Atari ST Computer Sales and Marketshare: A Comparison

[trixster]

Well I actually think it might be that (joking or not) attitude that annoys Atari owners. If the perception is that that attitude pervaded (or still pervades) the Amiga scene then I can see where the resentment comes from.

Each to their own. I have to say though, I've recently bought an Atari and my experiences so far of what's been achieved with Badmood and the Q2 test show that one particular Atari machine absolutely stomped all over what was possible with a fast-ram equipped A1200. So in that regard the boot is on the other foot.

[PortuguesePilot]

A fully upgraded 68060'd Falcon is a sight to behold. One could argue that it necks-on with the most solidly upgraded A4000's. But, as much as the Commodore machine, the Falcon is not the seminal Atari machine (one could argue if it actually is an ST at all). Released in 1992 and cancelled in 1993, it really stood no chance to actually get a foothold onto anything (Commodore made a similar mistake with the A1200). A shame, really... Maybe the whole story could have been different if the Falcon was released in 1989 in the place of the STe.

[Anakirob]

Originally Posted by PortuguesePilot

A fully upgraded 68060'd Falcon is a sight to behold. One could argue that it necks-on with the most solidly upgraded A4000's. But, as much as the Commodore machine, the Falcon is not the seminal Atari machine (one could argue if it actually is an ST at all). Released in 1992 and cancelled in 1993, it really stood no chance to actually get a foothold onto anything (Commodore made a similar mistake with the A1200). A shame, really... Maybe the whole story could have been different if the Falcon was released in 1989 in the place of the STe.

Well while the Falcon may be able to rival or possibly even beat the A4000 in performance, this thread is about sales and market share and the A4000 totally has the Falcon beat in that area.

And therefore you can actually do a whole lot more with an A4000 than you could with a Falcon simply due to the larger amount of software which runs on the Amiga. Indeed I believe this is one of the main reasons that the Windows OS is so successful. In many ways it's inferior to the alternatives such as Linux or MacOS, but there is just so much software available for it that it becomes an attractive option.

[kovacm]

Originally Posted by Anakirob

Indeed I believe this is one of the main reasons that the Windows OS is so successful. In many ways it's inferior to the alternatives such as Linux or MacOS, but there is just so much software available for it that it becomes an attractive option.

By 1993 all software from other platforms (Amiga, Atari and Mac...) GET PORTED to Windows. That was the end.
Before this you did not have e.g. Cubase on PC, LightWave, Cinema 4D, PhotoShop, Illustrator... best DTP on PC was Ventura running GEM. When PC become able to run GUI programs from other platform, all programs get ported to Windows.

I even open topic at Atari-Forum.com "Programs born on Atari, Amiga, Mac... and then ported to Windows" and you are welcome to help me to complete the list.

Originally Posted by PortuguesePilot

A fully upgraded 68060'd Falcon is a sight to behold.

trixster refer to stock Falcon when he said "what's been achieved with Badmood and the Q2 test show that one particular Atari machine absolutely stomped all over what was possible with a fast-ram equipped A1200. So in that regard the boot is on the other foot."

[ Show youtube player ]
[ Show youtube player ]
[ Show youtube player ]

note: this is stock, 14MB Falcon

[Amigajay]

Originally Posted by kovacm

By 1993 all software from other platforms (Amiga, Atari and Mac...) GET PORTED to Windows. That was the end.
Before this you did not have e.g. LightWave,

Wrong....The last known standalone revision for the Amiga was LightWave 5.0, released in 1995. Shortly after the release of the first PC version

Plus this thread is sales comparisons, not what an expensive underused piece of Atari hardware is capable of 20 years later.

[kovacm]

Originally Posted by Amigajay

Wrong....The last known standalone revision for the Amiga was LightWave 5.0, released in 1995. Shortly after the release of the first PC version

Plus this thread is sales comparisons, not what an expensive underused piece of Atari hardware is capable of 20 years later.

you get the picture.

[frank_b]

Originally Posted by kovacm

you get the picture.

This forum isn't as hostile as others though. Personally I like both machines for different reasons.

