[comp.sys.misc] 68k Wars

bobmon@iuvax.UUCP (02/08/87)

Seemingly the biggest question in Netland is "Which is truly superior?  The
Amiga, Mac, or Atari?"  However, this question cannot be answered, because
it is the *wrong question*.  The correct question is
"_Who_ is truly superior?  The Amiga, Mac or Atari _owner_?"

Some recent postings provide insight.  They were cross-posted, apparently for
no particular reason but really to allow psychological analyses.

  the Subject:
       Re: Minor historical point: the origin of ms-dos
  sent to Newsgroups:
       comp.sys.amiga,comp.sys.mac,comp.sys.m68k,comp.sys.ibm.pc

>The success of IBM is not particuarily due to their products, from a
>HISTORICAL viewpoint. The success of IBM has to do with their abilities in
>those avenues that attract the customer, marketing - sales - customer support.
>    [ and blahblahblah ]


And this is what came back:


>ralph@ATRP.MEDIA.MIT.EDU (Amiga-Man) writes:
>
>A humble request: Could the discussion of the origin of MS-DOS be
>restricted to the newsgroup "comp.sys.ibm.pc" ? Or even just there
>and in comp.sys.os (or whatever is appropriate ?).


Humility.  Commodore taught them humility.  THEY only run at 7.16MHz,
and their fancy tricks are achieved by *special chips*, the same sort of
technique that distinguished the VIC-20 from the lesser home video games.


sunny@hoptoad.UUCP (Sunny Kirsten) writes:
>Please get all this MS-DOS and Amiga !@#$%^&*( out of comp.sys.mac


Note the almost-controlled hostility and aggressiveness -- over-compensating
for a classic inferiority complex.  The screen is NOT too small, and we'll
SUE anyone who says otherwise!  We were FIRST!  WE'RE the Original!  Us! Us!


ihm@minnie.UUCP (Ian Merritt) writes:
>Why is this discussion on comp.sys.m68k?


A question.  Questioning, always questioning.  No certainties, no constancy.
No standards.  Nothing in common with anyone else.  Not user interfaces, not
disk formats, not hardware busses.  The fastest machine this side of a Cray
may be a 68020, but only if you write your own code.  Fortunately, there is
'C', so code can _easily_ port to any 680x0 machine.  (As easily as anything
*ever* ports between 4.2BSD and SysV, or was that Ultrix and System 7, or
maybe 2.7BSD...?)


No Atari enthusiasts have replied.  They're all out trying to run IBM-PC
emulators faster than IBM PCs.

As for the MS-DOS freeks, they're all repeating and contradicting each other
as usual.  MS-DOS is either an upgrade to CP/M, or a downgrade to RT-11
(or an upgrade to RT-11), or maybe TOPS-10, or TOPS-20.  Meanwhile, everyone
wants to put an 80386 chip onto their motherboard, a 68020 board in any
available slot, and Xenix on their oversized disks.


Send flames directly to my home -- I can't afford to pay my heating bills.
	...Bob "REAL MEN use slide rules!" Montante...