jkh@bambam.pcs.com (Jordan K. Hubbard) (10/25/90)
Whoa, whoa, whooooaa Nelly.. First off, there is a certain type of elitism among many 2000 owners that offends me, usually expressed in terms of "If you wanted a *real* Amiga, you should have purchased a 2000 and not that toy 500)." Now while this sort of thing was confined casual remarks in certain computer stores and on the net, it was nothing more than a petty irritation. Recent remarks by someone actually suggesting that the A500 folks should be screwed further into the ground, however, are going a bit too far and I feel compelled to toss in my two cents. While I may be far in the minority, I purchased an A500 as an already established Unix developer (with several Unix workstations at home) who was merely curious as to what all this "Amiga" hooplah was about. The A500 was cheap enough to qualify as an "experiment" for me, whereas the 2000 was not. I'm sure that many people (while not necessarily already computer professionals) also purchased 500's for the same reason: It was a cheap way of finding out whether or not the Amiga had anything significant to offer. Now, of course, I have become quite enamoured with the machine and wish that I *had* bought the 2000, but that's simply hindsight. What I have is about $1500 already invested in the A500 platform that I don't particularly care to throw away. Rather than buy a 2000 at this point, I'm more inclined to just wait and get a 3000 once all the bugs are worked out. There are also, I am fairly sure, a lot of other 500 owners out there who probably will eventually buy the latest hardware anyway: Why penalize them for testing the waters first? How many MacII owners started with an AppleII computer as well? Raise your hands. Despite the fact that I'll eventually have a 3000, I'd still like to make something usable out of my 500, and I feel that Commodore has more-or-less abandoned the A500 folks. They're certainly happy enough to market them as aggressively as ever, but have they offered any additional peripherals? Nooooo. If the A590 is the best that they can manage, we're in deep doo-doo. As it is, I'm left to scan the peripheral company adds anxiously hoping to see the words "A500 model" buried somewhere amidst the 1001 other offerings for the 2000. When it comes to memory, HD's or processor cards, the 2000 folks have it made. The A500 folks are considerably less lucky. We bought it, and Commodore was happy enough to take our money, but now we're out to sea. This sucks. DEC realized long ago that peripheral sales were where the real money was at. Commodore seems content to leave almost the entire area of such sales to third parties who are making big $$$ on it. Doesn't Commodore have any responsibility to its shareholders? If SUN or DEC offered up their underbelly on something like this, the stockholders would scream blue murder. I realize that these views may come across as a bit strong, but I really do get the distinct feeling that while Commodore will be perfectly happy to sell another half million A500's, they're going to be putting all the design effort into their 2000 and 3000 lines. This can't help but seem like robbing the masses to help the elite (not that the "masses" are all that poor either! All those pennies add up). Jordan
smp@myamiga.UUCP (Steve Palm) (10/27/90)
In article <JKH.90Oct25161356@bambam.pcs.com>, jkh@bambam.pcs.com writes:
JKH> Despite the fact that I'll eventually have a 3000, I'd still like to
JKH> make something usable out of my 500, and I feel that Commodore has
JKH> more-or-less abandoned the A500 folks. They're certainly happy enough
JKH> to market them as aggressively as ever, but have they offered any
JKH> additional peripherals? Nooooo. If the A590 is the best that they can
JKH> manage, we're in deep doo-doo. As it is, I'm left to scan the
JKH> peripheral company adds anxiously hoping to see the words "A500 model"
JKH> buried somewhere amidst the 1001 other offerings for the 2000. When it
JKH> comes to memory, HD's or processor cards, the 2000 folks have it made.
JKH> The A500 folks are considerably less lucky. We bought it, and
JKH> Commodore was happy enough to take our money, but now we're out to
JKH> sea. This sucks.
I agree with your point that 'most' folks who have A2000 class machines or
greater tend to look down on the A500 owners. I don't, however, think you
are looking at ALL sides of the issue.
When you purchase an A500 these days you get FED-EX pickup for warranty
work, with an 800 number to call for help to boot. What do you get in this
respect to the A2000? Nada. I live at least 200 miles from the nearest
dealer, so the two trips I've had to make for warranty repairs to date have
been expensive, and these both within the three months I've had it!
While I agree that the A500 needs to be better supported as part of the
Amiga family, I don't agree that you have been left 'in the cold.'
