#Scala Saves Time
28 messages in this thread
I don't understand how a program can be more powerful and perform less at the
same time.
Bart Van Bockstaele at 100574.2352@compuserve.com
… On AutoPilot and Amiga all the way from Belgium …
Bart,
"I don't understand how a program can be more powerful and perform less at the
same time."
I have 10 years of PC and Amiga experience. Here's the deal…
The PC has better business software because corporate buyers demand it. It's a
matter of survival in the market. The company I work for uses Word 6 and Excel
5, running on a 486 or better, on every desktop. Because the PC's basic
architecture is shot full of silly limitations, it has spurred an intense
hardware development program that results in you and I being able to walk into
any electronics store and walk out with a 100 MIPS PC. This is significant
because the single tasking DOS/WIndows OS allows an application to *almost*
take over the machine and use most of those 100 MIPS for itself. So
feature-for-feature, it tends to be faster.
The Amiga has a much more efficient basic architecture and OS. But hardware
shortcomings by Commodore and Motorola have left the Amiga a generation behind
the PC in CPU technology. The fastest Amiga ever made is roughly equivalent to
a 486-50. No slouch, but about 1/4 the power of the fastest PC's today.
Furthermore, Commodore never met a 7-MHz 68000 they didn't love; they stuck
with that level of CPU power far too long (about 1 MIPS max). Additionally,
that pre-emptive multitasking OS that we all love costs in application speed,
because the application can't hog the CPU. Programs that managed to hog the
Amiga's CPU died an early death, because users rightly felt they were the
result of sloppy programming. Incidently, this issue is now present in the PC
market as developers find that their first 32-bit NT-compatible applications
run *slower* than their 16-bit equivalent under ordinary Windows.
Bottom line is if you put equivalent machines side by side, say, an Amiga
4000/040-33 and a 486DX2-50 PC running DOS/Windows; then ran equivalent
software, you would see the PC apps running faster. But over a long period of
time, say a full day to a week, you would probably see the Amiga user *working*
faster because the machine doesn't get in the way like the PC does. Under
DOS/Windows, my 486-66 (about 40 MIPS) uses 100% of its CPU power to format a
floppy!
Take care.
Tab Trepagnier
Cruising on AutoPilot from Beaumont, Texas
Tab,
Thanks for the message. I can only totally agree.
>>But over a long period of time, say a full day to a week, you would probably
see the Amiga user *working* faster because the machine doesn't get in the way
like the PC does.<<
That's *very* well said, I think. It's really what I experience all the time.
In my classroom I have 5 pc's and 1 Amiga and indeed I perform better on that
one Amiga than on those five pc's.
However, my original question still stands. How can someone say that a program
can be more powerful than another and yet perform less?
A human can be very capable and yet perform badly because he is lazy. But in
computers?….
Bart Van Bockstaele at 100574.2352@compuserve.com
… On AutoPilot and Amiga all the way from Belgium …
Bart-
It has to do with features. Microsoft Word has many more features than any
Amiga word processor, but it's so buggy that its effective performance isn't as
good as you might expect.
Mr. Zombie
Paul,
I know that. The trouble is that my clients don't like to hear that. To them,
more powerful means faster and more features means more functions.
Bart Van Bockstaele at 100574.2352@compuserve.com
… On AutoPilot and Amiga all the way from Belgium …
Paul,
>Microsoft Word has many more features than any Amiga word processor, but it's
so buggy that its effective performance isn't as good as >you might expect.
Have to disagree with you there! Microsoft is doing a remarkable job of
providing maintenance release of Word 6.0 of Windows. Last I heard, the latest
version now has only 2000 bugs vs 3000 when it was released. ;-}
Regards,
John Chang
John, you always manage to brighten my day! <BG> But tell me then, why is
Word the official mandatory word processor of Scala?
Mr. Zombie
Paul,
Glad to know someone else enjoys my humor… don't everyone clap at once! 😉
>But tell me then, why is Word the official mandatory word processor of Scala?
I haven't the foggiest notion why it is the standard word processor for the
Scala offices. We are, however, looking at other solutions, including Novell's
Perfect Office.
Regards,
John Chang
BVB <<However, my original question still stands. How can someone say that a
program can be more powerful than another and yet perform less?>>
I'll give it a try, however, I haven't been following the thread. I don't know
if you/him/they were talking about a specific program.
It all depends on how you define power: speed, features, versatility, or by
some other standard.
For example you could have a WordProcessing program capable of loading and
saving a file in *any* other WP's format, yet unable to its own spellchecking.
A different WP might be able to save & load only its own format, but offers
as-you-type spellchecking at 600 words per minute in seven languages.
