HDTenEightyP/NetNews huggingface dataset:
Newsgroups: comp.sys.amiga.advocacy
Subject: Re: Byte A4000/A3000T-040 Review
From: Mark.Stuart@bbs.actrix.gen.nz
Date: Thu, 31 Dec 1992 09:29:39 GMT
Organization: Actrix Information Exchange

In article <58153@dime.cs.umass.edu> barrett@astro.cs.umass.edu (Daniel Barrett) writes:
> 
> 	Maybe so, but try calling Commodore sometime and mentioning that you
> have opened up your Amiga.  I know someone who mentioned this fact to
> Commodore employee, and this person was immediately informed that this
> action voided the warranty.  Thankfully, my friend's telephone call was
> anonymous, so the warranty was not actually voided.
> 
>                                                         Dan

Sounds a bit wierd to me. Over here Commodore have a massive Service Center
network throughout the country. They also do not mind people expanding
their machines, however if they do anything stupid a blow them up, thats to
the users cost.
 
In the general Wellington (NZ) area we have, ummm, 6 service centers I can
think of straight away, and we're one hell of a small place compared to
cities overseas. We are one of those service centers and have a technician
in store. So people have a lot of choice! For their PC's they also
offer/include an onsite warranty serviced by yet another nationwide
servicing network.
 
Other than that, Commodore NZ are just like the rest of Commodore, always
messin up ;-)
From: papresco@cantor.math.uwaterloo.ca (Paul Prescod)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.amiga.advocacy
Subject: Re: Future Amiga chipsets
Date: 3 Jan 93 18:38:10 GMT
Organization: University of Waterloo

>Make that "There will be 64 bit PC buses....."
>
>The PC crowd even have problems settling on a standard local bus at
>the moment.  The 64-bit 'bus' you are hinting is probably the raw
>CPU bus signals + a few control lines.  The high bandwidth that comes
>with it would only be useful for memory expansion (eg. cache, ram)
>hardly a general purpose bus for peripherals.  Eventually there might
>be a 'standard' for a more general purpose high performance bus, but
>that's a few years down the road.

Not so!  The VESA group, who designed the current local bus standard in
record time, are working on a mezzanine standard, which would be what
their 64 bit standard would be based on.  PCI is also a bus-decoupled
from-the-CPU standard.  It too will be 64 bit (when we have a 64 bit
CPU).
From: ggg@kepler.unh.edu (Gregory G Greene)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.amiga.advocacy
Subject: Re: a MB style flame against IBMs
Date: 23 Dec 1992 23:38:14 GMT
Organization: University of New Hampshire  -  Durham, NH
NNTP-Posting-Host: kepler.unh.edu

'>AGA is superior to SVGA (SVGA being 800x600x256c), and comes standard on
'>the A1200 ($600 retail?).

	Why is SVGA just 800x600x256?  Looking at a lot of SVGA graphics cards
   out there, there is also 1024x768x256 and 1280x1024x256.  Not to mention 
   the Hi-color and True-color ones at those resolutions.  How is AGA superior?
   Where is the A1200 at $600 retail also?  Its $699 around here with no HD and
   no monitor. 

[regarding PC games]
'>Not as good as an A1200 (or an A4000!), which will soon have games that once
'>again show who's game boss.

	Whats your definition of soon, next month, next year, next decade?  All
   I see is software companies bailing out of the Amiga market.  How can you
   have awesome Amiga games when you have no support?   Granted, I am taking
   a US view of things, because what I see coming out of Europe doesn't really
   impress me.  Its the same ol action/arcade stuff. 

