@database "ar116.guide" @Node MAIN "Amiga Report 1.16, July 9, 1993" @{" Open Magazine " link menu} _ ____ ___ ______ _______ _ d# ####b g#00 `N##0" _agN#0P0N# d# d## jN## j##F J## _dN0" " d## .#]## _P ##L jN##F ### g#0" .#]## dE_j## # 0## jF ##F j##F j##' ______ dE_j## .0"""N## d" ##L0 ##F 0## 0## "9##F" .0"""5## .dF' ]## jF ##0 ##F ##F `##k d## .dF' j## .g#_ _j##___g#__ ]N _j##L_ _d##L_ `#Nh___g#N' .g#_ _j##__ """"" """"""""""" " """""" """""" """"""" """"" """""" ###### ###### ###### ###### ###### ######## ## ## ## ## ## ## ## ## ## ## ## ## ## ## ## ## ## ## ## ## ## #### ## ## ## #### ## ## ## #### ## ## ## ## ## ## ## ## ## ## ## ### ###### ## ###### ## ### ## International Online Magazine July 9, 1993 No. 1.16 /////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////// From STR Publishing [S]ilicon [T]imes [R]eport @endnode @node P2-1 "For Starters" @toc "menu" ----------------------------------------- * NOVA BBS * Amiga Report Headquarters * Running Starnet BBS * Wayne Stonecipher, Sysop FidoNet 1:362/508 An Amiga Software Distribution Site (ADS) 615-472-9748 Supra V.32bis 24hrs - 7 days Cleveland, Tennessee ------------------------------------------ * IN THE MEANTIME BBS * Official Amiga Report Distribution Site * Running Starnet BBS * Robert Niles, Sysop FidoNet 1:3407/104 509-966-3828 Supra V.32bis 24hrs - 7 days Yakima, Washington ------------------------------------------ * CLOUD'S CORNER BBS * Official Amiga Report Distribution Site Starnet/MebbsNet Support Site West Coast USA * Running Starnet BBS * Larry Cloud, Sysop FidoNet 1:350/30 206-377-4290 USR HST DS 24hrs - 7 days Bremerton, Washington ------------------------------------------ * BIOSMATICA BBS * Official Amiga Report Distribution Site -- Portugal * Running Excelsior/Trapdoor/UUCP * Celso Martinho, Sysop FidoNet 2:361/9 +351-34-382320 V.32bis 24hrs - 7 days ------------------------------------------ Amiga Report can be FREQ'd each week from the systems listed above. Use the filename AR.LHA and you will always get the latest issue. ------------------------------------------ * LAHO BBS * Official Amiga Report Distribution Site -- Finland * Running MBBS * Juha Makinen, Sysop +358-64-414 1516, V.32/HST V.42bis/MNP 414 0400, V.32 MNP 414 6800, V.32 MNP 423 1300, V.32 MNP Seinajoki, Finland ------------------------------------------ @endnode ___________________________________________________________________________ /// 07/09/93 Amiga Report 1.16 "Your Weekly Source for Amiga Information" -------------------------- · The Editor's Desk · CPU Report · New Products · Dealer Directory · AR Online · AR Confidential · Send in the Clones · Rendered Reality · SHI Q & A · GVP I/O Extender · CDTV · Reader Ramblings » Shareholder Movement UPDATE! « » New Amiga CD32 Game Console??? « =========================================================================== Amiga Report International Online Magazine "Your Weekly Source for Amiga Information" » FEATURING WEEKLY « Accurate UP-TO-DATE News and Information Current Events, Original Articles, Tips, Rumors, and Information Hardware · Software · Corporate · R & D · Imports =========================================================================== PORTAL · DELPHI · FIDO · INTERNET · BIX · NVN =========================================================================== @node P1-1 "From the Editor's Desk" @toc "menu" /// From the Editor's Desk "Saying it like it is!" ---------------------- There are a lot of rumors flying about Commodore's CD32 game console. No confirmed information exists that we know of, but we have included a press release in German later in the issue that has some interesting details. I was unable to get it translated in time for publication, so you'll have to fend for yourselves in that respect. If somebody out there wouldn't mind sending me a translated copy, I'll run that next week. The big question about this new game console is, "Will Commodore market it properly?" I hope so. If not, it'll die just like Atari's Lynx color portable video game system. If people don't know it exists, they won't buy it. Also, Atari's Jaguar system will literally blow the CD32 into the weeds if it makes it out at the projected price of $200 (compared to $400 for the CD32). The Jaguar is a 64-bit RISC system with a DSP, compared to a 68020 at 14 MHz and AGA for the CD32. Hmmm... While the CD32 will easily compare to the 3DO and Sega CD, it can't hope to compete on even ground with the Jaguar, should it be successful. We've added yet another distribution site -- this time in Portugal. Much thanks to Sysop Celso Martinho. We hope to add distribution sites soon in Germany and the UK, as well as other countries. If you are a BBS sysop in these areas, have an internet address and would like to be a distribution site, please send me Email. That's it for now. See ya next week! Rob @ Amiga Report @endnode ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ @node P2-2 "AR Staff" @toc "menu" The Amiga Report Staff Dedicated to serving you! ====================== Editor in Chief =============== Robert Glover Portal: Rob-G Delphi: ROB_G FidoNet: 1:362/508.6 Internet: ROB_G@Delphi.COM Associate Editors ================= Technical Department -------------------- Micah Thompson Robert Niles Portal: Coming Soon! RNiles Delphi: RNILES FidoNet: 1:3407/104 Internet: BOOMER.T@genie.geis.com RNILES@Delphi.COM Graphics Department ------------------- Mike Troxell Portal: Coming Soon! FidoNet: 1:362/508 Contributing Department ----------------------- Tom Mulcahy Portal: Coming Soon! Delphi: 16BITTER BIX: HELMET FidoNet: 1:260/322 Internet: 16BITTER@Delphi.COM ________________________________________ Contributing Correspondents =========================== Marcus Albers Michael Arends J.P. Hillenberg Joe Jernigan PC DIVISION ATARI DIVISION MAC DIVISION =========== ============== ============ Roger D. Stevens Ralph F. Mariano R. Albritton @endnode ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ @node P1-2 "CPU Status Report" @toc "menu" /// CPU Status Report Late Breaking Industry-Wide News ----------------- PIONEER CREATES MULTIMEDIA SOFTWARE DEVELOPMENT GROUP TOKYO, JAPAN -- Japan's major audio visual product maker Pioneer has set up a group to create multimedia software for its latest interactive laser disk player. The group is called "Multimedia Creators Network" and it consists of noted computer graphics designers, musicians and motion picture writers. This group aims to create software for Pioneer's new multimedia device called Laser Active. The group's office will be located at Studio Garage, which is an unique software facility in Tokyo. Major Japanese advertising agency Dentsu and Los Angeles-based Magic Box Productions will also participate in this group. It is expected that these participating members will develop educational or entertainment software for adults. The Laser Active is a hybrid machine based on Pioneer's laser disk player. Besides regular laser disks, the device supports karaoke laser disks and game disks. These features were added to the laser disk player in cooperation with Sega Enterprises and NEC Home Electronics. With ROM packages, the user will be able to play NEC and Sega game programs on this laser disk player. The actual release of Laser Active is scheduled to be August 20. The retail price of Laser Active is 89,800 yen ($820). ROM packages for Sega and NEC game software costs 39,000 yen ($350) each. One game software cartridge costs about 10,000 yen ($90). ------------------------------ PHIBER OPTIK PLEADS GUILTY NEW YORK -- Mark Abene, better known throughout the computer world by the hacker handle "Phiber Optik," plead guilty on July 2 in Federal Court to felony charges of conspiracy and unauthorized access to computers. Abene had been due to go to trial on these counts today. The plea by Abene, entered before Judge Louis Stanton in the Southern District of New York, admitted intrusion into computers owned by NYNEX, BellSouth, and Southwestern Bell. In his statement, Abene said that he had, in his actions, "never tried to damage any computer systems and, to my knowledge, I never have." In the course of the proceedings, Judge Stanton asked Abene a series of questions including: whether he understood the charges; whether he realized that, by pleading guilty to felony charges, he was exposing himself to possible loss of civil liberties such as the right to vote, sit on jury or hold public office; whether he realized that he could face a maximum sentence of 10 years imprisonment and a maximum fine of $500,000; whether he understood that he could be required to make restitution for damages; and whether he was satisfied that he had received adequate legal counsel. He replied yes to all the above, but no to the question of whether he had been threatened or coerced by the United States Attorney's office to change his plea. Following the questioning, the judge asked Abene to say what he did. Abene responded by admitting that he had conspired with others to gain access to various computer systems, including those belonging NYNEX, BellSouth and Southwestern Bell; he had intercepted data on networks belonging to British Telcom and Tymnet; and that he had misrepresented himself to employees of phone companies to gain access to their systems. It was during these admissions that Abene said that he had never, to his knowledge, damaged any systems. At the end of Abene's statement, Assistant US Attorney Fishbein stated that Abene had fraudulently used computer accounts at New York University to access the remote computer systems. When asked by the judge to confirm Fishbein's assertion, Abene did. Judge Stanton then stated, "Mr. Abene is fully competent to make an informed plea in this case. He is knowledgeable of the charges against him and is aware of the possible consequences. I accept his guilty pleas." Judge Stanton then set sentencing for 9:30AM Wednesday, November 3rd. He asked Abene's attorney, Paul Ruskin, to insure that he do everything possible to cooperate with the probation staff in its development of a background of Abene for the sentencing procedure. Abene was then released on his own recognizance. Abene, together with Elias Ladopoulpos, a/k/a "Acid Phreak;" Paul Stira, "Scorpion;" John Lee, "Corrupt;" and "Julio Fernandez, "Outlaw," were indicted on July 8, 1992. Ladopulous, Stira, Lee, and Fernandez previously plead guilty to charges relating to the indictment. Lee, the only one sentenced to date, has received a year and a day. Stira and Ladopoulos are scheduled for sentencing on July 23. In a prepared statement after court adjournment, United States Attorney Mary Jo White said that the investigation leading to the indictment was performed jointly by the United Secret Service and the Federal Bureau of Investigation. She praised both the Secret Service and FBI and thanked the Department of Justice Computer Crime Unit for "their important assistance in the investigation." Ruskin, Abene's attorney, told Newsbytes, "My personal opinion is that Mark has outgrown the phase in his life in which he performed the activities to which he confessed. He wants to use his considerable computer talents in manners that will be productive to society." Fishbein told Newsbytes, "The government is satisfied with the successful end to an important case. We hope that other people involved in illegal computer activities recognize that the Federal Government takes these cases very seriously." ------------------------------ APPLE LAYOFFS HIGHER THAN EXPECTED CUPERTINO, CALIFORNIA -- Rumors fed by a New York Times article last week hinted Apple Computer would lay off as much as ten percent of its work force, but the official announcement of layoffs at Apple is worse than expected. The company publicly announced fifteen percent, or nearly 2,500 of the company's 16,000 employees, will be getting their pink slips. Most of the layoffs will occur this month, according to Apple which is calling the move part of its "re-engineering" effort planned for the next twelve months. Apple says the restructuring will be company-wide and aimed at accelerating revenue. In June, Apple said stockholders could expect lower earnings for the second half of its current fiscal year due to profit-cutting price wars. Intense pressure from the IBM and compatible personal computer (PC) industry has finally caught up with Apple, according to analysts. The two main pressure points are the success of graphical Microsoft Windows 3.1 and the PC price wars. This is not the first time Apple Computer has announced layoffs. However, this is the largest layoff the company has announced to date. In May of 1991 Apple laid off ten percent of its work force, or nearly 1500 employees. At that time, some employees set up a protest outside Apple and read excerpts from Apple Chief Executive Officer (CEO) John Sculley's book "Odyssey." Sculley said in his book that companies owe it to their employees to make "work" a rewarding experience and that corporate strategy should not be driven by the need to improve quarterly earnings. In the company's current dilemma, Sculley suggested Apple Computer was for sale last month when he mentioned to various publications his suggestion to IBM that it should buy Apple. Talks about a possible purchase of the company by American Telephone & Telegraph (AT&T) have been hinted, but no official announcement or even a confirmation of the talks has been forthcoming from either company. Sculley stepped down as CEO in June as well, and former Chief Operating Officer (COO) Michael Spindler took the CEO slot. Industry analysts have said if things were really, really bad at Apple, the company's board of directors would have put Sculley out entirely, but some speculation suggests such a drastic move would alarm stockholders. Sculley's responsibilities currently include travel in the search for new technology opportunities for Apple. There is a report by the San Jose Mercury News which suggests that Sculley may not return to Apple after his sabbatical ends in August. The wait now is for the company's second quarter earnings statement, expected in the middle of this month. The stock market appears to approve of Apple's layoff move as the company's stock was up in morning trading. Apple's stock has dropped one-third in value overall since the beginning of the year, to close Friday, July 2, 1993 at thirty-eight. Many analysts, however, including those at California Technology Stock Letter, are seeing Apple's stock drop as an opportunity for investors. Confidence in the company is high, they say, and they are urging their readers to buy as much of the stock as they can. The restructuring charges incurred by the current round of layoffs will not be seen until the third quarter earnings statement, Apple added. The preceding stories are © 1993 NewsBytes. Reprinted with permission. __________________________________________________ HP SCANJET IIC IS LATEST COLOR SCANNER TO GAIN DIRECT ADPRO SUPPORT The popular