it could run multiple isolated DOS boxes.
IBM doomed OS/2 with their earlier promise to MIS managers (as they were called then) that the PC-AT would be the last personal computer they'd have to buy for a long time.
Microsoft correctly hated the diversion of effort and compromises needed to get it to run on the 286 (which was truly awful when not being just a fast 8086) and didn't stop their Windows effort and at some point started up NT (well, we know the point, when DEC killed the Prism project, I just don't remember its relation to the other events).
This all came to a head when the 386 was the standard minimum CPU in a machine. OS/2 did not run competitively on it, Windows 3.0/1 could take significant advantage of it, was less complicated and imposing and I'm sure cost a lot less. And it could run multiple isolated DOS boxes.
That set the stage for what then happened.