Commodore returns...
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ElEctric_EyE
- Posts: 3260
- Joined: 02 Mar 2009
- Location: OH, USA
kc5tja wrote:
OK, so I was right. They don't have the exclusive trademark rights to Amiga. They have the trademark rights to AmigaOS. It says so plainly in the legalese.
http://www.osnews.com/story/23756/Commo ... gal_Action
Commodore Gets Rights to Amiga, Hyperion Takes Legal Action
http://www.osnews.com/story/23753/Commo ... gal_Action
Get your popcorn ready.
These threads could disappear at the hint of legal action. I seem to think that Commodore USA is the old Amiga Inc. which lost in court but there is a possibility that it is just a legal shell company. Based on the reaction, there are a lot of unhappy campers.
Barry Altman and Commodore
http://www.amiga.org/forums/showthread.php?t=54252
C= USA Owns Amiga, Goes AROS
http://www.natami.net/knowledge.php?b=1¬e=25272
Does anyone else using OS4 feel like A-inc has just stabbed them in the back?
http://amigaworld.net/modules/newbb/vie ... 7&forum=14
CommodoreUSA != Amiga Inc
http://amigaworld.net/modules/newbb/vie ... 55&forum=2
AMIGA Name bought by Commodore!
http://amigaworld.net/modules/newbb/vie ... 3&forum=16
Barry Altman and Commodore
http://www.amiga.org/forums/showthread.php?t=54252
C= USA Owns Amiga, Goes AROS
http://www.natami.net/knowledge.php?b=1¬e=25272
Does anyone else using OS4 feel like A-inc has just stabbed them in the back?
http://amigaworld.net/modules/newbb/vie ... 7&forum=14
CommodoreUSA != Amiga Inc
http://amigaworld.net/modules/newbb/vie ... 55&forum=2
AMIGA Name bought by Commodore!
http://amigaworld.net/modules/newbb/vie ... 3&forum=16
Note the picture in post #12. It is alleged plagiarism.
http://amigaworld.net/modules/newbb/vie ... 55&forum=2
http://amigaworld.net/modules/newbb/vie ... 55&forum=2
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BigDumbDinosaur
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- Location: Midwestern USA (JB Pritzker’s dystopia)
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Commodore returns...Sort of
GARTHWILSON wrote:
So it sounds like the new Volkswagen bugs, which are not bugs at all. The attraction, to me, of the older-type bug was not the shape, but the mechanical simplicity for do-it-yourselfers.
x86? We ain't got no x86. We don't NEED no stinking x86!
This looks neat ...
http://www.a-eon.com/
However I wish they kept selling the Mini-ITX boards, I'd have been more interested in a small embeddable system myself.
Dimitri
http://www.a-eon.com/
However I wish they kept selling the Mini-ITX boards, I'd have been more interested in a small embeddable system myself.
Dimitri
ElEctric_EyE wrote:
Why did they not pursue PowerPC? Maybe multiple PowerPC cores.
Note: there's no technical reason why PowerPCs couldn't snow the x86 architecture. It boils down to dollar amounts. In the 90s, more people invested in the x86 architecture, so that's where all the R&D went. It's really as simple as that.
(I do wish PowerPC had won, though. Such a freakin' awesome CPU architecture.)
At any rate, we can't change history, and there is no point in wallowing in it, except for recreational purposes.
kc5tja wrote:
The problem is that a 6502-based piece of hardware will not sell. A C64 is a home computer, and people expect home computers to connect to the Internet, display web pages with Javascript (and sometimes even Java) support, you'll need flash plug-ins so people can play their online games, etc. Even a 65816 won't keep up with that.
http://www.commodoreserver.com/
We're not the only active ones around. There are a lot of 8 bit users in the UK and their users are producing hardware and software:
http://commodorecomputerclub.co.uk
http://www.commodorefree.com/
Chuck, I don't want to sound like a nay-sayer, but I think you're missing a very important point. It costs a LOT to get custom plastic cases made, custom shielding, FCC type certification, and all the other things you need to market a product, at least in the USA. I'm not sure about Europe, but I suspect costs there will at least equal ours.
If your target market is small, you will never recoup your expenses. Observe, CMD is out of business now despite being very popular and whose products were always in relatively high demand.
Also, while a Comet64 will let a C64-user access such online services as GMail, Pivotal Tracker (if you're a developer), or Youtube, the user will remain utterly dissatisfied with the experience. GMail and PT both require Javascript support enabled (including DOM), while Youtube depends on Javascript for its UI and flash for its video playback. These are just three examples. All a Comet64 provides is a PPP connection to the Internet. You still need adequate browsing software. These packages just don't exist. Can they exist? I think so if you target SuperCPU users with SuperRAM, but who's going to write it? My Google searches have yielded no matches for Commodore browsers supporting Javascript.
