Was anyone else disappointed with the A1200?

[Bruce Abbott]

Originally Posted by dreadnought

Plus, my point was that laptops are more prevalent now because they have become affordable, not the other way around. People wanted them as much in the 90s as right now, the difference is that back then only those with deep pockets could afford them.

I don't believe that. I have a couple of laptops from the 90's, a Toshiba T1800 386SX with monochrome screen (released Sept 1992, same month as the A1200), and a Satellite 310CDS from 1998 that Bloomberg described as a 'Low Cost Home Laptop'. They both suck.

The 310CDS has a Pentium CPU and built-in 'sound card' so it could be a good games machine, except that the passive matrix screen has poor contrast and is horribly slow. It doesn't have a joystick port either, and of course there's no numeric keypad so good luck controlling flight simulators. To make this machine viable you needed a CRT monitor (very bulky) and an external keyboard and mouse. That raised the price, which made a desktop machine more attractive for anyone who didn't really need a portable computer - even if the laptop's base price was cheaper.

Originally Posted by dreadnought

And if you want to pretend that this fact, and more importantly the rise of smartphones wasn't a major factor in desktop sales decline then go ahead, but just about every serious analyst in the world will disagree with you.

Where did I say it wasn't? I just said they aren't ideal for games. But then the vast majority of smartphones users aren't primarily using them for games, if at all.

Originally Posted by dreadnought

This is vintage Bruce Abbott Something something New Zealand - presto! global trends confirmed.

Desktop vs. Laptop Market Share: What do People Prefer?

According to the IDC, laptops sell more than desktops. Here’s the breakdown for 2022:

Notebooks sold: 207,534,238 [57%]
Detachable tablets sold: 81,478,058 [22%]
Desktops sold: 76,924,993 [21%]

PC sales were in a decline of 19.8% in the fourth quarter of 2022. Here’s the breakdown of the affected devices:

2.3% decline in tablet shipments
28.3% decline for desktop PCs

Judging by the market share in 2022, it seems that desktops are losing the battle against laptops. According to data from Q1 2022, 67% of users used laptops to access the Internet.

almost two-thirds of laptops are personal users

Who has the biggest market share in laptops?

According to data from Statista from 2021, in the United States, the following brands held the most market share:

HP – 35%
Dell – 27%
Apple – 24%
Acer – 13%
Lenovo – 12%

Why use a desktop instead of a laptop?

There are several benefits to desktops:

Highly customizable in terms of hardware.
Limitless upgrade features.
Easier to repair.
More affordable.
Better for gaming.
Larger screen size.
Lower chance of theft.

However, desktops have a share of drawbacks:

Not portable.
Requires additional peripherals.
Takes a lot more space.

While desktops offer more hardware power, better customization, and upgrade options, they aren’t portable, which is their biggest drawback that turns away users.

For students and business users who are always on the go, a laptop is almost always a better solution in the long run.

So, what lies in the future?

The gap between laptops and desktops will continue to rise as the number of laptop users slowly but surely increases.

Originally Posted by dreadnought

Sure, when cornered and out of any real arguments, let's reach out for the laziest, most tired, low hanging fruit anti-PC trope there is. Something I could do myself in the previous post re: Apple snobs, but I only mentioned the coffee shop hipsters as silly and unimportant.

If they were 'silly and unimportant' then why mention them at all? The reason was to bolster your argument that Apple users are elitists.

Problem is it's not true. The real reason people use Apple products is that they work better. The real 'elitists' are the people who crow about the latest PC hardware as if only they have the technical expertise to understand it - as apposed to the 'illiterates' who get Macs because they just want something that works. The biggest snobs are Linux users, who look down at anyone who isn't proficient at using the command line (for stuff that should have a GUI).

Originally Posted by dreadnought

some more real-world scenarios for you, plus explain why yours was largerly Apples vs walnuts comparison. Maybe just consider this very simple common-sense thing: if Apple computers are really so, so much better than PCs - and cheaper! - how come they only have about ~10% of global market share?

