*does everything any contemporary consumer system can do at less than half the cost*

*does everything any contemporary consumer system can do at less than half the cost*
*fails spectacularly and falls into obscurity*
why?

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Because Americans were too stupid for it.

What home computer didn't die?
Atari, Amiga, all the British computers, MSX, etc..

They all got killed by PC compatibles.
Apple only survived because Microsoft bailed them out.

Commodore wanted to be Dell and put the money it made into their PC business. After it failed the renewed R&D for the Amiga lineup was too little too late.

Marketing.

Why do we have a stupid questions thread?

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American market stigma thanks to the C64 and friends turning Commodore into a toy company when everyone with actual money wanted more serious business machines
Shitty marketing/branding that further cemented this idea by presenting the platform as a glorified gaming console with extra gimmicks
Ugly as fuck toyish "look at me I can do color" interface that also further cemented the idea that it was a consumer gimmick machine
Inferior expandability compared to other popular platforms until the 2000 came out (at which point it was already too late)
Basic shit for non-consumer users like mass storage (that the PC and friends had years ago) were only provided by no-name third parties
Focus on the consumer market meant a race to the bottom and zero profit margins, which the Amiga's third party ecosystem only made worse
Killer apps like the Video Toaster were all focused on niches mostly dominated by high-end, high-margin systems where Commodore's aforementioned business model was a poor fit
People simply didn't give a fuck how many Jugglers you could run on a system that couldn't even run one spreadsheet application worth a damn

>Ugly as fuck toyish "look at me I can do color" interface
The fuck are you talking about?
Look at what PC had at the time.
Tell me what looks more professional Windows 1-2 or Workbench 1.
And Workbench 2 and later had very muted colors.

>that couldn't even run one spreadsheet application worth a damn
TurboCalc was great.
And it was pretty hard to provide a Lotus replacement considering that they sued everyone that made something that is similar to it.

>Tell me what looks more professional Windows 1-2 or Workbench 1.
Those iterations of Windows were hardly well-received either and most PC users ran straight DOS until 3.x hit, so I don't really know why you'd make that comparison. Neither are really justifiable, personal computer color palettes were absolutely terrible and were better left unused for those kinds of things.
Try comparing it instead to bitmapped systems like the Macintosh, Alto-likes and other graphical systems that directly catered to professionals. They lacked color but they made up for it by kicking the shit out of those early consumer interfaces in just about every other metric.
>TurboCalc was great.
Never heard of it, most prospective buyers didn't either.
>And it was pretty hard to provide a Lotus replacement considering that they sued everyone that made something that is similar to it.
Not the users' problem, they want a platform that works, not one they feel sorry for.

>Those iterations of Windows were hardly well-received either and most PC users ran straight DOS until 3.x hit,
And Amiga had an actually usable GUI instead.
I'm sorry if it looks too blue for you now. But no one gave a shit. No one had any real expectation of how GUIs are supposed to look at these days.

>Try comparing it instead to bitmapped systems like the Macintosh,
Macs wanted to pretend they're kitchen appliances. They didn't cater to professionals.

>Not the users' problem, they want a platform that works, not one they feel sorry for.
Do I blame the user? No. But I also don't blame the Amiga for that.
I don't know why you do.

Network effects.

>people who used to be young 20 years ago aren't young anymore

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You got some things right and some things utterly wrong.

Let me tell you why. The major corporations were using either Honeywell, ICL, Amdahl, or IBM mainframes. Mostly, the big corporations were using IBM. Just at the time IBM started producing desktop machines ICL tried to compete but, in effect, went broke trying to compete in the mainframe and desktop industries. So ICL customers started buying IBM. Honeywell and amdahl had no success in the desktop market, so IBM pretty muc h took over the two areas mainframe and desktop.They had a deal with IBM customers that the customers , when desktop PC's started becoming affordable, would buy IBM machines because the desktops would be compatible with the mainframes. IBM compatible PC's were now the industry standard. When home users could afford desktop PC's like they used at work they bought IBM compatible.

