From: das9674@usl.edu (Stephenson Daniel A)
Subject: Re: DIR
Organization: University of Southwestern Louisiana
Date: Sat, 15 Aug 1992 02:12:28 GMT

In article <vf5ma!-@lynx.unm.edu> kholland@hydra.unm.edu (Kiernan Holland) writes:
>In article <1992Aug13.024150.4423@usl.edu> das9674@usl.edu (Stephenson Daniel A) writes:
>>In article <1992Aug13.021424.21609@newshost.unh.edu> ggg@kepler.unh.edu (Gregory G Greene) writes:
>>>>>As for cpu power, the 486-50 beats it by quite a few marks.  A 040-25 only
>>>>>has the performance of a 486-33 cpu.  But if you compare a 040-33, well
>>>>>that may be another story.  
>>>>
>>>>heh heh, but the day you show me that 040-33 Amiga, I'll haul up 
>>>>an Intel 80486DX2-66Mhz machine.. :) :) :)
>>>>
>>>>(They really do exist, you know)
>
>It is not the speed that counts, but what you can do with it. 

Most certainly.

>Most PC users like yourself buy a 486-50 then go waste all your 
>CPU time on Wordperfect or a BBS program. Whata waste.

Nay, not I.

>Only PC users are dumb enough to have such a money-wasting hobby
>as a BBS. Tell me what else you can do that is really useful. 
>Oh, you can play wolfenstien 3-D at 4 times the pace. 
>Or you can view GIF's, neat. *NOT*

I see right through your play.  I almost regarded the above seriously!

>>>	Not to mention the fact that the 040 Amiga is selling for $5100.
>On the towercase 3000 with 200 meg HD and 5 megs of ram sells for that 
>much. You were smarter, you'd look at the market. 

Again, you cannot be serious.  What kind of market are we talking about?
You yourself said that what a person _does_ with the system is what
counts.  That 040 Amiga doesn't stand a chance in that regard.

>I probably know more about PC's than you know about Amiga's. 

>I have an Amiga 3000, which i bought for 2300 dollars. 
>If you add the price of a Progressive Peripherals '040 
>board,  you get $3800. Besides, I would get a 25mhz synchronous

Do you have any conception of what an absolutely incredible PC system
you could get with $3,800???

>bus and faster claculations instantly. you would still need a 
>faster bus, faster rams, and a 256K CPU cache. Amiga 3000's even 
>support two types of RAM's which none of the PC's have but 
>need. One is called Static-Column RAM. RAM's can either be added 
>in ZIPP or DIP form. ZIP-SCRAM are suppost to have thier 
>own burst mode in addition to the burst mode that is enabled 
>on the 68030. I heard that the ZIP-SCRAM's can reach access rates
>of 40ns using this burst mode. That is fast enough for a 25mhz 
>68040 to work with RAM without slowing down. 

PCs use SIMMs.  The lowest I've seen advertised (in time) is 60ns.
Is there a 50ns? I'm not sure.

>>>    I'll bet you will be able to get a loaded 486DX2-66 for a lot less
>>>    then that.
>>
>>Verily, Gregory!  Gosh, we TKKCers are right on mark *again*.  ;-)
>>
>>>							G.Greene
>
>Ya you can get a 486 for a lot less, but there is a lot of 
>things to keep in mind. 486 systems are usually ISA based, unless 
>you can go for a local bus (which isn't 
>even standardized) or EISA (which has very few cards made specifically
>for it, as compared to ISA). The increased sales of 486's should make the 

Most PC users like getting next-generation CPUs instead of relying on a
32 bit bus to run their 16 bit software.
I'd much rather own a 486 with ISA than a 386'EISA'.  Wouldn't you?

>PC's look a lot better to other users, but in reality there are a 
>lot of drawbacks of PC's. For one, who can you trust??  How many 

This issue can/has be/been beaten to death.  Suffice it to say that
while PC dealers are by far from perfect, there are still PLENTY
of reputable dealers from which to buy/trust, etc.

>companies have your bought from that just did not deliver a 
>working computer system? How long did you wait to get your system?

Good grief.  Come on, don't dare imply that PCs arrive not working.
Or that it takes months to arrive.     

>How much money did you shell-out in addition to the system cost? 

$130 for 4 megs RAM, $110 for a Soundblaster, and $49.95 for OS/2 2.0.
Worthy investments, I must say.

>If you bought a local bus system, who do you depend on to get 
>windows drivers and expansion cards for your local bus? 

I understood that local bussing had nothing to do with software or drivers,
but was in the realm of hardware.  So, whatever you threw at it, it bussed
it locally.

>How much extra stuff did you have to buy? How long did it take for you 

Well, if you must have MY anecdote:  I didn't HAVE to buy extra stuff.
Software buying is (clears throat) _understandable_.  I thought OS/2, RAM
and the SB worthy.

>to set up your system? Did everything come just the way the company 
>said it would? Where was your motherboard made? How many cards 
>have been ruined just becuase of the motherboard, if any?

