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From: chris@que.UUCP (Chris DeVoney)
Newsgroups: net.micro.cbm
Subject: Commodore Amiga (quick impressions but verbose)
Message-ID: <410@que.UUCP>
Date: Thu, 8-Aug-85 19:16:12 EDT
Article-I.D.: que.410
Posted: Thu Aug  8 19:16:12 1985
Date-Received: Mon, 12-Aug-85 08:18:33 EDT
Distribution: net
Organization: Que Corp, Indianapolis
Lines: 73

A Midwest distributor and Commodore had a private showing of the Amiga
for computer stores and the press in our city last Monday (8/4). I 
had the opportunity to talk with the distributor and the VP Sales of Commodore
and a person from the technical support group. Here are some impressions.

The room had twelve Amigas along the wall. Most were running graphics programs.
Simply, the graphics are staggering and the best I have seen on a <$10K box.
The sound was also excellent. I am throughly impressed with the machine's
graphics and sound.

I saw prerelease versions of pfs family software and the Enable product. I
very briefly dabbled with both and they work similiarly to their PC & Apple
counterparts.

I also used 1-2-3 on one of the machines. It works, slowly. I'm to used to
my PC AT to accurately judge the speed but it appeared to be slower than or
about the speed of a floppy-based PC. The machine used a 5 1/4 inch disk drive
but the "hardware accelerator" for the PC emulation mode is not yet ready.
The entire 8088-emulation was in software. 

On a sidenote, I tried to go to the end of the spreadsheet. The Amiga does
not have a home, page up or down, or end key. This need the use of 1-2-3 less
than ideal.  However, the 10 special function keys worked that same on the
Amiga as they do on the PC.

I breifly scanned the "user's manual" and "hardware manual." The user's
manual is well-illustrated (losts of pictures). For content I rate it no
better or worse than most other computer companies. The hardware manual left
a blank impression with me. I needed more than five minutes, the amount of
time I allotted myself to read through it, to judge its completeness. Most
important things appeared to be in the manual, but I cannot tell.

The machine is multitasking. I ran three graphics applications in different
windows. The applications slowed as each task was added, but none 
degraded to an unacceptable degree.

You can access the machine through the window-oriented methods using the
mouse, or through the cli (command language interface) which has commands
similar to MS-DOS V2-3. The OS uses UNIX-like subdirectories and I/O
redirection.

I found little technical information on the OS in their documentation. However
that may be a role that a technical reference manual will fill.

The distributor reported that attending dealers were impressed with the 
machine. I questioned three dealers. I found that the three had signed that
day to take on the Amiga line. Each felt the machine was a compliment to
their current lines (which were IBM or IBM-clone and Apple).

The VP of Sales stated that the machine will only be sold to speciality 
(computer) stores. He also stated the initial target audience is small
business users and departmental users. He also stated he sees tremendious
opportunity in the educational fields for the machine, both traditional (k -
12 and college) and industrial.

I also asked what was Commodore like today. The VP was a former Apple executive
and said he felt very comfortable with Commodore. The person from technical
was he was at Commodore during Trimel's reign and left. He's back now. The
difference was "like day and night." He obviously likes things now at 
Commodore.

The bottom line question to ask is: Would the reviewer buy one of these? I
will cop out by saying I never have and never will buy a computer for 
personal use. I let the company do that for me. I will state I see the signs
of the next Apple II in this machine. 


-- 
Chris DeVoney				voice: 317/842-7162
Que Corporation				uucp:  ihnp4!inuxc!que!chris
Indianapolis, IN 

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