Eyetech Group Ltd

Amiga Product Notes

Blizzard PPC accelerators manufacturing to restart

Following phase 5's filing for insolvency at the end of January the continued design and development (and future production of) their G4 accelerators for the A1200 has ceased. We are currently in discussions to see if it is economically feasible to resume this development work and go into manufacture - although this is very much a long-shot given the current (relatively early) state of the boards development. As far as we have been able to ascertain no design work at all has been carried out on the accompanying Cybervision-NG card.

However, the good news is that one of Eyetechs main hardware suppliers - German company DCE - has secured the rights to re-start manufacture of the very popular Blizzard PPC cards for the A1200 - including a contract with the software developer to maintain and update the ppc.library and other related software. Component orders are expected be placed this week. Typical component lead times are currently 10-15 weeks, so expect to see new PPC products shipping around May/June 2000.

Prices of the boards to us are likely to be around 8% higher (in DM) than those from phase 5 (due to higher component costs), but the current strong UKP to Euro exchange rate means that the price of the boards in UKP is likely to remain the same as for the phase 5 production. Back orders are now being accepted for these boards and delivery will be in strict chronological order. Unlike many other dealers we do not take funds from your card or cash cheques until goods are available for shipping, nor do we charge for order cancellation prior to shipment. The price charged will be that published on receipt of the new boards. If the final price turns out to be more than 8% different to the published price when you placed your advanced order you will be contacted and asked if you wish to proceed before your order is processed. Despite this 'no commitment' aspect this pre order policy helps us schedule our orders on our suppliers for realistic quantities and so helps us keep prices as low as possible.