[coco] wondering about 68k machines

[Willard Goosey]

>From: RJRTTY at aol.com
>Date: Sat, 9 Jul 2005 19:06:14 EDT

>    I have been thinking of getting an old 68k machine like the
>Amiga 500.     I always wanted a 68k machine but never got
>around to getting one.     I guess I was subconciously always waiting
>for a 68k based coco4 from Tandy.

If you go the Amiga route, I'd recommend something like an A2000.
Gives you a real, internal expansion bus.

>         How hard is it to get hardware and software support for the Amiga
>nowadays.  Would it make a good approximation to what a 68k coco4
>would be or would the Atari 520 ST be a better example.    

Software support seems fairly good.  I can't say much about hardware
support, I haven't tried it recently.

Amiga Workbench seems a lot like what Multivue _wanted_ to be, but
lacked the memory to be.  Underneath, well, AmigaDOS isn't OS-9, and
that can be both good and bad.

>It's clock is 8 Mhz
>I think?     Does that make it 4 times faster than the coco3?  Does it
>"feel" 4 times faster when executing machine  code or basic?

My Amiga 2000 runs at 7.xx MHz, to be an even multiple of video speed.

Remember, you're comparing a 2MHz _synchronous_ cpu to an 8MHz
_asynchronous_ cpu.  The 6809 reads|writes a byte every cycle. The
68K reads|writes a 16-bit word every 4(?) cycles.  Memory is about the
same speed on both machines.  

So, the 8MHz 68K box is about twice as fast as a 2MHz 6809.  And it
does show in things like displaying gifs.  

Willard
-- 
Willard Goosey  goosey at sdc.org
Socorro, New Mexico, USA
"I've never been to Contempt!  Isn't that somewhere in New Mexico?"
   --- Yacko