Path: utzoo!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!mailrus!cs.utexas.edu!usc!brutus.cs.uiuc.edu!apple!oliveb!amiga!cbmvax!daveh
From: daveh@cbmvax.commodore.com (Dave Haynie)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.amiga
Subject: Re: A new Amiga from Japan?
Message-ID: <9305@cbmvax.commodore.com>
Date: 11 Jan 90 22:57:58 GMT
References: <5351@tekig5.PEN.TEK.COM>
Organization: Commodore, West Chester, PA
Lines: 36

in article <5351@tekig5.PEN.TEK.COM>, waynekn@tekig5.PEN.TEK.COM (Wayne Knapp) says:
> Keywords: FM Towns

> However, there are several multi-tasking solutions for 80386 machines,
> and the 80386 hardware is more suited for mult-tasking than plain 68000.

80386 hardware is more suited toward UNIX and memory protection than a
plain 68000; built in MMU and support for virtual memory both help.  
However, they multitask equally well.

> Multi-taking is most likely going to be standard on every machine in a 
> few years so I don't see too much problem in this area.  I still think
> the FM Towns is very impressive.

It sounds quite interesting, but then again, so was the MindSet.  If the
cool video stuff isn't compatible with a PC hardware-based video standard,
such as VGA, EGA, etc, then the machine may have problems doing well
outside of niche stuff.  Unless it can support TIGA, which seems to be
a pretty good standard that's at least in part software based.  And
unless they've been _extremely_ clever, any VGA/EGA compatibility may
the speed of the video display.  The only fast video I've ever seen on
any PC (sufficient for anything other than blocky animation) has been
on some of the higher power graphics cards based around TI graphics chips.

This is one place I think the Amiga had an advantage by being different 
-- it wasn't even remotely an MS-DOS machine, so folks took it for what it 
was.  And even then it took a long time to get some serious software.
This machine is going to be dismissed as a slow '386 machine and not given
a serious look by most folks if they're not very careful about showing
off it's nonstandard features.

>                                         Wayne Knapp
-- 
Dave Haynie Commodore-Amiga (Systems Engineering) "The Crew That Never Rests"
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                    Too much of everything is just enough