Was anyone else disappointed with the A1200?

[desiv]

Originally Posted by Gorf

And 640*400 is not really a resolution someone would call "made for CAD" even in 1990 ...

True, but the 3000 could do 1280x512 I believe.

[Gorf]

Originally Posted by desiv

Never used them, but there were several CAD packages for the Amiga.
From Wikipedia (I know):

All rather semiprofessional except maybe DynaCADD

CATIA, AutoCAD, Pro/ENGINEER, TurboCAD are all missing

And 640*400 is not really a resolution someone would call "made for CAD" even in 1990 ...

Sure you could use an early gfx-card without support from the OS or even the CAD software or the A2024 monitor that was only 15'' and may also not be supported by the software

[Gorf]

Originally Posted by desiv

True, but the 3000 could do 1280x512 I believe.

Only in 25Hz interlace mode - not fickerfixed!

[desiv]

Originally Posted by Gorf

Sure you could use an early gfx-card without support from the OS or even the CAD software or the A2024 monitor that was only 15'' and may also not be supported by the software

Yeah, but 1280x512 was supported by the OS and didn't require an early GFX card.
Just a better monitor, and there were other monitor options than just the A2024.
I agree it never caught on, but the hardware could do it...

[Gorf]

Originally Posted by desiv

Yeah, but 1280x512 was supported by the OS and didn't require an early GFX card.

See above!
25Hz flicker modes are really useless...

Just a better monitor, and there were other monitor options than just the A2024.

Not with the build in frame buffer and workbench drivers the A2024 has that allow 1024*800@63Hz non-interlaced.

I agree it never caught on, but the hardware could do it...

nope - SHRES modes are not deinterlaced by Amber...

[desiv]

Originally Posted by Gorf

See above!
25Hz flicker modes are really useless...

Not with the build in frame buffer and workbench drivers the A2024 has that allow 1024*800@63Hz non-interlaced.

Interlace does not necessarily mean noticeable flicker. Interlace at 15khz definitely does...
25khz should be enough to not cause irritating flicker with a good monitor.
This review of that mode on the 4000 seems to indicate it isn't always that bad:
https://wiki.preterhuman.net/REVIEW:...ore_Amiga_4000

The scan rate in this mode is 25 KHz, which is enough faster than the 15 KHz interlace modes in the 2000 that it seems to eliminate flicker.

And again, the A2024 wasn't the only monitor to support higher resolutions.

[Gorf]

Originally Posted by desiv

Interlace does not necessarily mean noticeable flicker. Interlace at 15khz definitely does...
25khz should be enough to not cause irritating flicker with a good monitor.

Individual perception differs of course and back in the day a friend of mine was very happy with NTSC interlace modes (30Hz) for his workbench ... I could not look at it for more than 20 min without headache ...
Most people seem to be in the group, that do find anything below 60Hz not tolerable for work even on a good monitor.

And again, the A2024 wasn't the only monitor to support higher resolutions.

You don't seem to unterstand what the A2024 aka the "Hedley Device" actually does. It is not just a monitor but has a build in flickerfixer and frame buffer that allows every Amiga to display a 1024*800 screen at 63Hz in 16 shades of gray.

[desiv]

Originally Posted by Gorf

You don't seem to unterstand what the A2024 aka the "Hedley Device" actually does.

No, I do understand. I was just pointing out that there were other display options.

[Gorf]

Originally Posted by desiv

No, I do understand. I was just pointing out that there were other display options.

but for all other options you would need an additional gfx-card to take advantage of the possible higher resolution that monitor might support, since the A3000 only provides max. 640*400@60Hz as flicker free resolution.

And by 1990/91 there was no functional rtg-system or intuition-emulation, so the CAD-software had so support that proprietary card ... good luck with that.

[desiv]

Originally Posted by Gorf

since the A3000 only provides max. 640*400@60Hz as flicker free resolution.

Unless the 25khz is also basically flicker free with a good other monitor... ;-)

[Gorf]

Originally Posted by desiv

Unless the 25khz is also basically flicker free with a good other monitor... ;-)

No - its really not ... or only for a very small fraction of people.
I mean, this is the whole reason flicker-fixers do exist for the Amiga!
Sadly I am not aware of one that supports SHRES modes - the A3000 at least does not.
So we are back to square one:

The A3000 was not really the right computer for serious CAD.

[desiv]

Originally Posted by Gorf

I mean, this is the whole reason flicker-fixers do exist for the Amiga!.

Flicker Fixers exist for the Amiga to get rid of flicker when it is noticeable.
I agree that if someone is trying to use 15khz, they need one...
(I ran AMax back in the day with flicker on a 1984s... Could have used one.)

But as I have said, if the 25khz mode doesn't cause noticeable flicker with a good monitor for the user, then it wouldn't be a problem for them...

[Gorf]

Originally Posted by desiv

Flicker Fixers exist for the Amiga to get rid of flicker when it is noticeable.
I agree that if someone is trying to use 15khz, they need one...
(I ran AMax back in the day with flicker on a 1984s... Could have used one.)

But as I have said, if the 25khz mode doesn't cause noticeable flicker with a good monitor for the user, then it wouldn't be a problem for them...

What are you talking about?
The line-frequency is irrelevant for that - it only depends on the vertical refresh rate of the entire screen.

[desiv]

Originally Posted by Gorf

What are you talking about?

We can agree to disagree...
Have a good one!

