From: chucks@pnet51.orb.mn.org (Erik Funkenbusch)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.atari.st
Subject: Re: Falcon030, resolutions, TRUE color, and DSP
Date: 22 Dec 92 22:05:00 GMT
Organization: People-Net [pnet51], Minneapolis, MN.

aa399@cleveland.Freenet.Edu (Len Stys) writes:
>First of all, I'm told that 640x480 TRUE COLOR would require 4 Megs
>of memory for NICE games.  I'm told that 2 Megs would not really be
>enough since there must be room for other stuff like sound.

Except that the falcon only allows 3 memory configurations.  1M, 4M, and
14M.  You can't have only 2M of memory.

>Secondly, no one seems to know if this resolution (interlaced of course)
>could be displayed on TV without flicker.  Does anyone know?

If this is interlaced, it SHOULD work, it'll have SOME flicker, but TV's use
slow phosphor, so it won't be as noticable on a TV as a monitor.

>Thirdly, I have talked with someone that said that 640x200 (I'm not sure
>if you can get true color in this resolution) would also produce some
>pretty good games.  I guess that could be pushed to 640x240, but
>anyways, I'm told that 300k for ONE screen.  And you'll need at least
>TWO screens.  This would allow this game to produce with only 2 Megs
>easily--MAYBE even 1 Meg.

Again, there is no 2 meg configuration.  Though 640x400 should give too much
display contention to get good frame speed, 640x200 might be usable.

>I have been also informed that the Blitter REALLY would not be fast
>enough to move graphics around.  And someone suggested that Atari should
>have used the TI30410.  My question is, would the DSP work just as well?
>The Atari Advantage article states these things:

It's probably fast enough to do simple graphic moves, but nothing complex. 
The DSP doesn't really have the "oomph" to pretend to be a blitter.

>Image management: Shapes, sizes, contours, shading, highlights
>Vector manipulation; grahics "engines"
>CAD/CAM workstations' 3-D image generators
>Flight (and other transportation) simulators; arts and film sequences
>
>If anyone knows anything about the 56001 DSP, please join in and
>say something!

I've seen posts from people that work for Motorola and know EXACTLY what the
56001 can do.  They tell me the 56001 is not powerful, or precise enough to do
large graphical computations.  The 96001 is supposed to be much better for
this.  In any case, you lose the DSP to do audio things if you attempt to do
graphics with it.

>Will the DSP be able to produce CD quality sound AND generate graphics
>in a game?

The DSP doesn't give you the sound, the DAC's do, however, i'm sure the DSP
feeds the DAC's so you will probably lose your sound.

>What is the 32Kx24 bit (96K bytes) of local zero wait state SRAM for?
>What does the DSP do with it?

Well, it's program and data have to be stored somewhere..

>And lastly, the Jaguar is rumored to run off of a RISC 64-bit chip.
>We don't know what type of chip this is.
>
>Could the Jaguar POSSIBLY be a Motorola 68030 at 16 MHz and have a
>RISC DSP?

Well, knowing Atari's penchant for being dishonest, and alluding to things
that aren't so, I'd say it's a possibility, but, for those that buy a jaguar
(if it ever sees the light of day) I hope not.  That would be one SLOW game
system.