@database "ar201.guide"
@Node MAIN "Amiga Report Online Magazine #2.01 -- January 7, 1994"

                               @{" Turn the Page " link "menu"}

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                       International Online Magazine

                "Your Weekly Source for Amiga Information."

                   Copyright © 1994 Skynet Publications
                            All Rights Reserved

                                      //                                  
%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%//%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%
%% January 7, 1994                \\//                    Issue No. 2.01 %%
%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%

@endnode

@node P2-1 "Where to find Amiga Report"
@toc "menu"
%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%
%%                      Where to find Amiga Report                       %%
%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%

  Click on the button of the BBS nearest you for information on that system.

                            » FidoNet Systems «
                              ---------------

  FREQ the filename "AR.LHA" for the most current issue of Amiga Report!

@{"     OMAHA AMIGANET      " link P2-1-9} ..................................Omaha, Nebraska
@{"          NOVA           " link P2-1-1} .............................Cleveland, Tennessee
@{"     CLOUD'S CORNER      " link P2-1-3} ............................Bremerton, Washington
@{"       BIOSMATICA        " link P2-1-4} .........................................Portugal
@{"    AMIGA JUNCTION 9     " link P2-1-5} ...................................United Kingdom
@{"     BITSTREAM BBS       " link P2-1-6} ..............................Nelson, New Zealand
@{"   REALM OF TWILIGHT     " link P2-1-7} ..................................Ontario, Canada
@{"    METNET TRIANGLE      " link P2-1-8} ......................Kingston Upon Hull, England
@{"   AMIGA-NIGHT-SYSTEM    " link P2-1-10} ................................Helsinki, Finland
@{" RAMSES THE AMIGA FLYING " link P2-1-11} ...........................................France
@{"      GATEWAY BBS        " link P2-1-12} ..............................Biloxi, Mississippi
@{"       TALK CITY         " link P2-1-13} ...............................Waukegan, Illinois
@{"       AMIGA BBS         " link P2-1-14} .........................Estado de Mexico, Mexaco
@{"   THE STYGIAN ABYSS     " link P2-1-15} ................................Chicago, Illinois

                          » Non-FidoNet Systems «
                            -------------------

@{"    IN THE  MEANTIME     " link P2-1-2} ...............................Yakima, Washington
@{"   FREELAND MAINFRAME    " link P2-1-50} ..............................Olympia, Washington
@{"           LAHO          " link P2-1-51} ...............................Seinajoki, Finland
@{"         FALLING         " link P2-1-52} ...........................................Norway
@{"      COMMAND LINE       " link P2-1-53} ..................................Toronto, Canada
@{"       RENDEZVOUS        " link P2-1-54} ......................................New Zealand
@{"  LEGUANS BYTE CHANNEL   " link P2-1-55} ..........................................Germany
@{"   STINGRAY DATABASE     " link P2-1-56} ...........................Muelheim/Ruhr, Germany
@{"  T.B.P.  VIDEO SLATE    " link P2-1-57} .............................Rockaway, New Jersey
@{"     AMIGA CENTRAL       " link P2-1-58} .............................Nashville, Tennessee
@{"   CONTINENTAL DRIFT     " link P2-1-59} ................................Sydney, Australia
@{"    GURU MEDITATION      " link P2-1-60} ............................................Spain

@endnode

@node "menu" "Amiga Report 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} Amiga Dealer Addresses and Numbers
@{" Commercial Online Services " link P4} Sign-Up Information
@{"     FTP Announcements      " link P5} New Files Available for FTP
@{"   AR Distribution Sites    " link P2-1} Where to get AMIGA REPORT

                ____________________________________________
         //    |                                            |        //
%%%%%%%%//%%%%%| Amiga Report International Online Magazine |%%%%%%%//%%%%%
%%   \\//      | Issue No. 2.01             January 7, 1994 |    \\//    %%
%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%| "Your Weekly Source for Amiga Information" |%%%%%%%%%%%%%%
               |____________________________________________|             
                                                                          
   · The Editor's Desk     · Computer Product News   · FTP Announcements
   · The Grapevine         · Dealer Directory        · The Listening Post
   · The Humor Department  · Reader Mail             · Distribution BBS's
 
                           » SPECIAL FEATURES «

  CD32 Reviewed.......................................Jeffrey J. Peden II
  Emulation Rambler.........................................Jason Compton
  European Outlook............................................Jesper Juul
  Usenet Review:  Pinball Fantasies AGA......................Henry Norman
  Rumors from the Amiga Side..............................Richard Johnson
  CD32 Titles Spot Review....................................Sean Caszatt
  Usenet Review:  Turrican 3................................Mark B. Sachs
  CD Platform Comparison.......................................Harv Laser
  Mac vs. PC:  A Techincal Comparison................Sandberg and Hembree
                                                                          
%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%
%%         @{" DELPHI " link P4-1} · @{" PORTAL " link P4-2} · @{" FIDO " link P2-1} · @{" INTERNET " link P4-5} · @{" BIX " link P4-6}       %%
%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%

@endnode

@node P1-1 "The Editor's Desk"
@toc "menu"

%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%
%% The Editor's Desk                                    By Robert Glover %%
%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%


Welcome to the new year!  I hope 1994 will be as good a year for the Amiga
as was 1993.  If all goes well, we should see another chipset generation
from Commodore, and at least one new machine utilizing that chipset.  The
AAA design should prove to be one of the greatest computer achievments in
a long time, and should finally bring the Amiga back up to snuff with its
PC contenders.

As you may have noticed, the look of AR has changed a little.  We've done
this to freshen things up a bit, as well as break into new ground in a
few areas, and get rid of some of the excess fluff that was left around for
the few people that don't like AmigaGuide.  That's all gone, as we'll be
100% AmigaGuide from now on.  You, the readers wanted it, and you got it!


                     Rob @ AR                           \|/
                                                        @ @
----------------------------------------------------oOO-(_)-OOo------------

@endnode

@node P4-1 "Delphi"
@toc "menu"

%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%
%%       Delphi Internet Services -- Your Connection to the World!       %%
%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%


 Amiga Report International Online Magazine is available every week in the
 Amiga SIG on DELPHI.  Amiga Report readers are invited to join  DELPHI and
 become a part of the friendly community of Amiga 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 Username: type JOINDELPHI and press RETURN,
              At Password: type AMIGAREPORT and press RETURN.

  DELPHI's best plan is the 20/20 plan.  It gives you 20 hours each month
  for the low price of only $19.95!  Additional hours are only $1.50 each!
             This covers 1200, 2400 and even 9600 connections!

          For more information, and details on other plans, call
                 DELPHI Member Services at 1-800-695-4005


                             SPECIAL FEATURES
                             ----------------

 · Complete Internet connection -- Telnet, FTP, IRC, Gopher, E-Mail and more!
   (Internet option is $3/month extra)

 · SIGs for all types of computers  -- Amiga, IBM, Macintosh, Atari, etc.

 · Large file databases!
 
 · SIGs for hobbies, video games, graphics, and more!

 · Business and world news, stock reports, etc.

 · Grolier's Electronic Encyclopedia!


                  DELPHI - It's getting better all the time!



@endnode

@node P2-2 "AR Staff"
@toc "menu"

%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%
%%                        The Amiga Report Staff                         %%
%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%

  
                                  Editor
                                  ======

                               Robert Glover

 Portal:                          Rob-G
 Delphi:                          ROB_G
 FidoNet:                        1:285/11
 AmigaNet:                      40:200/10
 Internet:   General Mail:   ROB_G@Delphi.com     
             Submissions:    Rob-G@cup.portal.com
 


                      Assistant and Technical Editor
                      ==============================

                               Robert Niles

 Portal:                         RNiles
 Delphi:                         RNILES
 FidoNet:                      1:3407/103
 Internet:                rniles@imtired.itm.com



@endnode

@node P1-2 "Computer Product News"
@toc "menu"

%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%
%%                         Computer Product News                        %%
%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%



                        » Worktime Workout v1.01 «


Results Engineering, Inc. announces the release of Worktime Workout v1.01,
a Windows-based video program designed to help prevent Repetitive Stress
Injuries through a doctor-approved exercise routine.

Worktime Workout reminds users at an interval they select to take an
exercise break, then shows full-motion videos of models performing
simple stretches.  Worktime Workout also includes on-line Ergonomics
Hints and Body Mechanics Hints to help users reduce repetitive stress
both at work and at home.

Worktime Workout starts when Windows is launched, and exercise reminders
appear automatically.  Users can choose which exercises to include in
the workout, how many repetitions to perform, and how often to do the
workout, from every few minutes to every two hours.  The program includes
twenty exercises for hand, wrist, eye, jaw, neck, shoulder, and back.  A
complete 20-exercise workout takes about five minutes.

The exercise program was developed in conjunction with Dr. Paul M. Puziss,
a Portland, OR orthopedic surgeon, and Dr. Sandra K. Landis, a Beaverton,
OR optometrist.

Worktime Workout requires a 386/SX or faster computer running Dos 5.0
or later and MS-Windows 3.1, plus VGA or better graphics and a mouse.
Only 3 Meg of free disk space is required for program and video files.
No other hardware is required.

For further information, contact

Results Engineering, Inc.                   Telephone: (503) 232-1497
P.O. Box 42395                              Compuserv: 71532,1426
Portland, OR 97242-0395                     Internet:  results@teleport.com




                         » The Scientific Amigan «


TITLE

   Scientific Amigan


COMPANY

   Scientific Amigan
   POB 60685
   Savannah, GA   31420-0685
   Compuserve 72755,135
   Internet   waltal@well.sf.ca.usa


AUTHORS

   Walter Lounsbery, Publisher/Editor


DESCRIPTION

Scientific Amigan is a new publication devoted to addressing the needs
of research, development, and design with the Amiga.  This newsletter
format monthly provides the technical focus that general Amiga
publications lack.  Readers benefit from techniques and software
developed across a wide range of disciplines, instead of occasional
articles that can't get to the desired level of detail.  The
Scientific Amigan disk library provides a wide range of tools and data
for the scientist and engineer; any two disks from the library are
provided with the annual subscription to the newsletter.  Reprint
material is also available as a susbscriber service.

Charter subscribers get a special $10 off of the annual rate,
perpetually applied to their subscription renewals.  However, this
special offer is only extended to subscriptions recieved through the
end of January, 1994.

For more information, please email or write Scientific Amigan at
the above address.  Sample issues will be available soon after the
premier January/February 1994 issue.


PRICE

Charter Subscription $29 per year (available until Feb. 1994)
Regular Subscription $39 per year

@endnode

@node P5-1 "HWGRCS Patch level 6"
@toc "menu"


                    » HWGRCS Patch level 6 available «

TITLE

    HWGRCS

VERSION

    HWGRCS 5.6 at Amiga Patch Level _6_

AUTHOR

    Ported, enhanced, and maintained by

    Heinz Wrobel
    Karlstr. 16
    82131 Gauting
    Germany

    <heinz@hwg.muc.de>
    <heinz@edohwg.adsp.sub.org>

    FAX +49 89 850 51 25, I prefer email.


DESCRIPTION

    HWGRCS is a port of RCS 5.6[.0.1] done with SAS/C 6.3.

    The Revision Control System (RCS) manages multiple revisions
    of  files.   RCS  automates the storing, retrieval, logging,
    identification, and merging of revisions.  RCS is useful for
    text that is revised frequently, for example programs, docu-
    mentation, graphics, papers, and form letters.

    For upgraders from the old RCS 4.x on Fish 281/282:

        - HWGRCS supports the RCS_link feature
        - No problems with non-ASCII characters

    Special features:

        - File pattern expansion in all RCS commands
        - Support for .a,.asm,.i,.fd,.guide,.ps extensions.
        - GNU DIFF 2.6, GNU patch 2.1 and a N*rton like LP utility.
        - I try to _support_ HWGRCS.


NEW FEATURES

    New since patch level 5:

    - "-d" and "-M" should now (finally) be truly fixed.
    - HWGRCS now uses the POSIX compliant "-x/,v".
    - LP overhauled.

    ENHANCEMENTS:

    - locale.libray is now supported for TZ handling.
    - Limited Un*x filename support on the command line possible.


SPECIAL REQUIREMENTS

    V37, >1MB suggested, HD required.


HOST NAME

    Any Aminet site, e.g. ftp.uni-paderborn.de   (131.234.2.32) for users
    in germany.


DIRECTORY

    /pub/aminet/dev/misc

FILE NAMES

    HWGRCSp6f.lha
    HWGRCSsrcp6f.lha

PRICE

    I don't declare it shareware as it is GNU SW, but donations/gifts for
    my support are quite welcome! Donations in physical form preferred.
    Support ~ Gifts, especially for commercial users.


DISTRIBUTABILITY

    RCS is distributable under the Gnu Public License.

    For my support of HWGRCS I won't bill you, but I ask for donations (Hear
    me, commercial users? :-).

OTHER

    No bug reports for >~3 months. Did I finally catch them all? Report
    them for patch 7!

@endnode

@node P5-2 "MainActor v1.2"
@toc "menu"


                   » MainActor v1.2 available for FTP «

TITLE

  MainActor

VERSION

  1.2

AUTHOR

  Markus Moenig
  moenig@pool.informatik.rwth-aachen.de

DESCRIPTION

  MainActor is a modular animation package.

  It allows you to create,edit,time and play animations of the provided
  animation formats.

  You can convert any format into any other, allowing you to
  convert for example a range of pictures into an animation format
  of your choice, or resave the frames of an animation to an
  picture format, or simply to convert different picture formats.

  The following modules are included in this release:

  Animation Loader        Max. Depth         Animation Saver
  ----------------        ----------         ---------------
  Universal
  Universal_PicassoII
  Universal_Retina
  DL                         8 Bit
  FLI                        8 Bit           FLI
  FLC                        8 Bit           FLC
  IFF-Anim5                  8 Bit           IFF-Anim5
  IFF-Anim7_16               8 Bit           IFF-Anim7_16
  IFF-Anim7_32               8 Bit           IFF-Anim7_32
  IFF-Anim8_16               8 Bit           IFF-Anim8_16
  IFF-Anim8_32               8 Bit           IFF-Anim8_32
  IFF-AnimBrush              8 Bit
  Picasso                   24 Bit *         Picasso

  Picture Loader                             Picture Saver
  --------------                             -------------
  Universal
  Universal_PicassoII
  Universal_Retina
  GIF                        8 Bit
  IFF                       24 Bit           IFF
  PCX                        8 Bit
  Workbench-Icon             4 Bit           Workbench-Icon

  * Only available to registered users of MainActor and legal owners of the
    Picasso-II board.

  New features of Version 1.2

  - MainActor/MainView now have a center option which allows highly
    accurate centration of your images or animations.

  - New BorderBlank option.

  - MainActor has a new window called Project Information Window.  The
    new functions included in the window are:

       * An information window which will give you detailed
         descriptions of your current animation or picture list.

       * You can now view the size and time profiles of your projects
         as a graphical representation.

       * You can compare the decompression times of your projects
         through new timer functions.

  - New GIF/FLI/FLC/DL loader modules and FLI/FLC saver modules.

  - Chunky pixel modules (GIF/FLI/FLC) will fly if loaded through
    universal modules which support graphic cards (like
    Universal_PicassoII etc.). You can of course also view them on
    your native chipset as normal.

  - Introduction of a new (light) registration package. It does not
    have the handbook or the disk based updates but is cheaper.

  - You can now use the save/append functions again, even if you have
    not registered MainActor. You will have to deal with requesters
    though.

  General Features:

  -Intelligent caching/tracking, MainActor can cache your animations and
   picture lists, if you have not enough memory it will directly access
   your data from any device. This makes it for example possible to
   create/edit/play a 400MB animation on your 2MB Amiga.

  -If you run OS 3.0 or higher, you will get an extra speed bonus on
   animations through the use of the new graphics routines.
   For OS2.0/2.1 users there are specific routines in the modules, which
   will give them the best playback speed possible on their system
   (and my knowledge :)).

  -Under OS 3.0 you will get the extra features of showing pictures or
   playing animations in a scrollable, resizable window on your MainActor
   or Workbench screen. The colors will be properly adjusted to your screen
   attributes.

  -MainActor has an arexx port, nearly all functions can be accessed through
   it. You can for example scale or dither whole animations through
   the use of an image processor, scripts are included.

HOST NAME

  MainActor should be available on all Aminet sites.

  For Example :

  Scandinavia  ftp.luth.se            130.240.16.3
  Germany      ftp.uni-kl.de          131.246.9.95
  Germany      ftp.cs.tu-berlin.de    130.149.17.7
  USA          ftp.wustl.edu          128.252.135.4

DIRECTORY

  /pub/aminet/gfx/edit

FILE NAME

  MainActor1_2.lha

SPECIAL REQUIREMENTS

  OS 2.0+

PRICE

  The shareware fee is $50 or $25

DISTRIBUTABILITY

  MainActor is shareware.

@endnode

@node P5-3 "Amiga Mosaic v1.0"
@toc "menu"


                    » Amiga Mosaic available for FTP «


TITLE

     Amiga Mosaic

VERSION

     1.0

COMPANY

     None

AUTHORS

     Michael Fischer
     Michael Witbrock
     Michael Meyer
     email: amosaic@max.physics.sunysb.edu

DESCRIPTION

     Amiga Mosaic is a port of NCSA's X Mosaic World Wide Web browser
program.  It allows amiga users with a direct internet connection to
browse the World Wide Web's hypertext documents.