							Greg Greene
                                                        ggg@kepler.unh.edu


'>Jake Rose               :: Two men look out through the same bars.
'>jaker@csugrad.cs.vt.edu :: One sees mud, and one the stars.
Newsgroups: comp.sys.amiga.advocacy
From: das9674@usl.edu (Stephenson Daniel A)
Subject: What's this?!?!
Organization: University of Southwestern Louisiana
Date: Wed, 23 Dec 1992 06:50:27 GMT

What's this 'Guru Meditation'??  Is this the Amiga 'UAE'?  
--
Dan Stephenson                                         das9674@usl.edu  
"Yes Dan, I have heard of Ultima Underworld.  From my point of view it
 appears to be a rather large stick which you seem to be using to beat
 everbody in this group with." -Mark Steyn, comp.sys.amiga.advocacy
Newsgroups: comp.sys.amiga.advocacy
From: kodak@mentor.cc.purdue.edu (Jason 'KodaK' Balicki)
Subject: Re: HELP--AMIGA OR IBM PC CLONE?
Organization: Purdue University Computing Center
Distribution: na
Date: Thu, 31 Dec 1992 23:25:48 GMT

In article <1992Dec31.123632.1@stsci.edu> speck@stsci.edu writes:

>1) How would, say, an Amiga with a 68040 compare in raw number crunching power
>   to the same speed (MHz) 486 DX system?

It would compare favoribly.

>2) Can Amigas take things like 20" monitors with video cards that permit very
>   large graphics modes (like 1200-or-so pixels square)?

Yes.

>3) How easy is the Amiga to program yourself?  Are there REALLY GOOD
>   optimizing compilers available at reasonable cost, such as FORTRAN,
>   C, and BASIC?

The Amiga can be more difficult to program than a clone due to the
custom chips, if you do only general computing and don't take advantage
of any "features" then programing either would be just about the same.

>4) I've seen the wonderful graphics screens that Amigas can generate.  How
>   expensive are grahics packages to really use the Amiga to its advantage?
>   They are quite expensive for IBM clones (really GOOD software).

Good Amiga gpx packages are quite inexpensive as compared to their clone
counterparts.  Pick up any Amiga magazine (I recommend "Amazing Computings
Amiga") for a recent price list.

>5) One BIG pain I've had with PC programming is in FORTRAN and BASIC, where
>   the amount of memory I can use is limited.  For example, the FORTRAN I
>   have only lets you access 640K of memory!  Even if you had 20 MB!  How
>   does this work with an Amiga, i.e., if you have 10MB of RAM, can you
>   trivially use all 10MB at once (minus the memory used for the operating
>   system, of course) for declaring arrays, etc?  This is very important to
>   me.

There is no memory limit, however, there are several types of memory in
the Amiga -- the two most important are "Chip" and "Fast" memory.  The
short explaination is that "Chip" can be accessed by the custom chips
(graphics and sound) without processor intervention, and "Fast" can only
be accessed by the processor.  The actual amount of memory in the amiga
is only limited by the address bus of the processor, except Chip, which
is currently limited to 2MB (I only have 1MB of Chip and have NEVER run
out of Chip mem.)
>
>Thanks in advance,
>

No problem.

>Scott in Baltimore,MD


Sorry if I got anything wrong... please correct me kindly.  :)

--Jason Balicki
kodak@mentor.cc.purdue.edu
From: benjamin@zds-oem.zds.com (Adam Benjamin)
Subject: Re: A4000 or NOT
Organization: Zenith Data Systems, OEM Systems Engineering
Date: Tue, 22 Dec 1992 13:13:37 GMT

In article <5136@equinox.unr.edu> jason@aspen.math.uh.edu (Jason Grimes) writes:
>
>My first experience with a computer was with a CBM PET 4016 and compared to
>the other computers of the day ( TRS 80's and Apple II ) the PET was way cool.
>It had a 40 column screen with 16 KBytes of memory and a graphics character
>set.  We programmed ( in basic ) most of the popular video games like
>Defender, Space Invaders, Centiped, and a couple of others.  They didn`t 
>look or play like the real things, but, it was fun anyways.  All of the
>programs
>were saved to cassette tapes, which took about 10 min. to save and read.  We
>also had a PET 4008, two PET 8032`s, and a Super PET. This was in 1979 to 1984
>I think.
>
>
I vaguely remember playing some text adventure written in basic on a PET
at the local Community college.  I only remember falling into a pool that
was full of mercury... anyway,  What did (does?) PET stand for? anything?
is it Pretty Electronic Thing?  Programable Electronics & Transistors?
What what?

