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From: grr@cbmvax.UUCP (George Robbins)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.amiga
Subject: Re: 1.6 meg drives and the Amiga
Message-ID: <2592@cbmvax.UUCP>
Date: Fri, 23-Oct-87 16:43:47 EST
Article-I.D.: cbmvax.2592
Posted: Fri Oct 23 16:43:47 1987
Date-Received: Sun, 25-Oct-87 18:03:44 EST
References: <4534@zen.berkeley.edu>
Reply-To: grr@cbmvax.UUCP (George Robbins)
Organization: Commodore Technology, West Chester, PA
Lines: 31

In article <4534@zen.berkeley.edu> c164-1bj@cordelia.berkeley.edu (Jonathan Dubman) writes:
> The elation in switching from Apple 143K disks to Amiga 880K disks has now
> worn off, and I am once again becoming greedy.
 
A familiar computer disease...

> I want the 1.6 meg high-density microfloppies.
> 
> Apple's new Macs are socketed for the new IWM chip that will support the 1.6
> meg disks, and another company that makes half of a personal computer with
> half of an operating system actually comes with the 1.6 meg disks.
> 
> The acceptance of the format by the aforementioned behemoths will certainly
> result in massive price reduction on both the drives and the media in about a
> year.  Just as Jay Miner anticipated the cheap RAM chips, I hope Commodore has
> anticipated the megafloppy and has been at least keeping it in mind when
> working on new versions of the hardware and (hint) operating system.

There is no real significant price difference between the normal and double
density drives, at least at the component level.  They share the same basic
components, but require slightly better heads and electronics.

Unfortunatly, the same Jay Miner did not anticipate double density floppies
and the floppy disk control function he integrated in the Amiga chipset has
some real problems accomodating them.   We'll probably support them sooner
or later, but it's not a snap-the-fingers operation.

-- 
George Robbins - now working for,	uucp: {ihnp4|rutgers|allegra}!cbmvax!grr
but no way officially representing	arpa: out to lunch...
Commodore, Engineering Department	fone: 215-431-9255 (only by moonlite)