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DUALCORE

Maybe it's new to you, but even back in the days a good DSP was faster (in terms of clock speed) than processors. Because it was a very special processor you could do _some_ things really fast but I wouldn't call a GPU a special processor anymore.

"very special" processors for "very special" people. that computes :)

yes,but look at the clock speed of the GPU... it's somethink like ~700MHz at best?

That starcore dsp is -not- 4 GHz, it's typical IC designer propaganga: it's a four-core chip (okay, that's nice) at 1 GHz..

About the DSP discussion: Cell SPUs can indeed be seen as being DSPs.

I know too little about current gen GPUs to start a substantial comparison of DSP and GPU... However, they seem to get more and more programmable. And some guys are even doing general purpose processing on them.. FFT's are now possible, it seems (crazy =))

back on topic... and flame ;)

what is the best Atari Falcon demo and best Amiga 1200 demo (stock configuration only, maybe FPU allowed and some Fast ram on Amiga...)?

I trying to buy Amiga1200 for some time and I would like to organize local (Belgrade / Serbia) demo watching and comparation of Amiga and Falcon demos.

It would be interesting to see how much 3D polygons Amiga can display and how much Falcon :) or how much 'raster bars' can handle one system and how much other ;D

I am aware that many Amiga AGA demos are made for MC68030/50MHz but and that kind of comparation with Falcon would be OK... btw DHS "don´t break the oath " demostrate what boosted Falcon can do...

so any Amiga guy can propose demo for A1200 that can be compared to e.g. "sonolumineszenz / avena"?

calimero: the comparison between a falcon and an amiga 1200 is in favor the the latest. A boosted 030 Amiga isn't as good as a falcon because they are definitively different: the falcon is DSP equiped whereas the Amiga even the most powerfull is not.

For demos, they're good on both plateforms and as they aren't generally enough you can't compare: you'll not see 2 demos on the Amiga and on the Falcon with the same objects and number of 3D polygons. To compare you need that: the same 3D objects with the same code but routine perfectly optimised for both kind of hardware.

You definitively can't compare a Falcon and an Amiga 1200, it's like comparing a plane and a fast car: they are both used to move from A to B, but while the plane need an airport to take off and land on, a car can move without.

Whatever you'll find awesome demos on both plateforms: EKO's demos on the Falcon's and Virtual Dreams demos on the Amiga for instance but the list can be extended to infinity.

Optimus: did you read your email recently? Hope you find the Hugi Intro design great. Contact me when you'll have some free time and we will talk about it before final coding.

then let me rephrase:
let we see which coders are better :D who push their lovely machine to the limit!

and why not to compare F030 vs. A1200?! in old days Amiga500 was more powerfull than ST but yet Atari coders manage to do almost everything that amiga coders do but on weeker hardware...

btw Virtual Dreams demos looks nice on screenshots, I'll watch it as soon as possible... thanx

Ep: I read your email, like your ideas, will contact and discuss soon about feasability..

From what I've seen, AGA demos are quite more impressive than Falcon demos (either on terms of polygons but especially overall design). Well, the scene seems to be bigger (or maybe more popular) in Amiga. I even like several of the old A1200 demos more than Falcon demos overall, even if Falcon has quite better impressive 3d than A1200. Still, the Falcon is only 16Mhz 030 and that DSP, but that's impressive. And I love what the AtariST 16bit scene is doing too. Why isn't there a strong A500 scene? (Ok, I have seen few nice stuff produced but AtariST scene rules more).

q: was the a1200 scene bigger at it's peak than the falcon scene?
a: yes, approximately 10 times bigger :-(

q: was the a500 scene bigger at it's peak than the st scene?
a: yes, approximately 5 times bigger :-(

q: why are there 2 times more releases on atari than on amiga nowadays?
a: good question... :-) better ask the amiga guys, i'm too busy painting ;-)

q: why are there 2 times more releases on atari than on amiga nowadays?

