Dying, not dead

I am a former Amiga user and subscribed to Amiga publications before I even got my Amiga. I still have the magazines, but I sold my Amiga. I had one of the first 3000 Towers in the area, put 10 Megs of RAM on it (8 fast, 2 chip) and instantly I was the power user of the Amiga user group I frequented. I loved my Amiga and dreaded the day I had to sell it. I got Maybe 1/5th of the price I paid, and I cheated and got the educational discount. Now I own a Pentium-133 machine, 2.4Gigs of HD, 32Mb RAM, running Windows 95. I'm using a 1024x768x 16-bit colour display, a NEC 17" monitor and am connected via PPP to the Internet via local ISP. My sound card has wavetable synthesis (AWE-32), and everything works great.

I'll admit that Workbench 3.1 was a better OS, and the Amiga's custom chipset was much better than any Intel triton, endeavour or whatever, but I've got to say this, pain me as it does Ð the Amiga is dying. Not dead... yet. I'm not Amiga-bashing, but look, Commodore goes bankrupt; the company that bought the Amiga technology (Escom), who promised it would market and sell the thing during negotiations, flaked out. So what's worse? A company that doesn't develop very often and has poor customer service or a company that does not develop and does not even sell the thing? The third-party manufacturers can keep the boat floating for a while, but without the support of the mother-company, it's dead.

Yes I saw the 'Walker' prototype spread. Very nice. I really hope that's where the Amiga is heading. It's time for a new machine. Honestly, I would buy one again if the support was there, but I've been hearing for about two years now how everything is going to 'bounce back', and I really think there should be less 'patting ourselves on the back' for owning such a spectacular machine, and more development and products being made for it. If there were a development library for the Amiga, I'd buy it. But there isn't, and that's why I bought the Microsoft Development kit.
Richard Langis Jr.,Hillsboro, Oregon, USA

It's a sorry state of affairs alright, and I'm surprised we haven't had more letters like this one. I'm sure there are a lot of Amiga owners out there who are carefully thinking about doing the same as you have done, but hold on just a second. Are you doing things on your PC that you could just as easily be doing on your Amiga? There are an awful lot of people who end up getting rid of their Amigas, only to find out that they could have saved the money they spent on a PC that will be obsolete in six month's time.

Redesigning the Amiga

A lot has been said about what the Amiga platform has accomplished and where it may be heading. In my experience with a number of platforms, I have found that none is as reliable as the Amiga. As I have told a number of my colleagues throughout the years, the Amiga, if supported as other platforms have been, could become a very competitive computer again.

Take its operating system, for instance. As simple as AmigaDOS is, it can still run efficiently powerful programs and hardware like the Video Toaster, LightWave 3D, Brilliance, Photogenics, Final Writer, Deluxe Paint, etc. Take into account that the Amiga can run these and other programs with minimal resources, with 4Mb of FastRAM and, in some cases, without a hard drive, and the speed in which many of its graphics can be displayed on-screen. What other consumer platform can display animations, with various resolutions and colour depths, in real-time? Platforms like IBM and Mac cannot accomplish this without special add-on display cards and fast processors.

One thing I would like to add is what a number of editors have addressed as competitive redesigns to the Amiga. Many people have expressed how the Amiga should lose its custom chipset and I know the chipset does not allow IBM-like resolutions (i.e. 1024x768), but I am sure this can be added in the near future. Small computers like the A500, A600, and A1200 cannot easily adapt themselves with 24-bit cards that allow resolutions like these, but I am sure a redesigned ROM and chipset would be able to. After all, has anyone asked or recommended SGI to abandon its graphic co-processors? Yes, both the Amiga and Silicon Graphic workstations have graphic co-processors and SGI's can display high resolutions. Why can't the Amiga be designed to accomplish this?

The last thing I would like to say is a prediction that if Escom and Amiga Technologies can take the Amiga seriously, the Amiga can once again be a competitive system in the industry. The Amiga is powerful out of the box. Think about it. Add a RISC processor, on-board memory expansion to 128Mb of FastRAM, a more powerful chipset with higher colour depths and resolution, built-in 16-bit sound, with a refined operating system, and you will have the makings of a true Amiga workstation. In my field of computer graphics, I think a RISC-based Amiga workstation would have what it takes to go up against any SGI, Sun, or Dec computer system.
LeRoy Parham, Jr., Clinton, Maryland, USA

It's a nice idea and I particularly like the notion of telling SGI to lose its custom chips. However, as has been said before in this column, custom chips take a lot of money, time and expertise to develop Ð all commodities which the Amiga Development team is in short supply of. The solution, at least in the short term, is to take an off-the-shelf chipset and work on software to drive it. This way Amiga Technologies can rely on the vast amount of experience that people like Orchid, SPEA, Diamond and others can bring to its designs. It's all very well asking for a new chipset but how long do you want to wait for this new Amiga, and, more importantly, how much do you want to pay for it?

