Was anyone else disappointed with the A1200?

[Thorham]

Clearly as a toy computer, NASA used Amigas with it's toy rockets

[TEG]

Originally Posted by Thorham

Clearly as a toy computer, NASA used Amigas with it's toy rockets

In 1986, a group of NASA engineers faced a difficult choice in solving their data processing woes: continue tolerating the poor performance of PC architecture, or pony up the cash for exotic workstations. It turns out that the Commodore Amiga was an intriguing third choice, except for the fact that, paradoxically, it didn’t cost enough. Oh, and Apple wanted nothing to do with any of it.

Steeped in history, NASA’s Hangar AE is a hub for launch vehicle telemetry and other mission communications, primarily during prelaunch phases for launches at Cape Canaveral. Throughout the late 20th century, Hangar AE supported NASA launch vehicles in all shapes and sizes, from the Atlas-Centaur evolutions to the mighty Titan family. It even supported user data from the Space Shuttle program. Telemetry from these missions was processed at Hangar AE before being sent out to other NASA boffins, and even transmitted worldwide to other participating space agencies.

Coming down from decades of astronomical levels of funding, the 1980s was all about tightening the belt, and NASA needed budget solutions that didn’t skimp on mission safety. The Commodore Amiga turned out to be the right choice for processing launch vehicle telemetry. And so it was still, when cameras from the Amiga Atlanta group were granted permission to film inside Hangar AE.

The video below was filmed in 1998, over a decade after the first Amiga computers were installed at Hangar AE. It’s fascinating (and unsurprising) to hear that the Apple Macintosh was the first choice of computing hardware. Being a closed system, however, engineers couldn’t access the Macintosh at the level required, and weren’t able to develop the custom hardware that was needed to support their operations. In contrast, Commodore were more than willing to send NASA an enormous stack of documentation to help them out. Nice of them!

Gary Jones, then Principal Systems Engineer for NASA, goes on to say that the Amiga was an unpopular choice for his employer. “They want us to buy PCs and run Windows 95 and NT. We keep trying to tell them its not fast enough so they tell us to buy DEC Alphas. We tell them its too expensive. They don’t like the Amiga; it doesn’t cost enough.” Yikes.

The video takes place during STS-89 and its mission to the Mir space station. It appears that some of it has been lost to time, however an old blog post fills in some knowledge gaps, it’s well worth a look and is retro-tastic in its own right. Reports indicate that these machines were in use as late as 2006, and one was actually for sale not too long ago.
So the jingle goes, “only Amiga makes it possible”.

Source

But of course the CBM marketing department did not capitalized on this success.

[Thomas Richter]

Originally Posted by Bruce Abbott

They may not have understood them, but most buyers were highly sensitive to the technical details. Just look at any PC advert from that era and you will see technical specs prominently displayed. Magazines were also constantly harping on about them.

But those magazines address the hobby/personal market, but that market does not provide the volume to make a system sustainable. I am talking about the business market where you can sell many more machines - but you also have to offer more. Software, services... That sells computers, not technical specs. Decision makers in the business market neither understood nor care about the details. "Does it run Lotus 1-2-3" was probably a more relevant question back then than "what is the CPU clock rate", or "how much RAM does it have"? (What is RAM anyhow?)



The professional market provides the volumes to allow mass-production, forget hobbyists. This phenomenon was over with the C64. The business market used and uses computers as appliances, not as a toy.

Originally Posted by Bruce Abbott

However even customers who had no clue and didn't care about technical details always asked one question - "Is it IBM compatible?". I sold computers throughout the 90's and had to answer that question every day. Imagine how hard it is to sell an Amiga when that's the first thing to come out of the customer's mouth!

First, you sold to private customers, not to businesses I assume. Second, why did private customers wanted IBM compatible? Because they had one in their office, because someone bought it for them in their office.

