Exported from SPITFIRE Bulletin Board System on 04-06-93 at 20:56:08.
DATE..... : 04-06-93 20:55:11
TO....... : All
FROM..... : Sysop
SUBJECT.. : MSDOS 6.0 WARNING

Beware of the DEFRAG program that comes with MSDOS 6.0 -- it may trash
your hard disk.

After installing MSDOS 6.0 on my main system and cleaning up the mess it
made of the autoexec.bat and config.sys files, I decided to try DEFRAG, a
special version of Norton's Speedisk that comes with MSDOS 6.0.
I ran CHKDSK and version 6 of Norton's Disk Doctor and both reported all
was well with my hard disk (a 245 MB Quantum drive).  Then I ran DEFRAG. 
About a third of the way through the process, DEFRAG stopped with
"internal error 2".  Upon exiting to DOS, I found several subdirectories
and some individual files destroyed.
After cleaning up that mess and restoring the trashed subdirectories and
files from tape, CHKDSK and Disk Doctor both reported once again
that all was well with the hard disk.

Since I had everything on tape, I decided to try DEFRAG again.  The
results were similar to the first trial.  Once everything was restored for
the second time, I decided that I would just use MSDOS 6.0 without using
the DEFRAG program and continued on with the testing.

Everything seemed OK until I tried to download at 14.4KB using Procomm
Plus running under Desq View (this worked fine under MSDOS 3.3, 4.01, and
5.0).  The result was less than satisfactory.  Errors were occuring every
couple of seconds at regular intervals.  The problem occured even when
Procomm Plus was running in the foreground with no other programs running
in the background.

At this point I used the UNINSTALL utility that came with MSDOS 6.0 and
restored MSDOS 5.0. Now everything's working properly again.
Are these isolated problems?  Hardly.  One of our larger customers, the
U.S. Postal service, began upgrading some of their systems last week with
great praise for the new "features" of MSDOS 6.0.  This week they're
crying the blues.

It looks like MSDOS 6.0 is nothing more than an attempt to come up with
something to work better with Windows than the previous versions.  The
result?  An over-priced, under-tested upgrade designed to separate you 
from your hard earned money.

Oh well, maybe MSDOS 6.01 will be out soon.

Mike C.
NCT's Free BBS
(916)962-1947