carson@titan.rice.edu (Jim Carson) (01/27/89)
A while back I posted a survey of the Amiga user community on the net.
What follows is a summary of the over 30 replies I received. Thanks
to all of those who responded.
-- Jim Carson
carson@titan.rice.edu
**********************************************************************
I BACKGROUND
a. How experienced do you consider yourself with the Amiga?
EXPERIENCE:
Very -- wrote popular software 6 had amiga > 2 years 10
Fair amount of programming. 4 had amiga > 1 year 4
Some Programming 5 had amiga < 1 year 2
No programming on Amiga 10 did not say 10
b. What kind of hardware do you have? (Some people had more than one system)
Machines:
A1000 17 A/B2000 9 A500 7
Peripherals:
External Memory 18 Extra Floppy 14
Modem 11 Hard Disk 10
Printer 10 Accelerator board 3
Sound/MIDI interface 3 Clock Card 2
Sidecar 2 Digitizer 1
Ethernet Interface 1
c. How much do you use your Amiga? (Some people said "lots", which
I took to mean 2 - 4 hours/day)
> 4 hours a day 10
2 - 4 hours/day 6
1 - 2 hours/day 4
< 1 hour/day 1
d. What are your favorite kinds of programs (games, utilities, etc)?
Games 13
Utilities 9
Compilers/Program Lang 8
Telecommunication 6
Music 5
Demos 4
Editors 3
**********************************************************************
II. HARDWARE
a. Hard Drive/Card
Controllers:
WEDGE 1000; WEDGE 500 ($175-$200) - very good
Bear Products - good ($120 w/o chips)
Commodore 2090; C.Ltd.; Overdrive;- okay
Microbotics HardFrame
Startime - Bad performance
Drives:
Miniscribe; Seagate ST157N, ST277N - okay
Quantum; Rodime; Supra SCSI; GVP Impact; CDC Wren - good
b. Other Permanent Storage (Tape, CD, etc)
SCSI tape is nice for backup. R/W opticals are great for animation
(650MB Sony).
c. Modem
Supra 2400 - Great ($150 for 2400, $70 for 1200)
Hayes - Nice, but expensive.
Trailblazer T2000+; Ventel MD212 - good
Courier 2400; BytCOM 212AD; - okay
Bizcomm Intellimodem EXT; Avatex
1680 - adequate (incompatible w/software)
d. Midi interfaces
ECE MIDI interface, connected to an Ensoniq Mirage keyboard.
Golden Hawk MIDI Gold MIDI interface. - Nice little box, does the job
f. External Disk Drives
A1010. (3.5") - okay
A1020 (5.25") - slow, but good for transferring ibm <-> amiga
California Access - good
Byte by Byte PAL Jr. - nice, but obsolete. Company sucks.
g. Printer
Great:
Epson LQ-800. Nice, but not as good as an Imagewriter on a Mac
C.Itoh C310-xp - Fast (300cps), Very nice NLQ
Panasonic KX-P1090i - Very nice NLQ ($200)
Ok:
Epson LX-800 - cheap, quick with 1.3 drivers, graphics
Howtek PixelMaster color inkjet
IBM Colorjet
Okidata 82A w/Rainbow Tech firmware upgrade
Mannesman-Tally Spirit-80 - Excellent printer 5 years ago, good company.
Marginal quality:
Okimate 20 - cheap printer
Star SG-10 - cheap printer
Epson FX-286 - slow. paper jams incessantly. ugly NLQ.
Citizen msp10 - slow. problems with proportional print & tabs.
h. Monitor
Sony KV1311 - very good
C-A 1080 - good
C-A 2002 - good
NEC Multisync - good
Thompson 4120 - good
C-A 1084 - okay, but crackles
C1702 [modified] - adequate
i. Memory Expansion
INSIDER board (1MB + RT Clock) - great
Spirit, A501 - good
Starboard 2-meg - good
Orphan 4-meg - no recommendations
j. other
Joystick/mouse switch is helpful.
A-time clock - not recommended
TimeSaver: Kludgy, incompatible with a surprising amount of software.
**********************************************************************
III SOFTWARE
a. Applications (Word Processors, Spreadsheets, Compilers, etc)
WORD PROCESSORS/EDITORS:
excellence! ($185)
Manx Z editor.
ProWrite - Good for novices
Publisher Plus, fills in Write & File's gaps, pretty good overall ($65)
Scribble! - OK as a first word processor but lacks some features.
Softwood's Write & File - somewhat buggy but full of features ($65)
TeX - Beautiful implementation of TeX for a GREAT price.
TxED Plus - Good. Very easy to use.
Uedit - "The ultimate." Programmable text editor, fast configurable,
with (optional) spelling checker, ARexx interface.
Word Perfect - Somewhat sluggish, but lots of formatting features.
COMPILERS:
JForth - good
Lattice C 5.0
Manx C 3.60 with SDB - Excellent
MetaCompost assem - fair to bad
TDI Modula-2 - Lots of complaints about this one. Called "the worst
investment of $200..."
MISCELLANEOUS:
ARexx - Great idea!
ATalk III - okay
Diga! - Lots of potential, though the current version is buggy and
there doesn't seem to be an update in sight.
DBWrender 1.0 - used to make Tychoid, winner of the "Best Graphics"
category at the 1988 Killer Demo Contest.
Deluxe Paint II - good
DMCS - good for scoring songs on a synthesizer attached via MIDI.
Galileo - Great!
Handshake 2.12a - a great VT52,102,220 terminal program. (shareware)
Ispell2 - PD spelling checker
MSS Online! - nice, but kermit xfers don't work.
OnLine 2.0 - okay
PowerWindows - Excellent for making gadgets, menus, windows. ($60).
