Windows 3.1 was pretty light though. It did indeed start up pretty fast because it simply didn't do much. Remember a DOS PC had almost no startup time besides the BIOS Self-Test so there was some expectation to fulfill as well. With 95 and even more so 98 it really started becoming a thing.
The LCD looks amazing though for 1993. Where I lived we didn't see those appear until much later in the 90s and they didn't have that much contrast (they were still very crappy DSTN panels). In 1994 I worked for a computer shop that sold packard bell among others (mainly their own brands) and we didn't have LCDs until much later. I have seen this Philips 150S LCD later but not in 1994. According to ChatGPT the 150S is from 2002 but I can't find a source link so take it with a grain of salt :)
And at work we didn't get LCDs until 2004-2005! At that time I worked in a callcenter and we used to throw stress balls at each other which we had to stop when the LCDs arrived due to an unfortunate accident.
Don't know if this is /s or not, but for me it seems fast, but not extremely so.
My PC from '92, a 386 with 4Mb RAM was a bit slower, but not much. Boot took about a minute, including RAM test. Once in windows 3.1, bigger programs took long to start, but I presume that's mostly RAM limited.
This machine was very powerfull. 16Mb was huge and pentiums were rare.
My biggest slowdown was win95 on I think a cyrix 6x86 with 16Mb. But win95 was such a leap forward that we tolerated it.
SSD's brought us vack to this era of startup speed, and we're quickly regressing again.
As long as people are respectful and follow the guidelines, sure.
Edit: your other replies are not respectful and seem to violate the guidelines.
Edit 2: Anyone can be respectful to anyone else regardless of beliefs. Choosing not to be respectful doesn't say anything about the beliefs, it speaks as to the person being disrespectful. This will be my last edit/reply.
The only person here inciting a flamewar is you. Nice attempt at "concern trolling"
Your trolling in the other comments is the problem that you claim to be against. Everyone else seems to be having a rational discussion without letting their emotions influence their writing except for you.
Oh please. I stated a position that isn't even controversial, noting that these sorts of discussions are not really what folks tend to want on hackernews. Responses have been from agreement to claims of trolling. Feel free to give more compassion to folks with religious trauma as you join us all in being better folks.
are not really what folks tend to want on hackernews
This is simply not true - the thing that's unwanted is flamewars. The goal (aspirational as it may be) is curious conversation. If you are unable, for whatever reason, to engage in a topic with curiosity, that's totally fine but it's on you not to bring deliberate arson to the conversation other people might have.
None of this invalidates your views or experiences but the notion they give you some sort of righteous justification to poop in the thread is preposterous. You don't even have the excuse of ignorance - you've been here well over a decade.
> Can you just stop? It's really a much worse thing than whatever your problem with discussion over [a sensitive topic that will certainly bait flamewars] is. There's reams of mod commentary about it. https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=false&qu...
Since you are wanting to continue conversing meta, feel free, but I'm done. The point has been made and enough folks recognize a toxic topic to HN when they see one (which is why this thread has been flaggedeathed), and I'm happy to leave the dead thread where it stands.
Both 'why is this on HN' (right in the site guidelines) and 'let's start a religious flamewar' are things to avoid here. If you don't like the topic, read another post. If you think it doesn't belong on HN, flag it or email hn@ycombinator.com with your concerns.
Could you link me the case? I'm pretty curious about it. The cases I've seen have been when the school shooter was already largely finished killing people.
I had to do an internet search. It was Pearl High School, and it looks like the principal only stopped the subject from leaving the school grounds. Who knows if the subject would have killed more elsewhere, the subject had already killed that day even before going to the school.
That's the thing, we'll never know how many shooting deaths were prevented by "a good guy with a gun", because we don't know if more people would have been shot and died if the shooter wasn't stopped.
>I don't think there ever will be. I would probably not shoot a kid that I only suspect would shoot someone. I doubt a teacher would either.
There have been interviews with bystanders who had firearms on their person during a mass shooting and they didn't use their firearm because they didn't want the police to think they were on the side of the attacker(s). The idea that life is like a video game where there are unambiguous and easily identified "good guys" and "bad guys" in a chaotic situation is very juvenile.
I think I agree with you: It is difficult to identify between good and bad guys. A kid with a gun might be a good person making a terrible mistake which is why I wouldn't want to shoot him/her, especially if that person hasn't harmed anyone.
"hollow points, rounds designed to swell upon impact to ensure maximum harm."
My understanding is that hollow points were designed to prevent over-penetration rather than to harm more. How does the author know it was designed to "ensure maximum harm"? I can't help but think it was intentional.
Edit: Of course now that I read the rest of the article after initially writing this comment, I see that quote is also highlighted in a text box (side note, what is that called when they do that?).
