I am writing to anyone thinking of switching to a PC - you might not 
have to!

My two kids, like most nowadays, use a computer for project work at 
school. I'd been thinking about buying a PC to enhance the quality of 
the work they could produce.
With the latest PCs aimed at home use costing well over œ1000, plus 
extra for a printer and bering in mind it will undoubtedly be outdated 
next year I thought perhaps I was working at the problem from the 
wrong end and started to consider upgrading my Atari based system.

I spotted the Protext re-launch in AC#3 and ordered a copy - taking 
its re-launch as a good omen for my upgrade plan. This latest version 
is a revelation - full of features I expected to have to buy a PC to 
get! Protext has a real-time spell checker, a Thesaurus, colour image 
support (GIF and IMG), print preview, different coloured text output, 
import/export options including RTF and much more.

I'm running this all from floppies on a 2Mb STe machine with the 
dictionary loading from reset-proof RAM disk and the Thesaurus on my 
saved text disk and it all seems to work as fast as the average PC.

Hvving saved myself a grand I splashed out on an Epson Stylus 100 
Colour inkjet, I choose this model because both Protext and Imagecopy 
have dedicated printer drivers. I aslo understand recent Windows 
printers are not suitable for use with Atari systems because they don't 
include any bitmapped fonts at all.
 
On my system I settle for 360x360dpi output - although the printer is 
capable of 720x720dpi if I had more memory. The improvement over my old 
dot matrix is astonishing - near laser quality. I was also pleased to 
find older programs such as Write-On and timeworks include drivers to 
support this printer.

OK, so we can't use Encarta, but in two years time my Atari will be no 
more obsolete than the current crop of Pentium PCs!

Mick Smith, Worthing