Atari ST vs Amiga?

[atarian63]

The A1000 is far more than twice as capable.

with 256 no ram card and total crash o/s, and 6 months behind.. no even close, and ST being 1/2 the price and faster..

[ParanoidLittleMan]

I'm not sure if memory mapping would be compatible.

 

Of course that would not be compatible. And not only memory mapping ... Atari ST(E) needs specially for it designed add-ons, expansions.

 

And I think that instead 68020 some faster 68000 would be better - otherwise a lot of problems with many SW. Usually, expansion boards need new/modded TOS, so for instance some ST accelerator uses modded TT TOS . And even with modded TOS will be SW not working, especially many games because stackframe and other CPU related problems.

 

And here we are at biggest Amiga advance IMHO : expansion slot - what allows easy and simple upgrades like RAM, ROM, CPU, hard disk adapters etc.

[FastRobPlus]

On the Amiga side, a lot of the updates are used to power WHDLoad or allow the older systems to play better with OS 3.9, which is pretty inefficient.

Does an ST really need these kinds of updates? Even for games, are SCUMM VM, Exult, or those sorts of things around?

 

*edit*

Looked it up for myself. ScummVM is out for the ST!

Even so, I would think the acceleration is really only needed for the VGA games, since ScummVM does VGA to EHB conversion in real-time on the Amiga. On a stock ST, wouldn't you be limited to running 16-color games anyway? Would you need the extra speed? And on the ST, you have MIDI already, so you don't need to have software MIDI rendering via AHI like MIDI ScummVM games use for Amiga.

[ParanoidLittleMan]

Unfortunately, on some ST seemingly simple things like RAM expansion, TOS upgrade are pretty big problem, and only people experienced with electronic can do them.

Faster CPU is always welcome, and there is a lot of SW wich benefits - 3D games, compilers. etc.

 

And I don't think that upgrades are made because WHDload, but that WHDload can use them - fast RAM for insance. On ST no need for fast RAM, no need for TOS upgrade in case of games, except if you have 1.00 and want hard disk.

[Daft_Horse]

It's even worse than that when you take the software side into account.

 

Graphics code is utter junk, must load NVDI. Need fonts? Must load SpeedoGDOS. Want to multitask? Load Geneva, plus new desktop. Total free ram? 2.5MB out of 4MB, no upgrade possible.

 

You can cut down the amount of stuff to load by using "better" ones, but that makes it worse! Equivalent function from NVDI5 + MagiC... 1.8MB free!

 

Throw your hands in the air, in despair, switch on 2+4mb Amiga. Sit there, watching icons slowly load when you open a folder... At least there's 5.8MB free ram but the whole .info thing was obviously too much for a 68000

 

Both computers are crap and brilliant at the same time. What's amazing is that in all the many, many years they made them, they never fixed these huge problems. Even the falcon has a terrible os.

Edited June 18, 2013 by Daft_Horse

[ParanoidLittleMan]

Daft_Horse:

I don't know did you register here only to write in this thread, but what you say is just proof that you have no clue what talking about.

'Must load NVDI' - lot of people never use it. There are upgrades with more than 4MB RAM - up to 14MB on ST.

And most of people had no and have no need now for multitasking on Atari machines. And even if there was only 1.8 RAM free, it was OK for practically all SW.

 

They never fixed 'huge' problems because there are no huge problems. Old SW was just not so RAM hungry.

I was able to use Windows 95 with 4MB, and with 8MB it worked pretty fast.

Edited June 19, 2013 by ParanoidLittleMan

[Daft_Horse]

Yeah, lots of people never load NVDI, they just go make cups of tea while the graphics routines run.

 

I'm kinda embarrassed for you you're trying to defend rom tos. It's utter crap, it's so utter crap it doesn't recognise click and drags half the time, never mind something as wild as "let you select multiple icons in a direction other than right-and-down", or even change font. Let's all fire up our soldering irons to get a decent desktop with 2.x, whoops, still slow graphics.

 

Slow, barely functional UI, large chunk of GEM has to be loaded from disk. These are all huge problems, such a shame you take criticism of a computer as a personal insult.

 

Your mythical 14MB ram upgrade? Great, some third party company created a hack pcb in the distant past. Wonderful. I'll just go get some unicorn bait and we can go fish for it.

[ParanoidLittleMan]

I really don't see why you came here ... We saw a lot of similar BS writings already. Nobody thinks that TOS is something perfect, but it served people and SW well in most cases. And that is only what matters.

"Slow, barely functional UI, large chunk of GEM has to be loaded from disk. These are all huge problems, such a shame you take criticism of a computer as a personal insult."

Only insult here is insulting the facts.

