The September 21st meeting will be one of our three annual social/swap shop meetings. So bring your banter, your equipment and your software. There'll be plenty of people to exchange them with. We are also dedicating the evening to gamers, so if you want to bring in a game and drag along your joystick, bring 'em on.
Gilles Bourdin of Amiga Technologies told me today that 100,000 A1200s have already been sold in pre-orders.
Of course, on the other hand, only the continent of Europe has any sort of solid distribution network. In North America, we are still waiting, just as the Australians are. God only knows what the intrepid South American and African Amiga users are thinking now, to say nothing of AR's readers in Kiev.
One last thing - while contact information is nearly impossible to get, it has been confirmed that a company known as ISE, a startup totally unrelated and unowned by Escom, has been contracted to do ALL Amiga hardware and software development, on demand, from Amiga Technologies, leaving Amiga Technologies to be a marketing and sales company only. They have already been in contact with a number of Amiga engineers and developers, but no hirings have been reported yet - largely due to the apparent requirement that engineering be done in Germany, ISE's home.
For those of you who possibly do not know me I am John Smith and I have been appointed the UK Sales Manager for Amiga Technologies UK. I was previously with Commodore for 7 years, the last 2 years of them as National Sales Manager. ...
I will have available an excellent Amiga 1200 pack with software for the end of September as the entry level machine and also a higher but very competitively priced 170MB hard disk drive pack.
It will include productivity software like Database, Spreadsheet, Word processing package, Paint package and games. ...
There will be the Amiga 4000/040 pack with a 1 Gigabyte hard drive and 6 megabytes of memory and later, during November a 4000/060 pack. Top quality software again will be included.
All Amigas will have the latest version of the operating system,version 3.1, which has been optimised to improve system performance.
I will also have a new Amiga multisync monitor that vertically scans from 15 to 38 Khz which will avail itself to all Amigas from A500 upwards that have a RGB port.
Some of you surely know how long and difficult the takeover of Commodore was and how much this one year of latency hurt the Amiga market. Building up everything again was also a difficult task for us. Especially the financial and logistic situation. Without the support from our mother company ESCOM AG, nothing would have been possible. We actually revived the Amiga in two important steps: First, by acquiring the assets of the former Commodore for more than 10 million dollars; secondly, by starting it up again, which requested again several times the initial investment. Other main difficulties we encountered were to get specific parts and components for production. D-RAMs are on allocation, Amiga keyboards, floppies and SCSI harddrives have long lead times. Tailor made parts are difficult to get and they cost more than in the old Commodore times.
Our first objective was to get Amiga products back on the market as fast as possible. To achieve this goal in an acceptable time, we decided to build the A1200 and A4000T without modifications. We have however included the new version 3.1 of the Operating System for the A1200.
Ladies and Gentlemen, please be aware that the A4000T already is a complete new product. There have only been produced 200 units worldwide by the former Commodore. There will not be modifications on the casing for this year. The design proposals that were presented in Frankfurt are only a possibility for the models coming later. Please be aware: If we had decided to make enhancements immediately, there wouldn't have been machines on the market for the Christmas season. This decision does not mean in any way that we are going to stop research and development. Enhancements will be made on current machines for sure. I'll talk about this again later.
But now I would like to present you the actual status of our operations.
We are a German company located in Bensheim, 30 miles south of Frankfurt. Our production, assembling and material providers are located in Europe but the world is our market. Our team has grown tremendously to reach 39 people since May 31st, with the new addition of Virtual Products.
We are a flexible, aggressive, motivated, transparent and dynamic team. We can react very quickly to new situations, we take our strategic decisions faster than the competition does.
What is our team doing on distribution ?
Distribution
John Smith already told you about the UK distribution. One piece of information you will surely be interested in is that ESCOM shops will carry Amiga Computers in the United Kingdom.
The employees in these shops used to sell Amigas and we want to use their store traffic again. This will be an excellent additional sales tool to spread Amigas in the UK.
We will also support the Amiga dealers who have the best knowledge of the platform and who can provide excellent service to customers.
Distribution outside the UK.
The Sino market, which includes mainland China, Hong-Kong, Macao and Taiwan is covered by our Chinese joint-venture.
In North America, we already have installed a dealer network but are still looking for a potential distributor. Somebody who is willing to support and invest in our product. We are actually looking for a partner more than just a distributor.
Production
GOOD NEWS : We are still on schedule to produce Amigas for availability in September.
And even better news, we will have a real European manufactured product.
The Amiga 1200 will be produced in Bordeaux, France. Our successful negotiations with Solectron, one of the world leader of sub-contract manufacturing, guarantees a European high quality standard. Quality is very important for us, we want to reduce defective returns to a minimum. That's why we focused on Europe rather than the Far-East.
The Amiga 4000T motherboards will be produced in the United States, near Philadelphia. The units for Europe will then be assembled in the ESCOM facilities in Germany. The American units will be assembled in Philadelphia.
We have made an agreement with a European monitor manufacturer. He will provide a monitor especially adapted to be used with the Amiga. The monitor is a high-quality multisync monitor that can scan horizontal frequencies from 15 to 38 KiloHertz. The plug of that monitor is also adapted to the video output connector of the A1200 and A4000T. I think this is exactly what is needed for all Amiga resolutions.
As announced at our previous press conference, our plan is still to build 100,000 A1200s and 20,000 A4000Ts until the end of this year. These figures are based on existing orders and on customer based forecasts. I'm quite sure that this gives us the assurance that the whole production will actually be sold. A large percentage of our A1200 production will be sold alone in the UK.
Servicing
The repair and spare servicing will be centralized in our service-centre in Braunschweig, Germany, in coordination with the representation points in each country. The technical dealer support will also be handled here, as well as the distribution for computers and monitors in Germany.
Our service plan is very simple: we don't repair, we only make components exchanges.
Future plans, developments
As I promised before, I will now tell you about our future plans for research & development.
First, we plan to enhance current models. We are thinking of faster processors and chip integration for the beginning. We are going to integrate the 68060 chip for the A4000T this year. For the entry-level model, we are looking at an external CD ROM addition and more RAM onboard the bare units.
We are also planning to use the CD32 concept for developments of set-top-box systems. The set-top-boxes will open new markets for Amiga products. Set-top-Boxes could be produced in variants for cable-TV, satellite-TV and for telephone line communication and also be used for home-shopping and home-banking. I'm convinced that this market is tremendous and will push the Amiga technology into millions of households. Software publishers should be interested in writing software for such a widely spread platform. The Amiga architecture is optimally suited for set-top-systems because of its low demand for resources like RAM or processor power and because of its multitasking and real-time abilities, in summary, the Amiga is the most cost effective platform for set-top-boxes.
It is still under investigation which RISC platform will be used as the basis for the Amiga of the future. At this point, we cannot say more about this issue, thank you for your understanding.
IFA Berlin
From the 26th of August to the 3rd of September, we will be present at the IFA, one of the biggest consumer fairs in Germany for TV, communications and multimedia. 500 000 visitors are expected this year and we use the occasion to make our comeback with the Amiga in Europe. Virtual Products I-Glasses and Commodore will also be presented to our visitors. May I point out that the Amiga version of the I-Glasses will be much cheaper than the PC version because it doesn't require the VGA-to-composite conversion box, since the Amiga 1200 already has a composite output.
Ladies and gentleman, I hope this event was informative and I hope inspiring for you. We are now at your disposition if there are any questions you would like to ask us. Thank you for your attention.
Productivity, multimedia and entertainment software to be bundled with Amiga computers
Bensheim - 15/08/95 - The Amiga 1200, fitted with a 170 Mb harddrive and two megabytes of RAM will be bundled with the SCALA MM 300 Multimedia authoring software. With this combination, the user will be able to do high quality multimedia presentations out of the box at the advantageous price of 499 UKP. Some well known Amiga productivity software packages will also be part of this offer.
The A1200 is also available without harddrive but bundled with the productivity software, except for SCALA at a price of 399 UKP.
The Amiga 4000T, fitted with a SCSI harddrive of 540MB or 1GB and 6 MB of RAM will be available with SCALA MM 300. This is the perfect package for those who want to make professional-looking presentations in a quality unmatched on any other system at that price.
Contact: Gilles Bourdin, Public Relations Tel +49 6252 709 195 Amiga Technologies GmbH Fax +49 6252 709 520 Berliner Ring 89 email gbo@amiga-tech.de D-64625 Bensheim, GermanyToC
My name if Fred Murray and I live in Miami Fl along with Sam Ormes and Creative Equipment Intl! Sam has been a long time customer and friend to Alex Amor of CEI. For several months Sam has done a mini-interview with Alex almost weekly which has been posted regularly on GEnie. Here's the latest report:
The Sam Report #22 - Monday, August 28, 1995
MIAMI, Florida - "If you are not going to work with us, for God's sake work with *SOMEBODY* and get the Amiga moving in North America!" said Alex Amor of CEI to Escom recently.
