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Mac IIfx vs. Amiga 3000 vs. Atari Falcon/TT030

krebizfan said:
Couldn't the usenet advocacy groups be allowed to rot away peacefully?
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But I like saying Micro$oft. It's funny because of the $. Also, like replying to Apple help threads with "I thought 'Macs just worked' ? "

Anyhow, I vote IIfx simply because you can still buy one for relatively cheap whereas the other two fetch silly money and are hugely overhyped. Completely the wrong way to judge a machine but it's how I roll.
 
The IIfx darn well should be the best, judging by its original list price!

Atari Falcon $1299
Atari TT030 $2995
Amiga 3000 $3299-$4999
Macintosh IIfx $8970-$12000
 
The Mac IIfx had a 40MHz CPU and a specialized graphics card and special performance RAM. The Amiga 3000 and TT/30 and Falcon all had slower CPUs. The 16MHz 68030 Mac II model was the Mac IIx released 2 years before the Amiga 3000 and TT30.

The Falcon (1992) is similar to the Mac IIvx which was released in late 1992 with a major price cut in early 1993. $1900 for an Apple system with extra RAM and a hard disk isn't too extreme compared to the stripped down Falcon.
 
krebizfan said:
The Mac IIfx had a 40MHz CPU and a specialized graphics card and special performance RAM. The Amiga 3000 and TT/30 and Falcon all had slower CPUs. The 16MHz 68030 Mac II model was the Mac IIx released 2 years before the Amiga 3000 and TT30.
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But, are we comparing original specs, or with expansion?
 
The IIfx required its special RAM, so you can consider that stock. The IOPs (6502 CPU co-processors handling I/O tasks) were also standard, and even though the 8*24*GC was an option (and a scorchingly fast card for the time), the 8-bit card it came with in the stock configuration would not have substantially hobbled the system by comparison to the Amiga or TT/30.

I like the other systems, and I own an A3000, but the IIfx blows it out of the water.
 
I don't know much about the IIfx, but I doubt it compares to my A3000 with Mediator and CyberstormPPC. Everytime I say that though I'm told it's an unfair comparison because my A3000 isn't 'stock'.
 
KC9UDX said:
I don't know much about the IIfx, but I doubt it compares to my A3000 with Mediator and CyberstormPPC. Everytime I say that though I'm told it's an unfair comparison because my A3000 isn't 'stock'.
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Not unfair because not stock; meaningless because the result of shoehorning a 1997 CPU into a 1992 case should be compared to other 1997 computers. The Cyberstorm PPC may outperform an elderly IIfx but falls badly behind the 1997 PowerMacs. Really, just about all the add-on CPU upgrade cards were poor values costing almost as much as buying a new computer but providing half the performance of new system.
 
krebizfan said:
Not unfair because not stock; meaningless because the result of shoehorning a 1997 CPU into a 1992 case should be compared to other 1997 computers. The Cyberstorm PPC may outperform an elderly IIfx but falls badly behind the 1997 PowerMacs. Really, just about all the add-on CPU upgrade cards were poor values costing almost as much as buying a new computer but providing half the performance of new system.
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I disagree, because when I preordered my CSPPC, there was nothing on the market that could compare, else I wouldn't have done it. But, I'm biased.:D

My A3000 was made in 1990 BTW.

Also, there was no shoehorning. The A3000 was designed for CPU upgrades, and the CSPPC fulfilled that. That alone would have been a good reason to buy it over something that didn't have that capability, at the time.
 
tipc said:
As an aside, how did the IIfx compare w/entry level 68040 machines, and what was the price differential there?
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The Q700 and Q900 came out just a year later, and their 25MHz '040, depending on the benchmark, was twice as fast or more (depending on who's doing the counting, the IIfx came in at around 10 MIPS and the Q700 approximately 22). The Q700 also cost "only" around $6000 (compared to nearly $10,000 for the IIfx, IIRC).

On the other hand, the IIfx had a faster bus (also 40MHz) and its IOPs freed the CPU from a lot of extra work to service devices, although its SCSI should have been faster than what it was and about half of what Apple claimed.

KC9UDX said:
The A3000 was designed for CPU upgrades, and the CSPPC fulfilled that.
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I'm going to come across as a bigger fanboi than I actually am for the 68K Macs (I like them, but my specialty is Power Macs), but almost every 68K Mac with a PDS slot could fit this category, and Apple themselves even made upgrade cards -- the most relevant here being the two Power Mac upgrade paths, which added a 601 CPU to almost any Quadra as early as 1994. Since the Q700 came out in 1991, this is very close to the A3000, even if you don't count all the '030 Macs with PDS slots prior to it which took third-party upgrades.

That said, I've also got a QuikPak A4000T with an '060 sitting next to me. The NIC and Picasso IV make it even vaguely useful. :)

I do argue that CPU upgrades are not completely useless. Although I concur that they hobble their CPUs in various ways, that's outweighed by getting to keep your old peripherals or software. My PowerBook 1400 has an outstanding laptop keyboard and was durable as a tank, and the G3/333 I picked up for it let me keep all of that until I bought an iBook G4 (admittedly the G3/466 I later added to it was just for giggles). It's a trade-off like anything else, but it was a worthwhile upgrade at the time, I thought.
 
The only Apple CPU upgrades that were worth it at the time were the Sonnet G3 upgrades for the 7500/8500 era Powermacs. Maybe also the Daystar IIci upgrade cards.

My A3000 is sitting about 6 feet away from a stack of IIfx machines in my basement, never really compared them since they are different machines to me. Falcon 030's I will probably never own because of their price. Still much cheaper to install upgrades into a IIfx then an A3000 these days.
 
Sorry Guys, its just got to the be the TT030. It might not be the fastest, or most expandable. It won't run most ST games. It needs a hi-res graphics card , BUT it looks the coolest. Now why did I sell mine... I know I wanted space for something I would play with...
 
Ah, but you forget the Amiga 3000T. When you look up "tower" in the dictionary, you see a picture of the Tower of London and the Amiga 3000T :) It may not be the fastest but it's absolutely the biggest and heaviest and it doubles for a good hiding spot for "hide n seek".

In my opinion, there's no need to compare. Just get all three and enjoy them for their own merits. I have a Mac IIfx, an Amiga 3000 (plus the A3000T) but I haven't found a TT030 yet for a reasonable price. They are not cheap when you do find them.

If anyone is interested, here are some pics of the A3000T: http://vintagecomputer.ca/computers/commodore-amiga-3000t/
 
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