=========================================================================
 
INFO-ATARI16 Digest         Thu,  5 Apr 90       Volume 90 : Issue  410
 
Today's Topics:
                           Amiga/Atari help
                               Atari TT
                           Digitized Sounds
                 How to create a senseless flame war
              Splitting comp.sys.atari.st into subgroups
                  TECH: 50Hz and Boot Sector Booting
                 Toronto Atari convention impressions
                               TT rumor
                      Upgrading Mega 2 to Mega 4
----------------------------------------------------------------------
 
Date: 5 Apr 90 07:14:12 GMT
From: eru!luth!sunic!mcsun!hp4nl!solist!erwinh@bloom-beacon.mit.edu  (Chaos
 Conquerer)
Subject: Amiga/Atari help
Message-ID: <39@solist.htsa.aha.nl>
 
In article <10365.2619c11a@zeus.unomaha.edu> fh007@zeus.unomaha.edu writes:
>1-you can get an accelerator board for any amiga and use a 68030, Commodore
>  is currently developing UNIX for the Amiga.
>2-I dunno!
>3-Commodore does for sure, a plan just implemented, about 40% I believe, to any
>  student.
>4-does not apply!
>5-The Amiga has a custom chip set that takes care of many processor jobs,
>  speeding up programs that have heavy data movement and such. The graphics
>  have 4096 colors, displayable all at once. Don't throw away your software,
>  you can get the Mac emulator. The amiga 3.5 has 880k where the Atari has
>  about half. You can get a hardware emulator for a 286 pc.
>                                       Bob
 
I can imagine that you think the Commodore Amiga is much better than the Atari
 ST. Fine with me, maybe you are right (could be). But please stay in
 comp.sys.amiga.
 
Nice for the Amiga to have a accelerator board, nice to know that Commodore is
developing UNIX for the Amiga. Nice to know about some hardware emulator for a
286 PC. Not so nice to know that an ST diskdrive can only format about 440K on a
 3,5 inch disk, this is not true (and you know that as well as I do).
 
But enough of this slagging. The only point I try to make is the following :
 
If you are an Amiga owner, an Macintosh owner, any computer whatsoever owner,
please stay in your own newsgroup, or tell the story from both sides (not a
 simple I dunno!!). If you don't know than don't try to blacken the other
 computer.
 
 
Greetz
 
        Erwinh
 
------------------------------
 
Date: 5 Apr 90 15:10:46 GMT
From: ogicse!blake!ramsiri@ucsd.edu  (Enartloc Nhoj)
Subject: Atari TT
Message-ID: <6524@blake.acs.washington.edu>
 
In article <9255@mentor.cc.purdue.edu> skn@mentor.cc.purdue.edu (Doug Stevens)
 writes:
>I am very interested in the new TT.  Does anyone know what the graphics
>capablities are going to be.  The latest info I've seen was from an old
>Start magazine.  So does any of you out there have the latest stats.  Also
>(please don't laugh) does any one know the latest release date.
>
>                            Thanks, Doug
 
 
I heard that ATARI was shooting for an ANNOUNCEMENT at this year's FALL
COMDEX...  Note that this is an "announcement" vs.. the several
"showings" of the TT in the past....  Projected availability will
be 2nd Quarter 1991.
 
This may be rumor... on the other hand.. anything ATARI officially says is
rumor too ;-)
 
The 68030 STacy will be only "shown" at the FALL Comdex...
the "announcement" of this new machine is pending FCC approval...
 
-kevin
ramsiri@blake.acs.washington.edu
 
------------------------------
 
Date: 5 Apr 90 14:48:38 GMT
From: ogicse!blake!ramsiri@ucsd.edu  (Enartloc Nhoj)
Subject: Digitized Sounds
Message-ID: <6523@blake.acs.washington.edu>
 
In article <1990Apr3.202702.3038@ux1.cso.uiuc.edu> cs325ec@ux1.cso.uiuc.edu
 (Gregory Lemperle-Kerr) writes:
>ramsiri@blake.acs.washington.edu (Enartloc Nhoj) writes:
>
>>the point of frustration at times) NEWBELL "can't open file"
>>..  rebooting several times, coldbooting ... eventually solves
>>the problem... is there a fix for this?  I have tried reordering
>>NEWBELL.prg in my auto folder.. doesn't seem to do much..
>
>>THanks
>
>>-kevin
>
>NEWBELL.DAT may only contain 10 sounds.  If you put more in and it chooses
>the 10th, it will crash on trying to open a file whose name goes from the
>beginning of the 10th to the EOF.  Way to go Dan. :-).
>
>-- Greg
 
 
I only had ONE sound in the dat file at the time....
 