Sculpt-Animate 3D - Slow but powerful raytracing & animation ($150)
SoundScape 1.4 & Utilities
b. ENTERTAINMENT (Arcade games, adventure games, screen hacks, etc)
Arctic Fox - Not as good as the AT version.
Bard's Tale - A cute and addictive game.
Boulder Dash - nicely done
Crystal Hammer - okay
Dungeon Master - Great (despite it taking over the machine)
Earl Weaver Baseball - Excellent.
Empire - very good
F/A 18 - Great
Ferarri Formula One - okay
Hack - great pd game
Halley Project - crippleware
Interceptor
Infocom titles [over 10] - very good
Jet - good
Leisure Suit Larry (pseudo-crippleware)
Portal (mega-crippleware... avoid at all costs!)
Larn (freeware; superior programming)
Marble Madness
Mean 18 - okay, graphics leave much to be desired.
NetHack (freeware; very good)
Obliterator - good value
Phantasie I & III - a little buggy, but good
Rockford - fair. It would be better if it had about 4x the levels
Reach For the Stars - good.
Scrabble - okay
Shanghai - good
Sword of Sodan - good.
Three Stooges (nyuk nyuk nyuk) - okay
Tracers - "most playable game available" (according to the author :-)
TV Sports Football - Excellent.
Ultima II & IV - Okay. They pale next to Dungeon Master.
VYPER -- great arcade style shoot-em-up
Winnie the Pooh (for the kids) - okay
c. Utilities (floppy accelerators, screen savers, etc)
Great:
Anything by Matt Dillon Hotkey
Arc PopCLI
Blank Sectorama
Browser SetBeep
ConMan SnipIt
Dave Wecker's Vt100 emulator VirusX
FACC II WKeys
FastFonts WShell
GOMF Zoo
**********************************************************************
IV VENDORS (portions taken from replies)
Abel - I had a *BAD* experience with Abel Supply. They got me my order
but it was months (yes I said, "months") after I ordered it. That was
the only order I placed at Abel.
Briwall - They handle software for other machines besides the Amiga,
so I had to explain "GOMF" to the person on the phone.
All pieces came separately, still haven't gotten GOMF after a month. But
the prices are pretty good. To their credit, they did not bill my Visa
account until the individual items went out the door.
- Good prices and quick response.
C.Ltd - very helpful when I messed up my HD.
Compunik (L.A.) : Have the latest wares & every type of prgs. Honest service.
Computability - The guy on the phone had an Amiga, and was very familier
with the products avalilable. He checked the availability of the software
without me asking, and had me repeat the order to make sure he got it
right. That demonstrates alot of care, and I expect to be dealing with
them again.
Computer Mail Order - No significant problems.
- Prompt delivery, low price for A2000
- I bought my 2000 and printer from Computer Mail
Order. Service was good, the prices were not. The folks I dealt with knew
nothing about the Amiga, but they are good at processing orders. I had my
machine within days of closing the deal.
Creative Computers (in Los Angeles) is a good mail order company
Gamemanship (South Coast Plaza Mall in Westminster, CA) - a plethora of
the latest games. A place to go at least once a month.
Go Amigo - No significant problems.
- Good prices and quick response.
HT Electronics (Silicon Valley area) is really good.
Interstel - good support for software
LightSpeed - My favorite. Their prices are okay, but its that fact that
they seem to know something about the Amiga, that keeps me coming back.
Lyco - No significant problems.
Mac/PC Connection. (no Amiga specific products) great reputation, great prices.
Microbotics (Texas) - Good.
- never did do much to get that startime working.
Pacific Peripherals - The guy I talked to seem to know something about
the hardware and software, but not about technical support. Not too
good with people. I haven't seen any software updates arrive in my
mailbox. Though I did get an update from a network acquaintance who
was leaning on the PP tech staff.
Safe Harbor (WI) - a small but dedicated (and reasonably priced) mail
order firm. Great service, great prices, 800-number for ordering and a
PC-Pursuitable free BBS. Highly recommended.
Software Etc . (L.A.) : usually try to be smart but know squat about
what they are talking about = atitude problem .
Software Supermarket. Local shop, competitive prices -- 20% off list,
very good product selection)
SOS Computers (L.A.) : I hate the place . they just want your $$$
TEVEX - good mail order outfit; good prices
- I've had good dealings with Tevex.
The Memory Location (Wellesley, MA). They support only Commodore products,
and have great inventory, and software prices that rival mail order.
WordPerfect support is probably the best in the industry.
SPECIFIC INDIVIDUALS (since, as we all know, not all people are shining
examples to the world, nor even representative of their own company;
these people _make_ the vendors worth patronizing)
Dave Allen at RSI (makers of the WEDGE) - a level of support beyond
the normal bounds
Troy Donahue at Spirit Tech. - very helpful in correcting my screwups
Brian Groves at EarthRise MicroSystems (Columbus C-A dealer) -
very knowledgable and helpful
CATS (and all other C-A personnel on the 'net) - for *lots* of help
**********************************************************************
V. Anything else you think is important
I wish Commodore quality control was better. (Trouble w/A500)
Yes. I will never again buy badly-behaved software. If I can't run
it from my workbench it goes back to the dealer.
A personal opinion: I hate anything that I cannot back up, and will do
everything possible to avoid such software. I like to keep my master
diskettes in a nice safe place where I never touch them.
Lots of awesome public-domain software, and I don't know where
I'd be without comp.*.amiga. Also, Amiga Transactor is a fine
magazine.
**********************************************************************
Jim Carson Department of Computer Science
carson@titan.rice.edu Rice University
.!{uw-beaver,husc6}!rice!titan!carson Houston, TX 77252