🚀 go-pugleaf

Ok, one more time.  My first post didn't show, my second showed, but had
no lines of content.  Third try the charm?  Here goes...

Not trying to start a CPU war or anything, but for $4500 you could
purchase the following:

	Atari Mega 4 ST (4meg ram, 1 ds/dd floppy)
                  w/640x400 mono monitor (13")     - $1800
        Atari SLM804 300dpi *LASER* printer        - $1250
        Gadgets By Small Spectre GCR               - $ 300
        128k Mac ROMs                              - $ 130
        Mac System Software                        - $  50
        30MB Hard Disk                             - $ 500
                                                  ----------
                                                     $4030

The Spectre GCR will allow you to read/write Mac format disks directly
and at full speed.  The Atari's hard disk architecture and Spectre's
handler give hard disk performace FASTER than a Mac II.  Overall
processing speed is about the same as a Mac SE (no 30), but you can
get a 50-100% boost with a $300 accelerator that's available.  The
current software allows direct printing to the laser at 144 dpi using
the Imagewriter driver, but for $500, you could buy Imagen's
Ultrascript (postscript clone) and fonts and have 300dpi postscript
printing capability!.

Alternatively, $400 will get you PC-Ditto II and MS-Dos, and add the
functionality of a 10Mhz PC-clone to your system (and I haven't yet
mentioned the utility of the machine in its native mode).

$300 will also buy you an accelerator board that will bost speed from 
comparable to an SE to 50-100% faster.

Caveats:  Not one to be accused of claiming the above configuration is
          perfect, the following should be noted:

          Appletalk is NOT supported, but if this is a home machine,
          you don't need/wouldn't use it.

          When the laser is used with the Atari, it takes away 1 meg
          of RAM for its use - the printer is 'dumb' and relies on
          the ST's CPU and memory.  Thus your machine will be tied up
          while printing, but printing is fast (8ppm rating).

          Postscript printing is currently a bit clumsy - you first
          have to print to disk (hold command-K while clicking ok in 
          dialog box), then transfer the resulting file to the ST
          world, then run it through UltraScript - strange at first,
          but quite workable once you get the steps down.  Of course
          you can save $1750 and not get the Laser/Ultrascript pair,
          and use a cheap Epson compatible with the Epstart printer
          driver - brings system cost down to $3200 or so, leaving 
          $1300 to buy quite a bit of software and other add-ons.

          The Atari is not for everyone.  I'll be the first to admit
          that.  Dealer support is somewhat limited at present, 
          but if you're even a bit of a do it yourself/hacker type of
          person, it's probably worth serious consideration.

          
--

Stephen Goldstein     steveg@saic.com
My first Atari system? A 24K Atari 800, Rev. A ROMS, C(not G)TIA graphics
Disclaimer:  That's not what I said.