I had an Atari 520ST, simply because of the MIDI ports and a better choice of software to control my keyboard rack. Other than that, it was behind the Amiga in almost every way. I didn't buy an Amiga, because my Roomy had one. When I sold my ST, I stepped back from 16-bit and used my Commodore 128D until the mid 90s. Although, I didn't build a gaming PC with money I intended to get an Amiga with, but unfortunately, things were looking really down for Commodore at the time.
I would disagree, ST was ahead of Amiga in many things not just MIDI. First of all it had the high resolution 72Hz monitor and not the flickering Amiga RGB monitor, second it had higher computational power then Amiga, 10-20% higher. Also productivity software was much more plentiful then on the Amiga and the floppy was compatible to PC, the ST was a better computer, Amiga was a better gaming console for outdated arcade games.
You are right the mono high resolution monitor was better for production tasks. Unfortunately it was not possible to have a monitor with both colors and high res modes. You either had one or the other. The CPU power difference is in the same ballpark. 10-20% sounds a lot, but it was not a real differentiator. But the software side was and indeed there were more serious production software for Atari. For SOHO it was a better choice, while for games the Amiga. I think it could be the other way if they release ECS years earlier or they make a cheap variant in 85, not just the pricey A1000. This is where the simple ST design triumphed the amiga. Atari was able to ship the cheap, stable TOS (ROM based) STf series in 86. Unfortunately after that the development of the cheap ST series significantly slowed down.
For many years I was wondering what companies like Commodore or Atari made wrong. Now I know - they did nothing wrong. What happend was PC. Early PCs didn't look like the "ultimate things" but their design - from the very first XT-s - was the future. With old computers was like with various old OS-es. They could be pretty good, even better than the most popular ones - but without a lot of compatible software they ended before they really started. That's the advantage of mainstream OS-es. You can make a new version and still have billions of applications that are compatible. If you make a new OS from scratch - you have none (unless you emulate, but it kind of defeats the purpose of a new OS).
Well, Atari and Commodore were not just victims. Wait for the next video and you'll see what do I mean. Apple was able to survive while the other two weren't. So you are right with the software library, but there was the continuous development of PC. 286, 386, 486, Pentium, video and sound cards, Windows 3.1 were just the nails in the coffin of Amiga and Atari, not the coffin itself. If you flip the page the you'll find the lack of development. If you remember I've mentioned how Irvin Gould fired a talented CEO. You will see how a not talented cut R&D cost and miss focus. It is a sad but true story... :(
@@MrFrescho nah, you have many things wrong in the history. Irving Gould fired Rattigan not because he was jealous on his success, Rattigan was a part of attempt for hostile takeover of the Commodore company which was Gould the chairman of, similar to what happened to Jobs in apple. And the big nail in coffin for Commodore was actually the Amiga A1000 which made out of the most successful personal computer producer a red numbers writing candidate for bankruptcy, it was a ultimate fail Commodore never completely recovered from. Rattigan was able to save the C= by drastic cuts, but that limited the Commodore development at the end. Also Commodore bought Jay Miners engineers who simply lacked the efficiency of Jack Trammiels engineers, they were dreamers but did cost a lot of money and time Commodore did not have. But the real reason that killed ATARI ST line and two years later the Amiga line was software piracy, nothing else... Apple was able to survive due two things, first it was the computer that you would first meet at your local school in US, second after demise of Commodore and ATARI many their former users "upgraded" to apple to avoid PC based on intel platform (remember intel outside), that barely saved apple until Jobs came back and started new era of computer jewelry, but thats already a different story.
@@madigorfkgoogle9349 I would be happy to read the sources where you got teh information about hostile takeover. Indeed Gould fired a bunch of managers at the same time, like Commodore’s treasurer and controller, its North America general manager, and computer services director. He considered the same way when Tramiel criticised him because he used C= jet and oder resources for personal travels. There is also anothe point of view in: Commodore - The Final Years "Chief Operating Officer Henri Rubin had played a crucial role in undermining Thomas Rattigan, leading to the latter’s eventual dismissal from Commodore." Are you sure the A1000 was the nail? I think it is the miss management. Gould and later his Mehdi Ali lead the company to the dead end. Do you think they had a plan and in case yes, they were able to manage a company like Commodore? Based on the same book and the decisions they made I am sure not. Let me quote from the same book: "Rattigan had a definite plan of intercompany competition to motivate the engineers. He believed nothing spurred on designers like knowing another team might beat them to the punch. However, under the leadership of Irving Gould and Henri Rubin, there was no such urgency. Both men lacked the experience to get their soldiers moving." The software piracy was a real issue, I mentioned that. However those platforms received the programs and games up to 93-94. But I agree that, they lost the primary platform status at least partially because of piracy. I think the bigger issue was the lack of development or better to say, just crawling instead of running like the PC. Apple also survived because they release every year some upgrade and tried to keep up the speed. Additionally they pushed developers to use standard interfaces. When Motorola failed and they had to swithc over to PPC that helped them a lot. Even System 7.5 was only partially PPC native, partially it was running 68k code, while the PPC provided the computation power. When Jobs went back it was not his decision. NeXT was on the edge and his company was bought by Apple and then he "takeover" the CEO position. Apple failed to renew the System, so the whole story made sense, but still, his takover was closer to hostile than friendly.