[Bruce Abbott]

Originally Posted by Thomas Richter

Text mode on 68K would not have helped the least.

It wasn't the full answer, but It would have helped.

In the 1980's text mode was the standard. Bypassing the BIOS and writing directly to the screen dramatically sped up text rendering on PCs, which was a big deal when most had a dog slow 8088 CPU. Text-based interfaces reached a high level of sophistication with windows and drop-down menus which could be controlled efficiently with the keyboard. 'Power' PC users pooh poohed GUI systems like Windows and Gem for being fiddly and inefficient, and they were right.

The Amiga suffered when attempting to replicate those PC applications. 16 colors in hires sucked up 75% of the bus bandwidth, which became even worse when the blitter was printing text or scrolling the screen. It also looked ugly when colors separated as the screen was scrolled one bitplane at a time. Text mode would have made the Amiga more responsive, prettier, and nicer to use for business applications. It could have made ported PC apps look and feel identical to the original, which would go a long way towards convincing people that the Amiga was a viable alternative.

Most PC business programs were written in BASIC or C, so the primary hurdle to porting them (different CPU) was easily overcome. With text mode and a BIOS compatibility layer it would be a simple job to get popular PC apps onto the Amiga.

It also would help with emulation. In many business apps the main bottleneck was the user interface. Having to emulate 16 color text on the Amiga slows down rendering dramatically, which is generally far more noticeable to the user than CPU speed. It became even more obvious when the Sidecar was introduced, which should have been as fast as an actual PC - but wasn't because it still slowed down horribly when rendering text. I had a Sidecar and was extremely disappointed by this.

Of course in an IBM compatible world it wasn't the answer for everyone, but having a true text mode would have removed one common objection that many people had about using an Amiga for business.

People that wanted x86 programs to run required an x86 processor, not a 68K. CBM offered the bridgeboard to address those customers, but why would you get one if you could get a PC in first place without the Amiga part.

You might get a bridgeboard if you wanted the Amiga for its multimedia features etc., but still needed a PC to do business stuff. Having them combined was cheaper and more convenient than having to buy and allocate space for two machines.

Alternatively an accelerated Amiga could be sufficient - if the text rendering was efficient. My A3000 with 25MHz 030 was fast enough to emulate an XT in real time, but only in monochrome. That did the job for me but wasn't a pleasant experience. My A1200 with 50MHz 030 can emulate an XT with color text faster than a real one, which makes it similar to the PCs I was using back in the 80's.

The first power Macs (the desktop version) also had something like a 486 based bridge board, if I recall, as the first PPCs were not fast enough for a useable x86 emulation.

I guess it depends on what kind of emulation you are talking about. In the 80's most PC users weren't too concerned about performance, so an 8088 was generally fast enough. That changed in the 90's. In 1995 (when PPC Macs were introduced) you needed a 486 to run Windows 95.

[Bruce Abbott]

Originally Posted by Gorf

but for all other options you would need an additional gfx-card to take advantage of the possible higher resolution that monitor might support, since the A3000 only provides max. 640*400@60Hz as flicker free resolution.

Actually 768x576 @50Hz, but programs tended to use the 'standard' 640x400 because other systems were limited to that and it was good enough.

And by 1990/91 there was no functional rtg-system or intuition-emulation, so the CAD-software had so support that proprietary card ... good luck with that.

AutoCAD didn't move to Windows until 1992. Guess how much support DOS had for CAD software?

It wouldn't make much sense to produce a card with no way of using it.

In 1991 Digital Micronics introduced the 'Resolver' TIGA graphics card with a resolution of 1280×1024 (same as I use on my PC today!) along with their SAGE (Standard Amiga Graphics Environment) RTG system which was used by Art Department Professional, DMI Paint and Image Master. More applications planning to use SAGE included Draw 4D Professional, DynaCADD, Professional Page 3.0, Imagine, Calagari, and 3D Professional.

[grelbfarlk]

I think you all are forgetting that the Video Toaster had the best CAD program available on the Amiga, and it rendered the final output to 24-bit on the Video Toaster. The interface was at 640x400 or most often in overscan mode. And it was perfectly fine for that.

Sure it would have been nice to have a Warp3D version that did real time textured previews, but that never happened. Lightwave 5.0 I think went to PC and Mac which had proper OpenGL modes.

[Promilus]

Well while lightwave was 3D and was modeling I'd hardly call it CAD. CAD were things like CATIA or AutoCAD, Lightwave is more like Blender, Maya or 3dsmax.

[Gorf]

Originally Posted by Bruce Abbott

AutoCAD didn't move to Windows until 1992. Guess how much support DOS had for CAD software?

So?
PCs were even less suited for serious CAD.

In 1991 Digital Micronics introduced the 'Resolver' TIGA graphics card with a resolution of 1280×1024

Yes - Now we are talking.
But that does not explain the CAD-program mockup on the A3000 manual years earlier.

PS:
Dedicated CAD-systems like Intergraph or NX/UG used displays like the Tektronix 4014, that provides 4k*4k addressable pixels.
Yes: that is almost 2 times of what we call "4k" today - in the 70s!!

https://w140.com/tekwiki/wiki/4014

[TEG]

Originally Posted by eXeler0

Most likely (99,999%) that never happened. :-)

You mean for example, that if company like Sun would approach Commodore to make a deal about Unix on the Amiga, Commodore would refuse? No, you must be wrong