Apple are only one company, with an incompatible product - just like Commodore was only one company with an incompatible product. Considering that, I'd say Apple is doing pretty well. In 2021 Apple had 24% of the laptop market, not far behind HP and Dell, and twice as much as Acer and Lenovo.

Originally Posted by dreadnought

I'm happy you felt this way but somehow most of the world, especially those interested in games, chose the blandness of the boring metal box (which, as we have gone over many times wasn't all that much more expensive than similarly specced A1200).

I don't know why you think this is some kind of gotcha. How many times have I said that if you want similar specs you need to pay a similar price? The advantage of the A1200 was that you could play great games and do other stuff without having to pay for all that hardware PCs needed. Then if later you wanted more power you could add a RAM board or accelerator card for much less than buying a new PC. Perhaps it didn't have the same processing power as a high-end PC, but you didn't need it.

The A1200 was styled like traditional home computers, the vast majority of which had an integrated keyboard design. This includes the Apple IIc, Archimedes A3000, Tandy EX/HX, Vtech Laser 200, Memotech MTX500, Thomson TO7, Amstrad PC20 (AKA Sinclair PC 200), Philips VG5000, Schneider Euro PC, and all the others you know about.

The A500 had the same design, and it was a best seller for Commodore. One advantage you might not think of is that the entire system fitted in a small flat box, ideal for putting attractive artwork on and displaying in a department store. The customer could pick one up, pay for it at the counter and walk out the door carrying it by the handle like a briefcase.

Contrast that with a typical PC packaged in several awkward boxes, two of which are too large to carry easily even by themselves! I provided a free home delivery and setup service to my customers. Why? Not just to make the sale, but because I knew it would be set up right and I wouldn't have the customer coming back complaining that it didn't work (or worse, put their back out trying to lift it out of the car).

You talk about people choosing a bland metal box, but what about those who didn't? One of the commonly cited reasons for not liking the A2000 was that it came in a big bland metal box. But so did PCs. And people hated them too. Slimline PCs were popular for a while during the 90's. But this came to an end when high-end 486s and Pentiums required more room for a bigger power supply etc., and VL bus or PCI made riser cards too complex. At that point you didn't have a choice.

Some Amiga fans put their A1200 in a tower case. The idea was that they would have plenty of room to add a CD-ROM drive, 3.5" hard drive etc. I did this to my friend's A1200, and put a PC motherboard in there too! The two were linked together with the Siamese System so the same keyboard, mouse, and screen could be used. It was neat, but in the end we took the A1200 motherboard out and put it back in its original case. The tower case was awkward to move around, and after closing down his business he didn't need the PC features.

[Bruce Abbott]

Originally Posted by hammer

For the PC DOS era, Quarterdeck has software called "VIDRAM" that enables VGA card-equipped PCs to reallocate VGA memory for an extra 64K (16 bit) on top of the base 640K memory.

Thanks for that. I wondered if it was possible but couldn't find anyone who had done it.

[pandy71]

Originally Posted by Bruce Abbott

Thanks for that. I wondered if it was possible but couldn't find anyone who had done it.

Possible but what? Shadow RAM? Adding unused memory range to general memory pool?

[alexh]

Originally Posted by Bruce Abbott

I have a couple of laptops from the 90's, a Toshiba T1800 386SX with monochrome screen (released Sept 1992, same month as the A1200), and a Satellite 310CDS from 1998 that Bloomberg described as a 'Low Cost Home Laptop'. They both suck.

My Dad got a Compaq Contura 4/25c in 1992 as I was considering an A1200. It was a 486SL 25MHz with 4MB RAM, 120MB HDD, 640x480 in 256 colours. You could play Day of the Tentacle on it (just) when it came out the following year and I thought that it was comparable perhaps slightly better than my A500+HD8.

