rjc@wookumz.ai.mit.edu (Ray Cromwell) (01/09/91)
In article <41220@nigel.ee.udel.edu> TAAB5@ccvax.iastate.edu (Marc Barrett) writes: > > >> > Japanese companies put 2-3 times the engineering talent into their >products as do American companies. The result: better products. Companies >in other countries are catching onto this idea, and are putting putting >more of their total sales into research and devlopment. Unfortunately, >companies in the U.S. have yet to learn this idea, especially companies >like Commodore. It is fortunate that very few U.S. companies are as >bad as Commodore in this respect, though, or we'd be in *REALLY* bad >shape! > > As for IBM, the mainframe market is totally dominated by IBM, precisely >because IBM spends quite a lot on R&D. IBM is one of the few U.S. >companies that are still highly respected in Japan, precisely because >IBM is one of the few U.S. companies that have caught onto the concept >of putting a lot of money (as a percentage of total sales) into R&D. >BTW, over half of IBM's R&D budget goes into long-range scientific R&D -- >research that may not pay off for 50 years or more, if at all. A lot of >research at IBM is on things like superconductivity, nanotechnology, >and other research that does not turn short-term profits. By comparison, >ALL research at Commodore is very short-term, precisely because >Commodore's managers are more worried about short-term profits then >long-term strength. Tell me marc, how do you know so much about the Japanese culture and what American companies they respect if any. How do you know ALL Commodore research is 'very short-term'? You don't work for Commodore. How do you know what Commodore managers are thinking? Sometimes I wonder if you have any intelligence at all. You see one little press release on a promotion and some lay offs, then make BROAD SWEEPING IGNORANT conclusions on things you know nothing about making yourself look like a total idiot. Then after 3 or 4 posts telling about the new newsgroups, especially comp.sys.amiga.advocacy, you continue to post these messages to comp.sys.amiga. You have no idea what your talking about as shown by your 'Atari Lynx has Amiga custom chips' and your 'Commodore is cutting R&D' qwhen in fact, I heard that Andy Finkel said they just hired 3 new engineers, and layed-off no one. Please, please keep your posts out of Comp.sys.amiga and redirect your drivel to the appropriate group. >> >>(smile) >> >> >>> >>>>-- >>>>Dave Haynie Commodore-Amiga (Amiga 3000) "The Crew That Never Rests" >>>> {uunet|pyramid|rutgers}!cbmvax!daveh PLINK: hazy BIX: hazy >>>> "Don't worry, 'bout a thing. 'Cause every little thing, >>>> gonna be alright" -Bob Marley >>> >>> >>> -MB- >> ^^^^ >> (There is no cure) >> >> >> -mark= >> >> +--------+ ================================================== >> | \/ | Mark D. Manes "Mr. AmigaVision" >> | /\ \/ | manes@vger.nsu.edu >> | / | (804) 683-2532 "Make up your own mind! - AMIGA" >> +--------+ ================================================== > > > -MB-
swarren@convex.com (Steve Warren) (01/09/91)
In article <187e4f65.ARN097c@easy.hiam> lron@easy.hiam writes: >In article <41220@nigel.ee.udel.edu>, Marc Barrett writes: > >> As for IBM, the mainframe market is totally dominated by IBM, precisely > ^^^^^^^^^ > Really, that's why they laid off all those > personel that were on the production line > for the 3090, give me a break IBM has been > loosing ground in the mainframe market for > quite a while. Why would a company buy an > IBM mainframe when they can get a machine > that's compatible with the IBM machine but > faster, cost less and backed buy a well > established company??? IBM makes most of their income from