<>@2 Z/Z/Z/Z/Z/Z/Z/Z/Z/Z/Z/Z/Z/Z/Z/Z/Z/Z/Z/ *4@5 MEMORY TROUBLES - THE VISCORP SAGA *3]5@6 - - - - - - - > by MSC / A51 *1]1@2 /Z/Z/Z/Z/Z/Z/Z/Z/Z/Z/Z/Z/Z/Z/Z/Z/Z/Z/Z @1 You may have noticed that I have reverted to my original name of Mark S. Computerhead. This is because TCFKAMSCIM® (The Company Formerly known as M.S.C.I.M.®) has gone bust due to a cash-flow problem. This cash-flow problem arised from Converse asking for his £10.00 share in the company back. This meant that I had to introduce some compulsory redundancies (i.e. sack Converse), and this eventually forced me into liquidation. I contacted my creditors, and got a large cash-settlement. I used this money to fly to the Bahamas, and managed to sell the image of my former company to a large multi-national foundation. So ended the sad story of M.S.C.I.M.®........... ]5(What a shame-Ed.)]1 ]3AAAAAAAAAAAAAAANNNNNNNNNNNNNYYYYYYYYYY WWWWWWAAAAAAAAAAAYYYYYYYYY!!!!]1 *4@7 THE CONTINUING STORY OF THE VISCORP SAGA PART ONE *1@1 I have to admit I was completely surprised when Converse rang me up and informed me that Escom had sold Amiga Technologies to VIScorp. I was more shocked than I was when Commodore had gone bust. Despite the malicious rumours being spread around the circuit by Converse, I still thought that Escom (to be further known as E=) was a decent company, even if they did sell PC's. I thought, ]5"Well, they haven't done anything wrong yet, so let's just wait and see what they do."]1 I now realise that they are a load of b*st*rds @3[Don't you mean BASTARDS! zYLAX!]@1 who wouldn't know a good deal if their regular prostitute rammed it up their anal tract (OW!). All the hard work was done by the AT gang, and that was under a crippling budget, and an administrative team made up solely of w*n*kers @3[Or is that WANKERS! zYLAX!]@1 (i.e. E=). Forgive me if I seem to go over the top because England have just gone out of the European Championships to the Germans, and E= are a German company. So, needless to say, I'm not very happy. In fact.... I'm very pissed off indeed... so I'll stop writing this article and I'll carry on in the morning. Goodnight! ]3That's better.... now where was I?]1 I'm quite glad that VIScorp have got the Amiga. I have heard of the company before, and they seem to be quite sound. However, I tend to agree with the comment that they are ]5"A little company with big ambitions."]1 This is not necessarily a bad thing, although I am worried that they have bitten off more than they can chew. They are only a little company, and they may not have the money to invest into the Amiga. The reason that they may not have enough money, is that the technology that they are involved in (set-top boxes) has not really taken off yet, and is still in the beta-testing stage. The actual technology is the future, so VIScorp will have the money soon, but how soon is anyone's guess. VIScorp are already involved in the Amiga, because they license the Amiga operating system for use in their set-top box, "Ed" .....nice name! Since they already have the operating system, why bother buying the Amiga technology? The reason I ask this question is because, like many other Amiga-lovers, I am very paranoid about my favourite machine. The chance that the Amiga may finally have degraded to spend the rest of it's life as a set-top box sickens me. It also pisses me off. ]5A LOT!]1 Anyway, why buy the Amiga? Some people point to the losses Escom has suffered (over $200 million in total). Perhaps VIScorp thought that the operating system they needed so badly could drown with the sinking ship. Personally, I want to cling to the possibly naive thought that VIScorp wanted the Amiga just because it was the Amiga. I sincerely hope so anyway. At a recent meeting in Toulouse, France, Bill Buck said that he believed in the Amiga, and that he was committed to supporting it. I'm prepared to believe him (thousands wouldn't and won't) but I do want to see something happen in the next six months. I'm not really asking much, a souped up Amiga 1200 with 68030, 4Mb RAM and a 170MB Hard-drive as standard would be nice. This 68030 wouldn't have to be soldered to the motherboard because it could just be on a card stuck into the trapdoor slot at the factory. I don't really expect this to happen, but it would be nice. Further news is that Phase 5, makers of the Blizzard range of accelerators and the CyberGraphX card, have announced plans to build a new Amiga based on the much hyped PowerPC chip. They say that they are ready to build their own version of the next generation Amigas because they have seen too many half-hearted attempts in the last couple of years. Phase 5 are, of course, the company commissioned by Amiga Technologies to design and build the PowerPC Expansion cards for the big-box Amigas. I believe that they are using the technology they designed whilst researching has enabled them to succesfully combine the PowerPC and the Amiga Operating system. The new Phase 5 Amiga will not use the current AGA chipset, or even the well-known AAA chipset, but will use a totally new and unseen custom chipset. I believe that they will combine their next-generation CyberGraphX technology with completely new sound and graphics hardware. I'm probably wrong, but then again. Phase 5 claim that the new computer will be supplied with an operating system written completely in Native PowerPC code. This will have binary OS3.x compatibility however, so you "should" be able to run Amiga compatible software on the new computer. However, Phase 5 seem to be concentrating more on the software that runs under the CyberGraphX card rather than the Amiga software in general. The current press-release specifications of the Phase 5 Amiga are as follows; (Standard Configuration) *3@5 Processor: 603e PowerPC chip running at 120MHz. RAM: 16Mb of (probably) EDO RAM. Other: 1.2Gb Hard-drive, Quad-speed CD-ROM Drive, 1.76Mb High Density Floppy Drive, ISDN Interface, Fast SCSI-II *3 controller and a network controller. Price: In the region of £1400 (US$2000). *1@1 Phase 5's new computer will also (they claim) have hardware support for MPEG and 3D functions. The basic system will offer a resolution of 1600x1200 pixels at 24-bit colour depth with a screen refresh rate of 72MHz. It will have audio input/output of CD stereo quality, a video-capable and Genlock-compatible 24-bit video output and an FBAS/S-VHS video input. Sounds pretty good, don't it? I sincerely hope it catches on. [4 A group of management personnel from Commodore and AT have banded together to form PIOS. PIOS want to build a next-generation Amiga for the Amiga generation. Rather than just concentrate on video, as Phase 5, PIOS want to carry on the tradition of the Amiga as a "hobby" computer. With people such as Dave Haynie (ex-chip designer for Commodore) and Andy Finkel, PIOS look like a company to watch. All in all, I look forward to the continuing progress of the VIScorp deal, and also to Phase 5's new baby, and any new progress from PIOS Computer AG.