Jens Shoenfeld's anwer to the Apollo petition

[magnetic]

Seriously, some people need to grow up.  He's more than legitimized some of the arguments by agreeing to compromise with the sale of the MACH chips and ROMs.  IMNSHO the signers of the petitions are damn lucky he didn't simply say f-off tossers.

 
While I agree with you that its good that the Mach chips will be available due to the petition, I hardly thing that one of the remaining Amiga hardware manufacturers should tell potential customers to "f-off tossers" that is NOT good business. That kind of atittude i s NOT how you treat the community. (someone should tell some other amiga companies we know this as well)  Unfortanely with the level of fanboyism some amiga -ish companies feel like they can get away with bad customer support and products. We should just be grateful they are there. (even though we pay with hard earned money)

[darkage]

I really wonder how much Jen's paid for the Apollo IP.. Just very curious..

Even with his tough attitude towards Apollo I guess we should be grateful he's making reasonable new hardware.

[LoadWB]

While I agree with you that its good that the Mach chips will be available due to the petition, I hardly thing that one of the remaining Amiga hardware manufacturers should tell potential customers to "f-off tossers" that is NOT good business. That kind of atittude i s NOT how you treat the community. (someone should tell some other amiga companies we know this as well)  Unfortanely with the level of fanboyism some amiga -ish companies feel like they can get away with bad customer support and products. We should just be grateful they are there. (even though we pay with hard earned money)

No, a reputable dealer should not (and did not, for anyone who reads this out of context) say such disparaging things.  It was meant as extreme hyperbole to counter the opposition.

I think we're pretty fortunate in this community to have our providers whittled down to people who actually care about the Amiga, their products, and their customers.

[mechy]

I called this the sensible course of action, but I did also sign the petition.

He's well within his rights, no doubt about it.

That said, it's a shame yet another piece of hardware is going to die off for lack of documentation.

I don't believe "buying it to keep it off the market for our own good", I'm sure it was buying it to jumpstart a new product and the design turned out to be crap.

He didn't buy it to kill it originally,its after he bought it and found out what a poor problematic design it was and then decided to kill it.

junk should be eliminated from the market,but the problem is instead of buying a decent blizzard or cyberstorm board,almost everyone goes for cheap, and you get what you pay for.

mech

[mechy]

While I agree with you that its good that the Mach chips will be available due to the petition, I hardly thing that one of the remaining Amiga hardware manufacturers should tell potential customers to "f-off tossers" that is NOT good business. That kind of atittude i s NOT how you treat the community. (someone should tell some other amiga companies we know this as well)  Unfortanely with the level of fanboyism some amiga -ish companies feel like they can get away with bad customer support and products. We should just be grateful they are there. (even though we pay with hard earned money)

Having pride in what one sells and being the guy responsible for warranty is not a easy thing. Jens didn't tell anyone to f-off. Just because he runs a company does not mean he can't have a personal opinion. i didn't see any attitude in his quoted text,he was direct and simply told it how it is.
Anyone should stand behind their products.

If you think its so easy try building items for a near thankless market that won't support your living-Most anything we amigans get hardware wise is nearly a labor of love.. Then warranty those said products for xx years. he deals with everything from people running his stuff on poor/underpowered/incorrect power supplies to people not reading instructions and plugging stuff up wrong only to fry it then incessant whining when its not warrantied when they kill it. You need to try the other side of the fence my friend. See how you come out at the end.

Mech

[magnetic]

Mechy I wasnt talking about Jens specifically. I was adressing the comment "i would have told them to F-off tossers"

Also, I had a Toaster and amiga business with a public phone number. Believe me I know how hard it is to deal with amiga customers :0

[LaserBack]

He didn't buy it to kill it originally,its after he bought it and found out what a poor problematic design it was and then decided to kill it.

junk should be eliminated from the market,but the problem is instead of buying a decent blizzard or cyberstorm board,almost everyone goes for cheap, and you get what you pay for.

mech

apollo boards are good...there are ppl there running apollo 1260 at 80 and 90 mhz
ppl runing the apollo 4060 at 100mhz
I agree that blizzard boards and all phase 5 products are the best in the market
but nobody can say that apollo boards are crap or were bad designed
even the apollo 1230 series were much better than these new ACA crap boards

[MelbourneBen]

apollo boards are good...there are ppl there running apollo 1260 at 80 and 90 mhz
ppl runing the apollo 4060 at 100mhz
I agree that blizzard boards and all phase 5 products are the best in the market
but nobody can say that apollo boards are crap or were bad designed
even the apollo 1230 series were much better than these new ACA crap boards

Wow, thats very harsh....why do you think the new ACA boards are crap? Mines great. Have you ever owned one?

