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From: koonce@wheatena (tim koonce)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.m6809
Subject: Re: Future of CoCo3
Message-ID: <1447@cartan.Berkeley.EDU>
Date: Fri, 4-Dec-87 20:58:04 EST
Article-I.D.: cartan.1447
Posted: Fri Dec  4 20:58:04 1987
Date-Received: Thu, 10-Dec-87 05:51:30 EST
References: <750@potpourri.UUCP>
Sender: nobody@cartan.Berkeley.EDU
Reply-To: koonce@bosco.UUCP (tim koonce)
Organization: UC Berkeley Math Department
Lines: 37
Keywords: future, coco3, graphics
Summary: More memory?!?!


  A lot of people have been talking about the need to expand the
CoCo's memory from 512k to several meg.  As I see it, the problem with
memory right now is _not_ the 512k total memory limit, but the 64k
per-process limit.  Level 2 does not allow any easy access to large
amounts of memory.  What is needed is either 1) dynamic instantiation
of data objects under Level 2 (What I mean here is a call which is
"Create a new data module with this name and this size".  Then
programs could simply ask for a lot of data modules to be created and
link/unlink to manage very large data spaces.  This would still not
directly address the code size limit, though, but that can be gotten
around with multiple parallel processes communicating throught data
modules, or pipes, or...  Such a capability *could* be added, without
too much trouble.),  or 2) a change of processor to one with a large linear
address space, i.e. a 680x0.  More memory is of dubious usefulness
under the other limitations imposed by OS9 and the 6809.

  As for greater graphics resolution, things can get unpleasant for
the graphics programmer if graphics screens exceed about 40k, since
then you can't fit the graphics routines and all of the screen memory
into a single address space.  Simple tasks like drawing lines can then
get pretty complicated.

  Basically, I feel that the days of the 6809-based CoCo are numbered.
I like the computer for its capabilities for the price, but I don't
think that large increases in memory or graphics capability are
reasonable without a change of processor.  What I would like to see is
a dual-processor 6809/68000 system, that would allow you to run Level
2, with the 68k as an i/o processor, or OSK with the 6809 as an i/o
processor, or even OSK with Level 2 in a window!!

Tim Koonce

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|ARPA:   koonce@bosco.berkeley.edu       |                                    |
|Delphi: TIMKOONCE    CIS:72276,1135     |                                    |
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