The frustration index at CEI today was higher than the Miami humidity, and Alex appears ready to throw in the towel. His marketing plan for the Americas (prepared at the request of Escom) received a rather strange reply ... an "ordering ultimatum" to commit to X number of A4000Ts per month (cash on delivery) ... or (in effect) drop out of the picture.
I won't reveal the "X number" here but if CBM had sold that many, Mehdi and Gould would still be in business! The letter from Alex in response to that was one sentence long ... (use your imagination).
Meanwhile, the new CEI line of computers continues to "blossom". Tom Hillman of Scala USA once again waited patiently while Alex filled me in on the latest. The Scala exec is in Miami again ... to discuss with CEI the PC versions of their products.
Alex is pleased about our Amiga Survey running on Genie, and applauds the effort, but experience has taught him that Escom doesn't much listen to what is said on this side of the pond.
This has been the Sam Report from Miami for Genie.
Bill Kinnersley (billk@cs.ukans.edu) writes:
IMHO, it is about time someone finally told Alex Amor to put up or shut up.
Jason Compton (jcompton@flood.xnet.com) writes:
In case you haven't been with us for the entire program, he HAS been putting up.
Amor's plan called for marketing support from Amiga Technologies on a guaranteed 5,000 4000Ts (that would be paid-on-delivery.) in the first year. AT's reply called for no marketing support on a guaranteed 12,000 4000Ts in the first year.
In other words, Amiga Technologies wanted him to sell more than twice the amount of machines with no marketing.
Jason Compton jcompton@xnet.com Editor-in-Chief, Amiga Report Magazine (708) 741-0689 FAX You've got to go faster than that. Better start doing it right. AR on Aminet - docs/mags/ar???.lha AR Mailing list - Mail me AR on WWW - http://www.omnipresence.com/Amiga/News/ARToC
[excerpts from Garry's columns of July and August, 1995]
Power Computing of the UK who purchased GVP will be manufacturing '060 accelerators for Amiga 2000s with SCSI II ports.
I received a note in the mail from Eric Kloor of NoahJi's ... He wanted to tell me that Macrosystems is coming out with an '060 accelerator for the Amiga 2000.
The accelerator is being designed by Steve Kelsey. Steve designed the CSA Magnum, the Warp Engine and DraCo. Eric also wanted to tell you that they will also probably have accelerators for the Amiga 3000 and 4000.
If you would like more info from Eric about the accelerators, you can email him at eric@draco.com
There sure are a lot of companies indicating that they are about to release '060s for the Amiga 2000!
[Source: Northwest Amiga Group, Inc.'s "Northwest Amiga Journal" August, 1995. NAG's address is Galleria Suite 553, 921 SW Morrison, Portland, OR 97205-2723.]
DKB Announces 2000/060 Card
DKB, long-time developers in the Amiga market, have announced the upcoming availability of the Wildfire 060 accelerator.
The first Wildfire will be for the A2000, boasting an 060/50 processor and these features -
* Interleaved Memory
* 32-bit SCSI-II Host bus DMA interface
* 10Mb/sec SCSI transfers
* 90% CPU available at full speed SCSI DMA
* Fully Autoconfigurable
* 64 bit RAM expandable to 128 Megs
* Uses industry standard 72-pin SIMMs
* Allows mixing and matching of 4, 8, 16, and 32 meg SIMMs.
Models are planned for the 4000, 1200, and (possibly) 3000.
The list price for the Wildfire 2000/060 is $1699. Models will be available no earlier than the first week in October, subject to processor availability.
DKB is available at (810) 348-3821 voice, (810) 348-3531 fax, and 71333.453@compuserve.com e-mail.
Kevin Hisel:
Here are a few thoughts on the Motorola 28.8kbps modems that Mark Bellon has arranged for the club to get a special, direct-from-Motorola deal on and my experiences using one on my Amiga. (See the July CUCUG newsletter for details about the offer.)
I got the Power 3400 v.34 external and am quite pleased with it. The modem itself is fine and works great with my A3000. I'm not real hot on the lights being on top of the modem (as opposed to the front panel) as I am accustomed to stacking small drives, modems etc. on top of each other saving desk space. The casing is a little cheap and feels somewhat flimsy - although it matches the off-white Amiga casing color scheme quite nicely. I did not really need combat-quality packaging - it's the guts I paid for. In that regard, this modem simply delivers the goods.
I can set the Amiga baud rate (the link rate at which the computer talks to the modem) at 57,600 with a four-color VT-100 terminal screen or 38,400 with a full, 16-color ANSI terminal screen. Higher speeds and/or resolutions/colors introduce some loss, but your actual mileage may vary. I suspect that if you have a 68000-based Amiga, you might have to drop to a 2-color terminal screen to sustain a 38,400 link rate.
The main reason I wanted to go with a faster modem was the promise that downloading and uploading files would be faster. Transferring a compressed LHA/LZH file with my 14,400 modem would clock-in at about 1,660 characters per second. With the Motorola 28,800 baud modem hooked up (to another 28,800 modem of course) that speed almost doubles to a little over 3,200 characters per second. That cuts upload/download times in half which is a pretty cool deal for a guy like me who does a lot of file transfers.
One of my favorite features of the Motorola Power Series is the Flash ROM capability. Since modems are really little computers with a very specialized objective, they, too, run on software. Most modems (like most computers) come with their operating system software permanently "burned" into a read-only-memory (ROM) chip. Some new modems (like the Motorola Power series) allow you to update the ROMs with new software if/when it becomes available from the company. However, that feature is pretty useless to Amiga owners since the software required to re-program the modem's ROM chip is usually only available for other platforms like MS-DOS or Macintosh (the one exception being Supra which provides updates in Amiga format). However, Motorola had their thinking caps on when they designed the Flash update procedures for the Power Series. Yes, they do supply special MS-DOS and Mac programs which update the ROM, but you can also simply UPLOAD (they call it download - what is up with all those geeks at Motorola anyway?) the new ROM code into the modem from your favorite terminal program using XMODEM/CRC protocol. That means that not only can you use these fine modems with you Amiga (or Atari, C64/128, Color Computer, etc.), you can reprogram them too!
I was having trouble getting the Motorola to properly connect while in auto-answer mode with another, off-brand 28.8 modem. I mentioned this to Mark, and he located the latest Flash ROM update file (see PR062695.LZH on the BBS or just search for the keyword MOTOROLA using the Z command). I followed the instructions provided for using XMODEM/CRC to upload the new code (1,048,704 bytes but it only takes about 5 minutes at 57,600 baud) and now the modem answers flawlessly every time. Apparently the problem is one that only Rockwell-style modems suffer from (like the one I was trying to call the Moto with), but the new Flash ROM code provides a work-around.
If you were at the July meeting, you also know that we voted to purchase a Motorola Power v.34 for the BBS. It is now installed and seems to be working great, although the speed does push the poor, little PC we run the board with to its limits.
So, all-in-all I'm pretty happy with the new modem. It appears that Motorola is serious about getting into the consumer-grade modem market and has the expertise, reputation and firepower to back it up. If you're thinking about getting a 28,800 modem and you're a CUCUG member, definitely consider contacting Mark Bellon to get yourself one of these little jewels!
Jim Huls:
Well I guess I'll share some of my thoughts thus far. :)
To put it simply the modem works great at 28.8 and is quite reliable. I've only had once where I couldn't get a 28.8 connection which was, interestingly enough, Motorola's own BBS. I've only called there once, so it's not really time to start griping about bad phone lines or connections yet.
I have to admit that I feel somewhat cheated in that I think the manual is incomplete. I'm one of those guys who wants to know what all of the settings do and what I can change them to. The manual is incomplete in this respect. What's the setting for setting the dialer to a different speed? There's nothing in there to tell me. Then, I find some things in there about various settings and what they are set to, but where it tells me to find out about what they do, it says N/A. So where do I find out about these settings now, since Motorola decided to keep so much from the user? Luckily they have a BBS to call up and ask questions there.