HP ScanJet IIc is the latest flatbed color scanner to gain direct support from within ASDG's Art Department Professional and MorphPlus. The driver carries a suggested list price of $200 and requires a Commodore compatible SCSI controller with an external connection. The ScanJet IIc is the first SCSI scanner to be supported by ASDG. Its user interface operates identically to ASDG's driver for the parallel port based EPSON scanner family, and the GPIB and serial port based Sharp scanner family. As with the other scanners which ASDG supports, two versions of the driver are included. The first integrates the ScanJet IIc directly into ASDG's Art Department Professional. Asking ADPro to ``load'' from the scanner brings up the driver's WYSIWYG graphical user interface which has been carefully designed to make scanning for print and video applications easy. For example, it allows the video user to specify a region to be scanned in terms of pixels, while a print oriented user can specify a region based upon physical area. The user interface also allows picture aspect to be locked allowing a physical space on a page or specific screen size to be quickly and easily matched. When running on AGA equipped Amigas, such as the A4000/040 and A4000/030, all previews are displayed in 256 shades of gray for near photo-realism. Also provided is a stand-alone version of the driver which provides the same user interface but scans directly to disk. This allows the maximum scanning size to exceed available memory. Since this version of the driver is stand-alone, Art Department Professional is not required to make use of this product. The driver carries a suggested list price of $200 and requires a SCSI disk controller (with an external connector) which is 100 percent compatible with Commodore's SCSI Direct standard. To learn more about any of ASDG's award winning color imaging products, contact Ms. Gina Cerniglia at ASDG Incorporated, 925 Stewart Street, Madison WI, 53713 or call (608) 273 6585. Art Department Professional is a registered trademark of ASDG Incorporated. Other trademarks or registered trademarks are the property of their respective holders. ------------------------------ ASDG UPGRADES AWARD WINNING CygnusEd PROFESSIONAL CygnusEd Professional, the text editor for Amiga programmers and writers, has been upgraded to release 3.0. The new release, several years in the making, offers complete Workbench 2.0 and 3.0 compatibility, support for multiple languages, and many new features and improvements. CED's power, speed, and flexibility earned it the 1992 Amazing Computing Reader's Choice Award for Best Text Editor even though, at that time, CED had not been upgraded in over two years. The wait for a new CygnusEd is finally over. ASDG is pleased to announce that the original author of CygnusEd Professional, Mr. Bruce Dawson, has joined the full-time staff of ASDG and has produced release 3.0 of one of the most popular text editors ever released for the Amiga personal computer. Release 3.0 offers many new features and improvements. These include: full compatibility with Workbench 2.0 and 3.0 with CED's now-famous lightening fast scrolling and text rendering on any AGA screen; multiple concurrent CEDs can be launched in separate windows or screens; a full featured macro editor is supplied; the system clipboard is used for block operations allowing blocks to be shared with other programs; and search and replace strings offer ``history'' so that they can remember previous values. And, owing to CED's incredible following overseas, Release 3.0 is locale.library compatible, which means it can present its user interface in multiple languages. In addition to English, a localized text set for Germany will be provided initially. Also of note is Release 3.0's upgraded manual which has been substantially enhanced and re-typeset for increased quality. CED Release 3.0 carries a suggested list price of $119.95. Owners of previous versions of CygnusEd can upgrade to the new release for $30 plus $5 shipping in the United States. If you reside outside the United States, please add $15 for shipping. To upgrade, send a check and your original disk to ASDG. If you cannot locate your original disk, contact ASDG to make other arrangements. To learn more about CygnusEd Professional Release 3.0 or any of ASDG's other award winning products, contact Ms. Gina Cerniglia at ASDG Incorporated, 925 Stewart Street, Madison, WI, 53713 or call (608) 273 6585. All trademarks or registered trademarks are the property of their respective holders. ------------------------------ GVP MAINTAINS AMIGA VITALITY WITH NEW ImageFX GVP has announced the imminent release of a major upgrade to their image processing package, ImageFX. ImageFX has now been further enhanced to meet the changing demands of photographers, graphic artists, animators, educators, scientists, and hobbyists. Highlights of this comprehensive upgrade include faster global operation, multilevel UNDO, macro recording, and aspect lock. In addition, users can expect improved real-time feedback for all painting tools, new drawing tools, and more crazy effects. Moreover, there are dozens of new loader & saver modules, extended support for the new Epson 600 & 800 series scanners, plus Framegrabbers like the VLAB and PP&S 256. In an effort to stretch compatibility, ImageFX 1.5 now directly supports the Opalvision and Retina display boards. Finally, ImageFX 1.5 pushes the envelope of print quality to the limit, as further enhancements were made to the already-excellent output routines. If that weren't enough, the accompanying version 1.5 manual addendum provides clear explanations of changes and features, plus many existing chapters have been expanded and revised, making ImageFX 1.5 incredibly easy to use. These are just some of the changes made to the program that embodies its slogan, "Truly Integrated Image Processing." As a tribute to integration, Byrd's Eye Software* , makers of the ToasterVision package for the, Video Toaster have announced ToasterFX; an ingenious compliment to ImageFX, allowing it to load, save, and display directly to & from the Toaster with professional ease! Furthermore, ToasterFX modules allow ImageFX to preview and paint within the Toaster as well. Great Valley Products continues to support their "power to the people" approach by offering this new version to registered users at only $29.95. Version 1.5 is anticipated to ship beginning July 15, 1993. More information will be provided as it becomes available. * For more information on ToasterFX, contact Byrd's Eye Software at (512) 835 4811. ------------------------------ TERRA NOVA DEVELOPMENT RELEASES "DINER" OBJECT SET FOR IMAGINE Terra Nova Development of Ventura, California has released Volume One of its Designer Objects series of 3D models. This first volume, "DINER", is a three disk set of objects for Impulse, Inc.'s Imagine software for Amiga computers. The Diner set includes a variety of objects that together build a complete diner of the early 1950's, including a jukebox, counter, booths, a pay telephone, dishes, cups, silverware, and other items for place settings. In many cases there are both `hi-res' and `lo-res' versions versions of objects so that artists can optimize their scenes for either image quality or speedy rendering. In addition to the objects and image maps there are two Imagine projects on the disks. One, with scenes that can be rendered on five megabyte systems, offers fairly simple scenes; the other features more complex scenes that require up to fourteen megabytes to render. A manual is included. The Designer Objects series is intended to showcase the talents of gifted 3D artists by making available affordable collections of their 3D objects. The Diner objects were created by award-winning computer artist Bradley W. Schenck, whose work should be familiar to the Amiga community through articles and artworks including wins in the BADGE Killer Demo Contests of 1988 and 1989. Terra Nova Development, based on the California coast, is a ground-breaking multimedia development company hard at work on entertainment and application titles for several computer platforms. Terra Nova Development P. O. Box 2202 Ventura, California 93002 Price for the set is $47.50 US. Direct sales orders from California should include $3.44 sales tax. Orders accepted with money order, check or cashier's check in US funds. ------------------------------ ANNOUNCING ______ __ / ____/ _/ /_ / /___ ______ ______ / __/ /___ // __ // __ / / / ___/ // /_/ // /_/ / / /_ /_____// ____//_____/ /___/ / / /_/ FidoNet tosser/editor for all Amiga points (with WB 2.0+) (C) 1993 Nico Francois To quote Roger Nordin (ANet Test Bench) -- having just tried one of the early betas: "The program does look *very* impressive. I'd say it blows away everything else on the market today, no kidding." Feature list: * Requires Kickstart 2.04 or higher. * Supports new 3.0 features (newlook menus, memory pools,...). * Fully localized (Workbench 2.1 or higher). * Style Guide compliant. * Supports all current and future monitor modes. * Completely font-sensitive, user may select which fonts to use. * Keyboard shortcuts for most menus and gadgets. * All settings can be easily changed from within Spot. * Fast importing/exporting. * Automatically creates new areas for you, no tedious work. * Special fast message base format with only a few files per area. * Optional - fully transparent - message base crunching. * Message list with powerful functions (e.g. search body text). * Message thread linking based on subject and MSGID kludge. * Excellent support for multiple character sets (LATIN-1, IBM,...). * Built-in, fully asynchronous, Fido file request. * Multi-bossing and multi-domain capable. * Nodelist support (traplist.library). * Userlist editor. Every domain has its own userlist. * ARexx port. * Clock (Some of these features are only available in the registered version) Spot has been tested on nearly every Amiga model, including an A500 and an A4000/040. A harddisk and at least 1MB of RAM are strongly recommended. At least Workbench 2.0 is required, Workbench 2.1 or 3.0 for locale support. Spot will be released Saturday 3rd of July 1993. It will be available for file request from Great Balls Of Fire BBS (2:292/603@FidoNet): GBOF Line #1 - +32-16-640912 (V32b, ZyX 16k8, V42b - min 14k4) GBOF Line #2 - +32-16-640099 (V32b, V42b) The evaluation version will be freqqable under the magic filename of 'SPOT'. File can be freqqed from midnight 0:00 CET and is around 300K large. Spot will also be hatched into ADS and will most probably arrive at a local BBS near you. Nico Francois Fido: 2:292/603.10 Email: nico@pandora.augfl.be @endnode ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ @node P1-3 "Online Weekly" @toc "menu" /// ONLINE WEEKLY Amiga Report Online The lines are buzzing! --------------------------------- From Skipper Smith on Fidonet's Amiga_Tech echo... For those people who saw my comment on the Quantum GO drive and the A1200 that I have but won't work together. I finally got in touch with someone at Quantum's technical support and I have been told that the problem is a firmware bug and if I send my drive back to them they will replace it with one that works. As the GO drive was the best $/MB (at the time, my primary interest- far more so than speed), I am happy to hear this and I will be happy to report the results of my returning the drive when I get it back. Skipper Smith Motorola Technical Training All opinions are my own and not necessarily those of my employer ------------------------------ From Flayberger on Bix... Thank you! I don't know who to personally thank, but a BIX user was kind enough to take my announcement about being laid off from Commodore and have it distributed in an Amiga Report. After seeing my request in the Amiga Report, an Amiga user in Philadelphia called me about an ad- vertisement he had seen in The Philadelphia Inquirer a few days earlier. Since it sounded good to me, he faxed me a copy of the ad. I responded and got the position :-) I started to work on Monday, 6/21/93 as the Multimedia Information Product Developer for NCR, an AT&T Company in Columbia, South Carolina. Thanks again to everyone who helped in my job search! @endnode ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ @node P1-4 "Sharholder Update" @toc "menu" /// Commodore Shareholder Movement Update! -------------------------------------- THE COMMODORE SHAREHOLDER MOVEMENT UPDATE 7/02/93 This article follows up on the announcement of the Commodore Shareholder Movement. Questions, offers and advice have been pouring in from around the world. In response, this article will briefly discuss our background, activities and plans. This should establish our credibility and demonstrate the viability of this movement. BACKGROUND The people behind this effort were present at the 1991 Commodore Share- holders' Meeting. A prominent Philadelphia attorney was thrown out of the meeting for raising a "point of order" that the meeting be moved to the United States where shareholders could attend. Another shareholder, who worked for Commodore, warned the Board of Directors of the crisis which is now occurring. Other people have since joined the movement including other shareholders and Commodore employees. Similar attempts at affecting Commodore management have failed in the past. But now, new SEC regulations have given shareholders new abilities. The rules which previously favored management now allow shareholders to vote for, or run as, individual board members that are not part of management's slate. It is also possible to acquire corporate shareholder lists. There are a total of 3700 shareholders. The latest Standard NYSE Stock Report shows that Irving Gould owns only 19% of Commodore's common stock. A total of 70 institutional investors account for 20.6% of ownership, according to the Nelson's Directory of Investment Research. According to the new laws, these institutional investors may vote. Further, the remaining 60.4% of Commodore shareholders may be reached through an official proxy campaign. That 81% majority of votes may unite to elect independent directors. The three year terms of both Irving Gould and Alexander Haig are up for reelection this year. ACTIVITIES We are talking with candidates for new directors. These people must have the necessary abilities and reputation to get elected. After elected, they must be able to serve in a contentious environment until the remaining directors are replaced. They will start to correct Commodore's problems and move forward. Until a candidate states to us their willingness to run, we will not discuss their names. But the important thing is that these candidates will not be part of management's slate. We are constantly writing letters, on the phone, and communicating by E-Mail with people adding their efforts to the movement. We are in correspondence with the SEC and Commodore's legal council. Currently, we