[kovacm]

As I suggested, best way to determine production numbers is to collect as much as possible serials numbers of machines (or tanks ).

I made web site where Atari users can enter their serial numbers of Atari computers and Atari peripherals (equipment). You can also add pictures of motherboards, cases, stickers...

http://milan.kovac.cc/atari/chipmunk/

please use it (if you have any Atari )! If we type enough serial numbers, we can make some conclusion regarding Atari computer production!

like Mark_G suggested, there is "German tank problem" calculation if you have enough serial numbers in database.

---

Is there any similar site/database for Commodore or Amiga computers?

[nobody]

I think the ST had more users until 1990 or so. I had read that it had around 1.000.000 users in UK alone.

[dlfrsilver]

Ok, let's update a bit this thread with 2 pictures, made from the annual financial reports, between Atari, Commodore and Microsoft between 1988 and 1992 :



The conclusion is that from the official data we have regarding the amiga sold, for which the Dr Peter Kittel pointed based on the serial numbers the numbers of machine sold due to Commodore bankruptcy, if we have 5,2 millions amiga sold, when you see the graphics, since Atari did less than half the turnover of Commodore, It's impossible that 6 millions of Atari machines got sold.

On average, this means they sold something like 2,5 millions of ST machines.

[mkrleza]

From what I remember, the first Amiga games were mostly Atari ports not using all of the Amiga capabilities. Until Shadow of the Beast. I think the only Atari which came close to the Amiga was STE...

[Tigerskunk]

Originally Posted by Predseda

What I can see from the chart is the really dramatical drop of Amiga (and Atari) between 1991 and 1992 to PCs. Is that a coincidence that Windows 3.1 were introduced in April 1992?

Can only talk about my perspective here, but in 1991 in the german computer and game magazines the Amiga looked suddenly very old when you had those shiny new VGA games like Wing Commander 1&2, Ultima 6&7, Silent Service2, Gunship 2000, Comanche appearing on PCs, and only a lot worse looking versions on the Amiga much later, if at all.

The Amiga completely lost it's mind share here, and most of my friends switched over or at least lusted for an 386/486 machine because that's where the cool stuff was happening in 1991/92.

And those people who were more into arcadish games got an SNES, I guess.

The story would have been very different if Commodore had shown AGA in a hard disk capable Amiga in 1990, imo.
Most people would have been more than willing to upgrade, there just was not any indication from Commodore of new exciting hardware being released soon.
When the 1200 hit in early 1993, almost anybody I know had a PC already, and the Amiga was done here, and wasn't even reported about anymore in magazines.

And that's a shame, since it's a very nice machine, imo.
Could have easily competed with the PCs at that time on many fronts.

[Bruce Abbott]

Originally Posted by Tigerskunk

Can only talk about my perspective here, but in 1991 in the german computer and game magazines the Amiga looked suddenly very old when you had those shiny new VGA games like Wing Commander 1&2, Ultima 6&7, Silent Service2, Gunship 2000, Comanche appearing on PCs, and only a lot worse looking versions on the Amiga much later, if at all.

It's funny the perceptions people have. VGA was 'shiny and new' for PC owners who previously had to endure crappy CGA and EGA, but not a big deal for Amiga owners who were already enjoying better graphics. Similarly with sound cards that finally produced the realistic sounds we had been getting for years (though a sound card was an optional extra on most PCs, and games like Ultima 6 still used the PC speaker for many effects).

Take Silent Service 2 for example. Sure the Amiga version wasn't quite as colorful, but was the difference really that much? (apologies for not showing a screenshot of the PC version - crappy eab won't accept any more pictures in this post!).

[ Show youtube player ]

[ Show youtube player ]

The Amiga completely lost it's mind share here, and most of my friends switched over or at least lusted for an 386/486 machine because that's where the cool stuff was happening in 1991/92.

Silent Service and yet another boring Ultima game was cool stuff? What you really mean is the PC was finally getting some of what us Amiga users had been enjoying for years, for a much higher price. Sure they lusted after high end 486s, but most bought crappy 386SXs.

