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   COLUMN: read.me
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   July 31, 1996
   
                    AMIGA PASSES THE TEST AS A WEB BROWSER
                                       
                             By SANDY McMURRAY
                                Toronto Sun
                                      
   Sandy McMurray
    Months ago, I got e-mail from a guy named Dan Robinson. He asked when
   I was going to write something about the Amiga computer. My answer was
   simple: "Probably never."
    I didn't have an Amiga, and I didn't know anyone with an Amiga.
   Besides, what does the Amiga have to do with the Internet?
    I remembered the Amiga as a game machine with fantastic sounds and
   graphics. And somewhere in the fuzzy back of my head, I seemed to
   remember that Commodore had gone out of business. Dan gave me a quick
   history lesson. Yes, Commodore went out of business in 1994, but it
   was not the end of the Amiga. A German company called Escom bought the
   Amiga and announced plans for an affordable new Amiga called the
   Walker that was to debut this year. (Amiga has been sold again since.
   See below.)
    
    HONEST REVIEW
    I was interested. Dan arranged for me to have the use of a new Amiga
   1200, supplied by Amiga retailers Comspec and National Amiga. Dan
   asked me to use the machine, then write a simple, honest review of it.
   "If you think it's terrible, I want you to say that it's terrible," he
   said. "If you think it's great, I want you to say that."
    So here I am.
    The Amiga has always been an engineer's dream machine. Like the
   Macintosh, the Amiga was years ahead of PC technology.
    When the Amiga 1000 debuted in 1985, the industry was impressed by
   its custom chip set, and its excellent sound and graphics
   capabilities. The 1000 shipped with four-channel stereo sound and a
   4096 colour output (better than the 16 colours most computers used at
   the time). Years after the Amiga did it, PC manufacturers are finally
   figuring out that consumers might want stereo output (RCA plugs) from
   their computer.
    The Amiga was also the first computer with a true "preemptive
   multitasking" operating system, which allowed it to do several things
   at once -- something a Pentium running Windows 95 still can't do as
   well as an Amiga. And the Amiga 1000 cost about US$2,000 when its
   competition -- a "singletasking" 286 PC -- cost about $4,000.
    These days, many Amiga users are into complicated image processing,
   3D modeling, etc. This is possible on the Amiga using inexpensive
   software and very little memory or hard disk space.
    But my interest is the Internet connection. The Amiga 1200 is a
   relatively inexpensive way to browse the World Wide Web in all its
   graphical glory. The latest "IBrowse" and "AWeb" software supports
   HTML 3.2 commands, so you won't feel like a second-class Web citizen.
   And e-mail software like YAM (short for "Yet Another Mailer") works as
   well as anything I've used for the PC or Mac.
    As PC manufacturers slowly catch up with the Amiga's multimedia
   power, Amiga owners bitterly lament the marketing and business
   mistakes that have made the Amiga an artifact rather than Everybody's
   Computer. I know this is an overused analogy, but the Amiga is like
   the Betamax video machine: Technically superior, but a loser in the
   marketplace.
    Amiga evangelists will be pleased to know that Chicago-based Visual
   Information Service Corporation (VIScorp) hopes to bring Amiga
   technology into every home. VIScorp has just purchased the Amiga from
   Escom, and they plan to build and market a sort of Internet appliance
   using Amiga technology. See (www.vistv.com) for more information.
    
    NOT EASY TO USE
    My quick review would be that the Amiga 1200 is powerful, but not
   especially easy to use. My parents, who are just getting used to their
   Macintosh, would not be comfortable at all with the Amiga, but I think
   anyone with a mind for programming or engineering would learn to love
   it.
    If you're interested, the Amiga is an inexpensive and powerful
   computer that can get you on the Web. See (www.amigasupport.com) or
   call me at (416) 947-2416 for more information. I'll write more about
   the Amiga as I continue to use it.
    How's that, Dan?
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