From: skip@tacky.cs.olemiss.edu (Skip Sauls)
Subject: Re: REAL Information????
Organization: University of Mississippi, Dept. of Computer Science
Date: Thu, 3 Sep 1992 15:18:14 GMT

In article <AHANSFOR.92Sep3013256@wpi.wpi.edu> ahansfor@wpi.wpi.edu (Andrew L. Hansford) writes:
>>>>>> On 2 Sep 92 20:49:29 GMT, dingebre@imp.sim.es.com (David Ingebretsen) said:
>dingebre> The following is included in its enitirety. I didn't change
>dingebre> a word.  So... what has anyone to say!?!? Kickstart 3.0?!?
>dingebre> New Amiga Graphics Chips?!?  Does this mean that we're
>dingebre> finally going to get *REAL* information????
>
>          *************************************************************
>dingebre> * Kickstart 3.0 and New Amiga Graphics Chips Support
>dingebre> ProWrite 3.3 includes support for new features in Kickstart
>dingebre> 3.0, as well as allowing you to open up to 256 color screens
>dingebre> on machines with the new Amiga graphics chips.
>dingebre> ************************************************************
>dingebre> END OF QUOTE
>
>REAL information?  
>
>There is a 3.0 and a new graphics chipset and when they come out
>ProWrite 3.3 will support them.  What REAL information do you want?

If C= was not such a tortoise people would not be so desperate for some
sort of information.  C= could take a hint from Apple and at least
announce that there is some sort of new technology on the way.  It is
hard to go a month without reading about some new development at Apple,
even if the technology is years from being on the market.  Many Amiga
owners are technology freaks and it is upsetting when new developments
from C= are so few and far between.

The old argument that C= shouldn't announce new technology because
sales of older machines will wither is stupid.  The onslaught of cheap
and powerful PCs is making it harder and harder for many people to
resist the switch.  Besides, how much would the announcement of an
A4000 in the $2000 and up range affect the sales of under $500 A500s?

>Is there anyone who believes a new chipset doesn't exist?  and an OS
>to support it?  Details here are a bit cloudy not as to those issues
>as much as to the configuration of new machines and the marketing
>strategy of CBM here in the US.

I believe that there is an unreleased chipset, but I don't think that
it is really anything new.  

>The questions seem to be:
>
>Can the new chipset be put in the 3000 somehow?

Maybe on a Zorro III card, but it seems that many A3000 owners somehow
believe that they can just buy the new chips and plug them in.  It is
really amazing that people are saying that they want the new chipset,
but if they have to buy a new machine they'll just get a PC.  Honestly,
how many computer companies allow for upgrades to the latest technology?

The AA chipset is not like a stupid SVGA card for a PC or a color video
board for a compact Mac.  It will be an improvement much like a new
EISA/LocalBus/486-50 PC motherboard is over an ISA/386-16 or like a
new Mac Quadra is over the Mac Plus.  The A3000, for all of it great
technology, really has little more than the original A1000 when it
comes to the custom chips.  Sure, it has ECS, 2M chip RAM, and that
sort of thing, but these are more evolutionary than revolutionary.

>What will the new machine be configuration?
>  A4000 with CPU processor
>  A4000 with CPU on board

I like the CPU on a card idea myself.  I'd guess that it will have a
25Mhz 040, but I certainly hope that it is not priced like the 040 Tower.

>  Other AA machines over the user range

An A600 style machine with the AA chipset (A800?) and an 030 would be
nice, assuming the price is right.  The same components might also make
for a nice CDTV model...

>  IDE vs. SCSI

I bet that IDE will be included.  Although some seem to disagree, this
will not mark the beginning of the end of the world.

>  2.1 vs. 3.0

This is hard to say.  One poster suggested that 2.1 will be available for
all machines immeidately and that 3.0 might be on the hard disk of the
AA machins, much like 2.0 on the original A3000s.

>  DSP or not

I don't know why a DSP is considered so essential in an Amiga.  The NeXT
has had one for quite some time, yet it has hardly taken the world by
storm.  There may be a Mac out sometime soon which has a DSP and there
is some sort of thing called the Atari Fallacy or something like that
which may have one.  What are they good for?  If better audio is what
people want, I'd rather see a Super Paula with 16 voice DMA sound in
16bits with up to 56kHz or so rates.

>Marketing?

Doubtful.

>How does the A600 fit with a A4000 if the 500 and 2000 are
>discontinued and a 3000T is $6000?

I hope that the A3000T price is just some sort of cruel joke.  Maybe
they only have a few left and are hoping that no one will want one
before the AA machines come out.  :-)

If I had any say in the matter, the A500, A2000, and A3000 series would
all be discontinued in one fell swoop.  These would be replaced by the
A600 at the low-low end, mainly to compete with the Genesis and SNES.
The A800 would be a $500-$1000 home computer, the A2200 would be an
030 based AA machine in the $1000-$2000 range, and the A4000 would be
the same machine with an 040 in the $2000-$3000 range.  Of course,
other models such as the A4000T tower and the A3400 pizza-box would
follow.  :-)

>Will there be a low end console AA with a 020 for very little money?

I'd rather see them use an EC030, but in any case I think that they
will need such a machine to compete against the low-end Macs and
the cheap 386/486 SVGA & SoundBlaster equipped PCs.

>Power up options like before?

Maybe, but I'd rather see sales increase to the point that such incentives
are not needed.  It was nice of C= to offer such things to those of us in
the US, but they didn't do it to be nice.

>Price of new Machines?

If the prices are too high none of our speculaltions will matter.

>-- Andrew Hansford
>   ahansfor@wpi.wpi.edu

Skip Sauls
skip@tacky.cs.olemiss.edu