federico@actisb.UUCP (Federico Heinz) (03/22/88)
I'm just back from the Hannover Faire (in fact I've slept a couple of hours, the trip from Berlin on bus is MURDER), where I took a looong look at the Atari stand. There were some hardware novelties for the ST: an MS-DOS expansion board, a big display, an LCD screen... The MS-DOS board is called SUPERCHARGER, and consists of an 8086 system complete with 1MB RAM. It connects to the ST through the DMA port, and uses the ST's keyboard, floppy and screen (emulating CGA even in monochrome mode). They didn't have a production unit there, just a couple of prototypes that didn't pass the DMA bus through, but one of the developers (who was sitting there) said that the units that get shipped will do it (and recognize the HD too). Price is about DM 700, shipping should start in a couple of months (Real Soon Now??). The big screen looked also like a prototype (you know... cables scattered around, recently soldered open cable plugs...). It looked great too. I don't quite remember the figures, and am stupid enough as to forget the brochure at home, but it was far over 1K x 1K pixels, 66Hz, and a very nice steady picture. It connects to the Mega's expansion bus, and seems to be able to work together with the normal monitor (the machine I saw seemed to be driving both simultaneously, but in computer shows you never know). They listed some software that can use it (not more that 5 titles), and announced that they're working on a GEM driver. I also saw the Transputer machine. I didn't quite understand the setup, all the Transputer boxes seemed to need a Mega at the side (maybe as a front-end? sounds presumptuous). Unfortunately, all I can report about this machine is that it can display a photo of a bra-less blondine (it can display it even twice, side-by-side, with a color ball bouncing back and forth between both pictures!!!). Jokes aside, the graphics are astounding, but then all the graphics displays in the Faire were incredible (and about 80% of them were busy displaying this very same blondine and travelling a "magnifiyng glass" though her breasts. No kidding! At least Atari didn't have the magnifying glass). Aside from that (and some ray-tracing animation demos, but we all know that's not real time), I didn't see software, neither good or bad, for this machine. On ST software, there was RTX, ray-tracing, tons of Desktop Publishing stuff (I've given up trying to understand what DTP really is, I just beleive in it), database, CAD, games, SmallTalk, music, and then some. One sub-booth caught my eye with a ballpen-written chart announcing Turbo-C for the AtariST. They promise PC-Turbo-C compatibility, no limits on program or data size (arrays must be <= 32767 elements), and full GEM/TOS integration. The price seemed right (around the DM 200), and the benchmarks were impressing, for what they're worth. It seemed to be quite a new product, but has anyone out there used it? If yes, would you care to comment? Of course there were the PCompatibles, but I won't bore you. I did not, repeat NOT, see the 68030 box, nor was anybody willing to talk to me about it (but then I don't look like someone who's going to spend thousands of dollars. I think I need a haircut and a new suit). The only trace of it's existence was a job offer pasted on the wall in the darkest corner of the booth, very well concealed from view, asking for unix wizards for a 68030 product. All in all, the whole Faire was pretty boring. Everything was either bigger or smaller or faster or more colorfull, but I didn't see anything strikingly new. On the plus side of the ST department, I liked to see that the first products using the Mega expansion bus are getting out, and that there's plenty of good hackers doing marvels with the machine. DISCLAIMER: I can report only on what I saw, and I may have missed a lot. I have tried to be accurate, but my biases are clear (I love my Mega despite all). Half the words in this article are probably TM by somebody. This are my very own dear opinions, not anybody else's, and on second thought I'm starting to doubt them too. By the way, don't get too irritated by the hopefully ironical writing style. It's not meant to hurt anybody, it's just a bad habit of a bad writer trying to express himself in the wrong language (my mother-language is Spanish). -- Federico Heinz "In Dubio Pro Libido" BIX: fheinz | Beusselstr. 21 UUCP: ...!unido!tub!actisb!federico | 1000 Berlin 21 Tel: (030) 396 77 92 | F.R. Germany.