Good, you either realy don't know what you're talking about or being
sarcastic.  Are you Slu Aspiks in disguise?  :-)

>My brother owns a 486-33 Tower Case model, he bought it for 3000 dollars 
>1.5 years ago and just recently he needed to replace his motherboard. 
>Our school got 6 Gateways last may, so far 3 of them have had 
>semi-sever problems. My Amiga 3000's monitor has been replaced 2 times, 
>but the system itself has never had the motherboard, or any part 
>in relation with the internals, replaced. 

How unfortunate.

>When a friend of mine bought a Zeos 486, he expected it to deliver 
>in 6 weeks, however it took three months, by that time 
>he didn't have any current use for the system
>;it arrived to late. 

YAA. (Yet Another Anecdote).  Actually, I'd think a Gateway or a Zeos
would hold up fine, actually. Hmm.

>It took me 2 weeks 
>to get my Amiga 3000 when I ordered on student deal. 

It took me one day LESS than two weeks to get my PC from Packard Bell.
OS/2 arrived in 6 days.

>Then there is operating systems. OS/2 will probably be the OS 
>of choice later, but for now Windows 3.1 is the choice. 

Windows 3.1 is great for a lot of people with innsuffcient hardware
for OS/2 2.0

>Even on a 486 Windows is as slow as a turtle. But what choice do 

Windows is NOT slow as a turtle, unless that turtle is riding in
an F-16.   Windows 3.1 is faster that Windows 3.0, and a 486 makes it 
'scream', as advertisers say.

>you have?? If you use text-based applications like LOTUS 1-2-3, 
>you can only work in 80x25 modes which is hardly good enough for 
>some people's tastes, like mine. Even if you use Windows to expand your
>dimensions, some DOS programs will not work in the software that 
>support MSDOS from Windows. 

There ARE many MANY Windows version of software....

>You know how Microsoft makes so much money? Revisions!  

Perhaps.  I rather think it more from Excel and Word.

>While I was on warantee I got my Amigados revisions for FREE! 
>That included OS 2.0 revisions and extra software. 

I know you weren't speaking about OS/2 2.0, but all OS/2 upgrades are free
as well.

>And did MSDOS 5.0 set the world on fire? Ha ha ha ha, ya right.

Yes, actually.  It allowed the vast majority of users to get 
significantly more memory for programs.  For a DOS user it's a godsend.

>Only silly PC users can get excited about shit. 

What do you want them to do? wallow in DOS 2.3 so they don't 'waste'
time using their computers because they can't do anyhting with it or hate it so
much?

>Then you have the part about programming. ALl your compilers 

99.9% of computers users doesn't care a bit about programming.
[stuff deleted]

>Then there is graphics boards. Whenever it comes to graphics 
>boards on the PC's, you can really never be sure if your software 
>will work with the board. Usually, you'll upgrade to windows and 

C.s.a.a went through all this with John Anderson.  Every Video
card made in the last several years run Windows.  VGA is the ultimate
base standard.

>search all over hell to find a windows driver for your card.

Windows has zillions of video drivers.

>You might even have to buy the driver extra from the company you got 
>your card from. Then there is the question of resolution. 
>If your monitor is 640x480 and your card is 1024x768, there is no way you 
>can display 1024x768, it is physically impossible. On top of that 
>your card must support those resolutions, and must have enough ram to 
>use those modes.                 

Good grief, if i have a 640X480 monitor, do think I'm gona get a 1024X768
video card, on my own? No, of course not.  Do you think a PC dealer would
be stupid enough to put such a video card and monitor togather in the same
package? Of course not!  What you said made zero (0) sense.

>Then there is speed. Architecture makes the motherboard, as I 
>always say. If your motherboard is a piece of crap, don't expect 
>to even get 50% of your CPU's speed. If your software doesn't use the 
>CPU's 32-bit capabilities, then your CPU is hardly working its best.

Very true.  That's one of thereasons I use OS/2 2.0.  Any other questions?

>With all that you have a limitation on your expansion busses 
>speed. A ISA expansion bus only goes 8mhz. If your 486 goes 33mhz, you 
>silly ol' graphics board will be slower than any typical Amiga 
>3000 graphics boards. Maybe not in vector graphics, but actuall 
>animations and things that require intense memory moving, will 
>seem like a ultra slow Amiga 1000. In addition, the 3000's 
>CPU's synchronous to the (expansion)BUS, while ISA is always 8mhz.  

The slow bus helps in compatibility with old software.  I don't know
if it serves any modern purpose, however.  Also keep in mind that
a lot of software 1) doesn't need fast graphics, 2)is using Windows and
has a fast video card or co-processed video card, or 3)is fast enough.

>If I added a 68040 to my Amiga 3000, my bus would jump to 25mhz.
>This means that if I had a external graphics card like Firecracker 24
>or IV24, I would get a 150% increase in animation speeds. 

Congratulations.  Can you afford it, though?  Ahhh....

