Path: utzoo!attcan!uunet!husc6!bloom-beacon!apple!bionet!agate!helios.ee.lbl.gov!lll-tis!oodis01!uplherc!sp7040!obie!wes
From: wes@obie.UUCP (Barnacle Wes)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.atari.st
Subject: Re: NeXT announcement (was Re: Atari Workstation)
Summary: Yep, yer sure right!
Message-ID: <249@obie.UUCP>
Date: 3 Nov 88 06:16:45 GMT
References: <1449@wayback.UUCP> <6528@pyr.gatech.EDU> <10019@cup.portal.com> <3364@hubcap.UUCP>
Organization: the Well of Souls
Lines: 36

In article <234@obie.UUCP>, I wrote:
> [...]  In last week's
> _InfoWorld_, Cringely lists it as having a 25 Mhz 68030 for the main
> processor, [...] for (ta da!) $1995.

In article <3364@hubcap.UUCP>, rchampe@hubcap.UUCP (Richard Champeaux) writes:
|     Isn't the 25MHz 68030 still in the $400-$600 range?   The 56000 probably
| isn't cheap yet either, and the 2 Meg of memory is going to cost a couple of
| hundred.  That's already a sizeable chunk of $1995 and doesn't leave much
| for development and profit.  Of course, I haven't heard anything mentioned
| about a cache or virtual memory.

The 68030 has an on-chip instruction cache (external cache, ala the
intel cache controller chip, etc, not needed).  The MMU, supporting
demand-paged virtual, is also on the chip.  You get all this for free,
merely for the price of a 68030.  The prices you mention are, of course,
quantity one prices.  Imagine HOW MANY of them Atari would be buying,
and think BIG DISCOUNT.

| If that's the case, I suppose you could
| slap something together rather cheaply, but it certainly wouldn't be a
| high powered workstation.  I'm not sure I'd call it anything more than a
| high powered personal computer.

Opened up your ST lately?  Did you realize that not counting RAM chips
on either machine, the 520ST has fewer chips than a C64?  Yah, I think
Atari MIGHT be able to stick something like this together for around 2K.
Of course, it will need a LOT more memory, and a fair amount of disk
space, to be truly usable.  Can you imagine System V.3 running from a
floppy?  Most floppies don't have enough room to fit the V.3 kernel!

-- 
"The whole problem with the world is that fools and fanatics are always so
certain of themselves, but wiser people so full of doubts." - Bertrand Russell

"How come he didn't put `I think' at the end of it?" - James P. Hogan