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|Eบ |5First Things First|E บ            ^1 Diskovery |E             บ |5First Things First|E บ
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^Cby
^CJay Wilbur

^CWhat the heck is going on around here?

     I come from the Apple II world.  I can remember when my only hardware 
     incompatibility problem was talking to all the different printers in  
     use by the Apple II community.  Back then I thought I was in hell on  
     Earth.                                                                

     Now I am in the IBM world.  A world where even IBM can't make its     
     machines compatible with the rest of its computer line or even the    
     same machine.  This time I know I am in hell on Earth.         

     The past few disks have each seen a game by that master of mind       
     torture, John "BEZ" Besnard.  Before each disk hits the streets we    
     test it on all the machines we have at our offices (see Table A).     
     Once it gets past our extreme low-end PC/XT with a Hercules card using
     SIMCGA (we can't get more offbeat than that), we consider it stable   
     and release it.  WRONG.                                               

     Many of you who own REAL IBM XTs (just like the one we test on) have  
     called to tell us that BEZ's games lock up on your machines.  It      
     worked on ours, what could be different?  Did IBM change something    
     in mid-production on the XT and not tell anyone?  Are the different   
     versions of the CGA card causing a different weirdness to happen?     
     I don't know.  I do know that I need some help to fix this problem.   

     If one of BEZ's games went BOOM on your computer please pop the       
     following information into an envelope:                               

       1. A hardcopy of your AUTOEXEC.BAT and CONFIG.SYS files.            
          (Put them on a disk if you don't have a printer.)                

       2. A listing of ALL your hardware including the model               
          numbers and who made it.                                         

       3. Describe EXACTLY what happened to the game.                      
          (Screen shots will really help us out.)                          

       4. Your name, address and phone number.                             

     Please send this information to                                       
                Big Blue Disk                                              
          ATTN: Tech Support                                               
                P.O. Box 30008                                             
                Shreveport, LA 71130-0008                                  

     I don't want to sit here and blast IBM for being complete bozos.  But 
     if I find out that they have caused me (and you) grief, I will load my
     double barreled fountain pen and let them have it.  Of course, if I   
     find out it's something that we are doing wrong, I'll face the music  
     and take a few shots at ourselves.                                    

     Keep an eye out for that one.                                         

     See you in 30,                                                        
     J                                                                     


                                    Table A                                

                          Computer             Video                       
                          --------             -----                       
                       1. IBM PS/2 50          VGA                         
                       2. DTK 286              EGA                         
                       3. DTK 386/25           SVGA                        
                       4. DTK 386/33           SVGA                        
                       5. Precision 386/33     SVGA                        
                       6. IBM XT               CGA                         
                       7. IBM XT               Hercules                    
                       8. Tandy 1000hx         Tandy GFX                   
