acliu@skat.usc.edu (Alex C. Liu) (05/08/90)
[hello world] After years of having a 128 and drooling of getting an Amiga, I finally went ahead and bough a nice Amiga 2000 system. (Thanks to Commodore's Ed Discount, and thanks to Howard Diamond, for helping me out... :-). Now, the NEXT week my computer arrived, guess what, the A3000 was announced... I guess some of us are meant to drool all their lives! Anyways, after reading all the posts about multitasking with Amiga, I decided to give that a shot. And guess what. It didn't work. I mean, I had my amiga running this neat word processor thingie and that was just fine. But when I tried watching TV at the same time, thigs beginng to be sort of difficult. Then I tried Washing some dishes, and NOGO! Then when I tried doing Aerobics at the same time, thigs were just impossible! In conclusion. Amiga or NO amiga, I cant multatask! (Well, ok, I could type a paper and chew gum at the same time, but I can do that with a lowly C64 too!) :-) :-) :-) :-) :-) :-) :-) :-) :-) :-) :-) :-) :-) :-) :-) :-) :-) :-) :-) ______________________________________________________________________ Alex C. Liu | INTERNET: acliu%skat@usc.edu Voice: (213) 749-2730 | BITNET: acliu@gamera Q-Link: Alejandro | UUCP: ...!usc!acliu
ckp@grebyn.com (Checkpoint Technologies) (05/08/90)
In article <24562@usc.edu> acliu@skat.usc.edu (Alex C. Liu) writes: >Anyways, after reading all the posts about multitasking with Amiga, I >decided to give that a shot. And guess what. It didn't work. I >mean, I had my amiga running this neat word processor thingie and that >was just fine. But when I tried watching TV at the same time, thigs >beginng to be sort of difficult. Then I tried Washing some dishes, >and NOGO! Then when I tried doing Aerobics at the same time, thigs >were just impossible! In conclusion. Amiga or NO amiga, I cant >multatask! Ah, you miss the point. You *were* multi-tasking! You were performing more than one task by dividing your time between the available tasks. This is just what the Amiga does. You perceive the "context switch" (when your attention shifts from one task to the next) to be a hassle, and this is just the way humans work. Computers don't mind; they're designed to be able to shift their "attention" many times per second. Had you been word processing, and doing the dishes in an automatic dishwasher, and doing the laundry (I guess everyone's clothes washer is automatic by now), you would have been demonstrating "co-processing". You spend some time preparing the dishwasher and laundry, but then they function by themselves for a while. You now have more time to word-process because your other tasks are being performed by other processors. The Amiga uses co-processors for graphics and IO, which most programs use. This is why Amiga multi-tasking works just a bit better than most other personal computers. -- First comes the logo: C H E C K P O I N T T E C H N O L O G I E S / / \\ / / Then, the disclaimer: All expressed opinions are, indeed, opinions. \ / o Now for the witty part: I'm pink, therefore, I'm spam! \/