Funny, I thought that Amiga OS is what loads many things from disk - but thank you for enlightening us

[Daft_Horse]

When Amiga Kickstart sees a formatted floppy, it boots, opens the CLI, looks for (diskname):s/startup-sequence and goes from there. If it's not there, no big deal, you've got a command prompt. Just type the name/path of the program and it'll run. You can boot with a completely empty formatted disc.

 

Whereas half the ST's graphics code is hiding under the assumed name GDOS on a floppy disc back at the computer store. Font support, the impossible dream.

 

All you can say for the ST is that it'll eventually, after a few minutes waiting for you to insert a disc, bring you to the default gem desktop. I'll bet booting the workbench on an amiga from floppy is faster, and preserves your settings.

Edited June 19, 2013 by Daft_Horse

[+DarkLord]

I have owned an A1000, A2000, and a couple of A1200's.

 

Going for default desktop/bootups, none of them booted up faster than my ST's.

 

BTW, what exactly are you hoping to accomplish here? Coming into an Atari

dedicated forum and bashing will only get you labeled as a troll....

 

Just curious.

[GadgetUK]

Both Amiga and ST have equally annoying 'features' imo. Both are pretty advanced for the era they were created, but I do agree they didn't improve the OS's enough towards the end of the life cycle. Oh, and don't get me started about 'preserving settings'... The number of times i've adjusted things in Workbench to only find them shifted around again despite having saved them. At least TOS keeps them all nice and aligned properly, Workbench just sticks them all over the place half the time lol. There's no way my Amiga can boot quicker than my ST, that said I still love my Amigas - not for the OS, not for fonts, but for games =) Same with the ST. I dare say some apps might run better on the Amiga, but I am sure there's also a number of apps that work better on the ST than the Amiga despite the overheads for GDOS and graphics libraries.

 

EDIT: And the clicks and drags, I sort of see where you are coming from. It is annoying you cannot drag from different sides or bottom to top etc - that does annoy me on TOS 1.04. As for clicks, thats just a case of getting used to. Pressing and holding for enough time to have registered the start of a drag etc. I wish I could easily adjust the timings on my ST for that, there's probably a .acc util to do that but it is much easier on the Amiga.

Edited June 19, 2013 by GadgetUK

[Pacmania]

I seem to remember that Retro Gamer magazine did a really nice article on the ST last year and they listed some games that were apparently better on the ST than the Amiga.

 

I missed both these computers as I went from a Sega Master System to a Mega Drive but have been playing some of the classics via the wonders of emulation recently.

[atarian63]

Yeah, lots of people never load NVDI, they just go make cups of tea while the graphics routines run.

 

I'm kinda embarrassed for you you're trying to defend rom tos. It's utter crap, it's so utter crap it doesn't recognise click and drags half the time, never mind something as wild as "let you select multiple icons in a direction other than right-and-down", or even change font. Let's all fire up our soldering irons to get a decent desktop with 2.x, whoops, still slow graphics.

 

Slow, barely functional UI, large chunk of GEM has to be loaded from disk. These are all huge problems, such a shame you take criticism of a computer as a personal insult.

 

Your mythical 14MB ram upgrade? Great, some third party company created a hack pcb in the distant past. Wonderful. I'll just go get some unicorn bait and we can go fish for it.

at least it's clear and readable and works unlike the crash happy amiga o/s that looks like a child designed it

[+save2600]

Oh no you DIT'NT Atarian! "Crash happy", "child designed"... give the lame, twisted, tired, sorry and overused excuses of yours a rest already.

 

The one thing that truly does suck about some Amiga games is that they're directly converted ports of computer crippling, least common denominator ST games! And that should be enough to piss anyone off. It's like taking a low-fi recording, dumping it to a hi-rez format and trying to sell it as something special. Pffft.

 

In the end, neither computer was allowed to flourish because of such practices (among many others), letting the inferior systems "surpass" the real pavers and wave makers.

Edited June 19, 2013 by save2600

[atarian63]

Oh no you DIT'NT Atarian! "Crash happy", "child designed"... give the lame, twisted, tired, sorry and overused excuses of yours a rest already.

 

The one thing that truly does suck about some Amiga games is that they're directly converted ports of computer crippling, least common denominator ST games! And that should be enough to piss anyone off. It's like taking a low-fi recording, dumping it to a hi-rez format and trying to sell it as something special. Pffft.

 

In the end, neither computer was allowed to flourish because of such practices (among many others), letting the inferior systems "surpass" the real pavers and wave makers.