Thanks for the hint...  but this doesn't seem to explain
my problem....
 
 
anybody?
 
-kevin
ramsiri@blake.acs.washington.edu
 
------------------------------
 
Date: 5 Apr 90 15:03:12 GMT
From: naucse!tar@arizona.edu  (Tim Roeder)
Subject: How to create a senseless flame war
Message-ID: <1985@naucse.UUCP>
 
In article <10607@cbmvax.commodore.com>, valentin@cbmvax.commodore.com
(Valentin Pepelea) writes:
> Sometimes computer wars are initiated by users who have an inferiority complex
> about their computers and therefore get defensive. But most often they are
> created by users who simply never took a good look on the other side of the
> fence. Let's analyse such a typically uninformed poster...
>
 
While uninformed users are generally quite a pain, I see little need to waste
bandwidth with such an analyzation.
 
[stuff deleted]
 
Rather than including a copy of both sets of comments, I would like to request
that people avoid the chance to escalate this 'Flame War' into another set of
numerous useless postings (especially since it would be cross-posted to no
less than THREE Newsgroups).
 
While Mr. Pepelea makes some interesting (and arguably valid) points, I must
admit that it surprises me to hear an Employee of Commodore stoop to such
things as flaming another Netter.  Things come to mind such as "...stooping
to their level...", etc.
 
As pointed out numerous times, the ST/Amiga/Mac all have supporters/retractors,
and each machine has both strong and weak points.  There is no need to once
again debate these various aspects...especially with the intent of starting
a Flame War.
 
'Nuff said.
 
> Valentin
> --
> The Goddess of democracy? "The tyrants     Name:    Valentin Pepelea
> may distroy a statue,  but they cannot     Phone:   (215) 431-9327
> kill a god."                               UseNet:
 cbmvax!valentin@uunet.uu.net
>              - Ancient Chinese Proverb     Claimer: I not Commodore spokesman
 be
                                                      ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
I commend you for pointing out that you're not a Commodore Spokesman.
--
Timothy A. Roeder - Northern Arizona University(NAU)/Univeristy of Arizona(UA)
UUCP: ...!arizona!naucse!tar (NAU)
Internet: tar@naucse.cse.nau.edu (NAU) -- troeder@mis.arizona.edu (UA)
Bitnet:   roedert@arizvm1.BITNET (UA)
 
------------------------------
 
Date: 5 Apr 90 13:50:00 GMT
From:
 cs.utexas.edu!samsung!zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu!hp-sdd!apollo!rehrauer@tut.cis.
 ohio-state.edu  (Steve Rehrauer)
Subject: Splitting comp.sys.atari.st into subgroups
Message-ID: <499f1752.20b6d@apollo.HP.COM>
 
In article <1990Apr4.200716.20696@wam.umd.edu> dmb@wam.umd.edu (David M.
 Baggett) writes:
>Well, it's come up again.  Somone's hinted at breaking this newsgroup
>into subgroups.  This idea hasn't met with much support in the past,
>but maybe it's time to (once again) reconsider.
>
>I think a division between technical topics, game discussions, and
>rabid political flames might be nice.  Maybe comp.sys.atari.st should
>split into three groups:
>
>       comp.sys.atari_st.general       (Games, rumors, questions, etc.)
>       comp.sys.atari_st.wizards       (Technical)
>       comp.sys.atari_st.politics      (Rabid political & financial discussion)
 
