The future is now.

19 responses total.

Gads.  I sure hope not!

Turns out, it was. Just as I was entering this item, and got as
far as "the future", the system went down. A symbolic accident in
the midst of my mundane purpose, which was:

CD-ROM are now rampant, but haven't been discussed here. I'll start
with asking whether I'll be happy (;->) with the "PowerUser"
double speed CD-ROM (Mac) drive and the Grolier Encyclopedia (plus
"Bonus Software!" - AH Dictionary, Atlas Pack, and The Animals) from
MacWarehouse, all for $300?

Couldn't say for sure, but my wife really wants that same CD-ROM
deal for her IIsi.

re #2:  Most of the CD-Roms that come in those bundles are pretty lame.
        If you know *nothing* about the subject you are looking up,
        Grolier *may* be helpful.

That makes it sound useful for a middle-school student. I use the
AH Dictonary 3.0.1 (loaded to HD) now, and it is pretty limited. The
CD-ROM AH dictionary is supposed to be considerably more comprehensive.

I bought the MacWarehouse package, and have been going through everything
this evening, with the following off-the-cuff observations: 

The CD-ROM drive that came is a Toshiba TXM4101L1 (not the "PowerUser" box
shown in the catalog), with CharisMac Eng. CD AutoCache software. The
drive manual is not clear on some points, but everything came together
after some guessing and fussing. 

Grolier MM Encyclopedia: as I suspected, it looks quite useful for Middle
and High school. I can't run color and multimedia and quicktime movies on
my PowerBook 145, which limits some of the "glitz", but the information
base is fine, and still pictures are fair. 

American Heritage Talking Dictionary: lots of MB of words - much larger
than the diskette version I had - but essentially the same level of
type of content. I was disappointed that people and places are not in
this larger, but "standard", version (that wasn't clear in the adverts).

Atlas Pack (U.S. Atlas + World Atlas): again useful at Middle/High school
level, and even a bit beyond, with the extensive tables of geographic and
demographic data. However the maps are coarse, and the coverage is quite
uneven (e.g. Falkland Islands in some detail, but Chile only a crude
country map). 

The Animals, "A True Multimedia Experience". I can't run it at all as
one must have a 12"+ monitor and color. In addition, it isn't a CD-ROM
*database*, but just an application on CD-ROM, all of which must be
installed (ca. 2 MB). 

All in all not a bad purchase, but I'll be looking for better CD-ROM
databases, for special topics, for professionals. I now think that few of
these will be appearing in catalogs of mail order houses. 

Well, we're looking for something like that for our 13 year old son.
Sounds like it would be okay for some of his assignments and general
curiosity (<---see, popcorn :)  Let us know if you find any decent
(adult, college, graduate level) CD-ROMs.

I did some Get Infos on the disks described above, and here are bytes:

  American Heritage Dictionary                  321MB
  Grolier MultiMedia Encyclo (6.02)             632MB
  The ANIMALS!                                  634MB
  Atlas Pack                                    110MB

Of course MB-age doesn't tell the whole story - one is concerned perhaps
more with what is in the bottle than how full it is. But this does
reflect the comments I  made above about it. (I was wrong, previously,
about ANIMALS! - I mistook the *driver*, which is installed, for the
whole thing.)

related CD-ROM question - seems that there is a nearly absolute
necessity for running a CD on a 386 or better machine. That suckxx.
  
However, I came across one of those "parallel port" CD readers and
wondered *if* an 8086, 8088 or 80286 can be made to "play" the
thing - I haven't called the company yet to ask that specific
question though. 
  
thought I'd pick the brains of the the RealKnowledge (tm) around
here first.

My CD-ROM is turning out to be pretty useful, using the Grolier
Encyclopedia or the AH Dictionary. My main complaint is that I can't shift
CD-ROMS without quitting one driver and launching another (if the driver
is open, I can't eject the CD-ROM). Also, 6M of RAM (2 virtual) isn't
enough for a driver plus WORD and Versaterm! Is anyone using RAM Doubler
and, if so, are any problems or incompatibilities encountered? 

Another CD-ROM question: what companies make CD-ROMs from your files, and
how much do they cost? I heard of people putting their slides programs or
videos on CD-ROM: I'm wondering if it would be practical for making HD
backups, or (especially) for *long* term storage, where the survivability
of magnetic media is in question. 

using ram doubler is a must, I'd think. You need to disconnnect
the virtual memory but haven't had a problem with ram doubler yet.
  