To the editor of a small magazine or newsletter, the ability to take almost any
article submitted to him, load it into his own WP, then save in the 'proper'
format is a POWERFUL feature.
To the person at home writing the article, the spellchecker is the more
POWERFUL feature.
The same can be said for speed as a feature of a program. If the design of the
as-you-type spellchecking feature limits a speed typist to 20 words a minute,
then the typist does not see a powerful feature — reguardless of the fact that
the spellchecker can recognize 1,230,232 words.
The typist might see a different WP as having more power. The new WP can't
speedcheck as they type, but offers faster respond than the other WP could
(even after its spellchecker was off.)
Finally, a program can have the power of hundreds of features, but not have a
single feature that is powerful at what *it* does.
Ron.
I agree. I become more and more convinced that the word “powerful'' is wind,
just an empty and meaningless word when used without a precise context.
Bart Van Bockstaele at 100574.2352@compuserve.com
… On AutoPilot and Amiga all the way from Belgium …
Bart –
> In my classroom I have 5 pc's and 1 Amiga and indeed I perform better
> on that one Amiga than on those five pc's.
Ah! Microsoft multitasking!
jsaklad@welchlink.welch.jhu.edu . . JimDoc, on AutoPilot
>>Ah! Microsoft multitasking!<<
Better still: Multi-processing *and* parallel processing!
Bart Van Bockstaele at 100574.2352@compuserve.com
… On AutoPilot and Amiga all the way from Belgium …
> The Amiga has a much more efficient basic architecture and OS.
BASIC sucks on any machine.
dale@iam.com http://www.iam.com
Intangible Assets Manufacturing
>>BASIC sucks on any machine.
Dave you mean to tell me you did not code in BASIC while working at C=?
I though you guys used Amiga BASIC to prototype the OS?
🙂
Dale,
" > The Amiga has a much more efficient basic architecture and OS.
BASIC sucks on any machine."
What in the world are you talking about?
If I meant "BASIC" I would have spelled it so.
Jeez.
Tab Trepagnier
Cruising on AutoPilot from Beaumont, Texas
Making a joke. Sorry I have no sense of humor.
dale@iam.com http://www.iam.com
Intangible Assets Manufacturing
Dale,
>Making a joke. Sorry I have no sense of humor.
Oh, you have a sense of humor indeed! Just a SICK, SICK, SICK ONE! 😉
Regards,
John Chang
> Under DOS/Windows, my 486-66 (about 40 MIPS) uses 100% of its CPU
> power to format a floppy!
Get Warped!
dale@iam.com http://www.iam.com
Intangible Assets Manufacturing
Dale,
" > Under DOS/Windows, my 486-66 (about 40 MIPS) uses 100% of its CPU
> power to format a floppy!
Get Warped!"
No. I intend to get NT'ed.
I *personally* believe that OS/2 has no future.
Tab Trepagnier
Cruising on AutoPilot from Beaumont, Texas
"I *personally* believe that OS/2 has no future."
And you think NT does on the desktop? Servers and workstation versions I can
understand, but no way on the desktop.
NT won't kill OS/2 nearly so much as Win96 will. Have you seen screenshots of
Win95, or the beta? It looks incredibly like OS/2. Even my 11 year old
brother, who's never used any of them, or any GUI, spontaneously commented on
this.
Mr. Zombie
I was at the local CompUSA trying to get a tech job yesterday and the tech
manager let me play with the final beta version of WinEver. Not as bad as I
thought it would be, and it smacks of OS/2 in some parts, like having property
management accessed by the RMB and having a small icon of the opened
folder/hard drive/program in the top left hand corner. New wonderful
innovation from MS…
// Christian – AP 1.80
\X/ Only Amiga Makes It Possible
Yah, well, MS never made a buck innovating.
Mr. Zombie
Ain't that the truth? <g>
// Christian – AutoPilot 1.80
\X/
>>Bottom line is if you put equivalent machines side by side, say, an Amiga
4000/040-33 and a 486DX2-50 PC running DOS/Windows; then ran equivalent
software, you would see the PC apps running faster.<<
The equivalent software part is the rub. While Amiga software isn't exactly
perfect–though I think developers do admirable jobs given the resources they
have–it tends to be more efficient at what it does than, say, Windoze
software.
Mr. Zombie
Bart,
>I don't understand how a program can be more powerful and perform less at the
same time.
Ah, you must be talking about Microsoft Windows then? ;-}
Regards,
John Chang
>>Ah, you must be talking about Microsoft Windows then? ;-}<<
You are clairvoyant!<g>
Bart Van Bockstaele at 100574.2352@compuserve.com
… On AutoPilot and Amiga all the way from Belgium …