SPECIAL REQUIREMENTS

     - Amiga OS 3.0 or greater
     - MUI 1.4
     - AmiTCP or AS225 networking software

HOST NAME

     max.physics.sunysb.edu (129.49.21.100)

DIRECTORY

     pub/amosaic

FILE NAMES

     Mosaic1.0-AmiTCP or Mosaic1.0-AS225
     www2_mime.lha
     www2_rexx.lha
     Other support files (MUI, AmiTCP, etc) in directory "support".

PRICE

     Free

DISTRIBUTABILITY

     Freely distributable but Copyrighted.

@endnode

@node P5-4 "PGPAmiga v2.3a.2"
@toc "menu"


                   » PGPAmiga 2.3a.2 available for FTP «


[ A Quote from Dan Follows:             -Carlos                ]
[                                                              ]
[ " Note:  The RSA public-key encryption algorithm is patented.]
[ Therefore, it is ILLEGAL to use this software in the USA     ]
[ without an RSA license.  I have heard in my security classes ]
[ that PKP will sell you an individual license for a very      ]
[ reasonable price (< $5).  Also, it is also probably illegal  ]
[ to export this software from the US.  I don't know how that  ]
[ applies to ftp.... "                                         ]
[                                   -Dan Z                     ]

TITLE

     Pretty Good Privacy (PGP)

VERSION

     Version 2.3a patchlevel 2

AUTHOR

     Amiga port and enhancements by Peter Simons <simons@peti.GUN.de>

DESCRIPTION

             Pretty Good(tm) Privacy (PGP), from Phil's Pretty Good
     Software, is a high security cryptographic software application for
     MSDOS, Unix, VAX/VMS, Amiga and other computers. PGP allows people
     to exchange files or messages with privacy, authentication, and
     convenience. Privacy means that only those intended to receive a
     message can read it. Authentication means that messages that appear
     to be from a particular person can only have originated from that
     person. Convenience means that privacy and authentication are
     provided without the hassles of managing keys associated with
     conventional cryptographic software. No secure channels are needed
     to exchange keys between users, which makes PGP much easier to use.
     This is because PGP is based on a powerful new technology called
     "public key" cryptography. And PGP performs the public-key
     functions faster than most other software implementations. PGP is
     public key cryptography for the masses.

             Please take note that the archive contains a readme file,
     with checksums for ALL files in the distribution and is signed with
     my key! Please be careful, if this file is missing or rigged!


CHANGES
             This version is re-compiled with SAS/C 6.50. A few minor
     bugs have been fixed. Additionally, the manual is now availabe in
     TexInfo style and can easily be converted into AmigaGuide,
     postscript, dvi or whatever format. AmigaGuide versions are
     included.

             Also for the first time, the alt.security.pgp frequently
     asked questions (FAQ) are included in the archive.


NOTES

             A mailing list concerning PGPAmiga has been opened on
     peti.GUN.de. To subscribe, send e-mail to listserv@peti.GUN.de
     with "ADD your_address PGPAmiga" in the message body. You may add
     "HELP" in the next line to receive a command overview of
     ListSERV.


SPECIAL REQUIREMENTS

     none

HOST NAME

     Any Aminet host, i.e. ftp.uni-kl.de (131.246.9.95).

DIRECTORY

     /pub/aminet/util/crypt/

FILE NAMES

     PGPAmi23a_2.lha
     PGPAmi23a2_src.lha

DISTRIBUTABILITY

     GNU General Public License



@endnode

@node P1-3 "Amiga Report Online"
@toc "menu"

%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%
%%                       Amiga Report Online News                       %%
%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%


                             » FidoNet News «
                               ------------


*** Area: OMAHA_AMIGA                             Date: 23 Dec 93 20:25:00
*** From: Lee Brittain (1:285/11.0)
*** To  : All
*** Subj: CD32

 Well after a few days of playing around with this machine I have a few
comments for everyone. I am really impressed with it. I think Commodore could
really hit home with this. Pinball Fantasies and Sleepwalker are included with
the console. Most of you already know about Pinball Fantasies but I didn't. I
am really stuck on this game. The colors are vibrant and the graphics are
sharp. Sleepwalker is pretty much shovelware. It's ok but that's about it. 
 
 I decided to buy a S-Video cable to see if it made a difference. Well I hadnt
had any use for the connector on my RCA 27" tv anyways. The difference is
quite pleasing. The colors have more luster and the very small text on the
Pinball fantasies is quite sharp and legible now. It's worth the bux to buy
one if you have the connector on your TV. 
 
 I have D/Generation and James Pond 2 on the way from AmigaMan. Should be here
the middle of next week. I really hope to see some games made specifically for
the CD32 soon. The AGA ports arent bad but it seems a shame to waste so much
disk space. =) 




*** Area: AMIGA                                   Date: 28 Dec 93 20:39:55
*** From: Jeff Grimmett (1:202/701.20)
*** To  : All
*** Subj: CD32 and CGW (JAN)

Interesting article in CGW this month, they focus in on the new wave of game
consoles, including the belle of the echo, the CD³². If this is old news to
you, hit "N" now :-)

The CD³² coverage was quite fair, IMO.  They payed suitable homage to the
Amiga for the fanatics out there :-) and focused in on a few of the games
available.  One very interesting comment: [paraphrased] Pinball Fantasies is
almost worth the price of the CD³² alone.  They DO have misgivings about
Commodore.  Heh.  Must already own an Amiga...

Also a first: they were one of the few magazines to call the CD-I what it was:
NOT CD-I, but a completely different machine.  Even the processor is
different.  Might shed a little light on why this machine is suddenly
receiving publicity, eh?

Of course, they did not just jump on the Amiga bandwagon and call the CD³² the
game machine of choice, as I would expect.  They rather expect the 3D0
architecture to run rampant, but leave open the possiblility that the CD-I
could take off on the basis of its support base alone (a very good
possibility).  However, they do not close the door on anything (except maybe
the Pioneer box). As they say, the next six months may likely change the
landscape completely.  We shall see :-)

Anyway, among all the doom/gloom out there from certain dark corners of the
small magellen clouds, I thought some folks might appreciate the fact that not
all of the mainstream press is ignoring developments, nor is the world at
large completely brain dead :-)

Jeff (Holder of the Seven Rings of Beta Testing)




*** Area: AMIGA                                   Date:  2 Jan 94  8:56:00
*** From: Jon Peterson (1:396/36.0)
*** To  : All
*** Subj: FFish 1000th Disk Fund

Here is the list of donors for the sixteenth week of the FFish
1000th Disk Anniv thingy.

* Individuals *

Jon Peterson
Matthew L. Schultz
Chris Nelson
Asha DeVelder
Marshall Freedland
Jeremy Friesner
Michael Phipps
Darrin & Lisa Zimmerman (Amiga Un-Sig of Southern Michigan)
Eric V. Peterson (Canada)
Eric Zimmer
Fred M. Hamilton
Michael Meredith (England)
David Jennings (Australia)
Gary Delzer
David Gomme
Rick Russell
Julla O. Kouppinen (Finland)
Gary Simpson
Robert Sudbury
Jon Peterson (Asha's FF1000th Auction Amiga Check Pin purchase)
Mark Baker
Michael Berg (Denmark)
Sam Worf
Douglas & Susan Blakeley
Richard A. Boedi (Germany
Jari Neiminen (Finland)

* Users Group Donations *

Gateway Amiga Club, Inc.
Abilene Amiga Users Group
Niagara Amiga (Users) Group N.A.G. (Canada)
New Orleans Commodore Klub Amiga Group
Ohio Valley AUG (A $147 donation from this Group - Big Thanks
  and a sincere Merry Christmas.)

* Company Donations *

Randhir J. Jesrani (CompuQuick Media Center, Columbus, OH)
Dale L. Larson (Intangible Assets Manufacturing, Drexel Hill,
PA) Intangible is a new company that has just released its' first
product by the name of Amiga Envoy. No further info available.
Dale? This gentleman also has challenged other companies that
have benefited from FFish's efforts to join the effort.

 ****************
Many thanks to Robert Glover for posting these messages
from FidoNet in the Amiga Report (latest issues 136 and 137).
The drive has gotten a number of donations/inquiries from Europe
and Australia because of that publication. (This is getting more
international..Where's Hong Kong etc.??)

Total donations as of 1/1/94 are $839.50.  Got a ways to go
folks to purchase the (?A4000T?) but the fund drive seems to be
picking up some steam. BTW, there is pretty reliable info
that FFish does in fact already own an A4000 (shoot!).
Suggestions? A CD32 looks to be the most popular alternative.
Please talk this up with all concerned (Amiga users) and pass
the word on to your Users Groups. If you haven't joined the
effort, slip that hand into the pocket and pull out some bucks,
put it into any envelope and send it in.  Let's show what the
Amiga community is all about. Check over some of the programs
you have benefited/are benefiting from.  Register them and/or
pitch in for FishFund. * Reminder to everyone PLEASE!!! Pass the
word at any Users Group meetings you attend. This is to be a
group effort on behalf of all the Amiga users throughout the
world. Please donate whatever you can afford - or even better -
what you honestly think FFish's work has been worth to you
through the years. Thanks. BTW, there have been some very
nice comments to/about FFish included in the envelopes with
donations.  As I have been saving these, think I will include
them along with the donation "pot"/A4000T when the time comes.
Happy New Year to all - let's make this the year of the Amiga.



                              » Portal News «
                                -----------

Joseph P. Laleman
November 4th, 1992

Gail Flicher
Commodore
Business Machines, Inc.
1200 Wilson Drive
West Chester, PA 19380

Dear Ms. Flicher,


        I spoke with you on two occasions last week concerning my
troubles with Gold Service.  Yesterday, November 3rd, 1992, I
received a call from a woman representing Mr. Silven Fix.  Mr.
Fix was the service person assigned to repair my 3000T.  I
informed the lady that you had authorized me to take my 3000T to
my local dealer last week and that it was now working fine.  The
lady informed me that Mr. Fix was trying hard to get in touch
with me.  The telephone number that I gave Bob at Gold Service as
a primary number is the same number in which you reached me on
two occasions.  The business has four telephone lines and a full
time secretary.  I am perplexed why Mr. Fix had so much
difficulty reaching me.  The secondary number listed with Bob is
my home number and someone is at that number after 4:30 P.M.
Monday through Friday.  Previous to our last conversation, Bob
had told me that Mr. Fix would call me immediately to arrange an
appointment to repair my 3000T.  "Immediately" turned out to be
three days later.

        The following is the progression of my experience with Gold
Service:

        Wednesday, October 21st, 1992 - I telephoned the Express
number to use Gold Service.  I discovered that I was supposed to
have received a Gold Service number and was given a number to
call to inquire about why I didn't receive it.  I hadn't given
the Gold Service much thought because I thought I was covered.  I
assumed that all I had to do was give my name and serial number
to receive the service.  I had a problem with the Gold Service
registration initially.  I purchased the 3000T with the Commodore
special $500 rebate offer in March 1992 and my dealer sent all
the proper documents.  I received a notice that Commodore hadn't
received the receipt of purchase to authorize the Gold Service.
The receipt was necessary for the special $500 rebate and I know
that my dealer received the money.  To expedite matters, my
dealer FAXed the documents to Commodore and I didn't hear another
word about Gold Service.  Unfortunately, on my initial call to
the Express number, I was given the wrong number to call to
inquire about the lack of Gold Service number.  The telephone
number I was given had been disconnected.  I again called the
Express number and received the proper telephone number.  After
my name and serial number were checked through the system, I was
informed that I had duplicate serial and Gold Service numbers
with someone else.  The pleasant lady told me that she would tag
the account and I would receive the necessary Gold Service
material.  I received the Gold Service material within two days.
I telephoned the Express number for the third time, gave them my
Gold Service number, explained my problem to Bob, and was told
that the new mother board would be sent the next day (Thursday)
because by this time it was late in the afternoon.  I made an
effort to check that all the information was correct.  Even
though I informed Bob that I had a duplicate Gold Service number,
he had the wrong name, wrong address, and wrong model of Amiga.
Someone would have received a mother board mysteriously FedXed
from Commodore if I hadn't double checked the information.  I was
informed by Bob that, upon receiving the part, someone would
contact me to arrange a time and date for the repair.  At this
point I thought the problem was solved.

        Friday, October 23rd, 1992 - As promised, I received the
mother board FedX directly from Commodore.  I made arrangements
at work so I would be available to meet the repair person, but
his call never came.  I telephoned my Amiga dealer to see if he
could install the part, but I was told to wait for Gold Service
and they would take care of it.

        Monday, October 26th, 1992 - After not hearing from Gold
Service, I telephoned to inform them that I had received the
mother board and inquire why I hadn't been contacted by a service
person.  I was told that Gold Service was waiting to hear from
Commodore and that they would get back to me.

        Wednesday, October 28th, 1992 - I discussed the problem of
inaction by Gold Service with my dealer, he agreed to inquire at
Commodore for me to see if something could be done to speed
things along.  I received a call from you.  You told me that my
dealer couldn't install the mother board, that I would hear from
Gold Service shortly and my problem would be resolved.  I did
receive a call from Bob and, after apologizing for the delay, he
assured me that a repair person would call and set a time to
service my 3000T.

        Friday, October 30th, 1992 - In the morning, I telephoned
Gold Service to inquire why I hadn't received a call and was told
that Bob was unavailable.  The man asked if I wanted to speak to
another representative.  I spoke with a lady and tried to explain
my situation in detail to give her an understanding of my
problem.  I had to repeatedly ask her to allow me to explain the
problem.  At one point in the conversation she misread the
starting and ending dates of my Gold Service coverage and tried
to tell me that I wasn't covered anymore.  The final time she
interrupt me she asked who I had spoken with before.  After
telling her "Bob," she said she would transfer me to him and must
have thought she had me on hold, because she said to someone,
"I've got a guy on the line and I don't know what he's talking
about."  The next moment I was hung up on.  I again called back
and spoke to another lady who informed me that I wasn't hung up
on.  They were having phone problems.  For some reason, Bob was
now available and he informed me that a Mr. Silven Fix would call
me immediately.  I explained my conversation with the lady that
wouldn't give me the courtesy of allowing me to explain my
problem.  He informed me that she was following proper procedure
and would have diagnosed the problem within 30 seconds, but he
would communicate my feelings on the matter.  I told Bob that I
felt my treatment was poor customer relations.  Even though just
the day before Bob had apologized for the problems associated
with my case, today he was abrupt seemed little concerned with
the way I was being treated.  The time was 11:00 A.M. central
time and I sat through my lunch hour waiting for the call from
Mr. Fix.  By late afternoon I had had enough abuse from the Gold
Service people and telephoned my dealer to find out how I could
contact you directly again.  I left a message on your voice mail
and you returned my call within an hour.  (Thank you for your
concern and action!)  You were not pleased with what I explained
to you about how I was being treated and allowed me to take my
3000T to my dealer and have it repaired.  If I was allowed to do
that a week earlier, I wouldn't have suffered the down time and
the abuse from Gold Service.

        Tuesday, November 3rd, 1992 - I  received a call from a
woman who wanted to set a time for Mr. Fix to repair my Amiga.  I
informed the lady that, after a week delay, you had authorized my
local dealer to install the mother board.

        I am a long term supporter and user of the Amiga.  I am one
of the charter members of my users group and have acted as
president.  I have done many presentations promoting the Amiga.
At one time I wrote for the Canadian Amiga based magazine Amigo
Times.  I have acted as a beta tester for software companies.  I
have two accelerated 2000's, a 3000UX, and a (of course) 3000T.
My machines are loaded with all the state of the art, top quality
devices I can afford.  I use all my Amigas for professional video
and 24 bit, single frame animation.  Essentially, much of my life
has been spent with Amigas.

        In the video business, I deal with time related problems
every day.  What I hate the most is to tell my client that I
can't be on time because of "technical difficulties."  The
customer wants the product delivered when promised.  I don't want
him to think that I am negligent and just using excuses of
equipment malfunctions to cover my own incompetence.  Gold
Service looks great on paper.  I thought that Gold Service would
help protect me from missing deadlines.

        I can chock my exposure to Gold Service up as an unpleasant
learning experience.  I understand that problems with
communication can arise and action may be delayed, but the series
of delays I experienced only shows that Gold Service doesn't
deliver what it promises.  In addition to not being reliable, the
Gold Service personnel treat people in a rude, bruque manner.  If
the personnel can't (or won't) take the time to understand what
the customer is telling them, the customer is treated as if he is
the problem or that he's just plain stupid!

        The only timely action I received was directly from
Commodore.  From my perspective, what would work well would be a
system where parts were shipped promptly to an authorized service
center and the dealer would install or repair the Amiga.  My
dealer said that he could never receive a part as fast as I did
through Gold Service.  The Gold Service people don't seem to have
much incentive to be prompt, where the dealer has an interest in
keeping his customer happy.  I bought my 3000T through my dealer
to receive a better quality of service and I got it.  My
purchases at my dealer benefit Commodore.  Gold Service doesn't
sell anything for Commodore.

        Ms. Flicher, I would like you to understand that I am not
criticizing you or Commodore.  Like many people I know, I have
been very encouraged by Commodore's efforts in developing the
Amiga.  With the technical and marketing efforts by people like
you, I feel that the Amiga has a fighting chance for survival.  I
know that Gold Service is a separate company that you have
contracted to do the work.  I think a better choice could have
been made to represent your service requirements.

