From: skip@tacky.cs.olemiss.edu (Skip Sauls)
Subject: Re: I DID giev up on the Amiga!
Organization: University of Mississippi, Dept. of Computer Science
Date: Fri, 24 Jul 1992 16:15:43 GMT

In article <1992Jul24.093643.11790@mpifr-bonn.mpg.de> mlelstv@specklec.mpifr-bonn.mpg.de (Michael van Elst) writes:
>In <1992Jul23.213839.25936@news.iastate.edu> barrett@iastate.edu (Marc N Barrett) writes:
>>   Not as small as you'd think.  Most of the Mac II systems (and all of the 
>>Quadr systems) can output NTSC and PAL. 
>
>I haven't seen Quadra output but most Mac II systems cannot output a
>usable NTSC or PAL signal. Can you connect them to a TV or VCR ?

The original Mac II video boards could be made to work with NTSC using a
special cable and some software from Apple.  I saw an early Mac II display
a B&W interlaced image on a //GS color monitor (analog CGA-res like the
A108x).  It was about as usable as an Amiga in interlace mode.

>>   Is it really better to have no hard disk capability at all?  For Amiga 500
>>owners, adding something as basic as a hard drive can cost three times more
>>than they paid for their computer!  It's also a pretty safe bet that even the
>>slowest Macs are quite a lot faster than the A600's IDE port in terms of HD
>>speed.
>
>_All_ Macs except for the Quadra (and if I remember right the IIfx)
>have _slower_ HD interfaces. Their SCSI performance is below anything
>you can find on the Amiga and it should be slower than the A600s IDE
>port as an IDE port isn't inherently slow, it has a worse burst speed
>than SCSI and no time multiplexing of the bus, both aren't interesting
>if you have a midrange HD and don't access multiple disks in parallel.
>SCSI is of course more versatile but an A590 controller (not the utterly
>slow disk that comes with it) beats nearly all Macs.

I'm not a hardware type, but with PCs the IDE drives tend to transfer data
much more quickly on machines with faster processors.  If this is the case
the A600 may not make such a great showing.  It will be interesting to see
how fast the IDE drives are on the A600 and whether or not there is any
CPU left for anything else.

>>>>   Oh, yes, the infamous 160x480 and 160x960 HAM modes.  Too bad the
>>>>horizontal resolutions are lower than on my old VIC-20.
>>>
>>>Those modes aren't VGA.. can you read ? He said VGA compatible modes.
>
>>   Shows how much you know about Amigas.  These modes most certainly are VGA.
>>Get a clue next time.
>
>Shows how much you know about VGA. While 160x480 possibly could use 
>VGA frequencies the 160x960 can never be VGA as VGA cannot display 960 lines.

Oh really?  How is it then that every VGA, SVGA, and multiscan monitor that
I've used with my A3000 can display 960 lines?  Of course it flickers  and 
looks like crap due to the interlace, but then again that is a common problem 
that Amigas seem to have.  :-)

>Regards,
>-- 
>Michael van Elst
>UUCP:    universe!local-cluster!milky-way!sol!earth!uunet!unido!mpirbn!p554mve
>Internet: p554mve@mpirbn.mpifr-bonn.mpg.de
>                                "A potential Snark may lurk in every tree."

                                                          ___         __
  Skip Sauls, TKKC Charter Member                          |  |/  |/ / 
  skip@tacky.cs.olemiss.edu                                |  |\  |\ \__   





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