From: jmt@sactoh0.sac.ca.us (Jon M. Taylor)
Subject: Amigas and games/demo computers
Reply-To: jmt@sactoh0.SAC.CA.US (Jon M. Taylor)
Organization: Sacramento Public Access Unix, Sacramento, Ca.
Date: Tue, 8 Sep 92 06:03:41 GMT

        All of this talk lately about how the Amiga is better for demos
than PC clones are has me thinking:  the computer world seems to divide
up into two basic types (of users, programs, and systems).  These are
hacker/game/demo/neeto-hardware/cheap (like the Apple II, C-64, Amiga,
Acorn,
Atari ST), and mega-cpu/device-independent/"real-world app" type
computers (all pc clones, most UNIX boxes, Amiga 3000).  Obviously, the
former are better for games and demos and suchlike, because A) they are
cheap, B) they are standard.  In my opinion, C= is trying (with the
3000, AA, etc.) to make a category 1 computer into a category 2
computer, and, again IMO, it's not gonna work.
        I think that someone who marketed what would basically be a
programmable SNES (lots of ASICs, cheap CPU, static system design), and
targeted it at the hardware-hacker/game/demo group could make some
decent bucks.  The system would look a lot like the basic A500 design,
and it would work like this:
 
        1.  Lots of cool custom chips (powerful blitter, nice sound
chip, display coprocessor, etc).
 
        2.  Expandable with peripherals (HD, bigger monitor, etc.), but
nothing
that would change the basic system design.  Remember, one of the strengths
of
this system would be that ANY program EVER written for it would work on
the
first one off the assembly line and the last one.
 
        3.  No fancy OS or windowing interface or anything like that.
Leave that to the category 2 computers.  The "gamer" types wouldn't use
it because the wouldn't know how, and the hacker-types would bang the
hardware anyway.  Make the interface between the user and the hardware
as minimal as possible.
 
        4.  MAKE IT CHEAP.  In my fantasy-land, it should be no more
than $200 (US).  That will give it the large home penetration of the
SNES or the Genesis.
 
        5.  When it comes time to upgrade the technology and prorammers
have squeezed all they can out of the system, start out with a whole
NEW line of computers.  NO backwards-compatibility kludges - again,
that's for the category 2 computers.
 
 
        The amiga basically started out mostly like this.  Face it, if
it weren't for the low-end penetration of the A500, the Amiga would be
deader than shit.  As a corollary to that, I think you could take away
all non-7MHz 68000-non-ECS-non-A3000 systems and you wouldn't have made
a hery huge dent in C='s sales at all.  It's the A500 and the remaining
C-64 sales that keep them afloat.
        So, what do you think?  It may sound kind of like a step
backwards, but it would be fun!  Leave all of the high-end
DIG/x86/backwards-compatible-through-the-4004 |-> type systems to the
category 2 people and let us get on with what's *really* fun!  We
wouldn't have to even *try* to compete on the same level with them
anymore - it'd be truly apples and oranges.
 
Jon Taylor  jmt@sactoh0.sac.ca.us
 
-- 
-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-
Jon M. Taylor  jmt@sactoh0.sac.ca.us
"'Cause what the world needs now, is another folk singer, like I need a
hole in my head." - _Teen Angst_, Cracker
Newsgroups: comp.sys.amiga.advocacy