Newsgroups: comp.sys.amiga.advocacy Path: utzoo!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!rpi!zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu!menudo.uh.edu!sugar!peter From: peter@sugar.hackercorp.com (Peter da Silva) Subject: Re: 8-bit death (was Re: What the heck IS "Interactive TV"?) Message-ID: <1991Apr21.195406.25574@sugar.hackercorp.com> Organization: Sugar Land Unix -- Houston, TX References: <1991Apr21.152513.23054@sugar.hackercorp.com> <10944@mentor.cc.purdue.edu> Date: Sun, 21 Apr 1991 19:54:06 GMT In article <10944@mentor.cc.purdue.edu> blissmer@expert.cc.purdue.edu (Corey) writes: > >MS-DOS is an 8-bit operating system. As is MacOS (a VW Beetle with a great > >sound system). > Hmm. Are you REAL sure about that. I thought the MacOS was _always_ 16 bit The 68000 is a 32-bit processor, but the Mac O/S was designed with the same sort of address space limitations as CP/M. It's even more primitive a design than the rather nice ProDOS that the Apple-/// used. It's got a glorious graphics library, but the basic underlying operating system is basically CP/M. > and will be 32 bit (on 32 bit machines) with 7.0. It makes little sense to me > that Apple would write an 8 bit OS for a 16 bit machine (the Mac 128). It > does make sense to me that IBM would write an 8 bit OS for an 8 bit machine > (the IBM XT). Programming-model-wise, the 80x86 (x<3) is 16-bit, the 680x0 (any x) is 32-bit. -- Peter da Silva. `-_-' .