Path: utzoo!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!mailrus!uunet!decwrl!bacchus.pa.dec.com!granite.pa.dec.com!mwm From: mwm@raven.pa.dec.com (Mike (Real Amigas have keyboard garages) Meyer) Newsgroups: comp.sys.amiga Subject: Re: Real System Comparisons Message-ID: Date: 10 Aug 90 20:12:34 GMT References: <13466@cbmvax.commodore.com> <1990Aug10.061056.15745@ariel.unm.edu> Sender: news@wrl.dec.com (News) Distribution: usa Organization: Missionaria Phonibalonica Lines: 111 In-Reply-To: sdowdy@carina.unm.edu's message of Fri, 10 Aug 90 06:10:56 GMT In article <1990Aug10.061056.15745@ariel.unm.edu> sdowdy@carina.unm.edu (Stephen Dowdy) writes: In article mwm@raven.pa.dec.com (Mike (Real Amigas have keyboard garages) Meyer) writes: }I think you've got that backwards. Then again, it could depend on what }you're pricing. I've noticed that C compilers are much cheaper on the }IBM PC. But I haven't used them, so that to get the same quality you }may need to spend the same or more money. It has been my impression that software for the Amiga *is* cheaper. However, i have not researched this very much. I would like to give you my belief as to why this is (or should be) true.... This is called a "rationalization". One uses them to explain why things are the way the are, or the way one wishes them to be. I can rationalize the PC/Mac prices being lower, based on number of units sold vs. support costs. However, I'd rather crack open a magazine, and quote prices. Fry's electronics, which has good - but not excellent - prices: Home budgeting and checking software (Quicken): $40 Procomm Plus: $60 Norton utilties, advanced edition: $99 file namange utility, ala CLIMate (PFS: Preface): $50 Hard disk optimizer/etc (SpinERit II): $65 personal DBM/WP/Spreadsheet/checkbook/etc (PFS: First Choice & Quicken): $90 PFS: First Publisher (desktop publishing package): $110 These aren't the "el cheapo" products - most of these have been around for a while (some longer than the Amiga). I've recently seen a new line of products at Fry's (not advertised, so I have no prices handy) called "MySoft" or some such, with "MyWriter", "MyLabeller" and the like. The prices are around $20-$30/package, if I recall correctly. The first list of prices is comparable to the Amiga "el cheapo" software. I've as yet to see anything similar to the MySoft line, or similar to it's prices. Yes, if you only want to do Lotus 1-2-3, then you are perhaps best off with a PC/Clone. However, if you have a conscience about how best to further the cause of humanity/technology, and you can't morally abide by all the wasted effort in development on PC architecture, then try to find an alternative. It looks like technophilia can be as obnoxious as technophobia. Lots of people probably find the joining of those two causes as offensive as I do. Even ignoring that, there are still problems with the argument. For example, you could argue that if you can't morally abide by the wasted effort in the development of non-standard, single-purpose custom chips, then you should try to find an alternative. In reality, people don't buy architechtures or chips - they buy solutions to problems. For a wide range of problems, the IBM PC market presents a much more cost-effective solution than anything the Amiga has to offer. Yes, buying a system near Dave Haynie's "IBM PC equivalent to the A3000" isn't a lot cheaper than the A3000 itself (but it does appear to be cheaper). However, for most people, the A3000 is overengineered. They don't need 4 EISA slots; the probably don't need 1 if they've got a couple of 16 bit slots and a couple of 8 bit slots, but it's not hard to find that one slot if you want it. Likewise, size is more important than speed for disks. If I were buying an IBM (instead of an Amiga), I wouldn't even consider anything configured like an A3000; I can save 50% buy giving up options _I_ don't need. That these alternatives exist make the IBM PC clone the cost-effective solution to lots of problems. In many ways, cost-effectiveness is a sign of technological advancement. The hi-tech solutions tend to be low-cost; that's what makes them attractive. If they aren't, then what's the point of using them, other than pure "gosh-wow"? And if they mean pouring more of a persons resources (in the form of money) into them, then they are a detriment to the cause of humanity, irregardless of how they affect the "cause of technology." I firmly believe we are 5 years behind where we *would* have been if IBM hadn't designed the PC the way they did. Everywhere you see a PC At/386 machine, imagine at least a BitMap graphics Work Station (ala Next/68040, Sun,DecStation/R3000) running something like unix, only better. This would be the minimal machine. Yes, if IBM had introduced something that was state-of-the-art when they introduced their PC (say a 68000 box running OS-9/68K), then that might have happened. Of course, if IBM hadn't designed their PC at all, we'd probably be right where we are now, except that most of the people using IBM-PC class machines would still be doing things by hand. That means they advanced the state of the art by much more than 5 years by designing their PC at all. But that's true for _lots_ of IBM products. You could make a bigger boost by turning the 360 into something closer to state-of-the-art for the time it was introduced. Unix might never have come into being, and everybody would have shared libraries and rings of security and dynamic linking. But if they hadn't introduced it at all, we'd probably still be stuck in a world of business applications and technological applications needing different hardware to run on. Of course, I'm not going to buy an IBM PC now. With the 3000, CBM has managed to design a machine that's I think is worth spending money on (that's a first for them). Even with the overengineering, it's still the most cost-effective path to a modern, multi-tasking OS that provides sufficient resources to meet my needs. Which is exactly the reason I bought a 1000 in the first place.