#A5000???
16 messages in this thread
I found this on a local BBS, Anybody else heard anything???
***************** First reports of the A5000 *************************
Commodore have gone for much like the A2000 large case to contain the
power of this new machine. on the front panel it supports two 3.5" drive
(one as standard) and two 5.25" (one holding a CD-Drive). This is the
first machine to really support multi-tasking with it's three processors
on board.
Processors
———-
The A5000 will incorperate the new motorola 68060 + two 68EC040
processors, the '060' is clocked at over 35MHz and the two '040' clocked
at 25Mhz will give the A5000 a total speed at over 60MHz. The '060' with
sit on a seperate card in the cpu slot (as in the A4000) and both the
'040' will sit on the motherboard. The '040' have been design to help the
'060' ,this will be most evident at times of heavy multi-tasking. As a
result of this configuration the A5000 will have a new kickstart.
Kickstart/Workbench
——————-
The A5000 will have kickstart/workbench 4.0 (beta version has 3.2). This
kickstart is required to control the three processors , earlier kickstarts
will not be able to access the '040' (but the '060' can). This kickstart
will not be released for the older machines although 4.1 will. This
kickstart/workbench will enable the '040' to be assigned to different
tasks and as shiped one will handle all screen and sound processing and
the other will handle all of the I/O devices. This kickstart is a 1Mb chip
and will be shipped on the hard drive (to be confirmed). If it is released
in chip form then the chip will be placed on it's own card. This kickstart
will have a user-selectable kickstart screen so the user can select which
kickstart to load (either in slot or on harddrive) and the A5000 has been
tested with kickstart 1.2 upwards so there will be no more compatability
problems.
Chipset
——-
Commodore have done it again in changing the chipset as there are several
new chips. The A5000 with workbench 4 is now capable of operating in all
modes with a 512 colour pallet. To maintain the speed require to operate
in this mode one of the '040' can be assigned to the screen display (as it
is shipped). The maximum screen resolution is 4096 x 4096 with over 32
million colours on screen. This new chipset will be able to detect which
chipset it should use (orig. ,ECS ,super-ECS or AGA , super AGA ) by
detecting which kickstart is currently running or which is selected at a
cold boot.
Ram
—
As the new chipset has a higher resolution and more colours more chip ram
is required and commodore have responded by having 16Mb of chip ram on the
motherboard (expandable to 64Mb) and 16Mb of fast ram (theoretically
expandable to 1024Mb, tested to 256Mb). The chip and fast ram have been
organised on a 32-bit wide structure as in the A3000 + A4000.
Drives
——
The harddrive interface is the new scsi2 standard with a 210Mb slimline
hardrive mounted as standard. The floppy drive is a high density type and
the CD-drive is a standard A2000 internal drive.
Sound
—–
The sound is now 16-bit as the A4000 was supposed to have.
Internal Connectors
——————-
There are eight zorro III expansion slots with three IBM slots in parallel
with three zorro slots. There is no cpu slot as the '060' is on it's own
board and thus can easily replaced. If the kickstart is to be shipped on
the harddrive there will be an empty slot to place a new kickstart.
External Connectors
——————-
It has all the standard ports (disk drive, serial, etc.) and the keyboard
connector (same pins as the A4000) at the back, the mouse ports are on the
right side towards the back.
Price
—–
Well that depends on what pack you want as as of this moment there are two
1 all above = $3499 (Appox.)
2 all above plus
Amax v3.0 Mac emulator (100% compatable with all known software) +
Golden gate IBM emulator = $3999 (Approx.)(uses two zorro III slots)
This information has been confirmed by Commodore.
Wasn't posted around the first of the month, by any chance? <g>
Pete Jones, Brussels, Belgium, flying on AutoPilot
You beat me to the comment..but not the thought, Pete.
A couple of friends went to a local Amiga users group, and the speaker
(from CBM) told them not to run out and buy a 4000, but that the next
computer was going to make the 4000 obsolete and to save their money for
that. Otherwise I would not have posted that message for fear of being
laughed out of town.
even if it is not reality, It's nice to dream
Tom Spyrison
Sounds fishy to me. First the confirmed by C= part. And then there are
some REALLY odd technical detailes. Like the 060 being clocked at "over
35MHz" – the 060 will be introduced at 50MHz, and will come out at higher
clock speeds later. Then the Kickstart thing sounds odd – not the hard
drive part, but the testing with Kickstarts as early as version 1.2. Huh?
