Re: Who was Jack Tramiel to you?
Christian Brandt
> I saw him as a leader and visionary who brought affordable computing
> to the masses ("Computers for the masses, not the classes"). What are
> some other opinions of Jack?
I remember him being being a pocket size dictator whose weird ethics
are directly responsible for building highly incompatible computer lines
with a shady argument like "then we can sell our software twice". Why
was a PET2001 incompatible to a C64?
After Tramiel left CBM saw the light and tried to stay compatible, the
C128 is the first non-Tramiel-Solution, the C65 was bare of any Tramiel
ethics, the Amiga line was Tramiels Arch Enemy and so on. As he didn't
have any influence on the commercial success of the amiga I tend to
ignore him.
Even in the Atari theatre Tramiel tried his compability tricks first
and only took care of compability after the PC and Amiga market showed
him the light. Ever tried to run very early software written for the
260ST at bigger machines and visa versa? Later on he saw the light but
like most closed architectures his ideas usually came too little and too
late though all in all he seemed quite competent struggling in a dieing
home computer market.
Christan Brandt
Charles Richmond
> dunric schrieb:
>> I saw him as a leader and visionary who brought affordable computing
>> to the masses ("Computers for the masses, not the classes"). What are
>> some other opinions of Jack?
>
> I remember him being being a pocket size dictator whose weird ethics
> are directly responsible for building highly incompatible computer lines
> with a shady argument like "then we can sell our software twice". Why
> was a PET2001 incompatible to a C64?
A "pocket size dictator"??? Jack Tramiel must have weighed 300 pounds!!!
>
> After Tramiel left CBM saw the light and tried to stay compatible, the
> C128 is the first non-Tramiel-Solution, the C65 was bare of any Tramiel
> ethics, the Amiga line was Tramiels Arch Enemy and so on. As he didn't
> have any influence on the commercial success of the amiga I tend to
> ignore him.
I believe that what I considered the viciousness of Jack Tramiel was
"post traumatic stress" from being a Holocaust survivor. ISTM that he
and his father were the only two in his immediate family that survived
the Holocaust.
>
> Even in the Atari theatre Tramiel tried his compability tricks first
> and only took care of compability after the PC and Amiga market showed
> him the light. Ever tried to run very early software written for the
> 260ST at bigger machines and visa versa? Later on he saw the light but
> like most closed architectures his ideas usually came too little and too
> late though all in all he seemed quite competent struggling in a dieing
> home computer market.
>
Jack Tramiel *screwed* his dealers by some of his business actions with
the Atari ST. Microsoft would *not* even develop software for the ST
because of his business policies.
--
+----------------------------------------------------------------+
| Charles and Francis Richmond richmond at plano dot net |
+----------------------------------------------------------------+
Miika Seppanen
<bra...@psi5.com> wrote:
> After Tramiel left CBM saw the light and tried to stay compatible, the
>C128 is the first non-Tramiel-Solution, the C65 was bare of any Tramiel
>ethics, the Amiga line was Tramiels Arch Enemy and so on. As he didn't
>have any influence on the commercial success of the amiga I tend to
>ignore him.
Keeping the compatibility with Amiga-line was rather easy because the
development of it after initial launch was close to zero. One of the
main reasons to its failure.
-Miika
Miika Seppanen
<fri...@tx.rr.com> wrote:
>the Atari ST. Microsoft would *not* even develop software for the ST
>because of his business policies.
So there was something good in those policies after all. :)
-Miika
Ronald J. Hall
<ROFLOL>
--
Welcome To DarkForce! www.darkforce.org "The Fuji Lives.!"
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Anssi Saari
> Jack Tramiel *screwed* his dealers by some of his business actions
> with the Atari ST. Microsoft would *not* even develop software for the
> ST because of his business policies.
Hehe, so Atari ST is "Wintel free" then, nothing from Microsoft and
nothing from Intel? I guess later Amigas are the same, those without
MS Basic in them...
Sam Gillett
"Charles Richmond" <fri...@tx.rr.com> wrote ...
>
> Jack Tramiel *screwed* his dealers by some of his business actions with the
> Atari ST. Microsoft would *not* even develop software for the ST because of
> his business policies.
Maybe Microsoft remembered how Jack Tramiel screwed them on the Commodore
BASIC deal. ;-) Way to go Jack!!
--
Best regards,
Sam Gillett
Change is inevitable,
except from vending machines!
Kelli Halliburton
Amigas do not have MS BASIC in ROM like so many earlier computers did.
You had to load it from disk. And it was notoriously picky about being
installed on a hard disk. One could go so far as to say that only those
few who managed to get it installed on a hard disk could be said to have
MS BASIC *in* their Amigas. Otherwise, it was just on a removable floppy.
The IBM world did benefit from Microsoft's experience with the Amiga.
Many of the characteristics of MS AmigaBASIC were carried over into
Qbasic, Quick BASIC (they really are two separate products), BASIC
Professional Development System, and even Visual BASIC for DOS.
The PET contained a version of MS BASIC, and every Commodore 8-bit
computer from that point on carried a derivative or expansion of that code.
Kelli Halliburton
The developments in the Amiga line after the 1000:
500 - Kickstart in ROM
2000 - multiple Zorro slots; also video slot, CPU slot, bridge slots
Bridgeboard - 8086, 80286, 80386SX
2500 - 68020, 68851, 68881, 68030, 68882
3000 - ECS, SCSI onboard, 31kHz RGB
3000T - 68040
3000UX - Amiga Unix SVR4
2024 - high resolution monitor
2410 - 24-bit graphics card
4000 - AGA, IDE onboard, industry standard SIMMs
1200 - PCMCIA slot, 2.5" hard drive bay