From: sanford@ee.mu.OZ.AU (sanford tong)
Subject: JUST Amiga's future?
Organization: Electronic and Electrical Engineering - University of Melbourne 
Date: Thu, 23 Jul 1992 05:03:00 GMT

	Well, folks, i was just browsing through one of those computer
buyers/shoppers/etc guides at a store...you know, the ones which compares
the latest n x86's (where n is quite a big number) and had a bit of a sticky-
beak. I was a little bit disturbed.

	Basically, they had a table, and columns with some benchmarks, and
other equally questionable bits of data (MIPS, Megabytes, etc) and i thought
to myself...of boy. Beneath these numbers (eg. MIPS) was a comment which
was something like MIPS: The higher the number, the better.


	At this point, i was feeling more than a little bothered.


	I really view the Amiga as being the last opportunity that the personal 
computer business (particularly home, nowadays) had a genuine choice. Five
years ago, when the stock Amiga outperformed Macs and PCs in virtually every
way and was also cheaper (A500 especially), people didn't flock to the machine
as much as it deserved for reasons we all know...image(games machine, blah blah)
and also, because it wasn't used in the workplace to the extent that PCs were.

	(Note: i'm talking about the average Joe Consumer at home who can't
tell the difference between a computer and a terminal)

	In those days, there was still a choice, since PCs had a solid repu-
tation which shielded then from technological inferiority, and the Amiga,
being new, was unknown outside of computer enthusiasts, which leveled off
its price/performance advantage.

	Now, years down the track, the Clowns have been sent in en masse, and
the price consideration is no longer in favor of the Amiga. The machine still
has its merits, and has features which are notable, even in the A500. However,
these features are not measured in Mega-wotnots. The comments i usually hear
from a typical person about the CPU clock speed is, "7Mhz....that's a bit slow,
isn't it?" These are usually the same kind who can't understand why a 25Mhz
486DX is faster than a 25Mhz 386SX.

	Efficient use of resources is not important. The rest of the computer
is not important. All they want is a big number describing their machine.

	It's saddening, i think, that now, with most families starting to
think about getting a computer for word processing, bank balance, etc, that
they will open up their 'know-it-all-whiz-bang guide to every computer in the
known universe', and will sit there for hours and hours picking the biggest
numbers, with no idea about whether they mean anything at all. I guess you
know where that might lead in future. New products will be designed around
numbers, and i think we all know that optimisation for a particular benchmark
is not an unheard of thing.


	If the Amiga does fade, i will be VERY disappointed. Me, i have my
humble A500 with 5Mb RAM, Hard drive, DTP program (Pagestream) with more 
features than Mac PageMaker 4.2 (yeah, i know that there are programs which may
pack more punch, (after all, Macs ARE the undisputed world champs at DTP) 
but for a HOME user WITHOUT a postscript laser printer, i can say that i have 
not seen a Mac or PC program at the same price which gives as good an output.
I've seen a dot-matrix printout from PageMaker4 on PC....irk..)

	(btw: this isn't meant to be a challenge...just my honest observation)

	Right now, i have no plans on getting a PC, since, well, for what i
need, the PC doesn't offer me any more than my A500. Note, that when i say
this, i'm not making any compromises. I'm not speaking about technical
differences, Just purely practical ones.


	Anyway, my point.

	My system does what i need, and my guess is that when one considers the 
needs of a typical home user, even the A500 is by NO WAY obsolete for this
purpose. Unfortunately market lemmings know nothing of the sort, and will con-
tinue to buy machines based on Mhz and MIPS.  They will just follow the wise 
words in 'Computer Shopper' or something. 

	"What about an Amiga?"...

	"Amiga? How many Whetstones does it do?", with a cheeky grin, radiating 
his self-proclaimed vast computer knowledge, and the excitement of the prospect 
of speeding up his word-processing with all those whetstones...


	All this means only one thing. If an unknown company tomorrow came up 
with a truely innovative product which blitzes absolutely everything on the 
market, has unparallelled performance and was the most cost-effective item since
beer nuts, would it sell? It had better be PC compatible.


	Right now, i'm quietly optimistic (desperately optimistic?) that
something might happen. Someone appropriate at Commodore's going to have to 
realise that a lemming wants no fuss, everything-in-a-box purchase. No 
computerphobic is going to want to buy an A2000, then go to one place to buy an 
accelerator, another place for a multisync monitor, here to get a program they 
want, etc. In fact, just adding up the individual prices of add-on products
would give them a head-ache. What they want is a full system they can use at
a single, clean price. That's also why PCs are popular. That's why it's
important to have an '040 Amiga, rather than depend on cards. Have everything 
they need at one spot. Don't get the customers to shop around for the parts.


	Just a final comment. I'm not saying that all PC owners are market 
lemmings. I'm only talking about those people sitting at home who want to have
a computer, know nothing about them, and really have not had any choices. If
the Amiga doesn't right itself, i can only see things get worse. I don't mean
only for the Amiga, but for everyone out there who has great ideas, but will
have to work around an aging PC design.



	sanford	(quietly optimistic amiga fan who's been thinking lately)
			(contradiction in terms?   8^)