await Commodore's response to our request for the by-laws and shareholder list. PLANS Our immediate strategy is to take advantage of the new SEC regulations, and make our movement as publicly known as possible. We hope to locate and join efforts with other shareholders by working with magazines, newspapers, and television. This public exposure should aid us in pressuring Commodore to supply their governing by-laws and shareholder list. In order to nominate and elect new directors, we will ultimately have to solicit proxy votes and attend the shareholder meeting. The meeting will be held some time in November, and proxies will come out some time in September. We are not currently asking for anyone to assign us their proxies. First, we must complete the proper filing procedures with the SEC. At that time, all Commodore shareholders will be informed of the new candidates for directors. Meanwhile, we are allowed to talk about our intentions, and lay the groundwork for popular support. PARTICIPATION Many people have asked how they might participate. It is not too late to buy stock (at your own risk). Every vote is important. But more im- portantly, help us reinforce our message to the media. Write about the Commodore Shareholder Movement to magazines and newspapers. Call talk radio shows. Help us make Commodore's situation into a news story. Talk about the company with the wonderful products and the destructive management. Talk about how the shareholders and users at long last are able to take the situation into their own hands. Watch for future announcements (including our mission statement), and keep sending us feedback. Internet address: MarcR@cup.portal.com Electronic Bulletin Board: (215) 551-6113, 1485, 1120, 1121 BBS Usernames: Mike Levin and Marc Rifkin Commodore Shareholder Movement P.O. Box 8296 Philadelphia, PA 19101 @endnode ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ @node P1-4-1 "Information from SHI" @toc "menu" /// Safe Hex International Important Update --------------------------------------- TO: ALL From: Michael Arends SHI RVC/West P.O. Box 1531 Lynnwood, WA 98046-1531 USA ------------------------------------------------------------------- ATTENTION: PROBLEM CONCERNING NEW VIRUSES It is becomming Apparent to SHI that we may be running into a problem, that is we are currently running into a sort of slump as far as people turning in new viruses. Now certain programmers are seemingly having no problem finding some new viruses, BUT is making it HARD for all the OTHER programmers by NOT sharing them. WE NEED YOUR HELP, we need you to send us as many AMIGA viruses as possible, PLEASE send them to EITHER of the SHI regional virus centers. Mark the disk * ATTENTION VIRUS * and state if you want a reply or not, we will try to get your disk back to you, BUT it is not guarenteed. After the disk is analyzed, the disk will be formatted and your name arkived in the trash if thats what you want, and we ALWAYS keep our promise. Thanks, Michael Arends Send your viruses to the following addresses.. SAFE HEX INTERNATIONAL Erik Loevendahl Soerensen Snaphanevej 10 4720 Praestoe Denmark Ph. + 45 55 99 25 12 Fax + 45 55 99 34 98 ---------------------------------------------------- Michael Arends PIONEERS BBS: SHI RVC/West P.O. Box 1531 (206) 775-7983 Lynnwood, WA. 98046-1531 USA ---------------------------------------------------- Jim Maciorowski Ground Zero BBS: SHI RVC/East (813) 849-4034 P.O. Box 724 (813) 845-4577 Port Richey, Florida (813) 934-9765 34673-0724 @endnode ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ @node P1-5 "FAQ about SHI" @toc "menu" /// Often-Asked Questions about SHI and Answers ------------------------------------------- By Michael Arends Q: How do I know you're not doing this for profit? A: I've tried going through the "legal channels" to make this an OFFICIAL non-profit organization, but the cost alone just to be established was outrageous. If you need real proof that I am doing this not for profit, contact Erik Soerensen or Lars Kristensen in Denmark. They have records of all moneys sent to them from the RVC's Q: Where is the PC Version of SUPERKILLERS? A: We have it! After a L-O-N-G time in the waiting, I finally have it. It's actually two disks: McAfee's AntiVirus and F-Prot AntiVirus. Q: When are the SHI projects going to happen, ie, a universal BBS killer? A: Some of the projects are happening as you read this. Example, I have already seen the "Bootblock.library" that's NOW being used in versions of X-Copy! Now if I can get SSI to have MAVERICK to use this same feature, we'll be rockin'! (By the way, this library detects 180 different bootblock viruses before copying disks!) As for other projects, we are looking for programmers. If you know of any good ones, please let us know! Q: Are software companies intentionally producing these viruses, so that they in turn can sell virus-killing programs at a huge profit? A: Perhaps....Most of the time it is done by someone who just wants to ruin your system. Other times it is poor programming by "hackers". Still other times it is "system glitches" and not a virus at all. This is why it is IMPORTANT to have the latest information on these things, and even MORE important to have the latest killers from a non-commercial center.In the long run, the ones who profit are YOU. Q: Why do the prices for SHI disks keep changing ? A: To try and get more people interested in the SHI-disks, while keeping the price at an agreeable setting. If disks aren't selling, drastic measures need to be taken. However, I feel that the prices set now (June 1, 1993) are fair prices (taking into accordance the price is established by Safe Hex Interntional) and will not change for some time. Q: What's the difference between ordering from you and ordering from Jim Maciorowski in Florida? A: Not a thing...but if you live closer to Florida, the length of time to get disks in the mail is decreased. I've had disks go to him that wouldn't reach him until a week or so after I mailed them! Q: Why isn't SUPERKILLERS available to download from the RVC BBS's? A: Good question. Let's take the Fred Fish library for example. A man compiles a disk, distributes it to subscribers, and within a week almost every major BBS has the disks. Then the users of those boards download it for free, and Fred Fish gets ZERO for the disk. The disks aren't spread ILLEGALLY, but the fact that too many people have access to them and don't get it from a source indicates leeching and poor computing. Q: But Fred Fish is a COMPILER, not a PROGRAMMER. Is SHI this way too? A: SHI is composed of several programmers. In essence,"SHI" and "Anti- Virus Programmers" are synonymous. SHI is NOT just a compiling organization. We collect new viruses and help the authors who are making the anti-virus programs and share the contributions that are sent to SHI. Don't think of us as another Fred Fish, although we have been quoted as being such. We work hard to keep your Amiga virus-free. Don't you think a few bucks is good preventative main- tenance from something that could destroy thousands of hours of work in mere seconds? Q: What future projects do you have in store for us in the USA? A: Jim Maciorowski has started a VSUM-like program that has the list of all known Amiga viruses and what they do. He has written an article that is in the July 1993 issue of Amigaworld magazine, and I am seeking other publications to contribute articles to. Such as AR (Amiga Report,hehehe),and Amazing Amiga computing. As for subscriptions, I will continue to analyze what prices are the most cost-effective and experiment until the end of this year. After January 1, 1994, bonus disks with subscriptions will no longer be included with orders from EITHER RVC made after that date. As always, I am open to suggestions... SAFE HEX INTERNATIONAL - THE COMPUTERS GREENPEACE Our organization "Safe Hex International", SHI, is a grass roots movement which started in 1990 with Amiga computers. Today we are an organization with around 600 members who are all more or less involved in our work. We now have 31 virus centres around the world which have free phone help lines,and where anyone can get the latest Shareware virus killers on disk. These disks have been translated into the relevant languages with all imaginable instructions. Even inexperienced users can immediately understand what to do. The price of these disks is now at $5 US, including disk and postage i.e. a price anyone can afford. These disks are updated approximately every 4 to 6 weeks,and contain programs which are generally better than the best commercial virus killers! Our organization or our "movement",I should say, does not have the formal structure one normally associates with clubs, associations and the like. We are a non-profit making organization which has a very specific aim, we try to make active efforts which, in many ways,resemble those of Greenpeace.The resemblance to Greenpeace is not just coincidental. Greenpeace works in the biological environment. The only difference with us, is that we work in the data environment. As always, if you are interested in contacting SAFE HEX INTERNATIONAL for ANY REASON, especially for virus information or ordering help.you can contact any of our worldwide Anti-virus centers. the address's to ALL our worldwide centers have been listed in "AMIGA REPORT 114" or you can just write us at the address below.. ----------------------------------------------------- Michael Arends PIONEERS BBS: SHI RVC/West P.O. Box 1531 (206) 775-7983 Lynnwood, WA. 98046-1531 USA ----------------------------------------------------- @endnode ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ @node P1-6 "GVP IO-Extender" @toc "menu" /// Usenet Review: GVP ioExtender ------------------------------ By J.P. Hillenburg (jph@anaconda.bloomington.in.us) PRODUCT NAME GVP ioExtender (With version 1.7 software) BRIEF DESCRIPTION The ioExtender is a Zorro II hardware product which expands your Amiga 1500, 2000, 3000, or 4000 by two serial ports, one parallel port, and one MIDI port, in an extensible manner. The ioExtender is capable of any speed from 1 to 614400 baud. It also is designed to work cleanly with the ports contained in the G-Force 040 accelerator. However, I was not able to test this. AUTHOR/COMPANY INFORMATION Name: Great Valley Products Address: 600 Clark Avenue King of Prussia, PA 19406 USA Telephone: (215) 337-8770 Facsimile: (215) 337-9922 LIST PRICE $149.00 (US), with mailorder prices ranging from $110 to $130. I paid $150, but in recent weeks the price seems to have dropped dramatically. SPECIAL HARDWARE AND SOFTWARE REQUIREMENTS HARDWARE Requires a Zorro II-capable Amiga. No extra RAM is required, but 1 megabyte minimum is my recommendation. Does not require a hard drive, but the documentation assumes that you are using one. Does not require any particular CPU. SOFTWARE None. COPY PROTECTION None. It's a Zorro II-based dongle. :) MACHINE USED FOR TESTING Model used: Amiga 3000 RAM: (Fast) 16 megabytes 70 nanosecond Static Column ZIPs (Chip) 2 megabytes 80 nanosecond DIPs Kickstart version 37.175 Workbench version 38.30 Tested with: Commodore MPS-1270 InkJet Printer SupraFAXModem V.32bis (ROM version 1.200H) Best Data 'Smart One' 2400X REVIEW I tested the ioExtender specifically with Terminus 1.926, AmigaUUCP 1.16D, DNet 2.10, GPFax 2.23, JR-Comm 1.02a, term 3.3, VLT 5.576, TrapDoor 1.80, TransAmiga BBS 1.1, and PrintManager 1.1. In the case of all of the above programs, I was able to merely set my serial device and go. Once the device was set, it was mechanically no different than using the internal port. However, there was a noticeable performance increase. CPU usage dropped drastically. Unfortunately, selecting the parallel port for printer use is not so clean. You have to use the supplied "GVPIOControl" program to intercept parallel.device calls and route them to gvppar.device. I do not blame this on GVP, but on Commodore, since selecting which hardware port printer.device uses isn't nearly as easy as selecting serial devices. Audio digitizers tend to hit the Amiga parallel port hardware directly; so this merely allows you to use the I/O Extender to drive the printer, while the digitizer goes along on its merry way, banging the internal parallel port. GVP supplies 1/3 of a disk full of support programs, including the driver program, a port-interceptor program, a serial preferences program, an interceptor-preferences program, a system-information program, and a program which even improves native Amiga serial.device performance. The "GVPSerial" preferences program closely resembles the AmigaDOS 2.1 preferences, except for a few changes required for the board's nature (e.g., selecting which particular port, and, if you have multiple ioExtenders and/or a G-Force 040, which board). The "GVPIOControl" program allows you to redirect the serial.device and parallel.device to the gvpser.device and gvppar.device, respectively. However, one should have to do this only with the parallel.device, as most properly written, modern programs allow you to select the serial device driver. The "GVPIO" program simply goes in SYS:Expansion, and is the basis for the software driver. The "GVPinfo" program provides general system information. It specifically recognizes the ioExtender, by full name. It also displays information customary to this type of program, such as particular chips, RAM information, etc. A similar program, Nic Wilson's "SysInfo", mistook the I/O Extender for a GVP Series II SCSI Board. Commodore's "ShowConfig" program identified the board as a generic hard-drive controller, but provided no specifics. The "GVPPatch" program breaks up DMA packets to allow better serial.device performance, which I assume would work for other devices as well. The board itself contains two very-high-speed DB9 serial ports, one DB23 parallel port, one MIDI sub-port, and one expansion port. The MIDI port is a 9-pin port which attaches to an optional MIDI-expansion box. This box gives you full MIDI-expansion capability, via one "In" connector, three "Out" connectors, and one "Thru" connector. The expansion port is an internal port directly on the board which allows later attachment of other I/O related devices. I have heard mumblings of Ethernet capability for this port. DOCUMENTATION Documentation is provided in a 44-page plastic-bound manual. It has instructions for board installation in the A2000 and A3000, but not for the A4000. It also has clear, concise information on the necessary software, but doesn't document the "GVPinfo" and "GVPPatch" programs. "GVPPatch" does come with on-disk documentation. The documentation provides application examples for JR-Comm and AmigaVision, but assumes that the user would know how to use these to other programs. (Not too difficult, however.) It provides information which I would deem appropriate for someone who is moderately versed in Amiga specifics. While not assuming the user is a "technogeek" who knows the machine up and down, it is not for the weak at heart either. LIKES AND DISLIKES I like the fact that the ioExtender provided a fast, cheap, addition to my system. It provided additional ports which I had needed. I dislike the fact that the card was about 1 millimeter too large for my A3000, requiring me to remove one of the beige clips which would normally hold the front of the card in place. This particular process is fairly easy, and involves prying the clip out of place with a screwdriver. COMPARISON TO OTHER SIMILAR PRODUCTS I have no real basis for comparison. However, I do wish it had the 7 serial ports as per the Commodore A2232. Those are only 19200 baud, however. You can't have everything. BUGS None found. VENDOR SUPPORT I have had no problems other than the clip removal, so have had no need to contact GVP. WARRANTY No conclusive warranty information given. I find this to be disturbing, but not a deterring factor, as I have not ever seen or heard of a problem with the board that a software upgrade did not fix. CONCLUSIONS I am happy with my ioExtender. It seems to perform well and as advertised. I give it a 4 out of 5, as I feel it should have installed cleanly without the requirement of removing the clip near the front of the machine. There is a lot of empty space on the board, and I believe the board could have been manufacturered to require a lot less space. @endnode ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ @node P1-7 "Playable Previews" @toc "menu" /// Game Demos: Which ones are worth it? ------------------------------------- By Robert Niles OK, all this is my own opinion (and that of my seven-year-old son) BUT here's a listing of what I figure to be our 5 most favorite playable previews within the "jump and run" style games (Contact appropriate companies on how to purchase the full game). I'll start with the least favorite of the 5 and work my way to the number one (which was not agreed upon between my son and I). These files (archived name in parenthesis) should be available on most BBSs and commercial online systems. All are available on @{"In The MeanTime" link P2-1}. #5 - Super Caldron (DCD-SUPC.DMS) Great graphics, no sound (on a 1MB Chip RAM machine, don't know if this will be different for those who have more RAM). But good original ideas!! You're a little Warlock who has this endless supply of stones to throw around...pick up a broom here and there and fly! ...but watch out for the buzzards!! #4 - RoboCod (ROBOCOD.LHA) A funny new twist, more of an exploration type jump and run, but plenty to do and lots of secret places to find. Your charactor is part robot, part fish running around, the second level is neat... never saw a fish jump so high!! #3 - Arabian Nights (ARABIAN.LHA) Arabian Nights - another with great graphics. Secret places, the bad guys, lots of "acid" lakes to jump over, and a small bit of detective work will get you through the first level, then you're off on a cart ride through some mines in a race against time to finish off this preview. #2 - Woody's World (WOODYW.DMS) Now you got this little guy, in in the true Super Mario fashion you can have this little guy change into some sort of King, who can finally throw some killer stars against the bad guys in the land. Lots of "secret" places to keep you going after it again and again! Great graphics! #1 - This one was tied.... Traps-n-Treasures (TRSI_TNT.DMS) REALLY good game, original ideas, some problem solving and LOTS to explore!! You gotta a guy (a pirate) to run around with, there are shops in which he can get more stuff to better his fighting and to increase his health. There is plenty of underwater swimming, as well as stuff on top for you land lubbers. The only disadvantage here is some of the stuff is in German, but this won't stop you from playing at all!! Avoid the pirates on top and the sea animals below and explore! Zool Demo (ZOOLDEMO.LHA) Well of course you have heard of this one. You're an ant on a high speed mission to get as much candy and junk as possible while avoiding all moving creatures...lots to do here!! AGA demo version is available also. @endnode *************************************************************************** @node P4-1 "Delphi" @toc "menu" /// Delphi: It's Getting Better All The Time! ------------------------------------------ Amiga Report International Online Magazine is available every week in the Amiga Forum on DELPHI. Amiga Report readers are invited to join DELPHI and become a part of the friendly community of computer enthusiasts there. SIGNING UP WITH DELPHI ====================== Using a personal computer and modem, members worldwide access DELPHI services via a local phone call JOIN -- DELPHI -------------- Via modem, dial up DELPHI at 1-800-695-4002 then... When connected, press RETURN once or twice and.... At Password: type STREPORT and press RETURN. DELPHI's Basic Plan offers access for only $6.00 per hour, for any baud rate. The $5.95 monthly fee includes your first hour online. For more information, call: DELPHI Member Services at 1-800-544-4005 DELPHI is a service of General Videotex Corporation of Cambridge, MA. Try DELPHI for $1 an hour! For a limited time, you can become a trial member of DELPHI, and receive 5 hours of evening and weekend access during this month for only $5. If you're not satisfied, simply cancel your account before the end of the calendar month with no further obligation. If you keep your account active, you will automatically be enrolled in DELPHI's 10/4 Basic Plan, where you can use up to 4 weekend and evening hours a month for a minimum $10 monthly charge, with additional hours available at $3.96. But hurry, this special trial offer will expire soon! To take advantage of this limited offer, use your modem to dial 1-800-365-4636. Press once or twice. When you get the Password: prompt, type IP26 and press again. Then, just answer the questions and within a day or two, you'll officially be a member of DELPHI! DELPHI - It's getting better all the time! @endnode *************************************************************************** @node P1-8 "Rendered Reality" @toc "menu" /// Rendered Reality "I Render, Therefore I Am." ---------------- By Mike Troxell "I used to write a lot of FORTRAN, For science it worked flawlessly. Try using it for graphics! Write in C." Well, actually I used to write in COBOL, not FORTRAN. And while I always enjoyed writing in COBOL, I would'nt quite call it flawless, and it was business, not science and... Anyway, the point is that while every programming language has its area of expertise, every language also has its limitations. I'd no more try to use FORTRAN for business than I would try to write a graphics program in COBOL. This goes for computers as well. Each computer has its own strengths and weaknesses. This brings me to where I've been for the last few months. I've been looking for a new computer. During the last year I've gone from doing animations on a 2000 with a 40 MHz 68030, 40 MHz FPU, 9 megs of RAM and a 120 meg hard drive to working on a 1200 with two megs of RAM and a 40 meg hard drive. Obviously, I haven't been doing any animation lately. After about two months with the 1200 I decided I had to have a bigger system. Since I was basically going to have to put togeather a new system, I decided to look at all the available platforms (yes, even PC's). What I found was that for around $5000 I could put togeather the type of animation system I wanted from any of the three main personal computer platforms, (Amiga, IBM and Mac) as long as I was willing to put up with system and software limitations. I use IBM's at work every day so I started my search by looking at what was available on the IBM. Not much is available in the way of (good) graphics software under $1000. But if there is a hardware peripheral that you can think of, IBM's probably have it. Unfortunatly, they also have MS-DOS. Of course there are several alternative OS's for the IBM but most of them require a memory upgrade just to run them. Oh well, maybe when they finally get a real OS (that doesn't require 10 megs of RAM and 80 megs of hard drive space). Next I looked at the Mac. This is where I was really tempted. True, they don't have Lightwave, but they do have PhotoShop and several nice 3-D programs. What the Macintosh doesn't have are custom chips to speed up graphics, or a true multi-tasking OS (yet). I talked to one MacIntosh salesman who admitted that while System 7 does have a "type of multi- asking", he said he wouldn't recomend doing anything radical like rendering an animation in the background while you were downloading a file from a BBS, because the rendering would come to a near halt while the file was being downloaded. Maybe having an Amiga has spoiled me, but I like being able to run other programs while Imagine renders an animation. I proceeded to cross the Mac off my list of possibilities. So, where did that leave me? Back where I started, with the Amiga as the only logical choice. By next month I should have my Amiga animation system set up. I'm still a little nervous about spending this much money on an Amiga when Commodore just reported a record loss (a little nervous? Actually I'm on the verge of having a nervous breakdown!) but I don't see any alternative short of spending $20,000+ for a Sun or SGI graphics work- station. So, that's where I've been. Now, where am I going? Well, in the immortal words of Buckaroo Bonzai "No matter where you go, there you are." So I guess we'll just have to see what develops. Graphics is a rapidly changing field and what is new today may be old news tomorrow (which makes me even more nervous about purchasing a new system). In the next few months I expect to see even more graphics hardware and software products. That's what I expect to see. What's going to really happen? Like I said, I guess we'll just have to wait and see, but no matter what happens I'm convinced that with the Amiga I'll always be ready for it. ----------------------------- I talked to Centaur today and they said that the long awaited OpalVision modules are being shown this week at WOC in Sydney, Australia, and that they will be shown in America at SigGraph in early August. They said the modules would be shipping in America by late September at the latest. Essence II is available now to people on the Imagine mailing list, and those who recieve the Apex newsletter. It should be shipping to stores within a few weeks. I'll have more information on the OpalVision modules and Essence II next issue. @endnode *************************************************************************** @node P4-2 "Portal" @toc "menu" /// Portal: A Great Place For Amiga Users -------------------------------------- Portal Communications' Amiga Zone The AFFORDABLE alternative for online Amiga information ------------------------------------------------------- The Portal Online System is the home of acclaimed Amiga Zone, which was formerly on the People/Link System. Plink went out of business in May, 1991 and The Amiga Zone's staff moved to Portal the next day. The Zone has just celebrated its second anniversary on Portal. The Amiga press raves about The Amiga Zone, when compared to its competition. If you live in the San Jose, CA area, then you can dial Portal directly. If you live elsewhere, you can reach Portal through any SprintNet (formerly Telenet) indial anywhere in the USA or through Tymnet from anywhere in North America. If you have an account on another Internet-connected system, you can connect to Portal using the UNIX Telnet programs, from anywhere in the industrialized world. Delphi and BIX users can now Telnet into Portal for a flat $19.95 a month, with *unlimited* use. Some of Portal/Amiga Zone's amazing features include: - Over 1.5 GIGabytes of Amiga-specific files, online, 24 hours a day. Portal has dedicated a 2.5 GIGabyte disk drive to the Amiga Zone. We have virtually unlimited space for files and new uploads. - The *entire* Fred Fish collection of freely distributable software, online. All of it. Every disk. Well-organized so it's easy to find exactly what you're after. - Fast, Batch Zmodem file transfer protocol. Download up to 100 files at once, of any size, with one command. - Twenty Amiga vendor areas with participants like AmigaWorld, ASDG, Soft-Logik, Black Belt, Apex Publishing, Stylus, Prolific, NES, and many others including Compute's Amiga Resource with over 4 Megabytes of exclusive Compute magazine disk stuff you won't find elsewhere. - 35 "regular" Amiga libraries with thousands of files. Hot new stuff arrives daily. Since Portal has FTP connections we can get new freely-distributable software online within MINUTES of its being announced on Usenet. - No upload/download "ratios" EVER. Download as much as you want, as often as you want, and never feel pressued doing it. Start downloading files with your first session on Portal. - Live, interactive nightly chats with Amiga folks whose names you will recognize. Special conferences. Random chance prize contests. Famous Amiga folks aren't the exception on Portal, they're the norm. Instead of stumbling around in frustration you can talk to the people who design your hardware, who write your software. - Vast Message bases where you can ask questions about *anything* Amiga related and get quick replies from the experts. - Amiga Internet mailing lists for Imagine, DCTV, LightWave, HyperAmi, Director and Landscapes are fed right into the Zone message bases. Read months worth of postings. They don't scroll off, ever! No need to clutter your mailbox with them. - FREE unlimited Internet Email. Your Portal account gets you a mailbox that's connected to the world. Send letters of any length to computer users in the entire industrialized world. No limits. No extra charges. No kidding! - Portal has the Usenet. Tthousands of "newsgroups" in which you can read and post articles about virtually any subject you can possibly imagine. Usenet feeds into Portal many times each hour. There are 14 Amiga-specific Usenet newsgroups with hundreds of articles posted every day, including postings by Commodore personnel. Since Usenet is distributed worldwide, your questions and answers can be seen by literally hundreds of thousands of people the same day you post them. - Other Portal SIGs (Special Interest Groups) online for Mac, IBM, Sun, NeXT, UNIX, Science Fiction, Writers, amateur radio, and a graphics SIG with thousands of GIF files to name just a few. ALL Portal SIGs are accessible to ALL Portal customers with NO surcharges ever. - The entire UPI/Clarinet/Newsbytes news hierarchy ($4/month extra) An entire general interest newspaper and computer news magazine. - Portal featues an exciting package of Internet features: IRC, FTP, TELNET, MUDS, LIBS. Free to all Portal customers with your account. Internet Services is a menu driven version of the same kinds of utilities you can also use from your Portal UNIX shell account. - All the files you can FTP. All the chatting you can stand on the IRC. And on IRC (Internet Relay Chat) you can talk live, in real time with Amiga users in the U.K., Europe, Australia, the Far East, 24 hours a day. - Our exclusive PortalX by Steve Tibbett, the graphical "front end" for Portal which will let you automatically click'n'download your waiting email, messages, Usenet groups and binary files! Reply to mail and messages offline using your favorite editor and your replies are sent automatically the next time you log into Portal. (PortalX requires Workbench 2.04 or higher) - And Portal does NOT stick it to high speed modem users. Whether you log in at 1200 or 2400 or 9600 or 14.4K you pay the same low price. How does all that sound? Probably too good to be true. Well.. it's true. Portal Signup or for more information: 1-408-973-9111 (voice) 9a.m.