pcr@genrad.com (Perry Rothermel) (06/08/89)
I understand that Commodore has discontinued the 128D and in the near future will stop making the 64C. Is this true? Any comments from anybody at Commodore? I don't mean to spred any rumours, but talking to other sources, I believe this may be true. With this I also understand that Berkeley Softworks has also stopped developing any new GEO64 & GEO128 products.
dan.eagleton@canremote.uucp (DAN EAGLETON) (06/12/89)
From what I have read, it sounds like Commodore will continute makin the 64 as long as there is a demmand for it. The C128 and 128D were discontinued because of the price involved to incorporate three differenct systems into one. IE: The 64 and 128 plus the Z80 chip for CP/M. Any other rumors you want to share? Later - Dan Eagleton Co-Sysop CONNECTed II 'THE BBS' - Peterborough, Ontario * QNet 1.03a2: CONNECTed II 'THE BBS' - Peterborough, Can. (705) 743-7296.
gary.farmaner@canremote.uucp (GARY FARMANER) (06/13/89)
Perry, Clearly, there is some effort to kill the C128D and 64C from non-Commodore sources. For some reason this rumour is racing around North America. It has ZERO basis in fact. People stop purchasing machines when they hear they'll be discontinued, thus spreading a rumour can be factor. Recently, Word Perfect Corporation dropped a bombshell on CompuServe which claimed that only 300,000 Amigas had been sold in North America. That their product (a commercial word processor) had reached saturation levels, and that they would no longer develop new products for the Amiga (originally, they were going to abandon the word processor as well). Clearly, the Amiga has not sold anywhere near the numbers its power is dictating. C64s continue to be purchased is large numbers. C64 owners continue to upgrade to C128s (two reader surveys in the last year indicated that more C64 owners plan to upgrade to a C128, than the Amiga). If the C64 and C128 were out of the way, then theoretically more Amigas would be sold. I beleive that some Amiga owners, or developpers are attempting to sabotage the Commodore 8-bits to boost the Amiga's fortunes. And persistant rumours are an excellent way to do it. Don't beleive rumour, get the facts. Phone Commodore and ask. Gary --- * Via ProDoor 2.9a
gary.farmaner@canremote.uucp (GARY FARMANER) (06/13/89)
Dan, Although not a certainty, Commodore CANADA has supposedly stopped selling the C128D. They way overpriced it anyway, so it's not suprising it wasn't selling (a system was only $100 less than an A500). The C128D continues to be sold, and supported in the US. Where a decent system (monochrome) can be bought for less than $500! That is, less than the A500 alone. Gary --- * Via ProDoor 2.9a
brendan@jolnet.ORPK.IL.US (Brendan Kehoe) (06/13/89)
pcr@genrad.com (Perry Rothermel) wrote in comp.sys.cbm: >I understand that Commodore has discontinued the 128D and in the near future > will stop making the 64C. I just read on a BBS about 2 hours ago the exact same thing, save for no mention of the 64C (that'd be shooting themselves in the foot, as well as a few hundred software houses). The poster on the BBS said that the reason behind this action was the many problems people have been having with them. So why the HELL didn't they stick with the 128?? (Soapbox time) Instead of trying to look like a PC, they should've stuck with the original 128 design. They could've easily made the 128D precisely what I'm typing on now (the "old" 128) by putting in the rom & vdc ram upgrades. I've used both machines, and having a 1571 *always* there is a PAIN in the ass. Cancelling the entire 128 line is NOT a way to fix an original screwup. For chrissakes, there was NOTHING irreparably wrong with the original 128. Why does the same thought keep popping up in my head: BUSINESS machines? After selling over 13 millioon 64's and 128's, they're just now deciding to go with the Colt, PC-ad nauseams, and pump up the Amiga line? Come on guys..that's like a 5-and-10 suddenly turning into Tiffany's because they saw that they could get more money faster with less people bitching about problems. Of course, if this rumor is FALSE, then I've just made a complete ass of myself and must accept any flames a due course. (Sheesh) Well, that's my four-dollars worth. -- Brendan Kehoe brendan@cup.portal.com | GEnie: B.KEHOE | Oh no! I forgot to say goodbye brendan@chinet.chi.il.us | CI$: 71750,2501 | to my mind! brendan@jolnet.orpk.il.us | Galaxy: Brendan | - Abby Normal
elg@killer.DALLAS.TX.US (Eric Green) (06/14/89)
in article <919@jolnet.ORPK.IL.US>, brendan@jolnet.ORPK.IL.US (Brendan Kehoe) says: > > pcr@genrad.com (Perry Rothermel) wrote in comp.sys.cbm: > >>I understand that Commodore has discontinued the 128D and in the near future >> will stop making the 64C. > > I just read on a BBS about 2 hours ago the exact same thing, save for no > mention of the 64C (that'd be shooting themselves in the foot, as well as a > few hundred software houses). See this bi-month's issue of Info Magazine for more (mis?) information about this. The 128D is gone, apparently. They're still trying to figure out what to do with the 64C. Sales are adequate but slowly winding down. A mysterious "they" figures that next Christmas will be the 64's last hurrah. I wonder if this ties in with the rumors about CBM trying to make an ultra-low-cost Amiga-based video game? (further rumors rumored that the effort was a failure, but... that's the fun with rumors, you never know which way is up!). > So why the HELL didn't they stick with the 128?? In a word: cost. The moment Commodore introduced the Amiga 500, I stood up before a user group and announced that the 128 would be discontinued within a year. My reasoning was that I could get a 500 for little more than a 128+1571 costed, and people wanting to upgrade from the 64 would see the 500 as the next logical step, instead of the 128. I was frighteningly close to correct -- I think I was two months early on the demise of the original ("flat") 128. The other word is even more frightening: distribution. Many mass marketers stopped carrying the 128 because sales of home computers didn't justify the shelf space they were dedicating. For example, at one local mass marketer, what was once two facing 6' rows plus a half-row of floppy diskettes has become one-and-a-half rows and an endrack for the diskettes. The 128 and 1571 were the first victims. > 13 millioon 64's and 128's, they're just now deciding to go with the Colt, > PC-ad nauseams, and pump up the Amiga line? Come on guys..that's like a > 5-and-10 suddenly turning into Tiffany's because they saw that they could > get more money faster with less people bitching about problems. The 128 has a large circuit board, and is a complex machine. It is simply an expensive machine to make. The only thing that keeps the Amiga 500 more expensive, at the current time, is the cost of RAM -- the circuit board is about 1 foot by 8 inches, and the cost of the A1000 custom chips was amortized long ago (and they are in old, very cheap technology, something like 2.5 micron NMOS). Commodore has sold over 500,000 A500s, mostly to games players in Europe it seems. That pretty well skorches one of the major markets for the 128, now that the Europeans have moved beyond CP/M into the clone and MS-DOS world (thus flushing the 128 out of what little niche it had in the business world). -- Eric Lee Green P.O. Box 92191, Lafayette, LA 70509 ..!{ames,decwrl,mit-eddie,osu-cis}!killer!elg (318)989-9849 "I have seen or heard 'designer of the 68000' attached to so many names that I can only guess that the 68000 was produced by Cecil B. DeMille." -- Bcase