Re: The Apple ][ was crap

[Roy Miller <millers@iliveinnetnebr.com>]

John Oyler wrote:

> "Roy Miller" <millers@iliveinnetnebr.com> wrote in message
> 3B48CBE3.B8A28D95@iliveinnetnebr.com">news:3B48CBE3.B8A28D95@iliveinnetnebr.com...
>
> > I know this is nothing but Troll Bait, but I'll bite anyway. First, your
> history
> > is all wet. The Apple II came out in 1977, what color computer did
> Commodore or
> > Radio Shack sell then? You guessed it... NONE. The Apple II's colors were
> a
> > quantum leap forward over those two. Did the C-64 have better colors?
> Slightly,
> > however, it didn't appear until what? 1983? Surely they could have done
> much
> > better in the intervening 6 years.
>
> Roy,
>     You forgot the fact that the Apple II series, for the most part, was
> completely expandable. 7 slots is alot, even by today's standards.

No John, I didn't forget that. I was simply dealing with the issue that he
raised - color.

As someone else pointed out, the II went head to head with the TRS-80 Model 1
and the Commodore Pet. These machines had crude, monochrome graphics (IF they
even had graphics - and I don't count "graphical characters" as graphics), while
the II had 6 colors in BASIC, and, with dithering and other tricks, could have
many more. True, by the mid 80s there were computers that had better color (like
my old Coleco ADAM), BUT, if you were starting from scratch, and wanted to
compete with a computer that already existed, you'd better have better color
and/or resolution! The fact that the C-64 did only means that they knew that
they had to be better in color graphics than machine that had been on the market
for more than 5 years.

But, to return to your pointing out the slots, it is nearly forgotten that there
was a video board for the Apple II that used the 9918/28 video chip, giving the
II 16 colors and 16 sprites, with 32 "layers" so that sprites could pass "over"
items drawn on a lower "layer."

I think it interesting that in the 1986 Whole Earth Software Catalog, they
referred to the C-64 as the "bic lighter of computers" - Disposable. While the
II e/c were considered the premier choice for the home that had kids.

Roy

> Commodore
> wouldn't have a comparable computer, until the Amiga 2000 was released, and
> even afterward, they continued to make unexpandable systems such as the 500,
> 600 and 1200. And as far as that goes, they can hardly claim credit for much
> of this, it was a bought company. Throughout the history of all this, we
> mostly have companies that are trying to close the box, make it so that you
> can't add anything to the system, for whatever reason. The Apple II seems to
> have taken the exact opposite approach, perhaps something that is only
> possible when you have a person like Steve Wozniak designing it. Didn't they
> even offer schematics at one point, so that the ambitious hobbyist could
> build his own?
>
> Thanks,
> John
>
> PS I think he might be referring to the Vic-20, which also had color earlier
> than 1983. Even so, this is hardly a comparable machine to the Apple, and
> still several years too late (1981 I think).