mainframes. And that income is awesome. The fact that they have been loosing ground does not mean that they do not dominate in that market. Everyone in that market is loosing ground. The reason is the proliferation of all these hyperactive scalar engines. I don't intend to get into an architectural discussion here; I am aware that mainframe performance incorporates much more than pure scalar performance. However, many tasks that have traditionally been performed on mainframes are now being offloaded to smaller machines. Other tasks continue to require the peculiar capabilities of a full-fledged mainframe. But people are finding that much of their work can be performed on cheaper machines. Networking is driving this changover at an accelerating pace. This was the nightmare that IBM was concerned about when they originally came out with the IBM PC. They had an alternate machine that was not inherently crippled in the ways that the PC ultimately was crippled. But to produce a machine that could efficiently offload many tasks from their mainframes of that time would have been, in their eyes, financial suicide. IBM has always been capable of producing a really nice PC; they just haven't been willing. When the SPARC came out IBM responded with the RS6000. Now they are their own worst competitor. Their troubles are probably not at an end. -- _. --Steve ._||__ DISCLAIMER: All opinions are my own. Warren v\ *| ---------------------------------------------- V {uunet,sun}!convex!swarren; swarren@convex.COM
swarren@convex.com (Steve Warren) (01/12/91)
In article <22564@well.sf.ca.us> farren@well.sf.ca.us (Mike Farren) writes: [...] > >Hey, guys - the word is "lose". One "o". As in, "losing ground". >-- >Mike Farren farren@well.sf.ca.us Hey, Mike, I never said the ground was "lost". They just loosed it. Now it free, free, FREE AT LAST!!!!!!!!!! PS - Are you going to be the spelling flamer around here? PPS - I'm right and you're left -- _. --Steve ._||__ DISCLAIMER: All opinions are my own. Warren v\ *| ---------------------------------------------- V {uunet,sun}!convex!swarren; swarren@convex.com
farren@well.sf.ca.us (Mike Farren) (01/13/91)
swarren@convex.com (Steve Warren) writes: >PS - Are you going to be the spelling flamer around here? Nah, I was just overcome by a long-standing gripe. Somewhere in there, I guess I just loost my mind. -- Mike Farren farren@well.sf.ca.us
gjc@lsw.UUCP (Greg) (01/14/91)
In article <1991Jan9.095821.22197@mintaka.lcs.mit.edu>, rjc@wookumz.ai.mit.edu (Ray Cromwell) writes: > > How do you know what Commodore managers are thinking? Sometimes I wonder > if you have any intelligence at all. You see one little press release on a > promotion and some lay offs, then make BROAD SWEEPING IGNORANT conclusions > on things you know nothing about making yourself look like a total idiot. > >>> > >>> -MB- > >> ^^^^ > >> (There is no cure) You know I watched this happen all during the time I read the comp.sys.amiga group. All of you people are landing so hard on -MB-. Maybe we should add another group called comp.sys.amiga.flame.marc! I have never in my life seen so many people jump on a bandwagon just to make one, sometimes (not always) misinformed, gentleman feel bad. Not once in any of Marc's articles have I seen him in ANY way abuse anyone else!! We all care about the future of this wonderful machine called the Amiga, and I am sure that, since he has one, Marc does too. So, please if he says something you disagree with in the future, then please don't lower yourself to name-calling, correct him. And try not to be so caustic and insulting about it, otherwise *YOU* could end up in a few kill files! Gregory Casamento (The Borgster!)
