==================================================================== (C) 1992 by Atari Corporation, GEnie, and the Atari RoundTables. May be reprinted only with this notice intact. The Atari RoundTables on GEnie are the *official* information services of the Atari Corporation. To sign up for GEnie service, call (with modem in HALF DUPLEX) 800-638-8369. Upon connection, type HHH Wait for the U#= prompt. Type XJM11877,GENIE and hit RETURN. The system will now prompt you for your information. ==================================================================== ************ Topic 20 Thu Aug 01, 1991 S.JOHNSON10 [Steve] (Forwarded) Sub: Atari "Falcon" Project The August 1991 ST Format quoted Sam Tramiel mentioning "the Falcon project" and other new ST-based machines other than the ST Book and STylus. They're not rumors if big Sam mentioned them personally! 259 message(s) total. ************ ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 1 Mon Aug 03, 1992 C.KLIMUSHYN [-Chuck-] at 18:23 EDT Just wondering, all things being equal, the appropriate MMU's, blitter chip, fast RAM etc., how much of an approximate speed increase is a 68030/16mhz chip compared to a 68000/8mhz chip? Thanks, -Chuck- ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 2 Mon Aug 03, 1992 J.DOUGLAS5 [JimD] at 22:47 EDT The problem with the 'falcon' as a game machine is that the vast majority of games being produced today are for MS-DOS. Not much point in makeing or buying a game machine for which there are no games is there. JimD ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 3 Mon Aug 03, 1992 J.RICHTER [J.RICHTER] at 22:59 EDT Ben, I still get tha SCARY feeling that ATARI wants to be in the memory business.. That cheap $795 price tag could sore to over $1100 for a fully memorized Falcon... but... the Falcon does SO many nice things.. it would take around $2000 to equip a similar based with all tese new Video and Sound features.. sooo wadaya gona do... It seems to me me if they'd just progress behind the confines of that 1040e case it would make it nicer for everyone... WOW.... WOW.... After re-reading the Atari Advantage Falcon article I AM IMPRESSED!! and Iv'e been the biggest skeptic around here for awhile... what really impressed me was the UPGRADABILITY of the system!! (2) processor slots... External DSP connections!!! parallel processing between the 030 and the 20mips DSP... while the DSP is manipulating and preparing 3D images the 030 is simultaneously preparing the ground work to display them... and might as well throw in some true CD sound while your at it!!! WHOOPS... add some special efects by display all this to the background of a LASERDISK StarWars flick..while your at it! All this and it still runs PAGESTREAM.... wait I feel the BIG ONE really comin' this time.. H O W C A N T H E Y D O I T . . . F O R T H E P R I C E ? ? I really wonder if even BYTE mag has the smarts to do justice to this one... Here's hopin' it all true.... Jerry ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 4 Mon Aug 03, 1992 J.COLE18 [John Cole] at 23:04 EDT Lee, Doesnt the end of September seem like a good time to hold a Falcon030 Ageis Symposium? :-) I still want them to hold it in New Orleans! EVERYONE would come to that one! John ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 5 Mon Aug 03, 1992 C.KLIMUSHYN [-Chuck-] at 23:16 EDT Ok, don't everyone jump on me, but why would I want to buy a Falcon instead of an LC? From what I could tell from the AA article the 700-999 dollar price tag did NOT include a hard-drive or monitor. Add in a decent quality multi- sync. and high speed HD and you're close to the cost of an LC which has tons of close-to-ST-ease-of-use software. I think the LC has been upgraded to use the 030 at 16mhz also. Someone convince me so I can go out and convince my Mac-friends! :) Best Regards, -Chuck- ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 6 Mon Aug 03, 1992 J.RICHTER [J.RICHTER] at 23:25 EDT Steve, I deal with clones ALL the time and have yet to see 32,768 colors at 640x480!! and even if when they get to that rez they WILL NOT have the video horespower the Falcon has to do any real manipulation of those images (i.e. the falcons parallel DSP processing power)!! 99% of the latest IBM games are 320x200x256 and 640x480x256 .... if you've ever seen 1024x768 on a standard VGA monitor (the kind we can all afford) you'd realize how worthless that rez is on all but the MOST expensive monitors... AND the video card that will do 32,768 cost's as much as a complete FALCON which comes with CD sound and true SCSI II out the back to boot!! B U T who am I to stop ATARI from pumping up the true colors rez a notch!!!!!!!!!!!! Ken, Coming from a worse skeptic than yourself... RE-READ the Advantage article... NOT HARDLY JUST A GAME MACHINE.. I consider the posibilities of this system to be ENDLESS... If everything IS TRUE in that article ALL our eyes will pop out.. I work with the finest 486 systems in the world ALL DAY LONG ... and you can be SURE which system I'd be turnin' on when I got home!!! ..... well I might have to buy the 386 option board later on...you know, just to run Windows 3.1 and MicroSoft Word... JimD, Yeah and you can run em' with the 386 chip option on the FALCON... that is until the REAL awsome TRUE COLOR high speed CD quality games are out for the Falcon.... ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 7 Mon Aug 03, 1992 LEXICOR [Lee] at 23:26 EDT John Cole18 I agree that would be a very good time but here in Calif, at sunny vale. Like I said Atari should gather in it's chicks and see that they properly fledge. See you here :-) Lee ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 8 Mon Aug 03, 1992 J.ALLEN27 [FAST TECH] at 23:31 EDT The stock Falcon blows away an LC...except for the number of SW titles available. The two "slots" inside make it very convenient to build addosn for the machine. Not as easy as if it had a PC case and slots, but easy enough to make people happy. A couple of behind the scenes architecture changes make the machine 040-able, and using a 68LC040 (without FPU) this can be done very inexpensively compared to the Mac cards...a Mac LC LC040 card is $1,400+. Some really really slick things can be done on 3rd party memory boards, like combination memory/hi-res video, networking, etc. The base machine, in 68000 terms, running ST SW is probably 3-4X faster. An inexpensive...030 in an 030 is cheaper...accelerator card can get you to 5-6- 7X without 32bit ram, and 12-14X with 32bit ram. I'd say this machine is as good a jump in power/price as the 1040 was in 1986, and is also a 3rd party addon dream. I hope they can sell...zillions ;-) ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 9 Mon Aug 03, 1992 LEXICOR2 [Ringo] at 23:41 EDT Jerry. You are not the only one that is IMPRESSED by the article and the Falcon specs. About the animation stuff, well, hum, should I say something....well maybe later. Ringo ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 10 Tue Aug 04, 1992 SFRT-ASST [Kene @ SFRT] at 00:01 EDT I read the Falcon file in the library. I would probably buy the computer described in that file. However _that_ is a serious computer and it will need serious software at serious prices to take full advantage of of all its features. It would be nice if that software was available at ship time. Since that's NDA we won't know until Atari officially unveils it. And even with all that said I still think it's a kick-butt game machine. Or a VERY nice computer disguised as a kick-butt game machine. The RF Modulator and "Broadcast Quality" video signals are a give-away to me. I'd like to compare those specs to the computer we actually get. Nathan>>> Calamus (in the right hands which leaves me out) creates BEAUTIFUL ads. Unfortunately a full page ad in the LA Time would send people to Egghead to find it and they will say they never heard of it. And then the person will say its "for an Atari." and the salesperson will shake their head sadly, and say they don't carry Atari software. And ask in all seriousness, "Are they still in business?" [I went to Egghead a couple weeks ago for some Avery Disk Labels. The woman asked me "Will these work on an Atari?" I only pray that someday Scott will release LabelEaz.] And then the person will ask for ________ program. And the salesperson will offer them the program, the video tape tutorial, two books, and the service contract.... All the things you don't need on the ST because it's easy to learn and use. ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 12 Tue Aug 04, 1992 S.JOHNSON10 [Steve] at 01:11 EDT E.KRIMEN - Actually, it's not "emphasizing," but perhaps I'll just use "(i.e. ...)" instead. The news I got concerning pre-emptive multitasking on the Mac came directly from one of the System Software programmers on America Online. Atari could certainly fit the names of every dealer on a 1-page magazine ad. ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 13 Tue Aug 04, 1992 B.KING8 [Brien King] at 01:13 EDT Steve - > But who's going to pay $700-$1200 for a game machine....... The ones who wasted $3,000+ on a 486 so they could play games . About your comment on the resolutions... well, give it a chance, I still see stuff on the ST that looks very nice and they are only using 16 to 512 Colors.. Since the Falcon will come with (I think) 256,000+ Colors, I don't see any reason someone couldn't come out with Spectrum256000 . 640x480x256 is probably more then enough right now and if the Falcon has any slots at all, I don't see why a Video board couldn't be made for it. Brien King ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 14 Tue Aug 04, 1992 J.RICHTER [J.RICHTER] at 01:45 EDT Chuck... Re-read the article IT DOES contain a 40meg HD and a slot for the math chip.. something that the LC does NOT have... also.. the LC does not have 386 socket... does not have (2)direct processor slots... does not have DSP for true CD quality sound.. does not have midi ports... sounds like you didn't read the whole article!!! The LC is not EVEN in the same league... even a die hard MAC guy would agree to that.. ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 15 Tue Aug 04, 1992 J.ALLEN27 [FAST TECH] at 09:11 EDT The Falcon does not have a 386 socket either. The 386 was used as an example of what "could" be plugged into the expansion bus. There's a whole world of stuff I can think of. ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 16 Tue Aug 04, 1992 FAIRWEATHER [David] at 10:12 EDT I was talking to a friend who owns a Roland Sound Canvas, which is a multitimbral, polyphonic sound module, kind of like the MT-32 except that it uses sampled sounds. My friend suggested that, given the appropriate software, the Falcon's Digital Signal Processor Chip would allow it to function as a "Falcon Sound Canvas". What do you all think? I know its folly to wait for Atari to release anything, but, if the Falcon were available tomorrow for $700 and the Sound Canvas for $525 would the money be better spent on a Falcon? 1. Is the Falcon hardware capable of emulating a multitimbral, polyphonic digital sound module? 2. Is there any likelihood of software coming out that would act as a a sequencer and drive the "Falcon Sound Canvas" at the same time? Or would a second computer be needed to run the sequencer software? 3. How much hard drive space would a battery of say 128 sampled instruments require? ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 18 Tue Aug 04, 1992 DENNYA [Denny Atkin] at 11:06 EDT Can someone who's seen the article summarize the Falcon's specs? Or if it's a file, point me to the right place? Danke. ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 19 Tue Aug 04, 1992 M.FARMER2 [Mark Farmer] at 18:26 EDT To: J.DOUGLAS5 [JimD] Where do you get your incorrect data from? (more games are made for MS-DOS) computers. Is not the Sega Genesis and the S-NES a 68000 based system? Even the SEGA CD- ROM has a built in 68030 chip running at 16mhz (for faster processing of the data). Not to forget the Amiga, Mac, Next Computer Atari and others. you do not see any MS-DOS systems in the homes as game systems now do you? why do you think that is? To: J.RICHTER [J.RICHTER] don't give Atari a big head, they have yet to get one(Falcon) computer on the streets. ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 20 Tue Aug 04, 1992 C.KLIMUSHYN [-Chuck-] at 19:16 EDT Thanks all for the thoughts on comparing the Falcon to an LC. I live near Ann Arbor, Michigan which is MacHeaven (I've been told U of M is the single largest customer of Apple, don't know if that's true or not). J.Richter>...sounds like you didn't read the whole article!!! From the AA download synopsis I read about an internal slot for an "optional" HD and nothing about an internal socket for a 386 chip. Thanks for the reply, it's more that I don't know a whole lot about the LC . Please, Please, Atari spend some money and ADVERTISE this baby!! Best Regards, -Chuck- ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 21 Tue Aug 04, 1992 J.ALLEN27 [FAST TECH] at 20:35 EDT The NES, etc, are based on really fast 16 bit versions of the old 6502 that powered the Commodore 64....or is it the 6809? I can never remember...junk is junk. Actually, the little Apple "Newton" packs about 10 TIMES the horsepower the Nintendo packs...and fits in the palm of your hand. Ex: the TT gets about 7500 Dhrystones, the Newton gets 30,000 ;-) The Falcon: 16Mhz 68030 16Mhz 68881/2 optional 33Mhz 56001 1-14Megs dram 96K DSP ram Dram is on a daughterboard...3rd party nirvana Cpu expansion slot...double nirvana, anything goes ;-) 1.44 floppy Internal IDE hard drive...drive optional External true SCSI-2 interface Complex video system, all ST res's, 640x480x8bit, 320x200x16(15)bit 640x200x16(15)bit interlaced, and lots I still know nothing about Gutsy power supply Enhanced blitter Those are the highlights. One heck of a nice machine!! ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 23 Tue Aug 04, 1992 E.KRIMEN [Ed Krimen] at 22:25 EDT >If Atari starts a comparison they're dead. > >If I were IBM or Apple I'd buy the next two pages (or four) have a >image of a balance scale with Atari software titles on one side and >Mac or DOS titles on the other. > >Caption: > You decide. > >Subcaption. This ad created on a ___ with _________software. That will never happen. Not unless Atari gets real close in their percentage of market share, will Apple run an like that. Notice how many anti-Apple ads IBM or anyone else runs. None. Notice how many anti-PC ads Apple runs. Quite a few. Apple wants to bite a bigger chunk of the market, just as Atari does, but the leader in that market, MS-DOS clones, will rarely bite back. Apple wouldn't want to waste their advertising dollars on an anti-Atari ad. They'd prefer to use it on anti-MS-DOS ads. >However _that_ is a serious computer and it will need serious software >at serious prices to take full advantage of of all its features. It >would be nice if that software was available at ship time. This point can't be emphasized enough. The Falcon can't be sold on hardware virtues alone. Its software must be as spectacular if not moreso than the machine itself. Little anecdote: I went to a Microsoft Macintosh Business Solutions Seminar at the Hyatt Regency in SF today, and Microsoft's software for the Mac is on big- time steroids -- which is fabulous (for them). For example, some of the things that impressed me were that Word 5.0 has a built-in mini-paint program. Double-click on an image and the paint screen comes up. Excel 4.0 lets you rotate 3-D bar graphs so you can get the perspective you desire. Excel 4.0 has predefined color-schemes so you can paint your graphs in a matter of seconds and mouse-clicks. You can customize your menus and toolboxes very easily. Then, of course, there's all the benefits of System 7 like publish and subscribe, and that you can link their programs via networks (i.e. grab an image from another machine and put it in your document). This is the kind of software we need, and unfortunately, I don't see small ST developers doing this kind of stuff unless they have many, many programmers working on the same program, which will only happen if they sell lots and lots of software which means Atari has to sell lots and lots of machines. ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 24 Tue Aug 04, 1992 RJROBINSON [ Ron ] at 23:07 EDT Just a reminder, the Advantage article was presented as a "Preview" of the computer. Several of the final specifications were yet to be decided when the article was pulled together. Other information was collected from several sources -- often this information was not consistant even when from people "in- the-know." On the other hand, Atari read the article before printing, and hired the two guys in charge of pulling the issue together. This happened even *after* Atari read the article. Me thinks that is a good sign :-) There was confusion over the empty socket. A couple of sources indicated a 386SX chip could drop into the socket. Sort of a potential built-in "AT- Speed" perhaps? This feature was to my knowledge not verified before press time. There is one "Processor Direct" via two connectors, looked like enough pins for all the CPU bus signals, interrupts, etc. were available. The memory board connectors could be a handy second expansion port as Jim mentioned, very much a hardware hackers dream. Since several people have requested the specs from the preview article, I'll repost them here. Apologies to those who read them again. The next issue may have photo's of the insides for all to see. Atari requested the photo's be held until the formal intro in Germany this month. I suspect Atari Explorer will also contain detailed info on the new computer in the next issue. /////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////// /// A T A R I A D V A N T A G E M A G A Z I N E /// /// June/July 1992 /// /////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////// FALCON'030 REVEALED! -- The next generation of home computer is """""""""""""""""""" on the way and the Falcon'030 leads the pack with power and features. FALCON'030 at a GLANCE: * Motorola 68030 Microprocessor running at 16MHz, multi-tasking capable * Motorola 68881 or 68882 16MHz Floating point coprocessor * Motorola DSP 56001 Digital Signal Processor (DSP) * 1 to 16MB of memory and 512KB of ROM * 16 bit BLiTTER Graphics coprocessor running at 16 MHz * Enhanced Broadcast TV quality Video -- "True Color" 320x200 resolution, 32,768 colors or 640x480 resolution, 256 colors from a 264,144 color palette -- VGA or Video 320 or 640 by 200 or 400 resolution, 2, 16, or 256 colors from a 262,144 color palette -- Standard STe video modes with a 4096 color palette -- RF modulator and VGA monitor connections -- Overscan support -- Genlock and multi-media capable -- Graphics overlay and video tiling -- Enhanced high speed 16MHz Blitter graphics co-processor -- STe horizontal scrolling * "CD quality" stereo sound -- Stereo 16 bit Analog to Digital inputs -- Stereo 16 bit Digital to Analog outputs -- Eight channel stereo DMA sound engine with 16 bit PCM digital record/playback with up to 50KHz sample rates -- Stereo 8 bit STe compatible PCM sound -- ST compatible 3 channel PSG sound -- Multiplexer to connect Codec, DSP and DMA sound engine -- Stereo microphone inputs and headphone outputs connected to a 16 bit stereo codec -- DSP digital audio connector, up to 1MHz data transfer rate -- Built-in monophonic speaker * 1.44MB floppy drive * Built-in IDE 2 1/2" hard drive interface (drive optional) * SCSI II peripheral interface (hard drive, tape drive, etc.) * Mega STe/TT compatible local area network (LAN) interface * Enhanced modem/RS232 port * ST and STe compatible joystick/controller ports * Built-in "processor direct" expansion connectors * On board real time clock and battery backed up RAM * MIDI input and output * Parallel printer port * Enhanced keyboard controller allows 300 DPI mice ... ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 25 Tue Aug 04, 1992 J.RICHTER [J.RICHTER] at 23:24 EDT Jim, I certainly remain a SKEPTIC about ATARI's ablility to deliver hardware... but.... they did a hell-of-a-job on this system.. I talked with a guy who has actually SEEN one of the mother boards.. and besides the expansion slots there was, what appeared to be a real 386 chip socket... could be wrong.. it can be done either way, JIM? anyway, this DSP thing is AWSOME and I don't just mean for awsome games, I mean for an inexpensive medical /lab tool!! incredible signal measuring devices, automated voice response PBX system!! it just BEGS for all these new markets!!! .... even though the TT030 is twice a fast (maybe not with a J.ALLEN add-on) the FALCON has so much more potential... and for C H E A P . . maybe Jack will have the last laugh... that is if he doesn't blow it and flunk on the marketing end of things.. or not pass FCC.. or just not delivery to the USA on time... Does anyone know if the system is based on a 32bit bus? ..JIM ALLEN? ED, I agree 100%..!!.. Thats why they need a 386/486 expansion board or a Mac 256k rom support module!! that will get them by in the lean times while specific software can be written to take advantage of what the DSP can do!! if the emulators can access the rest of the Falcon hardware.. what a deal that might be... I MEAN think about it... its not a question of hardware it's a question of how much software..out-a-the-box it will run, and with the Intel module it could run another 20,000 pieces of software.. and Joe shop at Costco PC illiterate will buy'em by the thousands.. yes sir, its 100% PC compatible.. and runs CD quality sound to boot!! this will keep ATARI in business and allow me and others to stay with ATARI!!! hmmmm am I dreaming or is someone been slipp'in me drugs? ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 26 Tue Aug 04, 1992 SFRT-ASST [Kene @ SFRT] at 23:47 EDT Is there anything remotely like the cartridge port? But I suppose that's a minor hack. ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 27 Tue Aug 04, 1992 LEXICOR2 [Ringo] at 23:49 EDT Sounds like ED, has comeback with "Apple/mac" shock!! Only joking Ed, I know what you are talking about I've been to Mac shows also. To me the Falcon looks very good. I want one and I also want ATARI to sell tons of them that way we can keep Jim Allen happy!! Oh and also the rest of the developers. Ringo ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 28 Wed Aug 05, 1992 S.JOHNSON10 [Steve] at 00:18 EDT J.COLE18 - Hold it in one of the scummiest places in the country??? I think not! C.KLIMUSHYN - A basic Mac LC II 4/40 with a 12" RGB monitor retails for just over $2400 ($2800 for a 13" hi-rez color monitor). A Falcon 030 4/40 with an SVGA monitor should only retail for around $1500-$1700. Keep in mind these are *RETAIL* prices. The above Mac LC II system *SELLS* for around $1850 ($2100 for the 13" color monitor). I think the Falcon 030 can be *VERY* competitive with that on a price/performance basis. A *SUPPORT* basis is an entirely different matter. J.RICHTER - Then why do I see ads for even "65,536 Colors at 800x600" and 1024x768x256 (it doesn't give a price for the card alone, but for $675 you get the card and a 17" .26 dot pitch non-interlaced 1280x1024 monitor)? I agree that they probably won't have the necessary horsepower to do any "real manipulation" of the images, but it *IS* there. I know and, I think, said that I knew that most IBM games only use 320x200x256 and 640x480x256 is usually the tops for most IBM programs. I actually think the Falcon 030's graphics specs sound very nice--especially so for the price--and are more than adequate for most applications. I just don't think it's quite the "more colors than you can see" spiel that Bob B. keeps boasting about. Also, they seem to be using the "true color" term a bit loosely, although I'm not sure if anyone at Atari actually used that term. Additionally, I'd dare say that a 386 or 486 emulator for the Falcon 030 that has direct access to all the Falcon's features would be a far better clone than any other currently available, especially for multimedia. However, IBM software would have to be written to take advantage of the Falcon's internals (like the DSP), so I dunno 'bout that idea. SFRT-ASST - Haha! Sounds like when I was shopping for a hard drive mechanism for my ST and a guy at ComputerLand (they were the *ONLY* local computer store) said that I couldn't hook up a hard drive to an "Artari" and that I'd have to buy a Mac or IBM compatible if I wanted a computer with a hard drive. Those weren't his exact words, but my paraphrasing captures 100% of what he *DID* say. Needless to say, I left immediately...and laughing my ass off at that. CONNER - Well, I can't wait for *ATARI* to "spend some $$ on [the] Falcon." I also can't wait to see countless others "spend[ing] some $$ on a Falcon." Only after those two things happen over a period of a few months after it's released will I seriously consider getting one. D.KING8 - The only problem with adding a video board to the Falcon for any higher resolutions is that, due to the miniscule market, such boards will cost more than the Falcon did in the first place. Well, after reading the Atari Advantage article, I'm excited yet disappointed. I'm excited about most of the technical specs, but disappointed about some of the aesthetics. For one, it seems to have the same cheaply and flimsily- molded case the regular 1040 case has (I had heard before that the case would be *LIKE* the 1040, but not necessarily the exact same style). Also, it seems to have the same crappy keyboard (someone *PLEASE* correct me on that if it's not so) as well as having the same poorly located mouse/joystick ports. It's a bit sad that Atari can't even fix some of the most basic problems. On the hardware side, I'm still disturbed about the 'RAM board,' question the lack of an external floppy port (unless a SCSI external floppy is planned), and wish it were at least a 32MHz machine. All in all, I think I'll probably wait until the 'other' Falcon's come out next year before I seriously consider getting one. That would also allow time to evaluate whether they will be worthwhile (i.e. if Atari can successfully market them). All of that aside, Atari Advantage looks like a pretty nice magazine. It's sort of a much 'cleaner' version of ST Informer. The only problem I had with it is that there are too many mid-article advertisements. Also, there are some conflicting bits of info in the Falcon article. For one thing, the article says that there are "a pair of processor direct connectors" and "an additional empty socket...for unknown reasons" yet the table of connectors says "1...Internal bus expansion" connector. What's the story there? Second, it says "15 bit per pixel, true color operates in all modes except 640 pixel wide VGA mode" (keyword there being *ALL*) but only lists 320x200 as being a 15 bit per pixel resolution under the 'Falcon Video Modes' table. What's the story here? Is 640x480 the only "640 pixel wide VGA mode" or are *ALL* 640 pixel wide modes? Also, it says that it supports "STe horizontal scrolling" but doesn't the STe have both horizontal *AND* vertical hardware-assisted fine scrolling? If so, is it the same on the Falcon as on the STe? And finally, the picture on the cover is supposed to be a prototype Falcon 030, but it doesn't look black (or very dark grey). Is that because it's a prototype or what? ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 29 Wed Aug 05, 1992 E.KRIMEN [Ed Krimen] at 02:25 EDT Ringo, I've been using Macs for years and have been to enough shows to know them fairly well. :^) I always think to myself, "THIS is a 68030? Feels like my STE." Anyway, I bet the price tag on those Microsoft products are enough of a shock. :^) ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 30 Wed Aug 05, 1992 J.ALLEN27 [FAST TECH] at 12:24 EDT The "empty socket" was the 68881 math chip socket, NOT a 386 socket. The processor expansion bus will facilitate adding anything, including a 386SX. Can't comment on bus size. They can't do 32Mhz and hit the price point they are going for. 16Mhz is just fine, with the broad feature list, this is one mighty fine machine, and lays the ground work for heaven knows what. I'd also assume that 3rd parties will make tower cases, and expansion card cages available eventually. There is nothing that limits any of these opportunities. Way to go Atari! ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 31 Wed Aug 05, 1992 Z-NET at 20:40 EDT Mario- nice effort from someone to explain "sic", but not accurate. "Thus" is correct... when [sic] is in brackets, it means the quoted passage is reproduced precisely as in the original, even if questionable in grammar or spelling. See "potatoe." John Nagy ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 32 Wed Aug 05, 1992 M.HEMBRUCH [Mattias] at 20:57 EDT One thing that just sort of struck me while thinking about the FALCON... IBM & Apple have been pushing MultiMedia for a while now. It's SLOWLY starting to catch on. Don't know too much about MAC's, I think several models have decent sound facilities, but the price is quite high.. On the PC side, you need AT LEAST a 386sx, an (S)VGA card and a sound card. I doubt either one of these could match the FALCON's sound or video capabilities (accelerated PC video boards run around $350+, I seem to remember, and a decent soundboard another $150-200.) Now enter a FALCON. For ALMOST the same cost as adding a soundcard, 4 megs ram to run windoze, windoze 3.1, and a coprocessed video card, they can pick up a FALCON and use their existing vga monitor. Can you say "No comparison"? I knew ya could. If people start taking advantage of the FALCON's capabilties, I think Atarians will be using a new word. Not MultiMedia, but OmniMedia. Comments? Mattias ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 33 Wed Aug 05, 1992 LEPULLEY [Lloyd Pulley] at 21:08 EDT Jim, >>...16Mhz is just fine... How fast do you think the Falcon will be compared to a T16 or a T25 ST? Lloyd E. Pulley, Sr. ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 35 Thu Aug 06, 1992 J.ALLEN27 [FAST TECH] at 00:11 EDT Running stock ST software, a bit faster than a T25'd ST, but no match for a Tiny030'd ST...unless you Tiny030 the Falcon ;-) ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 36 Thu Aug 06, 1992 S.JOHNSON10 [Steve] at 00:35 EDT FAIRWEATHER - In a word, "Yes!" With the right software, you can utilize the DSP for digital synthesis or even as a digital multi-effects device. M.FARMER2 - It's true that "more games are made for MS-DOS" right now. Also, the S-NES uses a 65816 running at 4MHz. SFRT-ASST - Nintendo *USED* to have 80% penetration, but Sega showed us that it's possible to bring Nintendo down. The Genesis outsold the S-NES last Xmas by about 4:1 and it's still outselling it by around 2:1 or 3:1. Anyway, I think that's enough game console discussion for this topic. E.KRIMEN - I also don't think Atari should do comparison ads and rather just sell the Falcon on its own merit. RJROBINSON - The good thing is that, at this point, I can only think of Atari *ADDING* new features to or improving those we've already heard about. ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 37 Thu Aug 06, 1992 J.RICE5 [Joe Rice] at 01:00 EDT It seems I read somewhere (in one of the UK mags?) that Cubase 3.0 runs on the Falcon, so that would seem to imply that there is a port as Cubase uses a cartridge key. Joe ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 38 Thu Aug 06, 1992 LEPULLEY [Lloyd Pulley] at 01:14 EDT Jim, Thanks for the info. Next question.... Will we have to 'play' with memory to get some programs to run like we do with the TT (i.e. some need TT ram, some won't run in TT ram, etc.) or is the Falcon memory like the ST's...all of it fair game for any program? Lloyd E. Pulley, Sr. ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 39 Thu Aug 06, 1992 SFRT-ASST [Kene @ SFRT] at 02:09 EDT Where are you getting all the info about Falcon pricing, Other (later) Falcons? The AE article? I wouldn't bet a quarter on pricing info until Atari officially announced it. And then I'd still hedge my bets. With an 80 percent penetratio and new sales having a 4:1 ration Nintendo is still the leader. Sega may achieve market dominance. But Nintendo may do better. ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 40 Thu Aug 06, 1992 R.MARTIN22 [NETWORK 23] at 02:54 EDT MATTIS: Yes, I agree. That bus slot that was mentioned could be the inroad to some kick-butt "Toaster-killer" card. If only I had the money, and if the Falcon is close to what rumors claim, I'd develop a Toaster board for it myself. Seriously. Those guys at NewTek are now obscenely rich. Live And Direct [11:37 PM-5/Aug/92], Rod Martin, Network 23/ST Connection ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 42 Thu Aug 06, 1992 J.ALLEN27 [FAST TECH] at 10:44 EDT From what I've heard unofficially, the ram is "ST" ram, no flag diddling needed. Of course, an accelerator with "TT" ram is always possible, bringing back the flag diddling need ;-) ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 43 Thu Aug 06, 1992 M.PERDUE [Mario] at 18:52 EDT John, "Thus" _is_ correct. However, saying 'sic is latin for thus' doesn't really tell you much. The "spelling is correct" reference is just to help you remember what it means. It's kinda like "Bad Boys Rape Our Young Girls But Violet Gives Willingly" being used to remember the resistor color code. The colors on the resistors have nothing to with easy women or assulting young girls, but it does help remember the color sequence. ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 44 Thu Aug 06, 1992 M.FARMER2 [Mark Farmer] at 19:30 EDT to: C.oates2 If I/We had "Atari Advantage" we would not have to ask. maybe we should get a Sub to it. To: S.Johnson10 [Steve] I will have to Beat my son since he is the one that gave me the Data on the S- NES. He has the Atari 7800, NES, S-NES, Turbo-16, Sega Genesis (With The master Sega adapter), And 1-Ea Atari 1040STE 4 Meg. He Has Had 4-Ea Atari 800's (Old version), 1-Ea Atari 1200XL, 5-Ea 130XE's, 2- Ea Atari 2600's, 1-Ea 5200, 1-Ea Intelivision 1-Ea Odyssey II, 1-Ea Colleco Vision. He is our only kid :) (I could not handle anymore!) Also my wife confermed your Data at Toys R Us about Sega out selling the S-NES (To bad Atari has nothing to compare). ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 45 Fri Aug 07, 1992 C.OATES2 [Chris] at 01:00 EDT Well, I do have the "advantage" article, and the Falcon looks very cool indeed. About the Cartridge port: yes, it does have one, right on the left side, like a standard 1040. In fact, the prototyp case in the art. looks exactly like a 1040 case - slanty Fkeys, mouse & joy ports under the keyboard, etc. However, all the ports on the back are totally different. The video out is a DB-19, which I've never seen before, all VGA/Mac monitors I know are DB- 15 in various configs, so it looks like special cables might be necessary (Can anyone who knows more about mons. fill me in on DB-19 connectors?) In regards to anyone who wants the article, I know that AA was taking credit card orders over in their topic before the issue came out, so that might still be a viable alternative. For those who don't have it, I am willing to answer any questions... Chris O- ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 46 Fri Aug 07, 1992 S.JOHNSON10 [Steve] at 02:25 EDT J.ALLEN27 - Oh yeah? Well where are the "expansion card cages" for the ST (I assume you mean an external expansion box, like one with several VMEbus slots)? If they weren't delivered then, why should they be delivered now? Also, the confusion about there possibly being a 386 processor socket built into the motherboard, the Atari Advantage article says "You can add a math coprocessor in a socket under the RAM board" and "An additional empty socket was on the board for unknown reasons." Sounds like there are *TWO* empty sockets inside this bird. However, due to several other inconsistancies in the article, I wouldn't be surprised if this was wrong. How much extra would it cost them to boost it to 32MHz on a per machine basis? Certainly, it would be *A LOT* less than what third party accelerators will cost, which is why I'd want it. Don't get me wrong here, though. I'm not saying that Atari should close off any avenues for third party developers. It actually makes some very good sense (other than cost reasons) for them to only make it a 16MHz machine though as who would buy a TT if the Falcon were faster? M.HEMBRUCH - Yes, multimedia seems on the verge of a huge explosion and the Falcon would complement that very well. However, Atari needs to *AT THE VERY LEAST* make everyone aware of the machine. Right now, I'd say the Amiga is the best multimedia-capable machine with the Mac a very close second. Clone multimedia has been pretty lame, not to mention very expensive, up until the past few months when new 'breakthroughs' have occured in the clone market (that have existed in other platforms for many years prior). Unfortunately, it looks like Commodore may have new machines out before Atari gets the Falcon out. Wow! Sam Tramiel will be here next Wednesday. I didn't think it'd be that soon. I only have a week to get my 'interesting' (i.e. 'pointed') questions ready. ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 47 Fri Aug 07, 1992 J.RICHTER [J.RICHTER] at 02:30 EDT UKY... A non-standard VGA plug?... I mean does'nt the TT030 have a standard 15pin plug?... Falcon.. well, but gee... I gonna miss my WONDERFUL mega4 keyboard.. maybe I'll wait for the separates... I'm ready for the '040... WHY CAN'T THEY TAKE THE DARN M'BOARD OUT AND PUT IT IN A SEPARARTE ENCLOSURE... I mean $900 SX clones have'em? Jerry... Jim, Is there a software compatibility reason why the Falcon should not have a pure 32bit architecture? Even if current software can't utilize it? Can your add-on boards be designed to support the NEW blitter and take advantage of the AWSOME power of the DSP? Howabout a super 24bit TRUE COLOR board for the RAM slot?.. ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 48 Fri Aug 07, 1992 LEXICOR [Lee] at 03:39 EDT Lloyd, I could answer you memory allocation question, but then... I would have to Kill you. But don't dispare you will love the Falcon030. It will just be a few more days befor the first but not last "official" release of information. I can assure you that the cream of the Atari developers have falcons and are doing their best to get everything ready for the official release. BR is working non stop...(to his Credit) to help all in solving new machine problems and ATARI is well focused now. You are going to see and hear some trully astonishing things in the comming months. I wish I could say more but that would just be unfair. Just take my word on this one thing and believe this "The Storm that is comming" is not the one you think....In other words there will be break fluid all over the floor in Amiga city come the end of September! Lee ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 49 Fri Aug 07, 1992 LEPULLEY [Lloyd Pulley] at 09:40 EDT Steve, >>How much extra would it cost them to boost it to 32mhz.... Or how about the 25mhz '030 that Apple is starting to use in the Powerbook 145? Lloyd E. Pulley, Sr. ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 50 Fri Aug 07, 1992 J.ALLEN27 [FAST TECH] at 21:03 EDT Steve, the cost of going to 32Mhz is low, in cash, but it would make the computer as a whole impossible. I can't tell you why, but frankly if you understand how the ST works the answer should be readily apparent. So we'll just say cost is $1 million per unit ;-) As for expansion cages, if you have a MegaSTE or TT you can just go buy one. If the ST (MegaST) had sold well enough, and been a serious success in areas that required the addons, I'm sure an expansion chassis would have been made. It wasn't so it wasn't. If the Falcon is, it will, simple as that. Atari is building a low-cost whiz-bang, they are NOT trying to build the fastest thing of four rubber feet, so WHY would they go to 33Mhz or beyond, and raise the base price hundreds of dollars? For the fraction of users who need higher performance, there will be choices. Sounds sensible to me. ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 51 Fri Aug 07, 1992 C.OATES2 [Chris] at 22:33 EDT Lee @ Lexicor, or anyone else: I have heard a few mentions of this "coming storm" thing, including the 1/4 page ad in the Advantage on P. 58 - "the storm is brewing" Can anyone fill me in? I am completely lost as to what it means. Lee, you seemed to mention that it might have something to do with the falcon, so this may not be off-topic after all, but EMAIL replies are willingly accepted if others do not wish to be bothered... Chris (C.OATES2) ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 52 Fri Aug 07, 1992 S.HUGHEY1 [Steve @ RL] at 23:19 EDT Come on Atari... I want a Falcon in a desktop-style case with a detachable keyboard. My Mega STE has spoiled me, and I vow never to return! ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 53 Sat Aug 08, 1992 C.KLIMUSHYN [-Chuck-] at 00:41 EDT As I reread the AA article, the more I see this machine being targeted at musicians. The damn thing is a portable recording studio!! -Chuck- ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 54 Sat Aug 08, 1992 S.JOHNSON10 [Steve] at 00:58 EDT J.RICE5 - The pictures of the Falcon 030 in Atari Advantage show the same old cartridge port on the left side of the machine, so yes, it *IS* there. LEPULLEY - I believe the standard Falcon 030 RAM uses up to 14-15MB of ST RAM, if I understand what all's been said correctly. SFRT-ASST - Nearly all the conjecturing that's been done about the Falcon 030's pricing places it around $700 list (the last rumor I heard was $750 list for a 4MB machine with no hard drive and no math co-processor). ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 55 Sat Aug 08, 1992 LEXICOR [Lee] at 02:13 EDT Criss, My original interprataion of the "Comming storm" was vailed hints of the impending doom of ATARI. My comment was an insinuation that the "comming storm" would be related to the success of the Falcon. Now that nathan has publicly accused us of having such a machine, I can say that if we did, and if we knew its capabilities, and given our status as Silicon Graphic developers, and given our thrust at making ATARI computers and SGI computers directly compatable, The Falcon and it's DSP capability could mean that such things as Line draws under DSP could be as fast on the ATARI as on the SGI? being able to use an inexpensive ATARI with a very expensive graphics Work Station could mean very substancial sales for ATARI. Now I am not saying that this is the "the Comming STORM" I am only commenting that things are not always what they seem, For instance if you have a chance to get to the glendale show you will see and ATARI running in an SGI window at the same time as the SGI is doing other things, and you will see the SGI displaying applications on a standard SC1224 and Mega2. True cross compatable multi media. That might be exciting enough to charterize as a "Comming Storm" Lee ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 57 Sat Aug 08, 1992 T.EVANS21 [] at 07:37 EDT >LEXICOR [Lee] >Lloyd, > > But don't dispare you will love the Falcon030. ---- > ATARI is well focused now.------- > You are going to see and hear some trully astonishing things in the > comming months. > "The Storm that is comming" is not the one you think....In other words > there will be break fluid all over the floor in Amiga city come the > end of September! >---------- Lee, You don't know how _LONG_ we've waited to hear 'words' like that!!! Ya mean there's hope for 'us'?? <-:}Ted{:-> ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 58 Sat Aug 08, 1992 T.EVANS21 [] at 09:50 EDT >C.OATES2 [Chris] > >Lee @ Lexicor, or anyone else: I have heard a few mentions of this "coming >storm" thing, including the 1/4 page ad in the Advantage on P. 58 - "the storm >is brewing" Can anyone fill me in? I am completely lost as to what it means. > Chis: It's my guess this is what Atari has 'named' the "FALCON"... Cute huh?? Naw, It's a decent market ploy alright... I just hope it "FLIES"... "THE STORM IS BREWING"... Get it?? (About to be released)... Guys get paid big $$$ for this??? <-:}Ted{:-> ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 59 Sat Aug 08, 1992 ISD [Nathan] at 11:42 EDT Hmmm, and here I thought that the entire Storm thing was referring to an as yet unannounced new software program soon to be released that has nothing whatsoever to do with Atari and that we were supposed to be impressed with all this advanced info. Now it appears to simply be confusing people. No surprise. Since when did the "Storm" become equated with the Falcon? Nathan @ DMC Publishing ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 65 Sat Aug 08, 1992 R.WATSON15 [Wayne Watson] at 13:52 EDT If they name it the Storm, I wonder how many people will go looking for a car dealer selling Atari Storms. :-) The Atari Storm, built by Korea and imported by Atari. I like the Falcon better. ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 66 Sat Aug 08, 1992 R.BUSH [Richard Bush] at 13:53 EDT _I_ have a subscription to Atari Advantage and I have yet to see the article. What'd they do lose my subscription when the mag changed owners? Sheesh! ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 67 Sat Aug 08, 1992 AT-VANTAGE [Mike] at 15:53 EDT To: All Re: "The Storm" Nathan (msg #59) is correct. The "Falcon" is not the "Storm." --Travis "Rumor Squashing" Guy Ex-News Editor, Atari Advantage Magazine ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 68 Sat Aug 08, 1992 J.RICHTER [J.RICHTER] at 20:03 EDT Folks, It seems even as ATARI has promise in new hardware their OS manager heading up MultiTOS quit and went to APPLE/IBM...sheesh ... whats a Falcon gonna do without wings? (i.e. a modern Multi-OS)... ATARI, someone, is this true about Allan Pratt? and if so how badly will this impact the release of MultiTOS ... (remember the ALAMO.. I mean remember the FSMGDOS!).. Here is hoping that all negative memories will be forever gone as ATARI delivers FALCON in quantity before Christmas '92 all wrapped up in a warm and fuzzy MultiTOS that BLOWS Windows 3.1 away... all for under $1000... Bets Anyone? PS .. My sorce Says that there WILL be a slot for a 386SX and that the True Color resolutions will be TWICE that claimed in the AA! ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 69 Sat Aug 08, 1992 LEXICOR [Lee] at 21:52 EDT Ted E. There is little doubt about the power and advanced features of the falcon, I have already convereted an entire "terminator" film clip w/Sound in Falcon 15bit and saved it out as a computer file. It plays in real time with a tial motif. We will show this at Glendale. Come if you can. if you are there you are going to see some shocked ATARI users walking around looking for the neaest pet shop money in hand. IN fact even ATARI hasen't seen this stuff. You can bet that they don't have a remote Idea how good this machine is! Lee ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 70 Sat Aug 08, 1992 J.NESS [Jim] at 22:10 EDT J.RICHTER - Yes, Alan Pratt is gone, but everything I have ever heard about Atari's software group indicates it is one of the better staffed groups within Atari. Plenty of bodies to man the oars. It's true that whenever a management type in a vital department leaves, it takes awhile for his/her replacement to get organized and get up to speed. But it's not an issue of months, or anything like that. -JN ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 71 Sun Aug 09, 1992 LEXICOR2 [Ringo] at 00:28 EDT Lee, You got the "Terminator" film clip all finish already!! All in full true-color and Stereo sound. WOW!! About the pet-store. remember Jack T. had a commodore-PET. Later. Ringo ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 72 Sun Aug 09, 1992 S.JOHNSON10 [Steve] at 00:49 EDT J.ALLEN27 - I was wondering since Atari pumped the TT030 up from 16MHz to 32MHz without increasing the list price of the machine. However, perhaps there was so much time in between when the TT030 was first announced and when it actually shipped that the cost came way down. S.HUGHEY1 - You'll have to wait until around mid-1993 if you want a desktop- style Falcon, which probably isn't such a bad idea. ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 73 Sun Aug 09, 1992 SFRT-ASST [Kene @ SFRT] at 02:15 EDT Where _are you getting_ this info, Steve. I consider myself relatively sneaky, devious, and curious, but you constantly amaze me with your ability to hear rumors that I don't hear. Do you have Atari bugged or something? How can you find out about a mid-1993 computer? ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 74 Sun Aug 09, 1992 R.WATSON15 [Wayne Watson] at 05:02 EDT I was not impressed with the graphic offerings. What ever happend to SVGA graphics. This new bread of computer should have graphic capabilities that match or are better than the ones on that other system. ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 75 Sun Aug 09, 1992 C.KLIMUSHYN [-Chuck-] at 08:22 EDT J.Richter, That's good news on the SX-chip slot, I'll keep my fingers crossed. It may be time to push for a full DX-slot for the Mega-Falcon . Best Regards, -Chuck- ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 76 Sun Aug 09, 1992 D.ENGEL [Thunderbird] at 10:28 EDT Ringo, Please refrain from using those clever witticisms when referring to the reaction of the computer community about the new Atari "Falcon" (i.e "Brake fluid all over the floor at Amiga City", "...running to the nearest pet store, money in hand."... If you keep teasing us like that, I'm afraid that some of us will simply irrigate our trousers. We wouldn't want that, now would we??? ;- ) Actually, I had a question for you which you may or may not be able to answer, but I'll give it a shot... My sources indicate that the New SGI Indigo has a DSP similar to that alleged to be in the rumored 'Falcon', but that there is some 'glitch' in the Indigo design, which prevents the Indigos DSP from being used as a sensitive laboratory signal measuring device. My source says that SGI is working on a fix to it. My question would be this: would the supposed DSP in the hinted 'Faclon' be suitable for Lab measurement? While on the subject of DSP's... is it true that you can use it to render graphics onscreen faster than the CPU/BLiTTER? Could it be used to make an ultra-fast 'ARC' type file compressor? I know little about DSP's in general, so I assume that most everyone else knows little too. Any hints at the power of this little chip would be appreciated (by me, and not my MS-DOS and Amiga co- workers. heh heh heh). Thanks. AT-VANTAGE [Mike], I think that this company should hire Christina Applegate (a.k.a. Kelly Bundy) to be their spokesmodel. They sould get a lot more attention with some full page ads and maybe a few TV spots which would carry the slogan: "The Strom is coming!". (Every time I see on of those ads, I can't think of anything else but that 'Married with Children' episode.) But seriously, the point of advertising is to attract interest in a product. A good ad is one you remember and talk about. So far All I've seen is people remembering and talking about the 'Storm'. Even if they haven't identified themselves yet, people will remember and talk about it when they find out... "Remember those 'storm' ads we were seeing? Yeah, well I found out that it's the new XP-38 Space Modulator! It looks HOT. I'm going to get one soon. It has so many features. It's cool. You should consider getting one for the wife and kids. etc." you get the idea. I just hope the 'Storm' is something that I would have use for, after all this debate and discussion. ;-) ________________________ \hunderbird ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 80 Sun Aug 09, 1992 AT-VANTAGE [*] Travis [*] at 13:07 EDT Thunderbird, (cool signature, btw) I'm sure you "could have use for the Storm" when it breaks. Many people will. The Storm has been long overdue. It's been a long time since the last one in these parts. Kene, Don't worry, we've felt the chick up - she's ready, she's hot, she's a satisfier, and best of all... . --Travis ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 81 Sun Aug 09, 1992 LEXICOR2 [Ringo] at 13:31 EDT Thunderbird!<------"is that a Falcon related name?" You have now enter the Lee Seiler Zone. It was Lee that made the clever posts, sorry. He also has the Elan/SGI system so I am sure that he will have the answer to your second question. Only thing that I know about the New SGI systems is that they are comming out september, I also left a post in the Lexicor area regarding new processor and the new prices for the system. Later! (LEXICOR2-Ringo) ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 83 Sun Aug 09, 1992 J.RICHTER [J.RICHTER] at 14:45 EDT chuck,, Well not hardley... the average MAC color monitor along is $600 and the old LC is $999 and if it doesn't have the DSP capablity it will be a distant second in performance anyway... remember CPU speed is not the whole picture... it's complete system through-put that counts and the parallel operation of a 16MIPS DSP chipset in conjunction with a 16MHZ '030 will CRUSH the MAC... (68030-25 is around 6-7mips) I am sure the LCII is $1000 without the monitor anyway... but we know the LCII will be there.. WILL THE FALCON? Jerry Richter ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 84 Sun Aug 09, 1992 FAIRWEATHER [David] at 16:08 EDT For those of us shrouded in ignorance, will someone please explain just what the heck "Digital Signal Processing" is? I saw an ad yesterday for a Sony Carman CD player that had the term "Digital Signal Processing" trademarked! Is this a proprietary chip licensed from Sony? ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 85 Sun Aug 09, 1992 JEFF.W [ST Sysop] at 16:24 EDT Ken, Thanks for the chuckle. I think you summed things up precisely. :-) - Jeff ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 87 Sun Aug 09, 1992 XXTIMD at 16:35 EDT DSPs are used in things such as phones, modems, and things that process signals. The DSP found in the Falcon is the same one found in the Turtle Beach Multi-sound and the Gloria sound board. The DSP takes over the power needed to play back sound and such that is needed with CD quality sound. Instead of the main processor doing all the dirty work, the DSP can do it. The DSP can also do compression of the sound(CD quality sound is pretty BIG, 60 minutes of it almost fills up a 640 meg CD-Rom). ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 88 Sun Aug 09, 1992 J.KUDRON [Jim~ST Sysop] at 17:05 EDT Kene, But, did you see the pic of her "Ports"? Jim Kudron 9Aug92 ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 89 Sun Aug 09, 1992 T.EVANS21 [] at 17:49 EDT _ALL_ & Lee @ LEXICOR: Yeah, I 'blew' it... Still I think it would have been a great name!! It has marketability.. Falcon, Schmalcon.. I guess we're lucky they didn't name it the '080' or something dumb like that, eh?? <-:}Ted{:-> No, sorry I can't make the Glendale show, unless you need someone to carry your bags for you.. .. Are you comming to WAACE in October?? WAACE is only second to Glendale in size.. I'm sure you attend.. I'll shake your hand there.. <-:}Ted{:-> ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 90 Sun Aug 09, 1992 D.D.MARTIN [Swampy] at 18:02 EDT Geeez.. I thought the "Storm" was refering to the arena football team in Tampa!?! Anything's better than them Bucs! Hugs...Swampy ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 91 Sun Aug 09, 1992 SFRT-ASST [Kene @ SFRT] at 18:58 EDT You guys are terrible. But your answers sound like the fever dreams of 14 year olds... still. Considering the blind date with Falcon still hasn't happened. I'd wait until after I'd run Flash I for compatibility before I'd start looking for a pack of Winstons to look cool. Eh? Treat the Falcon with respect. Don't expect it to solve all your problems . And don't expect Jack to give you a huge dowry. You'll probably be much happier in the long run. Remember how hot and bothered you got about the older daughter named "TT". Remember how you expecter her to get a face lift and a new _tower_ chassis? Falcon looks good from the description. If there's software some of us die hard Atari people will still have a fun date. Who knows? Somebody may work up a retro-fit chassis with a detached keyboard. Somebody else may work up a hack to use internal modems. We may get the 4 or 386 card for it too. We won't know for sure until somebody officially announces it. ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 92 Sun Aug 09, 1992 C.OINES1 [Chazz] at 20:26 EDT Do all you Lexicore people spell "coming" with two "m"s? :) ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 93 Sun Aug 09, 1992 J.NESS [Jim] at 20:38 EDT Digital Signal Processing is done whenever you are working with both analog and digital signals. Digital, of course, is related to storage on disk drives, audio compact disks, etc. Analog is related to real life. Speakers and phones are designed for analog signals. A DSP is used to process digital info. Compress it, stretch it out, raise or lower its frequency, etc. And, there will be a D to A converter, and vice versa, to change audio to and from these digital signals, at the audio-in and audio-out jacks, on the Falcon. What is less clear to me is how the DSP will be used in video and other applications. -JN ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 95 Sun Aug 09, 1992 D.ENGEL [Thunderbird] at 21:06 EDT Kene: At least we can _get_ a date, instead of staying home on a Saturday night with windoze 3.1 >:-) I wouldn't make many women/computer comparisons if I were you, after all, you're using a computer which is old enough to be Ms. Falcon's grandmother, to which you'd have to spend thousands of dollars in plastic surgery to make her as sexy. touche' AT-VANTAGE: From what you say, then I can't wait to get a "storm"! By the way, were the last 5 years what we should refer to as "The calm before the Storm"????? (Remember _I_ said it first on 8/9/92) Oh, yes, thanks for the comments on my "handle". It goes back several years to my BBS handle, which came from my affection for the late-model car I own, as well as the classic '55-'57 T-Birds. I like the name, and have been writing software and such under it for several years now. _________________ \hunderbird P.S. My 'original' logo was really cool, but takes up 4 lines of text, so I reduced it so as not to annoy anyone. Here's a sample: > _________________ _ _ _ > /_/ / |/ |/ |/ . |/ > __/__/_ __ __/ _ _ / _ _ __/ > /_/ / /_/_/_/ /_(_/\_(/_//_/\/ /__//_(_/\__/ > See what I mean? I can hardly wait to get my hands on a Falcon with it's awesome graphics capabilities, so I can work with more than 16 colors at a time, or better resolution than ASCII!!! How much does a DSP board cost for the PC? ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 96 Sun Aug 09, 1992 XXTIMD at 21:27 EDT Well, you can get the Multi-sound for around 650-700 bucks. However, it also includes a Proteus/1 chipset with the CD quality DACs and DSP. You can get a Proaudio Spectrum 16, which has CD quality sound, but it does not have a DSP. While this doesn't really pose much of a problem , you need a pretty fast computer to do serious work. a DSP is good to have. This, coupled with a blitter chip, great looking graphics, and a '030 processor, makes the Falcon look like a very nice piece of equipment for a VERY nice price. I just hope Atari can deliver what it promised. ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 97 Sun Aug 09, 1992 LEXICOR [Lee] at 22:29 EDT About the DSP and SGI, come on over to our area and we will discuss it their...:-) ...and about the spelling of coming" you may have to re read the message and decide for your self if it is my exceptionally poor spelling or not....That is "coming.. &..Comming" AS to the DSP question IF I explain the graphics applicatio here now be for the NDA is lifted then Towns will insist I Kill you afere you read the message! ....think about some of our recient post about what we are doing...you should be able to work it out for your self. About: making fun of the Falcon...what makes you think any one is making fun of this computer? and be sure you unplug that toaster befor doing a break fluid check...if you don't you may be "shocked" by the results. And just as a point of interest....while the toaster is very popular and no slouch...the fact is that in many respects it is a dead end system, and as long as I can make ATARIs and SGIs pass graphics/video/code back and forth you have to allow for some very nervious amiga types. I know this will "Shock" you and is not really a Falcon specific remark...however...the cost of an Amiga system+ Toaster, 24Bit card, TBC and SFR you could buy a Silicongraphics work station with TBC/SFR and have cash in your pocket. On top of this You could buy 5 Falcons and the TBC/SFR and have a net- worked photo real craphics system, the only catch will be if the Vido out signal of the Falcon is commerical RS170. Even if it is not you could trade one falcon for a SCVT, which would solve that problem. Mostly it now depends on ATARI and where they are willing to provide the right hwd features. Lee ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 99 Mon Aug 10, 1992 LEXICOR [Lee] at 00:47 EDT R.M, What makes you think that it won't and who said the price is $700? Just courious :-) Lee ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 100 Mon Aug 10, 1992 SFRT-ASST [Kene @ SFRT] at 01:10 EDT I heard The Woz is working on a home automation system. Wouldn't it be nice if you could control the things in your house with a computer? Imagine, calling home and getting your Falcon to leave voice mail for your hubby. Or sending a fax from the office? How about faxing your pizza order to the local Dominos? How about using your Falcon to forward your calls (through voice mail) to your closest phone? Here's one I want. Call home from work and have the computer set my VCR. Or turn on ALL the lights in the house when I'm away on business. If there was a CD ROm you could have phone books on CD ROM. Imagine, your computer could do the walking. Hey, it could make a list of all the services you could call. It could automatically store phone numbers. All it takes in an interface standard. But in reality we'll have a few games. The DTP programs will fly. Somebody may make a hot MIDI and digital recording studio. I figure somebody will hack a tower case for it. And somebody will make a 386 board for it that will cost 85% of a full 486 system... It'll be fun. I'll wait to hear what they'll announce at Spring Comdex or Winter CES. ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 101 Mon Aug 10, 1992 S.WHITNEY [IAAD Member] at 01:40 EDT Forgive my ignorance, but could someone explain what a "codec" is? I have an electrical engineering degree so tech terms are okay. Thanks, Steve ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 102 Mon Aug 10, 1992 S.JOHNSON10 [Steve] at 01:55 EDT LEXICOR - Okay, I'm getting sick of it! Please say "coming" instead of "comming" from now on. LEXICOR2 - You too! Since the "Storm" ads are attributed to "The Storm" (at least it is in Atari Advantage), I'd just like to know who "The Storm" is. Is it Atari? Is it the the Atari Developer's Association? Who??? AT-VANTAGE - The what the hell is it? Don't magazines *HAVE* to disclose the real name of an advertiser? Is there a company called "The Storm" or is it an illegal front for someone else? J.RICHTER - Could be! I still hear rumors of up to 65,536 colors at up to 640x480 (and 256 colors at 800x600) and rumors that resolution is completely programmable up to 1024x1024 or even higher. We only have to wait 3 more days to find out for sure. I completely forgot about the COMDEX show in mid-November. How's this for a bit of conjecturing? Atari has mentioned a "late Fall" release for the Falcon 030 and mid-November falls into that time period. I'd have to say that Atari plans to release the Falcon 030 *AT* the COMDEX show. I guess we have to wait for Sam to say this on Wednesday, though. ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 103 Mon Aug 10, 1992 T.ZENTHOEFE1 [Tom Z.] at 07:26 EDT After reading the A.A. preview of the Falcon I got to thinking. Of the reported video modes of the Falcon, Which will be accessable with the current Atari ST monitors? ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 104 Mon Aug 10, 1992 D.FLORY [ALERTsys*Cop] at 10:26 EDT Kene, you can do all those things right now. The control of your lights was possible and I did it 5 years ago. Altho' the X-10 RT seems to have vanished, if everyone did their jobs right the home automation software they had should still be around here, I'd check the Radio and Electronics RT. I used their software for a while and then switched to Michtrons, controller controller software. Dave Flory, ALERTsys*Cop 06:49 PDT - 08/10/92 ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 105 Mon Aug 10, 1992 SFRT-ASST [Kene @ SFRT] at 12:06 EDT Thanks for the info, Dave. I don't care about the hardware or price. It'll be a $700 030 doorstop unless it has some kick-butt software that appeals to more than just a narror market segment. ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 106 Mon Aug 10, 1992 LEXICOR2 [Ringo] at 15:18 EDT Steve. Thanks for the correction. No more "comming" only "coming" is that better! Ringo ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 107 Mon Aug 10, 1992 J.NESS [Jim] at 16:23 EDT A while back, there was some discussion about the Falcon, and how much memory it can support. There was a question over whether it will be 14megs or 16megs. I've been forgetting to post a reply. The Falcon, as I understand it, was designed to be very ST compatible; much more so than the TT, for instance. The ST uses a 68000 processor, which can address up to 16megs of ram. For full compatibility, the Falcon should limit itself to the same "memory map." The MMU chip in the ST has always limited actual user ram to the first 4megs of this 16meg area. And, the upper 384k of the 16meg area has been used for hardware registers. For instance, the cartridge port, the DMA, shifter, RS232 and sound chips. Access to these devices is through memory mapped locations in the upper 384k. Since the ST did not allow users to add ram up into this area, there was never a problem. However, it looks as though the Falcon will allow expansion to 16meg. Going above this 16meg limit, as the TT does, will break some existing software. People like Fast Tech and Gadgets will probably do it anyway, as they have for the existing ST. If you expand the Falcon to 16megs, you are going to overrun the space reserved for hardware. In the Falcon, it may even be more than 384k. In any case, you may not end up with a true 16megs. I am guessing that this is where the 14meg comments came from. If my assumptions are correct, the upper 2meg of user memory would remain unconnected, so that there is no conflict with the hardware registers. I don't know snot about the Falcon, except what I have read in online magazines. The above is merely an educated guess. -JN ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 108 Mon Aug 10, 1992 S.JOHNSON10 [Steve] at 18:36 EDT FAIRWEATHER - The simplest way to describe a DSP (and no, it isn't trademarked by Sony) is to think of it as a math co-processor that runs like a bat out of hell. It's exactly what it says it is. It processes digital data, and *REALLY* fast. It can be used for any application that needs fast processing of digital data. For example: Digital sound sampling Digital audio effects (reverb, chorus, flange, pitch-shifting, etc.) Data compression/expansion Digital video processing Speech recognition Various imaging system applications Various analyzing applications and LOTS MORE!!! C.OINES1 - Do you spell "Lexicor" with an 'e' on the end? ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 109 Mon Aug 10, 1992 M.FARMER2 [Mark Farmer] at 19:18 EDT To: C.OINES1 [Chazz] I can't spell I thought it was "Cuming" for a long time :) ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 110 Mon Aug 10, 1992 SAM-RAPP [<>] at 19:30 EDT I may be ignorant here, but I shall ask anyway: If the DSP processes digital data, is there a built in way of doing the analog to digital conversion? If so, how many channels? What resolution? What sample rate? This monster sounds like it may have the possibility of becomming the ultimate in desktop test equipment!! I've always wanted a digital Oscilloscope/Meter/Freq.Counter/etc... Those PC type boards to do this stuff are quite expensive........ Also I would like to suggest that in the future this new machine not be referred to as a personal computer. I think Personal Workstation has a "more powerful" sound. Sam Rapp PS: A note to Brodie or Townsend.... Can we *-*-*PLEASE*-*-* see one of these at the WAACE show? Some of us (Chattanooga, TN) would have a difficult time explaining to our wives that buying a plane ticket to Glendale IS essential!!! ;> ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 111 Mon Aug 10, 1992 C.KLIMUSHYN [-Chuck-] at 19:46 EDT Kene, Who? Us being adolescent?? NEVER!! (can't wait to get next month's Atari Advantage centerfold spread of the Babe stripped down and naked without her case and shielding!!) -Chuck- ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 112 Mon Aug 10, 1992 D.FLORY [ALERTsys*Cop] at 20:44 EDT Is there anyone in the room who bought a 520ST in the first user group purchase, remember the 'kick-butt' software that was available. That Fig 4th and the Neochrome demos was really hot!!Then we got that really hot telecom program from Mark of the Unicorn..... Dave Flory, ALERTsys*Cop 17:28 PDT - 08/10/92 ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 113 Mon Aug 10, 1992 K.HOUSER [Kevin MQ Def] at 21:06 EDT Or maybe they named it Falcon in hope of breaking the ice in the *DRY* Atlanta market for Atari gear. The Atlanta football team is named "The Atlanta Falcons"... --Kevin Ehh, WHO *needs* Flash I with a machine like the "preliminary" "info" states. I want two of 'em for my studio NOW. Heheh.... ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 114 Mon Aug 10, 1992 C.CASSADAY [Chris C.] at 21:33 EDT I always thought that the "Storm" had something to do with the upcoming Lynx game - "The Gaurdians: Storm Over Doria." Just a thought. I am jealous of all you guys who have already read the Advantage article. I am still waiting for mine. To the hardware hackers: Is it feasible that a VME card could be made to incorporate the DSP and whatever other things neccesary to make the TT030 'up to par' with the Falcon? I understand that the VME bus in my TT is 16D/24A. What type of bus does the DSP have? Somehow or another, I seem to remember that someone said it had a 16 bit bus. Please fill me in. ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 115 Mon Aug 10, 1992 J.ALLEN27 [FAST TECH] at 22:56 EDT The standard STE architecture has 0-4xxxxx as ram, and Exxxxx as rom, and Fxxxxx as IO deviceland. Obvuously if you want to be STE compatible you'll need to leave Exxxxx and Fxxxxx the way they are. That leaves 14 Megs of space open to use, perhaps the Falcon uses them. Secret trick: A 3rd party memory board could include a hookup to the upper 8 address bits of the 030, use 4 4Meg SIMMs (16 Megabytes) and map the "extra" two megs into "TT ram" space, so the full 16Megs would be usable. Just a tidbit to get people thinking up neato things to do. ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 116 Mon Aug 10, 1992 AD-VANTAGE at 23:43 EDT Steve, A CODEC (CODer/DECoder) is a combo A/D and D/A with maybe some multiplexing in the same chip/system. -- Ron ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 117 Tue Aug 11, 1992 SFRT-ASST [Kene @ SFRT] at 00:15 EDT DAve.... DEcember 20th 1985: Megaoroids St-Talk .91 St-Writer First Word ST_Term by Jeremy "Jez" Sands (remember that name?) DB Master _One_ Database St-Basic And a couple months later I got DEGAS and Bratacus. I could have picked up NeoChrome but I had (and still have) a mono only system. At the time the directory listings were faster than the MAC, the screen didn't flicker like an Amiga, and it wasn't DOS. Oh man! I just found my third ST program. TYPESETTER ST... "Ultra High Resolution _PAGE LAYOUT_ __creatility__ for the 520 ST" --from XLEnt Software ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 118 Tue Aug 11, 1992 J.RICHTER [J.RICHTER] at 00:56 EDT Ken, Did you ever think that maybe Calamus SL and Pagestream might be "Kick But" properly modified to support the DSP and Math Chip??? and what about Calligrapher Pro... Not to mention what Lexicor is doing... sometimes we take things for granted until we los'em!! and don't expect class "A" software to come cheap ... on any piece of hardware... The Idea is to get 100,000 Falcons out there in the first six months... Once they take look at a couple of Lexicor and Calumus demo's with "more colors than the eye can see" Ya think maybe we'll be gettin' some new developers?.. If you look at what ATARI has integrated.. this is NO six month endeavor!! looks like a couple man years to me. Future Falcons could have 040's and 050's and DSP's at twice the speed of the current model... Looks like a well executed piece of hardware to me.. Now the question really is.. can the afford to manufacture the thing? will they have any money to Market IT?! these are the REAL scary questions... Jim Allen, Gee, what about you do'in something like the "40/40" add-on for the Falcon... you knows 68040 runnin' at 40MHZ... just dreaming.. but do you think something like this is even possible? givin the Falcon archetecture is what it is... here's hoping they sell 100,000 of the BIRDS so as to entice you!! Sam, I second the motion... from now on lets call this a "Personal Workstation" ... I wanna ... just once... stick my nose in the air and say the words... yeah, I know... but is it PW compatable? rembember.. PW .... PW.... PW.... I want my PW.... Wait a minute... I want some of the credit.. New name... boooo Falcon... how- about calling it the "Atari Personal Workstation"... name kind of answers many of the questions potential buyers might ask!! hmmmm... Does'nt it sound more professional to say .. have you seen the new Atari Personal Workstation? intead of.. have you seen the new Atari Falcon.. ya mean the hyped up 2600?.. no the...... Yeah... Atari PW030... "Atari will bring the Workstation to your living room".. hmmmm did I hear this somewhere recently? must be bedy bye time.... Jerry Richter ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 119 Tue Aug 11, 1992 R.MARTIN22 [NETWORK 23] at 01:04 EDT JIM: I downloaded that PI2 of her ports and I definitely have a question (read: screaming complaint) for Sam if that pic is indeed accurate. I sure hope that with all the Falcon's alleged audio capabilities, there are more out audio out ports than a single stereo mini headphone jack!!!! What a way to shoot yourself in the foot! LEE: No need to worry about NDA's. Just tell us about a hypothetical DSP in a hypothetical computer. Nudge, nudge, wink, wink. My TV station has NO graphics computer at all, and I'm really pushing for one. If the Falcon can get to the public with a "Paintbox" card/software and SFR, then I might be able to swing them towards it. Mind you, it would have to be 24bit AND have RGB outs. We're working with component vid. Live And Direct [11:28 PM-9/Aug/92], Rod Martin, Network 23/ST Connection ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 120 Tue Aug 11, 1992 S.JOHNSON10 [Steve] at 01:17 EDT LEXICOR2 - Ahhh! That's much better. Thanks! ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 121 Tue Aug 11, 1992 SFRT-ASST [Kene @ SFRT] at 01:20 EDT I have Calamus and SL. I even use them. I'm not good at it, but... hey, that's not the program's fault. DTP is a niche market. So is MIDI. So you've got to convince the rest of the world it's worth spending $1,200 on a $700 (yeah right) Falcon and a $500 software package rather than buy the b st the MAC or DOS world has to offer for that amount of money. We need killer softw are that appeals to more than just the niche markets. ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 124 Tue Aug 11, 1992 LEXICOR [Lee] at 02:58 EDT Rod Martin, you may rember a sceene from the "GOD FATHER" in which one player says to another in the restrant "I am going to speak to Tony in itialian..." and of cours all us non itialian speaking types knew nothing......of what was said.....Well Rod I am going to speak Mulitimedia now.".....it doesent matter at all what kind of signal the Falcon puts out...for professional use as you will want to use a scan converter on the VGA out anyway, from their it will got to somethink like a Panasonic AG7750 w/AGF700 TBC card. The output can then be direct back in to half inch with RS170 SIG or it cab be cross dubbed to AGR or JVC three Quarter inch. At this point you have master a and/or B reels which can be chroma A overlay or direct composit to one inch master head A and broacast. Now as it happens this is the system we are currently installing here, it can go on any atari, although we are installi ng it on our IRIS. The truth is that once any computer gets to and RGB or VGA out it can be used to create graphics for use in television. Right now the faverite cheep system is the Amiga The real test comes when you look at resolution, colors and speed at which it can produce the graphics you want to use and trans fer to Tape. The falcon and for that matter any basic VGA /ATARI can do the job when installed in to these kinds of systems. Now...I am going to speak regular again" ........get the point Lee ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 125 Tue Aug 11, 1992 J.RICE5 [Joe Rice] at 03:05 EDT Rod, I would think that for any pro audio applications one could use the DSP connector on the back. Hmmm, although that might require the use of an external A/D converter. At any rate, I hope someone makes an AES/EBU or S/PDIF digital audio interface for it. Joe ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 126 Tue Aug 11, 1992 CHERRY.FONTS [Todd] at 03:48 EDT Jez San wrote ST-Term? I remember using his TinyTerm program which was amazing. It had 'capture to disk', a dialer, and Xmodem CRC up and download and still came in under 5k. ..Todd ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 127 Tue Aug 11, 1992 S.ZIEGLER4 [Shane] at 07:08 EDT Well, I am new in here and I was wondering if somebody could answer some questions for me.... Will the Falcon only have slow ST RAM? Can the DSP chip used to do other thing than sound, like 3D video object calculations, or general video stuff, or maybe fast compression? thanks ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 128 Tue Aug 11, 1992 C.OINES1 [Chazz] at 07:57 EDT M.Farmer: Yeah, but I don't want to read about _that_ in a computer magazine ;) ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 129 Tue Aug 11, 1992 J.THOMAS12 [JT] at 08:05 EDT With all the talk of "the Storm is coming", why not run an ad stating just that- black background and the words "The Storm is coming" in ANY computer magazine. I wouldn't think taht would cost much money, would it? ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 130 Tue Aug 11, 1992 M.FARMER2 [Mark Farmer] at 10:38 EDT To: Who Ever I seen a "Eagle" the other day maybe that would be a good idea for the "New Atari Tower Unit". ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 131 Tue Aug 11, 1992 SFRT-ASST [Kene @ SFRT] at 13:08 EDT I think there are _two_ ST-Terms. One came out when the ST did. It had no download capabilities. There's a VERY cool program called ST-Term that Jez San didn't write. Jez also wrote Starglider, if I remember correctly. ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 132 Tue Aug 11, 1992 T.EVANS21 [] at 18:13 EDT I hope that Sam's on-line conference is a whole lot better than Leonard's was.. Leonard was a real dud, & IMHO, just a waste of on-line $$.. This time I'll wait until they summarize it and put it, (the conference) up in the lib.. <-:}Ted{:-> ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 136 Tue Aug 11, 1992 FIFTHCRUSADE at 21:38 EDT Kene, All markets are niche markets. The most important market for the Falcon is the GAME market. Games sell computers. Lets face it, no one is going to buy the Falcon to run accounting software or any business-only software. That leaves to home market and specialized uses (MIDI, DTP, Video, etc.). The home market consists, as far as I can tell, of 3 segments: Business-at-home, Software for educational use, and Games. The first one is mostly lost. The second is up-for-grabs. Atari's best chance is to sell their computers as fine computers with great games. Oh, I forgot hobbyists, Atari has those. Shane, I hear things like real-time raytracing from the demo people. I would assume you could add real-time texture mapping and real-time luminosity mapping as well. Sounds like the DSP chip will work for most simple operations requiring a high rate of data flow. I hear the Motorola demos for the chip included a software 9600 baud modem, and a 32 band graphic equalizer. Ben White 5th Crusade Software ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 137 Tue Aug 11, 1992 SFRT-ASST [Kene @ SFRT] at 21:46 EDT I'm for games too. Even though I can play the things. Or go to a specific niche. How about repackaging it in a case _with_ a monitor and a scanner and fax modem. Instant telecommuniation work station with voice mail... ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 138 Tue Aug 11, 1992 REALM [Joey] at 21:53 EDT I just read 130 messages.. dah ba dah ba dah ba... Ouch my brain hurts.:-) Gosh, I only looked a month back... Personally, for the rumored prices and specs, I think it's well worth the money. 32mhz would come in real handy doing your checkbook.:-) I think theres a point where overkill comes to my mind when your shooting for the home market. I think this things hit the point where it's well rounded and just about perfect for anything a normal human being would want to do. Having great specs are nice but there comes a point where there useless to the market your selling too. It's gonna be tough enough using 400K resolutions within 14megs of memory. Now all Atari needs to do is drop the TT and Mega STe. The Falcon itself is going to be directly competing with the Mega STe. One of them has to be dropped in price or eliminated. The TT is still better suited for some aplications but it to is going to be hurting from the Falcon. They seriously need a big brother unit in the TT price range which includes a couple VME slots, 32Mhz CPU with Math Co-Processor and a TT High with 1024x768 or 1280x960 in 16 color mode. I have a TT and use to have a Mega STe, by the way. I think it's more credible for somebody with a TT to say "drop them and get on with the show!".:- ) ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 139 Tue Aug 11, 1992 R.WATSON15 [Wayne Watson] at 22:23 EDT I just got finished reading the Advantage article and all I can say is WOW!!! What has been said here online doesn't touch what was said in the article. Atari, I am impressed. Sounds like you have a winner here. I just hope you can market this thing. I may be willing to put up with the 1040 case again just to fly one of these birds. I hope the Mega version will be as reasonable in preice as the entry level. It sounds AWESOME!!! What monitor would be a good one to use on the Falcon? Would it be able to support ALL of the rumored video modes? ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 140 Tue Aug 11, 1992 XXTIMD at 22:45 EDT Saying that the Falcon is a game machine is somewhat speculation. With CD quality sound and a DSP to handle it, good graphics, and a blitter chip, and resonably fast CPU, it would make a good game machine. However, the Amiga would have made a good business machine back in '86.owver, PCs were already entrenched in the business world, that it had little chance to break that hold. In todays world, the software makes the machine, not th e hardware. ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 141 Tue Aug 11, 1992 LEXICOR2 [Ringo] at 23:09 EDT Joey, I would also like the larger resolutions but with more than 16 colors. Ringo ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 142 Tue Aug 11, 1992 R.MARTIN22 [NETWORK 23] at 23:17 EDT JERRY: You hit the nail on the head. It doesn't matter how they get the money, but Atari MUST market the Falcon like there's no tommorow. Without marketing there's no purchases. Without purchases there's no mass of Falcon users. Without a mass of users, there's no more developers other than (maybe) those already developing for Atari (and they're dropping like flies). If Sam is only interested in selling the Falcon to the existing user base, the Falcon is doomed. If they cannot produce enough machines to satisfy the public, the Falcon is doomed. If they don't market and build a DECENT user base, the Falcon is doomed. It's not a question of market or manufacture. Somehow, somewhere, Atari MUST find the money to do both. It's now or never, Sam! HEAR US, SAM. THINGS HAVE TO CHANGE, AND CHANGE NOW!!! Live And Direct [12:59 AM-11/Aug/92], Rod Martin, Network 23/ST Connection ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 143 Tue Aug 11, 1992 C.KLIMUSHYN [-Chuck-] at 23:18 EDT ATARI PERSONAL WORKSTATION-THE PW, I love it!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Nice idea JR and Sam!!!!!!!!!!!!! -Chuck- ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 144 Tue Aug 11, 1992 J.RICHTER [J.RICHTER] at 23:48 EDT Niche...?? Everyone I'm working with is playing ... doing and talking about some form of DTP... I mean the perfect word processor is the ultimate DTP and visa versa.... the only whole right now is a MS EXCEL spreadsheet.. hey.. Sam and Jack, a little kissy..kissy and a few bucks might buy you what Steven Jobs could never get (I wonder why!) from MS!! ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 145 Wed Aug 12, 1992 FAIRWEATHER [David] at 00:17 EDT I agree that the name "Falcon" seems less than worthy of this computer. Atari Personal WorkSTation is nicer, with the indicated emphasis on ST. It is, after all backwards compatible and a direct descendant of the ST line. ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 147 Wed Aug 12, 1992 B.KING8 [Brien King] at 00:57 EDT Joey - I agree... quit wasting money on the TT, put the money on the Falcon. (I Own a TT). Brien King ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 148 Wed Aug 12, 1992 S.JOHNSON10 [Steve] at 01:00 EDT SAM-RAPP - The Falcon has a built-in stereo 16-bit A/D converter. R.MARTIN22 - What's wrong with a single stereo output? What do you want? Did you expect 8 seperate audio outputs or something? I was just thinking about something concerning the Falcon 030's graphics... At the CeBIT demo of the machine, some of the people who saw it and said anything about it said that the graphics were "near photo quality" or words to that effect. 320x200x32768 and 640x480x256 are nowhere near being that quality, so perhaps it *DOES* have even better graphics than reported by AA. Either that or the people who said they saw "near photo quality" graphics at the CeBIT show are legally blind. Up to 640x480x256 is fine, really (i.e. I don't really need more than that personally, for now), but that's been the standard on clones for the past few years and now they're moving up to 1024x768x256 and 640x480x32768/65536. Agreed, nearly all clone games and graphics applications have only supported 320x200x256 and 640x480x256, but I'd expect support for the higher resolutions to increase within the next few years since those are pretty much the absolute minimum of what most new standard clone systems are capable of. In that respect, the Falcon 030's specs (according to AA) won't quite match up with the competition in the near future. ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 149 Wed Aug 12, 1992 XXTIMD at 01:10 EDT I thought that the Falcon had 16bit color(65,000+ colors)? At least that what the previous messages said. 65,000 colorse is good enough for pretty much for all but professional work(16.7 million colors or 24bit color is prefered). I think the Falcons colors are good enough. Also, having 16 colors at high resolutions isn't that bad considering many buisness applications don't even use that many. The Falcon looks like a good well-rounded machine. Atari just needs to market it right. ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 150 Wed Aug 12, 1992 SFRT-ASST [Kene @ SFRT] at 01:33 EDT Yes, DTP is a niche. Unless, DTP raises the level we expect in typewritten letters. If that happens it better be as easy to work as an electronic typewriter, I guess document processors are the next wave. Okay, bundle the Falcon with Calligrapher or the other document processors. That way the user doesn't have to wait for FSMGDOS. Bundle it with a 386 so the person buying it doesn't say "I better get a 386 clone so I can do my work at home." ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 151 Wed Aug 12, 1992 LEXICOR2 [Ringo] at 01:57 EDT Steve, I think Lee had something to do with the Graphics. He created a large number of them. The graphics will also be included in the new "PHOTOREAL! - Lexicor software magazine". We have the Leonardo 24bit graphics version of images printed in full color. Ringo ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 154 Wed Aug 12, 1992 J.ALLEN27 [FAST TECH] at 09:54 EDT Unless you placed a 24bit setup next to the Falcon and studied the two REAL HARD you'd be hard pressed to tell the difference between 32000 colors and 16,000,000 colors. 32000 is just fine, and the difference in the HW required mandates the limitation...remember, even the cheapest Mac 24bit cards cost MORE than the whole Falcon is rumored to cost. Try and keep one foot in reality. ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 155 Wed Aug 12, 1992 DENNYA [Denny Atkin] at 10:48 EDT Jim, Yeah, but the Mac isn't the competition--the PC is. And PC 24-bit cards are now under $200 for non-accelerated (read: VERY slow) cards. ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 156 Wed Aug 12, 1992 JEFF.W [ST Sysop] at 18:24 EDT Calling the Falcon a "personal workstation" would be a marketing disaster, in my humble opinion. In the consumer market, too many people are still afraid of the word "computer". Throw something with the high tech sound of "workstation" at them and a great number would say "I don't need a workstation, whatever that is. I just want a computer." Don't worry about what would sound prestigious and important. Worry about what will sell this thing to current computer users _and_ (very important) new computer users. ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 157 Wed Aug 12, 1992 T.EVANS21 [] at 18:43 EDT _ALL_ IMHO.. 'Stick a fork in the TT, it's done'!! "IT" still hasn't passed FCC. So how can the market it?? I think what we'll see is a 'Falcon', plain & simple.. (1040 case). A 'Mega Falcon', detachable keyboard, & cake box case.. And an upscale 'TT Falcon', tower case, more ram, TT ram, etc, and business oriented???? <-:}Ted{:-> ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 158 Wed Aug 12, 1992 R.MARTIN22 [NETWORK 23] at 19:20 EDT LEE: Thanks for the explanation. It was a bit over my head, but I think I get the gist. JOE: I was not aware that the DSP port on the back was an in/out port. All I got from the PI2 was that it was only an in. My mistake. I'll have to think of another question now. Live And Direct [11:26 PM-11/Aug/92], Rod Martin, Network 23/ST Connection ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 159 Wed Aug 12, 1992 SLP at 19:34 EDT Let's see. Say the Falcon has 32768 colors at 320 x 200. Since at that resolution there are only 64,000 pixels on the screen, it wouldn't make too much sense to have over 64,000 colors to show. 2 pixels per color doesn't sound too bad. The more important part is how many colors those 32,768 choices come from. What is a standard television (US) signal in pixels? Scott ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 161 Wed Aug 12, 1992 R.MARTIN22 [NETWORK 23] at 21:27 EDT STEVE: I want 2 quality RCA output jacks. Show me ANY high-quality stereo system with a single stereo mini headphone jack driving the speakers and I'll shut up. I can't believe you can get high quality sound from an output like that, and with the sample rates possible with a DSP, I think they're necessary. Live And Direct [6:38 PM-12/Aug/92], Rod Martin, Network 23/ST Connection ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 165 Thu Aug 13, 1992 S.JOHNSON10 [Steve] at 01:05 EDT SAM-RAPP - One problem is that Leary is a Mac man. Yes, he's alive. A friend of mine did a documentary on cryogenics (called "ON ICE") a few years ago and interviewed him on the subject (Leary is an advocate of cryogenics, not all that surprisingly ). Well, after the RTC, I'm still worried that we're in for RAM rip-off city. I'm also still concerned about all the marketing/distribution factors since Sam wasn't willing to go into that. I *AM*, however, more impressed with the graphics capabilities now. ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 166 Thu Aug 13, 1992 G.E.M. [Gary] at 01:06 EDT Television is VERY LOW RESOLUTION, approximately 320x200 viewable but with an infinite number of colors in its palette. ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 167 Thu Aug 13, 1992 T.MCCOMB [=Tom=] at 01:31 EDT No doubt about it, the Falcon 030 is a dynamite machine! but if Atari doesn't get on every rooftop (and TV/Magazine) and yell about it, no one will ever know about. I was concerned about his reply that 'there will be advertising in the US when software appears for it'. Umm, right. What's that Six motnhs/ 8 Months? a year later?? What they need to do is fill a Wharehouse with them and then launch a 10-20 million $ Ad campaign (print/TV) that features an 800 number people can call to locate the nearest Dealer/or order direct from Atari(at list price). sniff, sniff, no MultiTOS for the masses. Then again I do have a Tiny Turbo on order, so maybe the TT kit will....??? -Tom McComb {1:27 am} Thursday, August 13, 1992 =>Do not reprint in ST Report<= ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 168 Thu Aug 13, 1992 LEXICOR [Lee] at 02:14 EDT Jim Allen, Shame shame shame on you! you know better than that. There is a "vast difference" between 32 thousand colors and 16 million colors. "Yaha...15,964,000" I don't want to here it. the plain fact is that comparing 32K color and 16M colors to the basic perecption of the user depends on What you show in the way of images. When you start displaying large smooth transistions you will see "color Tarrising" right away, this is completely unacceptable for any kind of work. When you are showing a wide verity of mixed colors,like a bush or forest sceenes than this effect does not rear its ugly head. The same holds true for scanning, when you have a fairly complex mix of colors you wont notice untill you try color matcheing, How ever with large areas of blended colors like cartoon images with shadows, you will again see the color terrising. 15 Bit is a giant step up from ST and TT color, but it is simply not ever a substitue fro 24 BIT color. I don't mean to jump on you so hard but I have been working with this for that last few months and what I observer is just a fact. Lee :-) ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 169 Thu Aug 13, 1992 R.MARTIN22 [NETWORK 23] at 02:25 EDT SLP: Your observation is illogical. The number of available pixels has nothing to do with the need or lack thereof for more colors than there are pixels. The only time your argument would be valid is if you were wanting to display ALL 64,000 colors on the screen at the same time. In the real world, the more colors the better. When you have enough colors to make transitions from one color to the next invisible, that's when you have enough colors. It is generally agreed upon that 16 million colors is enough to accurately display real-life and created images. If you get too far below that, colors begin to look false and gradients start "banding." Live And Direct [8:49 PM-12/Aug/92], Rod Martin, Network 23/ST Connection ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 170 Thu Aug 13, 1992 REALM [Joey] at 05:23 EDT Heres some useless facts about the eye, sense thats where all this color is headed. In 1 Second the eye sends 1 billion messages to the brain (it has a 1 BIP, I/O port).:-) Your eye can sense about ten million gradations of light and seven million shades of color. Whats that mean as far as 24bit color? I can only see 12 bits at a time if I turn my brightness button up and down.:-) Opps... yeah, that Falcon sounds great... ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 172 Thu Aug 13, 1992 S.WHITNEY [IAAD Member] at 05:57 EDT Thanks for the definition of CODEC, Ron. --Steve ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 173 Thu Aug 13, 1992 C.HOWER [Phoenix] at 06:06 EDT I am assuming you have all seen the forbes article by now, they suggested a $40 million dollar ad compaign. Atari? Try a $40 ad campaign. I hope that by some slim chance, atari will really push the Falcon and STBook as the powerful machines they are. Id like to see atari stick around. Tell The tremiels YOU want ACTION. ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 174 Thu Aug 13, 1992 R.WATSON15 [Wayne Watson] at 06:49 EDT A plug is a plug. The RCA jacks and the mini jack both carry the signal. The only difference is that you have 2 seperate plugs to do what is being done with 1 plug. It saves money and takes less room to do it. ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 175 Thu Aug 13, 1992 C.OINES1 [Chazz] at 07:25 EDT And you can use those nifty little CD Speakers without buying two adapters (in my case, a stereo gender changer and a stereo plug to 2 RFs) to hook the mess together. ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 176 Thu Aug 13, 1992 ISD [Nathan] at 08:20 EDT For those of you that missed it, the conference went quite well last night. While Sam didn't answer all the questions "saving something for Duesseldorf" he did come up with the RIGHT answers to a few excellent ones. I imagine that later today the transcript will be in the library. I'd say READ IT! :-) One area that was not addressed was that of North American marketing and advertising considerations. Instead, Sam stuck to the facts about the new computer, what it can do etc.. ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 177 Thu Aug 13, 1992 M.FARMER2 [Mark Farmer] at 09:33 EDT To: T.MCCOMB [=Tom=] What do you mean No MultiTOS? did I miss something? that was one of the only reasons I was going to wait for the falcon. ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 178 Thu Aug 13, 1992 SANDY.W [sysop] at 10:56 EDT The conference is available. #25262. ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 179 Thu Aug 13, 1992 JEFF.W [ST Sysop] at 13:16 EDT As Sandy pointed out, the transcript is in the library now. It is FALCONCO.LZH (file #25262) in Library #13. It looks like we'll be having a follow-up conference with Atari (this time with Bill Rehbock) after the Duesseldorf launch on some of the more technical aspects of the Falcon. Right now, we're looking at September 9th as the date. I'll post more details once we get a few more details worked out. - Jeff Williams ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 180 Thu Aug 13, 1992 LEXICOR2 [Ringo] at 13:28 EDT Mark. Read the Conference file. YES to MultiTOS for Falcons and TTs. Ringo ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 181 Thu Aug 13, 1992 LEXICOR2 [Ringo] at 13:34 EDT Jeff, That is going to be another great conference for all of us. Ringo ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 182 Thu Aug 13, 1992 CHERRY.FONTS [Todd] at 17:17 EDT Joey, What the eye can depict and what the brain interprets are two radically different things. Thank God we have a built-in smoothing mechanism that helps us make sense of all that data. Can you imagine looking at 4 colour print jobs and seeing all the dots instead of an image? Mind you, it'd sure be easy to tell if the registration was off. :-) It's the industry colour prepress experts that have determined that 24 bit is "enough". I'll go along with that, and agree that anything less isn't enough. This is for quality process colour previewing work though. I'll give Lee the benefit of the doubt that it holds true for MultiMedia as well (which I know peanuts about.) Regarding the stereo mini plug; I don't see it as being a big deal and I'm a recording engineer by profession. In the studio you wouldn't see very many RCA jacks either. We almost always use 1/4" plugs or XLR's where the signal is balanced. Mini plugs can tend to be a little flakey though since the contact surface is so small. They might crackle a bit which can really ruin your day if you're working on something important. But the actual sound quality will be more affected by the A/D converters, the analog circuitry, and the filters they use. In the studio, we spend thousands of dollars just to buy Apogee filters and A/D's. As an aside, I wonder what output level they're using? -10dBv I'll assume which is the consumer (non-commercial) standard. Which is also no big deal I suppose. If Atari do decide to brown-nose DigiDesign into porting ProTools (unlikely) then we'd be using the digital (DMA) in-outs. As someone else mentioned, AES/EBU or S/PDIF would'a been nice. ..Todd ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 184 Thu Aug 13, 1992 M.HEMBRUCH [Mattias] at 19:35 EDT There are TWO things that REALLY bugged me about the RTC last night (and I have seen the same sentiments on Usenet). 1) Sam said "If you want higher resolutions, but a TT". Oh, SURE... Invest in older technology, NO DSP, NO 8 audio channels, NO built in SCSI-2, NO IDE interface, NO 32k color mode, on and on and on.. 2) Basically all he did was upload the correct/updated version of the Atari Advantage stats, say "Maybe some in mid-October - sizeable quantities later", and then continously say "I can't talk about that, sorry, we aren't releasing that yet, no I can't tell you about xyz".. The 1/2 hour he was late was MUCH MORE FUN and WORTH the money.. The 1.5 hours after weren't worth more than 15 minutes of online time.. WHY bother calling a conference? He could have just u/led the 'official' specs. I WAS hoping to stick with Atari and maybe get a GCR.. The power:price ratio IS still the best, but the functionality is NOT what I want.. I think I'm gonna have to overpay for a Mac (I need 'a' Mac system for a contract I have) It was nicer hoping :-( (Maybe I'm just in a pessimistic mood). Mattias ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 185 Thu Aug 13, 1992 R.WATSON15 [Wayne Watson] at 20:01 EDT Well, I will try this again. What monitor would I need to run the Falcon in all the resolutions and what resolutions would the Atari SC1224 monitor be able to handle? ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 186 Thu Aug 13, 1992 J.LEBLANC3 [Jeff] at 20:40 EDT Chuck, Awhile back, when the MSTe and the TT were release, there was much discussion about offering these machines w/o the drive installed so that users with the knowledge/expertise/inclination could install there own hard drive. IMHO, this same option is being offered on the Falcon. ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 187 Thu Aug 13, 1992 R.MARTIN22 [NETWORK 23] at 21:24 EDT In reality, televison does not have a horizontal resolution. NTSC has 525 lines of resolution, but no number for horizontal resolution. The electron beam travels along the horizontal lines, laying down the color information without a set "start a single color here...stop here...start the next color...etc." Live And Direct [8:21 PM-13/Aug/92], Rod Martin, Network 23/ST Connection ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 188 Thu Aug 13, 1992 J.RICHTER [J.RICHTER] at 21:40 EDT Atari Advantage is calling it "15 bit" hence the 32,768!!... I have seen 32k colors on a PC makes Amiga look bad but 16bit at 640x480 would be nice... lets face it.. wev'e been lookin' at 640x200x4 colors so long 640x480x256 will seem AWSOME! by the way.. those cheap 32K cards for the PC are not capable of any animation!! its kinda like the Spectrum512 on the ST... If you truly can animate with 32K colors... well AWSOME games are a comin' ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 190 Thu Aug 13, 1992 J.RICHTER [J.RICHTER] at 21:44 EDT Atari Advantage is calling it "15 bit" hence the 32,768!!... I have seen 32k colors on a PC makes Amiga look bad but 16bit at 640x480 would be nice... lets face it.. wev'e been lookin' at 640x200x4 colors so long 640x480x256 will seem AWSOME! by the way.. those cheap 32K cards for the PC are not capable of any animation!! its kinda like the Spectrum512 on the ST... If you truly can animate with 32K colors... well AWSOME games are a comin' ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 192 Thu Aug 13, 1992 XXTIMD at 22:17 EDT Making games with 32k colors is impratical. Do you know how much data 32k pictures would take? a 16bit Targa file at 640x400 takes around 500k of space. You can definetly tell the diffrence from a 256 color picture and a 32k, but 256 colors does make a suprisingly good picture. Maybe a game will use the DSP for compression/decompression of the HUGE amount of data a 32k game would take, but it would have to be on the fly. ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 193 Thu Aug 13, 1992 LEXICOR [Lee] at 22:49 EDT J>R You are mistaken about animating Spectrum 512. There are some very good spectrum animations around and they are very impressive. The question of howmany colors is enough is really quite realitive in several ways. Most importantly one must consider "how" you wish to use the colors first. The next consideration is which colors you want to use and how they are to be generated. WE will be covering this whole question in Ringos news letter. get one and discover the fantastic world of "TRUE" color. Lee ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 194 Fri Aug 14, 1992 SFRT-ASST [Kene @ SFRT] at 00:26 EDT Whoa! NTSC doesn't have 525 lines of resolution. It has 525 _scan_ lines. ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 195 Fri Aug 14, 1992 M.POCHE [Mick] at 00:41 EDT I know what you mean Chazz. It would eliminate quite a bit of the spiders-web of wires I have now if I could just plug my little Sony speakers directly into the MegaSTE. The mini plug on the Falcon is no problem. If I should need RCA jacks, Radio Shack (shouldn't they think about a name change one of these days? Kind'a low-tech for the 90's) has adaptors for anything you should need. MHO on the resolution/colors "debate" is that for us folks who have been living with the limits of the ST's res/colors, the Falcon will be a dream come true. I believe, for the average user, who doesn't plan on doing any "true color" animations or rendering, 256 colors would be quite satisfactory. Most people will be satisfied that they will _finally_ get to see most of their GIF files in all 256 colors without resorting to some sort of hack (i.e. Spectrum 512). Also, I don't know if it's possible, but someone may find a way to push the colors past the hardware "limits" through the same type of trickery Spectrum uses. I'm not knocking Spectrum by the way. I still think it can give incredible results which would otherwise be impossible on my STE. And finally a compatibility question: I wonder if Falcon (the F-16 fighter simulation) will run on the Falcon (the "more compatible than the TT" super- computer)? I have a MSTE, and miss that program! ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 196 Fri Aug 14, 1992 E.KRIMEN [Ed Krimen] at 01:06 EDT >M.HEMBRUCH [Mattias] at 19:35 EDT > >1) Sam said "If you want higher resolutions, but a TT". Oh, SURE... >Invest in older technology, NO DSP, NO 8 audio channels, NO built in >SCSI-2, NO IDE interface, NO 32k color mode, on and on and on.. :^) I just bought a TT. Why? Because I knew EXACTLY what was going to happen with the Falcon, and it did. I needed more RAM and a faster CPU now. I couldn't wait for the Falcon. Again, an Atari computer, the Falcon in this example, blows the doors off everything else in or within about, oh, would you say a few thousand dollars in its price range? It's one hot computer, but it's not going to mature for several months at least. I'm really not excited about it at this point. I need to see software. All I see now is a lot of numbers for an STE on steroids. I expect to see some good Falcon software at Glendale though. Let's hope. It needs software -- damned good software. Atari's smart in getting developers working on stuff early, and from rumors, getting production running ahead of time. We know how fast the industry moves. But it's going to be several months until things really get rolling with the Falcon. Sam even alluded to this. He said some machines will be available in October, with more ready next year. I'm really worried about Atari's marketing plans. How are they going to push this bird in the marketplace? The other thing that bothered me was his remarks in response to the Forbes article. This article portrayed at least the best impression that Atari has in the industry (i.e. there IS an Atari Corp.), and he laughs at it. I would expect him to be concerned about what everyone is reading about the company he runs. If it was my company in that article, I'd be pretty damned pissed. I sure hope he's laughing because he knows something's in store for the Falcon. I hope it's not the same thing he's been doing for the last eight years. If his remarks about the Forbes article were just filler because they didn't know what else to say, that's pretty bad. I would hope Sam and Bob could think of something else. >2) Basically all he did was upload the correct/updated version of the >Atari Advantage stats, say "Maybe some in mid-October - sizeable >quantities later", and then continously say "I can't talk about that, >sorry, we aren't releasing that yet, no I can't tell you about xyz".. >The 1/2 hour he was late was MUCH MORE FUN and WORTH the money.. The >1.5 hours after weren't worth more than 15 minutes of online time.. >WHY bother calling a conference? He could have just u/led the >'official' specs. That first half hour was pretty fun, huh? :^) I enjoyed it too. I thought the conference was good. Not because of the information conveyed -- because there really wasn't any about the Falcon that we didn't know beforehand -- but because Sam and Atari chose to take time to participate with us on GEnie and share some information about the new computer. As I understand it, that was their first public discussion of the computer anywhere. (This message may not be reproduced in any magazine without my permission. Who'd want to anyway? :^) ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 197 Fri Aug 14, 1992 R.MARTIN22 [NETWORK 23] at 01:23 EDT Can someone please take the AA press release and update it with Sam's specs? I'd really like to see them all in one place, NIcely formatted. Live And Direct [10:12 PM-13/Aug/92], Rod Martin, Network 23/ST Connection ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 198 Fri Aug 14, 1992 FAIRWEATHER [David] at 01:31 EDT The most disappointing Falcon revelation for me was that it won't take SIMMS or even let you pop in DRAMS - you have to buy a memory board from Atari. That means I won't be able to cannibalize any of my other computers' ram chips and plug them into my 1-meg Falcon. It also means I can forget about the rumoured $700 price tag. If a $700 machine is released it will surely be a 1 meg model on which Multi-Tos is next to useless. 4 megs is the minimum I'd be able to live with. I wonder how much that model will cost, $1000? ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 199 Fri Aug 14, 1992 S.JOHNSON10 [Steve] at 02:02 EDT XXTIMD - Sam Tramiel confirmed that the Falcon 030 *DOES* have a 16 bit (65,536 color) mode that works up to 320x480 in non-interlaced and even up to 640x480 interlaced. I think it's the 'overlay mode' that drops it down to 15 bit (32,768). Okay... John, Bill, others at Atari, developers... What are *ALL* the graphics mode specs, including all possible resolutions and bit depths for each (and which are interlaced and which aren't in 16 bit mode)? So far, we have: 320x200x65,536 colors (well, 64,000 colors) 320x480x65,536 colors 640x480x256 colors 640x480x65,536 colors (interlaced) Now, I suppose the standard STe modes are there (320x200, 640x200, and 640x400) and all will allow up to at least 256 colors. Please clarify all of this for us, now that the cat's out of the bag (or the bird, anyway ). Is there an 'official' Falcon 030 spec sheet that could be reposted here? I still don't like Atari touting the 16 bit graphics mode as "True Color" as I think it's *VERY* misleading. R.MARTIN22 - I think I may have mislabelled the DSP port in that Degas pic as being a "Digital Signal Processor input" or something like that. I guess I should've labelled it "DSP I/O" or somesuch. Incidentally, it's a .PI1 file and not a .PI2 file. Okay, I'll agree that I would've preferred stereo RCA phono jacks (at least for outputs) than the stero mini-jack. However, in reality they're both pretty much equal. Besides, the stereo mini-jack isn't supposed to be driving speakers. It's there to provide both a stereo output and a headphone output (so I guess there's a headphone amp inside as well). If there's a headphone amp, that would also allow users to hook up the less expensive, non-powered mini-speakers. The only thing I'm worried about is that these outputs will be as noisy as the STe/TT 8 bit DMA stereo outputs. Everyone! Can we *PLEASE* take the non-Falcon talk elsewhere??? G.E.M. - NTSC is actually around 700x525, but VHS is only about 335x250. SVHS is around 600x450 and a lot of new TV sets have special SVHS inputs on them (and the Super Nintendo even has a SVHS output). NOTE: The above vertical resolutions are approximations assuming a 4:3 aspect ratio. And yes, since TV signals are analog, they have a more or less infinite palette. I've started a Falcon 030 topic in category 14 now that Sam made it official. However, rumors and speculation on future Falcon machines should stay here. ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 200 Fri Aug 14, 1992 SAM-RAPP [<>] at 02:25 EDT I am certainly not a professional programmer, but it seems to me that the data would get very cumbersome if the graphics in a game went above the 640x480x256 level. Not to mention hard on the hard disk and nearly impossible on a floppy drive. (307K per screen at 640x480x256) I don't see the Falcon Personal Workstation aimed at the High End DTP markets, thats the TT030's job. It seems perfect for the home user. More power than the clones, but more importantly, the power of transparency. Example: "I don't know HOW it does it and I don't care... It just does what I want it to do. It's so easy!" As to the software: Sam said in the conference that it is much more compatable than the STe line. If that is true, then all Atari would have to do is convince some of the old developers to come back and upgrade thier current software. It could be an easy way for developers to recycle old games and applications into a new market. I sure would like Tom Hudson back with an updated CAD 3D/StereoTek package for the falcon.... Enought for now.......It's 2AM ! Sam ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 201 Fri Aug 14, 1992 SFRT-ASST [Kene @ SFRT] at 02:38 EDT What _exactly_ do you mean by NTSC "lines of resolution?" ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 203 Fri Aug 14, 1992 REALM [Joey] at 03:38 EDT Todd, If we could see that closely we'd just use smaller dots.:-) Bedsides, I was just giving you guys a hard time for the fun of it.:-) Mattias, I don't think you'll find a MAC with those specs in the rumored price range.:-) I can understand you being upset over the TT answer. However, depending on what you need a TT, VME card may be better suited. I've seen a couple cards that will do 1280x960x256 with a 16m color pallete. Of coarse that'll stick you up in the MAC price range. From what I've heard adding higher resolutions to the Falcon through it's internal ports may be possible. Good point Ed! Buy what you want, use it NOW while your till alive. Congrates on the TT, by the way! I also support your point about keeping the system specs relative to the price. Lets not forgot the rumored price range. Now if it turns out to be $3000 then you all have my permission to complain.:- ) But relatively speaking the system is worth at least $1500. Which it'll probable hit $1200 by time you get everything you want. I still think it's a decent value at that range. Speaking from personal experience, before Atari does anything with marketing the Falcon they need to get their internal structure straightened out. The service department is fairly sad, along with delivering the product in quanity and keeping their dealers up on the current status of things. This is a lot more important then running ads during Doogie Hoser. Currently they're better at making enemies then money. Marketing Wizards at alienating and offending users with their lack of interest and support in the system after it leaves the door. I don't care if they do spend $40 advertise but supporting your customers is not the place to save money. ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 204 Fri Aug 14, 1992 S.JOHNSON10 [Steve] at 04:44 EDT LEXICOR - Are you only working on 15 bit color Falcon software or will it also work with 16 bit color? C.HOWER - The Forbes article didn't say a $40 million ad campaign for the Falcon. It said Atari needed about $40 million to successfully market *BOTH* the Falcon and the Jaguar game console. ISD - And at Duesseldorf he'll probably hold off North American pricing/marketing details until the BCS meeting in late September. M.FARMER2 - No, there just might not be a MultiTOS for older 68000-based ST's. The Falcon 030 will ship with MultiTOS and a MultiTOS package for the TT (and perhaps 030'ed ST's) will be available at a later date. CHERRY.FONTS - Keep in mind the stereo output is also a headphone jack, so there's probably some amplification there. M.HEMBRUCH - I thought the "If you want higher resolutions, buy a TT" was also a bit annoying. However, I believe Atari may have put most of its resources in the Falcon 030 several months ago in order to get *ONE* of the Falcon's out as soon as possible (i.e. rather than release a fleet (or flock) of Falcon's around the 2nd quarter of '93, they decided to get one, the 'consumer model,' out as soon as possible to get the market for the machine going). Personally, I think they should've released a base model desktop-style Falcon first and said that a smaller, less expensive 'consumer-model' was on the way. XXTIMD - re: games w/ 32k colors are impractical... That's what CD-ROM is for. From the looks of things, whatever marketing Atari puts into the Falcon won't really start until very late this year or early next year since it will take a few months until the machines are available in quantity. I don't know about this. Maybe Atari should wait until it has the machines stocked up before they release it here? Or maybe Atari's only going to do it's standard job of only marketing to current Atari dealers for the first few months (i.e. no advertising)? ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 205 Fri Aug 14, 1992 CHERRY.FONTS [Todd] at 05:10 EDT I think Falcon "Personal Workstation" is a serious misnomer. ..Todd ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 206 Fri Aug 14, 1992 DOUG.W [ICD RT] at 08:02 EDT Steve, The term true-color is correct when referring to a non-palettized (is that a word?) system, regardless of the number of bits per color. --Doug ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 207 Fri Aug 14, 1992 LEPULLEY [Lloyd Pulley] at 17:46 EDT I don't know, but I thought that Sam's conference was one of Atari's better ones. He seemed to be fairly straight forward with WHAT HE COULD TELL US. It's not his fault that much of the information he gave us had been leaked (or guessed at) beforehand. But now we have the 'straight scoop' with which to work. Of course, like most others, there were things that I didn't like or wished were different [i.e., 1040 case, Atari deserting the SLM owners - IMO, the clumsy memory upgrade path] but overall, I feel the Falcon's pluses WAAAAY outweigh its minuses. The only really disturbing thing that he said (IMO) was the 'F' word...FCC. Maybe I'm just gunshy but I shudder when I hear that word come from Atari's 'mouth'. Lloyd E. Pulley, Sr. ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 208 Fri Aug 14, 1992 TOWNS [John@Atari] at 17:53 EDT True Color is defined as having more colors available than pixels on the screen and not having a harware palette. Falcon030's 15bit mode is just that. ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 209 Fri Aug 14, 1992 M.FARMER2 [Mark Farmer] at 18:18 EDT To: LEXICOR [Lee] Upload some of the "Impressive Spectrum 512 Pictures" with animation. To: E.Krimen [Ed Krimen] I think Sam was making light of the Forbes article, not to show a concern. To: Who Ever ( - * - MULTI-TOS - * - ) What I would like to know is why Multi-TOS is part hardware and part software. Does this mean that they made mistakes in the TOS version and they need the software to correct Bugs in the tos? and the first versions of the Falcon will have BUGS in the TOS and later versions will have the TOS corrected? To: FairWeather [David] Well the price better be low since you can buy a 386 for under $1000 now thats with 2 megs, 2400 modem, VGA, Software (MSDOs 5.0, Windows 3.1 etc..) and a hard drive. Besides 2 megs should be min for a Falcon. TO: SFRT-ASST [KENE @ SFRT] NTSC = National Television System Committee NTSC was the first color television system, introduced in the U.S. in 1954 also used in Japan, Canada and mexico (And is still used today). you may see some VCR tapes, TVs or VCRs with this in the DOCS. The Format Has 525 Scan lines and 30 pictures are transmitted per second. Other Standards Used: European countries have 625 scan lines and transmit 25 pictures per second. PAL = Phase Alternating Line system Developed in Telefunken Laboratories in Hannover West Germany (Used In: Britain, Australia and most European countries) SECAM system Developed in France (Used in: German Democratic Republic, Hungary, Algeria and the U.S.S.R.) ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 210 Fri Aug 14, 1992 SFRT-ASST [Kene @ SFRT] at 18:24 EDT I work in video, television and film. I'm trying to find out what somebody is talking about when they say 525 lines of resolution. ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 211 Fri Aug 14, 1992 M.FARMER2 [Mark Farmer] at 18:46 EDT To: LEPULLEY [Lloyd Pulley] FCC reminds me of the IRS (and they remind me of Nazi Germany) If I remember correctly Atari has had Mega problems with the FCC I think the STE went back 2 times or more and some never made it thrue the FCC at all for a Class A. Maybe they do not have any Atari computers at the FCC so maybe Atari should donate a fue to the boss of the FCC (The Hitler Youth Organization (Chapter U.S.A.)). ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 212 Fri Aug 14, 1992 M.FARMER2 [Mark Farmer] at 19:00 EDT To: SFRT-ASST [Kene @ SFRT] They were prob reading the sears catalog etc... refering to Lines of Horizontal Resolution of a picture tube. But you asked about "NTSC". ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 213 Fri Aug 14, 1992 REALM [Joey] at 20:04 EDT Oooooh... I think I accidentally verged on flaming regrading customer support in the Falcon topic.:-) Sorry, I meant those things but in a constructive way, it reads badly. Thats what I get for posting at 3am. So is the Falcon scheduled for actual release in Germany at the show? I got the impression with no FCC it would start selling to the public directly following the show. At least they can get all the bugs out before final release here. ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 214 Fri Aug 14, 1992 LEXICOR2 [Ringo] at 21:02 EDT Mark, We will be uploading Spectrum 512(+) Render/raytrace 3D2 objects animations very soon. What this rending does for all ST users is create a more realistic looking animation than say a LOW 16 color animation. We will post more information in the Lexicor Software Category 25. Ringo ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 215 Fri Aug 14, 1992 C.KLIMUSHYN [-Chuck-] at 21:46 EDT Bet if they put the Falcon in a regular steel tower case there wouldn't be FCC problems. :) -Chuck- ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 217 Fri Aug 14, 1992 C.OATES2 [Chris] at 22:57 EDT What I know about true color and 15 bit/16 bit graphics: I have always known true color to mean: no palette. Period. Therefore a monochrome screen is true color, so is 15 bit graphics, and so is 24 bit. Now: 15 bit versus 16 bit. When you don't have a color palette, you must define each pixel to have an RGB value. Since there are three colors to define (red, green, blue) the number of bits per pixel must be a multiple of three. Hence, 15 bit color. But since computers deal best with numbers that are a power of two, the figure is padded out to 16 bits per pixel, meaning 15 bits of color, and one bit of alpha plane. the "Alpha plane" can be used for whatever, but since it is mentioned as part of the video overlay in the Falcon, this is my speculation: The alpha plane determined whether the color is in front of the incoming signal or not. I once saw a demo of genlocking, where black was masked to the incoming signal, and all other colors were seen on top of the signal. Pretty limiting, especially if you want a picture with black in it (such as self- censoring your movies :) Now, if you had an extra bit per pixel to determine the overlay, you could have the freedom to draw "behind" the video signal, then fade it in, pixel by pixel, to where it is "in front of" the video. I don't really know, that just seems to make sense to me. Any other ideas? ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 218 Fri Aug 14, 1992 J.ALLEN27 [FAST TECH] at 23:04 EDT NTSC = Never The Same Color twice ;-) "True Color" is not a defined term set forth by a standards committee, or regulated by the FTC. It just means a reasonable approximation of actual color being manipulated, shown on screen very close to what will appear on paper once printed. If you want to REALLY get technical, then you'll need to build in a feedback mechanism so the monitor/computer can be TUNED to some set standard by placing a known value on screen, veiwing the screen with a sensor, and adjusting the gamma adjustment tables to make a particular _RED_ absolutely positively the _RED_ you want it to be. These are available from SuperMac and Radius on the Mac, and cost...Monitor/card/sensor...around $5,000. One mans true color is another mans not quite...if you know what I mean ;-) Best to not get into debating the issue, there is no set standard, and hence no way to resolve the debate. Lets just say the Falcon has a sh** load of colors ;-) ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 219 Sat Aug 15, 1992 R.MARTIN22 [NETWORK 23] at 00:11 EDT LEE: Where can I get Ringo's newsletter? KENE: The 525 scan lines correlate to lines of resolution, including those lines which are considered overscan. Live And Direct [12:31 AM-14/Aug/92], Rod Martin, Network 23/ST Connection ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 220 Sat Aug 15, 1992 J.RICHTER [J.RICHTER] at 00:37 EDT Yeah Sam, And if you wanted something HOTTER then you just know that 32 BIT CPU socket will CRANK with a 1280x1024x16 video section and 32MHZ 030 or 040!!! I work with a HUGE PC firm and the newer systems will also be going to "Local Video" and SCSI II and cutting out the DUMB and SLOW ISA bus!! from the way ATARI has designed it .. there is NO limits! no reason not to put a 486' in the thing if you really wanted or 256K MAC rom support (wish they would'of made the cartridge port 512K) This is a Hardware Hackers dream-come-true... and about the memory.. well.. just go for the 16meg board... bite the bullet YOU WILL NEED it with MultiTOS!! and get yourself a HUGE add-on SCSI drive.. (MicroVision has a HOT and reliable 650megger).. you WILL need it! Can you imagen... cutting and pasting CD quality sound files and mixing that with a little 65K picture on the old TV video-in port!! I mean.. lets face it... a home system has to be FUN and ATARI has delivered (I hope soon) the most FUN- FOR-THE-BUCK that I have heard about in years... My PC MultiMedia friends are spending THOUSANDS on combinations that won't touch this guy outa the box... I mean (2) weeks ago.. I was mister winer... how a guy can change with a little good news... Also, I am proud of ATARI for not putting a HD in the Falcon!! it shows they have learned about what people WANT.. why would you want to be stuck with a 40/80megger and have to push it off on someone (hard to do)... why not call your local MaxTor or Quantum dealer and get that 120meg or 240meg internal that you wanted in the first place.. or what the hey plug in an external external 600meg or use your current cheepee 60megger just to get you started!! and they even have a port to plug in your SM1224 SMART...SMART... look at the folks ATARI can get started on a falcon who normally could not afford the $800 plus the $400 for a GOOD VGA!! I mean... whats a little flicker when it comes with 65,536 colors and ya only had 4 before!!! by the way the specs are presented.. it seems like ATARI could have easily made a 1280x960x16 mode!! but it cost at least $1000 to buy one... Mark, If you are going to shop on JUST price... GET THE $1000 clone.. these cheap System are terrible... crummy mice, bad keyboards and some with terrible compatibility problems... Let me tell ya the DSP stuff in the Falcon will add almost $1000 to the clones price tag.. and that DSP card for the PC will not be supported well in the IBM market.. these machines are just NOT in the same league with the Falcon .. current 16meg in simms is $480 dollars (4meg simms).. if ATARI can offer a package DEAL 16meg falcon for LESS .. GO FOR IT!!! Jerry Richter ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 222 Sat Aug 15, 1992 SAM-RAPP [<>] at 01:28 EDT While the "Pre conference" may have been fun, the "post conference" was very informative... All comments by Bill@Atari [B.REHBOCK]: ...there is already a CD-ROM driver finished for MultiTOS that auto detect High-Sierra and ISO9660. ** It installs as a MiNT .XFS driver. F030 is easily "Genlockable"; a cheap bob is required to strip the sync from the external signal. MultiTos provides 68030 hardware memory protection. ...there are 32K (24-bit) words of 0-wait state static RAM for the DSP. (It's 25ns,BTW) The RAM in the F030 is 32-bit wide, so you have 1, 4, or 16(14) meg configs. We could have done other multiples, but you take a speed hit. 8 channels @ 50KHz = 1 megabyte per second. ** IDE is fast and inexpensive. We use the 16MHz BLiTTER to do HD access. The BLiTTER does 16-bit reads and writes, the RAM is 32-bits wide. The MCU and VIDEL (Video Controller) sit on the 32-bit bus. Production MulitTOS dosen't have Virtual Memory, but VRAM from Overscan in Germany works well with it. (In reference to unpopulated memory board...) ...not from Atari. There will be 1, 4, 14 meg boards. There are no memory controllers on the board like on the TT. The pricing on the RAM will be very competitive. (In reference to upgrading memory boards...) ... no. The old board has to come out. (In reference to the new analog joysticks...) 15 buttons. The joystick has three fire buttons and a 12 key keypad. VERY VERY nice feel. (In reference to under the keyboard joystick ports...) Yes, the mouse and st joystick is, but the 15-pins are on the left of the machine. I don't like it more than anyone else and we do want to move them. Hopefully, you'll plug the mouse in and leave it, and use the enhanced joysticks on the new software. (In reference to the return of developers...) Last answer, yes there are some suprising people returning to the fold. I should have some interesting anecdotes to tell in a few months. ============================================================= Well, was the conference worth the $18 bucks I spent on it? (My wife says no!) Atari's potential is greater than it EVER has been, IMHO. Now a few things concern me: Sam says it is in Production. He also says it hasn't been sent to the FCC yet. Is that wise, givin Ataris past FCC problems? Is it possible that the 16MHz design makes it MUCH easier to get FCC? Case in point: Mega STe -vs- TT030. As I recall the mega STe fairly flew through FCC while the TT030 was abandoned for FCC class B. Any knowledgeable input on this? I still don't fully grasp the 14 megabyte limit on RAM. Maybe I'm just dense. Are two meg "reserved" somewhere for something? Is 14(16) the maximum that the MMU can handle? That seems to fall short for some intense digital audio purposes. (about 1 minute of CD quality stereo sound=11 meg or so) Can someone please explain the memory for simpletons like myself? (Jim Allen?) Hey this is too long !!!! Why didn't someone stop me sooner? Sam Rapp ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 223 Sat Aug 15, 1992 DITEK [David] at 01:28 EDT I've always heard that True color simply meant that the color definition was stored in the pixel memory location. Whenever I've seen 16 bit color, it's always been a 5-6-5 RGB split. I have no idea why the green component gets the extra bit, I guess someone had to. Does the Falcon have 15 or 16 bit color ? ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 224 Sat Aug 15, 1992 R.MARTIN22 [NETWORK 23] at 01:32 EDT MARK: NTSC = National Televsion Standards Committee Live And Direct [11:41 PM-14/Aug/92], Rod Martin, Network 23/ST Connection ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 225 Sat Aug 15, 1992 SFRT-ASST [Kene @ SFRT] at 01:35 EDT Ummmmm... I wouldn't bet rent money that video has 525 lines of resolution unless you're talking some type of sales jargon. The definition I can't quite remember has something to do with optometrics, and the ability to perceive "x" number of lines, at "x" foot candles, at "x" distance. On a test pattern it's the converging lines. At some point it's impossible to see any separation between the lines. Somewhere near that point is the resolution of that system. I may be wrong, I'd have to check with my video guru, but I think video has a resolution somewhere around 100 lines. _My_ logic is that only 262.5 lines are on a screen per field, and that the minimum best fidelity of a sampled signal is twice the maximum bandwidth of the source. This logic may be wrong. But I just can't see how you would see an image of 525 parallel _lines_ on a TV. But I get the feeling we're talking about two totally different types of resolution here. ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 226 Sat Aug 15, 1992 C.KLIMUSHYN [-Chuck-] at 01:38 EDT Jerry, Great post! I'm ready to swim to Germany!! -Chuck- p.s. Our old SC1224's will really do 16bit color? I thought they'd work with the Falcon but only in the old ST resolutions.... ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 227 Sat Aug 15, 1992 LEXICOR2 [Ringo] at 01:43 EDT Network 23 Nice to read you again. The first issue of the Newsletter is sitting here in my TT hardrive all 15- Megs. It is full of 24bit Graphics with a fantastic cover created by Lee Seiler! We also have articles about True color images and much more. Total 10+ pages! You can get the Newsletter directly from Lexicor Software or from me. We will post more information in the Lexicor Category. Ringo. ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 228 Sat Aug 15, 1992 SFRT-ASST [Kene @ SFRT] at 01:47 EDT SECAM (System Exactly Contrary to American Methods.) PALM {Brazil Only} Pay A Little More NTSC Never Twice Same Color (based on the fact that NO two NTSC systems will display the same color. If you have the same image up on 100 NTSC systems you will have 100 different colors. PAL has no Hue control (but it does have a color control) and the PAL system takes care of the hue adjustments internally.) Yes, that's oversimplified. Which brings up an interesting question, how will the Falcon's "TV" output be encoded for Europe? Is it possible to swap RF modulators and encoders? ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 229 Sat Aug 15, 1992 J.ALLEN27 [FAST TECH] at 03:12 EDT Ok, one more time: The Falcon is a really really spiffy off-spring of the STE and shares the same basic memory map. The top 1 Meg is used for IO devices, the next to top 1 Meg is used for Tos ROMs. That leaves 14 Megabytes out of the 16 Megabytes total address space. You can now use the full 14 Megs of address space as ram, the ram controller even does the work for you!! Yes the 030 chip allows more than a 16 Megabyte address space, but NOT when you are trying to be as compatible as possible to the STE. Far too many ST applications, especially games, are not and never will be "32 bit clean". So Atari made the new machine so it didn't _require_ 32bit clean software, it will run the older non-32bit clean software...like Tempus the editor as an example, and Calamus 1.09N as another example. It's really a very nice compromise, and if you _need_ more the 14Megs it can be arranged, by slapping a memory expansion board in the CPU expansion slot, rigged up to act the way TT ram does now in the TT...and on the Turbo030 accelerator ;-) So you could add, hmmm, 8 16Megabyte SIMMs, or something equally rediculous ;-) On the video, yes by implementing the "interlaced" mode you can get most resolutions on the SC1224, making the transition for ST users much less costly to begin with. Neat. NTSC has 525 periods of information between vertical sync pulses, so there is the ability to put 525 lines worth of info on the screen. Oops, that's 525 lines between even vertical sync pulses. Each period of information is unique, so that's about as close to having 525 lines of resolution you're going to get on a TV. But because TV is "overscanned" on the tube, you actually only see about 480 of those lines, the rest are "off screen". If you could scrunch the vertical size down enough you could see them all. Overscanning is used so they don't have to be as precise in manufacturing the TVs about lining up the display on the tube, the whole tube face gets zapped, otherwise you'd have to predcisely adjust the position of the display so it was located neatly on the screen. ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 230 Sat Aug 15, 1992 S.JOHNSON10 [Steve] at 03:50 EDT DOUG.W - Yes, but it's been said that there is a 262,144-color palette. I just want someone to tell me where and how the term "true color" applies. I've heard "true color" to mean a few things. Either "24 bit color" and/or "no palette" have been the usual meanings. If the Falcon 030 has "no palette" in its True Color mode, then okay. However, all we've been told about is a 262,144-palette and a 16 bit "True Color" mode without any clarification as to exact specs. TOWNS - Going by that definition, which I believe is the most correctly stated definition of "True Color," only the 320x200 resolution would be True Color (i.e. the 320x480 and interlaced 640x480 modes that Sam mentioned would not be True Color as was stated in the conference). See! If Atari would give us all the info rather than just scatterings, there wouldn't be all this confusion. M.FARMER2 - No, making MultiTOS part ROM-based and part disk/RAM-based isn't because of a lot of bugs. Just believe me that there are good reasons behind making it this way. A completely ROM-based MultiTOS isn't impossible, but the way it's being done makes some practical sense. I know that's hard to believe what with it being Atari and all. REALM - According to some folks in Germany, the release of the Falcon 030 in Europe will happen at the time of the show (or immediately afterwards). Also, it seems ST Sutra (an MS Works type package) will also be shown at the Duesseldorf show (maybe Atari will even be including this package with every Falcon?). I don't know if it's an Atari product, but it had been mentioned several months ago that the software package was offered to Atari and that they were considering taking it. Apparently, the Falcon's TOS has features like a more 3D look for the windows and "True-Color-Icons." ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 231 Sat Aug 15, 1992 D.GLISH [DAVE GLISH] at 09:47 EDT Since the Falcon is supposed to have a SCSI2 interface, does that mean a person would be able to hook up one of the new Floptical drives directly? This could then be used as a second disk drive (with great potential for doing backups). I have heard that the Falcon doesn't have a second floppy drive plug. ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 232 Sat Aug 15, 1992 M.PERDUE [Mario] at 10:10 EDT Kene, I dug out an old text book on TV's that explains it like this: "The scanning pattern of a TV camera in the United States is made up of 525 _lines_ (262-1/2 odd-numbered and 262-1/2 even-numbered lines). The beam completes the scanning of one _field_ each time it scans 262-1/2 lines. Two fields make a complete television picture, called a _frame_. The electron beam produces 30 complete frames per second." Seems simple enough. ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 233 Sat Aug 15, 1992 DOUG.W [ICD RT] at 12:02 EDT Steve, The 262,144 color mode on the Falcon does not use a palette. Everyone, In the video industry, the phrase "lines of resolution" refers to VERTICAL lines, not horizontal scan lines. --Doug ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 234 Sat Aug 15, 1992 G.NORTON [G.NORTON] at 13:02 EDT Tom, I noticed that line too...I hope Atari is going to wait for 6 months before they start advertising. They need to give the Falcon a good jump out of the starting blocks to make it a success. Hopefully Same realizes that you have to spend some money to make some money. Graham @ Quay Computers ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 235 Sat Aug 15, 1992 M.ALLEN14 [Mike Allen] at 13:20 EDT Rod, Actually 525 scan lines don't equal 525 lines of resolution. There are several scan lines (I forget how many) that are used for vertical sync in the NTSC standard. Mike Allen ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 236 Sat Aug 15, 1992 AD-VANTAGE at 13:25 EDT Chuck, The Falcon is in a steel case -- sheet metal shielding just like the other keyboard case ST's :-) I suspect one reason for the packaging we see in the Falcon was to use what has worked in the past. Maybe they stuck with the sheet metal shielding so they would not repeat the FCC problems experienced with the TT/MSTe. The surface mount multi-layer processor board will go a long way towards reducing emission also. I'll be very suprised if the computer is held up by the FCC this time. -- Ron ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 238 Sat Aug 15, 1992 M.FARMER2 [Mark Farmer] at 14:02 EDT To: J.Richter [J.Richter] No cheep system for me thank you, I was just pointing out you can get many of the same limits on a PC (not all). I am sure the Falcon would make many older PC owners wish they had one. But if the price for the falcon is to high they would look at can I get software from my local dealer (Atari=No) can I get it fixed Local (Atari=No). (NOTE: Not all cases but most). Also if the cost dif is not a big margin then they will not see why they should upgrade from there 8088 or 286 to the Atari Falcon, and just upgrade to a 386 or 486. To: R.MARTIN22 [NetWork 23] There maybe more than one meaning for the NTSC how ever I looked the meaning up Ref: "The NEW Illustrated Science And Invention Encyclopedia" What was your reference? ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 240 Sat Aug 15, 1992 R.WATSON15 [Wayne Watson] at 15:52 EDT There are a couple of things I would like to know. I hope someone can answer them. It was mentioned that the Falcon has an RS232C port. Is this different from the RS232 port we have now? What is the max. speed on this critter? Is it still limited to 19200? Will there be an easy way to upgrade the Falcon to 33mhz 68030 or will we need to have a hack in it like the several we have now for the ST computers? What about 40mhz, etc.? Will the same HD, flopticals, CD-ROMS, ability be there as in ICD's LINK? Will we be able to hook up any SCSI type drive/device? Will it need special drivers for each device or will there be a general purpose driver? I see there can be an internal IDE drive. Will the interface be there but not the drive if you don't want to order one or, will you have to order the interface/drive combo? I would like to have the interface there but, I don't want the drive because you can pick up 200+ meg IDE drive fairly cheap. I saw a 212 Maxtor for $350.00. I wonder if it will end up something like the TT/STE where you had to order the upgrade kit to get the internal drive ability? Why didn't they make one cover for all computers? I wonder if GFA Basic programs will have a problem with the Falcon like they have with the TT? I wonder if the Expansion bus will be another Mega flop (pun intended)? I hope items are created to use it more than they were for the Mega (Old Mega that is). Sam said that they make great Chip Merchants. I wonder if they are going to charge an arm and leg for the ram upgrades or, will they really be competitive? 1 meg SIMMS are down to $28 a pop. Atari isn't the only company "Right-sizing" around here. It only makes good business sense to cut out the waste. We have been "Right-Sizing" for awhile. What did they mean by SCSI II with DMA? I assume they are just using a term here and didn't mean it literally. In other words, the SCSI II port has Direct Memory Access? I wonder why they just didn't call it the Atari Falcon? Does the 'Atari Falcon 030' allude to an 'Atari Falcon 040'? What modes are interlaced that I can use on an SC1224? Will all the video modes be selectable between Non-Interlace and Interlaced? Why can't I get a REAL keyboard? These mushrooms have got to go. I take it that the Falcon will be in some ways better than the SST, TinyTurbo and TT in the fact that there will be no more ST/TT ram? All ram will be 32 bit ram instead of 16 bit ram? ALL applications will be ran in 32 bit ram? Don't take the above as a shot at either accelerator board. It was not meant like that. Well, that is about it for now. I know. It was enough. ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 241 Sat Aug 15, 1992 M.JONES52 [Jonesy] at 18:05 EDT Sam Rapp, re "the power of transparency" - you got it in one, I think. ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 242 Sat Aug 15, 1992 SFRT-ASST [Kene @ SFRT] at 21:19 EDT I know more than I want to know about NTSC. With luck I forget about 3% of what I know every year. Let's talk backdoor of horizontal sync. Let's see... we've got burst, breezeway, video... somewhere in there in the signal we've got vertical syncronization pulses... all that jargon used to get me aroused... I'm getting old. Anyway, NTSC (Never Twice Same Color) will hopefully die a horrible death within five years _after_ the FCC decides on the broadcast standard for Hi- Def. Unfortunaely they're making making it compatible with existing TV systems... ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 243 Sat Aug 15, 1992 SAM-RAPP [<>] at 23:05 EDT J.Richter------> One problem, if the Falcon has no DMA port, how am I going to get it to work with my lowly Megafile Hard disk? Also, does anyone know exactly what resolutions/colors will be available on the SC1224 monitor? And what are the spec supposed to look like on any new monitor in my future? Horizontal (upper and lower)/Vertical (upper and lower)? ________________ | | -----------> Sam ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 244 Sat Aug 15, 1992 REALM [Joey] at 23:43 EDT Wayne, GFA works great on the TT! I've written a couple programs that run in the TT res's no problem at all. The stuff you've tried must be old.:-) ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 245 Sat Aug 15, 1992 R.WATSON15 [Wayne Watson] at 23:49 EDT The TT/MSTE is in a metal case also. If you scratch that brown paint, you will notice a layer of copper covering the inside of the case. ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 246 Sun Aug 16, 1992 R.WATSON15 [Wayne Watson] at 00:57 EDT No Joey, it is not old. I know GFA works on the TT, at least the newer stuff does. I am talking about stuff that needs/needed the 24bit program. GFA Also works on the SST because I tested our BBS program on it. ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 247 Sun Aug 16, 1992 E.KRIMEN [Ed Krimen] at 02:12 EDT Rumour du Jour: Someone on Usenet posted Falcon details from the September issue of the UK's Atari ST User and one of the things rumored to happen was a new case design next April. Salt, anyone? :^) Tip du Jour: Read the transcript of the Delphi conference with Sam. There's some more juicy Falcon info in there. I don't know how much of it was said in the one here on Wednesday, but I enjoyed reading it. ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 248 Sun Aug 16, 1992 S.JOHNSON10 [Steve] at 03:07 EDT DOUG.W - You mean the "16-bit color mode" not the "262,144 color mode" right? Also, there's the question as to whether it's only the 16-bit color 320x200 resolution that has no palette or if *ALL* 16-bit color modes have no palette. R.WATSON15 - Supposedly, the new serial port will allow higher speeds than 19200, but I don't know how high. Accelerator upgrades will probably be easier in the Falcon 030. Yes, you will be able to hook up virtually any SCSI drive/device. The IDE connector will be inside the machine, so you *SHOULD* be able to just pop one in yourself as with the Amiga 300...er...600. I never put 'crippling' past Atari, though. And like I've said, I'm also worried about the Falcon 030 RAM. If they don't offer the RAM boards for less than $35/MB (maybe $40/MB at the absolute highest), then they're a ripoff as far as I'm concerned. SFRT-ASST - Don't hold your breath on that! It'll probably be at least 8-12 years before HDTV is affordable enough for most people and there won't be many HDTV broadcasts until there are a lot of HDTV viewers out there. Also, the FCC already decided several months ago that the U.S. HDTV standard does *NOT* need to be compatible with existing systems because they felt that that requirement was impeding the development of HDTV and that it was even somewhat unrealistic. SAM-RAPP - You can get an adaptor to use older ACSI/DMA devices with the Falcon's new SCSI II port. Since the SC1224/SC1435 are analog monitors, there's no real limit on the number of colors it can display, but I'm not sure about the resolutions (it may handle higher resolutions in interlaced mode). According to the August issue of ST FORMAT, the Falcon 030 "is reputedly heading for a [British Pounds]550.00 price tag." In actual exchange rates, that's about $1050.00, but it doesn't quite work that way since there are other international economic factors at work. In reality, that would probably work out to around $750, give or take $50. ST FORMAT also says that the Falcon's DSP yields about 13.5MIPS. ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 249 Sun Aug 16, 1992 J.LEBLANC3 [Jeff] at 07:26 EDT Relax Mark, Multitos is standard on the Falcon :> ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 250 Sun Aug 16, 1992 M.FARMER2 [Mark Farmer] at 07:27 EDT To: R.WATSON15 [Wayne Watson] Not just any IDE hard drive a 2 1/2 IDE drive. ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 251 Sun Aug 16, 1992 D.ENGEL [Thunderbird] at 09:26 EDT Is there any truth to the rumor that the MultiTOS/Newdesk combo in the Falcon 030 has had improved graphics added to GEM? Even though windoze is Sloooooow, most people seem to think it is much more powerful because of the nifty 3-D buttons, multi-color icons, etc. I'd love to see the Falon with enhanced GEM interface. It would help sell the machine. GEM is too simplistic for the 90's (Despite the fact that it works so well). ___________________ \hunderbird ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 252 Sun Aug 16, 1992 M.PERDUE [Mario] at 11:00 EDT Wayne, The programs that need the 24bit program to run are using the upper address bits for internal purposes. This causes a problem with the TT because it COULD have memory there. I suspect that this is one of the reasons Atari chose to limit memory to 16/14meg. If you limit your address space to 16Meg, you never need those upper bits. ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 253 Sun Aug 16, 1992 J.P.C. at 11:24 EDT ALL: Just to keep things in perspective.... In several advertising supplements of today's Washington(DC)Post, I see ads for 386sx's w/monitor, 80-100Meg HD, 4Meg RAM, DOS/Windows 3.1, Lotus Works, dot-matrix printer for less than $1,000! People buy what they see. The 'Falcon 030' looks GREAT on my SM124 but, unless it gets into the stores BEFORE XMAS, its ALL OVER. ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 254 Sun Aug 16, 1992 LEXICOR2 [Ringo] at 12:04 EDT J.P.C. You are right if the Falcon does not make it to Xmas the few dealers that we have left will be very upset. Ringo ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 255 Sun Aug 16, 1992 J.ALLEN27 [FAST TECH] at 13:22 EDT The Falcon will be "acceleratable" easily, 40 or 50 Mhz would be the target for an 030, if you're going to the trouble of speeding up, why stop at 33 ;-) Atari has been very sensible from the start on upgradablity with the Faclcon. If they can't meet the $35/Meg ram price, I'm sure a 3rd party will. Since the 4 Megabyte size board would require 8 1Megx4 chips, a small PC board, and an inexpensive connector, it should be salable for around $159 retail, or $40/Meg and still make a profit for the developer and dealer. The internal IDE needs to be a 2.5" drive to fit, and I'm sure they'll leave the space there, ready to have a drive slapped in, no tricks, no hurdles, no crippling. There's been a real, fundamental, change in Atari's veiw toward 3rd party enhancements and user upgradeability, and the Falcon will show it. The IDE and SCSI II ports are DMA'd ports. The Blitter chip is used as a generic DMA controller, not only drawing lines on the screen like lightning, but also reading/writing to disk. Something the Mac's lack and could REALLY use ;-) ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 256 Sun Aug 16, 1992 DOUG.W [ICD RT] at 14:27 EDT Steve, Yes, I goofed. I meant the 15- or 16-bit color mode. --Doug ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 257 Sun Aug 16, 1992 ISD [Nathan] at 14:54 EDT Ed ... From your post #247, I can only assume you did NOT read the transcript of Sam's GEnie RTC last week. I suggest that you do so as it was an excellent conference. It is file #25262. ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 258 Sun Aug 16, 1992 L.MCCLURE at 19:51 EDT One of the questions I wanted to ask, but had to leave before I was able to, was whether in the "14 meg" configuration, with 16megs actually installed, if any of the chips other than the CPU could 'see' the missing two megs. If for instance, the blitter could reach into that 2 megs, it could at least be put to use as a RAMdisk. Also, I wonder how difficult it would be for a third party to come up with a way to add RAM above the 16-meg limit. I have seen some folks question why the Falcon does not offer higher resolutions, or more colors at 640x480 (pointing out that you can now get under-$200 VGA cards that have 16-bit, and now, even 24-bit color). Of course, Falcon has one thing those VGA cards don't...it can output those in NTSC format, directly recordable on a VCR with no extra gadgets. The least expensive VGA card I have seen (mailorder) with NTSC output was $349...half the rumored price of the Falcon. ------------ Category 18, Topic 20 Message 259 Sun Aug 16, 1992 E.KRIMEN [Ed Krimen] at 21:36 EDT Nathan, I was at the GEnie conference, and I do have the transcript. What I meant was there was some stuff in the transcript that looked new to me - - stuff that I didn't see in the GEnie conference. ------------