--
/// AMIGA: | Steve Palm, Sysop of FidoNet node 1:11/16
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\XX/ MIND |_________________________________________________________ jkh@bambam.pcs.com (Jordan K. Hubbard) (10/30/90)
In article <83.2728F590@myamiga.UUCP> smp@myamiga.UUCP (Steve Palm) writes: > I agree with your point that 'most' folks who have A2000 class machines or > greater tend to look down on the A500 owners. I don't, however, think you > are looking at ALL sides of the issue. > When you purchase an A500 these days you get FED-EX pickup for warranty > work, with an 800 number to call for help to boot. What do you get in this Whoa! Maybe you get this service in the U.S., but I don't get it in West Germany. Don't forget that not all Amiga owners live in the United States. Jordan
dvljhg@cs.umu.se (J|rgen Holmberg) (10/30/90)
In article <JKH.90Oct29175704@bambam.pcs.com> jkh@bambam.pcs.com (Jordan K. Hubbard) writes: >In article <83.2728F590@myamiga.UUCP> smp@myamiga.UUCP (Steve Palm) writes: > >> I agree with your point that 'most' folks who have A2000 class machines or >> greater tend to look down on the A500 owners. I don't, however, think you >> are looking at ALL sides of the issue. >> When you purchase an A500 these days you get FED-EX pickup for warranty >> work, with an 800 number to call for help to boot. What do you get in this > >Whoa! Maybe you get this service in the U.S., but I don't get it in >West Germany. Don't forget that not all Amiga owners live in the United >States. Quite right, in sweden there is generally NO support from commodore at all. The guys working for commodore sweden seems to be too busy looking for work at other, well-known computer manufacturers like I*M etc. Jorgen
smp@myamiga.UUCP (Steve Palm) (11/01/90)
In article <JKH.90Oct29175704@bambam.pcs.com> jkh (Jordan K. Hubbard) writes:
JKH> Whoa! Maybe you get this service in the U.S., but I don't get it in
JKH> West Germany. Don't forget that not all Amiga owners live in the United
JKH> States.
That is true. However, it must also be remembered that Commodore Canada,
Commodore US and Commodore (??) are different entities with different goals,
directions, and policies, correct?
I realize that not all Amiga owners live in the U.S., and I realize that this
newsgroup is surely not limited to the U.S. It just was a initial response.
I am sort of confused by the differences I've seen in CBM CDA and CBM USA
policy.
--
/// AMIGA: | Steve Palm, Sysop of FidoNet node 1:11/16
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\XX/ MIND |_________________________________________________________ jesup@cbmvax.commodore.com (Randell Jesup) (11/13/90)
In article <JKH.90Oct25161356@bambam.pcs.com> jkh@bambam.pcs.com (Jordan K. Hubbard) writes: >Despite the fact that I'll eventually have a 3000, I'd still like to >make something usable out of my 500, and I feel that Commodore has >more-or-less abandoned the A500 folks. They're certainly happy enough >to market them as aggressively as ever, but have they offered any >additional peripherals? Nooooo. If the A590 is the best that they can >manage, we're in deep doo-doo. Sure the little 20Meg drive in the A590 is slow and small. It's also very cheap. However, it has that nice fast DMA SCSI port (same as the A2091, essentially the same as the A3000) sitting there ready for you to plug in a nice fast quantum or maxtor or wren, and you'll have disk I/O speeds as good as a 2000HD. Add to that the 2M of sockets and it's a nice little box - fairly cheap for the A500 owner on a budget, and with with a lot of potential power. You can even yank the 20Meg and drop in a 3.5" SCSI drive (the connector is already there). > As it is, I'm left to scan the >peripheral company adds anxiously hoping to see the words "A500 model" >buried somewhere amidst the 1001 other offerings for the 2000. When it >comes to memory, HD's or processor cards, the 2000 folks have it made. >The A500 folks are considerably less lucky. We bought it, and >Commodore was happy enough to take our money, but now we're out to >sea. This sucks. Why do you think we can sell the A500 so cheaply? It's because you don't need all the fancy casework, much bigger PS, etc, etc. You can put a processor slot and a Z-II slot in an A500-like machine, but it would cost considerably more. I can't talk about any future machines, of course, but I'm sure everyone out there realizes we're always looking at our product line and thinking about how we can improve it (not just as individual models, but the line as a whole). >DEC realized