Why I didn't buy a Pi

[Iggy]

So when you wrote:
"But the British made the Vincent Black Shadow - the best motorbike of all time! "

You really meant:
"But the British made the Vincent Black Shadow - the best motorbike of it's time! "

Father!
Yes, and an RC30 is very easy to ride hard, and spanks its 1990 competition.
But today's rides would out distance it when pushed.

[Iggy]

"Amiga is very easy to ride hard, and spanks its 1990 competition.
But today's computers would out distance it when pushed."

Very clever.
And true.

And no one should assume that I am anti-ARM.

I am really looking forward to the quad core A9 device I ordered.

Its under powered ARM devices I am not in favor of.

I have to check out the Soc Grandma mentioned (and yeah, the new Opterons will be very cool).

[Iggy]

On the other hand, something obviously gave the Amiga edge over the ST. Saying that it's all about the CPU, when talking about Amiga, seems like an under-appreciation of the work they did on the custom chips. To me, it's what gives the Amiga most of its character, and it's definitely why I still use it.

Not really.
I still own an Amiga, I sold the ST (although I would like to have a Mega STE).
I think Jay Miner was a genius (Dave Haynie on the other hand, definitely not so much).

As to its character, the 68K is at its core.

[Iggy]

Why not like Dave Haynie? I thought he did a lot for the Amiga. He made the A3000. He must have done something i'm not aware of.

Dave had a lot of influence on the 2000 as well.

But he has been a little too free with his opinions and misconceptions, and he's no Jay Miner.

Then there is that dreadful C128 that people keep mentioning. A 2 MHz Z-80?
You do realize that that is outperformed by a 1 MHz 6502 (which in itself is not that hot a cpu) don't you?

[Iggy]

The C128 was actually quite cool IMHO, and it was very complex. It was "three computers in one", and it was a dual CPU system that had both a Z-80 @ 4MHz (its 2MHz effective speed was because it had to pause and let the VIC-II chip get access to the system bus) *and* a 8502 (an improved 6502 that ran in either 1MHz or 2MHz depending on the current mode the computer operated in). The 128D had even a 6502 present (in its disk drive, which actually was a computer by itself just like the external 1541/1581).

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Commodore_128

http://hackaday.com/2013/12/09/guest-post-the-real-story-of-hacking-together-the-commodore-c128/

At what point did either of us ever become humble?
And I just do not like this things design.
Instead of three crappy cpus, why not use one decent one?

[Iggy]

There we agree tmhgm, the C65 would have been an excellent machine.
The two show entirely different approaches.
The C128 was full of kludged add ons, where as the C65 was an nice evolution of the original.

And CP/M, why?
It was pretty much dead by then anyway.
And it doesn't use graphics or sound.

[Iggy]

Because that was NOT the point of the C128 project ?

You know C= did have some plans for a "16Bit" computer, that was canned when the purchased Amiga, the 128 was meant to the last&best of all 8Bits.

As such it needed compability with the C64 and it's massive SW pool, the Z80 was added to add "pro" level CPM-SW. The 3rd CPU was in the diskdrive, cos thats how all C= 8Bit floppies flew.

Was the whole concept smart ? Or maybe just a few years late ?
Doubt that was a decision Dave and the engeneering team could make, but for what was demaned/allowed by managment they sure came along with a hell of a puter.

Gee Dad, hell is the only word were are in agreement on for this device.
And Commodore had a 16 bit machine, which they didn't develop that well either.
I mean, why is AGA so slow?

[Iggy]

Now you are assuming i am a rational human being...

Ps - red bikes go faster!

"red bikes go faster!"...than blue light in a vacuum.

And most ARM devices go faster than a Pi.