Path: utzoo!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!cs.utexas.edu!uunet!cbmvax!daveh From: daveh@cbmvax.commodore.com (Dave Haynie) Newsgroups: comp.sys.amiga Subject: Re: Time for a new computer Message-ID: <16713@cbmvax.commodore.com> Date: 20 Dec 90 23:56:51 GMT References: <39588@nigel.ee.udel.edu> Reply-To: daveh@cbmvax.commodore.com (Dave Haynie) Organization: Commodore, West Chester, PA Lines: 43 In article <39588@nigel.ee.udel.edu> PYC136@uriacc.uri.edu (Andy Patrizio) writes: >(Mounting SoapBox v1.2...) >In speeding the machine up, Apple was smart to do one thing, and that was keep >it downwardly compatible. The 65816 chip the IIgs ran was capable of simulating >a 6502 within itself, making it a IIe when there was need for it. >My point is this: if Commodore does create a new mid-line box, it should retain >some downward compatibility. One reason I'm reluctant to buy an A3000 is that >it only has a 68030 on board, and even if running ADos 1.3 there will still >be problems (besides, can you imagine Blood Money at 25 mhz???) The 68030 is more compatible with the 68000 than the 65816 is with the 6502. Especially since the main user-mode difference between the two, the MOVE SR, instruction, is replaced by an operating system call by all correct Amiga programs. The Apple IIGS is claimed as running about 80% of the Apple II programs; the A3000 does much better, I imagine. And realize, most of the Apple II programs that failed on the Apple IIGS fail because of things that Apple couldn't forsee when they came out with the Apple II. Very small differences between the 65816 and all, nothing really that much against the [relatively few] proper programming guidelines for the Apple II. Every Amiga program we've seen so far that fails on the A3000 fails because it has a bug that would have been prevented if the programmer followed the guidelines published before the A1000 was commercially available. In other words, the Apple II programmers accidently wrote programs that failed on the IIGS. Amiga programmers for the most part chose to fail on the A3000 (though some of the bugs can also happen by accident). The Amiga machines ARE NOT toy computers with toy operating systems like C64 or Apple II, they are real computers and, if do follow the guidelines, you can expect to run on any system from the A1000 on up to the A3000 and no doubt beyond as well. As for games, since all the Amiga timing is done based on the video display or hardware timers, any correctly written game should be pretty CPU speed independent. While you certainly CAN get away with software timing loops on the A500, they'll go 10-20 time faster on the A3000. One of the many reasons such things have always been expressly forbidden. >Andy Patrizio | ARPA: pyc136@uriacc.uri.edu -- Dave Haynie Commodore-Amiga (Amiga 3000) "The Crew That Never Rests" {uunet|pyramid|rutgers}!cbmvax!daveh PLINK: hazy BIX: hazy "I can't drive 55" -Sammy Hagar