Another PC buyer

A little over a year ago, Escom acquired the Amiga. Now VIScorp has it. It is clear that Escom couldn't do the job needed to revitalise the ailing machine, but what can VIScorp do? I can't say I've heard much about this company, leaving doubt as to what resources it is willing to invest into our computer. With the PC market full of Pentiums and Windows 95, can even a PowerPC, one that is used in PowerMacs, save the Amiga now? Consumer confidence must be lower than ever before and, let's face it, not many firms are joining us rather than leaving us. But there is yet another problem in the equation Ð the price.

When I saw an Escom advertisement in Amiga Computing offering a deal for A500/A600 owners to buy a new A1200, I thought great, a decent price, then I saw the words ÔTrade inÕ. Now, whilst kick starting the Amiga must be pretty painful to a bank balance, it cannot hope to sell Amigas for £250+ when for the price of an A4060 you could buy a pretty decent PC, one that could be used for working at home and bring data into the office with. With the price and position that the Amiga is in, I don't blame an awful lot of people selling their ÔworthlessÕ A600s and jumping into the PC market, as a lot of my friends have. And, it is with great sadness that I too have to make this jump.

I cannot afford to miss out on what the computer industry is doing Ð working on PCs. Had Commodore made the right decisions, I am sure there would be a market for programmers to produce Amiga software for businesses, but only a handful of small businesses using the format, and with Universities using Macs and PCs, I have no choice. Having looked at the PC market's prices, I can now see clearly what is wrong with the Amiga, and it doesn't take a genius to do that. All I can say now is good luck to the Amiga. I am giving my old A600 to my sister for games usage. I shall be buying a nice 133Mhz Pentium multimedia myself very soon! (Oh, and well done for being what I can see as the best Amiga mag on the market, and happy one hundred!)
James Green, Norwich, Norfolk

I guess you won't be needing our services any more then James. I think everyone is agreed on the fact that for what it currently offers, the Amiga is too expensive. However, if VIScorp manages to put the Amiga chipset onto one chip, and then sell its set-top boxes for a couple of hundred dollars, it can only mean a price drop for the Amiga as a computer too. I think it's probably best to hang onto your seats. The show isn't over yet.

More PC woes

First of all, I'd like to thank you for a great magazine. When Amiga World went under, I'd reached the point that I didn't read it much anyway, but I find myself reading your magazine almost cover-to-cover.

I bought my first Amiga (an A2000HD) in 1990 or 1991 during one of the few good marketing promotions Commodore did Ð the heavy discounts for those upgrading from another Commodore computer. Over the course of the next year or so, I fitted it with more and more RAM, an accelerator, a Bridgeboard and a host of PC peripherals, a display enhancer and a multifrequency monitor Ð it was quite a system for 1992.

Then Commodore went under and it became more and more difficult to justify the use of an orphan computer. I kept the Amiga, but since I was making my living at the time selling, repairing, and upgrading PCs, I had to buy one.

Now it's 1996, and my ageing A2000 has seen two PCs come and go, followed by a third that may have a little more tenure. Now I find myself doing very little on those PCs that I couldn't do on an Amiga Ð and I'd much rather do word processing, Internet access, and graphics work under the Amiga's OS than under any PC operating system out there (IBM's OS/2 Warp is the only PC operating system worthy of washing AmigaOS's feet Ð DOS, Losedoze 95 and the like aren't even worthy of running in the same room).

So I'd love to come back to the Amiga. Unfortunately, that A2000 is showing its age Ð itÕs best video modes display only 16 colours, and only very slowly. My latest PC, with its flashy Trident video card, will only very reluctantly do 16 colours Ð it'd much rather give me 16-bit or 24-bit colour, and it does so quickly. Since I need that kind of colour depth occasionally, the A2000 will either have to be upgraded or replaced outright. I could outfit it with an 040 or 060 accelerator and a Picasso video board, but by the time I do that, I've spent more than I would on a PC and I haven't done a thing about hard disk space.

Alternatively, I could get an A1200 and upgrade it, and then I'd have a machine small enough to tote around and full AGA compatibility. But a bare A1200 Ð 2 megs of RAM and a 14MHz 020 and no hard drive Ð costs $600 in the United States. That kind of money would easily buy a similarly-outfitted (albeit less useful) 75MHz Pentium.

