Path: utzoo!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!cs.utexas.edu!sdd.hp.com!usc!julius.cs.uiuc.edu!ux1.cso.uiuc.edu!ux1.cso.uiuc.edu!brownfld From: brownfld@ux1.cso.uiuc.edu Newsgroups: comp.sys.amiga Subject: Re: NeXT- what a ripoff!!!! Message-ID: <15500071@ux1.cso.uiuc.edu> Date: 14 Nov 90 01:51:00 GMT References: <232531@<1990Nov13> Lines: 105 Nf-ID: #R:<1990Nov13:232531:ux1.cso.uiuc.edu:15500071:000:5984 Nf-From: ux1.cso.uiuc.edu!brownfld Nov 13 19:51:00 1990 >Well boys and girls -and you Felix Lugo or whatever you are {NeXT fiend}!: > It appears that EVEN NeXT enthusiast are upset with their machines! >Check comp.sys.next! They complain and complain. For example: FrameMaker >which was redulded with bugs but still sold for $500 offers a bug free >upgrade!!Isn't that wonderful!!!! Hey but wait a moment: this upgrade will >cost $400!??!?!? One NeXT owner even says he "regrets purchasing FrameMaker" >a program whose upgrade nearly costs as much as the original. Expensive bug-fixes in my book are not acceptable. Companies make the consumer pay to fix bugs that shouldn't be there in the first place. Granted, the NeXT programs are large and very powerful (at least FrameMaker in this case,) but given the list price, bug fixes should be a given when you consider the increased possibility of their existence. > Thank G-D >we have bug free programming on the Amiga! Why even ProWrite now offers >Bug Free software---> Guarenteed!!!! No outrageously expensive software to >make the computer work- the Amiga is productive after spending maybe at >most a couple of hundred dollars at most- NeXT forget about it! You get what you pay for. Your claim of "Bug Free" is a crock. Nothing is bug free, and the Amigas that I use are not _close_ to being an exception to this rule. Softare on the NeXT has to be _devoloped_ because of the depth and power of the machine. Amiga code is _written_. _Writing_ programs for the Amiga using concepts that have been around on other machines for years is not a terribly trying task. You can just use a few more spiffy characteristics of the Amiga. Developing a new environment is different, and this is what NeXT offers. The Amiga is a spiffy machine that combines several factors of a lot of existing machines and makes them better. But when I see the System V beta and X-whimdows [sic] R4 on an Amiga, I just have to laugh. XNeXT, even with it's limitations and R3 status, makes Amiga X-Windows look like an incoherent pile of building blocks. This program is not by far the only example of this. > You want >FrameMaker? You want Color? You want anything and even your grandchildren >won't be able to afford to go to college since they will still be paying >off your debt! You also hear in comp.sys.next about Lotus and the >greed (Lotus wants to copywrite the "wheel" {the spreadsheet}) so these >NeXT dudes are complaining! Why not scream at Steve Jobs! The dude is >charging college students with 6 grand machines--- as if every kid This is just plain wrong. You can get a system that compares to a 5 grand IBM/Comp. system, and beats a ~5 grand Amiga system (3000UX) at a price of $3000. This does not include a lot of niceties, but does include a great deal of superior software and the NeXT environment/Unix. Of course, even the 5 grand IBM/3000UX systems, in my experience, leave a lot to be desired. And please do not confuse color as an all-descriptor. 16bit color on a NeXT is functionally better than an Amiga, and please consider 32bit. The Amiga has color, but so does the tree outside my house. >can afford to go to college without financial assistance! Who knows >there might be the day in which some top universities wi >will demand that incoming freshman buy a NeXT just like Drexel U. >demands a Mac. And how much does the NeXT actually cost!??!? It is >a single board, right!!! No. You seem to forget the display, drives, and about every other important part of the system. The Amiga is one board. A shoddlily built one, IME. > There is very little labor involved since >the entire manufacturing process is roboticized! So who is getting >all this money- Jobs and his minnions are going to rake in millions >.... unless Amiga users go out into the world and start educating the >masses! I forgot who I am quoting but "Jobs is getting more attention >than Gorbachev!!!!" Magazines from Newsweek to womens dailies glorified >the revolution!!! A major question that is being discussed is how Steve Jobs could be making money because of the low cost of his machines. The price for a NeXT machine is so low it's scary. The success of a company that sells it's products cheaply is a major concern. Roboticism does not outweigh quality that you have to pay for. NeXT machines are very finely built, the concept behind them is better than any previous machines in it's price range (arguably better than more expensive Sparcs, etc..) The Amiga might be revolutionary in it's ideals, but it's products, while capable, are not ideal. I give you interlaced mode, with flicker that defeats the purpose, and the stupid power switch machanics inside the 3000/3000UX, as a small subset of examples. Logical conclusion, and a handful of common sense, left to reader. > Stop him while you can!!! And settle for machines that pale in the face of his past creations? The man who brought out the Apple II and the Mac surely deserves more respect for creating the unmatched environments that these machines have created. Now he's doing it again, as strongly as the Apple II back in that late 70s, with a new machine that again shadows over it's competition for the same reasons. It gives people an excellent environment to work. This is easy to see when you take into account that most people I know would rather work on a NeXT, then a Mac, then maybe even an Apple II (as I am now) before anything else. Combining a superior GUI and a CLI (which happens to be 4.3 BSD UNIX) has not come about before at this price range (see "arguably better..." above.) The Amiga is nice. That is, however, all that it is. > J.Norell Guttman > njg2@po.cwru.edu Ken. Kenneth R. Brownfield brownfld@ux1.cso.uiuc.edu University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign {..!}uiucuxc!uiucux1!brownfld Junior, Computer Science/Engineering.