NetNews Offline 2/NetNews Offline Volume 2.iso/news/comp/sys/amiga/misc-part2/10222

Text File | 1996-08-05 | 8.4 KB | 174 lines

Newsgroups: comp.sys.amiga.misc
Path: brighton.openmarket.com!decwrl!waikato!kcbbs!planet!not-for-mail
From: [e-mail] (finn)
Subject: Re: Why are europeans dumb enough to buy amigas?
Message-ID: <[e-mail]>
Nntp-Posting-Host: ppp0-09.ak.planet.gen.nz
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References: <1996Mar11.221045@cantva> <[e-mail]>
    <[e-mail]> <[e-mail]>
Date: Thu, 28 Mar 1996 12:52:35 GMT

>On Mon, 18 Mar 1996 11:50:19 +0000, "Mr. Pink" <[e-mail]>
>wrote:

>>Where did other games classics such as Lemmings, Populous etc Originate?

>Why should anyone care?  All of the -current- games are best on the
>PC.  Are you really going to keep playing Lemmings/Populous forever?

I still havn't finished all the lemmings games, I have finished both Dooms on
the PC, and I still have more fun playing Lemmings.

>>Now, in that little 'conversation', I mentioned that dirty word to PC owners
>>- multitasking. Could I just take this opportunity to congratulate them on
>>the arrival of Win 95. (Ignoring OS2 - it just doesnt seem to have been
>>given the support it deserved)......

>WFWG worked OK for me for quite a while.  It multitasked, ran great
>apps, and so on and so forth.  Did you ever try it?

WFWG multitasked? I think not.  You may think it was running great, but
compared to my amiga (side by side, doing exactly the same stuff) it sucked.
It didn't multitask either, it task-switched.

>>Win 95 system requirements: at least a 486sx 33 (?) (DX2 66+ recommended),
>>with 4mb ram
>>(8mb+ recommended), and 50mbHD space (?).
>>Amiga workbench requirements: An amiga.

>Funny, but not true.  It requires a 386-class processor (ie with MMU)
>and 4M of RAM, although 8M is the practical limit.

I am using a machine with not much more system than that, and I am still
running a better OS than Win95.

>The Amiga requires just an Amiga, but the resolution starts at a
>laughable 640x200x4 colors, and the maximum normal WB screen is
>640x400x256 colors.  It's a joke.  No OLE, no Internet, no networking,

don't talk crap.  why are you talking about minimum res here? It doesn't
matter what my mic res is, what matters is that I am running a machine which
looks fine and doesn't restrict what I can do like windoze does. No OLE!
hahahahahah, why would we want a memory-eating crash monster?  Plus do you
have AREXX?  All you are doing here is going through the book of PC TLAs and
writing down all the ones you can't see on an amiga...  No Internet? I Tried
to get the Net working on the home PC, leaving my HD free to do my coding and
GFX on the Amiga.  We fired up the "Internet Setup Wizard", and whoops, it
asks for disk 11.  We pop in the Win95 CD, and find that.... It only goes up
to disk 10 hahahahahh.  very funny M$.  I found it a lot easier to set up the
Amiga, as I could actually see what the hell was going on.  I now have a PPP
connection doing everything a PC can do running at full speed for the modem.

>no extensive customized OS-wide modem support, no modern printer
>support, and plenty of other stupid problems.  Sorry, but with 486/100
>processors costing next to nothing, and motherboard upgrades being
>dirt cheap, the Amiga's memory-leanness have only held it back.

Why do you need support for a modem in the OS? it works fine just using the
hayes commands on mine.  No modern printer support?  What about:
  Fargo Primera
  the new Epson 720 dpi one
  Any postscript laser
  The Canon BJ610C
  and more.

The memory-leanness holding it back?  I think not, I can do anything on my
amiga faster than you can do it on your PC (apart from things like raytracing,
I'm talking OS stuff here).

>>So, you buy your 486sx33 4mb PC for about the same price as an A1200. Your
>>A1200 is all set to go, Everything is on its (admittedly small) HD. Your PC
>>sits their waiting for you to go out and buy Win 95. Another 80 quid or so.
>>Yay, we are multitasking. Not as quickly as the A1200 tho. Oh well, lets buy
>>some more RAM. Apparently that makes it faster. Cool, another 100 quid
>>spent. Things have improved, but not by much. Lets see what we can do. A new
>>processsor you say? Ooooh, lets go pentium. P60 good enough? yeah! .......

