Path: utzoo!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!rpi!usc!sdd.hp.com!spool.mu.edu!uwm.edu!psuvax1!news
From: melling@cs.psu.edu (Michael D Mellinger)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.amiga.advocacy
Subject: Re: NeXT/Amiga Flamage: Get a life.
Message-ID: <f&1Gjg#h1@cs.psu.edu>
Date: 6 Apr 91 00:01:00 GMT
References: <49886@nigel.ee.udel.edu> <3&8Ghkzh1@cs.psu.edu>
	<12502@pasteur.Berkeley.EDU>
Sender: news@cs.psu.edu (Usenet)
Organization: Penn State Computer Science
Lines: 55
In-Reply-To: navas@cory.Berkeley.EDU's message of 5 Apr 91 19:36:06 GMT
Nntp-Posting-Host: sunws6.sys.cs.psu.edu


In article <12502@pasteur.Berkeley.EDU> navas@cory.Berkeley.EDU (David C. Navas) writes:


   Well, they're shipping 50meg Quantums, but to answer your question, think about
   what you just asked.  The Amiga's system software comes on *three* *880k*
   disks.  A little rounding (for those of us up all night :) ), tells me
   I'd have > 37megs left.  A rather substantial difference as AmigaDos won't be
   paging madly to that drive either.

My point is that you are paying for a 50MB hard drive on your system
while NeXT ships a 105MB drive while leaving you 30-40 free.  There
are some things like the Improv Demo that can be remove.  The
NeXTDeveloper demos can be moved to floppies.  Actually, I wonder how
much of this junk do you actually need.  You can boot the NeXT off of
a floppy(ies), but it's not advisable.

   So go buy yourself a 16Mhz A3000, add a 25Mhz 68040 board, add 6megs of RAM --
   for educational pricing I get practically the *same* cost.  I don't have
   retail pricing, but I bet it would allow for a decent monitor in that case...

I don't think you can just drop a 25MHz 040 board in a 16MHz A3000 and
expect to get the same performance as a system that was designed to
run at 25MHz.   Someone correct me if I'm wrong.  Like I have to ask.

BTW, $3250 is the price to beat.

   So for the price of a color monitor I get a color system.  With slots, even.

   Like, excuse me, where's the price advantage?  I get a more responsive system,
   more harddrive, and *way* more usage of my memory than you would -- and the
   difference in price depends on the monitor that I can buy.  And I *can* buy
   a color monitor.

Color, the end all be all of computing.  Believe it or not, most of
the WORK people do on a computer can be done in B/W.  The NeXT
monochrome monitor costs $700 with the educational discount.  Probably
more than the Amiga color monitor.  Care to guess why?

   >Stupid reasoning.  Very stupid!  It's not the quantity it's the
   >quality of software.

   Ah, redemption. :)
   Darn right it is -- and the NeXT has some very interesting software.

   >if you are going to spend $3300 ($5000 retail) on a computer, then the NeXT
   >is (arguably) the best buy one can get for their money.

   Not when I can get an '040 for a 16Mhz Amiga it isn't.  Some other line of
   reasoning is going to have to be used.

When they actually ship, let me know how much they cost and how they
actually perform in the Amiga.

-Mike