If Amiga Technologies really wants to be anything but the poor man's alternative to an SGI workstation here in the States, it really has to move into this half of the decade. The A1200, although a huge step up from the A500 it replaced, was arguably on the brink of obsolescence when it came out. It seems most people bought an accelerator at the same time, but some kind of upgraded A1200, with 4 or 6Mb of RAM, a 400-500Mb hard drive, some kind of 040 processor, and a 15-pin SVGA port to use commodity PC monitors, selling for about $800, might stand a chance in this marketplace Ð if it's advertised. Simply using the existing design, sans processor on the motherboard, and putting the processor on an upgrade-style board so the machine can be upgraded to an 060 by people like me who think they need the extra horsepower would be ideal.

I'd buy such a machine in a minute and send that last PC packing. Unfortunately, I think there's a greater probability of Charles and Di straightening things out and undoing the damage done in the eyes of the public than there is of my dream machine materialising, and that's not just my loss. I guess we Yankees are just going to have to keep running around, thinking that the only truly productive platform out there is the 100MHz Pentium with 16-24Mb of RAM that can run Losedoze 95 at a similar clip to that of an 030-equipped A1200 under AmigaOS.
Dave Farquhar, Columbia, Missouri, USA

It's such a shame that the Amiga's history has been an 'if only' story. I think that if Commodore had pushed ahead while it was making the huge amounts of cash that they had from the A500, we could have been competition for the huge Mac market that is already out there. As it is, we have to put up with old-fashioned machines that run too slowly with a shrinking software market. Still, that's life eh?

Those games companies!

Hi guys! I'm an Amiga user from Mexico and I love your magazine, but I'm not writing just to congratulate you. As a matter of fact I'm writing because I'm seeing something terrible that I called the anti-Amiga syndrome, and the ones who have this illness are the software companies. Let me explain to you what I'm talking about:

Firstly, a group of guys want to be in the software industry, (a good example could be Team17, Bullfrog, etc. in their early years). Of course, it is difficult to develop software for the PC, and for the consoles it is practically impossible if you are a new group. So what they do? They develop games for the Amiga, they create some excellent software, and they even say that they are real Amiga fans and they'll always support the Amiga (Team17 once again). But what happens when these guys become a great company? Firstly, they start creating software for the PC, and then what happens? Well they usually say that the Amiga is not a profitable computer and they leave our platform!

Now, what am I trying to say? It's very simple. Some software companies are using us as a ÔbridgeÕ to start in the games business, and when they are famous they drop us like a piece of garbage! I don't know about you, but I can't tolerate this any longer - have you seen the Team 17 Web pages lately? Well if you look at them, you will see in the Team Talk section that Worms 2 will not be available for the Amiga. This is disgusting. A company that became a success on the Amiga is now saying that it can't earn any money from us. I agree that piracy is bad, but the PC is not piracy-free. I also can't understand why if it is not earning money then why has it survived all these years, why is it a great company now? The same happened with Bullfrog, and Psygnosis (they don't create games for the Amiga anymore because 'daddy' Sony says no, but Psygnosis was only famous because of the Amiga).

Let's stop being the launch platform for all those companies that want to be in the games world. Now is the time to show what Amiga users want. I'm not expecting to get Psygnosis or Bullfrog back to the ship, what I want is for the Amiga community to show their disappointment in these companies. Let's send some e-mails to Bullfrog, and to Team17 (maybe we will get Worms 2 after all). But must importantly, let's buy original games. We must show them that the Amiga is a great platform and this is the only way to show them. If I can buy original games (remember that I live on the other side of the ocean) then you can too.

Finally let's tell all those new companies that we are tired of this situation. If they want to develop for the Amiga they are welcome, but don't use us as a bridge to success on the PC. We deserve as much respect as all the other platforms, and maybe more, because the Amiga has survived tough times and we've never left our beloved machine. We are looking to the future, but we want to continue with companies that love the Amiga. Remember, just say no to the anti-Amiga syndrome!
Aristides Castiglioni, Mexico

Well done Aristides. You'll receive the £50 prize as soon as you give us your address. Apparently, the reason so many games come out on the PC as regularly as they do is problem enough, and most PC games actually shift less numbers than Amiga games back in the Amiga's heyday, which is a little surprising considering the disparity in the respective sizes of their markets. Not only can our readers e-mail and write to the games companies, they could also point out the results of our reader survey - they're up on our Web site at http://www.idg.co.uk/amigacomp/. Just go to the Stuff page and you'll find it easily.

Of course, on the other hand, Amiga users shouldn't expect these games companies to simply give up on their PC and console development just because we ask them to. They are making more money in these markets than they did on the Amiga, but that shouldn't stop them from bringing out games on our platform too.