Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP
Path: utzoo!watmath!watnot!watrose!jafischer
From: jafischer@watrose.UUCP
Newsgroups: comp.sys.amiga,comp.sys.mac,comp.sys.atari.st
Subject: Re: Mac vs. Amiga (vs. ST)
Message-ID: <8392@watrose.UUCP>
Date: Thu, 22-Jan-87 12:24:54 EST
Article-I.D.: watrose.8392
Posted: Thu Jan 22 12:24:54 1987
Date-Received: Fri, 23-Jan-87 02:04:39 EST
References: <8515@topaz.RUTGERS.EDU> <636@mit-amt.MEDIA.MIT.EDU>
Reply-To: jafischer@watrose.UUCP (Jonathan Fischer)
Organization: U. of Waterloo, Ontario
Lines: 26
Keywords: Mac, Amiga, ST
Xref: watmath comp.sys.amiga:1559 comp.sys.mac:843 comp.sys.atari.st:993


In article <636@mit-amt.MEDIA.MIT.EDU> ralph@ATRP.MEDIA.MIT.EDU (Amiga-Man) writes:
> ...  [talks about advantages of Amiga]
>- A true multitasking OS. I find this feature very important.

	I'm really curious: just how great is multitasking?  I.e., how much do
you, the typical Amiga owners, use this feature?  Even on Unix I find that the
only thing I consistently use '&' for is printing, and on my ST I have a wide
range of print spoolers to choose from.  And when I'm in the edit-compile-edit
cycle, the speed of Megamax compile-time, coupled with a RAMdisk, makes multi-
tasking a 'yeah it would be nice, but not utterly world-stopping' luxury.
(There is a multitasking C-Shell, but it's basically non-GEM, and still
pretty buggy).

	But then again... I _don't_ envy your high (until recently) prices,
nor your apparently buggy OS (see message 1292 in comp.sys.amiga!), but...
I _DO_ envy your multitasking!  I'm just curious how useful it
actually is.  I.e., is it that necessary in a personal computer,
and is it worth the slow-down in execution?  Even though I would really _like_
it, would I really use it that much?

	Uh oh, this could be taken as a typical my-PC-is-better-than-yours
posting.  It isn't.  The main intent of this posting is the question of
multitasking.

				- Jonathan Fischer