I'd like to back your excellent Plug and Play cover story (September) with an example. Last month, I had to upgrade a 486/66 (with an attached CD-ROM drive, built-in SoundGrabber, and Ethernet) to W4W (Windows For Workgroups). After the pure software installation of W4W, the multimedia capabilities of the 486 were gone, as well as its ability to print through LPT1. After a morning's work, I discovered that W4W needed an IRQ (interrupt request), so it simply took the IRQ of the LPT1. It also needed a DMA buffer, so it seized the DMA buffer of the CD-ROM drive...all without any warning! This inspired me to write the following analogy, a Plug and Play version of an instruction manual for an electric top to a VW bug:
Thank you for buying our install-it-yourself electric top for VWs, a state-of-the-art plug-and-drive accessory for
VWs. Here are some installation tips:
-- If your electric antenna ceases to work, displace its wiring so that its wiring takes precedence over the electric top.
-- If you already have an air-conditioning system, you'll have to upgrade your alternator for a more powerful model.
-- We suggest you swap the positions of the alternator belt and the air-conditioning system to bring the alternator nearer to the crankcase and reduce wear on the crankshaft, which has only three bearings.
-- After that, if your engine is difficult to start, we suggest you change the ignition advance by replacing the 10-microfarad capacitor with a 15-microfarad model.
-- In the same process, you will want to replace the jet hose of the carburetor with a larger one.
-- If after all these changes your VW doesn't start, please consult your nearest dealer. But we are sure that you won't have any trouble with our plug-and-drive kit.
If you had such trouble with your car, would you have accepted it for so lon
g?
Vu Tien Khang,
Khang.VuTien@cginn.cgs.fr
Toulouse, France
Plug-and-Drive Auto Mechanics