Now here's the thing... it cost... £1400 in 1992 (£3000 in todays money adjusting for inflation)

I bought a Super Nintendo + SuperMagicom (floppy disk cartridge backup system) instead. I got a cable to send the games from the Amiga 500's HDD. Drilled a 2nd hole in all my Amiga disks to turn them into 1.6MB SMC disks.

[hammer]

Originally Posted by pandy71

Possible but what? Shadow RAM? Adding unused memory range to general memory pool?

Using VGA's 64 KB (16-bit) memory window for CPU's programs. For performance reasons, ping pong with memory storage via the ISA bus is not recommended.

[hammer]

Originally Posted by oscar_ates

This 9months delay to release the chipset features to developers is unheard type of mistake, although I agree that it was too late to save the commodore ship since the twice sales would not save it from getting sunk. AGA like machine could be ok for year 1989-1990.

Compare 1994 CD32 performance with PS1 beast:

http://www.psxdev.net/forum/viewtopic.php?t=21

PS1 has 33MIPS(CPU)+66MIPS(GTE)+80MIPS(DCE)+X?(GPU)+Separate SPU(512KB own RAM)+2MB Main RAM+1MB VRAM performance for both 2D/3D. Commodore could not compete with this beast on the long run anyway.

For 2D games look at the "Castlevania-Symphony of the Night" and "Silhoutte and Mirage", very nice games.

Commodore would need to pull the SuperFX2 (20 MIPS INT16) tactics to remain in the game. It's about delivering a texture-mapped 3D gaming experience.

Amiga CD32 would need AT&T's DSP3210 (12.5 MIPS INT32, 25 MFLOPS FP32) @ 50 Mhz and 68EC020 @ 28 Mhz (about 5.6 MIPS INT32) to remain in the game.

PS1 is an integer beast, hence Commodore would need to offer an alternative (floating point path) to integer-only PS1. PS1 game ports for the PC need Pentium class CPUs.

For Western markets, PS1 was released in Q4 1995. Like many others, I purchased my Pentium 150 based PC in 1996. Intel released the Pentium Pro and Pentium 120/133 in 1995.

For the desktop computer use case, Amiga platform didn't transition into 68040 socket mass production, hence 68060 wouldn't be in the economies of scale.

Apple transitioned into "RISC" PowerPC in 1994.

The PC (or any desktop computer) has its subsidy with income tax offsets.

[hammer]

Originally Posted by Bruce Abbott

Oops! You just proved my point.

[ Show youtube player ]

Doom (low details) on 386DX-40 with 128K cache
Tseng ET4000 ISA = 26.751 fps
Trident 8900CL ISA = 23.0088 fps
WD90C32 = 26.838 fps (Diamond Speedstar 24X)

Trident 8900CL had the fast VGA potential.

IBM 8514's pro-app use case is irrelevant to PC DOS gaming.

I can reuse my ET4000 ISA for my Pentium 150-based PC, but a no-name OEM S3 Trio 64UV+ PCI is cheap.

Originally Posted by Bruce Abbott

Why?

To prove AGA is not Trident 8900CL class.

[grelbfarlk]

I bought a laptop last winter for $750 with 8 cores, 16GB of DDR5, a midrange GPU with 8GB and a fast IPS screen, it's pretty close to as fast as my desktop.
Commodore should have thought of making this thing instead.

[hammer]

Originally Posted by pandy71

Of course it can! How without access to this memory space, CPU could directly modify frame buffer content.
But seem you don't get my point - i've proposed you to place in this memory space CPU code so PC can experience Amiga or Atari ST reality.

Atari ST is rubbish and the 2 million install base shows it. Atari ST's music niche wasn't able to sustain the platform.

The PC, SNES, PS1, Saturn, 3DO, and Mega Drive have discrete memory pools for each CPU and GPU component.

PC's pack pixels and discrete memory pools are advantageous for its survival as an early 1990s 2.5D/3D gaming platform.

UMA is useful when the GPU and CPU have large enough on-chip caches and cache coherence competency.

Originally Posted by pandy71

Whenever your code is located in CHIP RAM then it is UMA and this is default configuration for most Amiga configs.

