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Technology Stocks : Adaptec (ADPT) -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Jay Lowe who wrote (1992)	5/2/1998 6:48:00 AM
From: Tom M	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 5944

I'd like to bring up a couple different points. First I've been in and out of ADPT for 3 years, always long. I was very nervous trading lately and haven't held very long at all - got again before earnings. I brought up a list of my concerns about a month ago that started a lot of discussion. Here are a few of my recent concerns in addition to the "dead money" issues heading into an overdue correction atmosphere as recently mentioned. -remember when they blew it last Q, we were all saying they just decided to take the big hit and write off the quarter and we were hoping their "delayed" purchases would certainly pad this Q. Well, it was obviously worse than we imagined. -there was a press release last fall when ADPT fell to about 32 on low volume, where they said that was their traditional slow Q, and that there would be "upside surprises" beginning of this year. This statement (which set them up for lawsuits most likely), helped the stock recover and make it to the 50's. Well, the scarey part is that it was actually worse than MANAGEMENT imagined. The seem to have been taken completely by surprise - not good. -their glory days with top value line ratings etc where done under a different CEO who retired last year. Those familiar with the names and dates please feel free to correct me. -just as they seem to have been safely diversifying, they spend all their cash to put most of their eggs in the SCSI basket. I'm still not convinced this is the winning idea. I believe IEEE 1394 Firewire will wind up being the daisey chaining connectivity winner for the masses, and it will be a low margin commodity. SCSI of course has its place on high end, but that's not to say something faster and cheaper can't entice many away. I'm having a hard time deciding what I'd be willing to pay now for this company, and have changed my open order several times. I just don't see them ever as being what they used to be. I sincerely hope for many of you this was the time to buy and the worst is over. I know you're supposed to be scared if the price seems cheap, but I couldn't pull the trigger. thoughts? Tom

To: Jay Lowe who wrote (1992)	5/2/1998 6:58:00 AM
From: Starowl	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 5944

Jay: I have long been an advocate of improved marketing for Adaptec. In fact, I have (ineffectually, I suppose) emailed suggestions to the company on the subject of improving name recognition of some of its key products. Recently I emailed one of its senior officers, suggesting the company buy some air time, even if it is only a contribution to National Public Radio's Market Place show: "Market Place is brought to you by Adaptec--we make computer products that move your information faster, blah blah blah . . ." At least there should be a tax deduction for an NPR contribution. After all, Intel wants the everyday user of its chips to see the advantage in faster processing. Speed is important. Adaptec works in speed and volume. Why should its products only be seen in trade journals or on the back pages of computer magazines? And why not change the names of its SCSI cards to something more interesting than numbers and letters? Name recognition. Be nice if Dell could advertise its computers as having the Intel Pentium II (Katmai?) 333 processor and the Adaptec "Cyclone" host adaptor, or something like that. Starowl

To: Jay Lowe who wrote (1992)	5/3/1998 6:30:00 AM
From: Torben Noerup Nielsen	Respond to of 5944

Jay, >Better not take guys like you for granted ... best to continue >to grow your loyalty and that of the next wave of technical >leaders! True, but I am not completely out of it yet! Also, now I am old enough to have other people working for me and I get to approve - or disapprove - their purchases :-) I don't think there was much they could have done about UDMA even if they'd seriously tried. But they are pushing UltraSCSI pretty hard now. I just saw another full-page add in this months Byte and there are lots of others. So they are not letting it go without a fight. Right now, I am waiting for something in the DVD and IIO areas. Those have promise. Cheers, Torben