/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\
   //   benjamin@zds-oem.zds.com  OR    af987@yfn.ysu.edu
 \X/  Adam Benjamin          Insert snappy humor here
\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/

Newsgroups: comp.sys.amiga.advocacy,comp.sys.amiga.misc
From: jmpierce@whale.st.usm.edu (Jimmy Malcolm Pierce)
Subject: Re: Don't let the Amiga Die (Part II)!!!
Organization: University of Southern Mississippi
Date: Thu, 24 Dec 1992 06:05:29 GMT

In article <1992Dec22.075616.4682@usl.edu> das9674@usl.edu (Stephenson Daniel A) writes:
>jmpierce@whale.st.usm.edu (Jim Pierce) writes:
>> (Stephenson Daniel A) writes:
>>>...or run text-based program from other floppy disks.  Can the Amiga 
>>>boot off a floppy?  Uh huh.  Then what do the vast majority of 
>>>Amigans do?  *Right*.  They swap disks.
>>
>>  Of course, they could do what I did to my Amiga, bought an external
>>drive. So both of my Amigas have an external floppy, much easier to move
>>them from machine to machine than ms-dog machines floppy drives. DJ.
>
>What?  What?  You know, for most people, most MS-**DOG** people
>(never mind the fact that we were talking about OS/2) booting from a
>floppy is done in *emergencies* when the _large_ harddrive isn't
>accessible for some reason.  And like a typical Amigan, you'll find
>*some* way to twist PC's (OS/2 or MS-DOS) use of harddrives into being
>a disadvantage because Amigas usually don't have harddrives to depend on.
>
>Woo woo.  Besides, Jimmy, many PCs have dual floppies *anyway*, so 
>your point is doubly-moot.

  Well, I use ms-dog at work... Some of our University machines never came
with hard drives, and some only came with one floppy drive and no hard drive.
I don't remember any mention of os/2 in this thread... But this thread
is so bleeping boring I usually kill most of it out of boredom from 
reading ms-dog user posts who haven't a clue as to their being abused
by i*m ! I have said before, and I'll say it again, buy whatever computer
you want to spend your money on, but don't spread lies about other
machines. It is my personal use of three computer labs full of ms-dog
computers that proves to me they are pieces of crap ! If, however, 
you like ms-dog, use it, I don't care... 
{ My first computer use wasn't even a micro. }
 
   BTW, until 6 months ago, our class lab of 286s didn't have any hard
drives, and we had to request dual floppies. One of each size, 3.5 and
5.25. Thats 14 machines, no hds for three years.
  
-- 
         Jim Pierce Bach. of Sci. in Applied Computer Science USM 
             jmpierce@whale.st.usm.edu  Disclaimer: Standard.
                   Video. Cher: Love and Understanding.
             'Rush Limbaugh is the 'Chia Pet' of TV shows !'
Newsgroups: comp.sys.amiga.advocacy,comp.sys.amiga.hardware
From: skank@iastate.edu (George L. Hall-Skank)
Subject: Re: Power-up for AGA Machines! rumour.
Organization: Iowa State University, Ames, IA
Date: Wed, 23 Dec 1992 00:48:25 GMT

In article <BzCyJx.D0L@fc.hp.com> koren@fc.hp.com (Steve Koren) writes:
>
>I very much doubt a single Alpha chip is anywhere even remotely close to
>2000 specmarks.  Today's RISC CPU's tend to get somewhere between 0.5
>and 1.8 specmarks per MHz.

	[benchmarks deleted]

>I'd believe 200, but not 2000.  Still, 200 is very, very fast.  It'll
>make your 68040 seem like an 8086 in comparison :-)
>
>  - steve

	It appears that the new ALPHA runs in the 150 specmark range.  Maybe
as fast as 200 specmarks running code in tight loops from cache.  I'm with
Steve, that's not very close to 2000 but that's still *quite* impressive!
It might even be the fastest processor on the planet, that depends on HP.

