Path: utzoo!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!rpi!think.com!zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu!cis.ohio-state.edu!tut.cis.ohio-state.edu!rutgers!rochester!kodak!uupsi!sunic!cs.umu.se!dvljrt From: dvljrt@cs.umu.se (Joakim Rosqvist) Newsgroups: comp.sys.amiga.hardware Subject: Re: A3000,is it really worth it? Message-ID: <1991May27.193347.22130@cs.umu.se> Date: 27 May 91 19:33:47 GMT References: Sender: news@cs.umu.se (News Administrator) Organization: Dep. of Info.Proc, Umea Univ., Sweden Lines: 46 In article Alex_Topic@resbbs.UUCP (Alex Topic) writes: > > Well the A3000 looks real perfect for doing business work, ect.. Also the >new A3000UX looks like something to get, since it can outpreform most micros, >and it has a faster bus than the NeXt... But there is afew things I hate >about it. > Namely! The CUSTOM chips!!! They should of been totally revised >and able to be backward compatible. Like Super Denise Should of at least have >256 colors in both hi'rez and low'rez! More less be totally vga! Also the >sound could of been upgraded, but I think 8-bit is good enough. > But the Agnus should of totally been modified! Like have triple >playfield mode, instead of dual playfield! Also have a faster blitter(32bit!) >maybe have multi-channel blitter, for even faster access! Have maybe 16 >sprites per scan line! Have a more powerful copper perhaps!.. Now this To make these dreams a little more specific: The copper could use the high nybble of it's MOVE word to store the number of words to be written, the real number being 2^n. Like: dc.w $5180,<32 colors> instead of dc.w $180,,$182,,$184,...etc A relative wait-instruction would be nice too, and there are bits left in a word enough for 5 bit RGB at least. Now for the sound: Since overscan can steal DMA-accesses from the sprites, why not let the sound channels be able to do this too. Audio takes 1 word/scanline, a sprite takes 2. Each sprite = 2 voices. 6 sprites = 12 voices + 4 existing = 16, a nice even number. (keeping 1 sprite for the pointer and another since they are logically paired) Then, there is a word for the volume control currently ranging from 0 to 64. I think the outputvoulme is too weak, let it go up to 255 and, since it is a word anyway, have 2 volume controls so every voice will be heard in both left and right speaker. Then, there is the filter problem. Easy, let every voice be connected to one of 16 SID-chips! It has 3 voices of it's own and the capability to filter an external signal with adjustable cutoff- frequency, resonance etc. /$DR.HEX$ -------------------------------------------- Email to: dvljrt@cs.umu.se 2 Windows on the screen? Oh no, not me. I just Logout & Go.