        Thank you for allowing me to express my concern about Gold
Service.  I hope that I am an exception rather than a normal case
for Gold Service.


Sincerely,

Joseph P. Laleman


P.S.

        Since my 3000UX has an EtherNet card, I have been trying to
order three additional cards so I can network my Amigas together.
I have repeatedly been told from several sources that Commodore
is not shipping the cards even though they are available.  Is
there any way that I can get them?   Thanks again.


@endnode

@node P4-5 "Amiga Report Mailing List"
@toc "menu"

%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%
%%                      Amiga Report Maillist List                      %%
%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%


No Official Amiga Report Distribution Site in your local calling area? Are
you tired of waiting for your local BBS or online service to get Amiga
Report each week?  If so, have we got a deal for you!

If you have an internet mailing address, you can receive Amiga Report
in UUENCODED form each week as soon as the issue is released.  To be put
on the list, send Email to Amiga-Report-Request@imtired.itm.com.  Your
account must be able to handle mail of any size to ensure an intact copy.
For example, many systems have a 100K limit on incoming messages.

Please do not send general Email to Amiga-Report-Request, only requests
for subscription additions or deletions (or if you are not receiving an
intact copy).  All other correspondence concerning the mailing list
should be directed to Robert Niles at rniles@imtired.itm.com.  Also, please
do not send subscription list requests or changes to the editor.

Many thanks to PORTAL Communications for setting this service up for us!

P.S.:  Please be sure to include your Email address in the text of your
request message, it makes adding it to the list much easier.  Thanks!

** IMPORTANT NOTICE:  PLEASE be certain your host can accept mail over
** 100K!  We have had a lot of bouncebacks recently from systems with a
** 100K size limit for incoming mail.  If we get a bounceback with your
** address in it, it will be removed from the list.  Thanks!

                     ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

@endnode

@node P1-4 "The Amiga CD32 Reviewed"
@toc "menu"

%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%
%% The Amiga CD32 Reviewed!                       By Jeffrey J. Peden II %%
%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%
 

Amiga CD32 Commodore's Kill-all-or-be-killed CD System

I can't express in words how great it is to be one of the very
fortunate few in  North America to have received the Amiga CD32 before 
it's official roll-out here.  I have  never been what I would call a 
hard core video-gamer, but when I read about t he CD32  I just knew I 
needed to have one.  When I read that NTSC/North American ones were 
being sold at the Toronto World of Commodore Amiga, I called up Amigaman

and ordered one, on the slim chance that I might be lucky enough to 
receive one of the units slated to come in before Christmas.  Well, it's
Sunday, December 26, and I am one of the few, the proud, the ecstatic. 

I am now an owner of a Commodore Amiga CD32!

First Impressions

Even though I knew what it was, and I had paid for half of it, I was
not allowed to even look at the box until Christmas Eve.  The first
thing I noticed was that the box was in 4 languages.  English, German,
French and Italian.  Also, the English texts are denoted with a British
flag, meaning that this is a box from the earlier European release.  I
expect that the machines released here in the U.S. next month will  have
a different box.  Also extremely interesting was the fact that the
whole back of the box was split up into 4 sections (one for each
language) telling about the Full Motion Video (FMV) module.  (It even
said that the release for the FMV/MPEG module was to be Fall '93)
Opening it up, you find the CD32 in the middle, being supported by foam
braces on the sides (which look like they were shaped for the A1200),
and in the front of the box, a container for the controller and cables. 
The cables are extremely low-cost.  The audio cables which come with
the A4000 and A1200 are pretty good quality cables (but they are by no
means professional quality).  These cables are cheap, and are
inflexible.  Also, while the CD32 supports S-Video output, no such cable
comes with the un it.  For RF output, it comes with a very old-style
Game/TV switch.  I believe it is the same one that came with my
ColecoVision!  I hope that Commodore does away with this style of 
switch in favor of the SuperNES style auto-detecting switch.  It does
come with a power-brick, but this one is smaller than the ones that come
with the A1200 (by about  25%) and it does not have a fan. Also, the
power switch is on the back of the CD32, not the power supply, which
means that the black/grey brick can be put out of sight.  The 
controller was set in the box in a way that took me a minute or two to
get out, but  that's nothing. :-)

"The World's First 32-BIT CD Games Console"

I pulled the thing out of it's box, and started connecting right away.
Ididn't  even look at the "Getting Started" instructions until half an
hour after it was running.  We had just gotten a new RCA 27" ColorTrack
Plus, which had a S-Video input, so I went digging through our
Video-Room's "snake drawer" - our own miniature version  of Radio Shack
(we run a small video production business here, out of our home) and
found an unused S-Video cable. I plugged it in, and turned it on, and
jumped about a foot when the TV blared at me. I was actually pleased  to
see an attractive boot up/intro  screen with soothing music.  An 
animated CD spinning with plasma lights float ing out of the top and 
bottom of the screen (a Northern Lights type of thing) and Amiga CD32  
at the top.  From this screen, you can hit the RED (Select) button to go
to the Non-Volatile RAM control screen.  From here you can Lock
(protect  from being over written) or Unlock the entries in RAM.  There
are 100 units available, and when they are all filled up, the oldest,
unlocked, items are  overwritten first.  This i s a very nice  touch,
because it means that you  could save your Pinball Fantasies 600 Million
Points score forever, and let  something else be overwritten first. 
The interface has a scrolling list of  all the entries, and on the side
of what I suppose you could call a window,  there  is an animated golden
key.  This key turns when you hit the select  button to  lock or 
unlock an entry.  Also from the boot up screen, you can  hit the BLUE
(Stop) button to  bring up the language selection screen.   There are
between 15 and 30 language s you  can select from. Mine came  defaulted
to American (as opposed to English).  I would assume that this  is like
Locale prefs on WB 2.1+ machines, and that any progr am that can  use
the locale.library can use these languages.  If there is a CD in the
machine  when it is booted up, most of the intro is skipped.  When a CD
is  dropped int o the  top-loading mechanism (A whole lot nicer and
quicker  than the tray machines and the CD caddies), the CD of the Amiga
CD32 begins  to spin, moves over to the right, smacking the 32 off the
screen, and then  moves across the screen wiping away the  Amiga por
tion of the logo.  It is  all very nicely done.

Inserting a music CD brings up the audio interface.  This is just as
creative as the rest of the machine. From the intro screen, it fades
into a blue screen, with a 4x5  matrix of track indicators, and the
control panel, which has buttons for Play /Pause,  Stop, Forward
Search/Skip, Reverse Search/Skip, Shuffle Play, Loop, and the b utton to
switch the counter between Total Elapsed Time, Elapsed Track Time,
Track Time  Remaining, and  Total Time Remaining.  The interface and the
track matrix are connected by  a multi-colored bundle of wire, making
things look all the more interesting. Then a track counter drops down
from above, and a CD slides in from the left. The counter hangs over the
CD, and a laser spits out pulses of light from the counter, to the CD,
and bounces it back up to the counter.  The counter moves from time to
time, keeping the beam of light on the spot where it would actually be
on the CD, a nd the  CD itself spins!  This is _THE_ best CD interface
that I have ever seen.  Almost every  function can be controlled by
dedicated buttons on the controller (making it  unnecessary to even have
the monitor on, although you may want to) or by using the directional
buttons on the pad, and using the select button when the flashing curs
or is over the on-screen gadgets. Stop the playing, and open the lid,
and the track cou nter lifts back off the screen, and the CD shoots out
to the left of the screen.  All th e text on the  screen is done in a
quartz clock type of font.  Hats off to the software engi neers for this
one!  I only wish they could read the name of the CD and/or the Track
title o ff of the CD.  It does have CD+G support though, for any of
those types of CDs (rare). 

And don't even ask how it sounds!  It is great!  It has almost
convinced my  father/boss to buy one for our video business (considering
our $200 ADC  player is on the fritz).  The first CD to drop in was a
collection of  Christmas music (somebody else's present), and you could
just about see  the full orchestra encircling you on every side.  And
Nirvana never sounded  as good as it did later, when I moved the CD32 to
it's final resting place. The  audio alone is worth almost 3/4 of the
total cost of the machine, in  my not so humble  opinion.

Gaming.  This IS what it's for, isn't it?  I got a bonus disk (well,
they had better ship it with something... I don't really think they
should call it a bonus though) with  Pinball Fantasies and Sleepwalker.
Pinball Fantasies CD Edition is not really worthy of being a CD game. It
still has only 4 boards (they have 600 megs to split with Sleepwalker,
Ireally think they could have whipped up another table or two) and it
still has the crude, less than a MOD quality, music for the tables. 
They did put one, fairly good, CD track into the game, but that's only
on the table selection screen.  I find myself  turning off the music
every time I play.  Hopefully the next in the Pinball _____ series will
take advantage of the media.  I know for a fact that this version of
Pinball Fantasies takes up just over 4 MB of space.  

Sleepwalker is a completely different story.  I was expecting some cute
little  platform game, with Super Mario World type graphics.  Boy, was
Iwrong!  That game is a tough sonova_____!  It took me a full day  to
get past the first level, and left me wanting to throw the controller 
out the window after each of my gaming sessions.  The graphics are
great, and the scrolling backgrounds are nice.  It is definately not for
the simple  minded.  I couldn't even finish the training level.  I love
putting Master  Lee in some place where he can't hurt himself, and go
off and try everything  I can.

One of the greatest things I've found so far is having the vampires
make you a bat and going off to God Knows Where.  Ocean really knows how
to make a CD game!  There are about  10  tracks of really great CD
music.  You can even access the Sleepwalker CD inte rface by  hitting
the BLUE button, while the game is booting, at the Ocean logo screen.

I think that a really good CD to come with the machine would be
Sleepwalker and Oscar or Jurassic Park.  And then, if space permits,
throw  on Pinball Fantasies.  Possibly James Pond 2 or 3 as one of
included platform games, but then again, if you give away everything,
then there  won't be anything to buy.  I have already ordered
Liberation, a game that  I know nothing about, except that it is massive
(4,000 computer generated  plots, 36,000 possible locations in each
city, multiple cities), and that everybody says that it is awesome. 
(Well, that and the fact that it is $5 more than the rest of  the
titles)  That will be here either tomorrow or Wednesday, depending on
whether AmigaMan got the game out Thursday or is waiting until Monday.  

Will it survive?  It depends.  If it is going to compete initially, it 
will have to be by merit alone. It is already doing great in Europe,
and  every unit that made it to the U.S.  before  Christmas has been
sold.  It is getting press, although not all of it is correct.  A friend
of mine tried to convince me earlier today that it was 12.5 Mhz, .2 Mhz
slower than the  Sega.  He also tried to tell me that the Sega was
32Bit, because the Sega itself was  16Bit, and the CD portion was 16Bit,
so together they are 32Bit.  He says that all this he read in a
magazine. The clerks at Electronics Boutique tried to tell a few of us
that the  CD32 was made by Atari, and that they most likely would not be
carrying it, as they  were going to sell the Jaguar, Atari's higher end
gaming machine.  It is ignorance and wrong information like this that
could kill the CD32.  But, there are some brighter  people who do know
what they're talking about when they talk about the CD32. (Other than
the run-of-the-mill Amiga user who reads Fidonet or Usenet)  Commodore
has stated that they will be advertising the CD32 starting the first
week of January.  I hope  they get they're first ad during SeaQuest or
Viper on NBC, ST:TNG on all the  syndicated stations, talk shows like
Letterman or Leno, and MTV.  This is the crowd they should try and snag,
in my opinion.  It's an uphill battle, but it's entirely possible.

@endnode

@node P1-5 "Rumors from the Amiga Side"
@toc "menu"

%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%
%% Rumors from the Amiga Side                         By Richard Johnson %%
%%                                                        (911:5000/3.0) %%
%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%


Here's the latest set of rumors I've come across.  Remember, these are just
RUMORS,  so  take  them with a grain of salt.  (however, personaly, I'd say
most of these are right on the mark..).
 
----
 
After all the other worthless rumors, many of which are just plain
impossible, here are some rumors that are REAL!  And things are looking
good for Commodore now!  We'll save the best for last, so enjoy!
 
First of all, how is Commodore doing now?
 
*   They   are  shipping  in  excess  of  20,000  CD32's  a  week  just  in
Europe/Australia.
 
*  Over 320,000 CD32's have already been sold (And Atari is hopeing to sell
a mere 50,000 Jaguars this year!).
 
*  There  are  now  far more CD32's than 3DO's (and it's going to stay that
way), and will soon (if not already) pass by the Sega CD in numbers.
 
*  They are shipping 40,000 A4000's a month (worldwide).
 
* Commodore ONLY makes AGA machines:  CD32, A1200, A4000, and soon A4000T.
 
* At the rate Commodore is selling Amiga's, they will ship 2 million this
fiscal year!  Which is more than they've ever sold in one year, and all AGA
machines.
 
* AGA games are starting to come.  Lots of big name developers who dropped
the Amiga are now back.
 
 
Comming real soon:
 
*  FMV  module for the CD32.  Supports the Video CD standard *and* Philips'
proprietary CD-I video CD's!  The FMV module is in production now.
 
* A4000T.  Tower case, 5 Zorro III slots, 2 video slots, lots of drive
bays, SCSI-II, AmigaOS/Workbench 3.1.
 
* New A4000.  A new, lower price A4000.  The 030 version has the CPU on the
motherboard.  The floppy drive is now a normal sized unit, so you can fit
two of them into the A4000 (it also fits in the A1200...).
 
(These two new machines should be in manufacturing now!)
 
* CD32 modules for the A1200 and A4000:
 
  A1200 version has a SIMM socket, supporting a 1-8 MB SIMM; FPU socket,
  Akiko chip, and external CD-ROM unit.
 
  A4000 version sports the MPEG stuff on a Zorro III card, as well as Akiko
  and the same external CD-ROM unit.  It will also work on the A3000,
  although some games probably won't work since they require AGA.
 
* AmigaOS/Workbench 3.1 upgrade for ALL Amiga's.  Includes new Datatypes
(ANIM, CDXL), new multimedia extensions (realtime.library,
tapedeck.gadget), CD-ROM support, tons of bug fixes and optimizations.
 
* Envoy.  Amiga networking system!  Yes, contrary to what some individuals
have said, Commodore's networking system is here.  Useable over the serial
ports or any networking card.
 
 
Coming in early 1994:
 
 
* CD32 will be released in the US in January.  Everybody thinks they will
screw up again, but I don't.  Game magazines are starting to rave about it.
We're going to have a ton of games -- more than Jaguar or 3DO (or "3-DOH!"
as Homer Simpson would say after blowing $700 on one) or Sega CD.  Sega CD
games pale in comparison and will lag far behind in every way.  3DO games
will be great, though, but will be few and far between.  Jaguar games will
probably be fast and relatively cool, but will have little graphics or
sound because the carts are so small compared to a CD-ROM -- and will cost
more.  CD32 has the largest market, is the easiest to develop for, and
offers a good amount of profit per disk (low cost compared to a cartridge,
and Commodore's royalty is small and reasonable).  The price will rapidly
go down to $300 (it's already around $370) and a cost reduced model will
get that down to $250 in 1994.
 
* CEI 4000M.  An Amiga/Mac hybrid!  It's an A4000 with 10MB of ram, and the
EMPLANT card; with 256K Mac ROMs and System 7.1.  For a price around $2500.
And of course, for another $100 you can get the IBM emulation module.  It's
funny since Apple just released their Mac with IBM compatibility.  I bet
Apple messes bricks when they see this Amiga that does EVERYTHING!
Especialy since they plan to advertise in MAC magazines!
 
* 3DO emulator for the Amiga!  This would be a card containing the 3DO's
custom chips and should cost around $300.  A Sega emulator is in the works,
but I don't know why you'd want one.
 
* All machines shipped with AmigaOS 3.1.
 
* Reduced A1200 and A4000 prices.  A1200 should get down to $300, A4000/030
down to $1200, and A4000/040 to $1500.  AGA actualy costs LESS to make than
ECS does, which is why the A1200 is so cheap.  It would be even cheaper if
they could make enough chips!
 
 
And coming sometime in mid 94:
 
 
* A4000C?:  Based on A4000, has only 2 Zorro slots and a small ("pizza
box") case without the 5.25" drive bay.  Uses a 25Mhz EC030 CPU on the
motherboard.  2MB chip, 4MB fast, 120MB HD.  Cost will be less than the
A4000/030 is, around $1000 street price.  Looks a lot like an A1000...
Also available with the 040 CPU card.
 
* A4000-040/40:  40Mhz A4000, 8MB fast, 240MB HD.  $2000.
 
* A4000T-40:  40Mhz A4000T.  The ultimate Toaster workstation.
 
 
And finaly, in late 1994 (probably to be released at the September WOC) the
ones you've all been waiting for:  AAA Amigas!  (names are tentative)
 
A1200 and CD^32:  Prices down to $250.
 
CD^64.
 
* 4 x speed CD-ROM
 
* Low end AAA chipset, 2MB DRAM.
 
* 25Mhz EC030 (twice as fast!)
 
* 1MB fast ram.
 
A1400.
 
* Detached keyboard.
 
* High speed 1.8MB floppy disk.
 
* Low profile "pizza box" case.  3.5" floppy and HD bays.
 
