help me spend some money

[Earl H. Kinmonth]

Help me spend some money ($25,000).  I'm in a position where I can
more or less decide how to computerize word processing and record
keeping for my academic department.

Currently we have a NBI system 64, a piece of S__T (no other word
for it) that costs us $7,500 in "maintenance" per year, above and
beyond supplies.  It has the worst communications software I've
ever seen and utilities that you wouldn't believe (do a search for
a word that happens to be in the last line of a 500 page manuscript,
and it'll show you every line, every page, until the end of the text!).

My idea is to replace this dinosaur with something running **IX.  The
replacement should be able to: (a) run Wordstar; (b) a DeBased clone;
(c) various MiSerable Dos programs on an adhoc basis; (c) support
six terminals for secretarial word processing (no more than 3 active
at any one time); (d) support two or more dialups (2400 -> 9600);
(e) support at least one tcp style high speed link (56k plus); (f)
have 150+plus meg disk capacity; (g) have reliable and simple tape
backup; (h) support fax.

Additional, highly desirable features.  Support for all Western
European languages including Russian plus Japanese, and Chinese.

So far, the one configuration that looks close is the Sony News
Workstation.  With academic pricing, a pair of these and terminals
would come within budget.  The MiSerable Dos support is a bit weak
as is the Chinese, but the other criteria are fulfilled.

Please e-mail comments and suggestions.  I'll provide a summary
to anyone who is interested.