Speaking of the Comet64, it's already an undesirable product, for there exist a plurality of Ethernet interfaces for the C64/C128. Why would I want another PPP solution offering less than 1% the throughput I could get with Ethernet?
You can market your product to the ever-shrinking niche of current Commodore owners, and that's great, but you're going to have to charge higher prices to cover your manufacturing costs (price reductions come only with volume). This means your product will always be non-competitive with what's available in the PC market, de facto.
Unless you want to give away your efforts for gratis, at least in part, you'll almost never succeed in making your product appealing to a market. The only business-sensible approach I can see (involving hardware at least) is to offer your product at a loss and charge for technical support issues as they arise (kind of how video game markets work, except with tech-support as the revenue channel instead of vendor licenses). Hopefully, you'll be able to break even with this model. But, as open source software vendors have learned, it's not easy.
So, knowing the challenges of manufacturing a product which is inferior to its competition in every way imaginable, knowing that marketing will cost an arm and a leg and ultimately be unsuccessful once the first PC World review comes out, why would Commodore want to pursue that approach? It doesn't make any sense.
I'm not at all happy that Intel's architecture won out. I was desperately hoping that PowerPC would soundly kick x86's ass. But, it didn't, and that's history. It's time to make the most of what we have. (And, besides, 32-bit x86 is not the horrible monster that everyone thinks is still the case from when 16-bit x86 ruled the world. It's actually quite pleasant to code for. And, x86-64 simplifies things further still.)
If your target market is small, you will never recoup your expenses. Observe, CMD is out of business now despite being very popular and whose products were always in relatively high demand.
Also, while a Comet64 will let a C64-user access such online services as GMail, Pivotal Tracker (if you're a developer), or Youtube, the user will remain utterly dissatisfied with the experience. GMail and PT both require Javascript support enabled (including DOM), while Youtube depends on Javascript for its UI and flash for its video playback. These are just three examples. All a Comet64 provides is a PPP connection to the Internet. You still need adequate browsing software. These packages just don't exist. Can they exist? I think so if you target SuperCPU users with SuperRAM, but who's going to write it? My Google searches have yielded no matches for Commodore browsers supporting Javascript.
Speaking of the Comet64, it's already an undesirable product, for there exist a plurality of Ethernet interfaces for the C64/C128. Why would I want another PPP solution offering less than 1% the throughput I could get with Ethernet?
You can market your product to the ever-shrinking niche of current Commodore owners, and that's great, but you're going to have to charge higher prices to cover your manufacturing costs (price reductions come only with volume). This means your product will always be non-competitive with what's available in the PC market, de facto.
Unless you want to give away your efforts for gratis, at least in part, you'll almost never succeed in making your product appealing to a market. The only business-sensible approach I can see (involving hardware at least) is to offer your product at a loss and charge for technical support issues as they arise (kind of how video game markets work, except with tech-support as the revenue channel instead of vendor licenses). Hopefully, you'll be able to break even with this model. But, as open source software vendors have learned, it's not easy.
So, knowing the challenges of manufacturing a product which is inferior to its competition in every way imaginable, knowing that marketing will cost an arm and a leg and ultimately be unsuccessful once the first PC World review comes out, why would Commodore want to pursue that approach? It doesn't make any sense.
I'm not at all happy that Intel's architecture won out. I was desperately hoping that PowerPC would soundly kick x86's ass. But, it didn't, and that's history. It's time to make the most of what we have. (And, besides, 32-bit x86 is not the horrible monster that everyone thinks is still the case from when 16-bit x86 ruled the world. It's actually quite pleasant to code for. And, x86-64 simplifies things further still.)
For all intents and purposes, you are right.
However, I've been to an independent game store like Gamestop and they had every game for the Atari 2600, they had games for the NES and Super NES, they had Nintendo 64 games, Sega and other systems. I bought a Retro Duo for my son and I'm still having fun with the original Mario 1,2 and 3 games. There is still a market and this mom and pop store will still be there for a couple of years.
You are right that the 65C816 will probably never play Youtube videos and so forth. It will never break the speed barrier.
From what I understand, only the first device has to pass FCC testing but I'll have to look into that.
If you were to go to Mouser or Digikey, when you go and buy an Atmega chip in quantities of 100, the prices go down. If you buy them in quantities of 1,000 the prices go farther down.
Have you ever bought LEDs? I see them being sold for .25 cents or .35 cents an LED. You can get a bag of 100 on Ebay for $3 to $4 dollars. Did you know it only takes .02 cents to make 100 of them? It is crazy. The reason you pay a lot is because you are paying a middle man and sometimes if you want something made cheap, you have to visit the people overseas who make them.