>Again, this is silly.  No one buys new 486/33s these days; the current
>low end is a P75, and very soon it will be a P100.  The Pentium makes
>Win95 fly.

No it doesn't, we have one here, and it is crawling next to my A1200 (the
Pentium is a P100, the A1200 is an '030 at 28mhz).  Win95 is more than 20
times slower than the Amiga OS.  That is a fact.  M$ never said than Win95 was
faster than anything else. that is also a fact. WIN95 IS SLOW!

>>Oh the subject of Win 95, a couple of points. Plug and Play. HAven't amigas
>>had basically the same thing for years?

>Not really.  They've had autoconfig.  The user still has to mess with
>setting up the software on the Amiga.

Not much, and still less than the PC.  We have a Win95 PC in the house, and I
still find it easier to add the new hardware to the Amiga instead.

>>Take the example:
>>I put a second HD in my machine. Plug in, switch on. Machine sits there. For
>>a whole 5 seconds. Boots, and I go to partition the new drive, at which
>>point it tells me 'drives have been added / removed from the system' etc.
>>Ok, so it wasnt sure if something had been added or removed. Win 95's plug
>>and play requires that you specifically specify the new device,  or let it
>>spend 20 mins or so looking for it (which a m8 of mine did.... it couldnt
>>find his new HD......)

>Absolutely false.  I recently added a CDROM to my system.  I stuck it
>in, connected it, and turned the machine on.  With no interaction on
>my part, it found the CDROM, and I then saw it as another drive
>letter.  Case closed.

Odd, that didn't happen to us.  We got some kind of conflict between the
network card and the drive.... I have never had that on my amiga.

>>I think by now my point is clear. The PC is a better machine than the Amiga.
>>I have no doubt about it, despite being proud of my A4K 030. Its just a
>>shame that PC owners a) refuse to admit that what 95 does, the Amiga has
>>done for years, a whole lot better, at a fraction of the requirements /
>>cost.  b) Ok DOOM was, and still is bloody brilliant (despite me being crap
>>at it!). Part of DOOM's success was it being released as PD. People love
>>saving money dont ya know.

>The Amiga series of machines is so much more expensive than PCs that
>it isn't even funny.

You get what you pay for.

>>When it comes to serious software, the PC leaves the Amiga crying in a
>>corner. The Amiga doesnt know what to do. Reason? The PC is a business /
>>home machine, that Amiga just a home machine. Amiga owning families are not
>>prepared to fork out several hundred pounds for a single database. For
>>several hundred pounds Amiga owners get no end of packages. Ok, they arent
>>as good, but they do their job. Very few Amiga titles cost over 100 pounds.
>>Very few PC titles cost less than 100 pounds! (Not talking games here)

>Works '95 is $35.  It blows the doors off of Amiga packages.

rubbish.  I am talking as someone who has access to both machine at any time.
the Amiga is better at most things than the PC.  Anything under Win95 sucks,
as it thrashes about with the HD so much that is just isn't funny anymore.
Does it really need to access for 20 seconds after a game of doom?  20 seconds
access.... about 40 meg of data at a good speed.  Plus, why dows it freeze up
any processor-intensive stuff for about a second every couple of minutes?
Doom is a noteable example.

>>There. On that note, I'll finish, before I stray from the point even more.
>>But Kjell Gudim is right. PC technology moves on sooooo fast. My M8s P60 is
>>out of date now too - before the warranty has even expired! But my A4000/030
>>is still keeping up, despite being almost 3 years old.

>Perhaps because Amiga technology really hasn't progressed for 3 years,
>and so software technology really hasn't changed much in that time
>either?  Or perhaps because you are happy to ignore just how poorly
>AGA fares next to more modern technology?  Or perhaps the new things
>offered in Win95 aren't understood by you?

 What new things?  Win95 has nothing new, just more stuff M$ have nicked from
UNIX, and sold to sheep like you as new. I will say it again, the PC in this
house is only here because my dad has it for work. He uses my Amiga when he
can too.

Finn Higgins

<[e-mail]>