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From: gross@umiami.miami.edu (JD144)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.mac.hardware,comp.sys.mac.misc
Subject: Apple's New Direction
Message-ID: <6897.26e532e9@umiami.miami.edu>
Date: 5 Sep 90 21:16:25 GMT
Organization: Univ. of Miami (IR)
Lines: 41

Well, just got done reading the latest issue of Macworld.  In it was an
interesting article under the heading of The State of the Mac.  The article
addressed the inherent design flaws in the Macintosh and how they affect
performance.

(If you really want to know, the issued discussed were: Lack of support
for NuBus block-transfer mode, no asych I/O, and no support for the new
DMA chips in the IIfx..not even with System 7.0)

Now, armed with this knowledge, I would like to offer my solution to this
dilemma: Completely redesign the Mac.

"But wait!  This will make it incompatible with the other Macs!"  Possibly..
but I believe it is high time that Apple stop trying to push it's now 6-year
old technology (albeit they have done an admirable job doing it!) and come
up with something brand new.

Y'see, many of the Macs performance problems comes from the fact that Apple
forces the poor CPU to do everything.  The sound chip and the IIfx's DMA
chips are the only separate processors available to do asych tasks.  And even
then, disk I/O will cause the sound chip to halt its execution.

When Apple is designing its '040 Macs, they should strongly consider giving
it the capabilities that would allow it to overcome the processing bottlenecks
imposed by the hardware and OS.  The Mac could easily do everything that
is touted as being only capable on an Amiga if these bottlenecks are
removed.

Well, it's just my opinion.  If you really need to flame me...go ahead.

Have a nice day. :)

-- 
Jason Gross     Comp Sci Ugrad     University of Miami     Class of '91 (?)
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Hey, wanna save the world? | Got sumtin' to say?        gross@umiami.bitnet
Nuke a Godless, Communist, | Pick and choose!        gross@umiami.miami.edu  
gay whale for Christ.      |                      gross@miavax.ir.miami.edu
              - Anonymous  |                     jgross@umbio.med.miami.edu
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