daveh@cbmvax.commodore.com (Dave Haynie) (01/15/91)
In article <1991Jan09.153108.17485@convex.com> swarren@convex.com (Steve Warren) writes: >IBM has always been capable of producing a really nice PC; they just haven't >been willing. When the SPARC came out IBM responded with the RS6000. Now >they are their own worst competitor. Their troubles are probably not at an >end. Though maybe that helps explain RS6000 performance. Its a real screamer if you're a single user with one big task doing Workstation type floating point operations. If you try to load it down with lots of heavy task work and more users, you might as well get the couple of PC Class machines you can buy with the same money and let each of them do 1/2 the work. Thus, the RS6000 is forced to stay as a workstation and no do mini or mainframe type work at all well. >--Steve ._||__ DISCLAIMER: All opinions are my own. > Warren v\ *| ---------------------------------------------- -- Dave Haynie Commodore-Amiga (Amiga 3000) "The Crew That Never Rests" {uunet|pyramid|rutgers}!cbmvax!daveh PLINK: hazy BIX: hazy "Don't worry, 'bout a thing. 'Cause every little thing, gonna be alright" -Bob Marley
es1@cunixb.cc.columbia.edu (Ethan Solomita) (01/15/91)
In article <181@lsw.UUCP> gjc@lsw.UUCP (Greg) writes: >We all care about the future of this wonderful machine called the Amiga, and >I am sure that, since he has one, Marc does too. So, please if he says >something you disagree with in the future, then please don't lower yourself >to name-calling, correct him. And try not to be so caustic and insulting >about it, otherwise *YOU* could end up in a few kill files! > >Gregory Casamento (The Borgster!) I do agree that people who call Marc Barrett four letter words and just generally bash him and insult him should stop, it isn't worth it. But I CAN'T understand these people who are defending him. He is either posting to have fun by annoying others or he is not sane. I remember back when he was in his "Where is 24 bit graphics" phases, he posted 7 articles within 48 hours, all of which were rephrased articles saying that because the Amiga didn't have 24 bit graphics the Amiga was doomed. That was when he first started the "Amiga -- Yesterday's Technology Forever" signature. Marc Barrett regular states incorrect information/lies as though they were facts and is always predicting doom. I compare him to the people I see on the street with signs saying, "Repent for the end is near." He simply has to stop saying things that are utterly untrue and acting like he knows what he's talking about. Perfect example was with his comments about Copperman's move. He proceded to say that Copperman increased R&D expenditures and now that he's gone that will just drop back down to nothing and the Amiga is doomed forever. Meanwhile, Copperman has NOTHING to do with development. In fact, Irving Gould and Co. set the R&D spending directly. Marc stated incorrect info. as fact and proceeded to state an opinion that was utterly negative. I can't believe I'm rambling on this long. I have been trying to stay out of this but I just can't stop myself. He isn't sane. -- Ethan "Don't forget the importance of the family. It begins with the family. We're not going to redefine the family. Everybody knows the definition of the family. ... A child. ... A mother. ... A father. There are other arrangements of the family, but that is a family and family values." -- Dan Quayle, of course. Our beloved Vice President. It's just too easy!
dewolfe@ug.cs.dal.ca (Colin DeWolfe) (01/15/91)
In article <181@lsw.UUCP> gjc@lsw.UUCP (Greg) writes: >In article <1991Jan9.095821.22197@mintaka.lcs.mit.edu>, rjc@wookumz.ai.mit.edu (Ray Cromwell) writes: >You know I watched this happen all during the time I read the comp.sys.amiga >group. All of you people are landing so hard on -MB-. Maybe we should >add another group called comp.sys.amiga.flame.marc! > That sounds like a good idea, but alas, I don't know how well UNIX handles exclamation marks in directory names. :-) > >Gregory Casamento (The Borgster!) -- Colin DeWolfe dewolfe@ug.cs.dal.ca
rjc@geech.ai.mit.edu (Ray Cromwell) (01/16/91)
In article <Rm5LV4w163w@exactus.UUCP> dave@exactus.UUCP (David Salas) writes: > >There is something pretty sad about all this MB vs EveryAmigaProgrammer. >Nobody is listening.... MB comments go straight into the trashcan, without >any consideration at all, followed by a number of derogatory attacks on his >personal views that do nothing for the image of Commodore, nor for the >personal image of the attacker. It seems that a lot of Amiga programmers >are in a state of Paranoia that blinds them from seeing past their nose. > >It is pretty sad to see that nobody is even willing to listen to any >crticism about their beloved machine. If the Amiga IS the ultimate machine, >WHY are you all asking for more!? It is obvious that the machine needs to >catch up with new technology, and there is NOTHING wrong with admiting it, >nor about talking about it. What is a perfect operating system good for >when so many programmers out there ignore the rules anyways!? > >I love my Amigas (I have 5 of them), but I am sorry to see that you people >are more concerned about convincing the world that what we have is already >the best there is, rather than working towards making it the best there is. > >Programmers out there: your rethoric does NOT pay your rent. Users DO! And >as a USER, I don't care what kind of multitasking the amiga has, what I do >care for is that applications I use work well with it. Do you really think we are not willing to listen to criticism? There's a fine line between constructive criticism and bashing. Long before Marc made it to Usenet, people were discussing the Amiga's limitations: 1) No MMU Protection, Resource tracking, virtual memory. 