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From: toddpw@tybalt.caltech.edu (Todd P. Whitesel)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.apple,comp.sys.mac,comp.sys.apple2
Subject: Re: Accepting the Mac (was Re: More Macweek Rumors)
Message-ID: <1990Mar20.153543.5841@spectre.ccsf.caltech.edu>
Date: 20 Mar 90 15:35:43 GMT
References: <1848@crash.cts.com> <18491@boulder.Colorado.EDU> <12667@thorin.cs.unc.edu> <1990Mar17.105403.17776@spectre.ccsf.caltech.edu> <10254@cbmvax.commodore.com>
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Organization: California Institute of Technology
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daveh@cbmvax.commodore.com (Dave Haynie) writes:

[ in response to stuff I wrote ]

>Yeah, right.  You're going to grow very old waiting for 65816s that can compete
>with the latest 680x0s.

Why should I wait for a CPU that does more than I need when I will be able to
buy a 20 mhz 65816 in a month or two? I don't do anything that requires the
raw power of a 68030/040, and I'm not going to pay for one because I'd be
wasting my money on features I won't use. Most of what I do are jobs best
done by coprocessors, and you'll notice that Apple has been devoting quite
a bit of research into them lately. I and many others don't pay for a CPU, we
pay for a system, and Commodore of all companies should understand the value
of that because it's the secret of the A500. Apple's finally learned to exploit
that secret and the Apple II has been crying for more of it for years.

>It really doesn't matter if WDC eventually comes out with a 20MHz part

They might or might not. But ASIC Technologies (two college students) reverse
engineered a 65816 state machine. On rented supercomputer time they silicon
compiled it onto a gate array and the prototypes are due in silicon Real Soon
Now.

We have 12 mhz capable accelerators already just waiting for faster chips, and
Applied Engineering is probably working overtime on a 20 mhz capable redesign.

Mensch, however, appears to be screwing around with a mask that is the same
one his wife (or daughter, I forget which) laid out years ago... His main
business these days is embedded microcontrollers anyway, so he's probably given
up on Apple. They shafted him from them start, anyway; Apple requires two
second sources and "won't buy from design companies" so after WDC licensed
VLSI technologies and California Micro Devices, Apple quit ordering from WDC.

>(neat trick; with a memory cycle time of 60ns, you'll need about 35ns-45ns
>SRAM to talk to the thing)

No problem, it'll be running on a cache anyway. The Transwarp GS accelerator
seems to do a mighty fine job of that already.

> it's not going to compete with newer machines.

Like I said, if they CPU isn't what's being used for everything, then who
cares, especially if price is a major concern? Most people are going to be
using the graphics performance which should be taken care of by a cheap
blitter and NOT the CPU.

> It's just going to lose based on architecture -- each instruction does so
> little work compared to a 680x0.

Hold it, you're talking like a power user, and not like your typical Apple II
customer. People who buy Apple II's want a cheap, reliable machine that does
what they need and doesn't give them any trouble. Try to corner one with the
sacred word "MIPS" and they'll ask you why you care. They already know that
the software will run acceptably fast, and that their friends will help them
use it -- that's how real people choose a system, by using it and not by
reading the spec sheet.

>Same reason you aren't seeing serious competition from fast 8088s anymore.  

Serious competition? Do you care about low end price/performance or just wicked
fast machines? Many of us care about getting a reasonable computer for the
price.

>>They will need it, because not everyone is going to want a Low Cost Color Mac
>>I won't, for example. I want my Apple //f and I know Apple will build it IF
>>we can convince them there is a market for it. 

>Thing is, it's going to cost more to build your 20MHz Apple //f, significantly
>more, that the el-cheapo color Mac.

I really doubt that, after seeing what Apple can do when they acutally pour
a little money into the Apple //. Right now the Low Cost Mac sounds like it
will be about as powerful as a Transwarped GS but will run 'professional'
Mac programs if you force it to, and for about the same price.

> Way back in '85, a 4MHz '816 cost noticably more than an 8MHz 68000.
> Things are going to be even more skewed now.

Not really; Bill Mensch won't be doing the production anymore.
Now it'll be large gate array houses and they shouldn't have a problem
with quantity or price.

> And which direction is Apple really heading, as if I needed to ask?
> While they certainly aren't moving downscale in either line, yet, they do
> seem to be spending most if not all their time on their 680x0 lines.

That's because they've been waiting for a faster 65816 and Bill Mensch hasn't
been able to give them one. Meanwhile, Apple Marketing has gotten it into their
heads that the Mac is the only computer Apple sells and so they've been trying
to strangle the Apple // without realizing what it's costing them in customers
or customer support. Their Mac support is not that hot either; the Mac
magazines have been pummeling Apple about it for years. Apple's hurting all
over right now, except in revenue; Commodore is lucky that it didn't grow too
fast too soon the way Apple appears to have done.

> Pretty much the same thing that other companies with old 65xx lines and new
> 680x0 lines are doing.  Compatibility is a nice goal, but there are times
> when it can wind up costing more to stay compatible than to dump all the
> compatibility and start over fresh.

Agreed, except I don't think the 65816 deserves a burial just yet. It's still
darn simple for what it *can* do, and the cost-effectiveness of that gives it
a market in the low end if someone dares to exploit it, as Nintendo is rumored
to be doing with their Super Famicom system.