I'm already aware of this, but Budgie has embedded Ramsey-like Fast RAM controller capability.

For PCMCIA RAM expansion, Budgie has a 16-bit buffered connection to Gayle's PCMCIA. Budgie also allows for cheap BOM cost 32-bit Fast RAM boards. A1200/CD32 is one step away from a 32-bit Fast RAM-equipped configuration.

A1200's embedded hardware features are more than A500. A500 doesn't have a 16-bit Fast RAM controller.

CD32's Akiko (combining Gayle, Budgie(Buster/Ramsey), and two CIAs) has further cost reduction when compared to A1200. This is why Commodore UK MD and UK game developers argued for upgraded CD32 specs.

Originally Posted by pandy71

In UMA graphics is prioritized over CPU.

I'm already aware of this.

Originally Posted by pandy71

In out of the box A1200 there is no FAST RAM thus it is UMA only.

I'm already aware of this. This topic is about A1200 criticism.

Originally Posted by pandy71

Obviously you not replying with understanding of my point but as this is irrelevant from this thread perspective as you far from main topic.

This topic is about A1200 (and CD32 by extension) criticism in a gaming context.

IBM 8514's non-gaming use case is irrelevant to this gaming topic.

Originally Posted by pandy71

It is not about OCS but R&D where German CBM also participated with success.

What's the install base for A2000 again?

Originally Posted by pandy71

Nope - you replied to your self - as i pointed earlier - you completely going off topic, mixing time, technology and flooding this topic with irrelevant numbers, examples etc.

Your IBM 8514's non-gaming use case is irrelevant to this gaming topic.

[hammer]

Originally Posted by Gilbert

Was anyone else disappointed with the A1200?

Most Amiga users and magazines seemed to be very happy with the A1200 when it came out. I wasn't at all, and a look at the first games pretty much ended my association with Amiga gaming. I just saw the same games with more colours and a bit smoother. There was no wow factor. After that I stuck with the Amiga 500 (with half meg memory expansion) and my Super Famicom (Jap SNES).

Here's what Commodore got wrong in my opinion

1. Too much focus on creating higher-res screen modes with more colours (and also making the blitter work in these different screen modes) and not enough on enhancing gaming(8 or maybe 16 sprites when the comparitively old Megadrive and SNES could manage 64 and 128 respectively). It's a bit like the original Amiga - yes it can display 4096 colours on screen, but the majority of the games for the system were 16 colours (Albeit some had added some Copper magic) and most didn't even run at 50/60 fps. That was fine back in 1985 but 7 years(!) later you expect a significant upgrade.

2. There was a mild improvement to dual playfield mode. Great!... when the SNES had 5(?) playfields and could scale and rotate whole screens. Commodore seemed to have no sense they were competing here....

2. Sound chip needed 6 channels to get a decent track playing with sound effects. Again SNES and Megadrive have 6 channels each. Using the same sound chip from 1985 was ridiculous!

3. Like the original Amiga, if you wanted to get a good number of objects on screen with a lot of colours and scrolling, you had to spend ages using hardware tricks or specific techniques. Time = money and developers aren't going to want to spend 2 years making an arcade quality game on the A1200 when simpler systems exist....

I do have a CD32 now, but it's not very impressive from a technical point of view, even the mighty Banshee is bettered on both the SNES and Megadrive. The reason I like it is because it offers something a bit different and it's an Amiga It's fairly obvious it had no hope of competing long term. I just find it hard to see what Commodore was thinking with the AGA architecture??

The original intent with AGA generation is to be bundled with $20 DSP3210 @ 50 Mhz.

DSP3210 is a fast object manipulator for AGA's Lisa display chip.

A1200's Budgie includes functions from Ramsey's 32-bit FastRAM controller.