2) No OS 24 bit graphics support. 3) Lack of 'bigname' software. 4) Poor marketing. 5) Custom chips still NMOS. 6) poorly written software. Marc's problem is that he uses misinformation to back up his posts, and he reiterates the same posts every month! I think I can speak for some people in that we are tired of hearing the same thing. Marc acts as if he knows Commodore's mistakes ahead of time, their decisions they will make, what every Amigan wants for his machine, etc. Don't make this into a battle of Programmers vs Users, because its not. Computers need everyone, smart advertising/marketers, engineers, programmers, and users. Users are free to make comments about poor programming/engineering/ marketing. The problem arises (like with Marc) when they comment about things they don't understand as if they understood them. What I mean by this is, suppose for example I said 'The Amiga custom chips are easy to redesign in CMOS, its the poor quality of Commodore engineers that's stopping this.'. Since I'm not an engineer, I have no right to say this, especially since its a mistruth. The correct thing to say would be 'Why haven't the custom chips been upgraded to CMOS?'. Some of Marc's posts are correct, but a lot of them aren't. His points are valid, but not the method he uses to communicate them. Marc also keeps changing accounts making it hard for people to put him in their killfile. > > >+---------------------------------------+---------------------------------+ >| David Salas | Exactus : David Salas | >| President | Genie : EXAC-DAVE | >| Exactus Information Service | UUCP : exactus!dave | >| (707) 524-2548 @ 2400 (8N1) | Fax : (707) 524-2546 | >| (707) 524-2553 @ 9600/1400 (V32/HST) | Voice : (707) 524-2547 | >+---------------------------------------+---------------------------------+ >My views are not necesarily those of Exactus Corp or anyone else.
daveh@cbmvax.commodore.com (Dave Haynie) (01/16/91)
In article <242^HH|@rpi.edu> peck@ral.rpi.edu (Joseph Peck) writes: >In article <17561@cbmvax.commodore.com> daveh@cbmvax.commodore.com (Dave Haynie) writes: >>Though maybe that helps explain RS6000 performance. Its a real screamer if >>you're a single user with one big task doing Workstation type floating point >>operations. >Well, I don't know about the more users comment. My dad's company does >business applications using Informix, and with 20 or so users on a >base RS6000 it still seems awfully fast..... even though lot's of >I/O is going on. I don't think I/O is really a problem. The RS6000s have the double-speed MCA bus (peaks at 40 MB/s), as well as a 20 MB/s "optical bus". That's generally plenty of I/O to support a number of users. The problem seems to be that lots of task switching can bring this machine to its knees. I don't use RS6000s myself, but like for any new CPU architecture, I've been watching this one. In various reviews (the January Personal Workstation, and a UNIX Review a few months back), they find these systems have better than [workstation] average hard disk performance, excellent single user math and CAD performance, reasonable but not amazing [workstation class] graphics performance, and rather moderate performance under a heavy task load (like the AIM benchmark series). >I don't know what would happen if you had all 20 people running Matlab >though.... (but then again, even one person running Matlab tends to screw >our Sun4's at work.... :) Actually, the same kind of thing seems to be true of Sun SPARC machines. Though the SPARCs seems to have kind of a plateau effect -- they drop off linearly for CPU hog tasks 1..N, then all of a sudden take a nose dive. I don't know if this is a Sun 4 implementation detail, or an expected effect of the SPARC architecture, though. >Joe Peck -- Dave Haynie Commodore-Amiga (Amiga 3000) "The Crew That Never Rests" {uunet|pyramid|rutgers}!cbmvax!daveh PLINK: hazy BIX: hazy "Don't worry, 'bout a thing. 'Cause every little thing, gonna be alright" -Bob Marley
jcb@frisbee.Eng.Sun.COM (Jim Becker) (01/16/91)
daveh@cbmvax.commodore.com (Dave Haynie) writes:
Actually, the same kind of thing seems to be true of Sun SPARC
machines. Though the SPARCs seems to have kind of a plateau
effect -- they drop off linearly for CPU hog tasks 1..N, then all
of a sudden take a nose dive. I don't know if this is a Sun 4
implementation detail, or an expected effect of the SPARC
architecture, though.