How about those lesser-powered cpus - any hope?

The literature that comes with ram doubler says that 4 meg is the minimum for
using it.  With 8 or more (original) ram it "rarely" writes files to the
hard drive.  I guess that implies that with 4 it uses a function like
virtual ram more frequently.  That might account for a performance or
reliability difference between 4 and 8+ meg users.  We have 8 and the
doubler seems to work just fine.  No noticeable glitches or even any
perceptible slowdown.


  Once installed, ram doubler can be de-selected by holding one key when
you start the computer.  Then I have the option of using virtual ram
available on my control panel if I ever would wish to do that, or not use
the doubler if some other peculiarity crops up.

The literature says doubler works with only one hard drive systematic
compression software ("disk stacker" I believe), but works with any
software that compresses files individually. 

How much RAM does Ram Doubler occupy? How much does it save from System?
Do you ever really challenge it, having 8M RAM? (Maybe that's why they
recommend 8M 8-}.)

No, I've not challenged Ram Doubler.  I've put up a big tent, but only run
a one ring circus.  Quite a problem.  I think system and all other files
show as being "regular" size but in a 2 times inflated environment.  I'll
have to check(I'm not at home), but I remember RD as being a very small
file. 

  So, I went from 8 with ca. 2 used on start-up to 16 w/ca. 2 used.  I'm
really used to using a very spartan environment of about 640k on various
other computers, so I really need to rethink how I organize and use (for
example) the hundreds of small text research files I've collected over a
number of years.

I have received a blurb for the "Infopedia" from Softkeys. The one CD-ROM
is supposed to contain the "complete" Funk & Wagnalls New Encyclopedia,
Roget's 21st Century Thesaurus, Hammond World Atlas, 1995 World Almanac
and Book of Facts, Merriam-Webster's Dictionary, M-W's Dictionary of
English Usage, M-W's Dictionary of Quotations, and M-W's Biographical
Dictionary. WOW. PLUS, they throw in the TIME magazine Multimedia Almanac
*free* ("$50 value"). All this (2 CD-ROMs) for $36.

So, is this really as good as implied? I searched the web and usenet for
reviews of it, but found nothing of value. (Playboy Magazine says "Dwarfs
the Competition....", for what its worth.)  The abridged character of the
American Heritage Dict, and the Grolier Encyclo, have been noted above. Is
that the case for the Infopedia? 

I have found http://www.echidnahouse.com.au/, which provides thoughtful
(not vendor hype) reviews of educational CD-ROMs - albeit from an Australian
perspective. This site is also called EdRev. 

EdRev gives the Infopedia a 5/10, stating that it is "fairly superficial",
as well as having interface features they did not much prefer. EdRev gives
their highest ratings to Encarta and the 1997 Grolier, both 8.5/10,
especially for use through high school.

They also review the E. Brittanica. They give that 7.5/10, but are very clear
that this CD-ROM contains the *entire*, unabridged, Brittanica - and costs
ca. $2000 (Aus.). They also note you can subscribe to the web site that also
contains the entire Brittanica, for $20/mo - which would provide nine years
of access of a continually updated version for what the CD-ROM costs for
an obsolescent version. (They did not evaluate putting that $2000 in
investments, which if they returned 12%, would pay for the encyclopedia
on-line indefinately.)

micros 115 has been linked to books 61. There has not been an item in books
for "books on CD-ROM", but one had been started in micros some time ago,
especially for major references. 

I saw today in PC Magazine that the Brittanica Encyclo CD-ROM is listed
at $300. I looked back at EdRev and found their review to be dated 7/96. 
That is an enormous drop from $1500 (US - $2000 Aus.)! The RevEd review
predicted that either the cost of the CD-ROM would drop, or the web service
cost would increase. Unless I've missed something, the former seems to have
happened. At $300, it isn't worth subscribing to the on-line resource,
even though that now costs $150/a (http://www.eb.com/). They offer a
7 day free sample access to the on-line service - worth trying at about
the time you are writing a report....They also offer a sample search. I
tried it for Oedipus Rex, and I must say that I'm not going to be very happy
with anything less than the Brittanica! The treatment in Grolier's (1993)
is a pale shadow of that in the Brittanica.

Hey! The CD-ROM is now $150 (+$7 s/h)! With that, I can clear out my 1953
Encyclopedia Americana (which probably cost the same back then). 

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