@OneTimer1

Yeah, well the A4000T was shown at the World of Amiga Show in New York in early 1993, was released in a batch of around 200 in April 1994 and then put on general release with Escom/Quickpak circa 1996-1998. EDO RAM was conceived in 1994 for release with the Intel 430FX chipset in 1995. The A4000T mobo was a 1993 design shipped to Amiga users in 1996!

It wasn't a bad motherboard design (it was as good as we ever got with SCSI and IDE built in and built in CD-Rom audio support etc). The fact was it was slow to market because of the C= bankruptcy and hence EDO RAM was an afterthought added by 3rd parties late on! The Zorro III and video slots made the A4000T last longer in the market it was late to! A great machine but a last hurrah! As always though 3rd parties were the ones who pushed the Amiga whether C= was dead or alive! It really made no difference. Dave Haynie running with a 5 man 'Amiga team' attached to Sony or another company with money could have aped what Commodore did as a multi-million $ company into the late 90s! C= was out of ideas and maybe didn't even realise it had to include things like support for EDO RAM or RTG etc! They were only selling widgets after all!

Last edited by BigD on 19-Nov-2024 at 10:39 AM.
Last edited by BigD on 19-Nov-2024 at 10:35 AM.
Last edited by BigD on 19-Nov-2024 at 10:34 AM.

_________________
"Art challenges technology. Technology inspires the art."
John Lasseter, Co-Founder of Pixar Animation Studios

@BigD

Quote:

BigD wrote: @OneTimer1 Yeah, well the A4000T was shown at the World of Amiga Show in New York in early 1993, ... It wasn't a bad motherboard design...

It might have been acceptable in 1993.

The A3000/A4000 Amiga is (IMR) a design for an 68030 compatible CPU with 25MHz, for the A3640 they used a schematics from Motorola's documents that was meant as a quick fix to connect a 68040 to a 68030 bus, and they even copied the error from this schematics, leading to interesting behavior when using ZIII cards with a A3640 (IMR inverted clock), because they tried to fix it on the Motherboard instead of the A3640

The A3000 has (IMR) the best CPU to ChipRAM speed of all Amigas making the CPU access faster than the Custom-Chips but that interface was complicated so they didn't use it on the A4000.

The only good thing on all A4000 are AGA and some bug fixes, I don't know if they did any good things on the A4000T,m the board was huge and expensive and ZIII has been proofed a step into the wrong direction.

@bhabbott

Quote:

Not just 'professional' reasons. A base model A2000 with single floppy drive wasn't that much more than an A500 if you were thinking of expanding it. Several of my friends had one, and they were were only using it for hobby stuff (playing games, chatting online etc.). In 1989 a B2000 with RGB color monitor sold for £875 in the UK, while an A500 with the same specs sold for £598. So you paid an extra £277 to get a much more expandable machine.

That's a tiny minority without a "killer app" until the Video Toaster and A2000/B2000 didn't have proper built-in productivity display modes until the delayed ECS variant despite being demo'ed in Q4 1988.

A2024 monitor's production runs are numbered in a very tiny 5000 units range.

For comparsion, there is about 2 million Windows 2.x install base and 7.67 million VGA annual sales in 1989 with killer apps such as GUI Excel, WInWord, Aldus PageMaker and Adobe Postscript.

https://ia904606.us.archive.org/BookReader/BookReaderImages.php?zip=/32/items/amiga-world-1989-12/Amiga_World_Vol_05_12_1989_Dec_jp2.zip&file=Amiga_World_Vol_05_12_1989_Dec_jp2/Amiga_World_Vol_05_12_1989_Dec_0124.jp2&id=amiga-world-1989-12&scale=2&rotate=0

For December 1989 from Amiga World mag:
Amiga 2000 with 1 MB RAM has $1496 USD.
Amiga 2000 with 1 MB RAM and 3rd party 40 HDD has $1949 USD.
Amiga 2000HD with 40 MB HDD and 1 MB RAM has $2099 USD.

Amiga 2000 with 1 MB RAM and C= 1048 monitor has $1739 USD.
Amiga 2000 with 1 MB RAM and 3rd party RGB monitor has $1659 USD.

Amiga 500 with C= 1048 monitor has $829 USD.
Amiga 500 with RGB monitor (non-Commodore) has $749 USD.

None of these offers has a stable 640x480p resolution mode. A no-brainer to why Apple Mac has attracted mainstream press marketing and publishing business customers.