* 25Mhz 030, '882 socket.
 
* Low end AAA chipset.  1MB chip ram (exp to 16MB), 2MB fast ram (upto
  16MB).
 
* CPU slot.
 
A4500.
 
* Detached keyboard
 
* High speed 1.8MB floppy disk.
 
* Low profile case, two 3.5" floppy bays and HD bays.
 
* 25Mhz LC040.
 
* Mid-range AAA chipset.  2MB 64 bit chip ram (exp to 16MB), 4MB fast ram
  (upto 32MB).
 
* SCSI-II
 
* 3 Zorro III slots.
 
A5000.
 
* Completely new architecture.
 
* 040, 060 versions (simply change CPU modules).
 
* RISC model in early 1995.  Will use HP's PA-RISC chip.
 
* AAA chipset (of course).
 
* DSP on the motherboard.
 
* upto 16MB chip ram, upto 128MB fast ram (probably 2/8 standard).
 
* ALL memory is *64* bits wide.  Fast ram may even be 128 bits wide, if it
improves performance significantly.
 
* 64 bit PCI slots (confirmed!)
 
* Four Zorro III slots, five in the A5000T.
 
* 3.6MB floppy drive.
 
* High speed SCSI-II interface.
 
* AmigaOS 4.0 with RTG, networking standard.
 
* Price well under $4000 (goal is $1500-$2000).  Different models with
various configurations of chip ram, ram and HD.
 
There will be nothing out there like this machine.
 
 
AAA chipset specs:
 
* Many different types of arrangements are possible, from low end to high
end.
 
  Low end:  uses 32 bit DRAM memory, lacks Linda chip.  >57MB/sec bandwidth
  shared between video and processors (IE, it slows down in hires/hicolour
modes).
  Can be expanded to 64 bit ram (mid range).
 
  Resolutions:  640 x 480 x 16 bit (72Hz non-interlaced)
                640 x 400 x 24 bit (60Hz non-interlaced)
                1280 x 400 x 24 bit (60Hz interlaced)
                800 x 600 x 8 bit (72Hz non-interlaced)
                1024 x 768 x 8 bit (60Hz non-interlaced)
                1280 x 800 x 6 bit (60Hz non-interlaced)
 
  Mid range:  uses 64 bit DRAM memory, lacks Linda chip.  >114MB/sec
  bandwidth shared.
 
  Resolutions:  640 x 480 x 24 bit (72Hz non-interlaced)
                800 x 600 x 16 bit (72Hz non-interlaced)
                1024 x 768 x 16 bit (60Hz non-interlaced)
                1280 x 1024 x 8 bit (72Hz non-interlaced)
 
  High end:  uses 64 bit VRAM memory and Linda chip.  >114MB/sec bandwidth
  for blitter, CPU, copper, and other DMA; >228MB/sec bandwidth for
  *video*.  Does not slow down at all in hires/hicolour modes.
 
  Resolutions:  1280 x 800 x 24 bit (65Hz non-interlaced)
                1280 x 1024 x 16 bit (72Hz non-interlaced)
 
* 8 to 16MB of chip RAM!  Can be added in 1 or 2MB increments (for 8 or
16MB).
 
* Chip RAM can be a mix of DRAM and VRAM.  With VRAM, there is *NO
CONTENTION* (remember how hires gets REAL slow in 16 colours [ECS] or 256
colours [AGA]?  Well no more!).  The blitter will be just as fast at 1280 x
1024 as it is at 320 x 200.  DRAM of course is cheaper.  But you could
have, say, 4MB of VRAM and 4MB of DRAM and use the VRAM for the screen and
DRAM for images for optimum cost/performance.
 
* Much faster, 32 bit blitter.  Can blit 24 bit images FASTER than AGA can
blit 8 bit images!!  And thus certainly faster than any Mac or IBM..
 
* Support for Quad-density floppy drives (3.6MB formated with FFS).
 
* Support for CD-ROM.
 
* Two 32 bit chips: Andrea (AKA Agnus/Alice) and Mary (AKA Paula).
 
  Andrea:  32 bit blitter and copper, burst mode memory access, 110Mhz
  display rate (4 x AGA).
 
  Mary: 8 channels of 16 bit CD quality audio, floppy and CD-ROM support.
 
* Two 64 bit chips: Linda and Monica (AKA Denise/Lisa).
 
  Linda:  video line buffer, controled by Andrea.
 
  Monica:  Chunky and planar video modes, HAM/HAM8, true colour, and a new
  compressed video mode.  Any display mode can be programed.
 
* Two high speed buffered serial ports.
 
A prototype AAA based Amiga is up and running NOW.
 
BEYOND AAA chips(!):
 
* Real time 3D rendering.
 
* Gfx pipeline.
 
* Scaling, rotation, texture mapping.
 
 


@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.  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

 · The *entire* Fred Fish collection of freely distributable software, online.

 · 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.

 · 35 "regular" Amiga libraries with thousands of files.  Hot new
   stuff arrives daily.

 · No upload/download "ratios" EVER. Download as much as you want, as
   often as you want, and never feel pressued doing it.

 · 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.

 · 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.  Thousands of "newsgroups" in which
   you can read and post articles about virtually any subject you can
   possibly imagine.  

 · 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 IS true.

Portal Signup or for more information:

   408-973-9111 (voice) 9a.m.-5p.m. Mon-Fri, Pacific Time
   408-725-0561 (modem 3/12/2400) 24 hours every day
   408-973-8091 (modem 9600/14400) 24 hours every day

   or enter "C PORTAL" from any Sprintnet dial-in in the USA,
   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              2.50 22.95  32.45  44.95  94.95
 2400/9600bps prime Sprint +%           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 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.
   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 and Amiga Report sent me!"

[Editor's Note:  Be sure to tell them that you are an Amiga user, so
they can notify the AmigaZone sysops to send their Welcome Letter and
other information!]

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 P1-6 "CD Platform Comparison"
@toc "menu"

%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%
%% CD Platform Comparison                                  By Harv Laser %%
%%                                                 (harv@cup.portal.com) %%
%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%


This is a re-type of a two page chart labelled "Comparisons of CD
Platforms" which was contained in a press kit sent to me (prior
to Consumer Electronics Show, Las Vegas, Jan 6-9, 1994) by the
public relations firm who is handling CD32 for Commodore. I have
attempted to be as accurate as possible when typing in this chart.
Any typing errors are mine.
-----


COMPARISONS OF CD PLATFORMS

Features    Amiga CD32     3DO      SegaCD      CD-I     Jaguar
-------------------------------------------------------------------
Suggested retail
price       $399           $699    #$129+223    $499    #$249+200
                                                (Philips)
                                                $399
                                                (Magnavox)
Bus width   Dual 32bit     32bit    Dual 16     16 bit   Single 64 bit
                                    bit                  w/16 & 32 bit
                                                         ports

Expansion
Bus         Yes            Partial  Partial     Partial  Partial
            (Processor,
            audio, video)

Micro processor, graphics
and audio
processors  68EC020/14    ARM/12Mhz 2x68000/    68340/   68000/13.3Mhz
            Mhz (32 bit)  (32 bit)  12Mhz       16Mhz    (16 bit)
                                    (32 bit)    (16 bit)

            Sprite         2 video              *MPEG    GPU (64 bit)
            Engine 64      animation             de-compression
            pixels wide    processors            engine
            (32 bits)      (32 bits)

            Graphic        DMA engine                    Object Processor
            co-proc.       (32 bit)                      Blitter (64 bit)
            (16/32 bit)

            Audio engine   Audio DSP                     DSP (32 bit)
            4-voice        (32 bit)
            (16 bit)

            *MPEG video
            decompression
            engine 40 MHz

            *MPEG audio
            decompression
            DSP (24 bit)
            28 Mhz

Processor acceleration
upgrade
capability    Yes          No       No          No       No

Internal Expansion
slot          Yes          No       No          No       Yes

Async serial port/High speed
auxiliary serial
port          Yes/Yes      No/Yes   No/No       Yes/Yes  Yes/No

Memory        2 MB RAM     3 MB     .128 MB     1 MB     2 MB

Chips         4            2        3           2        2

Video overlay genlock
support       Yes          No       No          No       No

ROM cart      No           No       Yes         No       Yes
              CD-ROM       CD-ROM   16 bit      CD-ROM   32 bit
              based        based                based
 
Screen resolution
              Up to        Up to    320x224     384x280  768x512
              1280x512     640x480

Colors        256/256,000/ 66536/   64/512      256,000/ 16.7 million
              16.7 mill.   16.7 mil.            16.7 mil.

Sound         16-bit       16-bit   16-bit      16-bit    16-bit
              CD stereo    CDstereo CD stereo   CD Stereo CD Stereo
              + 4-voice 8bit                    *MPEG CD
              * MPEG CD
              16 bit stereo

CD-ROM        2x speed     2x speed 1x speed    1x speed Planned

Hardware video
decompress    Yes, HAM8 &  Planned  No          *Yes     Planned
              *MPEG-1                           MPEG-1

PhotoCD
[tm]          Planned      Yes      No          Yes      Planned



* With MPEG full motion video module
# Base system, plus CD add-on



@endnode

@node P1-7 "Usenet Review - Pinball Fantasies AGA"
@toc "menu"

%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%
%% Usenet Review:  Pinball Fantasies AGA                 By Henry Norman %%
%%                                                (henryn@cpd.tandem.com %%
%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%


PRODUCT NAME

        Pinball Fantasies AGA


BRIEF DESCRIPTION

        Pinball game simulation.  Four different pinball tables.


AUTHOR/COMPANY INFORMATION

        Name:           21st Century Entertainment, Ltd.
        Address:        Westbrook street
                        Blueberry, Oxfordshire
                        OX11 9QB
                        UK

        US distributor: Digital Illusions, Inc. ("DI")

LIST PRICE

        I paid $40 (US).


COPY PROTECTION

        Look up a word in the manual.  Prompts at startup time.
        Hard disk installable.


SPECIAL HARDWARE AND SOFTWARE REQUIREMENTS

        AGA graphics.  PAL mode (NTSC 1200/4000, boot system with both
        mouse buttons depressed, select PAL, continue boot).

        Pinball runs on NTSC, but important parts of playfield are not seen.

                [MODERATOR'S NOTE:  Previous reviews of the non-AGA version
                have not mentioned any problems with NTSC vs. PAL.  I
                suspect that either Mr. Norman purchased a PAL version of
                the game, or the AGA version has different requirements than
                the non-AGA version.  - Dan]


MINI-REVIEW

        I bought Pinball Fantasies for my son's Christmas pleasures (yeah,
right!).  Since he's away skiing for a few days, I installed the game and
took it for a spin....  Wow!  *Now* I know why I upgraded to AGA!  If you
haven't yet seen this game, check it out!  It is your classical "Williams"
type pinball setup, with a playfield about three screens high (with
absolutely smooth scrolling), offering four different "machine layouts" (DI
calls them "tables").  They have the typical pinball gizmos, with bumpers,
bounce areas, buttons to hit, flippers, all *very well* done.  The really
slick thing with this game, nice graphics aside, is the uncanny realism the
authors (a bunch of Swedish programmers) have achieved in ball action:
you're there!  It is absolutely amazing (to me) to play this kind of
pinball!  This game should have some "addiction" government warning label on
it....  Ask your C= dealer if you can check it out on their A4000 demo
machine.  Get this game.  (No, I'm in no way affiliated with Digital
Illusions.  I'm just excited that in the midst of an avalanche of substandard
games, here's a *real gem*!)

        For some reason, DI "front-ended" the game proper with a module that
attempts to stop unpaid-for copies of the game to start circulating ("yeah,
right" again):  you have to look up keywords from the manual and answer a
question properly before you can begin shooting for those million point
bonuses.  This sucks.  Especially considering that one only has to copy a
few pages from the manual to be in business anyway (it is made thicker by
making it a four-language manual :).  But then I realized that this scheme
forced me to read something from the manual every time I start Pinball...
maybe it's not such a bad idea after all?

        Pinball is following the AmigaDOS rules, and behaves well.  Even
though it takes over the machine completely, it gives everything back in
order when it's done, and returns gracefully to AmigaDOS (as some put it, "it
multitasks well".  IMHO, multitasking has nothing to do with it:  it is a
simple matter of coding the darn thing properly).

        I don't know if it is true for all Pinball Fantasies boxes sold, but
the copy I picked up (at HT Electronics, Sunnyvale) didn't work right at
first... a substantial portion of the playfield wouldn't show on the
screen.  No clue in the manual...  When I saw all the Swedish names in the
list of game contributors, I figured maybe this should run on a PAL machine
to work right?  So I booted my A4000 as a PAL machine, and lo and behold:
the game came up with *all* of the playfield displayed (and with better
vertical resolution!).  It runs "semi-OK" in NTSC, but on my A4000 the
crucial lower portion of the playfield is hidden (including most of the
lower flippers), so it's hard to control the ball action -- the extra hassle
of PAL booting is well worth it!

        My only complaint is the sound effects:  the vendor could have spent
some more time and effort (MHO) on the noises emitted from a real pinball
table.  As it is, only some of the actions the ball experiences have audio
(I really miss that metallic rolling sound of the ball, especially when it
runs up and down these steel railings...  Oh well!).  This flaw is "hidden"
in a cacaphony of "game music" (which can be toggled off by hitting M).
However, the super realistic ball simulation more than adequately makes up
for this:  it is truly amazing!  If this is only a forerunner of AGA
productions coming out the pipeline, it's going to be expensive for me...
(HaHaOS :)).

        As Beavis and Butthead would have put it: "hehehe, dude, this game
is cool...  yeah, it kicks a**!  hehehehe, pinball rules!"

Merry Christmas to y'all!

  Henry Norman


@endnode

@node P1-8 "The Emulation Rambler"
@toc "menu"

%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%
%% The Emulation Rambler                                By Jason Compton %%
%%                                                  (jcompton@tcity.com) %%
%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%

I apologize for not appearing on the pages of Amiga Report lately.  I've 
been busy trying to compile a few other things like the first-time Amiga 
buyer's guide, and haven't quite had time to survey the emulation scene.  
It hasn't helped that Rob and I have had a hard time getting my articles 
to send correctly.  I'll try to make up for lost time here.

I'd like to start by addressing something said by Jesper Juul, who weeks 
back said that "Emplant is finally getting a bad review" and "it's nice to 
see someone being a bit critical to Utilities Unlimited." Actually,
there's quite a lot of Emplant and UU criticism floating about, and not
all of the reviews have been glowing.  I'd like to compare it with my
own, but I still haven't gotten one yet.  But, for all of you people who
are keeping track, here's the latest on Emplant updates, taken from 
comp.sys.amiga.emulations...

Fm: Jim Drew (UU) 72662,14
To: ?

As many of you may know, EMPLANT requires a custom logic upgrade in
order to make v3.2 and later software work.  This is no longer the case.
Let me explain the rumors, myths, and misconceptions of v3.2's release.

Yes, we started replacing custom logic.  Yes, we started shipping
replacement logic upgrades (with v3.2 software).  Yes, v3.3 and later
no longer requires the custom logic upgrade.  The reason...

A company in another country decided that they were going to start
producing clones (exact duplications) of the EMPLANT hardware, and sell
them as such.  Although, hardware can not be copyrighted, the custom
logic is considered to be software under US and international copyright
laws. Thus, reproducing EMPLANT in it's entirety, would be in violation
of copyright laws.

I received a phone call from somebody (annonymous) in Germany,
concerning the fact that a company was about to release a bunch of
EMPLANT clones, but
 due to problems recreating the custom logic (it took me 3 weeks to get
the different hardware emulation timings to work) the EMPLANT clones
would be delayed from their Jan '94 release date.  Basically, they could
duplicate the hardware, but could not make it 'tick'.

This was a serious problem for us.  With the World of Commodore show
only months away, and the CEI4000M bundle deal in negotiation, an
EMPLANT clone could be tragic.

We went into panic mode, and with v3.2 about to be released, I figured
the best thing to do in order to prevent the clones from working with
our 32 bit clean software would be to change the custom logic to remap
our hardware differently enough that simple software patches would not
work (one main reason for the extensive delay of v3.2)...so it was done.

With the help of the US government (they really do work!), we were able
to stop the clones from being produced, on the grounds that the circuit
board artwork was duplicated exactly.  The artwork (just like
paintings) is copyrightable.  We are currently seeking logorights on the
EMPLANT hardware, and we have been advised by the US government that a
patent for the EMPLANT hardware itself should be applied for in order to
prevent this from happening in the future.

So, we went back to v3.2, upgraded a number of things, and added
support for the older custom logic.  The new version is v3.3, and can be
used by any EMPLANT board.  Yes, v3.3 will be made freely
re-distributeable, meaning that it will be on GEnie, CompuServe, Portal,
BIX, our support BBS, and various FTP sites.

I appreciate your patience in this manner, and I just wanted everyone
to know the truth to what happened with v3.2 and why there was an
excessive delay in it's release.

Sincerely...

Jim Drew, CEO - Utilities Unlimited, Inc.
 [Endquote]

There you have it.  Some people actually HAVE received 3.2,  but it now
appears that 3.3 is the way to go, with a much easier upgrade route...
or it was, until Jim Drew came up with 3.4!  This is apparently a
better, new-logic-chip-less version of 3.3, but people are still having
memory problems (with the computer, not themselves).  Also, two FPU
routines are wrong (mainly seems to affect games), to be fixed in 3.5

A couple of people have A-Max IVs and like them, but I haven't heard
anything concrete and new.  Nobody has a better explanation for a lack 
of Amax III than "They probably wanted to sound farther ahead than 
Emplant"...