q: because most of Amigans have moved to PC due to utterly slow upgrades to their hardware from Commodore and all its followers (Gateway, ...). When I get fed up waiting for the Walker / ... I've finally sold my A1200 because hardware for upgrade was expensive and far slower than PC: the money / performance ration was lower on Amiga than on PC. MegaHertz really improve speed for general usage like zipping / unzipping, their was CD, fast 3D and it was standard. As I needed one for work, I've done the migration in 1997: it was really hard time for me and now I really enjoy having something different than a PC. I got 5 and worked 10 years onto them and ho my god, how can they call that a computer or even DOS / Windows an OS? When you compare that to any other OS available, I mean Linux / Unices / Netware / OS X / Sun OS / Be OS / ... you really see the difference.

q: Why is there twice as much demos released on Atari now than on Amiga?
Because of the quality of emulators: I don't think UAE is great for games / demos. Because it suxxs as it's not as great as other emulators for console / ST / ... So ST users have a good tool like steem or pacifist to make demos on their PC and Amiga users have changed their philosophy using Linux or Windows like most people.
Moreover contrary to Amigans, ST users and especially demomakers have kept their ST so this keep the faith.

And moreover for die hard coders ST is better to code than Amiga: its lower hardware features means you'll get more reward when it will come to release something: it's hard work but more rewarding.

Amiga is more artistic / design based: and you can do most things you do on an Amiga on a PC so...

Hope it helps.

@havoc :) keep up good work :)))

yes, and atari people use only atari today and they didn't move to Pc, MacOs or linux... c'mon!!

and Amiga500 coders can bent limits further?!? you will get same 'reward' if you push Amiga500 limits further... but that does not happend from Sanity to this day on A500, right?

I think that many Amiga owners had an Amiga when it was fashion to have one and sold them when it was time to go on.
Faster hardware would also be a reason for Atarians to move, but thay did not, so that can't be the only thing responsible for the loss of an A500 Scene.

Emulators can be a big help in development,but if the A500 sceners really lack of a good one, they should start developping one. I am nit sure it would help anything.

It is true many gfx man were on Amiga and i think they just saw it as the best gfx tool at that time. When that changed they went to PC and many into games business and here the story ends. As Amiga Demos often are more based on design (which is a cool thing btw.) it could be they lack the manpower in doing so nowadays and coder demos are chanceless in getting rewards (maybe).

But again i don't get it, cause i think you do demos for yourself and the rewards are the bonus not the reason.

Maybe thats different on Amiga ?

World is based under LOVE.
You follow those you love.
Demomakers do the same and have heroes.
Chaos / Sanity is one of them.
He has moved to the PC.
Amigans have followed.
ST heroes are less mediatic.
They don't care about themselves and are most unknown.
They have more love for their ST.
They then continued to love it and the quality of Emulators bring them more power and ergonomy.
That's life: this is not because you loose a battle that you loose the war.
However while Amigans battle against ST, PC won the computer selling battle.
So don't battle, make link / aliance and bring better demos.
ST scene is alive because of LOVE.
Amiga scene is less proficient because we have tried to copy the PC scene: upgrades, upgrades, ...
This is not the way because it's both expensive and not scene spirited based: hardware is the temptation, software is the solution.

++

Jumalauta PC
Jumalauta AMIGA
Jumalauta OSX
Jumalauta C64
Jumalauta VIC
...

Is there section of Jumalauta Atari?

Maybe Jumalauta is section of Jumalauta.

And Jumalauta is part of HiRMU

HiRMU is part of JESKOLA!

ei vittu =)

Oh we had heroes on the Atari scene.
Just say to any Atarian Nick/TCB.
Nick evaporated though after his work at Thalion.
Then time passed and the st scene was a bit empty.
Then more heroes emerged.
Just ask about Defjam/Checkpoint Ultra(AKA Candyman)/Cream.
Then more prople started doing stuff on ST.

Yeah, the list is not so big.
TCB invented some great new coding techiques.
Then next 5 years atari demos were basically big scrollers and some sync scrollers. No design or new coding techniques.

Infact, only demos that impressed me(coding side) after Cuddly was 4-bit sync scroller, Paolo Simoes, Zappy/HLC and Checkpoint products.

Sorry, i forgot that 2006 interesting 4 pixel width rasters on a ST by Mr. Ni! of the TOS-Crew.

Ziggy Stardust/OVR was another legend aswell

moredhel... oh yeah jumalauta are on atari .. they call themselves THE BEASTY BITS CLUB haha :D

@ggn Did Ziggy invented something new? No. He did some some fast routines only.