Why a 512 color pallet if max resolution supports 32million colors?
Regrettably I missed C= VP of engineering Lew Eggebrecht's WOCA speech,
but I've heard that the next Amiga was supposed to be completely modular,
with, for example (the example I was given, so this part is second-hand)
up to 24 seperate blitters – presumably one for each bitplane. But 32
million colors is 25 bits deep. And why no mention of the blitters?
Don't get me wrong – this sounds nice in many ways (especially the
unrealistic sounding price) but I saw lots of nice sounding fluff on the
4000 that left me disappointed when it came out. (Like 16bit sound.)
Paul
I have been suckered so much by all the different "stories" that I find
this one to be very hard to believe.
In reality, I believe C= is much more conservative.
"If you're feeling good,
don't worry, you'll get over it." ***Sensor***
Pay no attention to it. It's all fake.
Steve
It's a April fools joke that has been making the rounds.
Richard -> via the Amiga 1000 AutoPilot
Tom,
Hey, did I mention that I saw both Santa Claus and the Easter Bunny this
year? And, got a glimpse of Elijah at a Passover seder, too…:)
//Jonathan,
\\//via AutoPilot
There's quite a few reasons I'm convinced this is a hoax.
1. Commodore is unlikley to use an 040 to control I/O. It's overkill and
they've already got chips that are designed to perform this function.
2. If it's been tested with Kickstart 1.2 they must have booted the
machine from a floppy. 1.2 doesn't support autobooting from a hard drive.
3. A 512 color pallet. That's 9 bits. More likley they'd go with 12 bit
(4096 colors) or 16 bit (64000 colors)
4. A screen res of 4096 by 4096? The highest resolution monitor I've ever
heard of is 2048 by 2048 and it's WAY more expensive than a complete 4000
system with monitor.
5. 32 million colors? Not likley! True color is 16 million color and most
high end graphics machines have 24 bit color (16m color) and 8 bits alpha
channel (256 level transparency)
6. They're going to give you all these wonderful features and then they'er
going to stick you with a 210 MB hard drive. Not likley.
7. Eight zorro 3 slots and 3 inline IBM slots. Be a MIGHTY tight fit into
a case the size of a 2000.
8. If CBM was going to build this machine it would be geared towards the
professional graphics market and it would have and etherenet port built
in.
9. $3495? Give me a break! Try and buy a 4000 with 16 megs of ram and a
CD-ROM for that price.
9.5 Commodore would NEVER sell a machine with an AMAX included. They
couldn't get the QuickDraw roms in quantity. If they could get the roms
Apple's lawyers would have them in court till the machine was obsolete.
Also, NO emulator is 100% compatable with all known software. You'd be
REAL lucky to get 80%.
10. If Commodore officialy confirmed this machine they'd NEVER sell
another 4000.
This HOAX would have been believable if the author hadn't gotten so
carried away. It's like telling people you've written a program that will
do ray tracing at 30 frames/second on a stock 500.
Kind of a nice fantasy though. :^)
Jeff,
Why do messages like this exist?
I mean, if I wrote the following:
" Chevy is coming out with a new model, this year, called the Megacar. It uses
a 16 cylinder, 64 valve engine with an 8 liter displacement, and still gets 85
miles to the gallon, highway! Top speed is 225 mph, with a 0-60 of 2.5
seconds. Most interesting accessory is the in-dash coffee maker, nicely tucked
away so it doesn't interfere with the gear shift…all this, and more, for
$12,000! And yes, Chevrolet has confirmed the Megacar, so you know its true."
Retarded…
Hooey! Obviously written by a 12 year old. It must be that time of year
again. Listen to the address at the NY WOA show by Lou E. again and check
the facts on devices like the 68060.
Goin' AP
…..Mark Sterling
How can we listen to the address? It's over. I for one have missed it
and have been agitating for someone to upload a transcript, but no one
has. Do you have one?
Paul
I have watched a tape of the address made by a friend that was there.
Sorry but I don't have a transcript. If you REALLY want it I could ask my
friend to make a copy (VHS, SVHS, Hi8 or 8mm) and send it to you. Just
cover the cost of tape and mailing. Maybe $10 for VHS.
Goin' AP
…..Mark Sterling
Well, my VCR is broken. (3 days after the warrenty expired!) So no
thanks, but thanks for the offer!
Paul
Maybe a transcript will show up somewhere. Too bad about the VCR.
Goin' AP
…..Mark Sterling