WHEN Amax IV rolls around, I would like to stage a sort of forum of
Emplant vs. Amax IV, so if you'd like to start filling my mail with
your opinions, by all means do.

For my part, I have finally obtained a Spectrum emulator, but now can't
figure out what to do with it for the life of me.  If anyone wants to
send a few programs my way, I'd appreciate it.

A64 V3.0 update: A couple of CSAE people have one, but not too much
of use has been said.  I'll update you next issue.

In case anyone is interested, PC-Task is now commercial software...and
rather pricy at that.  Tenex carries it for about $40...which isn't
bad, but an XT bridgeboard runs about that much, and if speed is more
important than video (since PC-Task will get you VGA but a bridgeboard
only gives CGA out of the box with no cards), then a bridgeboard is
probably the better buy.

Lastly, Utilities Unlimited has agreed to send me a board: the quote I
got when I called them would be this week, meaning that by the time
you read this I may have an Emplant.  It would be at least a few weeks
before I published my full review, as I want to run it through as many
tests, paces, and uses as I can find.  I am trying to contact ReadySoft
to get a similar contribution of an A-Max IV from them in order to do a
true comparison, but haven't reached them yet.

Well, that should wrap it up for this week.  Please write.


@endnode

@node P1-9 "CD32 Titles Spot Review"
@toc "menu"

%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%
%% CD32 Titles Spot Review                               By Sean Caszatt %%
%%                                                        (40:800/910.0) %%
%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%


Here's my personal opinion on the CD32 titles I've seen so far:
(by "seen", I mean "sat down and played for a while")  

Ratings: (*****) = best   (*) = worst

OSCAR - nice platform game, with really good parallel scrolling.  Some of the
screens are too "busy", and it's hard to see what you're doing with all the
stuff in the background.  Well done, though, and just as good as Sonic and the
Mario games.  (****)

PINBALL FANTASIES - not exactly the most eye-catching game, but it is
undeniably the most addictive game I've ever played.  You know it's addictive
when you're hitting the start button for that "just one more time" for about
an hour.  Great CD sound on this one.  (*****)

SLEEPWALKER - I didn't like it on the Amiga, and I still don't like it on the
CD32.  It's not my type of game at all.  It's really "different", but contrary
to what some think...different isn't always good.  The graphics are not much,
and the gameplay is lousy.  Good thing it's free with the console, because
it's not worth buying.  (*)

CASTLES II - A strategy game for those that like medieval stuff.  The graphics
are good and the CD sound in the intro is spectacular.  
It seems like a game one could get wrapped up in, but it's hampered by the
CD32's controller.  This was a game meant for a computer with a mouse, not a
game console with a keypad controller.  I didn't try plugging in a mouse on
the 2nd port.  It may help...but still... (** 1/2)

LIBERATION - A definite cool game!  3D texture mapped graphics and a large
world to roam about in make this a game worthy of the CD32 and vice versa.  It
has a lot of options and is very open-ended.  A lot of fun to explore and get
lost in.  Not a game that one can start playing in two seconds, but one that
you grow into and don't grow out of.  Really good!  (*****)

WHALE'S VOYAGE - Another crap Amiga game trying to milk the CD32 market for
some sales.  The game is not worth buying for any system.   Avoid at all costs
and at any price.  (no stars)

DEEP CORE - Adequate shoot-em-up with a lot of stuff to blow up.  Nothing
original, just mindless destruction.  Good for what it is.  Nothing special in
the graphics department.  (The intro sequence doesn't not appear to be
converted from PAL to NTSC, so it jumps and flickers...kind of annoying, but
still quite readable and does not affect the game.)  (***)

ROBOCOD: JAMES POND 2 - More platform action.  A lot cleaner display wise than
OSCAR, but not quite as frantic and fun.  Very nice graphics and sound.
(***).

TROLLS - Another platform game.  A little more frantic than OSCAR and a little
more annoying.  So, it balances out.  The graphics are colorful and the sound
is good.  Nothing better than a 16 bit console though, so not really worth it,
if you have OSCAR already.  (Their practically the same game.)  (***)

ZOOL - The Amiga's Sonic beater comes to the CD32.  A really cool 3D rendered
Zool character is featured in the intro...and that's where the differences
stop.  If you've seen ZOOL AGA on the A1200 or A4000, then you've seen this
game.  Nothing fascinating...just solid play.  I prefer OSCAR as platforms go.
(***)

NIGEL MANSELL'S WORLD CHAMPIONSHIP RACING - A solid race game.  Much improved
over the A1200 version of the game in an intangible way.  I didn't enjoy the
Amiga version of this game at all for some reason.  The CD32 version is good,
solid fun.  The game is fast, easy to control and a lot of fun.  The graphics
are quite good, and the sound is fair (what do you what from a racing game?) 
Solid entertainment. (*** 1/2)

D/GENERATION - A novel puzzle/maze/shoot-em-up.  Unfortunately, the graphics
are on a par with the old 8-bit NES console and not a 32-bit CD-ROM based
system.  The gameplay is good, but the graphics are a real letdown.  (**)

ARABIAN NIGHTS - Yet another damn platform game.  Annoying and not really any
good.  There's nothing to stand it apart from the other platform games on this
system other than maybe the price.  It's cheaper than the others, but
remember, you get what you pay for.  (**)

So far, these are the ones I've played.  Far and away the most addicting game
is PINBALL FANTASIES.  It's one of the most fun games I've played on any
system ever.  But, it comes with the machine in the US/Canada release of the
console, and what's going to have to sell the machine are the OTHER titles. 
Right now, LIBERATION and OSCAR are the only other two titles I'd buy.  (Maybe
NIGEL MANSELL too.)


@endnode

@node P1-10 "Usenet Review - Turrican 3"
@toc "menu"

%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%
%% Usenet Review:  Turrican 3                           By Mark B. Sachs %%
%%                                           (sachs@crayola.cse.psu.edu) %%
%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%


PRODUCT NAME

        Turrican 3


BRIEF DESCRIPTION

        It's a platform shoot-em-up game.


AUTHOR/COMPANY INFORMATION

        Name:           Factor 5/Rainbow Arts


LIST PRICE

        $49.99 (US).  Local dealer price $35.95.


SPECIAL HARDWARE AND SOFTWARE REQUIREMENTS

        HARDWARE

                According to the manual, Turrican III will take advantage of
                extra RAM to reduce loading times, and will take advantage
                of a faster CPU to manipulate on-screen objects more
                efficiently. Indeed, loading times were very quick and BOB
                movement very smooth on my A3000. Also, there were no hassles
                because I happened to be running in NTSC mode.

        SOFTWARE

                None mentioned.


COPY PROTECTION

        Disk protection.  Not hard drive installable.


MACHINE USED FOR TESTING

        Amiga 3000, NTSC, 2M Chip RAM, 4M Fast RAM.


REVIEW

        It's been a while since the original Turrican and Turrican II
blasted their way into the Amiga game scene.  The first Turrican featured
mind-bendingly impressive (and colorful) graphics, bloody enormous levels,
kicky music and enough firepower to make even the National Rifle Association
happy.  Not long after that came Turrican II, with graphics that blew
Turrican I out of the water, wonderful 7-voice music, and enough firepower
to make even the NRA feel slightly ill.  Both are classics, indeed,
archetypes of the platform shooter genre.

        What could top that?  Not willing to leave well enough alone, Factor
5 has returned with the third part of the trilogy, imaginatively named
Turrican III.  The scenario is familiar.  Long ago humanity's arch-nemesis,
The Machine, was apparently destroyed; the galaxy enjoyed a period of
existence that was happy, peaceful, and on the whole tax free.  But of course
this couldn't last -- the Machine returned and went back to its old tricks
of blowing up planets and enslaving innocents.  Who's going to drop down to
the Machine's planet and blast his way through uncounted numbers of evil
minions to put an end to this unpleasantness, and not incidentally rescue
the cute manga babe whose cry for help alerted everyone to the menace?  Looks
like a job for Bren McGuire, who, with a heavily armed Turrican powersuit,
purple hair, and chin the size of Texas, is definitely qualified to take it
on.  All this is explained in the game's intro -- very stylishly done, with
scrolling backgrounds, text, and ominous music that matches the narrative
very well.

        Turrican III, like its two predecessors, is a platform shoot-em-up
with bosses, powerups, hidden areas, the whole deal.  As you may have
guessed, the concept is not exactly intellectual; no strategy or planning
involved, just straight death and destruction.  But that's OK.  It's worked
before and worked well.

        Anyway, after seeing the intro, I was very impressed, and eager to
see the game itself.  All that was left to do was to select Control Method
(the game supports two-button joysticks and Sega MegaDrive joypads -- a
definite plus), pick a difficulty level (from "Easy" to "Maniac") and off we
go!

        This, unfortunately, is where I stopped being quite so impressed.

        Turrican III isn't BAD, really.  But, sadly, it does not live up to
its predecessors.  Admittedly Turrican II -- with its colorful copper
backdrops, multilevel parallax scrolling, massive armaments, and so forth --
is a hard act to follow, but the third installment isn't even at the level
of Turrican I, much less II.

        First disappointment: the flamethrower, the most useful weapon from
TI and II (you can play it in any direction around you to take care of
baddies above or below the level of your gun) is gone!  It's been replaced by
a Bionic Commando-style rope with which you can, er, swing up to high
places. The rope is kind of neat, but I'd rather have the flamethrower to be
honest.

        Second disappointment: the graphics feel, well, SMALL.  Small and
junky.  Console-like.  Which shouldn't be a surprise, as this is really a
conversion of "Super Turrican" for the Super NES console.  But the stylish
touches that made the previous two installments so perfect are entirely
absent.  The palettes are drab, rather than colorful (there is obvious
dithering everywhere), the parallax scrolling looks unrealistic, and worst
of all your weaponry is NOT impressive.  As for the in-game music, it's OK,
but it doesn't provide the wonderful atmosphere we saw in the previous two.

        Third disappointment:  there's a fine line between "playable" and
"too damn easy."  TI and II were playable.  TIII is too damn easy.  It took
merely an hour to complete the game on Normal difficulty level; very few
places were actually difficult to get through.  The majority of the levels
are highly linear and compressed, almost pushing you straight to the exit.
Even the (few) non-linear levels are crowded with "EXIT" arrows everywhere,
making finding your way through no challenge at all.

        "Mark," I can hear you saying, "there must be SOME good points."
Well, OK, there are a few.  The intro's pretty nice, as I said.  The game
speed cannot be faulted -- no slowdowns anywhere.  There are a fair number
of bosses, which I personally happen to like.  A few of the levels ARE quite
stylish, such as a giant factory towards the end, swimming and underwater
sections, and an H. R. Giger-esque freight train (I kid you not) that was a
nervewracking experience to get across.  But even these levels were far too
short and featured few nifty or unusual touches.  Um... did I mention that
the intro was quite nice?

        That's about all I can say.  Turrican fans will be disappointed, I
guarantee; the latest installment in the venerable trilogy doesn't follow
the time-honored formula, smells too much of the console conversion that it
is, and, well, as much as I wanted to before actually playing it, I can't
recommend that you buy Turrican III.


CONCLUSIONS

        I wanted to like this game.  I really did.  But I didn't.  Buy "Hired
Guns" instead.


@endnode


@node P1-11 "Mac vs. MS-DOS Performance"
@toc "menu"

%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%
%% Macintosh vs. MS-DOS Performance              By Sandberg and Hembree %%
%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%


[Editor's Note:  This was sent to me on the Internet, so I don't really
know who the authors are, I got their names from the article itself,
because I like to try to give credit whenever possible.  Anyway, while
this is a Mac vs. PC comparison, it's more of a Motorola vs. Intel comparo,
so it was suggested that it could apply to the Amiga.  It's very inform-
ative, and very worth reading if you enjoy technical stuff!]


We have for some time seen claims made (primarily by MS-DOS sympathizers)
that the Apple Macintosh provides inferior performance when compared to
MS-DOS ISA/EISA/MCA.  The points made are usually like Jim Seymour's
claims that "On the price side of that equation, at every moment since its
introduction six years ago, the Mac has delivered less raw computing
performance at any given price level than a wide variety of comparable
MS-DOS machines" and "the raw power of 25 MHz and 33 MHz 386's and 486's
combined with the interprocess communication in OS/2, make a DOS machine a
far more powerful platform".  We can understand where a claim like this
comes from - there have been virtually no realistic MS-DOS vs Macintosh
benchmarks run!  Byte's benchmark suit comes with the disclaimer that you
cannot use it to compare the two machines and we have not been able to
find a reasonable 3rd party benchmark doing so. We will disprove such
claims then, not by use of extremely questionable benchmarks (one we found
had the Mac IIci 1,400 times faster than an unspecified 80386 machine,
clearly unreasonable), but by a careful architectural analysis of the two
computer families.  We have studied the two families for a considerable
time and present our data and conclusions below.  One of us (Sandberg)
holds both a BSEE and an MSEE in computer engineering and has designed
high-performance image-processing products for the ISA bus, as well as
several software projects for the Macintosh.  The other (Hembree) holds a
BS in Computer Science with 91 hours of graduate study divided between CS,
EE (digital and IC design) and Math, as well as hardware and software
product development experience on both Mac and ISA systems.


Processor Family Architectures

Let's begin with the fundamentals of the machines.  Let's go inside the
the architecture of the Mac and MS-DOS machines and see if these claims
can be derived from this most fundamental level.  In particular, we will
begin with the beginning, the Motorola 680x0 (68k) and the Intel 80x86/88
('86) CPU's.  We will consider primarily those features of the processors
available to programmers on the generalized Mac and MS-DOS platforms, not
features which require hardware mods or unpopular alternate operating
systems such as A/UX or OS/2.

Registers 

The first key to evaluating the potential power of a processor
is its registers.  The 68k family all have 8 address and 8 data registers
of 32 bits each.  The 68k family actually has two or three stack pointer
registers but this feature is not used in the Mac and is not included in
this analysis.  The '86 family have only 8 registers, 16 bits in the '286
and earlier and 32-bit in the later versions, all usable as data registers
and some as addressing registers.  Both families have additional registers
for status, PC, and control registers for special features (cache, memory
management, etc.) which are not used except in OS programming (discussed
below).  All 68k CPU's therefore have (8 + 8) x 32 = 512 bits of user
register while the '86ers have either 8 x 16 = 128 bits (286 and earlier)
or 8 x 32 = 256 bits of user registers.  We leave off discussion of the
'86 family's so-called segment registers for later. 

Instruction Sets

The instruction sets of the two machines both cover all of the standard
operations but with differing emphasis.  The 68k family adds bit
manipulation instructions and, in the '020 and later processors, bit field
instructions.  There are no comparable instructions in the '86 family,
which requires sequences of mask and shift instructions to do the same
tasks (these tasks are important in both graphics and in many efficient
data structures).  The '86 family supports both packed and unpacked BCD
operations including multiply and divide (but only using the accumulator
register AL) while the 68k family allows only packed BCD addition and
subtraction, but supports direct memory-to-memory operations with limited
addressing options.  This feature is generally of interest only to COBOL
compiler writers - and may help explain why COBOL compilers for the Mac
are extinct.  No 68k instructions except subroutine call and return (which
implicitly use the A7 register as the stack pointer) require specific
registers - i.e., if a count or bit number register is called for, any of
the 8 data registers can be used.

One feature of the '86 instruction set is the ability to override a few of
the implicit parameters by using prefix bytes.  The two most common uses
of prefix bytes are to override default segment registers (this is the
only way, except in string instructions, to use the ES segment register)
and to cause the "string" group instructions to repeat either
unconditionally or conditionally.  The third type of use is available only
on '386 and '486 CPU's and specifies 32-bit data and 32-bit addressing
offsets are to be used instead of the normal 16-bit data and 16-bit
offsets.  Thus, a '386 MOVES instruction could have 4 prefix bytes,
overriding the source segment register, selecting 32-bit operand size,
32-bit SI and DI register offsets and a repeat prefix.  A longstanding
problem with, in particular, the '86 string instructions has been that the
CPU, necessarily, allowed interrupts in the middle of long string moves
and compares and did not save the complete processor state.  In the '286
and earlier processors (we have not checked for the later ones) Intel's
manuals warn that only the last prefix byte in a multi-prefixed
instruction is saved during an interrupt and that this can cause improper
operation under some common circumstances.

In addition to being usable as generalized data holders, most '86
"general-purpose" registers are implicit parameters in a variety of
instructions such as variable-amount shifts (the CL register), and every
multiply or divide (which use the AX register and also the DX for the
largest operands).  As an example, the 68k family has a generalized (all
sizes and addressing modes allowed) memory-memory move instruction while
the '86 family uses "string" instructions.  The fact that 7 of the 8
general-purpose registers are also implicit parameters in various
instructions in the '86 family places compiler writers in a particular
bind.  They must choose between not using any registers (absolutely
destroying performance), trading off registers for instruction use (e.g.,
if the translate instruction is not used, the BX register becomes
generally available) or putting register save and restore instructions
around the instructions making use of the implicit registers.  This last
option is the one most often used but can be a fairly tricky one.  The
compiler must evaluate each individual occasion to determine whether the
overhead of setting up for the special instruction exceeds the execution
time of multi-instruction equivalent code.  Although the compiler can
determine which registers actually need saving, and hence the overhead
associated with the save-restore template, the time trade-offs are often
dependent on the repeat count and, if the count is a variable, the
compiler cannot determine which method is optimal and must make an
arbitrary choice (one which may never be optimal in a given use). 