Originally Posted by Bruce Abbott

You may argue that being 'IBM compatible' wasn't a 'technical' spec, but it is implied. And the next questions asked were "What speed is the CPU", "How much RAM and what size is the hard drive?", and "Does it have Super VGA?".

That was a question a private customer would ask. A business customer would ask "which kind of service do you offer, how many systems can you deliver in which time, and how much can you go down with the price if I buy more". It did not matter "too much" how much RAM it had, provided it would operate the software needed for the office. Sure there were applications for SuperVGA, but in general, the type of graphics card did not matter, all provided it was "good enough" and "works for my software".

Originally Posted by Bruce Abbott

I'm not sure what your definition of 'professional' is, or if it even matters. The business world drove PC sales, and most businesses knew what they needed - a PC. The few professionals using UNIX workstations knew what they needed too, and the existence of magazines like UNIX World is proof that it wasn't just 'hobbyists' who were interested in technical details.

Exactly. Forget about the private buyers. They do not buy volume, so it does not matter. Today, gaming is a big market, but back then... no.


There was a small market for "special applications" like CAD or TV production, and Amiga could get a foot at least into the latter.

Originally Posted by Bruce Abbott

So when Commodore comes along and says "Hey, we have UNIX on the Amiga too, you will buy it now right?", few take them up on it because they know a 25MHz 030 isn't going to cut it.

No, they did not buy it because the market was already taken by other vendors. We had at the university HP/UX systems with a 20Mhz 68020 or a 25Mhz 68030, 4MB or 8MB ram, continuosly swapping, but no Amiga. Why not? Because nobody knew that there was a Unix for Amiga, CBM could not deliver the volumes, nor the service contracts you need if you run 100 machines in a student pool. That means: If a machine develops issues, you need to have it fixed or replaced in short time. Downtime costs money, much more so in serious business, but CBM did not care - cheapest components, and once the customer was out of the market, CBM took it as "mission accomplished, we do not care about this guy anymore".



CBM never understood this business - they wanted to "push boxes", but that is not how this market operates. That is how you sell C64 in masses, but not serious machines.

[TCD]

Originally Posted by TEG

But of course the CBM marketing department did not capitalized on this success.

CBM had a marketing department? Are you sure?

[Gorf]

Originally Posted by grelbfarlk

I'm disappointed. Because AutoCAD was never ported to the A1200.

Old Blender for the Amiga? Here it is:

https://download.blender.org/source/...a-software.zip

Blender was started by Ton Roosendaal on the Amiga as a program called "Traces" (in the download link), before he switched to SGI...

https://zgodzinski.com/blender-prehistory/

[TEG]

Originally Posted by Gorf

Blender was started by Ton Roosendaal on the Amiga as a program called "Traces" (in the download link), before he switched to SGI...

https://zgodzinski.com/blender-prehistory/

- Why did you abandon Amiga and moved on to Silicon Graphics?

- The main reason was that Amiga itself proved to be a dead-end for production. The market demanded higher quality graphics, especially 24 bits color. If Amiga would have made that step sooner…

Another reason was platform instability. Both the hardware and the Amiga OS were notoriously unstable. You couldn’t rely on it to work for more than a couple of hours. When I finally had the first SGI and got to used to Unix a bit, it was such a relief!

Once again, Commodore did not really pushed the platform. They did some patch-up job.

[desiv]

Originally Posted by Thomas Richter

Second, why did private customers wanted IBM compatible? Because they had one in their office, because someone bought it for them in their office.

Exactly, and this was Commodore's really big mistake (IMHO).
Not in going after the business market, as I don't think that was reasonable, but in not doing what Apple did.
Education.

Yeah, some schools had Commodore's (mostly inexpensive C64s), but most schools had Apples! And I think that went a LONG way in Apple's survival as a computer maker.
People brought home what they had at work OR at school.

