CompuServe Messages

MICROBOTICS THE VICTIM OF FAULTY REPORTING IN AMIGAWORLD In the recently published issue of AmigaWorld (September 1993) there is a "roundup" style article entitled "A1200 EXPANSION: CHOOSING THE RIGHT PATH". The article starts on page 21. On page 24 there is a boxed table giving the aggregate results of AIBB 5.5 benchmark testing on various A1200 expansion boards and accelerators. Unfortunately for MicroBotics, the results reported for its new M1230XA accelerator are seriously in error and make the MicroBotics product look like a poor performer in comparison to other '030 based accelerators. This is a direct result of not running the AIBB test using XA's 32-bit memory. The author claims the test would not run when XA's memory was configured, so he and AmigaWorld chose to report XA's results using only slow, PCMCIA-based ram. Neither the author nor AmigaWorld contacted MicroBotics before publishing this extremely damaging, misleading report. Since we actually *use* AIBB to test XA's before shipping and actually included AIBB 5.5 on the installation diskette we sent AmigaWorld, it is especially puzzling and disturbing that they failed to at least ask for some explanation from MicroBotics before damning us in print. We feel that AmigaWorld has caused us serious harm as a direct result of this weak reporting and editorial work. Moreover, they have greatly misled and misinformed their readers. This is an extremely unpleasant and regrettable incident. In investigating why the author couldn't run AIBB 5.5 on XA, we found that the M1230XA returned from AmigaWorld was returned *wrongly configured* for *eight megabytes* of memory installed when the unit had actually only 4 megabytes installed. Naturally, this would cause almost any program that used FastRAM to crash. When the board was originally sent to AmigaWorld, it was *correctly* configured to 4 megabytes (indeed the last step before shipping was to run AIBB 5.5 on the board). So it left Texas correctly set up and came back wrongly configured. We can only conclude that the author (or someone at AmigaWorld) made improper use of XA's setup software to tell the system it had more memory than it actually did and thus caused the failure himself. Further supporting this surmise is the statement in the article that "each system was configured with…8MB of 32-bit RAM on board." We are demanding that AmigaWorld publish a full and prominent apology and full correction to their mistake in the next available issue. Unfortunately, no correction can really undo all the damage AmigaWorld has done to MicroBotics and the XA already. Nevertheless, we publicly call for maximum redress to the wrong inflicted upon us. In the table below, we show the aggregate AIBB numbers as reported by AmigaWorld compared to the *real* results that are obtained when running a properly configured M1230 XA. The third column is the percentage of error introduced by AmigaWorld's misreporting. As one can see by the gross average accuracy summary of only 42 percent, the reader would have been better off flipping a coin than relying upon the numbers in AmigaWorld. We plead for the understanding of prospective XA customers with regard to this unfortunate situation. Accurate AIBB load modules and benchmark information for the M1230 XA are available on the CompuServe and BIX networks as well as directly from MicroBotics. AMIGAWORLD ACCURACY RATING CONCERNING THEIR SEPTEMBER 93 "REPORT" ON MICROBOTICS M1230 XA ACCELERATOR AIBB 5.5 INTEGER RATING AmigaWorld Accurate PERCENTAGE ACCURACY Erroneous Test of AmigaWorld Report Report Report A500 3.93 12.04 32.64% A2000 3.83 11.73 32.65% A3000 0.63 1.94 32.47% A4000 0.31 0.96 32.29% AIBB 5.5 GRAPHICS RATING AmigaWorld Accurate Erroneous Test Report Report A500 4.54 5.76 78.82% A2000 3.37 4.27 78.92% A3000 1.91 2.42 78.93% A4000 0.82 1.04 78.85% AIBB 5.5 FLOATING POINT RATING AmigaWorld Accurate Erroneous Test Report Report A500 4.52 27.34 16.53% A2000 3.05 18.46 16.52% A3000 0.32 1.94 16.49% A4000 0.11 0.65 16.92% AGGREGATE PERCENTAGE ACCURACY OF AMIGAWORLD 42.67%