Amiga: Back for the Future
These days, it's easy to think computers all use the same hardware, operating system and applications software. Oh, well I guess there's that Apple computer thing which seems to be the rage amongst a minority group - but what do you tend to use in the office? It probably isn't a Macintosh.
Believe it or not, I (like a growing number of satisfied people) have shunned the 'popular' standard computing system and ventured into the territory of 'The Alternative Platform'. No Pentiums for me. Nor a trace of anything which was developed by the people who want to know where you are today. (What about tomorrow? Haven't they looked that far ahead?). Yet I can happily carry on with all the things home computers were designed for, and more. It can be a struggle at times, because of the minority status and public ignorance of such systems, but it's ultimately more fulfilling. I use IBM PC compatibles and Microsoft Windows 95/NT at work, but when it comes to real computing power the Amiga is the only choice for me.
The Amiga has had its ups, and its downs. The ups have been a result of an impressive array of features which made rival systems look rather poor in comparison. Since 1985, when it was first released, the Amiga offered a memory and CPU efficient, fully multitasking operating system which coped comfortably within less than 256k and automatically configured expansion hardware during boot up. You could boot the whole thing from an 880k floppy disk (and still can), output graphics to TV or video as standard, and do lots of multimedia stuff with ease. The hardware improved considerably over the years, giving an edge over anything other companies could throw together, until very recently (and only because of a lack of R&D).
The downs were mainly due to past owners Commodore. The Amiga was initially described as both "the first multimedia computer" and "Commodore's best kept secret". When the Amiga was first unveiled, IBM and Apple were almost ready to admit defeat in the fledgling personal computer market... but one look at Commodore's marketing plan was enough to realise there would be no threat, despite the specifications. Commodore underfunded research, deprived the Amiga of valuable marketing and pumped cash into the cut-throat IBM PC compatible market instead - which eventually caused Commodore's bankruptcy in 1994, right at the peak of Amiga popularity. It was the end of an era.
Eventually, after a few unproductive years' ownership by Escom, the Amiga found itself in the very
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