I don't believe this group has the volume to warrant a split.  It seems
like the "let's break it up" idea only comes up when seasonal flames
occur -- when they blow over, so does the desire to split.  Just my opinion.
--
   >>"Aaiiyeeee!  Death from above!"<<     | (Steve) rehrauer@apollo.hp.com
"Spontaneous human combustion - what luck!"| Apollo Computer (Hewlett-Packard)
 
------------------------------
 
Date: 4 Apr 90 06:35:30 GMT
From: eru!luth!sunic!mcsun!hp4nl!phigate!philmds!ehviea!leo@bloom-beacon.mit.edu
  (Leo de Wit)
Subject: TECH: 50Hz and Boot Sector Booting
Message-ID: <527@ehviea.ine.philips.nl>
 
In article <16000032@ux1.cso.uiuc.edu> cs325ec@ux1.cso.uiuc.edu writes:
|
|
|       I was wondering if someone could answer two technical questions:
|
|       1.) 50Hz:  Setting 0x448 to something other than zero does not
|               put the ST in PAL mode, does it?  I downloaded hertz.arc
|               from terminator, but the hertz.tos is non executable,
|               i.e. no 0x601a...  I have seen both a boot sector program
|               and a PD 50Hz program, but I can not find them now that
|               I need to disassemble them.
 
You must flip some bit of the I/O registers to switch between 50 and 60
Hz (it is not used for the 70 Hz monochrome display).
 
When I bought my hard disk, I was told to get TOS in Rom, because
things wouldn't work OK (had a disk based TOS at that time). There
appeared to be something wrong with these Roms, at least for my (color)
display: flicker, a smaller (less higher) display and higher intensity.
Sometimes, especially after a (long) hard disk access, it would jump
into the correct mode (normal brightness, no flicker, normal display
height). After some time I found out the problem, i.e. the ST was
running in the wrong mode. I wrote a small program that flips between
50 and 60 Hz and can be put in the AUTO folder (it isn't even
resident).  Here it is, with source code and uue-d program. Enjoy,
 
   Leo.
 
-------------------------------------
******************************************************************************
*                                                                            *
*    swaphz.asm    version 1.0 of 29 Oct 1988    (C) L.J.M. de Wit 1988      *
*                                                                            *
* This software may be used and distributed freely if not used commercially  *
* and the originator (me) is mentioned.                                      *
*                                                                            *
******************************************************************************
*
* NAME
*    swaphz
*
* SYNTAX
*    swaphz.prg
*
* DESCRIPTION
*    Swaphz swaps - for low and med res - between 50 and 60 Hz.
*
 
    module swaphz
    section s.ccode
 
* system variables
syncmode    equ   $ff820a
 
* GEMDOS & (X)BIOS stuff
gemdos      equ   1
super       equ   $20
 
swaphz
      clr.l    -(sp)
      move.w   #super,-(sp)
      trap     #gemdos
      move.l   d0,-(sp)
      bchg.b   #1,syncmode
      move.w   #super,-(sp)
      trap     #gemdos
      lea.l    12(sp),sp
      clr.w    -(sp)
      trap     #gemdos
 
    end
 
 
The program in uue form:
 
table
 !"#$%&'()*+,-./0123456789:;<=>?
@ABCDEFGHIJKLMNOPQRSTUVWXYZ[\]~_
begin 644 swaphz.prg
M8!H    @                             $*G/SP ($Y!+P (>0 ! /~"z
7"C\\ "!.04_O  Q"9TY!            y
 x
end
 
------------------------------
 
Date: 5 Apr 90 14:10:00 GMT
From: apollo!rehrauer@eddie.mit.edu  (Steve Rehrauer)
Subject: Toronto Atari convention impressions
Message-ID: <499f28f1.20b6d@apollo.HP.COM>
 
In article <20785@eerie.acsu.Buffalo.EDU> gbbrooks@sybil.cs.Buffalo.EDU (G.
 Brandon Brooks) writes:
>    The Atari TT was given a release date of late 1990 (as in December).
>The Atari TT will be shipping to developers around July or August of this
>year. No price or even in-the-ballpark estimate of the price of the TT was
>given.
 
Perhaps "last known tentative TT release date" should be part of the
periodic "answers to frequently asked questions" post here.
 
