Talk:RM plc

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Why is this page titled RM Education [Redirected from RM plc]?

I'm not sure it is my place as an employee to make major edits, at risk of accusation of bias in writing style etc - however the page title and focus of the opening paragraph here isn't quite right? The structure of the Group is that RM plc owns (or has owned) various subsidiaries, including RM Education Ltd.

...so why is RM Education (a subsidiary) the title, and target of the RM plc redirect? And, opening text doesn't describe RM plc (more an outdated description of the subsidiary) yet the page goes on to have a section on plc Group-level "business structures".

It seems this is a hybrid of the two organisational levels that either needs to be separated out or the page restructured to correctly describe the business hierarchy. Either it is the page for RM plc (hence the redirect, and some content including plc divisions and subsidiary companies) or is just the page for RM Education Ltd (and so should ideally exist as a child page where the wider RM plc group content exists).

While it is correct that "RM Education Ltd" is perhaps the closest part of the Group to the original "Research Machines" business set up in 1973, the Group has evolved substantially over time. In modern day, even if combined with RM Results financials (reported separately to the City) the revenue share is only roughly equal to RM Resources (the TTS and Consortium brands) so it is no longer correct to call RM Education Ltd the 'principal division'. As presented in the 2020 Annual Reports, page 97 (50 in the PDF), the largest divisional revenue comes from RM Resources.

Cletheroe (talk) 16:09, 26 March 2021 (UTC)

Feel free to correct the article name and content. There's plenty on the firm's history, perhaps as so many people remember RM computers at school, but not enough on its current shape and focus. Regards Guffydrawers (talk) 07:28, 29 March 2021 (UTC)

The recent attempt to change the article name to RM plc was reverted because of how it was done, not why. See Oxfordmale's talk page. Over to you folks familiar with the company's current form. Regards Guffydrawers (talk) 14:04, 23 May 2023 (UTC)

The article is now called RM plc. Regards Guffydrawers (talk) 08:02, 30 May 2023 (UTC)

Nimbus PC-186

I worked for RM as a software developer from 1983-1989 and was involved in the ROM BIOS and implementing MS-DOS for the PC-186 and the AX and VX range. I have modified the statement that the IBM PC/AT defined IBM compatibility (not true - that was the IBM PC and the PC/XT) and that it was the lack of protected mode in the 80186 that prevented the PC-186 being PC-compatible (also not true - at the time the PC-186 was released a number of manufacturers were producing PC-compatibles using the 8086 or 8088 processor, neither of which had protected mode). When the PC-186 was released, the PC/AT had only been shipping for a few months and there was very little software that made use of protected mode.

The reality is that the 80186 incorporated a number of support functions that were incompatible with the support chips chosen by IBM, making it impossible to build a PC-compatible using the 186 processor. The PC-186 didn't attempt any level of PC compatibility:

• It used support chips designed in-house by RM engineers that were not compatible with the equivalent functions on the IBM PC.
• Unlike the IBM PC, the processor had no direct access to video memory, so the large amount of PC software that wrote direct to video memory rather than going through the operating system couldn't work on the PC-186. This gave the PC-186 the advantage that applications had up to 1Mb available to them as opposed to the 640kb limit on the IBM PC.
• The PC-186 ROM BIOS was completely different to that used by IBM, so any PC software that bypassed the operating system to use the ROM BIOS wouldn't work on the PC-186.

I am also suspicious of the comment in the next paragraph that "Usually the PC-186 clients were diskless, booting via the network." That isn't how I remember it. My memory is that the PC-186 always had a floppy disk drive, but the hard disk drive was optional. I don't think we shipped any diskless versions of the PC-186. However, it was 40 years ago and my memory may be faulty, so I'm leaving that paragraph as it is. Does anyone have a source? Prh47bridge (talk) 09:50, 3 February 2024 (UTC)

>Usually the PC-186 clients were diskless

I recall seeing rooms of diskless PC-186s in the later style case (similar to the M-series), such as this [1], but would also hesitate with "usually". Diskless had practical appeal for embattled network managers & techs and it's only when the client OS became Windows 9x (RM Connect) that booting over the network died out. Regards Guffydrawers (talk) 10:07, 6 February 2024 (UTC)

I have rephrased parts of the passage on diskless PC-186s. Without an authoritative source we should avoid statements on how usual it was to operate them without floppy and hard drives. Regards Guffydrawers (talk) 06:39, 22 February 2024 (UTC)

CEOs

Is the list of CEOs useful or notable? If it is, then would a table be neater? Without narrative on each CEO's term it seems to this reader as if it's a list for its own sake. Guffydrawers (talk) 11:27, 3 May 2024 (UTC)