Extra cost incurred with Gayle (Fat Gray replacement)'s PCMCIA and IDE, and modification on Budgie to link with Gayle's PCMCIA.

http://www.bambi-amiga.co.uk/amigahistory/mikesinz.html

) The DSP system was very cool and the DSP was powerful enough to do a full V.32bis/V.42bis FAX/Data modem *IN SOFTWARE*. (The 2400 baud software was even scheduled to be included with the system - the V.32 stuff cost too much to include for "free") It would also so really good speech and sound and math (talk about fast rendering times!)


Pick the following path
1. IDE, PCMCIA as A1200's Gayle and Budgie design changes on Fat Gray, Super Buster and Ramsey.

or

2. DSP3210 @ 50 Mhz, 32 bit Fast RAM. AA500+ i.e. A500 with AGA+DSP3210.

[sandruzzo]

Mips don't mean more performance, if you can't use them. Power is nothing without control. Look at the modern GPU TFLOP scam...

[sandruzzo]

Look at the PS3 cell processor. On paper, the most powerful processor on the earth. In real life, it's almost impossible to squeeze.. Look at what they've been able to get from "powerless ocs/ecs": unbelievable stuff!

[pandy71]

Originally Posted by hammer

Using VGA's 64 KB (16-bit) memory window for CPU's programs. For performance reasons, ping pong with memory storage via the ISA bus is not recommended.

This is quite obvious - if you not using some memory space it can be re-used - shadow RAM (also shadow ROM when content of the usually 8 bit ROM was copied into cacheable 32 bit RAM) was offered by many chipsets .

But once again - Amiga/Atari ST reality was exactly same as running CPU code from VGA RAM only Amiga/Atari ST was more efficient in terms of CPU bandwidth designs.

[Promilus]

@sandruzzo - especially PS1 MIPS figures seems overflated (especially through the multimedia processor which unfortunately plays absolutely no role in anything game related except playing fmv cutscenes)... When it comes to Cell - sure it was great processor for what it was supposed to do. It was not processor for general computing, SIMD cores were for exactly that - doing SIMD stuff - basically it did supplement lacking RSX GPU with compute power needed for more astounding graphics. And it did do that ok. Problem is... Amiga never had anything like that. After original Blitter and Copped there was absolutely NO room for improvement in that area... so supplementing graphic components with additional compute power. Just CPU which came with NO fastram by default on home computer series like A500, A600 and A1200... Yeah...

[pandy71]

Originally Posted by sandruzzo

Look at the PS3 cell processor. On paper, the most powerful processor on the earth. In real life, it's almost impossible to squeeze.. Look at what they've been able to get from "powerless ocs/ecs": unbelievable stuff!

Cell was not main PS3 problem - problem was in speed between video and code RAM's - this was bottleneck - approx 20MBps - it was common to render image in Cell, then compress it to JPEG and later push over this narrow 20MBps to be decompressed by GPU in HW to be composed with GPU rendered part... Cell was difficult but with time developers was quite OK in squeezing its performance to the max https://www.eurogamer.net/digitalfou...-of-killzone-3 .

--- now i derailing this thread same as hammer - sorry ---

[AestheticDebris]

Originally Posted by pandy71

But once again - Amiga/Atari ST reality was exactly same as running CPU code from VGA RAM only Amiga/Atari ST was more efficient in terms of CPU bandwidth designs.

Being more efficient at something which, with hindsight, turned out to be a poor design choice is not much of an accolade though. If the original architecture had more cleanly separated out video RAM and not required code to be executable there, the scope for increasing performance might have been greater. The PC did that (mostly by accident) and we can see that it worked better in the long run.

The more I read this thread, the more I think the flaw in the A1200 was trying to retain quite so much compatibility. The home computer market had thrived by just re-architecting each generation entirely (as the console market would continue to do). If Commodore had followed suit and just focused on a new "Amiga" design that wasn't compatible with OCS/ECS, maybe they'd have come up with a winner. Being stuck with the dying 680x0 line and working around design decisions made for OCS was probably a complication they didn't really need.

[dreadnought]

Originally Posted by AestheticDebris

If Commodore had followed suit and just focused on a new "Amiga" design that wasn't compatible with OCS/ECS, maybe they'd have come up with a winner.