But there's the rub. Amiga users were spoilt by the Amiga and becoming bored it - while they pirated games instead of buying them and didn't spend anything on upgrades (hard drives, FastRAM etc.) that would provide a platform for better games.

The story would have been very different if Commodore had shown AGA in a hard disk capable Amiga in 1990, imo.
Most people would have been more than willing to upgrade,

Imagine if the A4000 had been released in 1990, at a similar price to an equivalent 486 of the day. How could anyone justify spending thousands on a 'games computer' that wasn't IBM compatible? Most Amiga owners grumbled about having to buy a 512K RAM expansion or extra disk drive.

there just was not any indication from Commodore of new exciting hardware being released soon.

Commodore did release new hardware, but I guess it wasn't 'exciting' enough. There was plenty of 3rd party hardware constantly being released for the Amiga too, but most users weren't interested. The only important thing to them was would this cracked game run on it?

When the 1200 hit in early 1993, almost anybody I know had a PC already, and the Amiga was done here, and wasn't even reported about anymore in magazines.

You mean wasn't reported in PC magazines, right? Hardly surprising.

And that's a shame, since it's a very nice machine, imo.
Could have easily competed with the PCs at that time on many fronts.

I would say it was a pity, but inevitable. The PC was squashing everything else by sheer numbers, and the PC world was everything to PC owners ("Amiga? Oh yeah I heard about that. S'posed to have great graphics and sound, but it's only good for playing games!").

[BigD]

The arrogance of PC owners still makes my mind boggle. Like being told by a 'friend' a lunchtime round his house that the Amiga was only a games computer while he played Mortal Kombat on his PeeCee with a flight stick and bleepy sound chip! Ridiculous! He should have been embarrassed! I was never embarrassed at owning an Amiga.

[Tigerskunk]

Originally Posted by Bruce Abbott

It's funny the perceptions people have. VGA was 'shiny and new' for PC owners who previously had to endure crappy CGA and EGA, but not a big deal for Amiga owners who were already enjoying better graphics.

It was a big deal for PC people, and it was a smaller deal for Amiga people who were used to 16 color games, most of them being crap ST ports.

Originally Posted by Bruce Abbott

Similarly with sound cards that finally produced the realistic sounds we had been getting for years (though a sound card was an optional extra on most PCs, and games like Ultima 6 still used the PC speaker for many effects).

Definitely a different take here.
VGA was a huge jump with its 256 colors capability and higher color space.
Soundblaster wasn't really special.

Originally Posted by Bruce Abbott

Take Silent Service 2 for example. Sure the Amiga version wasn't quite as colorful, but was the difference really that much?

Yes, it was.




[/QUOTE]

or these:




Yeah, if you don't give a shit about graphics, it's not much different.
But people did. And the Amiga looked very very old in comparison suddenly.

Originally Posted by Bruce Abbott

Silent Service and yet another boring Ultima game was cool stuff?

These are huge usually undisputed classics. You not liking them is your problem. They were extremely influential though.

Originally Posted by Bruce Abbott

What you really mean is the PC was finally getting some of what us Amiga users had been enjoying for years, for a much higher price. Sure they lusted after high end 486s, but most bought crappy 386SXs.

Might be, but I didn't give a shit what the "PC" wanted, since I had an Amiga.
I just saw that the stuff that I loved got much better version on the PC, and crap ones if at all on the Amiga.

Originally Posted by Bruce Abbott

But there's the rub. Amiga users were spoilt by the Amiga and becoming bored it - while they pirated games instead of buying them

Good point. The piracy on the Amiga was really bad. But at least here in Germany every game was double the price what they would have been on the C64. No wonder People were not keen on buying games.

I mean, paying 39 D-Mark for a bad game is one thing, but SEVENTYNINE for some crap was highway robbery.
That amount of money was more worth then than what 79 Euros would be today.

Originally Posted by Bruce Abbott

and didn't spend anything on upgrades (hard drives, FastRAM etc.) that would provide a platform for better games.

Why should I have done this?
What would have been my incentive to?

