45622,14,04/26/92,BILL WOLFF,ALEX ZELL R/COPH, Well I realize this is the wrong computer platform, but the following information can be of some good for someone. I know that a Commodore 64 has a number of cards that allows your computer to talk. One even allows your computer to listen too. In fact, the card manufacturer is called: Hearsay, Inc; 1825 74th Street; NY, NY 11204; and they made IBM version too. I am not sure if they did for the MAC or not. Now I know that there are some educational programs that work very well with the above mentioned cards on the C64. There is also an excellent word processor that even talks called "The Write Stuff" and works without any extra hardware. Also there is a communications program called SAMTERM, but it is really slow. You even had to hit CTRL-S once in awhile even at 300 baud, so the term could keep up with the BBS. 45623,05,04/26/92,RICHARD HINTON,ALL 4 MEG DRAM'S?, I just read an article in the Economist about the newest type of memory invented in Japan an captilized in the US, called flash memory. But the article memtioned that a 4 meg by 1 bit DRAM chip goes for about $15 each. I have 1 meg by 1 bit DRAM chips, but can't find the 4 meggers? Anyone see the 4 meg DRAMS? 45723,07,09/14/92,GEORGE LIMBERG,ALL MNP TECHNICAL DATA,ASDF I am researching a technical paper on MNP modem protocols. I have some basic data on the overview of each of the 10 levels, but need to get to the next l level of technical details for this paper. Does anyone know where I may find a reference manual,etc. on perhaps MNP 5 data compression techniques, etc. I have tried to speak to tech support at Microcom directly but they did not seem to have any leads. Any help in the right direction would be really appreciated. 45822,25,10/21/92,JERRY OLSEN,MURRAY ARNOW R/CD ROMS, Like most things, you must match what you purchase with your intended uses. But for starters, you should look for three things: access speed; whether the MS CD-ROM Extensions file Ward mentioned in fact is supplied; and whether the interface is supplied in the base price. A few of the VERY lowest-end products file to provide the .EXE file. Many charge extra (as much as $100) for the interface). Access speed is a more complex subject and directly relates to your current and future plans. If you simply want to read files from the drive, anything around 340ms access time is fine. But for technical reasons, if you plan to do such things as use reference-book CDs which demand random access of index files, you may want something much faster. With careful shopping, the lower end of decent products can now be had in the U.S. for under $350; higher-end products double or triple that. The shortest answer for users who don't need a lot of searching capability (or who are willing to wait for the delays) is simply to look for a product with the MPC (Multimedia PC Council) compliance logo. BTW, the cheapest of the CDs with solid specs has been the Sony CDU-535. After eval-ing various alternatives for an article, that's the one I personally settled on...which is about the best endorsement I probably can make. FWIW, if you want a detailed expansion of the above plus a survey of a couple of dozen shareware CD disks, one version of my article will appear in Shareware Magazine, whose Nov/Dec issue should show up at news outlets and computer stores any day now. Good luck. 45823,05,10/21/92,BOB SULLIVAN,WARD CHRISTENSEN R/LIMITING SOFTWARE APPLICATIO, My Sci America arrived on the day that I posted the message. It is the Nov 92 issue with a picture of an ant holding a micro-gear. The article title is "Software 'glitches' that endanger public safety." I have come to the tentative conclusion that even software needs the wisdom gained from actual experience. 45922,14,12/02/92,ROY LIPSCOMB,ALL DJ500 PROBLEM (!), I have a problem with my DeskJet 500. Since problems with the DJ are so rare, I thought I publish a note here. Maybe someone will also have a remedy. I've been using a serial cable with the DJ for about nine months and have had no problems. A few days ago, I switched to a parallel cable, bought new. In printing a long document, the DJ started out by printing fine. But I noticed later that it had printed a spurious "$" on pages 70, 86, 116, (two of them on) 160, and 176. When I individually reprinted the pages, one of the pages again featured a renegade "$" (in a different spot than before). I called Elektek, and a techie there said he had a problem like this with his DJ, and he cured it by removing the clips that secure the parallel cable connector to the DJ. Sounds like voodoo technomatics to me. Has anyone else encountered this problem? 45923,07,12/02/92,STEVE AIDIKONIS,ALL TELCO QUESTION, I recently received a notice (via bulk mail) from ma bell saying that I h have been receiving touch tone service without being charged for it. The notice went on to saythat for xx cents a month I could continue it. One of their telemarketers left a message to the same effect on my answering machine today. The question: does the telco really have the ability to switch their equipment so that it won't recognize my modem and pulse-tone switchable tones? 46022,08,01/13/93,ROY LIPSCOMB,ALL WHY DO 486'S GET HOT?, A fellow I know says that 486 DX2s run at better than 200 degrees Fahrenheit. I'm curious as to what specifically causes a chip to generate heat, given a fixed operating voltage. Is it due to the narrowness of the interconnections between the transistors? Is it due to the number of transistors? Is it due to the speed of the on/off switching of the transistors? (Perhaps a better question is, How much is due to each of these factors, and how much is due to others.) 46023,06,01/13/93,KEN STOX,ROY LIPSCOMB RE: WHY DO 486'S GET HOT, The newer generation of CPU's run hot for two reasons: 1) Speed, the faster you switch, the more heat you generate. 2) There are Xx10e6 components in a very small area. I would think that the biggest factor is a function of both, but really is just of function of speed, since that is also a driving factor towards smaller sizes.