Hi All,
I remember a friend of mine having a Next machine when I was younger and 'only' had an Amiga. Now that they're actually more affordable on Ebay, I'm contemplating getting one :-)
Is there any noticable speed difference between the color and the b&w version? I take it it natively uses color images and then dithers it down to b&w, but is this done in hardware?
Thanks!
-Yvo
I'm pretty sure the b/w machines are a bit faster than the color ones unless you are using a cube with a dimension board or an overclocked color unit. I have a turbo mono slab, and its really really fast. I've never actually used a color system before. I hope to fix that soon :)
Cool. Thanks for the reply. On to ebay... :D
You may want to ask in the market Place here before you go to ebay and buy. someone here might have a good system they'd sell.
There are currently a couple of them on ebay that I'm eyeing up, but some seem a little suspicious! ( no screenshot and 'was working when put in storage' for instance )
Sound advice... Thanks again! A bit off topic but how well does a NextStation hold up these days in terms of performance? I'm not expecting whizbang video / audio, but just from a user experience POV. As much as I loved my Amiga in those days, the UI didn't really age well...
Yvo
I actually used mine everyday up until a few months ago when I got really busy with some things and just haven't touched *any* of my computers at home much.
Mine is a NeXTstation Mono Turbo with 128mb of ram. It runs really really well. I can be working in WordPerfect, have multiple SSH and irc connections going, be playing mp3s, viewing pdfs etc all at once with no problem what so ever.
i even, at one point, had 3 friends logged into my NeXT via telnet compiling and running programs while I was working in the GUI with stuff and it was smooth. You will be very surprised at just how well they run, specially if you get a turbo mono slab like mine, the b/w is really easy on the eyes and its silky smooth running :)
By virtue of its DPS graphics system, you never see a window redraw. Even my 2.4ghz windwos xp machine has redraw issues at times. I've *never* seen my NeXT do it.
Quote from: "yzoer"I take it it natively uses color images and then dithers it down to b&w, but is this done in hardware?
As far as I know it doesn't do dithering. It either renders at 2-bit or true color.
The mono systems are faster in general, but the speed depends on the combinations of mono vs color and non-tubro (25Mhz CPU and bus/chipset) vs turbo (33Mhz CPU and bus/chipset).
As for the Amiga UI, I don't know if you've tried AmigaOS 3.9 with the various "extensions" (MUI, icon packs, etc), but I personally think it has aged rather well. AmigaOS 4 of course is much more modern. That is to say about the UI, not the applications. That is a different matter, and since there's no Mozilla/Firefox many think it has aged. Of course the Amiga community is still one of (or the) largest non-mainstream computing communities, so I guess that whole business about aging is questionable.
I personally think that the NeXTSTEP UI has aged gracefully. It's still pretty modern looking in my opinion, and if there was any skinability/themability you wouldn't be able to tell it from OS X. Of course, once again, there is a lack of "modern" applications (decent web browsers), and that's usually the "kill app" that makes and breaks machines/architectures/systems these days... unfortunately.
All in all, good luck getting your first NeXT :)
I adore the Amiga. I've been wanting an actual machine for ages, watching an Amiga 1000 on ebay right now!
In my humble opinion, the NEXTSTEP GUI is the best. ever ;) Sure, it would use a few enhancements, but its unobtrusive, stays completely out of the way, and fast. just like a farking gui SHOULD be. I'm sick of these GUIs that take up 30% or more of the screen and don't really DO anything. *glares at vista, mac osx*
ok.. not to take this thread too far off topic... :P
Quote from: "helf"ok.. not to take this thread too far off topic... :P
:D
How much are you looking to spend for an A1000 ? (PM me)
FWIW, I have a complete A1000, external 3.5", external 5" and monitor. All of them in their original boxes.
I also have a ( I believe it's 25Mhz ) A3000 sitting on a shelf. With the 3.1 ROM upgrade and workbench, SAS/C etc.
Anyone interested to swap their NextStation? :-)
Yvo
oooo.... no fair! I only have one NeXT at the moment :P
How about a sell? :P I'll private message you.