Path: utzoo!mnetor!uunet!husc6!mit-eddie!uw-beaver!cornell!batcomputer!itsgw!imagine!pawl16.pawl.rpi.edu!jesup From: jesup@pawl16.pawl.rpi.edu (Randell E. Jesup) Newsgroups: comp.sys.amiga Subject: Re: Autoconfig for expansions Message-ID: <556@imagine.PAWL.RPI.EDU> Date: 20 Mar 88 01:34:04 GMT References: <1408@sugar.UUCP> <507@xicom.UUCP> <2507@tekig4.TEK.COM> <3448@cbmvax.UUCP> <322@wsccs.UUCP> Sender: news@imagine.PAWL.RPI.EDU Reply-To: beowulf!lunge!jesup@steinmetz.UUCP Organization: RPI Public Access Workstation Lab - Troy, NY Lines: 127 Keywords: autoconfig hobby In article <322@wsccs.UUCP> terry@wsccs.UUCP (terry) writes: >who buys an Amiga is not seeing the ads", I think the large number of postings >by people who already own an Amiga, and referring to CLtd not advertising, are Uh, where did you get the impression that 'CLtd' makes amigas? Last I heard, CLtd was a HD, etc supplier for the Amiga. Maybe you meant to say 'Commodore'? Are you SURE you were at a Amiga users group? 1/2 :-) (Note that in this message, and another, he often referred to the producer of the amiga as 'CLtd'.) >the same markets. Look at DOS! Would Commodore be willing to sell/support >Xenixfor the Amiga? Would people trust it [the Xenix] if they did? Excuse me, but Commodore just announced an Amiga running System V Release 3 (at the hannover show). >} 11K of data into the 1K a bootblock takes up ? That is a trick! > I will try to get a copy of one by Red Sector or The Kent Team or >SCA, and mail it to you, if you like. Well? You're confused. By definition, a boot 'block' is 1K (2 sectors). Sure, one could write a bootblock to load in a larger program, but that is not an 11k bootblock. BTW, maybe 11k stuck in your head, because that's the size of a track. >} BTW, hasn't EA been using custom boot blocks for a long time ? > Yes. How large? 1K. Suprise. >} The 2090 will ship in...pardon me ? It shipped sometime last year ? >} Oh. Never Mind... >} (Yes, the 2090 has a DMA interface, and has been out for awhile) > Great. Where are schematics which are released for anyone to >incorporte into their products so that my next 20 Meg drive & controller costs >me the same as what a 20 Meg drive costs an IBM owner? How do I attach one >to my 500 or 1000? Sure, Commodore should design every product that's useful, then give away all the plans to everyone else. Right. All the information is there, and a number of companies have DMA harddrives out. (In fact, commodore licensed the design and a custom chip to the first DMA HD maker out there, Byte by Byte.) The reason PC harddisks are cheap is volume, and the fact that most use st506 drives (old tech), whereas more Amiga and Mac HDs are SCSI. Take a look how much Mac people pay for HDs, we're cheap by comparison. >IBM makes it's money by charging for the >cable... Commodore seems to make it by charging you a lot for what you get... Sounds OK to me. >admittedly, the Amiga is a better machine, in most respects, than a PC, but >I can get a PC with 640K and a 20 Meg hard-drive and controller and an EGA and >a color monitor for less that $1100 Uh, didn't IBM discontinue the PC ages ago? (And the XT, and the AT) I think you mean a cheap Taiwanese PC clone, by mail order. IBM couldn't make money in the lower half of the market. > The regional sales rep. for the intermountain West, including Utah. I >will *NOT* publicly post names, thereby opening myself up for a defamation of >character suit by airing his dirty laundry in public. There are only 10 of >them, and only one of them works Utah... figure it out. Truth is a valid defense against libel/whatever. Also, saying his name doesn't matter if you identify him (as you did). >} (To explore educational discounts, things like that, have a >} rep from your school call the Commodore Educational Marketing dept >} at West Chester. I think there is a program in place.) > > You are referencing something I said which you, again, truncated and >took out of context. I was complaining that a _discount_ was *all* CLtd >would do... Apple _gives_ hardware and software to schools. Apple gives obsolete, cheap computers to schools in return for immmense tax writeoffs (I think that's why they kept the price of an Apple II so high, so they could get bigger writeoffs when they gave away their production.) Is there something wrong about giving discounts? >} The only thing the new Kickstart rom gives you is the ability to boot >} from a ROM-Driver equipped device. > > So he was full of it. There IS a new Kickstart. Is it only ROM, or >will 1000 owners be able to use it too? Is it going to cost the users of the >older stuff more than distribution costs, just like the last one (1.1 to 1.2) >did? Here we go again. Yes, it will be available to A1000 owners (actually easier for them), and NO, the kickstart has NOTHING new other than HD/etc boot - not even bug fixes. 1.4 will be very different, big ROM changes, but that's a ways off. I would assume it will be cheap again. > Obviously, he didn't. The "kit" of which I speak is simply some >documentation and software; basically, how to do a cold-capture of the machine, >and a number of other things Commodore hasn't seemed to make public. Also, >some documentation specific to the 2000 and 500 and the 1.2 ROMs, which are NOT >documented in the Addison-Wesly(sp?) books. Cold-capture? You want Commodore to give out things that are kept non-documented (for a reason - because they WILL change in the future, and therefor are not reliable for future versions of the OS/hardware.) 2000, 500, and 1.2? Either you mean the A2000/A500 technical manual (hardware stuff only), or the 1.2 Autodocs, which ALL registered developers get (I got mine over a year ago, haven't heard of ANYONE who didn't.) Are you certain these people are currently registered developers, not from the old "anyone who says they are is a developer" program? It's still easy to become registered, but you had to reregister about a year ago. >} Registered developers have a phone number >} they can call to find out what happened to their orders, if something's wrong. > They called, en-masse. "We'll call you back" or "It's in the mail" >were the most common answers. Once again, are you sure this was Commodore Amiga Technical Support (CATS)? Not the generic user-support line? DISCLAIMER: I do not work for Commodore, I'm just a developer. // Randell Jesup Lunge Software Development // Dedicated Amiga Programmer 13 Frear Ave, Troy, NY 12180 \\// beowulf!lunge!jesup@steinmetz.UUCP (518) 272-2942 \/ (uunet!steinmetz!beowulf!lunge!jesup) BIX: rjesup (-: The Few, The Proud, The Architects of the RPM40 40MIPS CMOS Micro :-)