As I stated above I've thus far only called their BBS once. If I had a choice, I'd never call it again. The BBS interface is one of the most off the wall systems I think I've seen. I messed around on it for a brief time and went through some of the help items to try figuring out what I was doing and finally gave up from lack of time and frustration. With the BBS being long distance for me, I feel that Motorola should wisely consider new software with a simpler interface. No one likes to sit on a BBS running their phone bill up, trying to figure it out. Another nice addition here would be for the software to support .QWK so that way one can call up and download a packet which could contain any new messages from other users, as well as announcements of new software revisions for the Motorola modems. If Motorola is serious about selling modems to more of the general public and businesses, they really should consider this and updating the manual a bit.
As for the casing, I was amazed at how small the Power 3400 was and light too. When I was rummaging around my desk to get the cable connected for the first time, it didn't take much to move the modem by simply moving the cable around. I don't want a tank on my desk, but there comes a point where I don't want to be rummaging around with cables for anything else I might connect and worry about the modem flipping over and falling off my desk if I'm moving cables.
The lights on the top are quite odd for me. I want to look over and gander at what's going on at times. Also, stacking modems is another no-no now. I thought about just going ahead and mounting it on the wall, but when I turned it the way it had to be, I found the Motorola name and series number to be upside down. Now I know that such things like names being upside down sound a bit silly to the hacker type. The modem works fine after all. Seeing this on the wall with things upside down is just one of those things that bothers me and I'm sure others just like having pictures crooked on the wall.
Still, questioning Motorola's idea for the casing, I have to wonder why more manufacturers don't put an external volume control on their external models, like USR does on their Courier. After being lucky enough to borrow one for awhile, I've found myself quite spoiled with it. People may throw out cost issues or even ask why you would need it, but all I can say is that unless you never have used one, you'll never understand why. One example is, if you dial a wrong number or a number is out of service, you can turn the volume up so you can hear what's being said. Sure it might be some old lady at 3am, but at least you know what's being said, whether it be some sorta number no longer in service message or a couple four letter words you've heard when you go see a movie.
Don't get me wrong on alot of this. The guts of the Motorola modem gets the job done quite admirably. I was able to use a USR Courier with V.FC early in its life and found it quite unreliable and not worth any price tag they put on it. [Note from Mike Latinovich: V.FC is quite unreliable in any implementation, especially early ones. ;) V.FC was/is a hack, and sucks pretty bad. I feel sorry for some of the people who got suckered into buying V.FC. For some, they deserve it. ;) ] I've found v.34 at least on the Motorola to be surprisingly reliable on connects. Only once, out of many calls, have I not gotten 28.8 and then it was 26.4. Still not bad by any means.
As for working with my Amiga, I've set it up to work exactly as Kevin mentioned. I have a 3000 with 25mhz 030 as he does. If you want to take full advantage of the modem and lock the rate at 115.2, get a serial board that is lockable at that rate. Once installed, you won't have to worry about losing anything in terms of performance on the modem or Amiga side. It really makes a difference.
With all of this in mind, I'd like to say that I am happy with the modem. It works great and is reliable. I'd like to see Motorola get their act together on the BBS, manual, and casing issues. USR has them clearly beat in these areas, just as Motorola has USR beat with offering various features, such as caller ID. The catch here and with some other features is that most people are going to find the other issues a bit more important, since in some states caller ID is illegal and also many won't even use the service, since it is an added cost. Features are only good if you use them and then also how often you use them. The issues I mentioned are things that I think many will encounter a bit more often. Do I feel cheated in what I spent? Not on your life! At the price I paid, I feel real good about what I got in the modem operation department. If I had paid what Motorola charges most everyone else, I would've told them to go fly a kite. It's good, but unless they fix those other issues, they really ought to get the price down to a more competitive level. I just wish I had a v.34 USR Courier to compare to. It'd be interesting to see one next to it, since I really don't have the best lines around.
Mark Bellon:
Interesting.
Of course, on a long distance phone call, you are most likely to not get a high speed connection, since the number of (phone) switch and company hops can lead to degradation.
The manual is barely OK. I've seen worse, but it does seem to be about what most vendors provide. I'd have wished for a better manual too. Where I work, we have quite a few modem brands including USR, Motorola, Supra, etc. and I must say that the manual is "average". I got the feeling that they listed all of the registers and such and then expect a serious modem tweeker to go get a Hayes modem instruction set book from Computer Literacy or an equivalent techno-bookstore. PCI video card manuals have fallen into this realm as well. To really program them, you don't use the vendor documents, you get a special how to book.
As I said in the meeting, these modems are leading edge technology in "inexpensive" cases. They are very small and don't weigh very much at all.
The external volume is a nice feature. I agree that it would be useful to some, but personally I don't care one way of the other.
On the wall mounting issue and the modem name appearing upside down. The way you are trying it this is true, but that's not what they had in mind. The designers had it so that it would be down by the phone with the serial cable coming down to it from above (the desk or whatever). If you look at it from that angle, it's actually correct. It's really a desktop modem and when placed next to your computer the light are just fine. I do have to admit that my 30" deep, 8 foot long computer table gives me plenty of space for this to work. On a cramped desk, it can be a problem. I can say that there are quite a few other modems out there, including AT&T, that are actually weirder in shape, and the trend it growing.
I'll be happy to trade it in the "big brother" that can be mounted for "slight" increase in price. %^)
On the UDS BBS system. It's the pits. I've never seen worse. It's barely functional. To be fair, it being phased out shortly in preference to a WEB page. They are promising REALLY REAL SOON NOW. I can say that the human based phone support is nothing less than impressive and several major modem reviews agree with me. When I called about the Rockwell based modem problem, the first person I spoke with said there was something vaguely familiar about the problem description, but admitted that they weren't the expert on the PowerClass 28.8 and gave me the number of the engineer responsible for it! No, they didn't know I was a Motorola employee, either. I call the engineer, he listened for about 2 minutes and then said "sure sounds like what we fixed - get the Rev 2 download from the BBS".
Competitive? The typical discount price for the PowerClass 28.8 modem is under $300! COURIER V.everything, the "competition", is typically $370 or above on the discount market. The Motorola modems are a much better buy to start with and then we got them for about $50 less than normal.
All in all I'm extremely happy, as well, but agree the manual and BBS should be better. I personally don't care about the volume issue, although I know it is a vital feature to some and the case is fine for me.
Oh, one final issue. Motorola has a reputation for excellent connects under just about any line conditions. In the review I last saw, it outperformed the COURIER by turning in a perfect score, while the COURIER got a 97%. USR just improved their flash code so things will continue to evolve.
Kevin Hisel:
[To set the dialer to a different speed] That's on page 3 of Appendix C. It's the S11 register (DTMF tone duration). Their default is 80ms but with a good local digital switcher you can sometimes halve that. Try:
ATS11=50
See if that's fast enough for you and if it works with your local telco.
Re the manual: the only real bad part of the moto manual is the index. Want to know something about baud rate? Not there. How about cables? Nada. Where's RS-232? Gone. Parity? Nope. Stop bits? Nope. Data or Word Length? Nope. Duplex? Nope. Amiga? You've got to be kidding.
The modem itself is a lot more helpful than their sorry index. Just type:
AT$H
and you get a full listing of all AT commands and S register settings. That's definitely cool.
I am curious which commands/settings are listed as N/A that you came across (except for the FAX commands which most manufacturers do not include). The examples I saw were for features that are not included (like line switching on a two-line RJ11 set-up).
[As for the volume control issue] As long as I can turn the damn speaker off (ATM0), I am happy.
[On long distance high speed phone connects] From what I've read, one is considered "lucky" to consistently get 28.8 connects, even LOCALLY, regardless of the combat readiness of the modem(s) in question. Local telco lines have much variability of quality and it's a real testament to the genius of the designers of v.whatever that these little boxes can even deal with it.
One of the fellows at Supra who assisted with the design of their first v.32bis modem told me, "9600 baud over a phone line is Magic. 14,400 over a phone line is VooDoo Magic." What in the hell would 28,800 be...Divine Intervention?
Jim Huls:
[On the dialer speed setting] Thanks! I read that and can see why I never noticed it. Length of DTMF tones? Gimme a break! ;) Various modems that I've owned (not many) have almost always had something there that would explain what that actually means. If I messed around with modems a bit more, I probably would've put two and two together and got S11. ;)
[On the modem's AT$H command] That is kewl! I completely missed that one. I knew the USR's had something like that, so I was looking for it, but never saw it. Thanks again!
[On commands/settings listed as N/A] The ones I referred to were things like %R and automatic rate adaption, *FT and Fast train, and a few others. Go back to the command index and defaults and you'll find quite a few that don't list pages to look these things up in. There's just a N/A next to them. If you go a few more pages and look at the factory configs on page e-2 you'll notice that what something like *FT says is different than what it says in the command index. A few others are like that as well, but since there's nothing in the book to explain these, you kinda wonder what those *really* mean.