And I think Commodore COULD have taken on Apple on that front. But it would have required them to give discounts to schools (which Apple did) that Commodore was too cheap to do...
And that is fine if you are selling calculators or C64s at K-Mart (or wherever), but it's not OK for more serious PCs and not if you are trying to "capture a market."
Commodore never got past the fact that they weren't selling calculators...
It's too bad, because if there were Amigas in almost every school as there were Apples (at least here in the US), I think that would have sold a LOT more Amigas to homes...
And they could have done that for less than a quarter of Mehdi Ali's salary... ;-)

[Arc Angel]

The Amiga, in schools ?
Really ?
A disc based OS system, with no flicker free hi res mode, in schools ?
I thought I had read everything on eab, but no, there can be more nonsense ...

[Bruce Abbott]

Originally Posted by TEG

But of course the CBM marketing department did not capitalized on this success.

Why yes, just imagine all the other space agencies Commodore could have sold the A2000 to who also thought it was too cheap!

Once again, Commodore did not really pushed the platform.

Silicon Graphics

Silicon Graphics reincorporated as a Delaware corporation in January 1990. Through the mid to late-1990s, the rapidly improving performance of commodity Wintel machines began to erode SGI's stronghold in the 3D market. The porting of Maya to other platforms was a major event in this process. SGI made several attempts to address this, including a disastrous move from their existing MIPS platforms to the Intel Itanium, as well as introducing their own Linux-based Intel IA-32 based workstations and servers that failed in the market. In the mid-2000s the company repositioned itself as a supercomputer vendor, a move that also failed.

On April 1, 2009, SGI filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy

To think that Commodore, a calculator company that made their mark in low-end home computers used to play video games, could compete against SGI with their high-end 3D graphics workstations, is ludicrous. But typical of the Amiga fan who thinks such a pivot would be a piece of cake.

But what if by some miracle they did? Even in this ridiculous fantasy scenario they still would have failed. By the mid to late 90's SGI was being squashed by PCs just like Commodore was a few years earlier. Of course the Amiga fan will now tell us that SGI were also incompetent - I mean they could have used their 3D tech to make world beating gaming consoles that undercut the PlayStation, right? That would have been a piece of cake for a company which had no experience in the low-end consumer market.

[Amigajay]

So in conclusion after 126 pages, Bruce were you disappointed in the A1200!?

Seemingly talking about the A2000 and NASA this thread has lost its way!

[Bruce Abbott]

Originally Posted by Arc Angel

The Amiga, in schools ?
Really ?
A disc based OS system, with no flicker free hi res mode, in schools ?
I thought I had read everything on eab, but no, there can be more nonsense ...

Not sure if you are being ironical, but Commodore did make some effort to get Amigas into schools and universities. The problem wasn't the hardware so much as that other platforms had already established themselves.

Before the PC, the BBC micro was probably the most popular school system in New Zealand, with the Apple II being dominant before that. Both systems were disk-based. Neither had a 'flicker free hi res mode'. The Archimedes did, but was mostly used with 15kHz monitors similar to the Amiga. The Mac had it, but in a tiny monochrome screen (Steve Jobs famously insisted that it not have color because he believed monochrome was better for documents. He had a point too - what's the use of color when your laser printer only does black?).

Universities had their mainframes of course, and there was even an effort by the Wellington Polytech to make a home-grown educational computer, the Poly-1. The Mac became popular with graphic art students, while the BBC micro (and later the Archimedes) got in due to being the official educational computer in the UK. But State schools didn't have the budget or the curriculum to get into computers until many years later, by which time the PC was dominant.

Having a computer manufacturer promote their machine to schools with special deals helped, but systems were often chosen because a pioneering teacher already had one of their own. Commodore New Zealand did have educational deals. However the Amiga - despite having some good educational qualities - arrived late on the scene when most private schools had already made their choice.

By 1987 when the Amiga got here the personal computer market was awash with PC clones. Support for PCs wasn't an issue because every city had several PC vendors and IT support companies. So when schools felt the need to upgrade their aging machines, the PC was the obvious choice.