 

Oh yes I did! , only lame if you are on the amiga side of things, Us St users got the shaft on STE,little programming done to take advantage of the great sound abilities.I will say amiga o/s is much much improved as time went on and only crash happy in the early 1000 models with early o/s versions.. I always preferred GEM.

part of the reason for those conversions was that for the 1st couple of years ST had a 2 to 1 advantage or more in installed base,and much more in europe,specifically germany,software companies did this for just that reason. Write for the dominant platform then port as necessary. That said I hate ports as well.

Edited June 19, 2013 by atarian63

[atarian63]

also on TT and falcon

Edited June 19, 2013 by atarian63

[Daft_Horse]

at least it's clear and readable and works unlike the crash happy amiga o/s that looks like a child designed it

 

What would you know about clear and readable? You're forty nine and still borderline illiterate.

Edited June 19, 2013 by Daft_Horse

[atarian63]

What would you know about clear and readable? You're forty nine and still borderline illiterate.

I was there and a dealer for both lines. I would take my knowledge on the two machines over yours anytime. You seem to have omitted any info about yourself other than the obvious being "daft".

It would appear you have little to no knowledge based on your statements above. An ST with no disk takes appx 45 sec to come to desktop and loads no Gem files from floppy. It does not take minutes,you are talking out your ass.

Edited June 20, 2013 by atarian63

[OldSchoolRetroGamer]

What would you know about clear and readable? You're forty nine and still borderline illiterate.

 

A new member who throws around insults? Hope you are not expecting to stick around to long lol.......

[+save2600]

A new member who throws around insults? Hope you are not expecting to stick around to long lol.......

 

Thought that response was kinda funny actually.

 

I'd have given him a rep point if it weren't for the possibility that Atarian63 might drop a bunch of funky grey plastic and yellow keyboard stained ST systems with bad RAM and dead drives on my lawn.

 

BTW: doesn't matter how "fast" an ST can boot. Still can't do a damned thing with it once it does!

Edited June 20, 2013 by save2600

[atarian63]

other than run faster than amiga for a lower price, but then that was all long ago huh?! and Yes save2600, I am readying some ST parts to decorate your lawn! Watch out! Might toss you some amiga busted up crap if you are good!

 

Gotta say, at least when the st boots up it works! unlike amoeba err amiga err guru..

 

You may be surprised I have an A500, trying to have time to install the SD reader i bought last year.Excellent games machine!

 

Back in the day when I had my retail store we used to have multiples of each brand setup, with demos, the 2 sides of customers would come in and try to outdo the other brand with new stuff all the time,fun days that I miss!

Edited June 20, 2013 by atarian63

[+save2600]

You may be surprised I have an A500, trying to have time to install the SD reader i bought last year.Excellent games machine!

 

[+wood_jl]

(1) I grew up with ST, liked it well. FOR THE MONEY it was a great performer! "Color Mac for 1/3 the Price" is nothing to turn your nose up, in 1985! Only a dickhead would.

 

(2) No doubt the Amiga has nice hardware and effects. It took it a long time to become as cheap. I have A500 and like it very much, now, too!

 

(3) There's no shortage of this one-sided flip-flop thinking where ONE thing - pancakes vs. waffles, Chevy vs. Ford, Toyota vs. Honda, Atari vs. Commodore, Xbox vs. PS - only ONE thing can be totally, 100% kick-ass fabulous and the other TOTALLY AND ABSOLUTLEY SUCKS. That's ridiculous. There are lots of good products on the market. There are advantages and disadvantages to everything!

 

(4) There never has been - nor shall there ever be - a shortage of trolls to show up here (and on Commodore sites and any other site I'm sure) to attempt to start a shit storm. Welcome, to the latest perpetrator!

 

Good night!

 

ps - notice from the waffle industry: FUCK PANCAKES!

Edited June 20, 2013 by wood_jl

[ParanoidLittleMan]

Well said, wood_jl .

 

Actually, the bare fact that there are discussions at all about 'which is better' - means that they can not be so much different in overall quality.

 

Usually, I avoid threads like this, because it is boring, nothing new to see, etc. But when saw really stoopid and false writings from Daft_horse, I needed to correct. Of course, he just contunued nonsenses.

 

What reminds me on some general rule: when someone talks about how some product (computer, OS or similar in our case) is crap, he focuses mostly on one or few aspects. And of course overestimates importance of them. Considers some solutions as bad only because they are different than on his beloved system, and he is not used with. And usually, writer knows subject really poorly. Such 'writings' say in many cases more about writer self than about topic

[GadgetUK]

You know what the problem is? Society teaches people to adhere to belief systems (and there are many types - political, religions, region, nation etc), and typically your allies are the people that think and believe in the same things as you, and your enemies have different thoughts and beliefs etc. That's where the extreme fan boy behaviour comes from. People need to learn to become open minded and not judge based on their limited understanding of what they know, and what they do not want to know.