There was a problem with PMEG allocation scheme that caused this sort
of problem. It has been fixed for new software releases. The problem
occurs when virtual memory goes over 16meg and the Page Mapping info
isn't cached.
-Jim Becker
--
--
Jim Becker / jcb%frisbee@sun.com / Sun Microsystems
(kinder & gentler) != WW[3]xanthian@zorch.SF-Bay.ORG (Kent Paul Dolan) (01/16/91)
daveh@cbmvax.commodore.com (Dave Haynie) writes: > Actually, the same kind of thing seems to be true of Sun SPARC > machines. Though the SPARCs seems to have kind of a plateau effect -- > they drop off linearly for CPU hog tasks 1..N, then all of a sudden > take a nose dive. I don't know if this is a Sun 4 implementation > detail, or an expected effect of the SPARC architecture, though. Nope, that is a well know and easily explained characteristic of _any_ virtual memory system, usually called the "working set" phenomenon. It is a characteristic of any well written, modular software that it can execute along quite happily with a small subset of its total executable's virtual pages in real memory, because execution is focused for a "substantial" period of time on a limited number of virtual memory pages called the "working set". It is characteristic that the task executes some instructions out of _each_ page of its working set in every normal preemptive time slice. So, as long as (number of cpu intensive tasks) * (average working set of pages) < (total available real memory for virtual pages) page faults will be relatively rare and cpu bound jobs will mull happily away, execution traces limited to pages already in memory, for "substantial" (many time slices) periods of time, getting a substantial portion of 1/Nth of their stand-alone performance out of the cpu. When a process does page fault, there is a page not currently in demand that can be swapped out, and the other jobs use the extra time to their benefit. But, let the needed virtual page working sets exceed the total real memory available to hold them, and merry hell breaks loose. Since there aren't enough real memory pages to hold all the working sets, some job will do a page fault, and the page that gets swapped out is going to be one that another job is going to need _immediately_ when its time slice comes around in turn, so it will page fault, causing a page to be swapped out that another job is going to need in its next time slice, which causes a page fault, ... ad infinitum. The process is called thrashing, physically it means the read heads are moving so fast across the swap area your computer is trying to walk off your desk, and _no_ job gets any work done, since every job that comes up to finally execute in its newly swapped in page promptly hits another page in the working set that has been swapped out to satisfy some other job, so it page faults and goes back to sleep. The net result is that all N+1 jobs are sleeping waiting for page fault i/o almost all the time, the swap area i/o is maxed out, and performance drops into a black hole. It's really instructive to work through the numbers on this one, but I don't have the input data available, so you'll have to live with the qualitative description above. And, this having become a tutorial, a copy goes to .introduction. Snaffle it, Ferry, for the FAQs, please. Followups back to .advocacy. Kent, the man from xanth. <xanthian@Zorch.SF-Bay.ORG> <xanthian@well.sf.ca.us>
mykes@zorch.SF-Bay.ORG (Mike Schwartz) (01/16/91)
In article <Rm5LV4w163w@exactus.UUCP> dave@exactus.UUCP (David Salas) writes: >rjc@wookumz.ai.mit.edu (Ray Cromwell) writes: > >> Tell me marc, how do you know so much about the Japanese culture and >> what American companies they respect if any. How do you know ALL >> Commodore research is 'very short-term'? You don't work for Commodore. >> How do you know what Commodore managers are thinking? Sometimes I wonder >> if you have any intelligence at all. You see one little press release on a >> promotion and some lay offs, then make BROAD SWEEPING IGNORANT conclusions >> on things you know nothing about making yourself look like a total idiot. >> Then after 3 or 4 posts telling about the new newsgroups, especially >> comp.sys.amiga.advocacy, you continue to post these messages to comp.sys.amig >> You have no idea what your talking about as shown by your 'Atari Lynx has >> Amiga custom chips' and your 'Commodore is cutting R&D' qwhen in fact, I hear >> that Andy Finkel said they just hired 3 new engineers, and layed-off no one. >> >> Please, please keep your posts out of Comp.sys.amiga and redirect your >> drivel to the appropriate group. >> > >There is something pretty sad about all this MB vs EveryAmigaProgrammer. >Nobody is listening.... MB