						--George

-- 
George L. Hall-Skank            |    The next wave in Object Oriented      ///
Graduate, Electrical Engineering| Programming languages: COBOLPlusPlus!   ///
Iowa State University, Ames,	|				     \\\ ///
skank@iastate.edu               |				      \\X//
From: rburns@key.COM (Randy Burns)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.amiga.advocacy
Subject: Re: Power-up for AGA Machines! rumour.
Date: 24 Dec 92 02:13:52 GMT
Organization: Amdahl Corporation, Advanced Systems, Fremont CA


IMHO, Commodore would do well to look at the Sparc architecture. Sun
as placed a relatively high emphasis on making its designs cheap to make,
compared to HP, Dec, Mips and IBM. Sparc's machines don't do as well on 
some benchmarks as some of the competition, because they are being tuned 
to do well in mult-processor designs(i.e. you can come up with multiprocesser
benchmarks that make a Sparcstation 10 look good compared to the competition).
There may be some problems with the implementation of the Sparc intruction
set, but if more manufacturers start to use Sparc, we'll see these problems
resolved very quickly(the big advantage of an open standard is that if one
company doesn't solve a problem another can without running the risk of 
getting sued).

The real reason for choosing the Sparc would, IMHO be that fact that it is
at this point the only major chip design that is owned by a consortium
(i.e. Sparc International-granted Sun still dominates, but it has tried to
set up a structured that would work even if they didn't and some large 
companies have signed on). Intel won't license its latest technology-and Dec,
IBM, and HP are _very_ cautious about licensing theirs.Commodore is after all 
a hardware manufacturer. They could join Sparc International and have a say 
in the future direction of this standard just like anyone else. They'd also
inherit a large software base and a crew of techies that complement the
hackers that have made the Amiga a unique and distinctive machine.
From: pss1@kepler.unh.edu (Paul S Secinaro)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.amiga.advocacy
Subject: Re: Future Amiga chipset
Date: 21 Dec 1992 13:55:55 GMT
Organization: University of New Hampshire  -  Durham, NH
NNTP-Posting-Host: kepler.unh.edu

In article <n1282t@ofa123.fidonet.org> Aric.Caley@ofa123.fidonet.org writes:

>How  is  the IBM or Mac any better off in this regard?  The standard on the
>IBM is the SoundBlaster.  There are other cards but not much runs on them.

It depends on what you are talking about.  For games, SB or SB Pro is
pretty much the standard.  But Windows has device-independent sound,
and many of the new music/multimedia packages are for Windows.  And
those that aren't usually have a broader range of device support than
your average $59 game.

>>   JPEG was intended for still images.  Making JPEG work on animations in
>> real time is a major kludge.  Ask anyone who is familiar with QuickTime.
>
>Yeah.   QuickTime is software.  The DMI board is HARDWARE.  It uses JPEG in
>REAL  TIME,  30  fps.  What more could you want?  JPEG compresses more than
>MPEG will.

This is true.  JPEG can easily be used for full screen 30fps
animations.  Virtually all of the chipsets I'm aware of (LSI Logic,
AT&T, Zoran, C-Cube, etc.) support the necessary bandwidth, and then
some.

The problem I've heard of with JPEG is that at high compression rates
you get artifacts that aren't necessarily correlated from frame to
frame.  So you tend to get these wierd-looking artifacts in your
animations.  Things like shimmering fringes around objects, etc.  I've
never actually seen this happen myself, though.  MPEG is supposedly
much smoother as it was designed for motion from the ground up.  You
should also get better compression due to MPEG's interframe
processing/motion estimation techniques.  JPEG treats each frame as a
separate entity, so it can't take advantage of temporal redundancy
between frames.


Paul

-- 
Paul Secinaro
pss1@kepler.unh.edu
Synthetic Vision and Pattern Analysis Laboratory
UNH Dept. of Electrical and Computer Engineering
Xref: sparky comp.sys.amiga.advocacy:31989 comp.sys.amiga.misc:18975
From: chucks@pnet51.orb.mn.org (Erik Funkenbusch)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.amiga.advocacy,comp.sys.amiga.misc
Subject: Re: Don't let the Amiga Die (Part II)!!!
Date: 22 Dec 92 08:45:02 GMT
Organization: People-Net [pnet51], Minneapolis, MN.

papresco@cantor.math.uwaterloo.ca (Paul Prescod) writes:
>>Well, 8M of RAM by itself costs about as much as an Amiga that can multitask
>>games while downloading. I used to play "Tracers" while downloading on my
>>512K Amiga 1000.
>
>Show me an Amiga for $370.00 US new.