2 million Windows 2.x install base easily beats a few 100,000 A2000/B2000 install base.

In 1989, my family purchased A500+1084S for about $1300 AUD via mainstream Norman Ross stores. 512 KB RAM expansion was purchased in 1990. My family budget for a computer is about $1500 AUD range which is about £799 UKP or $1000 USD range.

For Commodore's Amiga mass production run, a no-brainer to why Amiga didn't attract mainstream "back office" and DTP (press marketing, publishing) business customers.

Despite Rev 6 A500 and A2000 being full ECS PCB capable, Commodore management decided to delay the full ECS for A3000's 1990 release.

Should the market wait for Commodore's productivity mode?

With Microsoft's Windows 3.0/Excel/WinWord wreaking 1990 ball, Commodore joined the losers like the DOS UI establishment like Word Perfect, Word Star and Lotus 123.


Quote:

@bhabbott, During the Amiga's commercial lifetime texture-mapped 3D was simply a matter of more mips, which was good for other 'use cases' too. Only problem is most Amiga owners were barely able to scrape up enough to buy an A500 with modulator, and didn't expect games to cost more than the price of a blank disk. This meant there wasn't a big enough market to justify targeting higher spec machines. By the time texture-mapped 3D became desirable enough to incentivize fans into upgrading (ie. Doom in 1994) the Amiga was already dead.

That's a flawed argument when there's a significant number of A500 owners have switched to gaming PCs from around Q4 1992 to 1994 since A1200 supplies were very constrained and A600 sales has bombed. Commodore had a very bad H2 1992 sales.

Like many others, my Xmas Q4 1992 computer was an i386DX33+ET4000 based PC.

In strong currency countries, when gaming PCs reached $1500 to $1800 AUD budget range in 1992 (for i386DX33 or Am386-40) and 1993 (486SX25 to 486SX33), it's game over for A500.

During Q4 1992, A1200 is largely "missing in action" due to supply issues i.e. 44,000 units.

During 1993, the Amiga wasn't price vs performance competitive beyond A1200's price range i.e. economies of scale issue. A1200's install base is very small for 3rd party add-on vendors.


Doom wasn't the only "killer app" 1993 game on the PC e.g.
1990's Wing Commander,
1991's Wing Commander 2,
1992's Wolfenstein 3D, Ultima Underworld: The Stygian Abyss,
1993's Wing Commander Academy, Star Wars: X-Wing, Ultima Underworld II: Labyrinth of Worlds, IndyCar Racing and 'etc'.

Ultima Underworld's texture-mapped 3D engine was demoed in 1990 Consumer Electronics Show (CES).

1990's Wing Commander made a lasting impression on Jeff Porter. Jeff Porter's original CD32 specs has 8 MB RAM (6 MB Fast RAM + 2MB Chip RAM) spec was designed to run VGA's Wing Commander with twice the CPU performance from A1200's.

Jeff Frank's argument is customers purchase Commodore's 32-bit PC clone. LOL.

Quote:

@bhabbott, There were many PCs before then that had few or no free slots too, particularly around the time of the A500+ and A1200 when slimline PCs were popular.

For context, the total low-end PC graphic chipset shipment history and forecast
1987 = 9.2. million, VGA 16.4% market share i.e. 1.5088 million VGA.
1988 = 11.1 million, VGA 34.2% i.e. 3.79 million VGA.
1989 = 13.7 million, VGA 54.6% i.e. 7.67 million VGA.
1990 = 14.3 million, VGA 66.4% i.e. 9.50 million VGA.
1991 = 15.8 million, VGA 76.6% i.e. 12.10 million VGA.
1992 = 16.4 million, VGA 84.2% i.e. 13.81 million VGA.
1993 = 18.3 million, VGA 92.4% i.e. 16.9 million VGA.

From Dataquest November 1989, VGA crossed more than 50 percent market share in 1989 i.e. 56%.
http://bitsavers.trailing-edge.com/components/dataquest/0005190_PC_Graphics_Chip_Sets--Product_Analysis_1989.pdf

Doom sales attachment rates are bad, but the PC market is huge.

For most cases, Amiga platform behaves closer to a game console platform.

Quote:

@bhabbott, Not necessary. Motherboard I/O is plenty fast enough for 3d games. The problem is rendering speed, and lack of colors if you really care about that.