Kevin Hisel: Ah, now I know what you're talking about. Yes, that is a little funky. It's kind of like saying, "Now don't you go worrying your pretty, little head over automatic rate adaption and automode modulation." Hmm, sounds like Apple to me! (flame bait mode = on)
Kevin Hopkins: Do we know of any difficulties that might be experienced by Amiga users who would want to avail themselves of this 28.8K Motorola modem deal? Namely, connecting them up (Do they have standard serial connectors on them? I assume the cable on the Mac version goes from standard serial to Mac serial.) and is the Amiga capable of keeping up with it? I see mention made of Macs and IBMs, so I thought I'd ask.
Mark Bellon: The connector on the modem is a standard RS-232C 25 pin connector. A standard Amiga serial modem cable will work just fine. I've been lead to believe that the PC version, which an Amiga owner would purchase, doesn't come with a cable but the Mac version does.
The PowerClass 28.8 modem uses the standard Hayes compatible instruction set and will work with any software that uses it (which is to say virtually everything on the market).
Jim Huls: Well, to be quite honest, if you want to get the max out of a 28.8 modem on the Amiga, your best bet is to buy a serial card that can be locked to the 115.2k rate. [That is the rate at which the computer communicates with the modem, regardless of how fast the modem communicates with the outside world.] I'll make an attempt to explain why, but maybe Mike will jump in.
With the way the Amiga chipset is designed, the serial port is not actually buffered, or if it is, it's like only 1k or some such low number. With this being the case, the CPU is forced into pulling this data off and keep things up to speed. On an A3000 with an 030, the 030 can keep you going at about 57.6k without much slowdowns affecting the system if multitasking. Anything higher, like 76.8k, can be used, but I do *NOT* recommend multitasking. With an 040, you might be able to hit that and maybe 115.2k. I only had a 28.8 for a week awhile back and no 040 so I can't answer that.
Anyway, these serial cards you see that take up a slot in any of the Zorro 2 or Zorro 3 Amigas can take care of this for you. Most of them have one of the UARTs, or some such chip, that you may be familiar with in the PC world. They provide a much larger buffer, so that way the CPU doesn't have to work overtime at high speeds.
It takes the load off rather nicely, but keep in mind that it won't provide any sort of true increases in graphics speeds, as the Amiga chips have their limits. I've found the combination of a graphics card with a serial card adds a whole new life to an Amiga when doing any telecommunications activities.
Getting such cards are your decision since it's your money. Suffice it to say that you can use the 28.8 on a 3000 with an 030, but be prepared for a slight slowdown if you want to get anything close to the max performance of the modem.
On a 68000 based Amiga, we're talking downright scary as to what kind of performance you could get. The first step would be to check out one of those serial.device replacements that are available. I really don't know what they could expect to see performance-wise.
As for the serial cards available, you will mostly see the GVP I/O Extender and Multiface III cards. Last I checked, the MFCIII with 2 serial and 1 parallel port went for $80 new and the GVP I/O with 1 serial and 1 parallel went for $110 plus another $15 or so if you want to add another serial port. There are other cards out there, like C='s old 7 port board, but it cannot be locked to a high enough rate unless you hack it real good. There are others, as well, but they too either cannot be locked high enough to mean anything or are extremely hard to get.
The last solution is buying an accelerator card that has a serial port on it. GVP and Phase5/AS&S both provide these solutions in some form or another. Not sure if there are any others or not.
As far as the two serial boards mentioned above, if you're buying new, you probably should go with the MFCIII as it's a very nice board at one of the lower costs. If you are looking at the used market, you won't find the MFCIII discounted much, but you should find the GVP board quite close. The GVP I/O is a *VERY* fast board since it was designed for midi-like, which is well over that what you can get with a 28.8 and is one of the reasons for the higher cost. The one I have comes with the standard one serial and parallel, as well as another serial port, and a special expansion port that was designed for their midi interface.
Mike Latinovich: Well, for the most part, that's accurate. It's a 1-byte buffer in one of the CIA chips that handles the serial I/O. Not a whole heck of alot, hence the Amiga itself (CPU) does more work than the CIA does. This is one of the many weaknesses in the Amiga's architecture. Grabbing one of the multi-serial cards does alot to fix the problem.
I can recommend both the bsc/Alfa Data MultiFaceCard III (MFC3) and the GVP ioExtender. Although, I would recommend the former more so, because it is cheaper, and it works. I've had no problems with either card, and I use both daily (both cards have their 2 serial ports locked at 115k2 all the time, with no problems).
If you, or anyone you know, were to come across one of the old C= A2232 7-port serial cards, I'd stay away from it like the plague, if you plan to do high-speed modeming, as it wasn't built to lock at any rate above 19200bps (It can be hacked, and can be used at higher rates, but not so reliably). However, if you were to need a pool of up to 7 2400 modems with data compression, such a card would suffice.
Anyway, a 3rd-party serial card is virtually a "must have" on the Amiga for greater than 38k4 bps serial data communications. If you were to watch some of the people who call my BBS, you can tell who (of the Amiga callers) is using a 3rd-party serial card, and who is using the stock serial port (especially on greater than 14k4 connections). Most of the times, the data rates will fall back to them receiving at ~1920cps on a 28k8 connection - a sign that they have a slow machine, and that they possibly have things set up wrong on their end.
I know that I've had the stock serial port locked up to 115k2 on the 4000/040 here, but that didn't work so nicely with the stock C= serial.device driver; I replaced it (serial.device) with artser.device [available on Aminet in comm/misc], and I could use 115k2 reliably on that port. However, it still eats the CPU alive, since the serial I/O on the stock port depends alot on the CPU of the machine.
You want a faster modem? Get a serial card.
Them's the words to live by on the Amiga, folks.
Kevin Hopkins: In our discussion on the 28.8K modems both you and Jim suggested that you really need an I/O board to keep up with the faster modem. Does this mean that A500 owners are pretty much out of luck when is comes to 28.8K or are they just not going to reap the total benefits of such a modem?" The reason I asked, is that an A2000 can have a board added, but an A500 can't, so are they dead? What about an A1200?
Mike Latinovich: A500 owners (along with (A1000? /) A600 / A1200 owners) won't really be able to take advantage of their 28k8 modems with the stock serial port. They just can't handle those high-speed serial rates that make the 28k8 modems so nice to use.
The only way you could add a serial card to the A500 is by adding one of those Zorro-slot expanders available that will give that machine (A500) a few ZorroII slots to toy with.
As far as the A600/A1200, I believe there is even an Amiga-specific PCMCIA card with 2 serial ports on it. Can't remember what it's called, or who its made by offhand, but it will allow you to use high-speed modems with the A600/A1200, provided you don't mind an ugly mess of serial cables protruding from a tiny PCMCIA card.
Jim Huls: Well it's hard for me to answer that and be 100% sure, since I have a 3000, but my experience with the 3000 leads me to believe that you would be hard pressed to do any multitasking with a 68000 based Amiga while downloading and have the rate set at anything higher than 57600. I really can't say if that rate is even possible. To my knowledge all 28.8 modems have a max rate of 115.2 so if you want the most out of your modem and live peacefully with it while multitasking, a serial card is the best solution. Now, someone may argue that you're never going to get that kind of throughput of 115.2 but that depends on what it is you're transferring. If you are transferring any text files for example, it is possible to hit anywhere close to that rate provided your system is setup for that. Meaning you better have an 040 installed or a serial card.
Kevin Hopkins: Mike, in a previous post you wrote:
The 16550AF chip, however, IS a necessity. Those are the ones that have the
16-byte FIFO buffers, and lock to 115k2, and make people happy, etc. As far
as cost, I haven't a clue. The PC I use came with 16550AFs, so mine were
quite expensive.
Mike Latinovich: It's a reference to the PC clone I use; it came with 2 16550AF UARTs on the motherboard (as well as one on the modem card it). The 16550AF is what you want/really need if you want to do reliable high-speed serial communications on a PC clone. They can handle the higher DTE rates that the newer modems (28k8s) use, such as locking the port at 115,200bps, etc.
On the Amiga, it's not too different. the high-speed serial cards available for Ami either use 16550AFs, or clones of the chip. They allow the same serial port rates as a normal PC, equipped with 16550s, would allow (in most cases).
Kevin Hopkins: I still have my serial setting at 38,400. At 57600, things seemed a little weird. However, I'm also getting some weird hesitations even at that setting with this new modem, as if I was on a UNIX machine with too many users on it. And that's just when I'm entering text.