As others have said, hollow points do cause more harm, but it’s a physical side effect of trying to stop the round in the target.
If the energy of the round wasn’t expended into the target, it would simply shoot through and continue into the next target behind, which is the absolute worst case.
You may end up only injuring the intended target but killing an innocent behind it.
They are absolutely designed to prevent over-penetration. That's how the FBI tests ammunition. They fire it into a block of ballistic gelatin and ammunition that penetrates far enough to have a high chance of incapacitating the target but not so far as to carry through completely gets the highest marks. The only real way to accomplish this is with hollow points. There's a reason every law enforcement agency in the country uses them.
Actually federal law enforcement has had a long preference for 10mm auto, and its shortened successor the .40 S&W. In particular the FBI HRT and SWAT still use it despite a history of over penetration.
I don't have a link, but I read a long article about the development process for the 10mm. Apparently, penetration was the reason they switched to 10 (and later 40). They were having difficulties with 9mm not penetrating windshields and other barriers.
Yes, in the late 80s/early 90s 10mm was chosen by the FBI because 9mm ammo at the time had a tendency to under-penetrate (not an issue in the present day, 9mm today performs significantly better than 9mm 25 years ago).
The story of the FBI's switch from revolvers to semi autos is pretty interesting. They decided on 10mm but some agents found it to be too "hot" and had trouble controlling it. So they put out a request for a modified 10mm round and Smith and Wesson came up with the .40S&W. They developed the round before they had a production gun to shoot it, though. Glock had "acquired" some of S&W's new ammunition at a trade show to study it and found that by making minor modifications to their existing Glock 17 they could fire S&W's new ammo. They submitted the new gun to the FBI who chose it as the standard issue firearm for all of their agents.
The release of the Glock 22 predates the release of the Glock 20, but going by their naming convention the Glock 20 was patented first. It's possible they modified the 20 but I believe it was the 17, I would have to check the book where I read it (Glock: The Rise of America's Gun).
It’s both. They help with over penetration, and increase damage. Both aspects are routinely advertised by ammo manufacturers, and the terminal ballistics are often advertised as having enhanced “hydrostatic shock” and larger wound channels.
Hollow points are intended to do maximum damage. It makes sense - you shouldn't be employing your weapon unless your life is in danger. If your life is in danger, you want to neutralize the threat as quickly and effectively as possible. If you don't need to do that, then you don't need your weapon at all. Shooting with the intent of wounding someone is a Hollywood-ism.
They're designed to prevent going straight through by expanding inside of soft tissues. One of the effects of that is increased tissue damage. So they maybe they weren't "designed to cause maximum harm" but that's certainly one of the effects over a full metal jacket round.
Yes, designed to expand in order to stop, not designed to expand in order to harm.
I do feel for the teacher; the situation is not ideal and I wouldn't want to have to shoot someone I'm supposed to take care of either.
I think it's good that this teacher sounds like someone who doesn't want to use his gun (not "trigger-happy"), I just hope in the unlikely situation where he would have to use it, that quality doesn't prevent him from stopping a threat before more harm is done.
I should have been more clear. That was the point I was trying to make. Anyone I've talked to about using firearms for home defense likes hollow points because of the damage they do to a home invader, not how much safer the rounds are because they stop.
Well, over-penetration is definitely an important concern in a home defense situation. I remember reading a case about a man that shot an intruder with a .44 Mag, the round went through the robber, through his house, across the street to another house where it hit his neighbor.
How do you increase stopping power? By having a bullet do greater damage to the target. That's what they are designed for. You can argue that there's a legitimate interest for doing so, but it doesn't change that it is about damage. They're banned by the hague conventions for warfare, seen as unnecessarily harmful, so they only see civilian use (although some military designs follow similar ideas, as far as I know none are exactly hollow point due to at least lip-service to these rules)
Also, the objective when shooting someone in self-defense vs shooting someone in war is often different. A wounded enemy is a huge burden - now they need medivac, and their fellows are concerned for their welfare. A dead enemy produces none of that overhead.
I edited "stop" to "prevent over-penetration" before I saw your reply. I meant about the bullet not going through anything and hitting someone unintentionally.
Is (1) a by-product of (2), or is (2) a by-product of (1)?
Some people are arguing that hollow points were designed for (1), causing the most damage, and that (2), stopping in the target, is just a side-effect of its true purpose.
> Is (1) a by-product of (2), or is (2) a by-product of (1)?
No, both are essential and important factors in what motivated the development of hollowpoints. The idea is both to maximize effectiveness against the intended target and minimize collateral damage; almost any time you have any justification to use a firearm the first is of central importance, and while the second may be less consistently important it is frequently important and overwhelmingly so when it is.