Gaming color display capability is a major factor since both SNES and PC's fast VGA clones exceeded Amiga OCS/ECS.

Quote:

@bhabbott, The answer is the same as for consoles of that era - a 3D graphics chip on a card with its own video output (come to think of it that's what PCs did too, with the Voodoo card). But once again the market just wasn't big enough to justify it. By the time 3d games were a big deal fans were switching to PCs anyway - and Commodore was already gone.

You have forgotten the flood of fast 32-bit CPU software rendered texture-mapped 3D game releases during 1994 and 1995.

PC's 1994 to 1995 software rendered texture-mapped 3D game releases,
1. The Elder Scrolls: Arena,
2. Heretic,
3. DOOM II,
4. Star Wars: TIE Fighter,
5. Rise of the Triad,
6. Star Wars Dark Forces,
7. Wing Commander III: Heart of the Tiger,
8. Magic Carpet,
9. Descent,
10. many others.

32-bit PC with 4MB RAM and VGA can run these mentioned games.

32-bit PC with 4MB RAM is common with the 3MB RAM game console target group i.e. 3DO, Saturn and PS1.

Atari Jaguar's and CD32's stock 2MB RAM config is below the common 3MB RAM game console target group.

Jeff Potter's original CD32 config has 8 MB RAM.

Major Commodore subsidiaries like Commodore UK survived Commodore International's bankruptcy.

Quote:

@bhabbott, But would fans have stayed with the Amiga if it was more expandable? No because they were also buying PCs to get Microsoft Word etc.

You have contradicted yourself with "Only problem is most Amiga owners were barely able to scrape up enough to buy an A500 with modulator".

GUI MS Word runs on 32-bit Amigas via MacOS software bridge i.e. AMAXs and Shapeshifter (1995).

https://youtu.be/8v4BaWwoyA0
Running MacOS on A500 via AMax.

MacOS on A500 and 1084S monitor's interlace display mode is not good. It goes back to A500's ECS Denise release delay debacle.


Quote:

The time of diversity and innovation was over. Consumers settled on the platform with 90% market share for good reason - who wants choice when it just leads to incompatibility?

That's contradictory when Phase 5 released 68060/PPC and CGX RTG for smaller install base A1200, 16-bit A2000 (16-bit OCS/ECS), A3000 (16-bit ECS) and A4000.

Last edited by Hammer on 20-Nov-2024 at 04:39 AM.
Last edited by Hammer on 20-Nov-2024 at 02:14 AM.
Last edited by Hammer on 20-Nov-2024 at 01:53 AM.
Last edited by Hammer on 20-Nov-2024 at 01:32 AM.

_________________
Amiga 1200 (rev 1D1, KS 3.2, PiStorm32/RPi CM4/Emu68)
Amiga 500 (rev 6A, ECS, KS 3.2, PiStorm/RPi 4B/Emu68)
Ryzen 9 7900X, DDR5-6000 64 GB RAM, GeForce RTX 4080 16 GB

@Hammer

Quote:

Hammer wrote: PC's 1994 to 1995 software rendered texture-mapped 3D game releases, 1. The Elder Scrolls: Arena, 2. Heretic, 3. DOOM II, 4. Star Wars: TIE Fighter, 5. Rise of the Triad, 6. Star Wars Dark Forces, 7. Wing Commander III: Heart of the Tiger, 8. Magic Carpet, 9. Descent, 10. many others. 32-bit PC with 4MB RAM and VGA can run these mentioned games.

With a 16-bit OS, a SoundBlaster 16 compatible sound card, and Multi I/O card for mouse and analogue joystick.

Yes, 1994 was the pivotal year. At least here in Australia.
It was in 1994 that the prices of no-brand beige mini-tower clone 486 PCs reached a price where a critical mass of people started to ignore the productivity returns on their investment.
The Age Green Guide was flush with small and large PC component integrators bundling priced-to-clear MS-DOS/Win 3.11 PCs.

The September 1995 release of the 32-bit Windows 95 + DirectX and the growing popularity of the internet moved the needle further, but I would say that the final pillar in establishing the PC as THE gaming computer was the rapid popularity of the 3Dfx Voodoo 1 in 1997.

_________________
All the way, with 68k

@agami

The PC's Mortal Kombat near arcade perfect port helped as well! The Amiga's MK1 & Mk2 ports were close to greatness but Probe Software just targeted OCS and 1-button (2-button supported in the options menu)!