Memory Models and Accesses

Another important aspect of processor power is how the CPU accesses data
(how easy is it to describe where the data is and get it).  This area
includes the processor's addressing modes, memory model, physical memory
size, and memory access speed.  Remember that we are not considering
special 680x0 or 80x86 features for x > 0.

For addressing modes, both processor families offer register direct,
immediate, indirect, offset, dual-register with offset and direct (or
absolute).  Where registers are used as addresses or hold parts of a
computed address, the comparison becomes much more complex.  The '86
family allows any of 4 registers to be used in indirect addressing, the
68k any of 8.  For offset addressing, the 68k family allows a 16 bit
offset from any of 8 address registers, the '86's allow either 8 or 16 bit
offsets from any of 4 registers.  In dual-register with offset addressing,
the '86 family allows either of 2 registers to be added to either of 2
other registers (giving a total of 4 combinations) and either an 8 or a 16
bit offset while the 68k family allows any of 8 address registers (or the
program counter, in the case of a source operand) to be added to any of
the other 15 registers (considered as either 16 or 32 bit signed values,
giving a total of 240 or 270 possible combinations) plus an 8 bit offset.
In the Mac absolute addressing can only be used to access a limited pool
of shared system variables, every other part of the Mac system must be
position independent and may be located anywhere in memory.

The 68k family also has predecrement and postincrement modes, which use
any of the address registers.  The only similar usage in the '86 family is
found in implicit addressing modes in the string and stack operate
instruction groups.  In the string group, the SI and DI registers are
implicit and in the stack group, the stack pointer register is implicit.
In short, we see that the '86 family's addressing modes are a proper
subset of the 68k family's modes and that the '86 family allows use of
only half as many registers in the modes which use registers.

As for memory models, the 68k family uses a simple large linear address
space which is broken on the Mac into RAM, ROM, and I/O devices (with
minor complications for NuBus).  The '86 family uses two address spaces,
I/O and memory.  I/O is a single 64k address space, accessed only thru
special instructions.  Memory is accessed as a series of 64k segments,
requiring segment registers to specify which segment is currently being
accessed.  It is these segment registers which cause larger programs
difficulty.  Different registers used in addressing use different default
segment registers, or these may be overridden with prefix bytes.  In the
general case, though, this means that access to an arbitrary memory
location requires that a segment register first be loaded, then the access
performed.  The property of locality may reduce the number of segment
register loads needed, but often at a cost in compiler complexity and/or
run-time checking overhead.  There is no way of completely avoiding the
fundamental problems in a memory model which always must always use one of
several auxiliary registers to determine a physical address.

Another factor in the evaluation of the benefits of addressing modes is
the cost in time of using a particular addressing mode, measured in clock
cycles.  Here, the individual members of the two families differ in the
amount of time needed, and the number of clock cycles needed to access a
particular address (register direct imposes no access penalty on these
CPUs).

The 8086/88 CPU's use a physical access cycle of 4 clock cycles, which
drops down two cycles in the latest family members. A perusal of Intel
manuals shows that each memory data reference for most data manipulation
instructions adds either 6 clock cycles (for a source operand) or 13 clock
cycles (for a destination operand) plus an additional effective address
(EA) calculation time.  This EA calculation time is from 5 to 12
additional clock cycles, with two more clock cycles needed if the default
segment register is overridden.  Thus, an add of a byte or word register
to memory takes 16 + (5 to 12) + (0 or 2) clock cycles or 21 to 30 clock
cycles to execute, if the instruction has been prefetched (else add 4 or 8
clock cycles).  Later members of the family drop this down to a minimum of
7 clock cycles, a very substantial improvement.  This figure does,
however, assume the instruction has been prefetched with no segment
register override done.  Clock speeds in the '86 family range up to 33 MHz
for the fastest 80386 parts.  Caches, for both instructions and data,
appear only in the latest family member, the 80486.

The 68000 used 4 clock cycle reads and 5 clock cycle writes, also dropping
to 2 cycles (for both read and write) in the latest family members.
Motorola manuals state that, for the same class of instructions as in the
Intel example above, a 68000 takes 4 clock cycles (memory source operand)
or 8 clock cycles (memory destination operand) plus an EA calculation time
of from 4 to 10 clock cycles.  Thus, the 68000 takes 8 + (4 to 10) or 12
to 18 clock cycles to add a byte or word register to memory.  Later
members of the 68k family also improve the clock cycle performance on this
instruction, down to an optimal 5 to 7 clock cycles (differing according
to EA calculation times).  This optimal case assumes only an instruction
cache hit, and would be faster in the case of a 68030/040 data cache hit.
Clock speeds for the 68k processor family range up to 50 MHz for the
fastest 68030 parts.  Instruction and data caches are included in the
latest two generations of CPU's, the 68030 and 68040.

In summary, the Motorola processors are superior to the Intel processors
in terms of instruction set, addressing modes, memory model, execution
clock-cycle timing, and fastest clock speeds.  In no sense, then, is the
performance of the Intel CPUs up to that of their Motorola counterparts.
The fact that high-performance workstation designers, have consistently
chosen 68k family CPU's rather than '86 family CPU's may be taken as
confirmation of this evaluation.  Is there, then, a system-level
implementation difference to account for the claimed Mac performance
disadvantage?


System-Level Hardware

Macintosh

The Macintosh family is simpler to analyze, since all of the systems are
manufactured by Apple Computer, Inc.  The Mac Plus and SE use 68000 CPU's
running at just under 8 MHz with zero wait-state memory.  Their SCSI
(high-speed peripheral) ports operate at 350 and 700 kilobytes per second,
respectively.  The Mac II uses a 68020 CPU with 68881 floating point
coprocessor (FPU), running at about 15.8 MHz, with two wait-state memory.
The SCSI port operates at a maximum data transfer speed of about 1.2
megabytes per second.  Accesses to NuBus boards take about 800 to 1000
nanoseconds (ns), with boards that require two NuBus wait cycles (200 ns).
The Mac IIx, IIcx, and SE/30 each use a 68030 CPU with 68882 FPU at the
clock speed of the Mac II with the same memory and SCSI speeds and, for
the IIx and IIcx, the same NuBus access speeds, with the SE/30's speed of
access to its direct slot being dependent only on the speed of the add-in
card.  The Mac IIci runs a 68030 CPU at 25 MHz, with support for 80 ns
DRAMs, a slot for an external cache memory card, support for burst-fill
mode, and somewhat faster NuBus cycle times.  For maximum performance,
Macintoshes must be upgraded with processor accelerators.  The highest
performance of these is the Daystar 50 MHz 68030 accelerator.  This
replaces the CPU in a Mac II family system and adds 32K of zero wait-state
burst-fill cache memory.  Additionally, a private high-performance bus can
connect the Daystar accelerator to video cards, SCSI cards, and memory
cards.

MS-DOS

The IBM/Compaq MS-DOS systems currently being sold use
8086/286/386/386SX/486 processors.  The processor speeds range from 8 MHz
to 33 MHz, with zero or 32k bytes of built-in cache and no cache
expandability.  Memory speeds run from zero to three wait states,
generally with more wait states on the faster processors.  ISA bus speeds
run from 1.2 to 8 million bytes per second (although this later figure
appears to be for DMA operations only).  EISA systems are reported to have
twice the data bandwidth, again for DMA primarily and slower for random
memory accesses.  MCA systems from IBM have high burst data rates, near
the best performance of EISA, but degrade even more rapidly in random
access operations.  All systems support DMA and can use disk controllers
whose performance is primarily limited by the disk head data rate.
Caching disk controllers in some models also greatly enhance disk
performance.

In general, top-end MS-DOS systems are engineered to be CPU-limited, not
memory-speed limited as the top-end Mac's are.  Unfortunately for the
MS-DOS folks, their CPU's are much less capable than the Mac's, to the
point that we have seen a 20 MHz (no wait state) 386 system outperformed
four to one on some non-floating-point tasks by a Mac Plus using
comparable quality commercial programs for each system.  A baseline IBM AT
(8 MHz) took over ten times as long as the plus for this graphics test.
We believe that most of the claimed drawing-speed advantages of MS-DOS
systems come from (expensive) special-purpose graphics co-processor
boards, usable only from a few programs such as Autocad.  In price, too,
the high-end IBM and Compaq machines are substantially more expensive than
the top-end Macintoshes, actually by enough to more than pay for a
top-of-the-line 50 MHz 68030 accelerator for the Mac.

Software Issues

Therefore, if the MS-DOS worlds claims of superior performance is correct,
the Mac software, system or application level or both, must be terribly
flawed.  As we have already seen, the 68k family provides a large number
of addressing modes which, used in conjunction with the large register
set, allows the use of complex data structures without imposing a
performance penalty.  Because of this, the Macintosh toolbox has from the
start been designed according to good object-oriented programming (OOP)
principles.  The best example of this is the Dialog Manager, which is
clearly two subclasses (dialogs and alerts) of the Window Manager, which
is in turn a subclass of QuickDraw.  Now that language support for OOP is
available, the toolbox fits even more cleanly into applications.  At the
OS level, the Macintosh Hierarchical File System (HFS) is clearly superior
to both DOS and OS/2, even the so-called RHigh-Performance File System.S
This superiority is in terms of both functionality and efficiency.  HFS is
simply faster, seldom requiring more than two disk accesses to read or
write a file block (and usually just one).  Subdirectories were implicit
in the original Macintosh File System (MFS), even though it was a flat
file system.  This meant that users (and developers) did not have to throw
out existing programs, or learn arcane CONFIG.SYS pathing protocols to use
it.

This leads to another area where the Mac has a decided edge over the
MS-DOS world.  Apple sets the standards and developers follows them.
Those who donUt, die in the marketplace when their products break. Because
there is a single graphics standard in the Mac (Quickdraw) which is device
independent, everyone goes thru Quickdraw to image to both the screen and
to printers.  With the exception of a dwindling number of game
programmers, Mac developers are a remarkably well-behaved bunch.  We have
determined by measurement that there are few performance gains to be had
by bypassing the system and toolbox calls.  This stands to reason since
Apple spends roughly $400 million a year on research and development.
This is a large enough amount that it would be surprising if the system
and toolbox routines and data structures werenUt as close to optimal
performers as can reasonably be designed.  Although bad application design
can ruin the performance of any system, the top performers in the Mac
world are truly stellar.  Such applications as WingZ, WriteNow, and Think
C 4.0 are examples of how fast programs can run on the Macintosh.

 In the MS-DOS world, Microsoft sets the standards, and the developers
Rwork aroundS them.  Bypassing DOS, or even the BIOS, is routine for the
rocket scientists of the MS-DOS developer community, in the name of
performance.  The reason for this is that MS-DOS began life as QD-DOS, a
RQuick and DirtyS clone of the CPM operating system for 8086 systems.
What this means in reality is that MS-DOS began life as a collection of
routines and data structures, Rflying in loose formation,S rather than as
a carefully integrated system.  Microsoft has had to work long and hard
just to get MS-DOS cleaned up and give it a rough approximation of the Mac
OS (but not toolbox) capabilities.  In the process, Microsoft broke most
existing applications.  Few DOS 1.x (or even 2.x) applications will run in
DOS 3.3 if they took the normal and expected shortcuts of most
high-performance commercial applications.  The only reasons for an MS-DOS
application to beat a comparable Macintosh application are in floating
point, if the Macintosh being evaluated does not have an FPU, or in a
text-based interface, where the MS-DOS application just writes a byte per
character but the Mac has to draw the character (a much more complex
task).  With Microsoft now proclaiming - belatedly but correctly - that
GUIUs (Graphical User Interfaces) are the wave of the future, even this
(hardware-based) advantage will be lost to the MS-DOS world.  And after
all, graphing and drawing programs simply canUt use simple text-only
display hardware.

Summary

In conclusion, without resorting to dubious benchmarks, we see that the
Mac architecture enjoys a fundamental advantage over the MS-DOS
architecture at all levels from basic hardware thru system software and
application software.  We are quite unable to understand the various
columnists' insistence that comparing generationally equivalent Mac and
MS-DOS machines always favors the MS-DOS machines when, as we have shown,
the truth is otherwise.  Indeed, since the current generation of Macintosh
hardware offerings do not wring the maximum performance out of the
Motorola 680x0 CPUUs, we can look forward to further improvements in Mac
performance.  MS-DOS machines are already pushed so near to the limits of
their hardware performance potential that only enhanced CPUUs will improve
their relatively laggardly performance.

We are of the opinion that most or all of the so-called benchmarks which
are bandied about are inadequate.  A reasonable benchmark would operate on
hundreds of thousands of bytes of data, and would place more emphasis on
integer that floating point calculations, but would perform both.
Further, the benchmark should not be concerned with any sort of I/O (which
can always be sped up by throwing faster hardware into the box).  For a
raw system performance rating, the benchmark should be coded in assembler,
not C or some other higher level language (HLL).  This is because such HLL
benchmarks are usually more a measure of the quality of the compilerUs
code generator.  Common code benchmarks, where the same HLL code is
executed on all of the systems being tested, are particularly susceptible
to another flaw, biased coding.  By biased coding, we mean writing the
code such that the compilers would fully exploit one processorUs
architecture but not anotherUs.  An example of this would be not using
register variables in C, or using only 1 or 2.  Such code would use
everything an MS-DOS CPU has but leave most of the registers of a 680x0
unused.

This is what we have observed with the Byte benchmarks.  Indeed, Byte went
further and RportedS a tiny-C compiler from a Z-80 to both systems.  Since
the Z-80 register set maps directly onto the 80x86 register set, this is a
fairly optimal fit and uses most of the resources of the 80x86 CPU, while
keeping everything in a single segment to avoid the 64 kbyte segment
limits of MS-DOS.  The 680x0 version of their tiny-C, on the other hand,
uses less than half the CPUUs registers, and those inefficiently (i.e.,
only the data registers and ignoring most of the addressing modes of the
68000).  If Byte were serious about its benchmarks, it would declare
everything registerized and pointerize the array accesses (like any good
commercial developer), then compare its brain-dead-C results to MPW C,
THINK C, and appropriate C compilers from the MS-DOS world.  We are of the
opinion that the results would be very interesting, but embarrassing to
Byte.


@endnode

@node P4-6 "BIX"
@toc "menu"

%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%
%%                    BIX - Byte Information Exchange                    %%
%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%


BIX is the premier online service for computing professionals and en-
thusiasts.  While other online services cater to computer novices, BIX is 
the place for knowledgeable people to go for answers to tough questions.  
You're likely to find many others in similar situations who can offer 
advice, give technical assistance, or point you in the right direction.

BIX is divided into areas called conferences, each devoted to a 
particular area of interest.  They range from algorithms to windows,
from writers to Amiga.  Conferences are categorized into groups,
usually referred to as exchanges, so that you can browse through
whatever groups interest you and see a list of the conferences it 
contains.

                  These are some of the exchanges on BIX:

amiga.exchange - the place for Amiga developers and enthusiasts
byte - the full text of each issue of BYTE magazine; source code too 
e.and.l - Entertainment and Leisure; music, pets, games, more
ibm.exchange - everything from OS/2 to PC clones
mac.exchange -  Mac news, support, software, advice
professionals - consultants, engineers, financiers gather here
programmers - some of the best brains in the business!
wix - the Information Exchange for Windows; Windows Magazine online
writers.ex - the professional and amateur writer's exchange


                       *** FULL INTERNET ACCESS! ***

BIX also features access to the Internet - you can use FTP to transfer
files from sites all over the world, telnet to log on to other online 
services, schools, and research sites, and send Internet mail to millions 
of people at services like DELPHI, CompuServe, America Online, MCI Mail, 
and other sites and services.  Services like "WHOIS" and "Finger" are 
also available, with more features on the way (like USENET newsgroups; 
our newsreader is currently being tested and should be available very 
soon!)  There are no usage fees or special charges for Internet access - 
it's all part of your BIX subscription. 


                      ==============================
                      Rates and Connect Information:
                      ==============================


BIX membership costs $13 per month, plus connect time.  There are several 
different ways to connect:

SprintNet*              $3/hour evenings/weekends   $9/hour weekdays
Tymnet:**               $3/hour evenings/weekends   $9/hour weekdays
(SprintNet and Tyment rates shown are for 48 contiguous US states only.)
                                                        
Tymnet Canada:          $4/hr eves/wkends           $9/hour weekdays
Tymnet Hawaii:          $10/hr eves/wkends          $20/hour weekdays   
Telnet(via Internet):   $1/hour, round the clock
Direct dial (Boston):   $2/hour, round the clock (up to 9600 bps)
 
 * SprintNet daytime hours are from 6am to 7pm, M-F, ET.
** Tymnet daytime hours are from 7am to 6pm, M-F, ET.

To find your local SprintNet number, call SprintNet at (800) 877-5045,
ext. 5.  Internationally, call (404) 859-7700.

To find a local Tymnet number, call Tymnet at (800) 937-2862.  
Internationally, call (703) 442-0145.