So I could have some tones playing in F-18 Interceptor?
Or some assets were loading faster?

Meanwhile on the PCs you had 256 color games, and no disk swapping plus faster loading from hard disks.
If Commodore had shown me this in 1991, I would have bought this immediately.
But honestly, I would have told anybody to "fuck off" if they told me to "buy fast RAM" to support the platform.

Originally Posted by Bruce Abbott

Imagine if the A4000 had been released in 1990, at a similar price to an equivalent 486 of the day. How could anyone justify spending thousands on a 'games computer' that wasn't IBM compatible? Most Amiga owners grumbled about having to buy a 512K RAM expansion or extra disk drive.

An extra 512K and a disk drive for hundreds of bucks isn't exactly exciting if all you get for that is something you already could do anyway.

I played R-Type on my 512k Vanilla A500 in 1989, I kind of wasn't really sure why Z-Out needed an additional 512K. It didn't look that much better to me.
Same with a lot of other 1mb games.

Originally Posted by Bruce Abbott

Commodore did release new hardware, but I guess it wasn't 'exciting' enough.

Seems so, since not enough people gave a fuck about it.

On the 1200, it was simply too late. Like I wrote above.
The same machine could have done wonders for a few years on the european market. I know it's only anecdotal evidence, but I would have loved to get a 1200 in 1990 with the option to buy a hard disk for it and having 256 colors at disposal.

In 1993 when it released here in Germany, people almost didn't notice it anymore.
When I saw one in a computer store back then I was like "wow, they still produce new Amigas?". And then I saw the A600 and was laughing.

Originally Posted by Bruce Abbott

There was plenty of 3rd party hardware constantly being released for the Amiga too, but most users weren't interested.

What kind of?
Fast RAM expansion for the workbench to run better?
Sounds really amazing, mate.

Originally Posted by Bruce Abbott

The only important thing to them was would this cracked game run on it?

You mean wasn't reported in PC magazines, right? Hardly surprising.

I didn't read any PC magazines.
You could see it in basically any computer mag that was centered on Amiga releases before that the reports about it became less and less frequent, since all the interesting stuff was suddenly happening on PCs.

And no wonder, the Amiga has been riding on the same chip set since 1985, and it was showing then. People were getting bored with it, while on the PC market there was a feeling of constant innovation.

Originally Posted by Bruce Abbott

I would say it was a pity, but inevitable. The PC was squashing everything else by sheer numbers, and the PC world was everything to PC owners ("Amiga? Oh yeah I heard about that. S'posed to have great graphics and sound, but it's only good for playing games!").

Supposed to, but in the end compared to the PC it looked very bad.

[Keops/Equinox]

Originally Posted by Bruce Abbott

Silent Service and yet another boring Ultima game was cool stuff? What you really mean is the PC was finally getting some of what us Amiga users had been enjoying for years

That's simply not true. Maybe not for you, but in general VGA and PC games were a big deal in 1992: Wolfenstein 3D, Alone In The Dark and Ultima Underworld were big milestones for videogames.
You could also see very exciting PC games previews in magazines in 1992, like Star Wars: X-Wing for example, which definitely showed that PC was the next big thing.

Demoscene was also starting to get really serious on PC in 1992, with Future Crew's Unreal demo that even Tim Sweeney mentioned recently on Twitter as a milestone:
[ Show youtube player ]

When I saw The Party 1992 invitation on PC that year, the music was a huge slap in the face, I could not believe it, the days of the PC speaker were over and it sounded to me like it came straight out of a music studio:
[ Show youtube player ]

I also remember that Borland's Turbo Pascal 7 was very popular for programmers (many people were mixing Turbo Pascal and Assembler). My first physics projects at university were done with Turbo Pascal (simulating galaxy collisions using RK4 integration and computation heavy things like that)

I slowly stopped using my ST and Amiga at that time and PC was gaining traction for me, those CD-Roms in magazines with countless freewares and sharewares were quite something for the kid I was back then.

