01 July 2024, 06:36 | #5221 | ||||
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A simple 32-bit fast memory upgrade for A1200s doubles the built-in 68EC020's performance. C0000 address range could be recycled as true Fast RAM like in some 3rd party CPU accelerator features, hence Zorro II memory address range for internal edge connector expansion wouldn't be affected. Mr "PCJr" Bill Sydnes gimped PCJr with low memory configurations. Quote:
Scrolling a 256-color 320x200 display at 30 frames per second by brute force requires a data transfer rate of 1.92 MB/s. 3.5 Mhz (260 ns read/write cycle) 16-bit bus has 7 MB/s potential. Frame buffer composition would need its memory bandwidth consumption. A500's bandwidth could have supported VGA's 256 colors at 320x200. 260 ns read/write cycle DRAM could been improved i.e. 16 bit @ 7.1 Mhz (140 ns read/write cycle FP DRAM, 2X) variant. A3000's Chip RAM is 32-bit wide and has the Chip RAM bandwidth to support VGA's 256 colors at 320x200. A1200's 32-bit @ 7.1 Mhz (140 ns read/write cycle) Chip RAM (4X mode) bandwidth for Lisa is to support 8-bitplanes entry-level SVGA level 640x400p/512p 256 colors display or 64-bit wide sprites capability. Jeffer Porter has an "8-bit planes with 16 million colors" mandate, hence it's AGA. Quote:
The color palette considerations for HAM mode are harder than VGA's 256 colors. In modern times, A1200 has access to strong "cheap RISC" from ARM to max AGA's capabilities. My argument remains the same, AGA is fine, but needs compute power. [ Show youtube player ] AGA HAM8 @ 640x200p texture-mapped 3D with high CPU compute power. This incomplete game tech demo runs great on real A1200-equipped PiSTorm-Emu68 or Vampire AC68080 V2/V4. It blows away VGA's 256 color effort. HAM8 has 64 base colors to minimize HAM artifacts which has extra flexibility when compared to HAM6's 16 base colors. AGA can handle texture-mapped 3D @ 640x200p/256p TV gaming when there's sufficient compute power i.e. it can be a strong CPU or custom math chip e.g. DSP for 3D. The Amiga approach uses custom chips to patch the weak CPU. AAA's high "business" resolution with 16.7 million colors display is a distraction when custom chip effort should been custom math power for modest AA and AA+. Amiga's primary audience is games and the development platform to create games. Amiga's primary audience is not about Apple Mac's artwork marketing of Adobe Illustrator or Photoshop, hence AAA's high "business" resolution with 16.7 million colors display is a distraction. Quote:
Last edited by hammer; 01 July 2024 at 06:59. |
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01 July 2024, 07:09 | #5222 | ||
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One of the major killer apps for the PC is Lotus 123's higher-resolution text UI on IBM MDA which displaced VisiCalc. Any platform with low-resolution text UI VisiCalc died along with VisiCalc. C128's 1985 release was too late when "next-gen" platforms were focusing on "next-gen" high business resolution GUI MS Excel which later displaced text-based Lotus 123. Quote:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_o...dia_franchises Star Trek with $11.2 billion which includes the following: Retail sales: $5.253 billion TV revenue: $2.3 billion Box office: $2.266 billion VHS sales: $1 billion DVD & Blu-ray: $426 million A "toy" doesn't stop a toy seller from earning billions of dollars. In the end, it's about earning money from selling products. Last edited by hammer; 01 July 2024 at 07:27. |
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01 July 2024, 07:33 | #5223 | ||
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Not that it would matter much what he did. Even at its height the Amiga didn't mange to crack 10% of the personal computer market. Those customers would be discarding their toys the second PC clones hit the shelves at a price they could afford. Quote:
Despite being 'braindead' the 286 quickly became the 'gold standard', and sales skyrocketed. The 80386 didn't overtake it until 1989, 5 years later - and 286 based PCs were still selling into the 90's. |
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01 July 2024, 07:42 | #5224 | |
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Actually I don't think they do today either. I'm struggling to even think of a piece of Star Trek merchandise to attach it to. Give it up. Your argument is flat out wrong and makes no sense. |
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01 July 2024, 09:36 | #5225 | ||||||
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Commodore UK's A1500 purpose was to kill Checkmate's original A1500 clone case. Strong Commodore will crush any wannabe Amiga clone. Commodore International didn't reduce the final assembly manufacturing risk via the final assembly cloning method e.g. AMD/NVIDIA provides reference designs, video firmware, and GPU chips for AIB cloners. Commodore Canada had the idea of purchasing 65,000 CD32 boards for Amitech's $1000 (68EC020@14 Mhz with 2MB 32-bit Fast RAM, AGA with Akiko C2P) to $1599 (68030@40/68882@40 Mhz with 4MB 32-bit Fast RAM, AGA with Akiko C2P) desktop A2200 clone which is superior to Commodore Germany's A2000/020-16 (ECS) and $1599 A4000/030-25 (68030@25/68882@25 Mhz, AGA). Quote:
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8086 and 80186 were used by PC cloners. IBM didn't use 8086 until the IBM PS/2 Model 25(1987). IBM PC/AT (1984) used 286 CPUs. 80186's 8086-2 instruction was added into 286 CPU. Both 186 (Jan 1982) and 286 (Feb 1982) were released in 1982, hence 186 is redundant. Quote:
IBM's braindead OS/2 prices OS/2 Extended Edition 1.0 was priced at $795 in July 1988. OS/2 Standard Edition 1.0 was priced at $325 in June 1988. Windows 2.x reached 2 million install base in 1989. [ Show youtube player ] Quote:
https://www.amigalove.com/viewtopic.php?t=45 Quote:
For 1989, Windows 2.x's official unit sales beats the Amiga's install base. According to Dataquest November 1989, VGA crossed more than 50 percent market share in 1989 i.e. 56%. http://bitsavers.trailing-edge.com/c...lysis_1989.pdf Low-End PC Graphics Market Share by Standard Type Estimated Worldwide History and Forecast Total low-end PC graphic chipset shipment history and forecast 1987 = 9.2. million, VGA 16.4% market share i.e. 1.5088 million VGA. 1988 = 11.1 million, VGA 34.2% i.e. 3.79 million VGA. 1989 = 13.7 million, VGA 54.6% i.e. 7.67 million VGA. Windows 2.x official unit sales reached 2 million. 1990 = 14.3 million, VGA 66.4% i.e. 9.50 million VGA. The double heavy hitters i.e. Windows 3.0 and Wing Commander releases. In 1990, Windows 3.0 sold four million copies in just one year. 1991 = 15.8 million, VGA 76.6% i.e. 12.10 million VGA. Windows 3.0 had 10 million sales. 1992 = 16.4 million, VGA 84.2% i.e. 13.81 million VGA. Windows 3.1's release. 1993 = 18.3 million, VGA 92.4% i.e. 16.9 million VGA. Intel's annual report from 1989 https://www.intel.la/content/dam/doc...ual-report.pdf Page 10 of 28 via Data Quest For the 32-bit market, the 386 architecture's 1989 market share is 57% against other 32-bit competitors. Last edited by hammer; 01 July 2024 at 10:46. |
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01 July 2024, 11:50 | #5226 |
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01 July 2024, 13:02 | #5227 | |
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The place where they had been making ground had been the home gaming market ("toys" as Bruce would have it). They could have continued in that space if they'd had the foresight to double down on it, bringing something like CD32 much earlier and spending a lot less time/effort on worrying about application compatibility. |
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01 July 2024, 17:05 | #5228 |
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a computer is what users make it to. We all of course know what it is able to but at that time most people did not use bigbox systems with added ram and better processor and graphic card and hard drive but standard even at beginning 90s was A500 with 2 disc drives. With such a configuration you cannot do something serious but play games. And if you look at the official commercials it was also marketed for gaming mainly.
Last edited by OlafSch; 01 July 2024 at 17:20. |
01 July 2024, 17:09 | #5229 | |
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01 July 2024, 21:40 | #5230 | ||
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I guess I know now why most of this thread is just about games |
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01 July 2024, 23:58 | #5231 |
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You want absolutely see things in B&W witch they are not.
The Amiga 500 was clearly positioned about the game market. Of course you were able to do others tasks, and this is what we liked as teenagers but a professional wouldn't equipped his company with a fleet of A500. Now if we talk about the Amiga machines in general, there was the Amiga 2000, everybody here know that, positioned as a serious machine. And it was indeed one, especially with the video Toaster which gave it its letters of nobility. So it depend of what we talk, the A500 or the Amiga brand in general? Commodore communication was muddled and the hardware did not evolved as it should have. So the Amiga brand mainly felt in the toys category from an overall public perception. Commodore faced a pitfall they did not managed to overcome : being ahead of the times. In the 80' the perception was there was serious machines, the boring ones and the other ones to play games (Pong, VCS 2600, arcade machines, etc..) not feat to do serious work. The games market was only for kids. So if you push a machine on the market and the shinning software for this machine is called "Defender of the Crown". Guess what happen in the general public perception? They never marketed the Workbench like Microsoft did for Windows for example. They just pushed the machines and Inshallah and so the perception of the brand which follows. |
02 July 2024, 01:03 | #5232 | |
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Not all software packs that it came with were games only, though.
