Path: utzoo!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!cs.utexas.edu!usc!elroy.jpl.nasa.gov!ames!vsi1!zorch!mykes
From: mykes@zorch.SF-Bay.ORG (Mike Schwartz)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.amiga
Subject: Re: Commodore Research and Development.
Message-ID: <1991Jan8.065444.7684@zorch.SF-Bay.ORG>
Date: 8 Jan 91 06:54:44 GMT
References: <1991Jan3.003449.1@ccvax.iastate.edu> <422.2782fdf3@vger.nsu.edu>
Organization: SF-Bay Public-Access Unix
Lines: 49

Commodore seems to have its hands full with just making 2.0 work and getting
their CD ROM machine out the door.  I am still waiting for my 2.0 Enhancer
package at a nearby Amiga dealer, and Commodore announced that they would
ship the CD ROM machine in Sept. 1990 (at Summer CES '90) with a hundred
titles and hundreds more by 1991.  Not that I am criticizing Commodore here,
just that they really do have their work cut out  for them.  

The CD ROM machine looks like it will be great, especially if CBM can get
the price down to near Laser Disk player prices.  Actually, laserdisk machines
aren't exactly setting the world on fire, saleswise, so maybe they should be
trying to get the price down to half what they announced it to be so it would
be a real consumer item instead of a hobbyist device.  After all, CBM did well
with a low priced C64, which was more of an appliance than a computer to most
of its owners.

It is not that CBM is not trying, they are getting the Amiga 500 into better
distribution channels (like Sears) and they could compete with and possibly
be better than all of the new 16-bit video game machines if they made a version
of the Amiga 500 with a cartridge port, no keyboard, and a video game operating
system for $200.

What commodore really needs to do is to finish the products they have under
development and to get the big players (Microsoft, Lotus, Ashton Tate, etc.)
to provide real business software for the machine so they can compete with IBM
and Mac.


If you look at things in perspective, Apple is having just as much of a problem
getting system 7.0 out the door as CBM is 2.0.  If the software base gave
business users a reason to buy the machine, the Amiga could sell 10's of millions.

If there were 10 Million Amigas, a laptop would make a lot of sense, but who
needs a $2000 laptop to play video games (albeit the best games around).

I say, just give CBM a chance, things look good for the future, even though
development is slow.  It just takes time to do things right.  Even though
the CD ROM machine is not out, I am glad that they did not make the same
mistake with it that they did with the Amiga in '85.  You see, they shipped
the Amiga before it was finished, and we all know how long it has taken for
it to gain a decent reputation.  I just hope that the CD ROM machine works
and works well.  Who wants a 4x sampling CD player that Gurus a lot?

Another thing to consider is that CBM does have some fine engineers and it
does show in the Amiga 3000 and Amiga Unix.  The Amiga is still far ahead of
the competition in many areas and it is advancing.  It is kind of fun to watch
the other computer manufacturers copying the things that the Amiga does best and
not doing as good a job at it.

Keep it up CBM, but let's try to be a little more timely.