The Amiga did have some educational presence here though. I dealt with several guys who were selling and supporting them around the country. Of course that all ended when Commodore did. By that time the PC was so ubiquitous that it was the only 'sensible' choice for classrooms anyway (no point learning on a system you won't be using when you enter the workforce!).

[Locutus]

Originally Posted by Bruce Abbott

I mean they could have used their 3D tech to make world beating gaming consoles that undercut the PlayStation, right? That would have been a piece of cake for a company which had no experience in the low-end consumer market.

....Except SGI did exactly that, they designed the Nintendo 64.


Now, the downfall of SGI is also a bit more complicated than all of this. They had reasonable 'low-end' products (Indy and O2) but their sales pipelines where never setup to sell them to anyone who wasn't a government contractor, VAR's, large universities or massive engineering companies like the Ford's and GE's of the world.


More interestingly, SGI did leave a large mark on computing history in the standards it left behind, OpenGL, massive institutional knowledge that drifted across the industry (AMD, Nvidia, etc all started off on generations of ex-SGI engineers).

[Locutus]

Originally Posted by Bruce Abbott

I can't find much info on this deal, only that apparently Sun wasn't happy with the licensing fee Commodore was asking. So yeah, bad Commodore for wanting to make a profit.

I've mentioned this before, but i seriously doubt the seriousness of the Sun license story, there's no corroboration from ex-Sun employees on it, and it's source is some vague USENET posts.

In December 1990 Byte magazine praised the A3000UX, saying...

Just because a magazine gave a good review did it make it into a decent offering.



Think about it, other UNIX's like the ones mentioned in the review unique selling points Commodore had absolutely none.


NeXT got you the absolute best development environment around (Genera was better, I'm biased), with rapid GUI development tools that allowed solving new problems.


A/UX, you get a UNIX running on common hardware (simplified support) with the convenient MacOS GUI you are already used too.


Other commercial UNIX's at the time might not have had such unique features (Solaris, HP-UX, AIX). But did however come with a whole software ecosystem, middleware layers, extensive compiler suites, third party software etc.


What did you get with AMIX? A vanilla SystemV with a basic UNIX toolchain and GCC, no software vendors, running on hardware that with the expansions required to fulfill the business requirements of a typical UNIX machine wasn't even much cheaper.


That AMIX (And also Atari UNIX) where stillbirths is completely understandable.


We have no idea about the sales numbers of the 3000UX, but I'm sure it was a business net-negative, even though it was probably cheap to develop (the port was subcontracted and minimum-effort, the A2140 was a licensed design, the A2065 was AmigaOS cross marketed) it's just a misdirection.




....AMIX what a terrible idea....

[Bruce Abbott]

Originally Posted by Amigajay

So in conclusion after 126 pages, Bruce were you disappointed in the A1200!?

Me? I'm just a sounding board for all the fans who were so disappointed by their A1200 that they can't stand the sight of it. My goal is to convince them to put it up on eBay with a Buy Now price of $1.

Seemingly talking about the A2000 and NASA this thread has lost its way!

Yes, it's great! Threads are much more interesting when they go off-topic...

[Bruce Abbott]

Originally Posted by Locutus

I've mentioned this before, but i seriously doubt the seriousness of the Sun license story, there's no corroboration from ex-Sun employees on it, and it's source is some vague USENET posts.

Yep. But it keeps turning up everywhere without attribution, and everyone believes it because it paints Commodore in a bad light.

Just because a magazine gave a good review did it make it into a decent offering.

True. However there are also posts by apparently knowledgeable users who had good things to say about it.

Personally I don't care a whit about UNIX and couldn't see the point in it, but I would probably think differently I was a UNIX user at the time.

Think about it, other UNIX's like the ones mentioned in the review unique selling points Commodore had absolutely none.