Apple II compatibility is disgustingly cheap -- don't let the current IIGS
fool you, it used the worst possible method because of budget constraints (or
worse, but I couldn't make any serious claims) and the entire machine suffered
as a result. Apple's failure to give it a real update after all these years
is another symptom of their indecision about the low end.

The IIGS system software is also a LOT cleaner than the Mac's because no new
CPUs have forced it to be patched all over yet. The GS toolbox has some good
hindsights in it and is constantly improving now that they are letting it.
It's a real shame that the big name software companies have abandoned the GS,
because System 5.0 is actually worth using, and system 6 (unannounced) is
rumored to be genuinely good even on a stock GS.
 
[ comment about Apple II NuBus card feasibility deleted by accident ]

Even if it is cheap, it's not going to be cheaper than a used //e and educators
often go for the cheaper solution. Not everybody has gobs of money to spend on
the latest technology, just because it is the latest. People would rather pay
less money to do the same things once they know what their needs are. When they
want something new, they go for it in steps as their budget permits. I don't
mean to bore you with this but with all the Mega-mongering going on it is easy
to forget that to most people computers are a tool and an investment and not a
toy to be bragged about.

>>I, for one, will never want whole Mac, and I don't feel a major need to
>>emulate one either though I respect the fact that many people do. I do want
>>to see a IIGS to nuke the Amiga, because I know it can be done. 

>It can't be done.  Period.  And that has nothing to do with Apple and
>everything to do with what the 65816 is and always will be compared to the
>680x0 line.

Let me be more specific. I want a IIGS to nuke the 500. A great home machine
that fufills the original purpose of the IIGS and that complements the Low Cost
Mac. Something which is easily possible when you look at how Apple makes CPUs,
and what the two would be used for. Many of us are sick of Apple's insane fear
that the Mac and the Apple II might (horrors!) _compete_ with each other!!
There will always be markets for both machines and if Apple doesn't realize it
soon then they will have abandoned the low end to CBM and Tandy. The Low Cost
Mac isn't going to arrive soon enough to fix things all by itself.

Besides, most of us buy for reasons OTHER THAN THE BLOODY CPU, so please don't
assume that everyone wants a 68K based machine just because it is a 'better'
CPU. It is also much more expensive and I for one am happy paying less for less
because the 65816 suits me just fine.

> As well as considering that Apple has never shown themselves to
>be stupid -- any Apple II machine that really looks better than an Amiga will
>also look better than a Mac.

Oh, now we can't have that now can we? Who's to say the low cost mac won't
inherit some of the technology from //f research? It probably will get the
disk coprocessor that first went out in the Apple //c+, if they haven't made
a better one yet. It'll probably have the ADB coprocessor from the GS, too.
And if it doesn't have at least a blitter then it will flop real bad. In short,
it'll have to look better than a similarly priced Amiga too. So what's to
worry about?

> The cost of your //f is going to put you up against the Amiga 2500 and Amiga
>3000 lines -- 68030 machines that run about as fast as a Mac IIci.

I doubt that. The Apple // stuff which has come out in recent years has been
artificially inflated in price because Apple hasn't bothered to care that they
are selling to a more competitive market now. Why else do you think Amiga and
the PC clones are cleaning up in the low end? If Apple hadn't been so intent
on cranking the Mac into solid competition with IBM, they wouldn't have gotten
so far out of touch with their entire distribution network.

> The current //gs already costs more than an equivalently set up Amiga 500.

The 'current //gs' uses five year old gate arrays and a ten year old
architectural structure but with major beef-ups. It also hasn't been given
any real subsequent development other than analog motherboard fixes and more
reasonable amounts of memory, although it has been given vastly better software
which is now deemed adequate; simply doubling the CPU speed (with a Transwarp)
transforms it into a viable machine.

In other words, it doesn't reflect Apple's real cost-cutting power by a long
shot. It doesn't have a fully new chipset (less than half have been changed at
all, and those were convenience upgrades) and this is where the problem is.

By doing to the //gs what Apple did to the Mac IIfx (and don't try to tell me
that designing the system intelligently costs that much money) they will save
gobs over the current design even after adding the bare essential new features.

> Or a similar low-cost Mac, should Apple want to introduce one.

Oh they do, you can count on that. But they seem to be having a lot of trouble
figuring out how to make a machine that will actually sell, and at the price
they want it to cost...

>I'm not talking here as some Amiga zealot, either.  I actually design the
>hardware, I know what I'm talking about.

I don't doubt that. But let me say that I've delved deep enough into the GS to
know how inefficent its current implementation is, and from talking to Apple
employees how cheaply it could be done if it REALLY used the most recent
manufacturing technology, which it does not.

The Mega II "Apple II on a chip" is the Ball and Chain of the GS -- it was
originally designed for a low cost //e but wasn't cheap enough to make the //e
any cheaper. (to Apple, apparently. Certainly not to us.)

When they get rid of it and implement the logic where it belongs (i.e. all
over the machine and integrated into the custom chips that handle each part
of the system already) it will blow away the performance limitations of the
current design and cost a hell of a lot less.

Do not assume that the IIGS is the best that the Apple II can do. You would be
doing the machine a serious injustice, and there are a number of specific
examples which are so trivial to fix that they would have done so long ago had
they been given more than miserable funding for the project.

>Dave Haynie Commodore-Amiga (Systems Engineering) "The Crew That Never Rests"

Todd Whitesel
toddpw @ tybalt.caltech.edu