Kevin Hisel: The screenmode has a lot to do with the efficacy of the modem-to-computer link speed. Sixteen colors (like you probably use to call the BBS) on an A3000 limits your abilitiy to go much higher than 38,400. I've found that it's no problem to go to 57,600 with a 4-color display like you might use logged into your shell account.
Close your eyes. Well, maybe not. It's a little hard to read with your eyes closed. Anyway, just imagine that every five minutes a GEOS '87 commercial is played on TV. Slick graphics accompanied by SID music get your toes tappin' and your adrenalin flowing. Brian Dougherty comes on the screen to show all Commodore 64 and 128 users that if they have Windows '87 (aka GEOS 2.0), they will have the computing power they need to solve all of their computing needs and wants! All across the world Commodore users are rapt with anticipation, drool running down their chins. Computer illiterates flock in droves to their nearest Toy 'R' Us to buy truckloads of Commodores they barely know how to turn on, simply to have this latest marvel make computing easy for them.
Commodore is selling 64s faster than it can make them. Berkeley Softworks can't make copies of Win87 fast enough. The help lines are flooded with calls for help with installing this new operating system. 1351 mice are more scarce than a cool day in August. GEOS T-shirts are free with each purchase.
Installation parties are held on every block across America. 30 million copies are expected to sell before Christmas worldwide! Brian is on the cover of Fortune magazine as the world's richest man!
And features? Wow, does Windows '87 have features!?! Longer file names! (O-o-o-o!) Plug and play peripheral! (A-a-a-h-h!) Online support through Q-Link, er-r GEnie! (Cool!!) Fast disk access with REUs! (WOW! The crowd goes wild!!) Color, 24-pin, and laser printer support! (12 people just passed out from hyper ventilation.)
So what are you waiting for??? Don't be the last one on your block to finally have a life, or to get promoted for your computer savvy. Have your boss licking your boots because you, and only you, have the intelligence and experience that comes from owning and knowing how to use Windows '87! Amaze your friends, intimidate your competitors, impress your superiors. GET WINDOWS '87 NOW! Or else, you'll be so far behind in the computer revolution that you'll be treated as a leper!
Obviously, the above is meant to point out a few things: (1) Windows 95 ain't all it's made out to be (or, don't be suckered into buying something you don't need). (2) Save yourself some serious money, and buy GEOS 2.0. Chances are it will do all you need your Commodore to do, and do it more easily! (3) Some of the much ballyhooed features of Windows 95 have been standard on Commodores for years. (Took 'em long enough to learn!) And if you should buy a different computer later, your GEOS experience will help you understand a graphical user interface (GUI) like Windows.
Windows '87 ... oops, GEOS 2.0. Start it up!!
[Source: From the Southwest Regional Association of Programmers / 64-128 newsletter "Comm-Adore", September, 1995. SWRAP's address is P.O. Box 8232, Chicago, Illinois 60652-8232.]
Kevin Hopkins: Mark, at the last meeting you mentioned a few things people could do to speed up the performance of their PowerMacs with just a little investment. You mentioned the clock accelerator kit sold be DVC for $79.95 and the L2 cache memory made by L2. Could you tell me why you prefer those manufacturer's devices and are these improvements as necessary on the newest models of Macintosh just released? How much of an improvement is someone likely to see?
Mark Bellon: The first generation of PowerMacs (6100, 7100 and 8100) had compromises in their design to make them very conservative. The conservative approach turned into somewhat slower memory systems than you would have hoped for and slower MPU clock rates as well.
One of the machines, the 6100, doesn't have VRAM. In Amiga speak, it only has chip RAM - no fast RAM. Since the memory system is highly pipelined, 64 bits wide, and can run at up to 40 Mhz this isn't that bad at all. Video slows the machine down about 4-6% depending on the resolution and color depth. This also means that some interesting things can happen.
Caches
Slow memory systems make caches particularly effective. Adding a 256 KB cache can easily speed a machine up by 20-30%. Larger caches add slightly more for general activity, but don't initially appear to be a big win - hence the well know adage in the PowerMac world: do anything you can do to add a cache but don't waste money on larger caches! Unfortunately, this is dead wrong in many cases, particularly on the 6100, a machine that Apple informs us makes up 65% of all PowerMac purchases.
Anyway, caches are good and many companies sell them. Unfortunately, most don't design them or understand them. They just sell them. It turns out that most of the cache boards out there are either of unknown design pedigree or are based on a sample hardware design article that Apple published early on, as an exercise, left to the reader to complete, WHICH ALSO HAD A SERIOUS FLAW IN IT THAT CAN LOCK UP A SYSTEM!
When I started looking for a cache for my 6100, I was aiming at a 256 KB cache, just like everyone else. Since I work with this kind of thing for a living, I started asking pointed questions like "How fast is the static RAM on your cache board?" and "What does a cache/memory bus cycle look like?" Not a single vendor could answer my questions and I spoke to quite a few. At the end of my wits, I tried the last company on my list, a no-name company call L2 that appeared out of nowhere on the Internet. I spoke with the owner and chief designer, Larry Knight. He was the former VP of engineering of a well known Mac accelerator company, with over a decade of experience designing caches and coprocessors. Not only did he have the answers I wanted, he had complete benchmarks showing that the "common knowledge" was wrong. I purchased a 1024 KB (1 MB) cache from him and it did amazing things to my machine.
As time progressed, L2 got a reputation second to none on the 'net. Machines that failed with others' caches always worked with those from L2. They replaced any bad product overnight. They wrote the first cache testing and sizing program I ever saw and made it available to the public. Others have written software, too, but I saw their's first. Why was a sizer necessary? It turns out that a batch of unknown pedigree 256 KB cache boards had been sold to people and they universally didn't see any performance increase. Why? The boards were filled with dummy chips! Another frequent problem is people were afraid to insert the boards properly. The cache must operate a very high speed and must be well seated. The slot for it takes a good push to get it in and many just wouldn't push hard enough, for fear of breaking their systems. Yes, you have to push until you get a slight "THUNK".
I've used their stuff in all of my referrals and have been very, very impressed. Only once did something fail immediately and they even called back (a few days after the exchange cache had long been running quite nicely) and told us why it failed (their automatic component insertion devices had a bug in them. They would register "empty" one component after they were really empty! One of the bypass capacitors was missing and the cache could pass diagnostics but not work in all systems).
L2 just makes great stuff at excellent prices.
Oh, about large cache magic. It turns out that many graphics programs are highly repetitive in what they do. A cache, if large enough, can keep the code for the program, the OS, the video memory, and the program data inside and yield as much as a 2x speed up. On the 6100, this is particularly important, since the lack of VRAM means that main memory is used for video, and main memory can be cached. This allows the cache hardware to optimize access to memory by converting small accesses into larger, more efficient ones. Reading 8 single bytes turns into a single memory read, not 8, for instance.
A 1024 KB cache can actually speed some graphics operations up by as much as 90%. Almost double, as expected. A 512 KB cache comes almost as close. Definitely worth going to at least 512 KB in my opinion and 1024 KB to get every last bit of performance out of a machine. In the 7100 and 8100, the cache isn't as much of a graphics accelerator, but if the cost of the cache is less than 10% of the machine, then spending that amount of money to get that amount of speed up is economically correct.
Clock Kits
Clock kits are out there a-plenty. The earliest ones used diagnostic clips that grab the clock chip and worked OK. That is until your system got stuck to the table top. You know, the plastic pads on the bottom that seem to turn to glue? Not moving forces the owner to use a bit of force [when finally trying to move the computer] and the system "jerks". The clip falls off or shifts and you loose you acceleration or "better" yet, lock up your system.
Not all of the early clock chippers came with a fan for the MPU. This meant the MPU would be very hot, since it was running faster than it was designed for.
DVC was one of the first to have a clock chipper that was under $100 that used an injection molded plastic sleeve to wrap around the clock chip forcing a very tight seal with the clock chip. They also had a fan.
Their design has improved, as well, as they now use a rotary switch to set the clock rate instead of swapping clock crystals.
Again, they just make good stuff at a good price. There are actually many kits out there now that are as good as theirs, but I like the service I get from them and I haven't found enough of a price difference to warrant a change.
The New PowerMacs
How about the new PowerMacs (7200, 7500, 8500, 9500)? The 8500 and 9500 machine comes with 512 KB caches. The 7500 doesn't come with one, but it can be added, and they can be as large as 4096 KB! This is important, as processor speeds and main memory sizes go up. You need bigger caches to get the same level of improvement as you got in the "old days". Using 1/32 of main memory as a rule is generally a good idea. I would strongly urge the use of 512 KB caches as a minimum now, rather than 256 KB, but 1024 will be a factor.
