Path: utzoo!utgpu!water!watmath!clyde!att!osu-cis!tut.cis.ohio-state.edu!mailrus!ames!vsi1!altnet!uunet!super!rminnich From: rminnich@super.ORG (Ronald G Minnich) Newsgroups: comp.sys.amiga Subject: amiga on a mac ii budget- the sequel Message-ID: <575@super.ORG> Date: 29 Jul 88 19:34:18 GMT Sender: uucp@super.ORG Reply-To: rminnich@super.UUCP (Ronald G Minnich) Organization: Supercomputing Research Center, Lanham, Md. Lines: 110 I got a number of good replies on the 'amiga on a mac ii budget' question. Thanks to all of you. -------------------------------------------------- Dave Haynie writes: The flickerFixer will get you slightly above the Mac II's pixel resolution, if not quite up to the number of colors you can get at once with a Mac II. The display is just as good, sharpness-wise and all. While we're spending as much as a Mac II, why not get as much power. There are a number of 68020 and 68030 boards for the A2000 CPU slot. One of these should certainly fit in that budget range. I'd certainly recommend the Commodore-Amiga A2620 board, but that's not yet out in the US yet, so if you were buying one today you'd probably go with CSA or Hurricane. In the area of hard disks, you're already ahead. Any DMA driven hard disk for the Amiga, in combination with the FastFileSystem you get with V1.3 of the OS, is noticably faster than a Mac II's hard drive. Even slightly more so with a 32 bit board in place. -------------------------------------------------- From: Eric Lavitsky Lessee - Mac II budget == $6,000+ (for a reasonable system) So - A2000 + 2nd floppy == ~1500 Flicker Fixer == ~ 550 Monitor == ~ 600 Wow - easily a 200 Meg hard disk on top of that (~1500), a 68020 board (CBM's) and some software. Also, you'd have to include some network card to meet what the Mac II can do - so let's say an Ethernet card as well. I'd also recommend a different monitor - perhaps a Sony 1302 or the new 16" PGS multiscan monitor... Yes, you heard me right - Princeton Graphics has just released a 16" multiscan RGB monitor that scans at the low end at 15Khz !!! (just right for the 15.75 that the Amiga needs for it's standard signal). If the quality of the picture is anything near as good as the current 12-13" PGS monitor, it should be fantastic. It retails for $1375 ... -------------------------------------------------- From: Chuck McManis Well a Mac II budget (for a complete system including keyboard) is about $10,000. I would get the following An Amiga 2000 with an 8Meg board populated with 2Meg ($2500) A Zenith FTM monitor and a FlickerFixer ($1000) A Commodore 2090{a} and 100Meg Connors hard disk ($1400) A 6 month $2500 Certificate of Deposit, so that I could get the C/A '020 board. An HP LaserJet II laser printer with full RAM ($2000) And that would leave me $500 to by Interceptor, StarGlider II, Empire, Bard's Tale II, Ports of Call, Flight Simulator II, Arexx, and TxEd+. -------------------------- X-Possible-Reply-Path: Arved@cup.portal.com X-Possible-Reply-Path: sun!portal!cup.portal.com!Arved What do you mean by "make up for the mac ii's superior display?" I use an Amiga 2000 with a Sony MultiScan monitor (the CDP 1302, identical internals to the MAC ][ color monitor), and have something like 712x512 pixels usable (through the PD program MOREROWS, which increases the display from 640x 480 up to this value. The only "lack" of display clarity arises from the use of 2-pixel wide fonts rather than the MACs standard 1-pixel wide font. Since the Amiga's fonts are held in relatively simple files, and the DOS includes a font editor (as well a a simple icon editor), you can make the Amiga fonts >>>JUST<<< as good as you want them. I had been working on a set of one-pixel wide fonts, but the promise of soon t be released upgrades to the OS including postscript screen fonts has let procrastination take it's course. The only reason I could see to get a MAC ][ is compatibility with some MA software (if you have any, this may be a concern), and the availability of UNI on the MAC ][. Commodore has promised UNIX, but is realistically at least a year away. -------------------------------------------------- From: Pete Ashdown "What I Would Get" - By Pete Ashdown Amiga 2000 - $1400 Flicker Fixer - $500 Sony Multisync Monitor - $600 NewTek's Video Toaster (Genlock, Frame Buffer, Frame Capture, Digital Effects and a whole lot more) - $800 SCSI Interface - $150 300 Meg Internal SCSI Hard Drive - $2000 Removable 40 Meg Cartridge Hard Drive - $1200 Which comes to roughly $6650. Roughly the price of a Mac II system with an 80 meg hard drive, Apple's monitor, and NOTHING ELSE. I suppose you could mix and match the 40 meg cartridge drive with memory expansions. I'd probably take the board by Microbotics that allows you to use up to 8 Megs of SIMM chips. Beyond that, you aren't taking the cost of Amiga software vs. the cost of Mac II software. For example: Photon Paint Amiga - $70.00 Photon Paint Mac II - $300.00 Don't ask me why the Mac's software is so overpriced. I've heard (and read) rumors that Apple demands that manufacturers charge bloated prices for their products (I don't think that is the _exact_ words of Apple though). I mean, look at the cost of the //GS vs. an Amiga 500. Then look at what you are getting in comparison. -------------------------------------------------- The point is clear: You can get a better machine than the MAC II for a LOT less money. Thanks to all who wrote. ron