From: 71231 DOT 104 AT compuserve DOT com (Richard Slobod)
Newsgroups: comp.os.msdos.djgpp
Subject: Re: Why did ID choose DJGPP for Quake?
Date: Mon, 10 Jan 2000 23:16:57 GMT
Organization: Deja.com - Before you buy.
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In article <gc4d4.271$CJ1 DOT 9007 AT dfiatx1-snr1 DOT gtei DOT net>,
  "Damian Yerrick" <snews AT pineight DOT 8m DOT comMUNIST-PIGS-AOL> wrote:
> "Eli Zaretskii" <eliz AT is DOT elta DOT co DOT il> wrote:
> > On Wed, 5 Jan 2000, Kalum Somaratna aka Grendel wrote:
> > > I might be wrong but I don't think there would be any on this
> > > newsgroup using a 386+287 for serious work in 2000.
>
> 386 PCs? No. Their BIOSes probably have the century bug.

Possibly, yes.  Probably?  Not necesarily.  Many older computers have
BIOSes that handle dates past 1999 just fine (_most_ of them in my
experience, but I admit that that's not a large enough sample to be
statistically valid).

Also, note that the age of the machine doesn't really relate to the
chances of it being Y2K compliant.  There's only been a real impetus to
make sure that everything's Y2K compliant within the last several years.
Anything older than that, regardless of exact age, has a roughly equal
chance of having Y2K problems, whether it's a 386, 486, or even an older
Pentium.  (In fact, the one machine I've run into whose BIOS was
completely incapable of handling a year 2000 date _was_ an older
Pentium.  The various other old machines -- just about all of them older
than the Pentium -- at worst failed rollover but were fine once manually
set.)

For that matter, having a Y2K-incompliant BIOS doesn't even remotely
render the system unusable.  There are various solutions for getting the
OS' date set correctly even if the BIOS can't provide it properly.

(Mind you, I agree with Kalum Somaratna's above statement; chances are
that no one here is using something as ancient as a 386 for serious work
simply for performance reasons.)


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