What about the 7200 which comes with a 32K cache?
The 32 KB cache is the L1 or primary cache and contained within the 601 processor. When I am speaking about caches, I am talking about L2 or secondary caches. This are very important for performance improvements, as they can be added or increased in size, while the L1 caches can't.
I strongly advocate the addition of at least 256 KB of L2 cache to a 7200, but not more than 512 KB.
What about clocking these machines up? Coming off the shelf at 75 MHz, is it worth it?
I'd certainly wait for good clock kits to come out and make sure that the machine is initially stable. The 7200/75 can easily be clocked to 90 or 100 Mhz.
The new machines appear to be a little less conservative in the way they handle the PowerPC 601, is this true?
The new machines handle the 601 in a significantly more aggressive fashion than the first PowerMacs. Conservation can't be determined purely by the clock speed, especially when the top speed of the 601 is 120 Mhz (which will rise to 150 Mhz). The new PowerMacs are extremely aggressive in their memory system, which is tremendously faster than the 6100, 7100 or 8100.
The lack of an L2 cache in the 7200 and 7500 isn't a sign of conservation either, since the memory system is so much better, the value of an L2 cache is less than it was with the slower memory system based [678]100 machines. The performance level of a 7200/75 (without an L2 cache) is most excellent when compared with the original 8100/80 (with a 256 KB cache).
It is true that it wouldn't have cost Apple anything to speak of to offer the machines with clock rates that were 10 Mhz higher or so, but the real advantage of this wouldn't show up much (10-15%).
I must admit the 7200/75 is positioned to provide a low cost PowerMac platform for entry level consumers and the clock rate of 75 was picked to be identical to the entry level Pentium (which is also 75 Mhz). It's still an excellent machine and can be clocked and cached to get a significant performance boost. As an entry level machine, it's just fine. The next step (7200/90) is also picked to match the Pentiums.
If you can't afford a machine in the 7500 class or higher, the 7200 is a very nice choice and blows the doors off of the 6100, which it replaces.
If you have money to burn, the best, and really only machine to buy at this juncture is the 7500 since it preserves so many options and can be made as fast or faster than the 8500 or 9500. Unless you need the video out or 6 PCI slots, it's the machine to watch. You can build a very sharp system now and upgrade it to a 150 or 200 Mhz 604 or 604e in the next 12-18 months. It has the same case as the 7200 (which is most excellent and flexible) and avoids the complexities of tower cases (which Apple always get close to right but not "right" enough). If you have to have a 604 it can even be added now, yielding a virtual 8500 without the cost (and video out).
I am sick of hearing about Windows95. Hundreds of reviewers have said it looks more like a Mac. So? And if I hear Mick Jagger sing "Start it up" one more time, I'm going to cancel my cable subscription. I don't own a PC and I won't buy one. Bill Gates can get rich with someone else's money.
More like a Mac? How close is a Mac to the Amiga? The short answer is "Not very close". Yes, they both use a 680X0 Motorola microprocessor, but the Mac OS caters to a very different crowd. I've never owned a Mac or actually played with one much. What's the point? I have a 40Mhz Amiga 1200 [DKB Cobra EC030 (The EC stands for Extra Cheap)]. No PowerMac ever made can duplicate the performance of my little Amiga. But - I've still had a small hankering to actually use a Mac to see the differences.
My chance to use a Mac arrived this month in the form of a Mac emulator called ShapeShifter (SS). This emulator had been floating around AmiNet for a while, but the word on the net was that it was buggy. I ignored it for months. My experience with emulators was limited to the A64 Package, which ran OK on my A600, but crashed badly on my A1200. In the end, I couldn't get too interested in Commodore 64 software. I wrote a lot of it in the eighties and now it all seems so quaint. Ho Hum.
If it weren't for a friend, who got interested in SS and actually spent the 3 weeks necessary to extract a copy of the Mac ROMS, figure out the installation instructions and finally get it up, I would not be writing this. My friend installed SS on my Amiga for me. Without his help, I would never have attempted it.
My difficulty with the installation stemmed from a complete lack of knowledge of the Mac OS. Like most of you, I didn't have access to a Mac and a NULL modem cable, necessary to capture an image of the Mac ROMS, and a High Density floppy drive. If you do have these items, then you are home free. SS comes with a program for the Amiga that will extract the ROMS for you.
Now that the installation is done, and I have instant access to a "Mac IIci", I thought I'd share my experiences with you.
ShapeShifter is available on AmiNet as misc/emu/ ShapeShifter3.1.lha. Written by Christian Bauer, the program is shareware. The $40 shareware fee gets you a version of the program that uses your hard drive in a more efficient fashion. There is no mailing list for SS, but you can get up-to-the-minute news on comp.sys.amiga.emulations. At last look, there were 140+ messages posted.
The SS archive includes all files necessary, but two: The Mac ROMS, and the Mac Operating System. AmigaGuide docs are reasonably complete, but are aimed at someone that already knows the Mac. Some of the terminology was very confusing. Shape Shifter is not for the beginner.
When I first got started with SS, I had been provided a set of "one meg ROMS" and the Mac 7.1 Operating System. The installation went pretty smoothly, once these files were in place. Since I was using an unregistered copy of SS, I had to create a large file on my hard disk that emulated a Mac hard drive. I told SS to make me a 20 MB file to hold the Operating System and my applications. That worked fine.
SS requires some configuration to make it compatible with your Amiga. I had to set the screenmode, number of colors, where the serial and parallel ports were, how much memory to allot to the Mac, and several others.
Then I was able to actually click an icon on my workbench and watch my Amiga transform itself into a Mac. Since I had no idea of how a Mac was laid out, I just clicked on every pull down menu item to see what it did.
The Mac, I found, does not have a right mouse button. Very strange. It does have a "Workbench", but it does not have anything like a Shell, or CLI. You do everything on a Mac by opening "Folders" (directories) and double clicking on icons to launch a program.
I must tell you that I am not a Workbench oriented person. I operate my Amiga from SID2, ToolsDaemon, and the Shell. In other words, I like to have complete, pinpoint control over my computer. This is simply not possible on the Mac. Nothing like SID or DirOpus exists on the Mac.
When I got the Mac flying, I found that two applications programs were included. One is an unarchiver, which is absolutely necessary. The other is ZTerm, a terminal program. After configuring ZTerm, I found it to be a very good program. I use it to download Mac files from Mac archives. Once the files are downloaded, in .hqx format, which is an Apple version of UUencode, I drop the files on Unstuffit. This unarcs the files.
So, now I can go online and download shareware and freeware Mac files and attempt to install them. I found very few freeware files. Most authors expect a $5 to $50 shareware fee.
ShapeShifter and the Amiga multitask. If you double click the (included) Mac handler, you can have direct access to the Mac files from the Amiga. This is quite handy. So far, I've used the Mac to download graphics and sound files and Unstuff them. Then the files can be easily copied to the Amiga.
I recommend you have an accelerated Amiga with at least 8 MB of fast ram to enjoy SS. I may have to buy a 16 MB chip! SS supports up to 24 bit graphics, but only if you have a video card. Most of these cards are supported. If, like me, you have a 1200, you can only see 256 colors. And that costs a ton of speed and chip ram. I don't recommend it. Try the black and white mode. SS does not run slowly. It takes about seven seconds to load and there is no lag on the cursor.
File transfers to my internal floppy are a problem. I found there is a "bug" in the mfm.device. There is a fix if you can read hex and operate a Hex Editor. Check the newsgroup for details. A high density floppy drive would be very helpful for loading Operating Systems and Applications.
I have tried MS Word, ClarisWorks, and other pieces of business software on my "Mac". They all work well, and fast. Demo versions are available on the net.
What didn't work for me initially was printing. I finally got it working. I was just unfamiliar with the Mac. Printer drivers on the Mac are nothing at all like the Amiga. I RTFM and finally got it to work, only to discover the Mac is not capable of ASCII text printing. Everything it sends to a printer is graphics. (I'll stick with my Amiga, thank you.) The printers I am using are a Starjet 48 and three Epson/Panasonic dot printers. I used Chuck's Printer Driver.
Something like Arexx exists for the Mac. It's called AppleScript. It's a scripting language that can send and receive information to your program. Multitasking as we know it does not exist on the Mac. When you click the close gadget on a running program, the program does not shut down. It remains in memory, frozen. It is best to quit a program by RAmiga Q. That will kill the app and return all available memory. You can only run one program at once, just like a Vic20.
The Mac is the most resource hungry OS I have ever encountered. Typical programs require 3-5 MB of disk space and 2-4 MB of memory. For this reason, I recommend a minimum of 8 MB of ram and the fastest drive you can get your hands on. SS supports SCSI and IDE. We were able to access an Apple CDROM also.