-5p.m. Mon-Fri, Pacific Time 1-408-725-0561 (modem 3/12/2400) 24 hours every day 1-408-973-8091 (modem 9600/14400) 24 hours every day or enter "C PORTAL" from any Sprintnet dial-in in the USA, or enter "portal" from any Tymnet "please log in:" prompt, USA & Canada or telnet to "portal.com" from anywhere. PORTAL'S CURRENT RATES: All prices shown are in U.S. Dollars Total Total Total Total Cost Cost Cost Cost Fee 1 hr. 5 hrs. 10 hrs.30 hrs. Startup Monthly Per Per per per per Fee Fee Hour month month month month $ $ $ $ $ $ $ Portal 19.95 19.95 2400/9600/14.4Kbps, *direct 24 hrs 0.00 19.95 19.95 19.95 19.95 2400/9600bps nonprime Sprint or Tymnet 2.50 22.95 32.45 44.95 94.95 2400/9600bps prime Sprint +% or Tymnet 5.50-10 29.95 69.95 119.95 varies 2400/9600bps non prime # PCPursuit 1.00 20.95 24.95 29.95 49.95 * plus cost of phone call if out of Portal's local dialing area Direct rates also apply to connections made to Portal using the UNIX "telnet" program from an account you may already have on an Internet-connected system. % 9600 bps Sprintnet and Tymnet available in over 300 cities areas + $10 rate prevails at smaller US Cities # PCPursuit is a service of US Sprint. Portal is a PCPursuit "Direct Access Facility" thus connection to Portal with a PCP account is simply a matter of entering C PORTAL,PCP-ID,PCP-PASSWORD at the SprintNet login prompt instead of C PORTAL. Note: Portal Direct 9600/14400 bps service is availble for both USR HST modems, and any V32/V32.bis modems. There are dozens of direct-dial high speed lines into Portal. No busy signals! SprintNet 9600bps service is V.32 modem protocol only. Tymnet 9600bps services is V.32 modem protocol only. Again, Portal does NOT surcharge high speed modem users! Portal subscribers who already have an account on an Internet-capable system elsewhere, can use that system's "telnet" program to connect to Portal for $0.00 an hour. That's right ZERO. From anywhere in the world. If you're in this category, be sure to ask the Portal reps, when you signup, how to login to Portal from your existing Internet account. Call and join today. Tell the friendly Portal Customer Service representative, "The Amiga Zone sent me!" That number again: 408-973-9111. Portal Communications accepts MasterCard, Visa, or you can pre-pay any amount by personal check or money order. The Portal Online System is a trademark of Portal Communications. @endnode *************************************************************************** @node P1-9 "Reader's Ramblings" @toc "menu" /// Reader Ramblings "The Reader's Soapbox" ---------------- By Joe Jernigan I'd like to respond to Rex "The Catman" Morriss in AR103. Concerning his accurate discussion of Commodore marketing, he is right on target and also very generous in his effort to help (I'd offer to help, but I'm burned out and need some help from C= before I can help). But what can be done? The problem as I see it is the attitude of a single man (and his "yes men" at the top with him). At one time Jack Tramiel was the marketing department of Commodore. He was shrewd enough to realize that without advertising/sales/marketing (something Irv deemed unnecessary), the only thing to do was lower the price and increase demand. That's what happened. That's what worked. All the top cats at C= got very rich *without* marketing the machine. Therefore I suggest that it'd be pretty hard to convince them that C= needs to market. And when confronted, they give excuses like 'we don't have the dealers to handle the demand,' etc. (Wonder if it's because you chased them away or something :) Also, to avoid confrontation, they'll move the shareholder meeting to the Bahamas *just to make it inconvenient* to get flamed/presented with the facts. In the days of the 64, Commodore represented a good value. I *used* to recommend them to everyone. I sold several and still haven't received my commission check! Now I downplay the machine to the new buyer. Someone might say, "What do you think about the Amiga?" I'd say, "It's a pretty good machine," and leave it at that. That's exactly the truth. It is a pretty good machine. The trouble is the company that manufactures the machine has no grasp on selling the thing. Amiga owners are probably the most computer savvy people around. Many started with the 64 and subsequently got on the Amiga wagon. The problem is that IBM, and it's clonies/cronies, have created such a *name* that that's all people know. And I gave up (as I mentioned above) explaining and educating a person why they would *want* (not necessarily need) sound, what linear addressing is, etc. Most of 'em don't care, they're not going to program anyway. It's simply too much resistance to overcome for me to "sell" somebody on the Amiga. It used to be a little easier before super VGA graphics and the slide of peecee hardware prices. *That* was the help I got from C=. *They* made it a good value which made it easier for me to sell. Now I just say go ahead and get a PeeCee because chances are that they'll have some software to *choose* from in their tiny specialized niche. Most likely, there isn't even a program available for the Amiga, much less a *choice*. I wonder if C= DID even start to market the Amiga isn't it too late now. Isn't the market pretty well saturated with Mac's and PeeCee's (those "name brand" computers)? It's one thing to get a first time buyer to select a C=, and another to get somebody who already owns an XT or 80286 or Mac "Classic" (whatever that is) to switch platforms. *What about my software?* Well, Amax or Bridgeboard... But here again -- I have to explain/educate the consumer about C='s product line AND I'M NOT GETTING PAID FOR IT! I'm making the Gould's richer and all I get the satisfaction of knowing that I sold a superior machine and also if they have questions, I'LL BE THE FIRST ONE THEY COME TO FOR HELP!!! Starting to get the picture a little here C=? In case not, I'll sum up. 1) A precedence was set when C= got rich WITHOUT advertising. 2) That's ok, but C= did not (IMNSHO) KEEP (it started off, yes) the Amiga line a good value. 3) That's ok, but you didn't have a MASSIVE advertising/educating the consumer as to WHY the Amiga is a superior machine (the "Stevie" commercial had little educational content). BTW, I didn't see it on TV, my dealer had it on video tape and I borrowed it and watched it on my VCR. 4) I don't mind being your sales force, but I DO mind being your VOLUNTEER sales force AND I feel I earn a little gratitude by having to answer incessant beginner questions. I know that ethics dictate that in turn of someone helping me, I help someone else. I feel I've repaid my debt. I also feel C= could pay its debt to me by ADVERTISING THE BLOODY MACHINE so as to make my job of selling it easier. OK, got off here. Here's the point, and if I could drill one simple statement into C=, it would be: "Either lower the price and increase demand or advertise HEAVILY and increase demand." ASSUMING *you* want to increase demand. *I* want you to increase demand because that'd be a bigger market share resulting in more and varied software and it'd help the C= volunteer sales force not have to waste time educating the consumer as to WHY/HOW the Amiga is a superior machine. Sounds like United We Stand America doesn't it! Now, I know Irving (the bomb) has heard the decree "Advertise the Amiga" before. I can just imagine his attitude. It's my company, I can do what I want. If I'm satisfied, then everybody else should be too. Let them go out and start a computer company if they don't like it. Well, OK Irv, but you've got to know that everybody has a boss. Whether you're an employee or have clients or customers. The customer is always right. Who would have thought that advertising/marketing would be an important criteria in computer ownership satisfaction AFTER THE SALE!!! It's like you have to keep advertising in order to preserve brand loyalty or something! The Amiga market is unique in that its users ARE so savvy. They're also the hardest working sales force C= has. You better believe me, they KNOW what's going on with other platforms and the Amiga line is constantly being compared to the other guys. But the reverse isn't necessarily true. As an example, most Mac users think System 7 is a multitasking OS! If I gave free advice, it'd probably be something like, "do what made the 64 a hit." Offer a value. Superior hardware (and leaving a CLOCK out of the A1200 and not including documentation and a language [I've heard] ain't it Irv) at a blow-the-others-away price. Irving owes us that and if he doesn't pay up, his US market might just wind up being a tiny niche (read Toaster) machine. @endnode ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ @node P1-10 "Commodore Dymanmic Total Vision" @toc "menu" /// Usenet Review: Commodore Dynamic Total Vision ---------------------------------------------- By THP (thp@sx.ac.uk) PRODUCT NAME Commodore Dynamic Total Vision. Now known as Amiga CDTV since a remarketing strategy, and "You what?" by most non-Amiga followers. BRIEF DESCRIPTION #include Erm... er... Audio CD and interactive software player based around Amiga 500 engine with CD-ROM drive and cut-down I/O peripherals, which can be added on via the usual Amiga expansion sockets? Read on. Since the CDTV first appeared on the market in August 1991, there's been much confusion -- from the public, Amiga users, the magazines and Commodore's marketing team themselves -- over what the machine actually capable of, and which markets it is aimed at. So, to put the record straight, it's time to give a full breakdown of the CDTV, as I don't think anyone else has done so yet. Tsk. KEEP IN MIND THAT... The author has moved to the CDTV from an A500 <0.5 meg Chip RAM, 1.5 meg Fast RAM, 2 drives>, a Technics stack, a desire to own a 'Pizza box' machine, and a break-in... so the move was obvious. AGA, Kickstart 3, and ARexx won't get much of a mention. The author is also aware of sarcasm and irony. COMPANY INFORMATION Name: Commodore Business Machines, Inc. Address: 1200 Wilson Drive West Chester, PA 19380 USA Name: Commodore Business Machines UK Ltd. Address: Commodore House The Switchback Gardner Road Maidenhead, Berks Sl6 7XA England [Commodore has other offices in other countries as well.] LIST PRICE Variable, due to different peripheral and software bundles at a range of prices. Currently in the UK, it varies from approximately 250 pounds for the standalone machine
up to approximately 450 pounds . Shop around, since the prices are being slashed each month, with better and better value for the buyer. Everyone's waiting for the new Commodore CD-based console, so stores are clearing stock of CDTVs. OBTAINING THE MACHINE I ordered the CDTV Multimedia package from Hobbyte in mid-February of this year, and after a couple of days of waiting, it arrived, after a few calls explaining that the shop had to wait for another Multimedia pack to come in. The bundle as ordered consisted of: Amiga CDTV main box Remote Control plus batteries. CD Caddy with Tutorial CD Cables to hook it all together. Hookup booklet And: <'Basic Multimedia' pack> Wired Mouse Keyboard External Drive AmigaDOS 1.3 System disks and documentation Since then, I've borrowed a RocTec external floppy drive with slight personality problems, and that's the complete system under review, apart from the colour portable TV I use as a monitor. Nowadays, the CDTV is best obtained by mail-order, as few computer shops <'Box shifters'> stock the machine due to lack of large-scale demand. And so, it is rare to get 'hands-on' play-testing or demonstrations in shops, resulting in public confusion and scepticism, leaving us right back with lack of large-scale demand. Great. HARDWARE The CDTV main box is of similar dimensions as any standard Hi-Fi 'separate' component: 430mm x 330mm x 95mm . It is completely black, with 15mm high cylindrical silver feet: very gothic and stylish. On the front, you've got : Main power switch with 6.5mm stereo headphone jack, the CD caddy slot with eject button and power indicator and CD active indicators in green and yellow, to the left and right of the CD slot, respectively. Then the indicator panel with the headphone volume level , CD track number, and realtime clock display both in cyan, and a 'CD' video indicator, and finally, the CD audio controls along with a soft-reset switch and a CD/TV video switch. A trapdoor under the indicator panel reveals a credit-card slot to allow the use of RAMcards for saving 'data from applications'. . The options are 64K and 256K. I've yet to see them on sale. A PCMCIA slot would have been far more useful, especially for memory expansion. The entire design is very swish, and would sit nicely at the base of a Technics or Denon Hi-Fi stack. 