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Re: A2 HTML viewer
Jorge ChB wrote:
Michael J. Mahon <mjmahon@aol.com> wrote:
I don't think I would class this as "much better" than Apple graphics,
particularly after the 6-color modification.
Michael, believe me, that's because you've not been in front of it's
crisp, colorful, beautiful display showing graphics *plus* colored 80
columns text... And that price included the (huge) color display.
Remember what was the price of color displays at that time ?
Yes, I noticed that. The large color display signifcantly
increased the cost of entry, which no doubt kept it out of
the mass market.
And I actually did see some ISC (Compucolor II) systems. And there
were some amazing color systems back then in the $8,000-$10,000
range. (My company wound up going for the more expensive spread.)
And that, too, is an important market positioning issue: do you
shoot low enough for the mass market, or high enough for the
professional market, or do you shoot somewhere in the middle and
risk "sitting between two chairs"?
The Apple II is not truly 140*192@6 colors, you know why.
This one had a *true* 160*192@8 colors, *plus* 80 columns colored text.
How did it manage that with an 8KB video frame buffer? That
seems to require closer to 12KB.
And the key to success has nothing to do with these things.
Oh, I don't know--price and manufacturability are pretty big
factors in market success--though not definitive. ;-)
Getting substantial and useful graphic capability with very
little additional system cost *is* the stuff of success.
Cost-performance wins sales.
-michael
Parallel computing for 8-bit Apple II's!
Home page: http://members.aol.com/MJMahon/
"The wastebasket is our most important design
tool--and it is seriously underused."