>I'm sorry if it looks too blue for you now. But no one gave a shit.
You're completely right, nobody /did/ give a shit, but not just about the blue, but about anything GUI in general because personal computers were generally used in uni-tasking roles to begin with. Those that did have an interest in graphical computing, however, /did/ have expectations already after five years of Alto-likes, early Unix windowing systems and the likes of the Lisa and Macintosh.
In comparison to those early systems which generally ran at high resolutions and had much more professionally designed interfaces, the Amiga looked absolutely amateurish, not unlike the early PC platforms you're knocking that themselves were utter failures.
>Macs wanted to pretend they're kitchen appliances. They didn't cater to professionals.
You know absolutely nothing about the Macintosh then if this is actually what you believe.
>Do I blame the user? No. But I also don't blame the Amiga for that.
Who's blaming anyone? The simple reality was that it did not have the applications people wanted regardless of the cause, OP asked "why" after all. But Commodore certainly still could have done more for the professional side of the Amiga than they did, they were far from just another irrelevant startup.

I'd be interested in hearing which ones those were if you have more than just some fuzzy memories to show me through rose-tinted lenses.

>Alto-likes, early Unix windowing systems
Those weren't home systems
>Lisa
was a piece of shit that no one bought
>Macintosh
Was released only a year earlier and didn't even have any colors at all
And was actually often called a toy by professionals at the time unlike the Amiga 1000.

>You know absolutely nothing about the Macintosh then if this is actually what you believe.
That's literally what Jobs envisioned for it.

>Who's blaming anyone?
It sounds to me like you do.
Your whole posts sounds pretty mad.

>Those weren't home systems
You're too narrowly focused on the relatively insignificant and incredibly unprofitable consumer market full of newbies and other people who couldn't tell a proper GUI from a hole in the ground, not unlike Commodore.
>was a piece of shit that no one bought
>Was released only a year earlier
And everyone knew about it.
>and didn't even have any colors at all
This is just the same bunch of mindless fanboy bullshit that gets regurgitated a million times.
Let's re-iterate this again: _nobody_ outside of the consumer market gave a fuck about color. It was nice to have, but it wasn't essential. Especially at that stage.
>And was actually often called a toy by professionals at the time unlike the Amiga 1000.
>That's literally what Jobs envisioned for it.
And that's why the Mac had a very rocky start itself and may well have faced the same fate had Jobs not have been luckily ousted by the company shortly after its release, thus relinquishing his influence on it.
The 128K was very much a toy, but the 512K, Plus (while limited in a lot of similar ways to the Amiga 1000) and more ultimately the Mac II were not.

>You're too narrowly focused on the relatively insignificant and incredibly unprofitable consumer market full of newbies and other people who couldn't tell a proper GUI from a hole in the ground, not unlike Commodore.
As opposed to the huge market of early graphic terminal windowing systems for Unix systems?
It targetted consumers just like Apple did, which you keep mentioning as a positive counter-example.

>And everyone knew about it.
But no one liked it. No one looked at the Amiga and thought "Boy I wished it was more like the Apple Lisa".

>Let's re-iterate this again: _nobody_ outside of the consumer market gave a fuck about color.
All you have been doing is complain about colors.
Make up your mind.

>The 128K was very much a toy
Then why do you keep bringing them up when you agree.
>Mac II
Released at the same time as the A2000, which you claim came too late.

