Path: utzoo!utgpu!water!watmath!clyde!att!osu-cis!tut.cis.ohio-state.edu!mailrus!cornell!batcomputer!itsgw!steinmetz!uunet!sugar!karl From: karl@sugar.uu.net (Karl Lehenbauer) Newsgroups: comp.sys.amiga Subject: Next Machine Message-ID: <2658@sugar.uu.net> Date: 20 Sep 88 23:48:51 GMT Organization: Sugar Land Unix - Houston, TX Lines: 55 There was a bit in InfoWorld today about Next Inc's Next Machine. It has some stuff I particularly want for my "Next Amiga", which may have to be a Next Machine. Specifically, if the report is true, every Next Machine shipped will include a 300 MB read/write/erase optical disk drive. They will also contain a 25-MHz 68030 (!), 4 MB RAM, ethernet, SCSI and MIDI interfaces, Mach Unix, X-windows and Display Postscript, all in ROM. It also comes with a 1220X960 or so gray-scale display, including monitor, with a color graphics board being developed by Pixar, which if you've been really out of touch for a few years and don't know, is a LucasFilm spinoff, now at least partially owned by Steve Jobs, that has received tumultous acclaim for their computer animation work and markets a dedicated computer animation system. The report indicated that the system includes a lot of software to produce animation and other never-before-supported-by-the-vendor- in-a-general-purpose-system stuff. I also heard a tantalizing rumor that the Next Machine has 16-bit sampled stereo DMA audio with a playback rate of something like 44.1 KHz, giving it studio-quality audio capabilities if true, and is of particular personal interest. Steve Jobs reconfirms himself as a great visionary (even if he did blow it in some ways with the Mac) to have included all that stuff in the base system. The result is that the least-common-denominator machine, the one almost all developers have to develop for, has all this blow away stuff that one can count on having there in each and every machine sold. (This has been one of the great things about the Amiga, too, in its market, that it has all those graphics and sound capabilities in every machine.) The other is that by bundling all that stuff, he gets price breaks on the hardware, falling production costs due to the volume, plus lower end user costs are since if the stuff were aftermarket items, they'd have to have higher margins. Think of the games! (1/2 :-) The price is $6000, with a 40% educational discount to be available. While that clearly prices it far beyond an Amiga, it seems to logically extend a lot of the capabilities of the Amiga, has an incredible amount of stuff for the money, and defines a niche that I would have liked (or would like) to see Commodore enter with some kind of "Super Amiga." A cost comparison to the Mac II was easy, since IW ran an article in the same issue about Apple's price increases. A 4 MB RAM, 40 MB disk, 14 MHz (?) 68020-based Mac II costs $8100, without a display adapter, monitor or 300 MB optical disk, ethernet, MIDI, Unix, software. As an aside, they have certainly "fixed" Unix; that is, considering Mr. Jobs' insistence on user-friendliness, I imagine that have made Unix operation really turnkey, (a cheap 300 MB distribution medium helps a lot), including invisibilizing and streamlining system administration. If Next, Inc. can deliver the machine in quantity at that price, they're going to blow the Mac II, the high-end PS/2s and ATs, and all the Suns and Apollos right out of the water. Disclaimer: I'm just this guy, you know. -- -- uunet!sugar!karl, Unix BBS (713) 438-5018