'Cool' is an understatement. It's gorgeous. Probably the best-looking Amiga machine yet. Along the back, there's the usual Amiga ports: external floppy drive, serial, parallel, RGB out, and audio left/right. Because the machine was designed to sit next to the household VCR, there are appropriate RF connectors below the RGB socket, according to country of retail. In the UK, we get RF in, RF out and Composite Video out. In the States, you get S-Video instead of RF in. The Euromachine gets a SCART socket. The RF modulator is thus inside the machine, as is the power transformer. The socket is a standard 'kettle' connection with a mains plug at the other end of the lead. There's a fan in the back, which sucks air through the machine from the vents on the top and sides. There's a lot of machinery in the box , so it needs whatever cooling it can get. The keyboard socket is a weird miniature DIN configuration, as is the wired mouse socket. No joystick ports -- a major design screwup. However, there's a pair of MIDI connections and a removable plate labelled 'Expansion', which can have a SCSI interface installed for adding extra storage. There's an internal genlock available as well. Good, eh? The remote control acts as mouse and joystick, and has buttons for the digits 0 to 9, ENTER, ESCAPE, GENLOCK, CD/TV, JOY/MOUSE. The additional buttons REW, PLAY/PAUSE, FF, STOP are mainly for audio CDs. Finally, there are headphone volume controls, a power switch, a joypad, and buttons A and B for selection, like most console keypads have. Normally, the remote is in "MOUSE mode," where the joypad controls mouse movement , A and B act as Left and Right mouse buttons respectively, CD/TV switches the video output between the CDTV's own output and what's coming in via the RF input , and GENLOCK overlays the CDTV output onto the RF input if you've got the internal genlock. The CD and volume controls have the same priority as the controls on the main box. If you switch the machine off from the handset, you have to switch it back on from the handset. The main power switch is likewise. Same system as my Technics receiver used to have. Notice that Hi-Fi analogy again. When in Joystick mode, the only active controls on the remote are the joypad and the A and B buttons. Problem is, they're very unresponsive, with no microswitches, and have an extremely unreliable action when playing. Apart from low-movement games like Lotus Turbo 2, where accurate left / right / up / down / fire action isn't needed, they're complete and utter crap. Don't even think about playing Llamatron, Gods, or anything needing fast response. Commodore's answer to this is the 'Brickette', which costs around 45 pounds and plugs into the mouse socket. It gives a trailing lead with 2 standard joystick/mouse sockets at the end, and the intelligence to recognize which method of input is being used. Because it sits on the mouse port, you have to buy a new standard mouse to go with it. There's a third-party solution which relies on internal fitting, designed by Almathera and sold by GoldTech, called CD-Joy, which does the same thing and doesn't take up the mouse port , and sells for about 25 pounds. I've yet to test either of these , but I've got to upgrade soon. As usual with Commodore vs. Third Parties, you must weigh losing your warranty against better hardware performance. C'est la vie. The keyboard? Black, virtually identical to the A2000 keyboard, with a 50" partly coiled cable, and a nice key action. A massive improvement on the somewhat 'dead' feel to the A500 keyboard, with a 3-position angle adjust. Oddly, there are two blank keys that have no function and are documented in an accompanying leaflet as 'not having any function'. Only with Commodore. ;-> The wired mouse is the next generation from the old A500/A2000 mouse, having a curved back and large buttons that are flush with the back of the mouse. The buttons are sized in a 60:40 ratio, very comfortable to use with Intuition, but unfortunately not microswitched. The external drive is larger than the average third-party external drive, has a yellow 'in use' LED to match the CD drive and the 'CD-video out' indicators , but for some insane reason, doesn't have a pass-through port. And there are few drives that match it either in styling or colour. Tsk! As for the operating system, it's based on Kickstart 1.3, with the 1 meg ECS Agnus, the standard Denise, and 1 meg of Chip RAM onboard. The processor is a 7MHz 68000. This version of AmigaDOS has been around long enough that everyone should know what it's about, so I don't need to reiterate previous reviews, which should come as a relief. It has all those classic OS bugs you love to hate. There's a realtime clock, displayed at all times, as witness the display panel description, but it isn't battery-backed. The machine has private RAM for internal Preferences settings. This means that whenever you unplug the main unit, you have to reset the clock. Oh joy. External preferences are no problem, as the machine uses the standard 1.3 DEVS:system-configuration file when booting from floppy or hard disk. DOCUMENTATION The 'Hookup' manual is just that. A page of 'Contents of the box', two pages of 'Plug the leads in here, here and here', and you're left booting the Welcome disk as the manual switches language. The 'Multimedia' pack ships with Workbench 1.3, so I got the Workbench boot disk, the Workbench Extras disk and The Very First, which is the Workbench tutorial disk. There is no copy of the AmigaBasic manual, nor the equivalent of the A500 Manual . Just the Enhancer Software manual. Maybe the others had been forgotten when packing all the bits into the 3x2x2 foot box the machine came in - I wasn't fussed. I've still got all my old A500 manuals which weren't nicked with the machine, and rarely need to refer to them nowadays. Besides, I'd used 1.3 for nearly 2 years; so once I'd run through the Welcome CD a couple of times, I skimmed through the Workbench disks to see if anything had changed. Nothing had, so I reached for my old all-singing-all-dancing system disk and booted up. Lack of documentation is no problem for an old hand like myself, but I don't know how 'Joe Punter' would manage. THE WELCOME DISK Booting the Welcome disk gives a couple of title screens, a extremely average soundtrack module whilst loading, and the main menu, offering a 'How to use CD titles' interactive tutorial, a 'Tech' guide and an 'Available Software' section. The tutorial is essentially an explanation of the remote control functions and how to select options from on-screen menus, which is fairly obvious anyway, but it's there if you really need it. The 'Available Software' section is simply a batch of title screens and voiceovers split into categories like Entertainment, Reference, Education, etc. Note how some titles don't have a screenful of graphics but just the title name in a simple font. It'd be interesting to contrast what's actually been written against the expectations of the disk. Most useful is the 'Tech' section, which explains the expansion options and the CD-audio panel. It also shows use of the internal system preferences adjustment, but doesn't tell you how to get to it. The coding quality on the disk is about the same as that in 'The Very First'. 'Desert Dream' from Kefrens it isn't, but it gets the job done, with an initially-cheery-then-rapidly-becoming-bloody-irritating 'ping' at each selection prompt. Luckily there's a certain amount of logic in the programming - you can skip irrelevant parts of the audio playback and graphics, and on going back up the disk menu structure you don't get information repeated. Just as well, given that the female voice on the disk sounds like she's being indecently tickled, and the male could pass as a member of the National League of Depressives whilst on an acid trip. Who ARE these people? If the truth were known, it's more interesting to hack the disk from AmigaDOS to see how it's all supposed to work. To be honest, it's a bit of a botch job, as witness the first line of the s:startup-sequence: ;THIS STARTUP-SEQUENCE IS TOO GODDAMN CLUTTERED ! RE-WRITE IT ! Temper, temper. So much for the glamorous world of programming CBM introductory software. This isn't all: there's a load of unused demo scripts, graphics, discarded sound samples and credit screens that should have gotten wiped before the disk went to print. See what you can find. The disk uses the preferences as set in the machine's private RAM, which include: language of user, screen position, screensaver timeout , keyclick toggle when using the CD-Audio panel, clock mode <12/24 hour> and setting, and a video sync toggle. This is downloaded as the working system-configuration by the program CDTVPREFS. The audio sections of the disk amount to 49 megs of data split across 444 files. Bear in mind that this is a 58 meg disk, according to c:Info. All are standard IFF samples, so you can play around with them with the music program ProTracker. This is why you really notice the loading time during the longer sentences in the 'Tech' and 'Available' sections - the CD drive speed isn't really fast enough for file-dependent software. Strange that CBM didn't just use the 'direct-from-disk' long sample player available in the public domain. It may be that the data throughput isn't fast enough, but it'd speed the loading up. Separating the disk into AudioCD and Amiga partitions wouldn't be worth it - there are too many separate audio sections. The graphics are all IFF ILBM images - use Mostra or another IFF picture viewer to skim through them. I recommend a viewer that supports command line wildcards. The 'voiceover beings' aren't listed in the 'hidden credits' screens. Probably due to reasons of acute embarrassment and public ridicule, no doubt. CDTV IN ACTION My normal working system is based around the ARP shell and commands, with CygnusEd , DiskMaster 1.4 , MessyDos and PowerPlayer. All run perfectly, apart from ARP's 'assign' now refusing to accept multiple assignments in a single command line. Weird. Programming with SAS/C is just about possible with a meg of RAM and a single drive, but it would be better if the compiler and header files were distributed on CD. The boot disk would contain just the shell of preference, the editor and the user's source code. The header and library assignments would be linked across onto the CD. To get at the compiler itself, just add the CD directories to the executable path. Not as fast as a hard drive, but better than floppy, and easier and more reliable to distribute. The first main thing you notice is that the CD filing system and handling routines grab 150K of Chip RAM workspace as AmigaDOS boots up. There isn't an option to switch the device drivers off, either. The RAMdisk is thus fairly limited. Anything over 400K is pushing it, or there isn't enough workspace for DMS or LhA to work. Don't bother loading Workbench if you need RAM workspace. That, or get hold of an external drive with a pass-through port. It's just as well the machine isn't based around Kickstart 2.04, since the memory shortage would be chronic. Multitasking with more that 2 big utilities or hitting the RAMdisk fragments the memory very quickly - this machine desperately needs a Fast RAM expansion. There is a hardware dongle that disables the CD drivers but still allows audio CD playback, but - you've guessed it - it's an internal fitting. Goodbye warranty.... Some software doesn't like the CD device when running or uncrunching. Large executables, such as ProTracker and DPaint, can be extremely awkward when PowerPacked. Assorted demos and games fall over as well, due to either memory requirements or hardware differences. Sometimes both. Marble Madness won't run despite the machine's being based around Kickstart 1.3 , and StarGlider won't format its gamesave disks. More modern games released since Kickstart 2 are better, due to the new machines' forcing software compatibility. No problems with ThunderHawk, Lotus 2 or Pinball Fantasies. The same goes for demos - anything that is 2.xx compatible should be OK co-existing with the CD drivers. 1.3 stuff varies from piece to piece, but the CD switch should fix this. When things crash the system, you'll get the usual 'Software Failure: Retry / Cancel' alerts, but rarely a Guru meditation. What would normally give a Guru just throws up a soft reset, accompanied by a whirr as the CD drive resets its head and the screen kicks back to the bootup animation. Odd. Talking of resets - the RESET switch on the front of the main box is vary badly positioned. I often run a BBC Micro into the back of the CDTV via the serial port for file transfers to the Amiga BBC Emulator . When checking things at the BBC end with the CD/TV switch, I've got to be fairly accurate with the thumb to avoid hitting RESET and killing the machine. Why the hell wasn't this switch put under the main power switch, and the headphone jack moved to here? Gawd knows what it's like when you start genlocking... The CD caddy mechanism gives a resounding 'Clungg!' on insertion, and the manual eject has an action similar to an external drive. You've got to have a reasonably positive action, or the caddy can jam. Pity it's not a motorized drawer, given the CD-Audio marketing side, but there's precious little free space in the main box, and all of that is needed for ventilation. The fan in the back is quieter than the A2000 fan, and is pretty ignorable. I'm not sure how expandable the system is re power requirements, but 2 external drives are no problem. This may be the reason the CDTV drive has no pass-through port - CBM was unsure about PCB burnout due to overload from external power requirements, so they didn't want to risk multiple drives? Surely not. As to the CDTV and Audio CDs - according to the CDTV information flyers, the sound quality is supposed to be 16bit x 8 oversampling. It's as good as my Technics stack was, when you run it through the phono jacks into a stack system, as every Amiga should be used. Through the RF modulator output to the TV, the audio level is rather low. The CD Audio panel frontend is extremely easy to use, and has all the functions of a full CD player, including Time to Disk End, Time to Track End, Disk Time, Track Time, 10 second Introscan, Randomize and full random programming up to 16 tracks. It's a pity all these features can't be accessed from the main box displaypanel, only via the video output, because it means I've got to lug the TV along with the CDTV to where the good hi-fi tapedeck is. In another room. After going down a flight of stairs. And unplugging means losing the clock and internal preference settings. Life is fun. And that internal screensaver? We can just assume it only applies when the CDTV internal preferences are being used, as I've yet to see it in action when booting from floppy. One thing that the manual doesn't tell you, and this is a biggie, is that you can start up an Audio CD during ANY POINT of system operation. What you've got is the CD hardware being under control of software when required, but with full manual override from the controls on the main box. An example of this is the Audiopanel mode of the CDTV. Press PLAY on the front of the CDTV, and the disk will start, but the software doesn't register this, and movement of the selection cursor will still result in a keyclick. When PLAY or STOP is selected by software, it doesn't affect the hardware override. Sometimes the software link to the CD hardware can crash for no reason, but it's rare. The Amiga audio is directly laid on top of the CD Audio. The Amiga output has always been at a higher level than most Hi-Fi component output levels - as anyone who runs an Amiga into a stack system will tell you. Same with the CDTV. Problem is, the CD output is at normal Hi-Fi levels, and thus when you run both at once, the Amiga tends to drown out the CD if there's a constant noise level or tune happening on the Amiga side of the system. Volume levels aside, we're talking hitting PLAY from ANYWHERE. Workbench, bootup, or system-trashing games. Seemingly Contradictory Fact #1: disk-based games are superb on a CDTV! Having your own choice of CD soundtrack whilst playing games is a positive boon, and adds a whole new atmosphere. Games that have their own in-game music don't work well with