One word: Falcon.

[pixie]

Originally Posted by dreadnought

One word: Falcon.

It all depends on prices I guess

[pandy71]

Originally Posted by hammer

Atari ST is rubbish and the 2 million install base shows it. Atari ST's music niche wasn't able to sustain the platform.

Well... contrary to your misleading statement - ST is still used as MIDI machine (praised for one of the lowest latencies). Also seem ST developers are more productive than Amiga developers. (never owned ST, not emotionally attached to ST)

Originally Posted by hammer

The PC, SNES, PS1, Saturn, 3DO, and Mega Drive have discrete memory pools for each CPU and GPU component.

Discrete memory (non-UMA) lead to bandwidth issues and usually video RAM is not accessible directly (if there is direct access to video RAM then CPU has very limited available bandwidth so even fast CPU can't perform efficiently software bitblit and similar algorithms - usually at a cost of latency some buffering is is introduced).

Originally Posted by hammer

PC's pack pixels and discrete memory pools are advantageous for its survival as an early 1990s 2.5D/3D gaming platform.

Yes and no - PC developers started using those features relatively late, also creativity for inventing things like Mode X (PLANAR same as in Amiga) was required to push further gaming on PC.
Main problem in Amiga was not providing RAM bandwidth - in first half of 80's it was technological limitation, in 90's strategic management failure.

Originally Posted by hammer

UMA is useful when the GPU and CPU have large enough on-chip caches and cache coherence competency.

UMA is always cost/performance balance - cache may hide some problems but it is not ultimate solution to all UMA problems.

Originally Posted by hammer

I'm already aware of this, but Budgie has embedded Ramsey-like Fast RAM controller capability.

For PCMCIA RAM expansion, Budgie has a 16-bit buffered connection to Gayle's PCMCIA. Budgie also allows for cheap BOM cost 32-bit Fast RAM boards. A1200/CD32 is one step away from a 32-bit Fast RAM-equipped configuration.

A1200's embedded hardware features are more than A500. A500 doesn't have a 16-bit Fast RAM controller.

CD32's Akiko (combining Gayle, Budgie(Buster/Ramsey), and two CIAs) has further cost reduction when compared to A1200. This is why Commodore UK MD and UK game developers argued for upgraded CD32 specs.

And? you describing obvious things - not having possibility to use PS/2 DRAM modules (even single one) on A1200 PCB seem to be serious flaw but on opposite this created opportunity for 3-rd party vendors to offer FAST RAM expansion boards. So from market perspective CBM provided bare minimum and market decided about remaining possibilities.

Originally Posted by hammer

I'm already aware of this.
I'm already aware of this. This topic is about A1200 criticism.
This topic is about A1200 (and CD32 by extension) criticism in a gaming context.
IBM 8514's non-gaming use case is irrelevant to this gaming topic.
What's the install base for A2000 again?
Your IBM 8514's non-gaming use case is irrelevant to this gaming topic.

This topic is about A1200 disappointment and obviously you are not aware of this or you mixing things up to gain unfair advantages over your interlocutors.

Once again - 8514 is physical example and counter argument to your claim that fast CPU is enough. IBM introduced 8514 as fast CPU was unable deliver sufficient graphic performance - same purpose was Amiga HW acceleration - it was faster than CPU in basic graphic operations - simply HW graphic acceleration need to be under same technological growth as CPU's - this is common for modern times and Amiga is one of the main precursors of this paradigm shift - one of the first, mass available, consumer computers offering in standard HW acceleration for graphics and PCM audio.

[TEG]

Originally Posted by AestheticDebris

Being more efficient at something which, with hindsight, turned out to be a poor design choice is not much of an accolade though. If the original architecture had more cleanly separated out video RAM and not required code to be executable there, the scope for increasing performance might have been greater. The PC did that (mostly by accident) and we can see that it worked better in the long run.

Do you mean to forbid access to the video RAM for the cpu since OCS?