comments go straight into the trashcan, without >any consideration at all, followed by a number of derogatory attacks on his >personal views that do nothing for the image of Commodore, nor for the >personal image of the attacker. It seems that a lot of Amiga programmers >are in a state of Paranoia that blinds them from seeing past their nose. > >It is pretty sad to see that nobody is even willing to listen to any >crticism about their beloved machine. If the Amiga IS the ultimate machine, >WHY are you all asking for more!? It is obvious that the machine needs to >catch up with new technology, and there is NOTHING wrong with admiting it, >nor about talking about it. What is a perfect operating system good for >when so many programmers out there ignore the rules anyways!? > >I love my Amigas (I have 5 of them), but I am sorry to see that you people >are more concerned about convincing the world that what we have is already >the best there is, rather than working towards making it the best there is. > >Programmers out there: your rethoric does NOT pay your rent. Users DO! And >as a USER, I don't care what kind of multitasking the amiga has, what I do >care for is that applications I use work well with it. > > > >+---------------------------------------+---------------------------------+ >| David Salas | Exactus : David Salas | >| President | Genie : EXAC-DAVE | >| Exactus Information Service | UUCP : exactus!dave | >| (707) 524-2548 @ 2400 (8N1) | Fax : (707) 524-2546 | >| (707) 524-2553 @ 9600/1400 (V32/HST) | Voice : (707) 524-2547 | >+---------------------------------------+---------------------------------+ >My views are not necesarily those of Exactus Corp or anyone else. The Amiga needs to catch up in only a few ways. But it seems to me everyone else (IBM, Apple, etc.) is trying to catch up to the Amiga in more ways. The Amiga started the Multimedia revolution and is still way ahead. Amiga is the first PC-type computer that had multitasking and virtually all software ever written for it (except for some video games) support it in a very friendly way (unlike Windows 3.0 or Multifinder) and have since day 1. The Amiga is the only box I know of (actually I know it is the only box...) that you can run Amiga, CP/M, Unix, and MS-Dos in windows on the same machine. It is also the only box that you can boot up as Amiga, Unix, or Mac. The Amiga is also the only system that you can buy for $500 and play great games on or buy for $4000 and compete favorably with some of the highest end workstations money can buy. The Amiga is the only computer you can buy a video toaster for! The areas which the Amiga has been lacking are improving very quickly. There will be a choice of 10+ 24-bit video cards within 6 months. There is networking software and hardware available from several vendors. And the biggest area that the Amiga has been lacking in has been favorable press and that is changing radically (witness the recent articles in Byte Magazine). Another big area that needs much more improvement (but none is forseeable) is in the area of the normal applications that you run on lesser computers. Of the major software developers, you won't find any Microsoft, Lotus, Ashton Tate, etc., programs for the machine. The best you can find is an older version of WordPerfect. The main reason for the lack of support is that Amiga users expect more from software than these large companies have been able to do on the lesser machines and when a plain vanilla port of a PC program runs on the Amiga, it looks pretty weak. Mykes
swalton@solaria.csun.edu (Stephen Walton) (01/17/91)
[Please note that Ken has the Followup-To line on the original message set to 'comp.sys.amgia.advocacy.'] A similar thrashing effect with virtual memory can be demonstrated with a single program which does a Fast Fourier Transform of a large array. The standard FFT algorithm requires pairs of elements of the array separated by 1 at pass 1, 2 at pass 2, 4 at pass 3, and on up to N/2 at step log_2(N). This causes horrible effects. Once again, one sees that the time for the FFT grows as expected as N*log_2(N) for N smaller than the working set, then explodes to much larger values. Before re-becoming an astronomer, I programmed hypercube architecture computers, and the FFT was my specialty. One of the big advantages they have is lots of RAM: an AMETEK (now defunct) 64 node system had 64 MB of real RAM and could do a 32 MB FFT several times faster than a VAX with 8 or 16 MB. So, VM is not The Solution To All Your Woes. ------------------------------- Stephen Walton, Dept. of Physics & Astronomy, Cal State Univ. Northridge I am srw@csun.edu no matter WHAT the stupid From: line says!