What a waste though! I think had the A600 not been released, there should have been a big push to get people to upgrade to AGA with more buttons on joypads/joysticks in 1992 and therefore a doubling down marketing-wise on the A1200 (and an 030/25 SKU ASAP) by C=! Then an AGA version of both games could have been as good as the PC! I can only surmise that no one at C= HQ valued the A1200 or AGA and were expecting the PC to swoop in and steal their breakfast! That's why they paused Amiga R&D and started building PCs themselves! Fools!

Last edited by BigD on 20-Nov-2024 at 01:51 PM.
Last edited by BigD on 20-Nov-2024 at 01:49 PM.

_________________
"Art challenges technology. Technology inspires the art."
John Lasseter, Co-Founder of Pixar Animation Studios

@agami

Quote:

With a 16-bit OS, a SoundBlaster 16 compatible sound card, and Multi I/O card for mouse and analogue joystick. Yes, 1994 was the pivotal year. At least here in Australia. It was in 1994 that the prices of no-brand beige mini-tower clone 486 PCs reached a price where a critical mass of people started to ignore

Games like Doom used DOS 32-bit protection mode runtime.


DOS Protected Mode Interface (DPMI) is a specification introduced in 1989 which allows a DOS program to run in protected mode, giving access to many features of the new PC processors of the time not available in real mode. It was initially developed by Microsoft for Windows 3.0, although Microsoft later turned control of the specification over to an industry committee with open membership. Almost all modern DOS extenders are based on DPMI and allow DOS programs to address all memory available in the PC and to run in protected mode

_________________
Amiga 1200 (rev 1D1, KS 3.2, PiStorm32/RPi CM4/Emu68)
Amiga 500 (rev 6A, ECS, KS 3.2, PiStorm/RPi 4B/Emu68)
Ryzen 9 7900X, DDR5-6000 64 GB RAM, GeForce RTX 4080 16 GB

@BigD

Quote:

BigD wrote: @agami The PC's Mortal Kombat near arcade perfect port helped as well! The Amiga's MK1 & Mk2 ports were close to greatness but Probe Software just targeted OCS and 1-button (2-button supported in the options menu)! What a waste though! I think had the A600 not been released, there should have been a big push to get people to upgrade to AGA with more buttons on joypads/joysticks in 1992 and therefore a doubling down marketing-wise on the A1200 (and an 030/25 SKU ASAP) by C=! Then an AGA version of both games could have been as good as the PC! I can only surmise that no one at C= HQ valued the A1200 or AGA and were expecting the PC to swoop in and steal their breakfast! That's why they paused Amiga R&D and started building PCs themselves! Fools!

For 1992, Commodore wasted 1 million production run on A600 and caused mortal financial wound.

Ali ordered A1200 design on Feb 1992 and it was completed around May 1992.

During 1991, Jeff Franks argued for low-end ECS Amigas with mid-to-high PCs product stack.

Blame Jeff Franks from the Commodore PC division. Bill Sydnes backed Jeff Franks' argument.

Commodore - the Final Years book reveals the main instigator for the wreaking Commodore-Amiga group. The focus is on Jeff Franks.

Last edited by Hammer on 21-Nov-2024 at 03:40 AM.

_________________
Amiga 1200 (rev 1D1, KS 3.2, PiStorm32/RPi CM4/Emu68)
Amiga 500 (rev 6A, ECS, KS 3.2, PiStorm/RPi 4B/Emu68)
Ryzen 9 7900X, DDR5-6000 64 GB RAM, GeForce RTX 4080 16 GB

@Hammer

Quote:

Hammer wrote: During 1991, Jeff Franks argued for low-end ECS Amigas with mid-to-high PCs product stack.

Fun fact:
You will find a lot of people here complaining about C= killing the A500 when it still sold well.
The A600 was just a LowCost A500 (for the management) so everything should have been fine but it wasn't.

----

And before people start complaining, The A600 was a bad product because it lacked A500 compatibility and didn't really cut the price for an entry level Amiga.

Last edited by OneTimer1 on 21-Nov-2024 at 08:55 AM.

@OneTimer1

Didn't _all_ ECS system lack A500 compatibility?

(for a certain erroneous definition of "compatibility")

Last edited by kolla on 21-Nov-2024 at 09:47 AM.

_________________
B5D6A1D019D5D45BCC56F4782AC220D8B3E2A6CC