>As opposed to the huge market of early graphic terminal windowing systems for Unix systems?
Most computer systems delivered in the '80s went to businesses and government organizations who typically ordered them in massive fleets. You weren't exposed to these kinds of systems in the home, but you saw them at work or in universities.
>But no one liked it. No one looked at the Amiga and thought "Boy I wished it was more like the Apple Lisa".
Nobody really hated the system, they didn't like the $10,000 price tag that came with it. I think the fact that we're sitting here debating about the failure of the Amiga rather than the Macintosh and its precursors is evidence enough for that.
>All you have been doing is complain about colors.
Our definitions of "don't give a fuck" are two different things.
Your argument: "Nobody gives a fuck that the colors were ugly"
My argument: "Nobody gives a fuck if it supports color because the colors were ugly"
Understand now?
>Then why do you keep bringing them up when you agree.
I'm not talking about the 128K, that was old news by the time the Amiga shipped, instead it was going against the 512K and the family of officially supported peripherals that were key to its success, and within four months it had a hard disk, too.
>Released at the same time as the A2000, which you claim came too late.
Right, but in the mean time Apple still worked on improving the platform with things like the HD20 and LaserWriter that turned them into serious business systems, all leading up to the release of a powerful piece of kit that was a vast improvement in every way.
...while all the Amiga crowd got while they waited was the even more gimped A500.
Haha, wait, they didn't even get that. They were stuck on the 1000 for almost a full two years until the 500 AND 2000 came out at the same time to little fanfare outside of the existing userbase everyone else had moved on. On top of that, the 2000 still sported the same crusty old architecture.

>does everything any contemporary consumer system can do
You high, OP?

what couldn't it do?

*at the time

>Most computer systems delivered in the '80s went to businesses and government organizations who typically ordered them in massive fleets. You weren't exposed to these kinds of systems in the home, but you saw them at work or in universities.
It was but people tended to use it with simple terminals without fancy windowing systems.

>I think the fact that we're sitting here debating about the failure of the Amiga rather than the Macintosh and its precursors is evidence enough for that.
What does the Apple Lisa has to do with the continuing existence of Apple?
That's like saying Apple TV is evidence of Apple's current success.

>"Nobody gives a fuck if it supports color because the colors were ugly"
Which is stupid. Color support is always a plus. Might not be a draw for an office computer, with more important priorities but it certainly was never a drawback. You might perceive it now as ugly. But back then no one did.

>instead it was going against the 512K and the family of officially supported peripherals that were key to its success, and within four months it had a hard disk, too.
It was only a memory upgrade to the 128K.
Its success has very little to do with the hardware which really wasn't all that great for the price, it's mostly because it had a very successful marketing campaign and Apple deeply entrenched itself in the American education system.
And those are certainly smart things Apple did and Commodore didn't but they have nothing to do with what you criticized.

>It was but people tended to use it with simple terminals without fancy windowing systems.
I don't think you actually understand what is actually being talked about or why it is being talked about.
We are not talking about Unix systems as a whole.
>What does the Apple Lisa has to do with the continuing existence of Apple?
I even went out of my way to specify "Macintosh" in that sentence and you still keep trying to go on some tangent about the Lisa. We get that nobody bought it, it doesn't fucking matter.
>Which is stupid. Color support is always a plus.
But it's absolutely not, because outside of the highest of the high end it always came with trade-offs. Shittier resolution, awful palettes, more expensive hardware. Worry about color on the printer, not the screen.
>You might perceive it now as ugly. But back then no one did.
No, it pretty much was damn ugly. You noted it yourself when you poked fun at Windows 1.x/2.x a while back. We just tolerated it because we knew the hardware was limited and we were happy just to have it, it was a novel experience.

Those shitty palettes were absolutely useless for any use case that actually needed color unless you were a developer catering to those kinds of systems.