@@MrFrescho I heard/red it from different sources, most inside being the Mehdi Ali himself. And yes the firing of other managers at same time and the use of security to oust Rattigan out of Commodore is a clear indication that it is a truth. Im 100% sure A1000 was a final nail in coffin, its paper launch and lengthy and costly development, its misplacement on market, bad pricing, poor compatibility, drained the Commodore reserves fast. If Commodore would not have the bestseller PC in game (C64) and Rattigan would not stop the production of A1000 after only a half year of mass production and massively cut working force and not needed assets, the Commodore would die in 1986. Also the Amiga had to be streamlined for much lower production costs to be able to compete. You can go and explore Commodore financial data if you dont believe me, the A1000 was sold until 1990 with very low success, and the rest of stock was then scrapped. Without German Braunschweiger team there would be no A2000, just the A500... ATARI ST outsold Amiga till 1988, the C64 outsold Amiga during entire Amiga production. PPC introduction was full of hickups, I remember majority of programs running much slower on PPC being emulated, also the platform was not based around PCI bus at initial and not having preemptive multitasking was even bigger problem. Sales went down in that time, the savior was the OSX. NeXT was acquired/merged with apple to replace the planed beOS as the PPC OS platform and Jobs was NeXT CEO, got role of consultant in apple. Jobs took over apple few moths later. Jobs took advantage of very low share price since apple was close to bankruptcy at that time, as the initial PPC introduction was a not a market hit.
Thanks for the Video
I had an Atari 520ST, simply because of the MIDI ports and a better choice of software to control my keyboard rack. Other than that, it was behind the Amiga in almost every way. I didn't buy an Amiga, because my Roomy had one. When I sold my ST, I stepped back from 16-bit and used my Commodore 128D until the mid 90s. Although, I didn't build a gaming PC with money I intended to get an Amiga with, but unfortunately, things were looking really down for Commodore at the time.
I would disagree, ST was ahead of Amiga in many things not just MIDI. First of all it had the high resolution 72Hz monitor and not the flickering Amiga RGB monitor, second it had higher computational power then Amiga, 10-20% higher. Also productivity software was much more plentiful then on the Amiga and the floppy was compatible to PC, the ST was a better computer, Amiga was a better gaming console for outdated arcade games.
You are right the mono high resolution monitor was better for production tasks. Unfortunately it was not possible to have a monitor with both colors and high res modes. You either had one or the other.
The CPU power difference is in the same ballpark. 10-20% sounds a lot, but it was not a real differentiator. But the software side was and indeed there were more serious production software for Atari. For SOHO it was a better choice, while for games the Amiga.
I think it could be the other way if they release ECS years earlier or they make a cheap variant in 85, not just the pricey A1000. This is where the simple ST design triumphed the amiga. Atari was able to ship the cheap, stable TOS (ROM based) STf series in 86. Unfortunately after that the development of the cheap ST series significantly slowed down.
For many years I was wondering what companies like Commodore or Atari made wrong. Now I know - they did nothing wrong. What happend was PC. Early PCs didn't look like the "ultimate things" but their design - from the very first XT-s - was the future. With old computers was like with various old OS-es. They could be pretty good, even better than the most popular ones - but without a lot of compatible software they ended before they really started. That's the advantage of mainstream OS-es. You can make a new version and still have billions of applications that are compatible. If you make a new OS from scratch - you have none (unless you emulate, but it kind of defeats the purpose of a new OS).
Well, Atari and Commodore were not just victims. Wait for the next video and you'll see what do I mean. Apple was able to survive while the other two weren't. So you are right with the software library, but there was the continuous development of PC. 286, 386, 486, Pentium, video and sound cards, Windows 3.1 were just the nails in the coffin of Amiga and Atari, not the coffin itself.