It did have one - you could boot Amiga OS and a have a normal Amiga, which you couldn't do on those other workstations.

Also it came with a lot of OS source code. But apparently this was considered by many to be a bad thing back then.

NeXT got you the absolute best development environment around (Genera was better, I'm biased), with rapid GUI development tools that allowed solving new problems.

Yes, you are biased. Some of us didn't need rapid GUI development tools for an OS that was defunct by 1996.

A/UX, you get a UNIX running on common hardware (simplified support) with the convenient MacOS GUI you are already used too.

More bias.

What did you get with AMIX? A vanilla SystemV with a basic UNIX toolchain and GCC,

Works for me. Nice and lean is what I would want, not tons of middleware bloat.

That AMIX (And also Atari UNIX) where stillbirths is completely understandable.

Or any UNIX really. Who wanted an OS that needed 4MB of RAM just to boot up?

We have no idea about the sales numbers of the 3000UX, but I'm sure it was a business net-negative, even though it was probably cheap to develop (the port was subcontracted and minimum-effort, the A2140 was a licensed design, the A2065 was AmigaOS cross marketed) it's just a misdirection.

That's right, you have no idea. I see that didn't stop you from being 'sure' that it was all bad though.

....AMIX what a terrible idea....

I agree. But some people must have thought it was a good idea and convinced Commodore to do it.

[grond]

Originally Posted by Bruce Abbott

Works for me. Nice and lean is what I would want, not tons of middleware bloat.

Or any UNIX really. Who wanted an OS that needed 4MB of RAM just to boot up?

Anyone that didn't mistake computers as toys. What UNIX offered that no AmigaOS to date has offered is memory protection and data ownership. That did require some additional resources and thus cost extra money but costs didn't matter to those who needed those features. In 1998 I had a UNIX computer under my office desk with 2GB of RAM. Typical PCs of the time had 32 MB of RAM and wouldn't have allowed to even install the required amount of RAM for running the simulations I was running day in, day out.

Staying in the toy niche was what made Commodore's business so little profitable and later on killed it altogether when PCs also became usable as toy computers.

[Locutus]

Originally Posted by Bruce Abbott

Personally I don't care a whit about UNIX and couldn't see the point in it
....
Works for me. Nice and lean is what I would want, not tons of middleware bloat.
....

Who wanted an OS that needed 4MB of RAM just to boot up?

I knew i was shooting myself in the foot by ever replying to you, this is bizarre circular reasoning just is futile to engage with.


The actual factual errors in your response, ...why even bother at this point.


Sorry for adding on to this thread.

[Lord Aga]

Originally Posted by Arc Angel

The Amiga, in schools ?
Really ?
A disc based OS system, with no flicker free hi res mode, in schools ?
I thought I had read everything on eab, but no, there can be more nonsense ...

Well, compared to the crap we had in schools, a humble A500 would be like a 30th century piece of technology.

[jotd]

What, you're calling Thomson TO7 and MO5 (that we had in France) crap?

Well you're right.

[Gorf]

Originally Posted by Bruce Abbott

To think that Commodore, a calculator company that made their mark in low-end home computers used to play video games, could compete against SGI with their high-end 3D graphics workstations, is ludicrous.

Silicon Graphics started small in the 80s ... and much later than Commodore.
They just took a more professional approach.

Of course the Amiga fan will now tell us that SGI were also incompetent - I mean they could have used their 3D tech to make world beating gaming consoles that undercut the PlayStation, right?

They did:
the "Reality" coprocessor in the N64 was designed by Silicon Graphics.


Later (1999) a large group of important engineers left SGI for Nvidia.
So the successor of SGI-technology can now be found in the XBOX, the PS3, and the Nintendo Switch.
(and in the PC of course)

Some of us didn't need rapid GUI development tools for an OS that was defunct by 1996.

macOS is defunct since almost 30 years now? Why did nobody tell Apple!?

(macOS IS essentially NextStep by just an other name)