Only screen that reminds me of Ziggy was that one fullscreen in European Demos. Or was ist Ziggy?

Ziggy was good when doing fast code, for example 3D.
Tho, Ziggy's 3D bites the dust when i saw Zappy's incredibly FAST 3D in overscan.

Sad that Atari ST(E) demos lacks of design.

But how about my dream team that consist of desing and code:

Zappy as a coder
Defjam as a coder
Keops as a designer (and additional coder)
505 as a musician
Hooray! :)

Yes, more heroes, more releases, more dynamic, more public.
It's just a clockwork mechanic: do the first step and they follow but this step is huge.

When I talk about heroes, I know TCB / TLB / Replicants are all Thalion related, but they where less charismatic: newspapers about video-games didn't talk very much about the Atari ST once the Amiga was released. Why? Simply because once the Amiga get released, most gamers bought one as games where better and faster released than on the ST which became a second plan machine with most of the time bad conversions coming from the Amiga.

When the Amiga 500 was released this was the contrary: games conversion occured from the ST to the Amiga but where allmost the time better on the Amiga while not using its potential thought. Those games where exactly the same but the music was better.

Once developpers and editors saw bigger Amiga market than ST, specific games were released for that plateform using its inner hardware. ST can't beat the Amiga on games because Blitter / Paula / Copper were a custom chips team unbeatable by a mere 68000. And the Atari 520 ST was merely that: a 68000 @ 8MHz.

But this was great fun for ST democoders: less power, less colors, less blitcopy power, lame sound, lame OS, MSDOS disk compatibility, ... Everything was set for the ST becaming something to use to the max and to equal the Amiga without its power: you don't loose your time dealing with the system, it's simpler, more archaic than the Amiga OS.

So demos on the ST were great and using the hardware to the maximum. Amiga demos were different, design based because the initial spirit of the Amiga makers was different than those who build the ST. One computer was aimed at musician using midi instruments, this is the ST, the other was aimed at video making user. One was made for wordprocessing, this is the ST, the other was a computer console. The Amiga / ST war was lame because engineers didn't made these machines for the same aims, something lots didn't understood. And the Amiga won because users wanted better games.

When it comes to demos, the Amiga was more cinema based with tons of cinema inspired demos and design was the rule. After the first period were demomakers make their first step making ST like demos with some added soundtrack, they get used to the real potential of the Amiga and started using it while having the benefit of the design spirit initiated by the Amiga engineers (Lightwave / video grabber / Cinema / dream machine). The OS was really great but in fact became the most annoying stuff for demomakers and game makers. When the A500 was released it was the rule to go past the system: most games and demos where simple absolute coded and packed file. Everything was static, graphics and sounds were loaded at specific areas address in ram using ORG directive in ASM. This was great for little intros and demos. The OS wasn't used that much because they didn't care about launching a demo from Workbench. This is also why users get plenty of guru meditation: the crash system reporter of the Amiga. This occured a lot for one simple reason: no memory protection. And as the Amiga OS was a premptive multitasking one this occur a lot: one single byte altered in a system structure and your system is making a reset. And demomakers weren't really interested in clean system coding. This bring the idea of an instable computer to most people using Amigas. In fact when demos started to emerge, this was mainly due to the invention of trackloader by silents / scoopex. This was a way to totally get rid of the system: a dream for a demomaker. This way the OS wasn't even loaded that the demo was loaded and running. Various coders excellate on this demo technic: Chaos / Sanity was one of those making the SOS / Sanity Operating System, a demomaker OS to load trackloaded files, and stuff like that, like memory allocation. He even included a debugger and has coined its own assembler to produce Sanity demos.