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That doesn't make it true, and is highly insulting for a machine like an Amiga. |
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02 July 2024, 04:27 | #5233 | |||
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https://wnhub.io/news/finance/item-43432 Quote:
Apple's iOS and iTunes business displaced Sony's "toy" Walkman and generated revenue to support MacOS X and Apple silicon while workstation vendor like SGI is dead i.e. Chapter 11 bankruptcy. NVIDIA started with a game console targeted NV1 and transferred to the gaming PC market with NV3 RiVA 128 and NV10 GeForce 256. Based on gaming PC's GeForce designs, NVIDIA's Quadro started in 2000 and targeted the workstation market against 3DLabs' and SGI's market. NVIDIA has "economies of scale" to beat 3DLabs and SGI. Quote:
Bruce doesn't understand money is still money. Bruce is using "toy" as a negative like an old-school IBMer. Last edited by hammer; 02 July 2024 at 05:00. |
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02 July 2024, 04:43 | #5234 | ||
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If a toy generates billions of dollars in revenue, it's a serious business as any other business. The mentality that looks down on "toys" doesn't understand winning the grassroots user base. The original Xbox's code name is Midway in reference to https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Midway This initiative is still active with Microsoft's recent purchase of ZeniMax Media and Activsion-Blizzard. Microsoft is spending billions of dollars to defend Windows against PlayStation. IBM can bugger off and die. Last edited by hammer; 02 July 2024 at 05:07. |
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02 July 2024, 05:30 | #5235 | |
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SGI's remaining graphics business was transferred to NVIDIA in late 1999. https://www.eetimes.com/sgi-graphics...ves-to-nvidia/ SGI was bleeding engineers who wanted mass-production graphics cards, hence the breakaway companies such as 3DFX (graphics business transferred to NVIDIA in late 2000) and ArtX (purchased by ATI in early 2000). ------------ Commodore International announced voluntary bankruptcy and liquidation on April 29, 1994 due to mismanagement (cite: Commodore The Final Years by Brian and Commodore the Inside Story - The Untold Tale of a Computer Giant - David John Pleasance). Besides the "read my lips, no new chips" directive for A3000's R&D, Commodore The Final Years by Brian has the extra information for 1987 to 1989. The 1986 to 1989 were the critical years for designing the proper successor to the A500 and providing stable "business" high-resolution GUI for the masses. 1986 to 1989 was also Microsoft's opportunity to displace text-based Lotus 123, WordStar, and WordPerfect via Mac GUI ports of MS Excel and WinWord. MS Excel Mac port's team was credited as the main team that kept Windows 2.x R&D alive despite Steve Ballmer's anti-Windows (pro OS/2) push. Last edited by hammer; 02 July 2024 at 05:40. |
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02 July 2024, 06:24 | #5236 |
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That is probably Commodore's biggest fault: To market the Amiga as a games machine first with additional uses second rather than as a multimedia machine first that can also play games. They did that early on, but once the Amiga 500 started to sell the marketing was aimed at kids wanting to play games and could tell their parents that a computer could also be used for other things.
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02 July 2024, 07:23 | #5237 | |
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02 July 2024, 09:28 | #5238 |
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I got the impression that in the US it was the exact reverse situation. The Amiga was first a multimedia machine for use in professionnal context and aimed at grown up.
Even the gaming library made in the US reflect that. Many HD friendly serious games. I'm not even sure there was any plateformer or arcade game made there. |
02 July 2024, 09:38 | #5239 | |
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The Amiga’s long-term success came from games, the Amiga would long be dead in the late 80s if the A500 never came out, which we all know was aimed at the mid-range gaming computer sector to target the Atari ST which was primally used for gaming. |
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02 July 2024, 10:19 | #5240 | |||
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So was The Tramp. So you're saying IBM associated the PC with toys right from the start? Actually The Tramp was a comedy character, so that means IBM was associating it with humor too. Did they think the PC was joke? No, and not a toy either.
The PCjr was though, which is why they commissioned Sierra to make a game for it - King's Quest. Quote:
By the time OS/2 Warp was released in 1994 computer games had become a big part of the PC market. One of the features of OS/2 that IBM promoted was it's compatibility with DOS games, along with its multimedia capabilities, in an attempt to appeal to the broader market. But they couldn't beat Microsoft, who had been bundling games with Windows since version 1.0 in 1985. They introduced Microsoft Solitaire in Windows 3.0 in 1990. Since Microsoft offered cheap OEM deals on Windows and DOS it became a standard feature of PCs from that time on, resulting in Microsoft Solitaire becoming the most popular computer game of all time! Quote:
So the truth is that Microsoft Windows was associated with 'toys' (ie. computer games) far more than OS/2 Warp was. Quote:
The problem is that many people do use the word 'toy' as a negative when applied to the Amiga. One poster in particular likes to describe Amiga OS as a 'toy' with negative connotations. It was also a very common epithet thrown at us by PC users back in the day. So when you are using that word you need to make your intention clear to avoid being misunderstood. I accept that you didn't intend your comment that 'OS/2 "Warp" is based on a "toy"' as a negative, but it's still wrong. The purpose IBM had in using the Star Trek reference was to appeal to adults who enjoyed science fiction, in the same way that they appealed to adults who enjoyed comedy with The Tramp. In both cases it was an attempt to get through to 'non-technical' people who otherwise wouldn't have an interest in their product, not (just) people who wanted a 'toy' to play with. The purpose behind the word 'Warp' was to associate OS/2 with a 'warp drive' - fast, powerful, technically advanced. It had nothing to do with toys or even entertainment - though obviously a fast powerful technically advanced OS would be expected to better handle multimedia - which includes entertainment and games. Having said that, it must be acknowledged that IBM used Star Trek references in their internal names for OS/2 versions. They were obviously Star Trek fans. Somehow though I don't think calling it OS/2 Ferengi (their internal name for the previous version) would go down well. I'm betting they chose the word 'warp' to reflect what they intended it to be. |
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