Date: Tue, 18 Jan 2000 22:37:42 +0000 (GMT) From: Terry Lambert <tlambert@primenet.com> To: brett@lariat.org (Brett Glass) Cc: tlambert@primenet.com (Terry Lambert), jcm@dogma.freebsd-uk.eu.org (Jonathon McKitrick), chat@FreeBSD.ORG (freebsd-chat) Subject: Re: IBM Message-ID: <200001182237.PAA13223@usr09.primenet.com> In-Reply-To: <4.2.2.20000118143609.01924f00@localhost> from "Brett Glass" at Jan 18, 2000 03:06:32 PM
next in thread | previous in thread | raw e-mail | index | archive | help
> Obviously, these were different departments. > > This ThinkPad has been a great deal of trouble for me. Its > power management has never worked correctly, and the thermal > design is poor; when you put it into the docking station, the > station places the fluid-filled heat exchanger up against a > slab of insulating plastic. The unit gets so hot you can't > touch it. The MWave modem originally did not work at 33.6 > Kbps, and when they finally hacked the code so that it could, > it was balky, slow, and shut off the sound while you were > online. If the machine tried to make a sound during the call, > the system crashed -- sometimes immediately, sometimes as you > hung up. I can't tell if you are saying this is a Windows crash or a BSD crash... if a Windows, all I can say is "Well, Duh!, that's the reason for Windows, it's what it does". If you are complaining about a BSD crash, it is perfectly legal, in Findland, Germany, and elsewhere, to take the Windows drivers and run them through "Sourcer" from V Communications, Inc. (Frank van Gilluwe's company, author of "The Undocumented PC"), and then use this documented source code to as interface documentation to create a BSD driver. I am deeply surprised that the countries where this is legal do not have more of this going on; if I were a citizen there, you could be guaranteed that I would spend much of my time getting my hands on hardware with Windows drivers, and making BSD drivers. Linux seems to have learned how to do this. If that isn't enough, the MWave modem was widely criticized when it was released, as any "Winmodem" or DSP codec-based modem so far released. Unless you got a prerelease of the hardware, you have only yourself to blame. > And, of course, IBM refuses to release the technical > information that would let anyone develop a better driver > or one for BSD. The modem -- in fact, the entire MWave -- > is useless under BSD. The documentation is attainable. I will personally put up half the cost of a copy of "Sourcer" for up to 5 people who agree to do the reverse engineering work, and are familiar enough with Windows and FreeBSD to do the work, and will agree to send the software to someone else in that position, should they not produce one driver every six months. As far as the hard part about WinModems, I seriously doubt you will be able to utilize the "modem" part under any circumstances, regardless of whether or not IBM (or any other vendor) releases all of the technical information that they can legally release. This is because the CODEC that is necessary to utilize such a modem is both Copyright and Patented in most cases. However, I would be happy to pursue documentation for what can be legally released (e.g. that is not under non-disclosure from another vendor) on your behalf; however, I doubt the availability of the CODEC license will allow you to get very far, regardless of the documentation. > The service I've gotten on this ThinkPad has likewise been > horrendous, in part because it's outsourced to a chop shop > called "Solectron." I suspect that IBM has lost money on the > 760 laptops because they so frequently need repair. I do > not know if this is why they try to charge users who send > their machines in for warranty repair. Repair of my unit > was held up for several days because their billing department > wanted to charge me $300 -- for two tiny pieces of plastic > which were dented but did not affect operation. (During > the delay, they didn't order parts for the repairs > which WERE covered by the warranty, even though they knew > that those repairs were to be made even if I declined to pay > for overpriced ones it did not need.) And I've already mentioned > that the machine was TWICE not fixed properly. You need to call you Customer Care Representative, whose sole job is to fight tooth and nail on your behalf. > It's been back and forth to Memphis three times since the > beginning of December, and FINALLY seems to be stable enough > for me to reload my data onto it. So it was fixed. > >IBM may be many things, but in the seven months since they > >purchased Whistle, it's bleedingly obvious to me that they have > >a very strong service philosophy. > > It's hard to generalize about an organization as large as IBM. > The IBM PC Company seems not to have such a strong service > philosophy. IBM PC Direct, their sales division, once sent me > an obviously used laptop when I ordered a new one. (The > packaging was not intact, the AC adapter cord had a knot > in the middle, and the previous user had already selected > an OS -- so I could not choose OS/2 instead of Windows. You haven't been through the Cultural Indoctrination Process; you may have had a bad experience (which seems predicated on buying a modem that was knowingly not supported by BSD, and which doubled as a sound card, and then trying to use it as a modem), but I can tell you that they are agressively service oriented. Julian and Archie will tell you the same thing, since they are also recent indoctrinees. > >PS: Just so that people know my bias, I still have a bad taste > >in my mouth from the last time I was swallowed by a very large > >company, back when Novell bought USL, and I can still say nice > >things about both Novell and IBM. > > Novell and IBM both have good sides and bad sides. But this > is certainly the last time I'm buying a ThinkPad. Their > PC Company seems to be one of the bad sides. Well, that's too bad. Unfortunately, if there's no customer base for off-brand OSs, then there will never be support for those OSs forthcoming. > P.S. -- I am currently working on a BSD driver for a Lexmark > inkjet printer for which they only furnish Microsoft drivers. > Alas, Lexmark (another IBM company) will only release > the information required to write drivers under NDA. (I'm not > sure why; there's nothing terribly unique about the way ANY > of the major manufacturers' inkjets work.) I'm pretty sure that it's the same reason Adaptec invented their HIM layer for microcode: to prevent people from building clone hardware that utilized drivers that they had invested engineering effort in writing. It's a means of using software license to protect a hardware market, where margins are often hovering around 3%. All hardware manufacturers do this; it's probably quasi-legal, if they have significant marketshare where they do it. > I'd be willing to > give away the source, but due to the NDA I won't be able > to. (Sigh.) I will, however, publish binaries if I can. Binaries. > For the life of me, I don't understand why Lexmark wouldn't > want the UNIX market to use their products. What UNIX market? How many lost sales have they suffered because of this? Where's the IDC report to back up the lost sales numbers to the marketing people? But that aside, I've described the process for revealing interfaces and offered to go half-sies with you on funding it. I really don't know what else I can personally do. Terry Lambert terry@lambert.org --- Any opinions in this posting are my own and not those of my present or previous employers. To Unsubscribe: send mail to majordomo@FreeBSD.org with "unsubscribe freebsd-chat" in the body of the message
Want to link to this message? Use this URL: <https://mail-archive.FreeBSD.org/cgi/mid.cgi?200001182237.PAA13223>