>It was only a memory upgrade to the 128K.
Which was the primary fault of the 128K, secondary to its laughable lack of supporting peripherals. The 512K solved both of those glaring flaws and made the platform useful enough to hold over until the Mac II fixed most of the remaining faults.
>Its success has very little to do with the hardware which really wasn't all that great for the price, it's mostly because it had a very successful marketing campaign and Apple deeply entrenched itself in the American education system.
We've come a long way from "Macs are just toys that want to be kitchen appliances" but you still sound like you're just skimming clickbait on computer history topics and don't truly know what you're on about. The education market may have purchased their share of Macs but by and large they were still ordering Apple IIs in droves and couldn't fully get off of that tit until Apple started shipping LCs with IIe cards in them, the ultimate key to the early success of the Macintosh was the publishing industry and similar disciplines that made great use of peripherals like the LaserWriter. Commodore never had anything like this.
>And those are certainly smart things Apple did and Commodore didn't but they have nothing to do with what you criticized.
Nothing to do with what? My over-arching theme here that I'm trying to completely lay out is that Commodore had a lot of potential with the Amiga but instead squandered it pandering to consumers instead of professionals with real money, something that Apple and many other successful workstation vendors *did* do.

>this thread
Literary two 20 year olds fighting over shit they have no idea about.
Brilliant. Hope you guys love wasting time doing the uttermost dumb posting.

Educate us, then. I'm sure you've learned all there is from that crusty old C64 you played video games on as a kid.

>Literary
Actually, nevermind. I've seen you before and already know you're a complete dumbshit who just wants to hear himself bitch.

>We are not talking about Unix systems as a whole.
Me neither. Your point was that the majority of the market were so used to windowing systems for UNIX systems and similar so much that they didn't like the Workbench 1 Look & Feel.
My counter-argument to that is they were only used by a tiny minority of people.
>I even went out of my way to specify "Macintosh"
Which I addressed later.
>you still keep trying to go on some tangent about the Lisa.
I didn't brought it up, I'm just replying to your arguments.
>But it's absolutely not, because outside of the highest of the high end it always came with trade-offs. Shittier resolution, awful palettes, more expensive hardware
Not true for the Amiga though. Compare it with the Macintosh, it was cheaper and had higher resolution in low color mode (still more than the Macintosh had).

>NYou noted it yourself when you poked fun at Windows 1.x/2.x a while back.
I'm making fun of it now. It's like very old-fashioned haircuts - What's considered ugly changes.

>Those shitty palettes were absolutely useless for any use case that actually needed color u
How so? Amiga was pretty popular in many use cases that needed color.

>like the LaserWriter.
There was anything besides the LaserWriter worth using?
And how is it different from the Video Toaster you criticized before?

> I'm trying to completely lay out is that Commodore had a lot of potential with the Amiga but instead squandered it pandering to consumers instead of professionals with real money, something that Apple and many other successful workstation vendors *did* do.
And I think it was the right thing to do to target the consumer market and it's not the reason they failed. That was the big upcoming market that was up for grabs.
Commodore even tried to UNIX workstations and they failed.
And also that Apple, which also focused on the mass consumer market, is a really bad counter-example.

>Your point was that the majority of the market were so used to windowing systems for UNIX systems and similar so much that they didn't like the Workbench 1 Look & Feel.
My point was that there were already five years of graphical personal computers that existed to give people "expectations," you're hanging off of the Unix example in particular but ignoring the more mainstream examples like the Macintosh that were already around for a year at that point and fresh in everyone's mind.
>I didn't brought it up, I'm just replying to your arguments.
You're blatantly just looking for things you perceive to be weak points and attacking them based on your rather limited understanding of them.
>it was cheaper and had higher resolution in low color mode (still more than the Macintosh had).
You mean the shitty interlaced modes that looked terrible and still didn't fix that damn awful GUI?
>How so? Amiga was pretty popular in many use cases that needed color.
Sure, later in its life with significant hardware upgrades. Even 4096 colors really isn't that much, definitely not for anything photo-realistic. Some graphic design applications could benefit from the ability to live-preview approximations of the final product without printing anything, but then you'd have to punish yourself with that shitty low-resolution mode. Who wants to do that?

>using asterisks instead of green text
Can't you seriously not tell the difference?