If you flip the page the you'll find the lack of development. If you remember I've mentioned how Irvin Gould fired a talented CEO. You will see how a not talented cut R&D cost and miss focus. It is a sad but true story... :(
@@MrFrescho nah, you have many things wrong in the history. Irving Gould fired Rattigan not because he was jealous on his success, Rattigan was a part of attempt for hostile takeover of the Commodore company which was Gould the chairman of, similar to what happened to Jobs in apple.
And the big nail in coffin for Commodore was actually the Amiga A1000 which made out of the most successful personal computer producer a red numbers writing candidate for bankruptcy, it was a ultimate fail Commodore never completely recovered from. Rattigan was able to save the C= by drastic cuts, but that limited the Commodore development at the end. Also Commodore bought Jay Miners engineers who simply lacked the efficiency of Jack Trammiels engineers, they were dreamers but did cost a lot of money and time Commodore did not have.
But the real reason that killed ATARI ST line and two years later the Amiga line was software piracy, nothing else...
Apple was able to survive due two things, first it was the computer that you would first meet at your local school in US, second after demise of Commodore and ATARI many their former users "upgraded" to apple to avoid PC based on intel platform (remember intel outside), that barely saved apple until Jobs came back and started new era of computer jewelry, but thats already a different story.
@@madigorfkgoogle9349 I would be happy to read the sources where you got teh information about hostile takeover. Indeed Gould fired a bunch of managers at the same time, like Commodore’s treasurer and controller, its North America general manager, and computer services director. He considered the same way when Tramiel criticised him because he used C= jet and oder resources for personal travels.
There is also anothe point of view in: Commodore - The Final Years
"Chief Operating Officer Henri Rubin had played a crucial role in undermining Thomas Rattigan, leading to the latter’s eventual dismissal from Commodore."
Are you sure the A1000 was the nail? I think it is the miss management. Gould and later his Mehdi Ali lead the company to the dead end. Do you think they had a plan and in case yes, they were able to manage a company like Commodore? Based on the same book and the decisions they made I am sure not. Let me quote from the same book:
"Rattigan had a definite plan of intercompany competition to motivate the engineers. He believed nothing spurred on designers like knowing another team might beat them to the punch. However, under the leadership of Irving Gould and Henri Rubin, there was no such urgency. Both men lacked the experience to get their soldiers moving."
The software piracy was a real issue, I mentioned that. However those platforms received the programs and games up to 93-94. But I agree that, they lost the primary platform status at least partially because of piracy. I think the bigger issue was the lack of development or better to say, just crawling instead of running like the PC.
Apple also survived because they release every year some upgrade and tried to keep up the speed. Additionally they pushed developers to use standard interfaces. When Motorola failed and they had to swithc over to PPC that helped them a lot. Even System 7.5 was only partially PPC native, partially it was running 68k code, while the PPC provided the computation power.
When Jobs went back it was not his decision. NeXT was on the edge and his company was bought by Apple and then he "takeover" the CEO position. Apple failed to renew the System, so the whole story made sense, but still, his takover was closer to hostile than friendly.
@@MrFrescho I heard/red it from different sources, most inside being the Mehdi Ali himself. And yes the firing of other managers at same time and the use of security to oust Rattigan out of Commodore is a clear indication that it is a truth.
Im 100% sure A1000 was a final nail in coffin, its paper launch and lengthy and costly development, its misplacement on market, bad pricing, poor compatibility, drained the Commodore reserves fast. If Commodore would not have the bestseller PC in game (C64) and Rattigan would not stop the production of A1000 after only a half year of mass production and massively cut working force and not needed assets, the Commodore would die in 1986. Also the Amiga had to be streamlined for much lower production costs to be able to compete. You can go and explore Commodore financial data if you dont believe me, the A1000 was sold until 1990 with very low success, and the rest of stock was then scrapped. Without German Braunschweiger team there would be no A2000, just the A500... ATARI ST outsold Amiga till 1988, the C64 outsold Amiga during entire Amiga production.
PPC introduction was full of hickups, I remember majority of programs running much slower on PPC being emulated, also the platform was not based around PCI bus at initial and not having preemptive multitasking was even bigger problem. Sales went down in that time, the savior was the OSX.
NeXT was acquired/merged with apple to replace the planed beOS as the PPC OS platform and Jobs was NeXT CEO, got role of consultant in apple. Jobs took over apple few moths later. Jobs took advantage of very low share price since apple was close to bankruptcy at that time, as the initial PPC introduction was a not a market hit.
@@MrFrescho I would be happy if my comments would not be removed by youtube