Path: utzoo!attcan!uunet!portal!cup.portal.com!Xorg
From: Xorg@cup.portal.com (Peter Ted Szymonik)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.atari.st
Subject: Atari at Comdex
Message-ID: <11426@cup.portal.com>
Date: 17 Nov 88 14:37:01 GMT
Distribution: na
Organization: The Portal System (TM)
Lines: 79

FROM COMPUSERVE:

Dateline: Las Vegas, NV   November 15, 1988

Good News and Bad News from the Gold Room (Atari's full room
                                                   display).

Bad News:

1.  Effective 10am 11/15 GFA has dropped MichTron to seek a new
    US distributor or start its own.  [I surmise that GFA had no
    idea how lucky they were and made the mistake of assuming
    that the bigger US market was being inadequately serviced by
    MichTron!<dgg>]  Dave Small was approached by GFA and
    declined to pick up the distributorship.

2.  No Atari 68030 box was shown.

3.  Supra management reports that they are focusing their
    development time and efforts on the Amiga due to the strong
    support they get there, vs. the lack of support from Atari.

4.  The "laptop" is still in breadboard and designer's model
    stages.

5.  Many of the developers are in a mood of gloom and dismay.

That's the bad news.  In the main, it is discouraging but NOT
fatal, and the following Good News does tend to mitigate some of
the problems.

Good News:

1.  Atari is holding a special developers conference tonight
    (11/16) at 6pm (8pm EST).  No one has been advised of the
    topic(s) or of the reasons for the meeting, so some positive
    surprises could be in the works.

2.  The Atari booth is _loaded_ with developers and products
    which will be focused on in a subsequent report.

3.  Although the "laptop" is a mere prototype at this moment,
    Atari is targeting release of a whole laptop line with
    production runs starting in 2-3 months.  The model has a
    nearly ST sized keyboard, will have a blue LCD screen
    (optionally backlit), a built-in track-ball mouse controler,
    built-in 3.5" floppy (half meg with optional full meg
    drive), and "at least 20 meg of HD" and 520 and 1040 RAM
    options.  The target price will be US$1,500.

4.  The ATW (nee ABAQ) ATari Work station was shown.  It should
    be in production fairly soon.

5.  MichTron is replacing GFA Basic with Hi-Soft Basic effective
    yesterday morning.  Hi-Soft Basic is extremely polished,
    fast, and complete.  It is Microsoft Compatible but also
    allows labeling [and procedures?] and directly portable
    to/from Amiga as well as MS-DOS machines.  It has a great
    compiler and doesn't require manual translation.

6.  Supra has completed a $149.95 suggested retail 2400b
    internal modem for IBM machines and is considering doing one
    for the MEGA ST's.

7.  Sam Tramiel has apologized for not responding to the many
    Emails and messages since his CO.  In an unusual move to
    show his good faith with the existing user base, he has
    announced _official_ online affiliation with CIS and the
    Atari Fora, and a direct EasyPlex line to Sig and him will
    be operational shortly.  He reaffirmed his desire to hold
    more CO's with our users and seems to recognize that we are
    a potent and strongly pro-Atari force!

The "goods" seem to outnumber the "bads" and tonight's
conference with the developers in Las Vegas should bring more news
of note.  It will be posted here as soon as we have it.

*** Overheard in passing Sam T. to Sandy Small, "Well, it looks
like we will have a laptop MAC before Apple does!" ***