>Hard drives and other cards would work as fast as they can.
>On a PC, this i hardly a reality, unless you have EISA or Local Bus.
>As of now, the Local Bus systems only have graphics and hard drive 
>expansion, and only one/two slots. An Amiga 3000 has four 32-bit slots.

Should I put my 16 bit cards in a 32 bit slot?  Right now, 32 slotas aren't
needed as much because their cost would be justified by the lack of cards.
This is NOT to say that they wouldn't be nice, but the PCs will sell new with
this standard, with a plethoria of 32 bit cards in, oh, perhaps a year, 1.5
years.

>Then lets talk about memory. You can have memory in sync with your 68040,
>or memory on the motherboard or memory in your slots. While you can 
>only have 2 megs of CHIP, and 16 megs of ZIP SCRAM or ZIP PAGE memory, 
>you can have as much ram as you will ever need on the 68040 board. 
>Some ram boards even use 32megabyte SIMMS. 

SIMMs don't come that big.
Also, should I care how the Amiga uses memory?

[More programming stuff deleted]

>Then you have consistency. Have you ever been able to keep 
>your interfaces straight? Do you get tired of looking at 

Sure! OS/2 is great at that!  I can Cut And Paste from ANY application,
be it DOS, OS/2, or Windows.  Isn't that grand?

>text based user interfaces? Don't you wish everything ran on 
>Windows? Do you wish everything ran on MSDOS? Do you wish 
>your dos commands to be consistent with each other? 

Well, until I can afford OS/2 versions of everything, there will be
Windows and DOS, too.  Don't knock Windows and DOS too too much, there
is a sitload of stuff available for them.

>Amigados 2.0 is consistent and predictable. Though you don't 
>get very many colors, the speed is fast and the interface 
>is almost as good as Xwindows. In some ways Amigados 
>2.0 blows Xwindows away. 

True, there is much less unpredictability in a proprietary OS-GUI.
You DO pay for it however..

[Next section about audio]

-I use my Soundblaster for games.

>Then there is modems. Well any modem you have that is external, 
>I have too. I mean, I can use it too, since our serial ports are 
>pretty much the same. Same goes for hard drives. 

Good for you.  At least C= doesn't make 'proprietary modems'.

>Then you 
>can talk about those 1.7 meg HD floppies that CBM installed to a 
>few recent Amiga 3000's (HDFixer in the Fred Fish library will 
>fix the newest kickstart [Amiga's idea of BIOS] to support 1.7 meg 
>floppies). 

...as I could talk abou $130 2.88 megabyte PC floppy drives. The standard
is still 1.44 meg, but rememerb that the Amiga standard is but 880K or so.

>Ok, how about viruses? 
>Well i can tell you that I haven't had a virus in 2 years, 
>and I don't even run Virus Killing software upon startup. 
>Compare this to your typical MAC, afterwhich the Amiga is stereotyped by PC 
>users. I bet all of you have had at least 3 viruses, while I have had only one!
>Call me lucky? Well, I also have a 400 disk library of floppies that 
>I collected over the past year. Most of these are European software. 
>I dare you use this much Euro-software. Shall I mention the 
>word "Michealangelo". (Evil Grin) That's what I'll do, write MSDOS 
>viruses for a living. He he he he. What the hell would I care?
>I know it is no joking matter. But just think, most doctors use 
>MSDOS and MAC computers. Just imagine how many medical records were lost!
>Oh how much AIDS patient's records were tweaked by some MAC/MSDOS worm-virus. 
>Safety is the question.

I did have a virus once.  I zapped it.
Oh well, that's when one must deal with when one has the largest software
library aailable anywhere... :-) :-)

>I could go on talking about things such as the graphics boards 
>that can draw 100 million pixels a second and the '030 acceleration boards
>for the Amiga 500 that sell for 500 dollars and run at about 40mhz, 
>but I will not. Just keep this in mind, the 486 is just a sped up 
>386 with some extra cache instructions. The 040 is a whole different CPU that 

The 486 has a FPU, very integrated design, an on-chip 8K cache, and pipelining.

>has some RISC architecture and many more features than a 486 (also faster).

As does the 486, as I have mentioned.  It remains dubious that and 040
**available for the Amiga** is faster the new 486DX2-66Mhz PCs.

>By the way, I bought my Amiga 3000 for 2300. A 68040 just costs me an 
>extra 1500 dollars, which I have, but I have set my mind on buying a 
>386 for my mother, who must use PC's for her work. 

Good for both of you.  It's not that I dislike the Amiga, but I dislike    
uninformed people with misconceptions or prejudices about PCs.  They may
not be suitable for everybody, just scores of millions of them.  :-)
--
*Dan Stephenson   das9674@usl.edu 
*"It reminds me of something Cally said. 'He who trusts cannot be
*betrayed, only mistaken.' It was a saying of her people.... Cally is
*dead. So are most of her people." -Avon, from _Rescue_ (Blakes 7)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.amiga.advocacy,comp.sys.amiga.misc