As for the price of a PC in 1992, it was expensive indeed, but so was an Amiga 500 in 1987:

Prices in France:
1992: PC 386 DX 40 MHz, 4M RAM, 85 MB HD, SVGA + Monitor
7990 F (it did not include a Soundblaster but it had a hard drive)

1987: Amiga 500 + Monitor
7490 F

[Bruce Abbott]

Originally Posted by Keops/Equinox

As for the price of a PC in 1992, it was expensive indeed, but so was an Amiga 500 in 1987:

Prices in France:
1992: PC 386 DX 40 MHz, 4M RAM, 85 MB HD, SVGA + Monitor
7990 F (it did not include a Soundblaster but it had a hard drive)

1987: Amiga 500 + Monitor
7490 F

Apples, oranges. The price of 'a' 386DX-40 in 1987 was?

[Tigerskunk]

Originally Posted by Bruce Abbott

The price of 'a' 386DX-40 in 1987 was?

Who cares?
The point is, the Amiga was expensive in 1987, and so was the PC in 1992.

But you could get state of the art tech for that money in both cases.
Whereas Commodore failed to deliver to do that in 1992.

[Bruce Abbott]

Originally Posted by Keops/Equinox

That's simply not true. Maybe not for you, but in general VGA and PC games were a big deal in 1992: Wolfenstein 3D, Alone In The Dark and Ultima Underworld were big milestones for videogames.

But the games in question were Silent Service II and Ultima 6, not these ones. Tigerskunk said,

Originally Posted by Tigerskunk

but in 1991 in the german computer and game magazines the Amiga looked suddenly very old

Wolfenstein 3D, Alone In The Dark and Ultima Underworld were all released in 1992. Curious how games that hadn't even been released yet were able to reach back into the past to make the Amiga suddenly look very old.

You could also see very exciting PC games previews in magazines in 1992, like Star Wars: X-Wing for example, which definitely showed that PC was the next big thing.

But I couldn't, because I didn't read PC magazines (why would I when I had an Amiga?).

Demoscene was also starting to get really serious on PC in 1992, with Future Crew's Unreal demo that even Tim Sweeney mentioned recently on Twitter as a milestone:
[ Show youtube player ]

No PC demoscene around here. Why not? Because it was pointless. The Amiga demo scene was about coders showing what they could do with the Amiga's custom chips. Once they moved to more powerful machines that cred was lost, since you could always just throw more CPU power at it.

Demos on the PC were inherently pointless because the PC didn't have a custom chipset to show off. You could make an 'EGA demo' or 'VGA Demo' etc., but not a 'PC demo'. And why would you want to? You spend ages developing some clever technique that pushes the hardware to the limits for a unique graphical effect, then Intel brings out a more powerful CPU and any kid can reproduce it in BASIC!

When I saw The Party 1992 invitation on PC that year, the music was a huge slap in the face, I could not believe it, the days of the PC speaker were over and it sounded to me like it came straight out of a music studio:
[ Show youtube player ]

Those days should have been over a lot earlier - and they were for Amiga owners, because we never had them!

PC speaker sound was irrelevant to us. Some of us heard it once and were so repelled that we never touched a PC again. Unfortunately I didn't have that option because I had to sell and service them. I remember endless frustration trying to get crappy PC sound cards to work with various games. Meanwhile the Amiga just worked, and didn't subject us to music that sounded like it came from a toy synthesizer keyboard.

BTW did you watch those Silent Service II videos? How does the PC version's sound compare to the Amiga?

I also remember that Borland's Turbo Pascal 7 was very popular for programmers (many people were mixing Turbo Pascal and Assembler).

Not for Amiga programmers it wasn't. I've done a bit of x86 assembly language programming though, and it sucks compared to 68k.

I slowly stopped using my ST and Amiga at that time and PC was gaining traction for me, those CD-Roms in magazines with countless freewares and sharewares were quite something for the kid I was back then.

In PC magazines. But Amiga owners bought Amiga magazines, with cover CDs that were also stuffed with countless freewares as well as full commercial programs. Before that most Amiga magazines had cover disks, and before that there were separate freeware distributions such as the famous Fred Fish disks. I have an original "Fish and More Vol. 1" CD which was produced in 1990.

