#PC Imagine?
John,
Impulse's newsletter is available on an irregular basis for
registered Imagine owners, though if you called they'd probably send you a
copy. I don't have their new phone number handy, but they're located in
Minneapolis, so getting connected shouldn't be too difficult. As far as I
know, Imagine for DOS is not a Windows product, which is probably a plus as
Windows apps usually carry a perfomance penalty. 486 prices are dropping
like rocks, pretty tempting, eh? I use 486's at work, just installed
Windows 3.1, (not a bad upgrade, hated 3.0 but 3.1 is almost fun to work
with) so I understand the quandry. With a 25MH 030, a 33MH 486 might have
a slight edge in performance, and with the 50MH internal clock speed 486's
coming out, there's some potential there as a graphics powerhouse,
especially with imagine. Also Martin Hash's Journyman I think is going to
be available on the 486, so things could get interesting. On the other
hand, having worked on Sparcstations, 486's, Mac's and Amiga's, I find I
prefer the Amiga. The windowing environment is terrificaly flexable and
completely integrated with the operating system, it has a sophisticated
command line structure, still handles multitasking better than Windows, and
I've never had to mess with device drivers, odd memory management schemes,
and "config.sys" files. And AREXX allows interprocess communication in a
way that I think we'll have to wait for Windows NT to even come close to.
Also there's supposedly a new bridgeboard card coming out from commodore
based around a (I think) 386SX that rumour has it may be actually priced
sensibly. The nice thing about the amiga is having your cake and eating it
too, environment-wise. Again, good luck on whatever you decide.
-David