But the Amiga then change for better games, better sounds, ... This required more memory and to ease the pain of waiting for loading, the hardrive appeared. Trackloaded demos could't been installed on it. So files demos came back when the Amiga 1200 was released. The OS was updated like the custom chips. Allas this was too late: the PC was better because Intel played the MHz race while Motorola (the CPU maker of ST / Amiga main CPU) was not) and the companies making hardware for the industry was also making lots of cards for PC which were not available for other kind of hardware: VGA / Sound cards. The Amiga OS was really great, but once again without memory protection, it was really easily reseted by somebody hitting the hardware directly, like did demomakers. It was a nightmare to launch demos from workbench or Amiga running more and more diverse hardware: once the MHZ race was launched, the companies making hardware for Amiga started to follow and each years their was updates for CPU: 020 + FPU @ 28 MHz instead of the standard 14 MHz EC20 (economic version without the FPU and with a weak address bus), 030 @ 33 MHz with FPU, 030 @ 50 MHz with FPU, 040, 060 @ 66MHz and memory upgrades were bigger and bigger: 2 / 4 / 8 MB of Fast RAM. Then arrived the video RTG cards for the Amiga 4000 with its zorro bus. But these last weren't used by games / demos. So they didn't sell to the main market of the Amiga and didn't save it from commercial death. Hence its technological death of the Amiga: no more market for obsolete Amiga hardware. Add to this the Gateway and others companies trying to buy Amiga while understanding it was a dead duck and Amiga users started to move to another platform for gaming and others uses.

The Atari Falcon wasn't this platform: some Atarian moved from the ST to the Amiga and they didn't move back to the Atari. They insteed moved to the PC. But this is not why the PC won: it won the market because it was a business machine. A genius called Bill Gates has understood quite quickly that the main market in the computer industry was not the video game, consoles are for that, but companies. Selling type writer software like Word under DOS and some other software usable by companies to improve their business was the way to make lots of money. Moreover lots of people wanted to type their letter at home using a better typewriter than the usual ones. And with the open architecture of the PC, it was quickly possible to make Asian Clone of the American machines. He then make lots of money because the OS which was the worse on town aka DOS wasn't given with the machine but insteed licenced and sold : so he made the software and let others make the hardware. This provided him with loads of money, and you know where all starts: by using a big big company and its horse power, IBM.

The Falcon was like the A1200: a born dead machine. Obsolete from start and not adapted to the market. In fact the A1200 was an upgraded A500 and a powerfull 2D console but not enough to beat the SNK NeoGeo for instance. The Falcon could have been a great 3D machine instead but this market was taken by the more dynamic PC with its ever changing video cards / motherboards and CPU. I remember Niko / Oxygene / Pulse told me: "this machine wasn't used, so I moved to the PC". The PC was with its 3D attracting games the mass market: 3D Wolfeinstein, Ultima Underworld, Doom, Quake, ... Because 2D died soon after Wolfenstein release and games using the same rendering technic. And most companies making video games started to make 3D games, all plateforms were served but of course the PC with its chunky / direct access graphic mode was better than any other plateforms, and get more developpers involved. Solidarity (the number) is a force, the most powerful and then the scene moved to this plateform too.

To come back to the topic, it seems obvious that Atarian were more concerned about keeping their computer and even if they don't show it publicly, were in fact more closer to Atari than Amigans to Amiga: this last company was playing with the nerves of its fans during years without any serious hardware releases but a lot of announcements and nothing done. This lead most users to buy a lot of newspapers about their Amiga and finally understanding that stories told were pure fiction, moved to the PC. Most if not all newspapers about Amiga died in 1997 because they were not selling anymore enough to be profitable. Amiga was bought but nothing happened for years and when the PowerPC machines were released, this was a niche market not very interesting for video game companies and software companies. The Amiga community was divided, lost after all these years of desert trip and surely found more than welcome to use another kind of computer even if its OS and technologies were far far worse.

Atarians were in fact less concerned by the same problem Amigans suffered: Atari was not only an hardware / OS making company and they didn't suffered from all this division and mess. I can mistake but I also think Atari machines remains easier to demo / game code than Amiga ones: the OS don't stop you all the time and can be switched off quickly with few ASM instructions: not the same case on the Amiga. TOS is simple because you've only one way to launch programs and this is from the GEM desktop itself (well there is the Auto folder where you can automatically run programs whom don't call special system functions but that's not a problem: people are ready to click an icon to watch a demo / game), the Amiga OS is a far far more complicated beast and then lost due to its super powerful but hard to code OS (demomakers vision: utilities software and Amiga OS are really great and better when smartly coded, but this don't seems to be useful for most people uses).

Thank you reading.

@moredhel: Ziggy did invent something: fullscreen 3d. He invented a way to do multiplications in synchro code. Check out all fullscreens and then check that one out.