this technique, as the music is usually out of tune/tempo with your CD, and combining the two sounds dire. Games with only spot-effects or a constant throb work best. The only thing is the Amiga tends to drown the CD out when producing throbs. The best results are obtained with CDs that are mastered with a loud signal. THP Recommends: If you thought Lotus 2 was good, try it with 'Angel Dust' from Faith No More blasting out in the background. Or StarGlider 2 with Jean-Michel Jarre? Thunderhawk with Metallica? BLAZEMONGER with Cher? [MODERATOR'S NOTE: BLAZEMONGER INCORPORATED recommends that you play Bing Crosby and "Great Head-On Train Collisions Of The 1980's" simultaneously. - Dan] As to CD-based games - most use the CD only as a way of avoiding disk swaps. Few have separate data/audio partitions - the only one of note is Sim City, where a full studio-mastered audio soundtrack plays during the game. Obviously, there's only spot-effects from the Amiga side, with the CD audio being under software control. The Lemmings soundtracks won't improve , but at least you can play the game via ParNet. It'd be interesting to see if the 'Scene picks up on this, and release any productions that use a certain audio track as the basis for the design, graphics and coding, with special effects overlaid by the Amiga audio hardware. The mind boggles. Back with AmigaDOS, if you start an audio CD before the Amiga goes over to the Workbench screen, the digital output will hang. AmigaDOS checking to see which drives are attached and what's in everything, obviously not expecting to find 'Happiness' from the Beloved in a drive... The boot preference sequence appears to be the following: [Floppy?] -> [CD-ROM/CDAudio?] -> [Hard drive?] -> [Bootup Animation] as the CDTV will recognize Audio and CDTV disks but still check the external drive first. One big advantage of having all floppy drives fitted externally is that if the boot drive dies, replacement is very easy, and a wide choice of replacement mechanisms are available. Speed of directory access on the CD drive is slow via the shell, but with the Req or ReqTools requesters, is very fast. 300 files in 2 seconds isn't bad. Not quite so impressive is the data transfer rate - a quick shell utility for timing file access that I hacked together in C reckons a 220K file takes around 5.15 seconds to suck off disk. The still-to-spin disk start adds another 1.7 seconds onto that. The disk spin timeout cuts in when no files are accessed, or, when using Audio CD, if the system is paused or not playing for around 8 minutes. OK, these benchmarks aren't breaking any records when compared to the double-speed drives now available; but if you're not using the system for file-based games which load massive files all the time, I can't see the problem. I've yet to test out the genlocking capabilities of the machine, and the MIDI interfaces and ParNet, due to lack of cash. EXPANSION At the time of writing, there's no standard way to expand the memory with Fast RAM, although the 'Blizzard' board is currently being thrashed out and will be with us soon. The CD-Switch may suffice for those just requiring the full 1 meg. The SCSI adapter is an excellent move, making the CDTV useful as a cheap mass-storage device. Gamers have got to get some form of standard joystick interface: either the Brickette or CD-Joy. CPU acceleration is only possible through systems relying on the 68000 CPU socket. The machine can be expanded to the SuperAgnus with 2 megs of Chip RAM via the MegaChip board - some CDTV suppliers will fit this as an optional extra before shipping the machine. It is possible to upgrade the operating system to Kickstart 2.04, but the CD driver chips also need replacing, and they currently aren't widely available. Without memory expansion, a Kickstart upgrade is ill advised. BEST USES The EuroScene ------------- Because it's still based around Kickstart 1.3, the CDTV is the last machine to feature the 'classic' chipset. With the CD-Switch, all the big 1 meg demos and productions that conflict with the CD.device will work, although some older works may still require that half meg of trapdoor SlowFastRAM that used to sit in the A500. A standard joystick interface is a must, obviously. And at 'scene gatherings, play your own CDs whilst coding/copying/gfxing, all from one power socket. ;-> 'Scene musicians also get a look in, with the MIDI sockets as standard , and the CD output plugged straight back into a sampler on the parallel port. Never again experience that 'Oh f*ck! 5 minutes to the deadline and I need a sample from that CD back at home!' feeling. Assuming you've got the CD to hand. ;-> It's also possible to jam over Audio CDs via MIDI , or even playing lead guitar through a sampler and blasting the output over a CD track. And if we don't say anything about Karaoke-thru-sampler-over-CD, hopefully everyone will have the good taste not to try it. Games ----- Likewise, Kickstart 1.3 means all the classic games will run, although the CD-Switch and a 'stick interface are vital. The predicted 'trend' towards releasing games on CD means future compatibility as well, albeit without the AGA chipset. Versions of Kickstart don't usually make much difference to game quality. The possibility of selecting your own audio soundtrack for games is an added bonus. And massive games for the future? Eye of the Beholder on CD? The original came on 3 disks, and, being AmigaDOS-based, was hard drive installable. Consider 660 megs of dungeons, missions and chaos, with no disk grind or swap. Failing that, how about a CD-quality in-game soundtrack? Elite 2? Frontier? Whatever it's going to be called, the scale of this one when released on CD is just IMMENSE. The original BBC version had 2000 planets spread through 8 galaxies, with loads of extra information, realtime fly-by-wire docking computers, combat, trading and exploration. In 100k. We know Dave Braben's using an A2000 with an 030 as his working machine, but what about CD? If not 660 megs of planets and missions - how about an exclusive music score by Jarre or Huelsbeck? Okay then, a selection of modules from Nuke, Greg, LizardKing and Jester? Either would be great. Lotus 2, Thunderhawk, F15 and their ilk have been discussed already with regard to in-game music. CD also stops the drives grinding under trackdisk, though. Pinball Dreams/Fantasies could be expanded with extra tables and music. The trick with the audio is to get the relative Amiga/CD overlay volume levels correct. Software houses - are you reading this? Communications / Networking --------------------------- Many people on UseNet are using a CDTV as a CD Fileserver via ParNet with great success. Add this idea to a BBS machine , and you've immediately got 660 megs of online downloadable software, which can be swapped for another batch in a few seconds. Add a SCSI tower case plugged into the SCSI expansion, and that's one HELL of a fileserver. The speed of CD access isn't so important in this situation, as no modem yet can download at over 50k/second, so the relatively low CDTV data transfer rate isn't important. If AmigaNetworking ever takes off , the possibilities are even greater. The obvious archive disks such as the Fish collections and the AB20 and AmiNet snapshots would be interest enough; but on a mixed machine-type system, clip art, samples and typefaces would be a major bonus. Finally, the CDTV offers an alternative to a normal CD-ROM drive, when used with ParNet. Printers can still be used by squirting data onto the serial port of the CDTV through the NET: handler. Given that it's also a separate computer, it can act as a leisure/hackabout machine, leaving the 'serious' power-machine to run Real 3D, Imagine, Morph, TVPaint, etc., with no risk of virus-trashing, Lemmings-at-3am urges, and abuse-from-children. You can even run all those CDTV titles without any compatibility problems > and not have to bother installing the CDFilesystem. Best of all, you can do all this with just the basic machine and a spare external drive. Set up a systemdisk with the startup-sequence running ParNet and NetMount, and possibly even Workbench and PowerPlayer so you can play modules whilst you're at it ;->, plug in the ParNet cable, and boot up! FOR THE FUTURE If the new CD console is going to be based around AGA and an '020, I'd like to see: STANDARD JOYSTICK PORTS! Kickstart 3.xx More MIDI support DSP for direct off-CD sampling Keep the design and styling RF pass-through port USABLE JOYPAD Pass-through port on external Internal Genlocking SCSI RAM Expansion RESET switch Real-Time Clock, Internal Prefs Welcome Disk Further WishList ---------------- Volume controls for Amiga & CD? All Audio functions on Display Networking interface? CONCLUSIONS In case it's not blatantly obvious, I'm extremely pleased with the CDTV and its capabilities. Mind you, it's not that I've got a choice of another machine. My first upgrade will probably be a CD-Joy and a CD-Switch, then a long hard look at the Blizzard board when it finally turns up. And finally, if I ever get some serious cash together, I'd like one of the SCSI interfaces. Either way, if I ever get a top-end machine, I'm keeping this one as well. ;-> DISCLAIMER THP is not associated with Technics, Commodore Business Machines, Hobbyte, GoldTech, Almathera, Faith No More, J.M. Jarre, the Beloved, nor Metallica, in ANY way, apart from being: An infrequent customer / failing to get a job with them / aware of their products / fan of their music. COPYRIGHT NOTICE This review is copyright 1993 by THP, Citrus Inc. All rights reserved. Permission is granted to copy and distribute this review free of charge, but it may not appear in any commercial publication, in whole or in part, without the author's written permission. CONTACT... ...this lunatic for CDTV musings, Psion advocacy, insults at 3am when you really don't need them, moronic anecdotes, Amiga advocacy, drinking, job offers on the lines of reviewing, beta-testing, documentation, lugging, obscure jokes, and references to Absolutely sketches, at the following address: thp@sx.ac.uk @endnode *************************************************************************** @node P4-3 "Holonet" @toc "menu" /// Holonet: Inexpensive Internet Access ------------------------------------- *** HOLONET *** HoloNet is an easy to use Internet Access BBS. HoloNet is based on custom BBS software which provides an easy to use menu driven interface. HoloNet is ideal for those looking for an easy way to use Internet services. HoloNet does not currently provide UNIX shell access. Services include: o Convenient Access A local call in 850+ cities nationwide. o Online Publications Include USA Today Decisionline, Newsbytes, Datanet Computer News, Eeeekbits, and Boardwatch Magazine. o USENET Averages over 30MB of USENET news per day. The following news readers are available: NN, TIN, and RN. o Internet E-Mail Members have an Internet E-mail address similar to: member@holonet.net o Internet Access Access to telnet, talk, finger, IRC, and FTP. (note: you must comply with the policies of any networks you use) o Single and Multi-player Games Board, card, fantasy, and puzzle games. o Support for Eudora Excellent off-line Macintosh e-mail reader. o UUCP E-mail and USENET feeds Link LAN E-mail systems and BBSes to the Internet. How to try HoloNet for FREE: Telnet: holonet.net Modem: 510-704-1058 (Berkeley, CA) at 1200, 2400, 9600, or 14400 bps. There are free demo numbers nationwide, for an automated response containg a list of access numbers, send e-mail to access@holonet.mailer.net How to get more information: E-mail: info@holonet.net Modem: 510-704-1058 at 1200, 2400, 9600, or 14400bps Voice: 510-704-0160 Fax: 510-704-8019 HoloNet is a service mark of Information Access Technologies, Inc. Copyright © 1992 Information Access Techologies, Inc. All Rights Reserved. @endnode *************************************************************************** @node P1-11 "Clones of the old Arcade" @toc "menu" /// Send in the Clones: Arcade classics available on the Net --------------------------------------------------------- By Marcus Albers (malbers@ns.ccsn.edu) I have been playing video games for 10, maybe 13 years, ever since we bought a Sears Pong Game System. It had Tennis, Squash, Single Tennis, and Hockey. It was an amazing system for its time. Then I found the video arcade. Such classics as Dig Dug, Donkey Kong, Pac- Man, Space Invaders.... I always wanted to play these games again on my Amiga. When you compare these games with the playability of some of the newer games, the new ones stink. They like to replace flashy graphics and digitized sound effects for good old fashioned playability. I have more fun in an arcade with Galaga than with Super C. Well, if there are any others out there that feel the same as me, help is on the way. On the Net, without much pain (just a little downloading time) you can have many arcade classics, most Amiga-tized to take advantage of the superior technology of the Amiga, without losing playability. Be forewarned, many of these games are extremely addicting. Consult a physician if constant replaying persists. *** Pac-Man *** This excellent game appears to be one of the most cloned games ever. I have found a number of clones based on the Pac-Man theme, i.e. little yellow man eats dots in a maze and stays away from the ghosties. I have found a few clones of this on the Net, some true to the original, others a little further out there. Deluxe Pac-Man This is by far the best port to computer of Pac-Man that I have ever seen, on any system. The graphics are superb, and the sound is quite good. Good theme music, as well. This game is your basic Pac-Man, with a lot of extras, in the form of power-ups that appear under the ghostie starting place (where the fruit appears in the old game). Some of the power-ups include a speed-up that doubles the speed of Pac-Man, to let you get that last little dot before the ghosties gobble you up. Another one is the glue, which slow the ghosties down a mite. The best one, IMHO, is the gun. This turns Pac-Man into a maze/shoot'em up. One of the best graphic enhancements has to be the fact that when you die, or the level ends, there is sort of a video zoom which looks extremely cool. Wack Man This is an interesting implementation of the Pac-Man theme. It does away with the standard maze design and uses a more free design theme, causing the mazes to look more like the blocks of the old Tank Combat game on the Atari 2600. The character view is a top-down view of the Pac-Man character, and a side view of the ghosts (?). The movement of the player's character is very unobstructed, unlike the linear movement of the old Pac-Man game. There is no facility for diagonal movement, making it feel more like an old Commodore 64 game. The music is fairly good, making it about the only redeeming quality of this attempt at a clone. Mouth-Man There is not much to say about this one. It looks like