I just watched the 8-bit generation video finally, narrated by the excellent Bil Herd :). Whoever here had a hand in putting that together, thank you so much! .. One take-away I have from this video I haven't seen/read elsewhere is that it seems like the only "Jay Miner engineered device" that was ever properly marketed by parent company was the Atari 2600? i.e. - Original Atari/Bushnell wanted to kill the 2600 kinda early - Warner Atari did a big marketing push in 1980-1981 and that made the 2600 super successful. - Neither Bushnell nor Warner seemed to know what to do with the Atari 400/800. You can see this in the initial high price, and also in locking out the system to developers early on (which imo is why it lost to the Apple II). - We all know the story of how Commodore didn't know what to do with the Amiga 1000.. And if you count the 3DO with RJ Mical and others as a descendant device, that too could have been handled better... Am I off the rocker here? There is some irony that the only Jay Miner device that was properly marketed was handled by "New York Blue Shirts"... I know the Amiga was a mis-managed device but I often feel like the Atari 400/800 deserves that award just as much as it was the first home computer to show the real benefit of custom chips, and at launch in 1979-1980 was way more powerful and capable than contemporaries.. John
On 3/13/2017 5:21 PM, John Heritage via vcf-midatlantic wrote:
I just watched the 8-bit generation video finally, narrated by the excellent Bil Herd :). Whoever here had a hand in putting that together, thank you so much!
..
One take-away I have from this video I haven't seen/read elsewhere is that it seems like the only "Jay Miner engineered device" that was ever properly marketed by parent company was the Atari 2600?
i.e. - Original Atari/Bushnell wanted to kill the 2600 kinda early
- Warner Atari did a big marketing push in 1980-1981 and that made the 2600 super successful.
- Neither Bushnell nor Warner seemed to know what to do with the Atari 400/800. You can see this in the initial high price, and also in locking out the system to developers early on (which imo is why it lost to the Apple II).
- We all know the story of how Commodore didn't know what to do with the Amiga 1000..
And if you count the 3DO with RJ Mical and others as a descendant device, that too could have been handled better...
Am I off the rocker here?
There is some irony that the only Jay Miner device that was properly marketed was handled by "New York Blue Shirts"... I know the Amiga was a mis-managed device but I often feel like the Atari 400/800 deserves that award just as much as it was the first home computer to show the real benefit of custom chips, and at launch in 1979-1980 was way more powerful and capable than contemporaries..
John I appreciate this kind of analysis! Thanks for offering it. Am I off the rocker here? I think not. Your assessment seems reasonable to me. I never saw the parallel of the Atari and Amiga as custom chip machines that similarly failed. On the other hand, VIC and the C64 succeeded - wildly- and we probably would all agree this was largely due to their custom chips. What were the "NY Blue Shirts"?
NY blue shirts (is still) a term that a lot of California / Silicon Valley people use for "East Coast Leadership Style". The execs in the 70s-80s all wore blue dress jackets and tended to rule with a lot more of an iron fist than the west coast was used to :). I think the quote in there from Ray Kassar where he was telling his superstar developers they were just another cog in the machine summarizes this style completely.. That's very true.. the C64 was definitely a strong success due that combo of cost/performance you can only get with custom chips.. Similar to Amiga, it's ashame the C64 never got an official 65C816 treatment like the Apple IIGS.. With GEOS being semi popular in the late 80s, and a huge install base, the 16-bit C64 might have been viable for a while.. On Mon, Mar 13, 2017 at 8:18 PM, Douglas Crawford via vcf-midatlantic < vcf-midatlantic@lists.vintagecomputerfederation.org> wrote:
On 3/13/2017 5:21 PM, John Heritage via vcf-midatlantic wrote:
I just watched the 8-bit generation video finally, narrated by the excellent Bil Herd :). Whoever here had a hand in putting that together, thank you so much!
..
One take-away I have from this video I haven't seen/read elsewhere is that it seems like the only "Jay Miner engineered device" that was ever properly marketed by parent company was the Atari 2600?
i.e. - Original Atari/Bushnell wanted to kill the 2600 kinda early
- Warner Atari did a big marketing push in 1980-1981 and that made the 2600 super successful.
- Neither Bushnell nor Warner seemed to know what to do with the Atari 400/800. You can see this in the initial high price, and also in locking out the system to developers early on (which imo is why it lost to the Apple II).
- We all know the story of how Commodore didn't know what to do with the Amiga 1000..
And if you count the 3DO with RJ Mical and others as a descendant device, that too could have been handled better...
Am I off the rocker here?
There is some irony that the only Jay Miner device that was properly marketed was handled by "New York Blue Shirts"... I know the Amiga was a mis-managed device but I often feel like the Atari 400/800 deserves that award just as much as it was the first home computer to show the real benefit of custom chips, and at launch in 1979-1980 was way more powerful and capable than contemporaries..
John
I appreciate this kind of analysis! Thanks for offering it.
Am I off the rocker here? I think not. Your assessment seems reasonable to me. I never saw the parallel of the Atari and Amiga as custom chip machines that similarly failed. On the other hand, VIC and the C64 succeeded - wildly- and we probably would all agree this was largely due to their custom chips. What were the "NY Blue Shirts"?
I worked at an computer store that focused on the Amiga and I could spend days ranting about Commodore. Commodore didn't know what to do with the Amiga. They had a great product but wouldn't put the money into it like Apple did with the Mac. There was a moment of light when Harry Copperman took over and he tried to do a few things.
From him we got the 3000UX, the TCP/IP stack & Networking car, the Lowell Board.
While not the best, at least there was some development. I remember there was hope and I think they "promoted" him and it went downhill.
participants (3)
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Christian Liendo -
Douglas Crawford -
John Heritage