I believe an Amiga 600 is $299 (maybe $399 list) which is close enough to your
$370.  That comes with 1 Meg of memory by the way.

.-----------------------------------------------------------------------------.
| UUCP: {crash tcnet petrus quest}!orbit!pnet51!chucks | Amiga, IBM, and any  |
| ARPA: crash!orbit!pnet51!chucks@nosc.mil             | system you let me    |
| INET: chucks@pnet51.orb.mn.org                       | get my grubby mind   |
|------------------------------------------------------| into.                |
| Programmer at large, employment options welcome, inquire within.            |
Xref: sparky comp.sys.amiga.advocacy:32291 comp.sys.amiga.misc:19162
From: quix@panix.com (George Papadopoulos)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.amiga.advocacy,comp.sys.amiga.misc
Subject: Re: Byte A4000/A3000T-040 Review
Date: 28 Dec 92 18:08:30 GMT
Organization: PANIX Public Access Unix, NYC

In <BzyrAo.FEp@NeoSoft.com> peter@NeoSoft.com (Peter da Silva) writes:

>In article <1992Dec28.004411.11737@serval.net.wsu.edu> boutwell@beta.tricity.wsu.edu (Scott Boutwell) writes:
>> >> o CBM forbids internal expansion by owners

>> >It is incredibly stupid and
>> >backwards for C= to void warranties because you told them
>> >you opened up your computer (mine was an A3000).

>> I was wondering when someone would address this issue...  Byte hit the
>> nail right on the Head with this one.  Commodore should really listen to
>> this one.

>I think a lawsuit might be in order, since for a personal computer with slots,
>opening it up to install cards is part of normal and expected usage. I can see
>this sort of restriction on the 500 through the 1200, but on the 2000 on up
>it's like voiding your car's warranty because you changed the oil yourself.
>-- 
>Peter da Silva.  <peter@sugar.neosoft.com>.

	A trueism, unfortunately. Many automobile warranty coverages force
owners to have service done by authorized dealers only. A real pain...

	As for The GS deal, my friend is itching to put a new hard drive in
his machine, but the local dealer wants $50US to do it. What gives? He
could easily flip the top and drop it in... *sigh*
From: cs902125@ariel.yorku.ca (SHUK C YIP)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.amiga.advocacy
Subject: Re: VistaPro & clones
Date: 4 Jan 93 04:22:56 GMT
Organization: York University, Toronto, Canada

In article <mbrown.0z0v@legend.akron.oh.us> mbrown@legend.akron.oh.us writes:
>You'll Find That Popular Science is LUDICROUS to the Point of 
>Pointedly ignoring the Amiga. They do and will Make an Active point of 
>ignoring the Amiga(they never even said any thing about the toaster 
>far as I know, most likely becuase it doesn't run on the mac.). They 
>also talked about VR on the IBM but won't point out that the only 
>Commercial VR companys now, Exclusivly use the amigas in the Customers 
>VR setups.
>   For all I know, there is No VR company marketing VR systems that 
>use the MAC or IBM.(I know I could be wrong, but I don't think I am).
>    Mark
>

I think it is the time for us to write the complaint letter to POPULAR
SCIENCE.

1. no Video Toaster review.
2. VR system is Amiga.
3. VistaPro is for Amiga first and we've scenery animator anyway.
Newsgroups: comp.sys.amiga.advocacy
From: jerry@msi.com (Jerry Shekhel)
Subject: Re: CBM mention on 12/11
Organization: Molecular Simulations, Inc.
Date: Tue, 22 Dec 1992 17:10:30 GMT
X-Newsreader: TIN [version 1.1 PL8]
X-Posted-From: phoenix.msi.com
NNTP-Posting-Host: sol.ctr.columbia.edu

David Tiberio (dtiberio@engws10.ic.sunysb.edu) wrote:
:
: 	Wrong, the Atari 400 and the C64, with all their screen interrupts,
: can not display multiple screens like the Amiga can...
:

No David, *you* are wrong.  The Atari 400 had hardware very similar to Copper.
If a full multitasking OS were feasible on that machine, it would be trivial
to implement Amiga-like screens on it.