(Anyone remember the earliest date they'd heard for the TT?  Seems to me
that STart interviewed Jack Tramiel (or was it Sam?) back in '87, and
quoted him as saying it was "nearly ready, probably within a few months".
I'll have to see if I can dig out the issue and get the exact words.
Remember last fall, when Atari cheer-leaders were certain that it couldn't
possibly be out any later than spring 1990?  Sigh.)
 
Seems like every company in this industry has its infamous vaporware (Amiga
people probably would nominate the "Video Toaster" as their favorite); guess
the TT is Atari's.  Seems like Atari has become the "boy who cried 'TT'!"
--
   >>"Aaiiyeeee!  Death from above!"<<     | (Steve) rehrauer@apollo.hp.com
"Spontaneous human combustion - what luck!"| Apollo Computer (Hewlett-Packard)
 
------------------------------
 
Date: 5 Apr 90 10:46:08 GMT
From:
 eru!luth!sunic!mcsun!hp4nl!phigate!prle!prles2!cstw68!meulenbr@bloom-beacon.mit
 .edu  (Frans Meulenbroeks)
Subject: TT rumor
Message-ID: <1302@prles2.prl.philips.nl>
 
In article <2122@atari.UUCP> apratt@atari.UUCP (Allan Pratt) writes:
[...]
>deny?  Just assume that anything you don't hear from several sources is
>probably false, and things you *do* hear from several sources are
>probably false, too. Even things from Atari can be false: I said STe's
>might not have SIMM sockets, but that turned out not to be the case.
[...]
>it!" ... So here goes: To my knowledge, the TT will ship under the
>Atari name.  However, I'm not Jack Tramiel, or even Sam, and my
>knowledge goes only so far.
 
Yes, Allen, but when....
 
Some history.
 
I remember having seen the TT on the Duesseldorf Fair early Sept '89.
When asking about availability the answer was something like
"within three months" or "before christmas"
 
Somewhere at the end of '89 it was announced on this very network that
the TT would be available 1Q90. I still remember that a fellow reader
got flamed by an atari official because this reader questioned the
availability of the TT. The answer was something like (sorry, I cannot
quote, since I do not save every article I receive):
"We told you that the TT will be available 1Q90. 1Q90 still has six
weeks to go, so there is no reason to flame atari for announcing
vapourware".
 
Well as you all know 1Q90 came and go, and no TT appeared in the shops.
At Cebit now they tell the system (with tos will be availabe in june or
july (I forgot)).
 
*** FLAME ON ***
 
Do you really believe to see a TT this year???? I have seen the TT being
announced about 5 times in the last two or three year by now.
For me the TT is no more or less than a lot of other products announced
by atari (e.g. the modem, the PC addon board etc.). Vapourware.
 
Why is the system not available. Does an atari official dare to reveal
that?? A single capable EE could have developed this system maybe three
times since it has been announced first. I for me, I lost confidence in
atari a long long time ago....
 
*** FLAME OFF ***
 
Ok. back to MINIX.
 
Frans Meulenbroeks        (meulenbr@cst.philips.nl)
        Centre for Software Technology
        ( or try: ...!mcsun!phigate!prle!cst!meulenbr)
 
------------------------------
 
Date: 5 Apr 90 09:21:38 GMT
From: hpcc01!hpbbn!hpbbi4!stefan@hplabs.hp.com  (#Stefan Bachert)
Subject: Upgrading Mega 2 to Mega 4
Message-ID: <510003@hpbbi4.HP.COM>
 
/ hpbbi4:comp.sys.atari.st / jdroh@athena.mit.edu (Jae D. Roh) / 11:21 pm  Apr
 4, 1990 /
In article <1090@olnl1.UUCP>, paulz@olnl1.UUCP (Paul v.d. Zwan) writes:
> It should work, since the motherboards for the Mega2 and Mega4 are the same.
 
This is not true in all cases. I bought a Mega2 which has neither
the layout lanes nor the drill holes for adding more memory !
So there are Mega2 only motherboards.
 
Stefan
 
------------------------------
 
End of INFO-ATARI16 Digest V90 Issue #410
*****************************************