[AmiDude]

I owned an ACA1230/42 and I can say it's a piece of crap! Very unstable design, especially with motherboard rev 1b & 2b. Also, the ACA630 is not compatible with a lot of games due to the SDRAM memory. Also, you can't change them if the SDRAMS are getting fried or something,  because there soldered to the board. Why didn't Jens use a plain oll' 72pins EDO socket!?
Another downside is te lack of an (optional) FPU. I know most of the people don't use the FPU anyway, but a certain percentage of us does. Think of JPEG loading in AdPro or faster 3D rendering. OK, you can say "wy not do that kind of stuff with your PC (WinUAE), because it's faster." But I (and others aswell) like it when I see my beloved Amiga work hard to do the job!
Google "aca1230/42 problems" to see how many complains there are about the ACA's from Jens...

[rewlako]

I owned an ACA1230/42 and I can say it's a piece of crap!

Well, I don't think you're either a very novice user (with all due respect), or you don't have a clue what you're talking about.  Or you're trolling.

Also, the ACA630 is not compatible with a lot of games due to the SDRAM memory.

Why not?

Also, you can't change them if the SDRAMS are getting fried or something,  because there soldered to the board.

Why on earth would the SDRAM get fried (unless you're doing something you're not supposed to)?

Why didn't Jens use a plain oll' 72pins EDO socket!?

Why should he?  SMD RAM takes less space, it's cheaper, easier in many ways, modern and still in production, no RAM sockets to wear out, etc.

Another downside is te lack of an (optional) FPU. I know most of the people don't use the FPU anyway, but a certain percentage of us does.

That's the key: a percentage.  The remaining 90% doesn't need the FPU, so the board is cheaper without one.  Simple logic.

Google "aca1230/42 problems" to see how many complains there are about the ACA's from Jens...

I did, and couldn't find many.  Sorry.

[Bamiga2002]

@AmiDude
Most problems with ACA's are due to A1200-motherboards not having the timing-fixes done. Some problems are with the ACATune-tool that's still needs updating.

[AmiDude]

@rewlako

#1
I'm into Amiga's since 1985, so I guess that makes me an expert user. And don't acuse me of trolling; I'm an A.org member since 2005. You on the other hand could well be a troll; member since April 2012... Very suspicious...

#2
Why not, you say? Ask Jens!

#3
Anything can get fried, especially by very novice users that don't know what they're doing.

#4
EDO is cheap too, and very easy to replace.

#5
He could put an FPU socket onto the boards, so that buyers can deside to put on an FPU or not. It's their decision in the end.

#6
I did too, and find many. Sorry.

[utri007]

I've apollo 040 and it has it problems but it is OK for me. It works only with some MOBO / ROM compinations. Like it works with 1d4 with rom 3.0 but not with 3.1, it works IF timingfixes are done, just like ACA.

It has fast chip ram access,so fast that it seems faster than 060 with WB and some colors.

It is much more unstable than blizzard with zorro extenders, but with plain aga is stable.

And it seems that there are as many revisoins as there are apollo boards??

Apollos are part of Amiga history, yes they aren't best product in playground, but we are NOT talking new/still in production products here.

So keeping mind that historical point and there woun't be new apollo boards, Jens attitude is little childish? But he has his opinions and he is owner, so he has all the right to be childish.

[spirantho]

I have to say that using EDO these days would be crazy. The reason for using soldered on SDRAM is fairly obvious - cost. It's probably cheaper to stick 64MB RAM on the thing these days than it would be to fit a socket! That and it'll be a lot more reliable, and take a lot less room, and far faster than EDO.
As for SDRAM causing compatibility... that doesn't make much sense. I suspect the issue there is something different which could be fixed by a firmware upgrade.
I can't say I've seen many problems myself, actually.. and I looked on Google too. Do you have links? (Not trolling or criticising, I'm genuinely interested)

[AmiDude]

@AmiDude
Most problems with ACA's are due to A1200-motherboards not having the timing-fixes done. Some problems are with the ACATune-tool that's still needs updating.

You could be right about that. But that makes the ACA boards not very "Plug 'n Play".
My Apollo's & Blizzard boards are not suffering from that problem.

[AmiDude]

I can't say I've seen many problems myself, actually.. and I looked on Google too. Do you have links? (Not trolling or criticising, I'm genuinely interested)

Just google "aca1230/42 problems" and you will see various of posts.
Example link: ACA1231/42 problems