:
: an Atari ST can do a 
: Boing! demo, but not like the Amiga can. You have obviously never used an
: Amiga...
: 		

Ha.  Even that same Atari 400 had a Boing demo that was almost as good as the
original Amiga one.  And please stop telling me what I have and have not
used.  I used an Amiga for three years in college.
--
+-------------------+----------------------------+---------------------------+
| JERRY J. SHEKHEL  | Molecular Simulations Inc. | Time just fades the pages |
| Drummers do it... |     Burlington, MA USA     | in my book of memories.   |
|    ... In rhythm! |        jerry@msi.com       |         -- Guns N' Roses  |
+-------------------+----------------------------+---------------------------+
Newsgroups: comp.sys.amiga.advocacy
From: nwickham@nyx.cs.du.edu (Neal Wickham)
Subject: Questions about A4000
X-Disclaimer: Nyx is a public access Unix system run by the University
	of Denver for the Denver community.  The University has neither
	control over nor responsibility for the opinions of users.
Reply-To: nwickham@nyx.UUCP (Neal Wickham)
Organization: Nyx, Public Access Unix at U. of Denver Math/CS dept.
Date: Sat, 26 Dec 92 02:43:28 GMT


I have a few questions about the A4000.

Will my old Trumpcard SCSI controllor work in it or even the 2091?

Does A-max work?

What kind of Norton SI does it get with PCTask or something?  ...and what
is the likelyhood of something like PCTask doing VGA graphics at reason
able speed?

Do the new Vortex Golden Gate emulators work?  ...the C= 386sx Bridgeboard?

Anyone know anything about the new Quad Sync monitors?   


Thanks,



                                       NCW

Xref: sparky comp.sys.amiga.advocacy:32058 comp.sys.amiga.hardware:22005
Newsgroups: comp.sys.amiga.advocacy
Subject: Re: Don't let the Amiga Die (Part II)!!!
From: jbickers@templar.actrix.gen.nz (John Bickers)
Date: 28 Dec 92 17:35:34 PST
Organization: TAP

Quoted from <1992Dec28.000513.1305@sol.ctr.columbia.edu> by jerry@msi.com (Jerry Shekhel):
> John Bickers (jbickers@templar.actrix.gen.nz) wrote:
> :
> : > Yet they would not and do not run on Peter's $199 512K Amiga with no HD,
> :
> :     As several people have already posted, text editors, comms
> :     programs, games, demos, MOD players, paint programs, word
> :     processors, the applications most used on Amigas, WILL run on a
> :     512KB machine.

> All these things (except MOD players, of course) also ran on a 16KB Atari
> 800.  See my point yet?

    Somewhere in my response to Dan I referred to a "current feature
    level that is expected nowadays". This sentence of yours is pure
    hogwash.

> :     Ha ha! Funny, I thought it was you who introduced some irrelevant
> :     crap about the Atari 800 into this thread.

> Irrelevant?!  Peter's argument was that the Amiga is superior because it can
> run useful applications in 512K, and the PC can't.  My Atari 800 example was

    Your Atari 800 example is foolish, but because it's your argument
    you refuse to admit so. Your bald-faced lie about it being able
    to run the apps of today is just sinking you deeper into your web
    of self-deceit.

> meant to show that it was a stupid argument.  You seem to be the only one
> who didn't get it.

    Har! You introduced a broken analogy, but true to form you'll
    stand by it, eh? No matter what lies you have to produce to back
    it up.

> | JERRY J. SHEKHEL  | Molecular Simulations Inc. | Time just fades the pages |
--
*** John Bickers, TAP.                   jbickers@templar.actrix.gen.nz ***
***    "Radioactivity - It's in the air, for you and me" - Kraftwerk    ***
Newsgroups: comp.sys.amiga.advocacy