Path: utzoo!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!cs.utexas.edu!sdd.hp.com!think.com!mintaka!geech.gnu.ai.mit.edu!rjc From: rjc@geech.gnu.ai.mit.edu (Ray Cromwell) Newsgroups: comp.sys.atari.st Subject: Re: Amiga is better then what??? Message-ID: <1991Jun29.070944.24341@mintaka.lcs.mit.edu> Date: 29 Jun 91 07:09:44 GMT References: <678091803.2@therip.FidoNet> Sender: news@mintaka.lcs.mit.edu Followup-To: comp.sys.amiga.advocacy Organization: The Internet Lines: 110 In article <678091803.2@therip.FidoNet> Rod.Fulk@f24.n228.z1.FidoNet.Org (Rod Fulk) writes: > > DRL> > DRL> >Since the ST uses standard parts it is easy to get most of the items... > DRL> > DRL> Eh? Standard parts? Like the standard SCSI drive inside my Amiga, the > DRL> standard memory chips, the standard printer connected to my standard > DRL> parrallel > DRL> port right next to the standard serial port which talks to my standard > DRL> modem? >I said standard parts... Such as the RF modulator.. (RS part) the drive >controler (RS part) the sound chip (RS part) very ver properitory (sp?) chips >in the ST. "That's the problem with standards, there are so many to choose from." The Amiga chips have been in mass production for 6 years. They are very cheap now (since they are in mass quantities). > DRL> I can use all the memory in my system too. I just have to keep > DRL> graphics & > DRL> sound data in the 1st 2 megs. Why do you say the Amiga has to waste > DRL> memory to > DRL> do d.b. graphics & sound? Having to keep it in a limited section of > DRL> memory > DRL> only constitutes a limitation, not a waste. >2 meg? You must have a 3000 cause the others are limited to 1meg and the old >500's to 512k. Any time you must load the data into the upper memory and copy >it down into lower memory to be used is wasting memory.. (Ie having it in two >places at the same time..) Not to mention the slowdown while copying the >memory around.. (ST's have a four meg limit.. That should make a BIG >difference when the bigger graphics displays become common.) The Amiga doesn't "copy" data. Let's say you have a compressed animation loaded. 2 screens will be allocated in chip memory. The first frame will be displayed and while it is being display, another frame will be "decompressed" directly to the other frame. This is copying in a minor sense. What about resident programs? Putting programs in a ram disk is a waste of memory? Why? Because the program exists in 2 copies. The one copy that is in the ram disk, and the one that gets loaded and executed from the ram disk. On the Amiga, you make a program "resident" (it has to be reentrant and re-executable) and you can run as many copies as you like without taking any extra memory except for stack. (For instance, I could run 100 copies of the program "ls" program which is 16k long and only eat 116k of memory. 16k for the 100 programs (all running the same code in ram, not copies) and 100k for the 100 1k stacks for each task. Without resident code, you would need 1.7 megabytes to do this. Not a very good example, but in 1mb of memory I can run 3 or 4 copies of my favorite editor (100k executable) and only use 100+k of memory.) > DRL> On the subject of memory, what exactly is the difference between "ST > DRL> memory" and "TT memory" on the TT? Is ST mem 16 bits wide? >No, the ST memory is limited to 4 meg... (Same as chip memory as opposed to >fast memory.. The TT uses the same type of setup memory wise as the Amiga.. >CPU ram is VERY fast and is unlimited in theory.) Does this mean the normal ST is limited to 4mb? (barring hacks to the motherboard) The Amiga's normal limit is 9mb (the 68000 is limited to 16mb due to it only has 24 address lines) Of course any 68020/30 board would give you more, but I'm talking standard add on memory. No processor upgrades. > DRL> Oh? On what do you base this assumption? I really don't know what > DRL> business software is available for the ST other than PageStream (is > DRL> 2.1 out yet for the ST? I've been using it for a while, & am looking >With the St you have a rock solid display that except for the Ami 3000 you can >not get at all... You can get close to the mono screen but you cant quite get Deinterlacer's on the Amiga cost ~$200 now. Every Amiga can have a rock solid display. With the ECS Denise chip you don't need a deinterlacer. With the A2024 you get 1024x1024x4. (not mono) You need atleast 4 colors to have a nice "3d-look" GUI. (background, highlight, shadow, and text color) >computer.... BTW, if your GUI was so great why use a CLI? The Newer STe's and >newer have powerful enough GUI's that CLI's are not necissary for anything >except specialized jobs... That's because the Shell is great for lots of things especially scripting and batching. Let's say you wanted to catalog every c source on your harddisk to a file? $ ls -R rootdir | grep \\.c\|\\.h >t:filecat There are things you can do in a shell that are just not possible in a low-bandwidth environment like a GUI. That's why even Mac programmers/power users use MPW or some other shell. >(Software wise the ST has a slighlty better selection of bussiness programs.. >Such as data bases, spreedsheets and that stuff... ) Examples please. The Amiga has a multitude of databases, spreadsheets, authorware, etc. For instance, the Amiga has SuperBase Professional 4, DBMan V( Dbase clone), MicroFiche Filer, Advantage, Analyze, MaxiPlan, SuperPlan, VIP Professional, Accountant, Best Bussiness Management, Datatax, Desktop Budget, Easy Ledgers, Phasar 4.0, Service Industry Accounting, etc, etc. It's easy to make statements like "slightly better" it's harder to back them up when it comes time to compare quantity and quality. [followups to c.s.a.advocacy, I'm out of this group.] > > * Origin: The R.I.P. (616)235-2313 [HST] (1:228/24) -- / INET:rjc@gnu.ai.mit.edu * // The opinions expressed here do not \ | INET:r_cromwe@upr2.clu.net | \X/ in any way reflect the views of my self.| \ UUCP:uunet!tnc!m0023 * /