                             ================

There is no surcharge for 9600 bps access via either telecom carrier.

There is no surcharge for up to 10mb of Internet mail per month (sent
and received).  There will be a charge of $1 per 100,000 bytes 
thereafter.

                             ================


                20/20 PLAN OPTION (for USA-48 users only):

Volume users can choose the 20/20 Advantage Plan, which is $20 per month
and includes the first 20 hours of access by any combination of methods 
from the contiguous United States.  Additional use is $1.80 per hour 
(additional use for telnet access is $1 an hour).  The 20/20 Plan's cost is 
in addition to the $13 monthly fee.  


                           INTERNATIONAL USERS:

If you wish to connect internationally through Tymnet or SprintNet, 
please contact your local PTT.  BIX accepts prepaid international calls,
direct dial, or telnet connections.  In order to make a "collect" (not 
prepaid) call to BIX, your account must be verified before the charges 
are accepted.  When you complete the registration, we'll mail you a BIX
Membership Agreement by regular US Mail.  Whe you receive it, sign it 
and return it to us by mail.  When we receive it here, we'll authorize
your account to make reverse charged calls.

If you want to access BIX right away, contact your local PTT to set up a 
prepaid account.  You'll pay your local carrier for your calls to BIX in
advance, so there's no waiting period or verfication needed. Or, connect 
at BIX via telnet to x25.bix.com.

SprintNet international calls from most locations are $24 an hour.
Tymnet international charges vary, but are generally between $20-$30 an hour.


                           ====================
                           Billing Information: 
                           ====================

You can charge your monthly BIX membership fees to your Visa, 
Mastercard, Discover, or American Express card.

You may have your company invoiced for one or more BIX memberships with 
a BIX Corporate Account.  To do so, send by US Mail or fax a Purchase Order 
including a Purchase Order number, invoice address, contact person, a 
phone number where we can reach the contact person, and the company's 
fax number.  Please direct it to the attention of Connie Lopes, who
handles corporate accounts.  Our fax number is 617-491-6642.  Your 
corporate account will generally be set up within 24 hours.


                            ===================
                            To Sign Up For BIX:
                            ===================

   Dial by modem 1-800-695-4882 or 617-491-5410 * 
   (use 8 data bits, no parity, full duplex)

   Press a few carriage returns until you see the Login:(enter "bix") 
   prompt, then type  bix

   At the Name? prompt, type bix.amrpt

* Users already on the internet can telnet to x25.bix.com instead.
  At the USERNAME: prompt enter bix, then bix.net at the Name? prompt.
  Once your account is registered, you can connect the same way, except
  at the Name? prompt you'll enter your BIXname and then your password.


Using the above procedure will allow users in the 48 contiguous United 
States to take advantage of our special "5 for $5" offer.  This offer 
lets you use up to 5 hours of evening/weekend time on BIX during the 
current calender month (whatever month you sign up in), for $5.  
Additional time is $1.80 per hour ($1 per hour for telnet).  At the end 
of the calender month, you will be placed into our standard rate plan, 
at $13 monthly plus connect charges.  You may also join the 20/20 Plan 
at this time.

If you have other questions, please contact BIX Member Services 
at (800) 695-4775; send a fax to BIX at (617) 491-6642; or send Internet
mail to info@bix.com.

BIX Member Services hours are 12pm - 11pm, Monday through Friday, ET.  


@endnode

@node P1-12 "European Outlook"
@toc "menu"

%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%
%% European Outlook                                       By Jesper Juul %%
%%                                               (norjj@stud.hum.aau.dk) %%
%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%

Please email me whenever anything important happens in the European
Amiga world!


The Party
---------

On the 27th to 29th of December, a huge computer gathering of took
place in a conference center in Herning, Denmark.

Around 3000 computer freaks paid the 150 DKR ($23) entrance fee, mostly
people from Denmark, but with a good deal taking the trip from Sweden,
Norway, Finland, Germany, Poland, Belgium...

Most of them brought their computers so a few thousand Amigas got
together as well, perhaps 500 PCs, some 64s, CD32s, a 3DO, a Neo Geo,
and even a Sparc Workstation.

In addition to the purely social aspect of getting together, various
competitions were arranged. Most important of all, the demo-competition
with a $3500 prize. Then several smaller competitions: Intro-
competition (small demo), music, and graphics. Commodore staged a
dealer-demo competition with the nice but out-of-production 1950
monitor to the winners.

Several surprise arrangements of a less technical nature were also
arranged: Tug of war, Karaoke (on the CD32, naturally),
disc-os, and for the brave people, "Body Crashing": drink 1.5 liters of
cola as fast as you can. Prize? -Another 1.5 liters of cola.

Commodore (along with some other dealers) seem to finally have realised
that a lot of their market is "The Scene", as it's called. So they were
there with a large stand displaying the whole line of Amigas, network
boards. A huge-screen demonstration of the CD32 took place in front of
a large and (obviously) very receptive crowd. The interested found
their way to MPEG, CDXL, and "Ask Commodore"-sessions. A tiny
developer conference also happened. Scala MM300 was demonstrated by the
nice Norwegian people who wrote it; Scala and C= Norway seem to have
just about merged as companies. Not a bad thing at all.

On the evening of the 27th, "Top Gun" was shown on a large screen by a
CD32 with MPEG. To be true, it was a PAL CD32 displaying a NTSC CD-I
version of the film; it looked great nevertheless, and there's now
reason to believe that that MPEG module is just as flexible as
Commodore's promised. It is a bit funny to realise that Tom Cruise
actually fights The Russians at the end of the movie (or does he call
them "Ruskies"?). Yes, it was at that time before we found out that
Russia and the Soviet Union wasn't quite the same thing, and before it
became clear that we weren't going to fight them anyway. This is a good
example of completely state-of-the-art technology being used with a
completely outdated content! Well, the movie can be a bit of fun to
watch anyway.

On a not so light note, racism reared up its ugly head; two demos were
wisely barred from the competition due to fascist content. Hey, Europe
did try racism and fascism 50 years ago. It was no fun, and it isn't
cool either!

"The Party" (the official name) was very well organized, with
24-hour kiosks, ice-cream bar, junk food, and a cafeteria. The official
party t-shirts were popular items sold. Separate sleeping quarters (or
rather: rooms) had wisely been arranged. Alcohol was banned and
confiscated at the entrance, to guarantee complete focus on the
computer screens.

Surprisingly, the "guys" who put it all together even included members
of the female gender, so contrary to what you may think, it wasn't all
socially unsure young boys with acne. Computers, and even computer
freaks, are becoming mainstream.

Both the printed press and TV covered the event quite well, doing
interviews with brilliant questions like: "What is a demo?", "What is a
group?". Some participants even explained that they were there because
Amiga people are so much nicer and so much more helpful than PC people.
Well that's all true, isn't it?

(Thanks to Jes Soerensen and Jesper Skov who were there.)



New products
------------

More and more Envoy (C='s networking software) licenses are appearing.
Village Tronic, makers of the Picasso II board, are selling a parallel
port networking solution called "Liana" for DM 129 ($75). ABF are
selling their Amiga Link solution with Envoy for DM 398 ($229).

The first 3DO's are appearing in Europe. Price is currently at DM 1699,
quite a bit ($977).



Old products
------------

Following Jason Comptons article in AR139, I'd like to point to a few
avaliable Amiga expansions.

W.A.W. Elektronik offers the following CDTV expansions:
-A 2MB chip/ 2MB fastram expansion.
-An 8MB fastram expansion.
-A SCSI interface for internal or external HDs.
(No prices listed.)


Accelerator boards for the 3000 can still be found. R2B2 advertises a
'040 board for DM 1698 ($977).


For the 1200, Micronik sells a tower box with 4 Zorro-II (yes, the ad
says "II") and 2 PC slots. All for DM 499 ($287).



Addresses:
----------

ABF Computer GbR
Postfach 14 25
74304 Bietigheim-Bissingen
Germany

Tel. 07142 93 00 10
Fax. 07142  3 33 92


Micronik ComouterService
Emil Nolde Strasse 32
51375 Leverkusen
Germany
Tel. 0214 93186
Fax. 0214 95791


R2B2
Wilhelm Leithe Weg 83
44867 Bochum
Tel. 02327 32 19 56
Fax. 02327 32 19 57


Village Tronic
Wellweg 95
31157 Sarstedt
Germany

Tel. 05066 7013 - 0
Fax. 05066 7013 - 40


W.A.W. Elektronik GmbH
Tegeler Strasse 2
13467 Berlin
Germany

Tel. 030 404 33 31
Fax. 030 404 70 39



@endnode

@node P1-13 "Reader Mail"
@toc "menu"

%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%
%%                              Reader Mail                              %%
%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%


*** Area: NET_1_285_11                            Date:  3 Jan 94 16:41:00
*** From: Rick Ethridge (1:285/11.0)
*** To  : Robert Glover (1:285/11.11)
*** Subj: AmigaWorld Complaint


I've had problems attempting to send a subscription payment to AmigaWorld. 
The first payment was sent by regular mail (money order). My subscription was
cancelled for non-payment without notice. I resent payment by REGISTERED MAIL
followed up THREE WEEKS LATER by a phone call to IDG's 800 number. All we got
was the run-around. It seems that we're small fry to this large conglomerate
publishing operation! If you would, please try to intercede or put a "blurb"
in an upcoming AmigaReport. With your on-line mag as informative as it is, 
maybe I should cancel payment on the last money order and send the money to
you! 


@endnode

@node P3 "Dealer Directory"
@toc "menu"

%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%
%%                           Dealer Directory                            %%
%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%



                           Almathera Systems Ltd
                              Challenge House
                              618 Mitcham Rd
                              Croydon, Surrey
                             CR9 3AU  England
                         VOICE: (UK) 081 683 6418
              Internet: (Sales) almathera@cix.compulink.co.uk
                  (Technical) jralph@cix.compulink.co.uk


                           Amigability Computers
                               P.O. Box 572
                          Plantsville, CT  06479
                            VOICE: 203-276-8175
                        Internet:  amiga@phantm.UUCP
                             BIX:  jbasile
              (Send E-mail to subscribe to our mailing list)


                            Apogee Technologies
                          1851 University Parkway
                            Sarasota, FL  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
                     Internet:  B.GRAY@genie.geis.com


                        Brian Fowler Computers Ltd
                                11 North St
                                  Exeter
                                   Devon
                                  EX4 3QS
                              United Kingdom
                           Voice: (0392) 499 755
                           Fax:   (0392) 423 480
                Internet:  brian_fowler@cix.compulink.co.uk


                CLICK! Microcomputer Applications B.V.B.A.
                            Boomsesteenweg 468
                        B-2610 Wilrijk - Antwerpen
                             Belgium - Europe
                         VOICE:  03 / 828.18.15
                           FAX:  03 / 828.67.36
                     USENET:  vanhoutv@click.augfl.be
                             FIDO:  2:292/603.9
                         AmigaNet:  39:120/102.9


                        Comspec Communications Inc
                  Serving your computing needs since 1976
                              74 Wingold Ave
                             Toronto, Ontario
                             Canada   M6B 1P5
                     Computer Centre:   (416) 785-8348
          Service, Corporate & Educational Sales: (416) 785-3553
                            Fax:  416-785-3668
                   Internet:  bryanf@comcorp.comspec.com
                              bryanf@accesspt.north.net


                       Computers International, Inc.
                             5415 Hixson Pike
                          Chattanooga, TN  37343
                           VOICE:  615-843-0630


                             DataKompaniet ANS
                             Pb 3187  Munkvoll
                             N-7002  Trondheim
                              Norway - Europe
                          VOICE/FAX:  72 555 149
                      Internet:  torrunes@idt.unit.no


                               Digital Arts 
                           122 West 6th Street
                          Bloomington, IN  47404 
                           VOICE: (812)330-0124 
                           FAX:   (812)330-0126 
                               BIX:  msears 


                           Finetastic Computers
                           721 Washington Street
                            Norwood, MA  02062
                           VOICE:  617-762-4166
                             BBS:  617-769-3172
                            Fido:  1:101/322
                       Portal:  FinetasticComputers
               Internet:  FinetasticComputers@cup.portal.com


                               HT Electronics
                         275 North Mathilda Avenue
                           Sunnyvale, CA  94086
                           VOICE:  408-737-0900
                           FAX:    408-245-3109
                          Portal:  HT Electronics
                 Internet:  HT Electronics@cup.portal.com


                          Industrial Video, Inc.
                           1601 North Ridge Rd.
                             Lorain, OH  44055
                           VOICE:  800-362-6150
                                   216-233-4000
                  Internet:  af741@cleveland.freenet.edu
                            Contact:  John Gray


                                MicroSearch
                        9000 US 59 South, Suite 330
                              Houston, Texas
                           VOICE:  713-988-2818
                           FAX:    713-995-4994


                          Mr. Hardware Computers
                               P.O. Box 148
                              59 Storey Ave.
                          Central Islip, NY 11722
                           VOICE:  516-234-8110
                             FAX:  516-234-8110
                         A.M.U.G. BBS:  516-234-6046


                     MusicMart:  Media Sound & Vision
                            71 Wellington Road
                          London, Ontario, Canada
                           VOICE:  519-434-4162
                             FAX:  519-663-8074
                             BBS:  519-457-2986
                            FIDO:  1:221/125
                        AmigaNet:  40:550/1
                          MaxNet:  90:204/1
                        iNET: koops@gaul.csd.uwo.ca


                              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


                           Wonder Computers Inc.
                             1315 Richmond Rd.
                      Ottawa, Ontario, Canada K2B 8J7
                           Voice:  613-596-2542
                           Fax:    613-596-9349
                           BBS:    613-829-0909


          (Dealers:  To have your name added, please send Email!)

@endnode 

@node P1-14  "The Grapevine"
@toc "menu"

%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%
%%                             The Grapevine                             %%
%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%


- Omaha, Nebraska
  ---------------
  While sitting here putting together this week's issue, I was pleasantly
  surprised to see a rather nice trailer for the upcoming series premiere
  of Bablyon 5.  The debut date, at least here in Nebraska, is set for
  Sunday, January 30th.  Please check your local listings for times and
  channel.


@endnode

@node P1-15 "Humor Department"
@toc "menu"

%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%
%%                         The Humor Department                          %%
%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%


Operating Systems


By Bill Wilson, Rob Freundlich, Dag Gillies, and others
in Usenet's rec.humor.


=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=

Did you ever wonder what driving to the store would be like if
operating systems ran your car?

MS-DOS:  You get in the car and try to remember where you put
your keys.

WINDOWS:  You get in the car and drive to the store very slowly
because attached to the back of your car is a freight train.

OS/2:  After fueling up with 6000 gallons of gas, you get in the
car and drive to the store with a motorcycle escort and a
marching band in procession. Halfway there, the car blows up,
killing everybody in town.

UNIX:  You get in the car and type GREP STORE. After reaching
speeds of 200 mph en route, you arrive at the barber shop.

Windows NT:  You get in the car and write a letter that says, "go
to the store". Then you get out of the car and mail the letter to
your dashboard.

OS/400:  An attendant locks you into the car, then drives you to
the store where you get to watch everybody else buy filet mignon.

Taligent/Pink:  You walk to the store with Ricardo Montalban, who
tells you how wonderful it will be when he can fly you to the
store in his Learjet.

S/36 SSP:  You get in the car and drive to the store. Halfway
there, you run out of gas. While walking the rest of the way, you
are run over by kids on mopeds.

MacIntosh System 7:  You get in the car to go to the store and
the car drives you to church.

OpenWindows: you can't drive the car because the hood ornament completely
blocks your field of view.

AmigaDOS 3.0: You get in the car and it drives you to a great little
store no-one else in town knows about.

=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=


@endnode

@node P2-3 "In Closing"
@toc "menu"

%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%
%%                       _    _       __  ___    _                       %%
%%                      /\\  |\\   /| || //  \  /\\                      %%
%%                     /  \\ | \\ /|| ||(< __  /  \\                     %%
%%                    /--- \\|  \/ || || \\_||/--- \\                    %%
%%                   /______________________________\\                   %%
%%                  /                                \\                  %%
%%              Amiga Report International Online Magazine               %%
%%                   January 7, 1994 ~ Issue No. 2.01                    %%
%%                 Copyright © 1994 SkyNet Publications                  %%
%%                           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.  Amiga
Report is not  affiliated  with  Commodore-Amiga, Inc., Commodore  Business
Machines, Ltd., or any other Amiga publication in any way. All items quoted
in whole or in part are  done so under the  Fair Use Provision of the Copy-
right Laws of the United States Penal Code.

%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%

@endnode


@node P1 "Columns and Features"
@toc "menu"

@{"   From the Editor's Desk   " link P1-1} Saying it like it is!
@{"   Computer Product News    " link P1-2} Product Announcements and Info
@{"         AR Online          " link P1-3} The lines are buzzing!
@{"       CD32 Reviewed        " link P1-4} A close look at the CD32
@{" Rumors from the Amiga Side " link P1-5} A look into 1994
@{"   CD Platform Comparison   " link P1-6} Comparing the game machines
@{"       UseNet Review        " link P1-7} Pinball Fantasies AGA
@{"   The Emulation Rambler    " link P1-8} Utilities Unlimited clears the air
@{"        CD32 Titles         " link P1-9} A Spot Review
@{"       UseNet Review        " link P1-10} Turrican 3
@{"       MAC vs. MS-DOS       " link P1-11} Performance review between Intel and Motorola
@{"      European Outlook      " link P1-12} News from Europe
@{"        Reader Mail         " link P1-13} The readers speak!
@{"       The Grapevine        " link P1-14} We heard it through the grapevine!
@{"    The Humor Department    " link P1-15} Jokes, Quotes, and Shameless plugs!

