Path: utzoo!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!cs.utexas.edu!sun-barr!newstop!sun!imagen!atari!portal!cup.portal.com!Classic_-_Concepts From: Classic_-_Concepts@cup.portal.com Newsgroups: comp.sys.amiga Subject: Re: Commodore, Amiga, Apple, and MAC Message-ID: <28812@cup.portal.com> Date: 12 Apr 90 02:40:56 GMT References: <23800@pasteur.Berkeley.EDU> <626@lovelady.cs.utexas.edu> <28761@cup.portal.com> Distribution: na Organization: The Portal System (TM) Lines: 22 All stock Amigas can multitask. Right out of the box. Even the 256K varieties (early 1000s). To use MultiFinder on the Macintosh, you require at least a Mac Plus, at least version 5.0 of the operating system and at least 1 meg of RAM. BUT the instructions explicity warn that you will need at least 2 meg if you plan to run more than one large application program at a time. Amigas multitask from the moment you power up Workbench. Multifinder must be specifically configured for startup. This is not a significant difference but more a detail of convenience. Multifinder doesn't work with all Mac programs. Running applications can fragment memory on the Amiga or the Mac, but **Macintosh applications require contiguous blocks of memory**. To clear up a fragmentation problem on the Mac, close down everything. Rerun everything. To be fair, I have also found this to sometimes be necessary when running the Amiga version of Deluxe Paint. I always give it a pretty hard workout and at some point find I can't even load small brushes. Rerunning the software cleans up the problem. On the Mac, to set aside memory for running an application under Multifinder, you can trust the default or tweak it from a utility to increase or decrease the size. Personally, I like the operating system to worry about this for me rather than juggling memory menus. That's enough for one posting ... LadyHawke