There are some good applications programs available. I registered my copy of SS (The process took ten days; I got a key file by Email) and now it works much faster. I could then give SS a whole partition. It got "useable" at that point. My Amiga/Mac runs about twice as fast as my friends Powerbook 180. Quite useable. If you want to try the Mac on your Amiga, I recommend you buy a copy of "The MacIntosh Bible", by Peachpit Press. It's available everywhere for $30. I was making no progress until I got this book. Now I'm a Mac Maniac. It's fun to go shopping on the net for programs.
Next month I will relate more of my discoveries in the Mac world, like how to install a later Operating System and just exactly what an "Extension" is. I am assembling a list of FTP sites that serve Mac software. If, between now and the next issue, you decide to install SS, be warned: I had severe problems with OS 7.5 and do not recommend it until I can find out what the problem is. I know others are using it, but it crashes my system.
[Source: "The NotePad" of the San Diego Amiga Users Group, 9/95. SDAUG's address is P.O. Box 81801, San Diego, CA 92138-1801.]
* We are also talking to software editors to make them write that software we want to see in these shops.
* We'll have to move away from the 680XX processor range for sure.
* In the United States, we are looking for a partner more than for a distributor. We have some negociations going on at the moment that seem to be very promising. Currently, we have signed a non-exclusive agreement with a distributor called SMG. This contract is valid until the end of the year. Marketing and promotion will be made by our partner in the States, in accordance with us of course.
* The CD32 should not be reintroduced this year. We want to do something new next year on the CD32 base. For the MPEG card for the actual CD32, I think that we aren't going to produce it anymore. But we are looking at the market and if it is worth it, we have no problem if a third party company wants to produce it under licence. This could actually be a good solution.
* ADSP will restart. Yes, we want the chips to consume less power. This is actually one of the development goals for the near future.
* Yes, we are working on an Internet package indeed. I think this will be a very sucessful bundle for the A1200 and for the A4000T. For the A1200, we want something that can run with disks and the standard 2MB of RAM. And the package has to be very easy to use, sort of plug and play. Regarding online services, we actually have a lot of plans, but these I can't talk about.
* The current A1200 sold will have 2 meg chip RAM and an optional 170 MB harddrive, loaded with the bundle software. The price, I can tell, is 699 DM without HD and 999 DM with 170 MB. The prices, of course, will depend on different countries, VAT, etc...
* The OS has to be improved in many points. There has been some work done on this by the AOS replacement project team. Please don't ask me about details, but I know about resource tracking, vMem, and memory protection to be urgent things to improve/implement. The docs for developers will be made available on our FTP and WWW servers. This is being made currently. There will be email adresses for ADSP support. We are still building up this developer support structure and we want it to be efficient and easily accessible. Servers are running domains are reserved and used. Email adresses have to be made and publicly announced. The developer docs have to be put in a directory. I think this should be running in two weeks. (Actually, it is all ready, but not accessible yet.)
* We will support user groups and fairs and events and everything possible, according to our human ressources. Of course, we know how valuable user groups are for us. This can be by sending some machines, POS material, or attending etc., but please be aware that we still are a small company with a big job to do.
* We now have 32 people in Bensheim, 5 in London, 3 in the USA.
* I will always post my news on the newsgroups, and there will be the Amiga homepage THE OFFICIAL ONE this month. We will announce it. It might be www.amiga-tech.com, but it might also be www@amiga.de or www@amiga.com.
The August 17th meeting began with former President Richard Rollins presiding and sporting the wireless microphone that several members conspired to get for President Jim Huls, who was absent due to vacation. There were several questions concerning a coup d'etat, but Richard assured us that there hadn't been. He wasn't sure about Vice President Dave Witt's status, but from the back of the room, Dave waved his right to conduct the meeting (just to be on the safe side). Richard then executed the traditional introduction of officers. The floor was then opend for the Question and Answer Session.
* Jon Sago asked about an Amiga LAN card, can it do peer to peer networking between an Amiga and a PC? Mark Bellon stated that "yes" it can.
* Charles Earl was looking for an old style monitor cable for his C64.
* Jim Lewis had a question about the IO Extender Board.
* Mark Bellon announced that Motorola had extend the modem deal, so if anyone was still interested he could get them a modem.
After the Q&A, Richard Rollins announced that the new models of Macintosh had been released.
Richard then outlined the schedule of meetings for the rest of the year. September will be a social/swap meet and gamers' night. In October Carlos Ramirez from CU-Online will come and talk to us about his service and will be offering a good deal for those wishing to sign up. In December we will conduct club elections.
The floor was then turned over to our C64 Librarian, Angelo Koutsos, who showed the disk for this month - a collage of the best programs from the first twenty disks in the CUCUG collection.
CUCUG64 - 8/95: This disk contains a cartridge backup program. There are several games, like Lunar Mission, some Dr, Who music, and a scanner frequency program.
Macintosh Librarian, Mark Bellon, had three Mac disks for this evening. But before he showed the new disks he demonstrated the CD demo of the game Marathon 2. It's a shoot 'em up with 16 bit color and stereo sound. It networks for multiple players. It has fluid movements. The purpose of the game is to save human life - alien life? Well... using two shotguns they don't do so well. You can change the enemy. Supposedly there is a Barney blaster version of this game somewhere.
Mark then show the club disks.
CUCUGMAC #8: ADB Probe (a program to check the Apple Desktop Bus), App Disk, Clip Folio, Mac Paint, Termulator, Mandelbrott, SCSI Probe, Patriot Command ( a Missile Command style game) and Time Video.
CUCUGMAC #9 & #10: A collection of sounds, Sound Editor, Sound Out and Sound Master.
After Mark's demo, Amiga Librarian Kevin Hisel showed the two new Amiga disks for this month. Before he started though, Kevin couldn't resist making the "Hey, Good Lookin'" Mr. Microphone joke about the wireless mike when he took the floor. He then moved to the club's new Amiga disks, being shown on Ed Serbe's machine, which was set up for the Amiga graphics demo to come later in the evening. Kevin said his first program was a hard drive formatter program. At which point, he gave Ed a big wink. But really, Folks, ...
CUCUGAMI #147: Icon Deluxe (an icon editor that is not crippled, very paint program like, 400 x 400 pixel size editing), Nibbler (a kind of Worm game meets Donkey Kong).
CUCUGAMI #148: MegaTron (Tron cycle game for multiple players up to 6 or 7 humans), DB (a database program, easy to customize, although the interface leaves something to be desired), BeyondTheDark (best of the screen blankers, easy on the CPU).
Before the break, it was announced that Fred Cline needs a 14.4K modem. Angelo Koutsos needs a 2400 modem.
The Amiga SIG meeting for August was conducted by Ed Serbe, CUCUG's resident graphics wizard. Ed specializes in the production of the most wonderful animations with the sparsest of budgets in mind. Ed began his presentation by stating his theme: "How to keep a classic computer interesting."
To preface his latest creation, Ed wanted to show us where he got the materials he used. His secondary purpose was also to clue us in on a treasure trove of wonderful resources. Using his Toshiba single spin CD-ROM drive with AFS AsimCDFS v2.0 file system software for it, Ed showed us his Aminet #6 CD-ROM. Ed said the disk is set up with AmigaGuide format documentation which makes navigation through the huge amount of material relatively painless.
Just an example of the things available on this single CD-ROM disk, Ed showed us a game called "It's The Pits", a kind of shoot 'em up where you fly down a tunnel and can view and shoot from both the front gunner and the tail gunner positions. In passing, Ed mentioned that more and more of the graphic material he looks at is for AGA. Ed then showed another game called "Black Dawn" which is like "Dungeon Master".
Ed has been very impressed with the wealth of material on the Aminet CD. It contains all the issues of AmiNews, all of Eric Schwartz's animations, tons of games and graphics. He said you can spend weeks just looking at it all.
Ed showed us an animation called "Fool" just a sample of what was available in that category.
Ed then began to focus on the process he used to create his latest animation. He said he used graphics as backdrops for his animation. One of the tricks he uses generally is to look at the biggest files, because they're usually the best scans. He said there is a wealth of such resources on Aminet: Lightwave objects, Imagine objects, and graphics resources of all kinds. He said there are some real nice Workbench backdrops.