the Atari-Soft implementation for the C64. Plays about the same and sounds about the same as well. It is good for nostalgia, but not much more. One difference that this one has is that it contains a maze editor. Unfortunately, I found nothing more to attract me to this game. Fruit Panic. Its Pac-Man gone Jumpman! The characters are there, looking more on the line of the characters from the Pac-Man cartoon and Pac Land video game. You utilize jumping and elevators to gobble up all of the fruit on the levels of the screen. I like the interesting approach, but there are a lot of control enhancements that could be made, like smoother movements, and better jump comtrol. Overall, an OK game. Snackman I have two words for this one - stay away. It is an exceptionally long file for such a poor program. If you like to listen to a good MOD, take the music off of the intro and trash the rest. There is little sound in the game, no graphic enhancements, and the ghosts have no AI system, which even the first Vic-20 conversion had (by the same name, interestingly enough). Not worth the download time, IMHO. *** Space Invaders *** The first ever alien shoot'em up game to hit the arcades, Space Invaders took the video game industry by storm. It has been ported to just about every home system and computer system. Not much has changed (not counting Super Space Invaders) from the original, which remains one of my favs. Ameoba This is the only conversion that I know of for the Amiga, and an excellent one it is, too. It stays very true to the original, keeping graphics colourful, yet not obtrusive. This is enhanced by game responce that is as good, if not better, than the original arcade version. Not to appear two-faced, I have to say that I like the fact that this was a direct port from the arcade version, whereas I liked the enhanced version of Pac-Man. The reason that I like this direct conversion is simply because I seemed to like Space Invaders more than Pac-Man, and I always wanted to know what Pac-Man would be like with more stuff (not having played Super Space Invaders, I may be somewhat biased). Also, the "direct" conversions of Pac-Man where simply not as good as this one. Enough of the disclaimer.... Ameoba is very user friendly, and multi-tasks excellently. As I said previously, the game has no major graphical enhancements, but the game itself is sold on excellent game play. Who cares if it is ancient! Next week, we will look at clones of Asteroids, Boulderdash (a C64 CLASSIC), Omega Race, and others, including the not so ancient (but definitely cloned) Tetris, in Send In the Clones II: I Think I'm a Clone Now. Internet FTP sites, authors, and addresses are available upon request from me via E-mail, malbers@ns.ccsn.edu. Maybe I was too lazy to write all of the information down before I started this article. Maybe I just like to recieve E-mail. @endnode *************************************************************************** @node P4-4 "NVN" @toc "menu" /// NVN WANTS YOU! Another Network Supports Amiga! -------------- National Videotext Network (NVN) National Videotext Network (NVN) has recently added an Amiga Forum to it's growing lists of available services. The Amiga Forum is ready and waiting for you! Order an extended NVN Membership of 6 or 12 months, pay for it in advance and receive a bonus in connect time at no additional charge. Choose from two subscription plans: 6-Month Membership ------------------ Pay just $30 for a 6-month Membership and receive a usage credit that entitles you to $15 of connect-time in the Premium services of your choice. Your total savings using this plan would be over $20!* 12 Month Membership ------------------- Pay $50 for a full year's Membership and get even more free time online. We'll give you a $25 usage credit to use in your favorite Premium services or try out new ones. You could save as much as $45.* For more information about either of these plans, give us a call at 1-800-336-9096. -=* 9600 BAUD USERS *=- $6/hour non-prime time - $9/hour prime time You can join NVN one of two ways. By voice phone 1-800-336-9096 (Client Services) or via modem phone 1-800-336-9092. @endnode *************************************************************************** @node P1-12 "AR Confidential" @toc "menu" /// AR Confidential We heard it through the grapevine! --------------- [Editor's Note: Yes, it's in German.] Commodore Büromaschinen GmbH 60528 Frankfurt, Lyoner Straße 38 Für sofortige Veröffentlichung: Ansprechpartner: Karola Bode Leiterin Marketing/Kommunikation Pressesprecherin Telefon: 069/6638-157 Fax: 069/6638-139 AMIGA CD32 Die neue Generation: Spielvergnügen und Computertechnologie, die ultimative Game-Maschine für alle Action-Fans! Mit der Einführung des AMIGA CD32 bringt Commodore volle 32-Bit-Leistung in die Spielewelt. Ein neues Zeitalter der Unterhaltungselektronik ist angebrochen. Technologie und Spielfreude werden perfekt in einem Gerät kombiniert. AMIGA CD32 bietet mit seinem 32-Bit-Prozessor und seinem 32-Bit-Grafikbeschleuniger außergewöhnliche Grafikfähigkeiten. Die Farbbrillianz wird erzeugt durch 256.000 Farben gleichzeitig aus einer Palette von 16,8 Millionen. Durch die neue Technologie wird eine Geschwindigkeit und eine Reaktionszeit erreicht, die den Spielspaß zum echten Erlebnis werden läßt. Das CD-ROM-Laufwerk mit Toplade-Mechanismus läßt sich leicht bedienen. Die CD wird eingelegt, und AMIGA CD32 startet automatisch. 4 CD-Standards stehen zur Verfügung: Audio CD, CD+G (Grafik), CDTV und AMIGA CD32. Die CD-Technologie bietet Musik in Konzertqualität mit digitalem Stereo-Sound bei einer Samling-Rate von 44 kHz. Das mitgelieferte Spielpult ermöglicht dem Spieler eine präzise Steuerung über ergonomisch konstruierte Tasten. Der Game-Controller reagiert prompt, sensibel und auergewöhnlich schnell. AMIGA CD32 setzt einen neuen Standard im Preis-/Leistungsverhältnis der Gamekonsolen. Als Zusatzoption wird ab Herbst '93 das MPEG Video-Modul für über 70 Minuten Video zu einem außergewöhnlichen Preis verfügbar sein. AMIGA CD32-Full-Motion-Videomodul bietet bei 30 Bildern je Sekunde 1:1 Fernsehqualität. Das Produkt AMIGA CD32 wird ab August 1993 im Commodore Fachhandel und über die 5 größten Versender verfügbar sein. Ausgeliefert wird AMIGA CD32 mit einem Game-Controller, den notwendigen Anschlußmöglichkeiten an den Fernseher bzw. Monitor und einem auf AMIGA CD32 zugeschnittenen neuen Spiel. Aus urheberrechtlichen Gründen kann der Titel dieses Spieles noch nicht bekanntgegeben werden. Parallel zur Einführung des Produktes werden 17 AMIGA CD32-Titel verfügbar sein. Bis Jahresende sind weitere 30 interessante AMIGA CD32-Titel vorgesehen und zwar aus den Segmenten Jump and Run, Simulation, Strategie und Action. Die entsprechenden Spiele sind ebenfalls über den Commodore Fachhandel verfügbar. Firmen wie Mindscape, Microprose, System 3, Gremlin, US Gold Flashback, US Gold, Electronic Arts, Ocean, Grandslam, Millennium u. a. haben entsprechende CD's angekündigt, die über die jeweiligen deutschen Distributoren erhältlich sind. Der empfohlene Verkaufspreis des Produktes wird mit 699,-- DM angegeben. Technische Daten: CPU Motorola 68EC020, 32-Bit-Mikroprozessor, 14 MHz Takt Speicher 2 MB RAM, 32 Bit breit 1 MB System-ROM, enthält das komplette AmigaDos, ein Echtzeit-Multitasking- Betriebssystem Laufwerk CD-ROM mit Top-Lader, doppelte Geschwindigkeit Grafik AA-Chipsatz mit folgenden Modi: - 256.000 darstellbare Farben aus einer Palette von 16,8 Millionen möglichen - Auflösungen bis 800 x 600 Punkte - 2 Grafik-Koprozessoren zur Grafikbeschleunigung Videoausgabe S-Video für Fernseher PAL, NTSC und SECAM Composite Video für Monitor oder Fernseher (SCART oder Video) PAL, NTSC und SECAM HF-Modulator-Ausgang für Fernseher (Antenne) Audioausgabe Vierkanal-Stereosound Vier 8-Bit-Digital/Analog-Wandler 16-Bit-Audio-CD-Stereo mit 44 kHz Schnittstellen Spielpult mit 11 Schaltern (wird mitgeliefert) 2 Spielpult-/Joystick-/Mausanschlüsse Hochgeschwindigkeits-Aux-Anschluß für eine Tastatur, Datenhandschuh für Virtuelle Realitt etc. Erweiterungsanschluß AMIGA-Computer-Box Erweiterungsanschluß AMIGA CD32 Full-Motion-Videomodul Unterstützte CD-Standards AMIGA CD32 Audio-CD CD + G (Grafik) CDTV Abmessungen 212 mm tief x 311 mm breit x 81 mm hoch Gewicht Systemeinheit 1,44 kg Netzteil 1,53 kg Netzanschluß Externes Blocknetzteil, 22 Watt Frankfurt, den 28.06.93 @endnode ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ @node P3 "Dealer Directory" @toc "menu" /// Dealer Directory Serving our readers! ---------------- Apogee Technologies 1851 University Parkway Sarasota, Florida 34243 VOICE: 813-355-6121 Portal: Apogee Internet: Apogee@cup.portal.com Armadillo Brothers 753 East 3300 South Salt Lake City, Utah VOICE: 801-484-2791 GEnie: B.GRAY Computers International, Inc. 5415 Hixson Pike Chattanooga, TN 37343 VOICE: 615-843-0630 Finetastic Computers 721 Washington St Norwood, MA 02062 VOICE: 617-762-4166 Portal: FinetasticComputers Internet: FinetasticComputers@cup.portal.com MicroSearch 9000 US 59 South, Suite 330 Houston, Texas VOICE: 713-988-2818 FAX: 713-995-4994 PSI Animations 17924 SW Pilkington Road Lake Oswego, OR 97035 VOICE: 503-624-8185 Internet: PSIANIM@agora.rain.com Software Plus Chicago 3100 W Peterson Avenue Chicago, Illinois VOICE: 312-338-6100 (Dealers: To have your name added, please send Email!) @endnode ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ @node P1-13 "Humor Department" @toc "menu" /// The Humor Department Jokes, Quotes, Insults, Shameless Plugs -------------------- From Josh Farley on Fidonet's Amiga International echo... Due to a couple of questions regarding the following, and with the humblest of apologies to David Letterman... TOP 10 Reasons "*BM" is written here as "*BM"... 10. Due to its highly UNgraphic nature, it cannot be viewed in its entirety without the accompaniment of an adult. 9. `Ass-Backward ugly oversized garbage disposal' takes up too much room. 8. Cursing isn't allowed. 7. Forgot the first letter. 6. Superstition- say it, and you may end up with one. 5. OUR wrists don't bend that way. 4. Don't want to get reply reading---`U-B-M? Hey, I be Q!' 3. Thought of Windows causes severe hand spasms that register as `*'. 2. Two words- Big Brother AND THE NUMBER ONE REASON THAT "*BM" IS WRITTEN AS "*BM"... (crescendo...) The Amiga's auto-destruct sequence just happens to be IB- ^%^#& NO CARRIER @endnode @node P2-3 "In Closing" @toc "menu" =========================================================================== Amiga Report International Online Magazine July 9, 1993 * YOUR INDEPENDENT NEWS SOURCE * No. 1.16 Copyright © 1993 All Rights Reserved =========================================================================== Views, Opinions and Articles presented herein are not necessarily those of the editors and staff of Amiga Report International Online Magazine or of STR Publications. Permission to reprint articles is hereby granted, unless otherwise noted. Reprints must, without exception, include the name of the publication, date, issue number and the author's name. Amiga Report and/or portions therein may not be edited in any way without prior written per- mission. However, translation into a language other than English is accept- ble, provided the original meaning is not altered. Amiga Report may be dis- tributed on privately owned not-for-profit bulletin board systems (fees to cover cost of operation are acceptable), and major online services such as (but not limited to) Delphi and Portal. Distribution on public domain disks is acceptable provided proceeds are only to cover the cost of the disk (e.g. no more than $5 US). Distribution on for-profit magazine cover disks requires written permission from the editor or publisher. Amiga Report is a not-for-profit publication. Amiga Report, at the time of pub- ication, is believed reasonably accurate. Amiga Report, its staff and con- ributors are not and cannot be held responsible for the use or misuse of information contained herein or the results obtained there from. =========================================================================== Only * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * _ _ __ ___ _ * * /\\ |\\ /| || // \ /\\ * * / \\ | \\ /|| ||(< __ / \\ * * /--- \\| \X || || \\_||/--- \\ * * /______________________________\\ * * / \\ * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * Makes it possible!! @endnode @node menu "Amiga Report 1.15 Main Menu" @toc "menu" @{" Columns and Features " link P1} News, Reviews, and More! @{" About AMIGA REPORT " link P2} Staff, Copyright information @{" Dealer Directory " link P3} Dealer Addresses and Numbers @{" Commercial Online Services " link P4} Sign-up information /// 07/09/93 Amiga Report 1.16 "Your Weekly Source for Amiga Information" -------------------------- · The Editor's Desk · CPU Report · New Products · Dealer Directory · AR Online · AR Confidential · Send in the Clones · Rendered Reality · SHI Q & A · GVP I/O Extender · CDTV · Reader Ramblings » Shareholder Movement UPDATE! « » New Amiga CD32 Game Console??? « =========================================================================== Amiga Report International Online Magazine "Your Weekly Source for Amiga Information" » FEATURING WEEKLY « Accurate UP-TO-DATE News and Information Current Events, Original Articles, Tips, Rumors, and Information Hardware · Software · Corporate · R & D · Imports =========================================================================== PORTAL · DELPHI · FIDO · INTERNET · BIX · NVN =========================================================================== @endnode @node P1 "Columns and Features" @toc "menu" @{" From the Editor's Desk " link P1-1} CBM's CD32 ??? @{" CPU Status Report " link P1-2} Apple layoffs @{" Online Weekly " link P1-3} The lines are buzzing @{" CBM Shareholder Update " link P1-4} For information.... @{" Important Information From SHI " link P1-4-1} Send in those viruses! @{" Q&A on SHI " link P1-5} SHI answers some frequently asked questions @{" Usenet Reivew - GVP ioExtender " link P1-6} Reviewed with v1.7 software @{" Game Demos " link P1-7} The best of the playable previews @{" Rendered Reality " link P1-8} Choosing an animation platform @{" Reader Ramblings " link P1-9} A responce to "The CatMan" @{" Usenet Review - CDTV " link P1-10} Commodore's Dynamic Total Vision @{" Send In The Clones!! " link P1-11} Clones of the old Arcade hits @{" AR Confidential " link P1-12} Info on CBM's CD32 (In German) @{" The Humor Department " link P1-13} The top 10 for *BM!!! @endnode @node P2 "About Amiga Report" @toc "menu" @{" For Starters " link P2-1} Where to get AMIGA REPORT @{" AR Staff " link P2-2} The Editors, and Contributers @{" In Closing " link P2-3} Copyright information @endnode @node P4 "Commercial Online Services" @toc "menu" @{" Delphi " link P4-1} Select for information on these services @{" Portal " link P4-2} and how to sign up. @{" Holonet " link P4-3} @{" NVN " link P4-4} @endnode