Path: utzoo!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!rpi!crdgw1!uakari.primate.wisc.edu!sdd.hp.com!wuarchive!psuvax1!news From: melling@cs.psu.edu (Michael D Mellinger) Newsgroups: comp.sys.amiga.advocacy Subject: Re: Blitter vs. 040 (was: Computer Architecture question Message-ID: <7haHkcs5@cs.psu.edu> Date: 16 May 91 08:06:01 GMT References: <1991May15.125954.1993@NCoast.ORG> <1991May16.045252.7706@NCoast.ORG> Sender: news@cs.psu.edu (Usenet) Organization: Penn State Computer Science Lines: 74 In-Reply-To: davewt@NCoast.ORG's message of 16 May 91 04: 52:52 GMT Nntp-Posting-Host: sunws0.sys.cs.psu.edu In article <1991May16.045252.7706@NCoast.ORG> davewt@NCoast.ORG (David Wright) writes: Who ever said it COULDN'T. I sure didn't. You don't have to tell ME that. Say that in a reply to someone who might have claimed otherwise. Well, NCW was following the converstation a while back. Did he go home for the summer? >rate. NeXT year people aren't going to be asking if they should buy a >486 instead of an Amiga, it's going to be SPEC 30+ Compaq machine. As Oh please, what planet do YOU live on. nExt year people will STILL be using DOS, nExt year people will STILL be debating which VGA board to use (or is XGA worth your while? Inside 3 brand-new(TM) reports!). As it is the 2nd largest population of PC clones owned for the home STILL have EGA or less graphics, and '286 machines are still selling well. And you actually believe people will move to an INCOMPATIBLE chip, with ZERO support or software, when the whole Windows/OS-2/PM slop is still being fought? Get real. A lot depends on when MS gets OS/2 3.0 written. At any rate, an 040 NeXT will emulate a 10MHz 286 in software. Insignia seems to think they can get SoftPC to emulate a 386 VGA PC by the end of the year. The little old NeXT SPECs at 12 or 13(at best). Now if you drop an R4000 in a machine and it SPECs at 36(makes the division easy for you!), what can we conclude? A DOS emulator that Peter da Silva would appreciate? And of course, NeXT should have their SPEC 30+ machine NeXT year too. I imagine most developers will find porting their software to it a breeze. >I was trying to demonstrate with my 030 + blitter < 040 argument. I would never argue otherwise. What I WOULD argue is that 68030+blitter>68030, and 68040+blitter>68040, which is obvious to anyone with a brain bigger than that of a stegasaurus. Right, but adding N to N doubles your performance, while adding N to 3N gives you 33% more power(going from a 25MHz 040 to 33MHz one will do this). Of course, we just can't add the mips, because the blitter is dedicate to graphics. So, which chip do you let do the graphics? The one that does N mips or 3N mips? >There are extra cycles to burn, it doesn't matter if you have to >context switch, you still win. Really??? Where are you getting these magical "extra cycles"? When I have something to do there are NEVER enough cycles, even if I was using a Cray! Is this like having too much clean air (Heck, there's enough of it, let's just keep using flourocarbons to propell our hairspray). You removed part of my posting. I was talking about the extra cycles that an 040 would have over a blitter + 030, which is an extra 030 for context switching. >Not necessarily. Can I pick the 1 CPU? I would think that it depends Sure, but unless you missed the point, whatever you pick I also get, PLUS I get another CPU as well. The value of the blitter diminishes as you add it to a faster CPU. Adding it to HP's 57 mip Snake($12K) isn't going to do shit. Well, to be fair, it will probably get in the way. >on how the system is designed. 1 fast CPU can definitely beat 1 >dedicated CPU and another general purpose CPU. Not to mention the >fact that half of your hardware is being wasted when you aren't doing >graphics. A ray tracer would definitely win with the 1 fast CPU. Hmm.. "half" my hardware, huh? I guess that blitter really does outway the Amiga's superior bus, superior expandability, and larger RAM support. Must just leave enough for the "cool games" to balance it out, right? Let me know how well the 88K or R4000 fits into the current Amiga when it comes time to make a bigger and better Amiga. Or is Commodore going to wait for the 050? -Mike