Those of us who didn't ditch our Amiga for a PC the instant they finally got hardware parity continued to enjoy our machines for many more years. That's more than you could say for the average PC owner, who was constantly forced to 'upgrade' if they wanted to play the latest games.

[Bruce Abbott]

Originally Posted by Tigerskunk

It was a big deal for PC people, and it was a smaller deal for Amiga people who were used to 16 color games, most of them being crap ST ports...

Yeah, if you don't give a shit about graphics, it's not much different

I think the graphics in the PC version of Silent Service II are pretty shitty. The Amiga version is a bit shittier in some places, and better in others.

Looking at the in-game images I can see a lot more than 16 colors in the Amiga version. It appears to been crudely ported from the PC version except for the nice copper shading which looks better than the PC version. Someone obviously put a bit of effort into using the Amiga's hardware.

The static image of the submarine didn't port so well, probably because they used a crude color reduction technique. Seems they didn't have a copy of Art Department Professional (or an equivalent program for the PC).

But for a game like this the graphics don't have to be amazing, just 'serviceable'. Could the Amiga version graphics have been better? Sure. Did people who actually played the game give a shit? No.

VGA was a huge jump with its 256 colors capability and higher color space.

With judicious use of the Copper the Amiga could produce a similar color range. It could also use HAM mode to produce photo-realistic images. More importantly, every Amiga could do this, which means that every Amiga game ever produced had (or should have had) great graphics, whereas the PC had to wait until VGA became popular. Then when it did PC fans went gaga over finally getting a good color palette, while graphic artists struggled to make good use of it ("how are we going to port these EGA screens to VGA? I know, let's just make a whole lot of shades of the same garish colors!").

These are huge usually undisputed classics... They were extremely influential...

...on the PC. The Amiga had different classics that were just as good IMO. But the PC market was much larger so naturally its games were more 'influential'.

Good point. The piracy on the Amiga was really bad. But at least here in Germany every game was double the price what they would have been on the C64. No wonder People were not keen on buying games.

But they pirated C64 games too, right? Even though they were cheaper. Perhaps if every Amiga game sold for 1 Euro the pirates would have bought them.

I mean, paying 39 D-Mark for a bad game is one thing, but SEVENTYNINE for some crap was highway robbery.
That amount of money was more worth then than what 79 Euros would be today.

So you weren't a game developer then. Because if you were you would understand why prices were so high. Certainly the PC had an advantage there due its much larger user base. However the Amiga market would still have been large enough to permit price reductions if wasn't for the rampant piracy.

If Commodore had shown me this in 1991, I would have bought this immediately.

Then 2 years later you would have dumped it for a PC, right?

An extra 512K and a disk drive for hundreds of bucks isn't exactly exciting if all you get for that is something you already could do anyway.

The extra 512k is so you can play games that need 1MB, and the extra drive is for making it easier to pirate them, duh!

And no wonder, the Amiga has been riding on the same chip set since 1985, and it was showing then. People were getting bored with it, while on the PC market there was a feeling of constant innovation.

Constantly innovating - from PC speaker to 2 channels of digital sound, from 4 fixed colors and no sprites etc. to 256 colors and no sprites etc., from a CPU that's slower than a Z80 to one that just about matches a 68040, from an OS with no multitasking or GUI to one that does but needs 8MB RAM and 40MB of hard drive space to work properly. And PC owners are also constantly innovating ways to pay for yet another 'upgrade'.

But it was a successful marketing strategy. Make them buy shit and then 'innovate' the next model to be less shitty, and they think you are doing them a favor! Now I see why the Amiga failed. They should have started with a 6502, no GUI or multitasking, 128MB RAM and slots for 'future expansion'. Then in successive years they could dribble out endless 'innovations', until it eventually becomes the A1200 (or something like it) in 1991. But wait! They can't stop there. For the Amiga to be successful they would have to continue 'innovating' it, forcing users to buy a new model every couple of years. Silly Commodore, they didn't realize that producing a design that lasts for years reduces sales!