Path: utzoo!attcan!uunet!seismo!sundc!pitstop!sun!pepper!cmcmanis From: cmcmanis%pepper@Sun.COM (Chuck McManis) Newsgroups: comp.sys.amiga Subject: Re: Mac OS / Amiga OS Message-ID: <55976@sun.uucp> Date: 9 Jun 88 18:27:10 GMT References: <8805170742.AA28361@cory.Berkeley.EDU> <4710@watdcsu.waterloo.edu> <467@amanpt1.zone1.com> <4732@watdcsu.waterloo.edu> <5086@dcatla.UUCP> <54709@sun.uucp> <5701@bloom-beacon.MIT.EDU> Sender: news@sun.uucp Reply-To: cmcmanis@sun.UUCP (Chuck McManis) Organization: Sun Microsystems, Mountain View Lines: 84 [Last one and I'll take it internal ...] In article <5701@bloom-beacon.MIT.EDU> (Jim Reich) writes: [>> is me writing ... ] ->> Amiga's ->>system software, and hardware are a couple of years *AHEAD* of the ->>Mac, but the Mac is catching up rapidly. You see the Amiga has always ->>been a multitasking OS and has always had automatically configuring ->>dipswitch-free expansion architecture. The Mac finally got the latter ->>when they introduced the Mac II ->No they didn't -- the Multifinder STILL isn't multitasking ("coming soon") and ->A/UX is not in common use -- Too expensive by far... Read what I wrote please, they got "the latter" which referred to the dipswitch-free expansion architecture. I to think that MultiFinder is about as revolutionary as DesqView. ->>and that is because Commodore is doing better at selling ->>themselves as a business computer maker. As the software gets better ->>and Commodore becomes more profitable, investment goes up, and the ->>machine gets better. I don't doubt the Amiga will own the small ->>computer market by 1993. ->Oh come on-- Commodore is improving, but own the small computer ->market? Be serious. Quality of the product is not, and never will be ->the determining factor in sales. Seen an IBM or Apple ad lately? Seen ->a Commodore ad? I'll give you a hint, the ten page foldout in Time ->magazine ISN'T the Amiga ad... The Amiga is currently specialized -- ->hackers, graphics and sound people, game players and some other smart ->folks, but not enough. How about an Amiga dealer network? Apple and ->IBM have fiercely loyal dealers all over the place. Commodore? A few ->dedicated dealers who do a LOT of business (SOMEONE has to be selling ->those 600,000 machines!) -> -- Jim Reich -> cthulhu@athena I am serious. First off, there are, by some estimations, over 7 million Commodore 64s out in the world. This is the largest single manufacturer installed base (that's larger than Apple's Apple II line, and while there are more IBM-PCs (approx 10 million in the 8bit class) they are from several manufacturers). This demonstrates a) Commodore's ability to manufacturer *many* machines economically, and b) that there are sufficient channels in place to sell them. Secondly, as the Amiga matures it offers features above and beyond what the original Mac and Mac plus could offer. It *will* have more pixels on the screen standard (702 X 512 non interlaced) offers a multitasking OS now, faster speed, lower cost, and equivalent software, and you can do desktop video on it. Apple and PC/AT clones cannot compete against that at the same price, the architecture decisions they made were wrong. (Hindsight is 20/20 no?) [I am not including the Mac II ok? That's out of the 'small' computer market.] So take the following scenario : The Amiga installed base passes 1 million by 1 Jan '89 and two million by 1 Jan '90. Given the current rate of sales for the Mac that means it will exceed the Macintosh installed base in the middle of 1990 at 2.5 million units. The original PC is practically history now, with all new sales going to the AT and 386 clones. So by 1990 if you buy a home computer, it's probably a Commodore. If you want something that you can use PC programs on you get the 286 bridge card in a 2000 or some other product that is essentially a 500 with a bridge card interface. The Apple IIGS is no threat, neither are 8088 based PC's, Atari's, or 68000 based Mac's. So Commodore owns the home/small computer market. Apple concentrates on the Mac II and maybe a cost reduced Mac. IBM concentrates on the PS/2 Model 50 and above. Atari sells Transputer and '030 boxes for a while. The clone manufacturers try to produce PS/2's and get squashed by IBM. Tandy sells the PS/2 clone but can't offer the packages that run on an Amiga. (Desktop video, great games, animation software) The $3K - $10K market will be much more jumbled since there is no clear leader even today. But that's what makes it interesting no? (Marketing analysis and extrapolation is tricky at best, there are many assumptions in the above some obvious and some not, like the assumption that *relative* prices will stay the same and there will be no new home computer makers in the market. So take it for what it is, an educated guess at what the world will be like in 3 years.) --Chuck McManis uucp: {anywhere}!sun!cmcmanis BIX: cmcmanis ARPAnet: cmcmanis@sun.com These opinions are my own and no one elses, but you knew that didn't you.