@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}  Getting better all the time!
@{"   Portal   " link P4-2}  A great place for Amiga users...
@{"  InterNet  " link P4-5}  Subscribe to the AR Mailing List
@{"    BIX     " link P4-6}  For Serious Programmers and Developers
@endnode

@node P5 "Files Available for FTP"
@toc "menu"


@{" HWGRCS patch level 6 " link P5-1} Port of RCS[5.6] 
@{"    MainActor v1.2    " link P5-2} A modular animation package
@{"   Amiga Mosaic v1.0  " link P5-3} World Wide Web browser program
@{"   PGPAmiga v2.3a.2   " link P5-4} Public Key encryption program

@endnode



                 -----------------------------------------
@node P2-1-1 "NOVA"
@toc "menu"


                               * NOVA BBS *
                  Official Amiga Report Distribution Site
                          * Running Starnet BBS *
                         Wayne Stonecipher, Sysop
                            FidoNet  1:362/508
                 An Amiga Software Distribution Site (ADS)
                 615-472-9748  USR DS 16.8  24hrs - 7 days
                           Cleveland, Tennessee
@endnode           
                ------------------------------------------
@node P2-1-2 "In The MeanTime"
@toc "menu"


        
                          * IN THE MEANTIME BBS *
                  Official Amiga Report Distribution Site
                            * Running AXShell *
                            Robert Niles, Sysop
                            rniles@imtired.itm.com
                509-966-3828  Supra V.32bis  24hrs - 7 days
                            Yakima, Washington


                          ******* Notice *******

After 13 September 1993, In The MeanTime will no longer be on FidoNet, thus
we will no longer be accepting File REQuests (FREQs). We WILL be still 
accepting calls and will have the latest edition of Amiga Report online.
Downloads to first time callers are still accepted. For the west coast 
call @{"Cloud's Corner" link P2-1-3} to FREQ the latest edition of Amiga Report.

Those who call for the latest edition of Amiga Report, and who do not with
to establish an account, log in as guest with the password of "guest".
At the prompt type "ARMAG" (without the quotes).

@endnode           
	       ------------------------------------------
@node P2-1-3 "Cloud's Corner"
@toc "menu"


                          * CLOUD'S CORNER BBS *
                  Official Amiga Report Distribution Site
         MebbsNet/Starnet Support/Distribution Site West Coast USA
                         * Running MEBBSNet BBS *
                            Larry Cloud, Sysop
                            FidoNet:  1:350/30
                            MaxNet:  90:180/10
                  Internet:  larryc@hebron.connected.com
                 206-377-4290  USR HST DS  24hrs - 7 days
                           Bremerton, Washington


New users can call and get ANY copy of Amiga Report.  These are considered
"free" downloads, they do not count against any file ratio.  The latest issue
of Amiga Reports can be Freq'ed (FileREQusted) from here as "AR.LHA", as "AR"
or as ARxxx.LHA where xxx is the issue number.  Freq's are valid at ANY time.

For users interested in reading AR, but who do not have access to AmigaGuide,
you can freq ARBUL and get the AR in bulletin form.  This service is provided
for persons who do not have Amigaguide (such as IBM users).  Please note that
any pictures distributed with the "regular" Amiga Reports archive will NOT be
sent with this freq.  This file is not available for dial-in users, but you
can read bulletin #5 with your capture buffer open and get the same file.



@endnode
                 ------------------------------------------
@node P2-1-4 "Biosmatica"
@toc "menu"


         
                            * 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
@endnode
                 ------------------------------------------
@node P2-1-5 "Amiga Junction 9"
@toc "menu"


                           * AMIGA JUNCTION 9 *
         Official Amiga Report Distribution Site -- United Kingdom
                       * Running DLG Professional *
                          Stephen Anderson, Sysop
                  Sysop Email:  sysadmin@junct9.royle.org

      Line 1  +44 (0)372 271000  14400  V.32bis/HST   FidoNet 2:440/20
      Line 2  +44 (0)372 278000  14400  V.32bis only  FidoNet 2:440/21
      Line 3  +44 (0)372 279000  2400   V.42bis/MNP

                   Internet:  user_name@junct9.royle.org

@endnode
                 ------------------------------------------
@node P2-1-6 "BitStream BBS"
@toc "menu"



                             * BITSTREAM BBS *
               The BBS of the Nelson (NZ) Amiga Users Group
                  Official Amiga Report Distribution Site
                       * Running Xenolink 1.0 Z.3 *
                            Glen Roberts, Sysop
                             FidoNet 3:771/850
               +64 3 5485321  Supra V.32bis  24hrs - 7 days
                            Nelson, New Zealand

@endnode
                 -------------------------------------------
@node P2-1-7 "Realm of Twilight"
@toc "menu"


                         * REALM OF TWILIGHT BBS *
             Official Amiga Report Distribution Site -- Canada
                        * Running Excelsior! BBS *
                         Thorsten Schiller, Sysop
                    Usenet: realm.tdkcs.waterloo.on.ca
                    UUCP:   ...!uunet.ca!tdkcs!realm
                             FIDO: 1:221/202
                             Fish: 33:33/8
                              24hrs - 7 days
                         519-748-9365  (2400 baud)
                         519-748-9026  (v.32bis)
                              Ontario, Canada


     Hardware: Amiga 3000, 105 Meg Quantum, 213 Meg Maxtor, 5 megs RAM


@endnode
                 -------------------------------------------
@node P2-1-8 "Metnet Triangle"
@toc "menu"


                          METNET TRIANGLE SYSTEM
                  Official Amiga Report Distribution Site
                          UK Support for Mebbsnet
                  * Running Mebbsnet and Starnet 1.02a *
                             Jon Witty, Sysop
                            FIDO:  2:252/129.0
                              24 hrs - 7 days
                     Line  1:   44-482-473871  16.8 DS HST 
                     Lines 2-7: 44-482-442251  2400 (6 lines)
                     Line  8:   44-482-491744  2400 
                     Line  9:   44-482-449028  2400 
                Voice helpline  44-482-491752  (anytime)

                 Fully animated menus + normal menu sets. 
                  500 megs HD - Usual software/messages 
           Most doors online - Many Sigs - AMIGA AND PC SUPPORT 
                Very active userbase and busy conference  
             Precious days and MUD online. AMUL support site. 

@endnode
                 -------------------------------------------
@node P2-1-9 "Omaha Amiganet"
@toc "menu"

                            * OMAHA AMIGANET *
                  Official Amiga Report Distribution Site
                       * Running DLG Professional *
                           Andy Wasserman, Sysop
                              24 hrs - 7 days
                            FidoNet:  1:285/11
                           AmigaNet:  40:200/10
                      Line 1:  402-333-5110  V.32bis
                      Line 2:  402-691-0104  USR DS
                              Omaha, Nebraska

@endnode
                 ------------------------------------------
@node P2-1-10 "Amiga-Night-System"
@toc "menu"


                          * AMIGA-NIGHT-SYSTEM *
             Official Amiga Report Distribution Site - Finland
                       * Running DLG Professional *
                            Janne Saarme, Sysop
                              24 hrs - 7 days
                     InterNet: luumu@fenix.fipnet.fi 
                           FidoNet:  2:220/550.0
                          +358-0-675840  V.32bis
                             Helsinki, Finland

@endnode
                 ------------------------------------------
@node P2-1-11 "Ramses Amiga Flying"
@toc "menu"


                        * RAMSES THE AMIGA FLYING *
             Official Amiga Report Distribution Site -- France
                       * Running DLG Professional *
                            Eric Delord, Sysop
                         Philippe Brand, Co-Sysop
                        Stephane Legrand, Co-Sysop
                    Internet: user.name@ramses.gna.org
                            Fidonet: 2:320/104
                        +33-1-60037015 USR DS 16.8
                        +33-1-60037713 V.32bis
                        +33-1-60037716 1200-2400
  

Ramses The Amiga Flying BBS is an Amiga-dedicated BBS running DLG-Pro
on a Amiga 3000, 16MB RAM, 2GB Disk space, 3 lines.

We keep a dayly Aminet site mirroring, NetBSD-Amiga complete mirror site
from ftp.eunet.ch (main site), Amiga Report, GNU Amiga, Ramses is the
SAN/ADS/Amiganet French coordinator.



@endnode
                 ------------------------------------------
@node P2-1-12 "Gateway BBS"
@toc "menu"


                            * THE GATEWAY BBS *
                 Official Amiga Report Distribution Site 
                        * Running Excelsior! BBS *
                          Stace Cunningham, Sysop
                            Dan Butler, CoSysop
                              24 hrs - 7 days
                   InterNet: stace@tecnet1.jcte.jcs.mil
                           FidoNet:  1:3604/60.0
                    601-374-2697 Hayes Optina 28.8 V.FC
                            Biloxi, Mississippi


@endnode
                 ------------------------------------------
@node P2-1-13 "Talk City"
@toc "menu"


                               * TALK CITY *
                  Official Amiga Report Distribution Site
   708-372-0190 - 2400bps   708-372-0268 - V32 14.4K  708-372-0283 USR DS 14.4K
     Fido Net 1:115/372,0  Phantom Net 11:2115/2.0  Clink Net 911:6080/4.0 
                            UUCP tcity.com

        Over 3 Gig of Files Online  |  More and More things everyday.

With Three IBM CD-ROMs online, 10 lines, support for all platforms, and a REALLY
dedicated sysop (The Mayor).


@endnode
                 ------------------------------------------
@node P2-1-14 "Amiga BBS"
@toc "menu"


                               * Amiga BBS *
                  Official Amiga Report Distribution Site
                        * Running Excelsior! BBS *
                         Alejandro Kurczyn, Sysop
                             FidoNet  4:975/7
                         First Amiga BBS in Mexico
                        (5) 887-3080   9600 V32,MNP
                         Estado de Mexico,  Mexico


@endnode
                 ------------------------------------------
@node P2-1-15 "The Stygian Abyss"
@toc "menu"



                         * THE STYGIAN ABYSS BBS *
                    312-384-0616  14.4 USR Courier HST
                    312-384-6250  14.4 Supra V.32 bis (FREQ line)
                    312-384-0716  2400 USR Courier

  FIDONet-1:115/384.0    CLink-911:6200/2.0  NWNet-206:310/0.0--206:310/1.0
      PhantomNet Central States Cooridinator-11:2115/0.0--11:2115/1.0
      FaithNet Central States Cooridinator-700:6000/0.0--700:6000/1.0
                     AMINet Chicagoland HUB-559:2/5.0
                             Chicago, Illinois

     Over 4 GIGS of files  I  Over 3700 MODS  I  Over 120 On-Line Games
              Tons of digitized sounds  I  Over 15,000 GIFS
           Supporting:  Amiga  I  IBM  I  Macintosh  I C=64/128
              SIR SAMMY-SysOp     Enter.......If you dare!!

@endnode
                 ------------------------------------------
@node P2-1-50 "Freeland Mainframe"
@toc "menu"



                          * FREELAND MAINFRAME *
                   Offical Amiga Report Distribution Site
                       * Running DLG Progessional *
                           John Freeland, SysOp
                 206-438-1670  Supra 2400zi
                 206-438-2273  Telebit WorldBlazer(v.32bis)
                 206-456-6013  Supra v.32bis
                              24hrs - 7 days
                       Internet - freemf.eskimo.com
                            Olympia, Washington
@endnode
                 ------------------------------------------
@node P2-1-51 "LAHO"
@toc "menu"



                               * LAHO BBS *
             Official Amiga Report Distribution Site -- Finland
                             * Running MBBS *
                            Lenni Uitti, SysOp
                      Tero Manninen, SysOp (PC-areas)
                     Juha Makinen, SysOp (Amiga-areas)
                        +358-64-414 1516, V.32bis/HST
                        +358-64-414 0400, V.32bis/HST
                        +358-64-414 6800, V.32/HST
                        +358-64-423 1300, V.32 MNP
                            Seinajoki, Finland

Our machine is a 386/33 with 20MB of memory, 1GB harddisk and a CD-ROM
drive. The BBS software is a Norwegian origin MBBS running in
a DesqView windows.

We have over 7000 files online (both for the Amiga and PC) + 650MB stuff
on the Aminet CD-ROM disk.

Every user has an access to download filelist (LAHOFIL.ZIP), list of
Finnish 24-hour BBS's (BBSLIST.ZIP or BBSLIST.LHA) and every issue of
the Amiga Report Magazine (AR101.LHA-AR1??.LHA) even on their first call.

The system has been running since 1989 and is sponsored by the local
telephone company, Vaasan Ladnin Puhelin Oy.



@endnode
                 ------------------------------------------
@node P2-1-52 "Falling BBS"
@toc "menu"



                              * FALLING BBS *
             Official Amiga Report Distribution Site -- Norway
                             * Running ABBS *
                          Christopher Naas, Sysop
                  +47 69 256117  V.32bis  24hrs - 7 days
                    EMail:    naasc@cnaas.adsp.sub.org
@endnode
                 ------------------------------------------
@node P2-1-53 "Command Line BBS"
@toc "menu"



                           * COMMAND LINE BBS * 
            Official Amiga Report Distribution Site -- Canada 
                Canada's Amiga Graphics & Animation Source 
                        * Running AmiExpress BBS * 
                           Nick Poliwko, Sysop 
                    416-533-8321  V.32  24hrs - 7 days 
                             Toronto, Canada 
@endnode  
                 -------------------------------------------
@node P2-1-54 "Rendezvous BBS"
@toc "menu"


                             * RENDEZVOUS BBS *
           Official Amiga Report Distribution Site - New Zealand
                  New Zealand Excelsior! BBS Support Site
                  * Running Excelsior! Professional BBS *
                            David Dustin, Sysop
                  Internet: postmaster@eclipse.acme.gen.nz
                +64 6 3566375  Supra V.32bis  24hrs - 7 days
                       Palmerston North, New Zealand


@endnode
                 -------------------------------------------
@node P2-1-55 "Leguans Byte Channel"
@toc "menu"


                         * LEGUANS BYTE CHANNEL *
            Official Amiga Report Distribution Site -- Germany
                         * Running EazyBBS V2.11 *
                           Andreas Geist, Sysop
                    Usenet: andreas@lbcmbx.in-berlin.de
                              24 hrs - 7 days
                    Line 1:  49-30-8110060  USR DS 16.8 
                    Line 2:  49-30-8122442  USR DS 16.8

                 Login as User: "amiga", Passwd: "report" 

@endnode
                 -------------------------------------------
@node P2-1-56 "Stingray Database BBS"
@toc "menu"


                          * STINGRAY  DATABASE *
            Official Amiga Report Distribution Site -- Germany
                           * Running FastCall *
                           Bernd Mienert, Sysop
                 EMail: sysop@sting-db.zer.sub.org.dbp.de
                  +49 208 496807 HST-Dual 24hrs - 7 days
                          Muelheim/Ruhr, Germany


@endnode
                 --------------------------------------------
@node P2-1-57 "T.B.P. Video Slate"
@toc "menu"


                          * T.B.P. VIDEO SLATE *
                  Official Amiga Report Distribution Site
                      An Amiga dedicated BBS for All
                         * Running Skyline 1.3.2 *
                          Mark E Davidson, Sysop
                              24 hrs - 7 days
                        201-586-3623  USR 14.4 HST
                           Rockaway, New Jersey
                                                                          
              Full Skypix  menus + normal and ansi menu sets.             
             Instant Access to all.  Download on the first call.          
                                                                          
       Hardware:  Amiga 500 Tower custom at 14 MHz, 350 Meg maxtor,        
           125 Meg SCSI Maxtor, 125 Meg IDE Maxtor, Double Speed CD rom,  
                                  9 meg RAM                               


@endnode
                 --------------------------------------------
@node P2-1-58 "Amiga Central"
@toc "menu"


                            * AMIGA CENTRAL! *
                  Official Amiga Report Distribution Site
                          CNet Amiga Support Site
                        * Running CNet Amiga BBS *
                            Carl Tashian, Sysop
                  Internet mail:  root@amicent.raider.net
                   615-383-9679  1200-14.4Kbps V.32bis
                             24 hours - 7 days
                           Nashville, Tennessee


Hardware: Amiga 3000 Tower 68030+882@25MHz, 105 meg Quantum, 225 meg Seagate,
Zoom 14.4k modem

@endnode
                 --------------------------------------------
@node P2-1-59 "Continental Drift"
@toc "menu"


                         * CONTINENTAL DRIFT BBS *
                  Official Amiga Report Distribution Site
        * Running MAXsBBS software (DLG Pro is being delivered!) *
                   Murry Chaffer & Andre Lackman, Sysops
                               +612 9188375
                            24 hours -  7 days
                            Sydney, Australia 


@endnode
                 --------------------------------------------
@node P2-1-60 "Guru Meditation:
@toc "menu"



                            * GURU MEDITATION *
             Official Amiga Report Distribution Site -- Spain
                         * Running Remote Access *
                            Javier Frias, SysOp
                              +34-1-383-1317  V.32bis
                             24 hours - 7days
                                   Spain

@endnode