On his present project, Ed began by taking objects from the Aminet CD-ROM and then rendering them together. Using DCTV, stencils, and rub through to modify the CD-ROM resource objects, he molded them into the final product he wanted. Ed said this as yet unnamed animation has 500 frames in it. This would require about half a gigabyte of storage as IFF images, about 46 megabytes as DCTV frames. It contains 6 scenes, 12 legs with 48 frames per leg. The total animation runs 58 seconds. Through the use of the tricks of his trade, Ed was able to reduce its size until the whole thing loaded into memory before it is run. Some serious compression is being used.
In this animation, we see a space ship fly down to planet Earth (Cape Cod actually), fly around sculpture in a city plaza, around a street sign, through a factory, with a final departure from the planet passed a CUCUG logo.
Ed said he used mondo slowdown mode in Imagine to be able to get nice flight into the distance. The software engine Ed uses to drive his piece is the animator PageFlipper FX. To get things "just right", Ed edited the script to tweak it.
Dan LaPine asked about adding sound to the animation. Ed said he hadn't done so; he has done some sound with past animations. It was possible, but syncing sound to the action was a difficult proposition and one he just didn't want to deal with.
Ed talked about his ZIP drive a little. He said that although the ZIP drive is great for storage and generally performs well, it falls down with reference to speed on multiple accesses such as is required for large animations.
Raymond St. John asked a DCTV question on capturing a color frame from a video camera. Ed said it was a very difficult problem without a large investment in equipment.
To round out the night, Ed played several other animations off his Aminet CD-ROM. He also showed a couple more games: "Psycho Squares" and "House of Diversion."
Thanks Ed for another great "animated" evening.
The 64/128 SIG had 9 members present, in anticipation of another telecommunications information exchange. Apparently some homework was done, because several people had some answers to questions from last time. There were also some real newcomers to the world of telecommunications, so part of the time was spent bringing them up to date. We discussed PINE at greater length, including a short review of how to get the messages you receive into your hands in hard copy form. This included using the folder and your buffer to download messages in a form that can be printed.
We also got onto the World Wide Web to do some searching. With the help of everyone, we were able to make some sense of the Web. Thanks to Angelo Koutsos for being the moderator and leader of the group. Next meeting will be a gamers' SIG, so be prepared to bring your favorite games and to wreak havoc on the unsuspecting!
Richard Rollins conducted a discussion of MacTCP, PPP and Netscape. We obviously need someone willing to tell the rest of the group the details of what was discussed.
The August meeting of the CUCUG executive board was held on Tuesday, August 22nd at 7PM at Kevin Hisel's house (address and phone number, both in the book). Present at the meeting were Jim Huls, Jim Lewis, Richard Rollins, Craig Kummerow, Kevin Hopkins, Garry Morenz, John Sago, Kevin Hisel, Emil Cobb, Angelo Koutsos.
Jim Lewis: Jim began by saying "The meeting was cool." Jim thought the lapel microphone worked well. He noted that Radio Shack sells a similar mike for $40. Jim moved that the club buy one, since the one we used at the meeting was merely loaned to us for the occasion. After some discussion, Jim Huls used a Presidential authorization to purchase the microphone.
On a personal note, Jim is looking for OS/2 support anywhere he can find it. Anyone knowing of a good source of OS/2 information, please contact Jim.
Returning to the August meeting, Jim said "Ed's presentation was, as usual, mind boggling. It's amazing what he can get out of ancient equipment."
Richard Rollins: Richard conveyed Mark Bellon's apologies for missing the Board meeting. He is on a sudden business trip to Los Angeles. He was sent away on a trouble shooting emergency.
Speaking of the August meeting, Richard stated that the Mac SIG went OK. Five or six people were there.
Richard noted that next month our general meeting will be a social. He said "We will have three Macs at the meeting in order to network the game Marathon."
Carlos Ramirez from CU-Online will be coming to speak to the whole group in October.
The November meeting is tentatively scheduled as a meeting covering HTML.
Relating Mark Bellon's reports Richard said Mac disk sales were OK. He said Mark has more uploads ready for the BBS.
In the news, Richard noted that Power Computing's Mac clones have been getting rave reviews. Richard also brought up the online magazine Tidbits, recommending it to Mac users as a good source of information.
Craig Kummerow: Craig reported nine members were present at the C64/128 SIG gathering this month. Angelo Koutsos ran the meeting. It was a good help session. Craig said online topics seems popular with SIG members.
Craig stated there will be four systems for the gamers at next month's social.
Craig said we ought to sell the club's surplus 8-bit equipment. The Board agreed and, when asked about pricing, told him to get what you can get for it. Angelo said he was familiar with selling items over the Internet and will market our equipment on comp.sys.cbm.
Craig said his future attendance will be spotty due to his continuing his education. Craig also said he is upgrading his computer to a PowerPC 6115.
Emil Cobb: Emil reported that "The 64 side went really well." He expressed an interest in attending the Macintosh SIG next month.
Overall attendance was "very good."
Kevin Hopkins (KH2): Kevin presented the exchange newsletters and handed out the mail. In particular, Kevin noted that the Metroplex Commodore Computer Club of Dallas/Ft. Worth picked up an article by our own Mike Latinovich for their August newsletter. Congratulations, Mike. Your article on the Amiga's serial cards is getting around. We may not be seeing much of Mike now that he has taken a job with an Internet provider in Indianapolis. Congratulations Mike on the new job. Keep in touch.
Kevin presented a letter from someone interested in selling their A3000.
Kevin reported that their is a possibility that Prairie Gardens will donate their old C64 system to CUCUG. They used to do their accounting on it, but it now needs a good home. It looks like CUCUG is becoming a C64 orphanage.
Garry Morenz: Garry enjoyed Richard's presentation at the Mac SIG. Garry uses a Macintosh at work. He said he realized he was behind the times after seeing Richard demonstration of the Internet.
Garry showed the Board a Maltron keyboard. It has a very unusual design and its creator could possibly give a presentation on it. This may occur at the social in September.
Jon Sago: Jon asked if we needed machines at September's social.
Kevin Hisel (KH1): Kevin began his segment by welcoming Garry back to our Board meetings. He has been missed.
Kevin reported that C64 disk sales tied Amiga disk sales in August. Kevin said he will be reducing the Amiga disk offering to one disk per month. Macintosh disk sales did well for the month.
There was discussion on producing a Macintosh flyer for the club.
Putting on his Sysop's hat, Kevin reported that the BBS is working well. There was a discussion of 28.8K modem flakiness.
Jim Huls asked Kevin about the Election protocol and there was a short review of the timetable for club elections in December. Jim Lewis brought up some of the Bylaws changes that will need to be made to comply with the tax laws.
Dave Witt: Commenting on the August General Meeting, Dave said "The meeting was excellent. Ed's presentation was cool as hell!"
Angel Koutsos: Angelo said the Novaterm meeting was awesome.
Angelo offered to post club flyers at the DCL on campus.
Jim Huls: Jim thanked everyone for taking care of the meeting for him this month while he was on vacation. Smiling, he said, "I didn't think of any of you."
Meetings are held the third Thursday of each month at 7 p.m. at the IBEW Local 601 Union Hall (352-1741), located at 2901 Research Road in the Interstate Research Park in northwest Champaign. To get there, go north on Mattis over I-74 and turn right at the second stop light, onto Interstate Drive. Then take the first "real" left at Research Road. The Electrician's Hall is the third building on your left. There's a big flag pole right out front and it's directly across the street from one of Hobbico's signs. You should park and enter the building in the back.
ASCII text files of all recent Status Register newsletters are available for downloading on our BBS or our WWW site. Other user group newsletter editors may leave a comment to the BBS Sysop to request free access. To initiate a newsletter exchange, just send us your newsletter. As a matter of CUCUG policy, a newsletter exchange partner will be dropped after three months of no contact.
This newsletter was prepared with PageStream 2.22 on an Amiga 3000 25/100 and output to an HP Laserjet IIP plus. Pagestream was donated to CUCUG by Soft-Logik Publishing Corporation.
For further information, please attend the next meeting as our guest, or contact one of our officers(all at area code 217):
President: Jim Huls 892-8730 Vice-President: David Witt 685-2815 ntranger@msilink.com Secretary/Editor: Kevin Hopkins 356-5026 kh2@uiuc.edu Treasurer: Mark Landman 398-2910 mlandman@prairienet.org Corporate Agent: Jim Lewis 359-1342 NOSPAMlewis_j_e@yahoo.com Librarian/Sysop: Kevin Hisel 406-948-1999 khisel @ cucug.org C64/128 SIG: Craig Kummerow 784-5919 cwkummer@prairienet.org Macintosh SIG: Richard Rollins 469-2616
Call our Starship CUCUG BBS at (217) 356-8056, always online, up to 14,400 baud, supporting all CBM and Macintosh computers. Email us at
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