>There was anything besides the LaserWriter worth using?
Sure. Where was Commodore's answer to AppleTalk or the HD20? PageMaker?
You're really underestimating how big a deal the LW was on its own for that market.
>And how is it different from the Video Toaster you criticized before?
Well, for starters it's an in-house development that meant they actually got something out of it on top of what they already got from the systems. The VT was independent, and also came too late in the Amiga's life to really save it. And while Commodore still kept trying to build a gaming console that could do some work on the side, Apple took advantage of their newfound success and pivoted from a consumer focus on the Macintosh to a more workstation-oriented approach, which not only meant they could build more profitable and more expensive systems but they could also insulate themselves from the PC revolution below that was eating the Amiga and everything else in that market alive.
But I never really criticized the Toaster, anyway. That and digital painting where the two things the later systems were peerless for unless you really wanted to pay out the ass.
>And I think it was the right thing to do to target the consumer market and it's not the reason they failed. That was the big upcoming market that was up for grabs.
It was, but they had no hope against PCs in that segment, and half of their advantage was that they delivered a lot at a low cost which was accomplished by Commodore totally shooting themselves in the foot on profit in order to be competitive. It was the same kind of fight they'd just won with the C64, but lost the second time around.
But in a way, you're still right, because so many of the Amiga's advantages and features were very consumer-centric. To move into a different market with it would have probably involved taking out a lot of what made it special to its core userbase.

Last fucking round of meme arrowing and I'm done, It's not like anyone's opinion is going to be changed by a bunch of incoherent autistic rambling on the internet. But this thread probably would have fucking died anyway, so whatever.
>Commodore even tried to UNIX workstations and they failed.
Yeah, that endeavor was a shit show. I don't think they had to go that far, though. As I said, the Amiga had tons of potential, they just squandered it.
>And also that Apple, which also focused on the mass consumer market, is a really bad counter-example.
They did at first with the Compacts but that didn't last for long, the Mac IIs and early Quadras were far from mass market with their price tags that could exceed five figures and when they returned to that focus again in the early '90s it almost killed them for really a lot of the same fundamental reasons the Amiga and a lot of other alternative platforms got slaughtered.

I still think there's plenty of reasons to love the platform but I'm just not baffled that it died and I can't stand the posthumous worship of it. They were still great systems to a ton of people, and it's got a loyal userbase for a reason.

knew some poofter would do this

>you're hanging off of the Unix example in particular but ignoring the more mainstream examples like the Macintosh
I've addressed those in my other arguments.
>You're blatantly just looking for things you perceive to be weak points and attacking them based on your rather limited understanding of them.
I could the repeat my former sentence here. It feels like you take every sentence like it belongs to a wholly different discussion.
>You mean the shitty interlaced modes that looked terrible and still didn't fix that damn awful GUI?
That was only the way to get the resolution with standard video format, which is something that helped Amiga's popularity.
And what was awful about the GUI?
>Even 4096 colors really isn't that much, definitely not for anything photo-realistic
So what? Still ahead of anything with a comparable price.
>AppleTalk, HD20
Zorro expansions.
>PageMaker
I'd lump that together with desktop publishing.
>The VT was independent,
The VT exploited Amgia's unique hardware to be able to do what it did and was possible with A2000's highly expendable design.
>m a consumer focus on the Macintosh to a more workstation-oriented approach,
Commodore served both markets. A500 for home users and the A2000 and later for workstations. Sensible business strategy.
>It was, but they had no hope against PCs in that segment
What market would have given them a better chance?

This. Commodore had so little faith in their own product that they shilled internally for PCs and wouldn't bother spending any real money on Amiga R&D, hence while 1000 and 500 era ones were good, by the time 1200 came it was really 'meh' and sold only due to brand recognition and backward compatibility.

>They all got killed by PC compatibles.
No, they weren't. Commodore literally commited suicide with retarded management.

i still like the story that Mehdi Ali was running a currency exchange scam by shipping amigas between countries with no intention of actually selling them