I don't believe you have to give away your product to make any market share. Products sell themselves. Commodore did what they could to kill off the Commodore 64 line in order to promote the Amiga line. There are still a lot of users out there who would buy an Amiga. Just price an Amiga on Ebay and you will find it is sold for hundreds. Prince an old 30 MHZ IBM and you might find it for $50 bucks because an IBM doesn't hold its price. You might say that analogy is flawed but you can go and look on amiga.org or amigaworld.org and there are probably about 4,000 worldwide users who are still using their machines and many of them are still writing programs for them because those machines are just that good.
I have no problem going with the beagleboard at beagleboard.org because it is a more powerful platform that needs an alternative operating system as a base for a computer. It already runs Linux.
I made some final designs to a 65C816 computer that I would like to build but no one has even been interested in looking at what my future design and concept would be or what possibilities exist. What I do know is that I just don't want to give away my ideas that I spent two years on for others to just take.
What I do know is that people hate the options given to them today and they would buy an Amiga like computer if it was viable today. I'm not that experienced or rich so I can't deliver that but I have good ideas.
However, I've been to an independent game store like Gamestop and they had every game for the Atari 2600, they had games for the NES and Super NES, they had Nintendo 64 games, Sega and other systems. I bought a Retro Duo for my son and I'm still having fun with the original Mario 1,2 and 3 games. There is still a market and this mom and pop store will still be there for a couple of years.
You are right that the 65C816 will probably never play Youtube videos and so forth. It will never break the speed barrier.
From what I understand, only the first device has to pass FCC testing but I'll have to look into that.
If you were to go to Mouser or Digikey, when you go and buy an Atmega chip in quantities of 100, the prices go down. If you buy them in quantities of 1,000 the prices go farther down.
Have you ever bought LEDs? I see them being sold for .25 cents or .35 cents an LED. You can get a bag of 100 on Ebay for $3 to $4 dollars. Did you know it only takes .02 cents to make 100 of them? It is crazy. The reason you pay a lot is because you are paying a middle man and sometimes if you want something made cheap, you have to visit the people overseas who make them.
I don't believe you have to give away your product to make any market share. Products sell themselves. Commodore did what they could to kill off the Commodore 64 line in order to promote the Amiga line. There are still a lot of users out there who would buy an Amiga. Just price an Amiga on Ebay and you will find it is sold for hundreds. Prince an old 30 MHZ IBM and you might find it for $50 bucks because an IBM doesn't hold its price. You might say that analogy is flawed but you can go and look on amiga.org or amigaworld.org and there are probably about 4,000 worldwide users who are still using their machines and many of them are still writing programs for them because those machines are just that good.
I have no problem going with the beagleboard at beagleboard.org because it is a more powerful platform that needs an alternative operating system as a base for a computer. It already runs Linux.
I made some final designs to a 65C816 computer that I would like to build but no one has even been interested in looking at what my future design and concept would be or what possibilities exist. What I do know is that I just don't want to give away my ideas that I spent two years on for others to just take.
What I do know is that people hate the options given to them today and they would buy an Amiga like computer if it was viable today. I'm not that experienced or rich so I can't deliver that but I have good ideas.
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GARTHWILSON
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I wrote a lot more, addressing things raised above, but decided it was getting too O.T., so I removed it and I might start another topic for it instead.
If that's true, that's sad to hear. kc5tja, didn't you say Apple did something similar with the II and the Mac? The C64 still went a lot of years though.
Quote:
Commodore did what they could to kill off the Commodore 64 line in order to promote the Amiga line.
Yes, Apple definitely killed the IIgs in favor of the Mac. This is no secret.
Though, what might surprise some folks is that Commodore didn't kill the C64 (it was selling clean up through the hey-day of the Amiga). They DID kill the Commodore 128 though, in favor of the Amiga. According to Dave Haynie and Bil Herd, it's the first time Commodore nixed a computer in favor of another.
A pity, because the C128 was actually on its way to out-selling the C64 if projections were allowed to follow through.
Oh well.
Though, what might surprise some folks is that Commodore didn't kill the C64 (it was selling clean up through the hey-day of the Amiga). They DID kill the Commodore 128 though, in favor of the Amiga. According to Dave Haynie and Bil Herd, it's the first time Commodore nixed a computer in favor of another.
A pity, because the C128 was actually on its way to out-selling the C64 if projections were allowed to follow through.
Oh well.
ElEctric_EyE wrote:
Too too bad they didn't go with a PowerPC based computer... Only reason I'd buy one today is to tear it apart to see how it worked. That's basically what I did when I was younger anyway! But using an Intel x86 CPU? Sounds like boring, retread material.
Look http://www.cybernetman.com/
and the other snazzy model with the PDA display in it is a ACER.
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GARTHWILSON
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