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From: eric@topaz.ARPA (Eric Lavitsky)
Newsgroups: net.micro,net.micro.atari,net.micro.cbm
Subject: Re: Amiga vs. ST
Message-ID: <3044@topaz.ARPA>
Date: Fri, 2-Aug-85 09:37:58 EDT
Article-I.D.: topaz.3044
Posted: Fri Aug  2 09:37:58 1985
Date-Received: Sat, 3-Aug-85 10:41:20 EDT
References: <268@ihnet.UUCP>
Organization: Rutgers Univ., New Brunswick, N.J.
Lines: 56
Xref: watmath net.micro:11268 net.micro.atari:980 net.micro.cbm:1585

>From bryan@ihnet.UUCP (b. k. delaney) Wed Jul 31 08:45:21 1985
>Subject: Amiga vs. ST

>I hate to dampen the Amiga fire, but the Amiga is a doomed machine.
>How can I say this before 1 Amiga is sold?  Simple, this is history
>repeating it self, all over again.  Remember the Comodore C-64 and
>the Atari 800?  It was obvious to anybody, who seriously looked at
>BOTH machines, that the 800 was a better computer.  But the Atari
>cost twice as much.  Guess which one, really sold.  Want more proof?

It was obvious to who? - most certainly to Atari owners it was. I had
seen an 800 before I bought my C64 and as far as I was concerned, the
*only* thing the 800 had over the C64 was Star Raiders. My C64 had
better sound, more memory to deal with and equal graphics (maybe not
in color flexibility.) 

>Looked what happened last December, Atari sells 1/2 million 800XLs
>at 89.95 while C-64 sales down 90%, and most people thought C-64
>sales down due to "soft market", how come Atari sold 1/2 million,
>price/performance.  Enough history here is today:

>Amiga 256k 1 internal floppy	$1295.00	"better machine"
>Atari ST-260 1 internal floppy	$ 499.00	"1/2 the price"

>Need I say more ?

Yes. I don't care much about last December. Atari desperately sold
out as many machines as it could. Jack Tramiel needed the instant cash
to fund the ST. I'm sure Atari didn't turn a real profit on those 
machines. The ST-260 doesn't even exist and the regular ST is having
problems. 

Amiga 512K, 1 880K internal floppy	$1500
Atari 512K ST, 1 400(?)K floppy		~ 700

And the Amiga at least has a Basic (Microsofts best effort to date -
Atari has expressed doubts as to whether they will ever market one),
true multi-tasking and much more color flexibility than the ST. It's
sound also beats the ST by a large margin and it is more easily
expandable (up to 8.5 Meg of Ram total). There are already LISP, LOGO,
Pascal, C compilers available for the Amiga - what has the ST got?
The ST will never be able to preform the same as the Amiga. I'm willing 
to pay double to not be left in a hole in a year when I want to expand
my machine. I can't guarantee the Amiga will sell - that remains to be 
seen. I don't believe anyone should judge it prematurely - you must see
it first. Put it next to an ST or a Macintosh, then re-read the machine's
specifications and decide if it is the machine for you and to grow with
you.

Eric
-- 

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