ben@contact.uucp (Ben Eng) (01/17/91)
In <17616@cbmvax.commodore.com> daveh@cbmvax.commodore.com (Dave Haynie) writes: >In article <242^HH|@rpi.edu> peck@ral.rpi.edu (Joseph Peck) writes: >>In article <17561@cbmvax.commodore.com> daveh@cbmvax.commodore.com (Dave Haynie) writes: >>>Though maybe that helps explain RS6000 performance. >>with 20 or so users on a base RS6000 it still seems awfully fast..... >>even though lot's of I/O is going on. There is a comprehensive article titled "A Performance Comparison of the IBM RS/6000 and the Astronautics ZS-1" by William Mangione-Smith, Santosh G. Abraham, and Edward S. Davidson of the University of Michigan in the January 1991 issue of _Computer_ from the IEEE Computer Society. The catch phrase is "application-specific performance bounds for two superscalar machines, and the DECstation 3100, help explain actual delivered performance and indicate areas for improvement." It's a fairly technical article that might give some insight into the RS/6000. Ben -- Ben Eng | ben@contact.uucp (416)-431-3333 150 Beverley St. Apt #1L | Bix: jetpen Toronto, Ontario M5T 1Y6 | UofT Engineering Science: engb@ecf.toronto.edu _-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_| Home: (416)-979-7885, (416)-979-8761
bruce@zuhause.MN.ORG (Bruce Albrecht) (01/18/91)
>There is something pretty sad about all this MB vs EveryAmigaProgrammer. >Nobody is listening.... MB comments go straight into the trashcan, without >any consideration at all, followed by a number of derogatory attacks on his >personal views that do nothing for the image of Commodore, nor for the >personal image of the attacker. It seems that a lot of Amiga programmers >are in a state of Paranoia that blinds them from seeing past their nose. I think there are very few Amiga owners who would not agree with Marc Barrett that Commodore should be developing hardware and software to improve the resolution and number of colors the Amiga can display. The problem is that Marc Barrett tends to post a half a dozen articles a month, every month, announcing the doom of the Amiga because they aren't improving it the way he wants it improved. He's been doing this for several years. There's at least one university that decided not to buy Amigas primarily because of a few rants by Barrett about a year ago. Many of his postings on why it would be easy to improve the Amiga in the ways he wants it improved, or comparisons with other systems are wrong, and show a deep lack of understanding of the technical issues. Most recently, he posted several articles which were grossly inaccurate in terms of hardware, as well as totally inaccurate in terms of Commodore's business organization. His claims that Commodore would be laying people off in R&D when, in fact, the were actually hiring, is at least as damaging, if not more so, than anything his detractors could do. -- bruce@zuhause.mn.org
melling@cs.psu.edu (Michael D Mellinger) (05/05/91)
(Ray Cromwell) writes:
Do you really think we are not willing to listen to criticism? There's
a fine line between constructive criticism and bashing. Long before Marc
made it to Usenet, people were discussing the Amiga's limitations:
1) No MMU Protection, Resource tracking, virtual memory.
2) No OS 24 bit graphics support.
3) Lack of 'bigname' software.
4) Poor marketing.
5) Custom chips still NMOS.
6) poorly written software.
I know a company that can help you with 5 out of six of those. Number
5 doesn't apply.
-Mike