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From: mwm@eris.BERKELEY.EDU (Mike (My watch has windows) Meyer)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.amiga,comp.sys.atari.st
Subject: True Multitasking, and some history lessons
Message-ID: <3708@jade.BERKELEY.EDU>
Date: Sun, 24-May-87 20:43:08 EDT
Article-I.D.: jade.3708
Posted: Sun May 24 20:43:08 1987
Date-Received: Tue, 26-May-87 01:25:07 EDT
References: <943@cooper.UUCP> <159@tahoma.ARPA>
Sender: usenet@jade.BERKELEY.EDU
Reply-To: mwm@eris.BERKELEY.EDU (Mike (My watch has windows) Meyer)
Organization: Missionaria Phonibalonica
Lines: 42
Keywords: which is better
Xref: mnetor comp.sys.amiga:5159 comp.sys.atari.st:3711

In article <159@tahoma.ARPA> bakken@tahoma.ARPA (Dave Bakken) writes:
<I bought my Amiga in December of '85, and I chose it over the Atari
<because it was (and still is) the only PC to offer true multitasking.

Horsefeathers. OS/9 has been available on a fair number of machines
for years, and it has true multitasking. It even does it better than
the Amiga. (Can you say "resource tracking?" I knew you could. If
you're an Amiga hacker, you probably preceeded it with some
four-letter words and "missing.")

It's been at least three years since Radio Shack starting selling OS/9
for the Color Computer (I started 32 shells on one once, just to see
how it would run. Not bad...). With the introduction of the CoCo III
last year, Tandy announced only OS/9 for an OS. They also put in an
MMU. With the release of OS/9 level II early this year, you got a
windowing system, as well.

Of course, there are other multitasking OS's around for micros (CDOS,
MP/M, UnixFlex, BOSS (?), and probably others), but OS/9 is the only
one of them to get into widespread use. And having it on a CoCo meant
that I could buy a system that ran a pretty fair Unix clone (fair in
the sense of features; it was smaller & faster) for less than $1000
_complete_ three years ago.

You can run OS/9-68K on the Atari-ST, as well. But you then get the
problems of an OS that's not supported by the hardware vendor.

Anyone trying to decide between the ST and the Amiga ought to go look
at a CoCo (but be prepared for salesmen who'll try and sell you an
IBM-PC clone). If it does what you need, you could save a bundle.

	<mike

P.S. - In spite of the above, I *do* think the Amiga's a wonderful
machine, and have only seen two personal computers that I'd be willing
to trade it for: Mark Crispin's DEC 20 and John Gilmore's Sun 3.

--
How many times do you have to fall			Mike Meyer
While people stand there gawking?			mwm@berkeley.edu
How many times do you have to fall			ucbvax!mwm
Before you end up walking?				mwm@ucbjade.BITNET