long ago that peripheral sales were where the real money >was at. Commodore seems content to leave almost the entire area of >such sales to third parties who are making big $$$ on it. Doesn't >Commodore have any responsibility to its shareholders? If SUN or DEC >offered up their underbelly on something like this, the stockholders >would scream blue murder. Then again, if the 3rd parties didn't do things that were somewhat risky, or very niche-oriented, or provide some choice, then the Amiga might not exist anymore. We do peripherals, especially ones with a fairly large potential customer base (A590, A2091, A2065 (ethernet), the infamous ULowell card (largely for the Unix folk), etc). We can't cover every niche, and if we did we'd drive away all the 3rd parties, who are willing and able to take risks we can't, or know markets better than we could, or have lower overhead or faster turnaround. >I realize that these views may come across as a bit strong, but I >really do get the distinct feeling that while Commodore will be >perfectly happy to sell another half million A500's, they're going to >be putting all the design effort into their 2000 and 3000 lines. This >can't help but seem like robbing the masses to help the elite (not >that the "masses" are all that poor either! All those pennies add up). I think you're being overly pessimistic. Sure we'd like to sell 500,000 A500s in the coming year. We'd rather sell 1,000,000, and if paying attention to the A500 (peripherals, redesign, or whatever might help sales) will help, I think it's a good assumption we're interested. Another thing to realize is that while a lot of the Amiga sales in the USA are A2000s or better, most of our sales elsewhere are A500's, so it's _very_ important to us as a company. As usual, I speak only for myself (and then within obvious limits), and NOT for Commodore Amiga, Commodore International, or Commodore Business Machines. -- Randell Jesup, Keeper of AmigaDos, Commodore Engineering. {uunet|rutgers}!cbmvax!jesup, jesup@cbmvax.cbm.commodore.com BIX: rjesup Common phrase heard at Amiga Devcon '89: "It's in there!"
Lee.Scoggins@p10.f21.n232.z1.FIDONET.ORG (Lee Scoggins) (11/18/91)
AREA:UUCP_HRDWR > > In article <JKH.90Oct25161356@bambam.pcs.com> jkh@bambam.pcs.com (Jordan > K. Hubbard) writes: > >Despite the fact that I'll eventually have a 3000, I'd still like to > >make something usable out of my 500, and I feel that Commodore has > >more-or-less abandoned the A500 folks. They're certainly happy enough > >to market them as aggressively as ever, but have they offered any > >additional peripherals? Nooooo. If the A590 is the best that they can > >manage, we're in deep doo-doo. > > I think you're being overly pessimistic. Sure we'd like to sell > 500,000 A500s in the coming year. We'd rather sell 1,000,000, and if > paying attention to the A500 (peripherals, redesign, or whatever might > help sales) will help, I think it's a good assumption we're interested. > Another thing to realize is that while a lot of the Amiga sales in the > USA are A2000s or better, most of our sales elsewhere are A500's, so it's > _very_ important to us as a company. I have found that it's not that unusual for third party developers to do the lion's share of development on a given platform. I think you will find the same thing for the Apple II series, the Atari 800/600/1200 series, etc. I am overjoyed at the fact that there has been a recent explosion in the number of peripherals available for the A500. I, like a lot of people, started with the A500 as a computer "for the kids". Since the original purchase of the A500 with a 1084 monitor I have added the following: 3 1/2" external drive A501 512K memory expansion/clock Supra 20meg HardDrive (the A590 had not been released yet) Supra 2meg ram expansion module I feel I've got a machine pretty much capable of doing anything that the A2000 can do. I probably could have done it cheaper by starting with an A2000, but budget-wise I feel I did the best thing I could do at the time. Someday (if I can talk my wife into it <grin> ) I'll make the jump to an A3000 or A4000. Until then I think those of us who own A500's have a lot of options open to us thanks to third party developers. -- ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- AFIT Amiga Users BBS/UFGateway |Lee Scoggins - via FidoNet node 1:110/300 1:110/300 Dayton, Ohio |UUCP: afitamy!232!21.10!Lee.Scoggins (513)-252-7681 |ARPA: Lee.Scoggins@p10.f21.n232.z1.FIDONET.ORG ----------------------------------------------------------------------------