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Did the 68k machine have a presence in the demoscene?
- Thread starter 1200XL M.U.L.E.
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MrFahrenheit
Well-known member
This was made on Macintosh II computers, in 1988.
This Residents music video was made in 1990, also on Macintosh computers. This is a really low resolution upload to YouTube. I used to have a better copy long ago, but it has since been lost to moving.
Besides, the whole Mac operating system was essentially a "demo scene". Nothing touched it for the time.
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MrFahrenheit
Well-known member
3lectr1cPPC
Well-known member
Ah, neat! Do you happen to know what the name of the song in the video is? I'd love to find a higher quality copy of it.
MrFahrenheit
Well-known member
It's Harry the Head, by the Residents.
3lectr1cPPC
Well-known member
Looked that up and it isn't that one. That one's got lyrics and sounds quite different.
According to the credits the music is by Jeff Beal and Chris Poehler, couldn't find much on either of them.
According to the credits the music is by Jeff Beal and Chris Poehler, couldn't find much on either of them.
MrFahrenheit
Well-known member
Not sure what you mean. It was literally on their "Freak Show" album, 1990:
Freak Show
Freak Show is the eighteenth studio album by The Residents, released in December 1990 on Torso and ESD. Freak Show is a concept album detailing the stories of several different characters within a traveling carnival freak show. Following the success of the album, this concept was expanded to...
3lectr1cPPC
Well-known member
Ah, I see what happened. I was talking about the IIfx animation, not the other animation that you linked, just saw that now.
1200XL M.U.L.E.
Well-known member
Lots of neat replies! Thanks for the insight, everyone! 
So, the 68k machines did not have much of a presence in the demoscene in the 80s and 90s.
From a technical standpoint, the machines lacked the specialized hardware like DMA and co-processors, which Amiga had plenty of and Atari had some of. Access to hardware through low level coding in assembly language was difficult, especially with a hardware abstraction layer sitting on top of the bare metal in the OS. On the plus side, this layer made the transition from 68k processors to PPC processors much easier.
From a commercial standpoint, 68k machines were more expensive than 32-bit x86 systems. Wikipedia says the introductory price of the Quadra 650 was $2699. x86 systems could be had for much, much less and more off them ended up in more people's hands.
All good stuff!
So, the 68k machines did not have much of a presence in the demoscene in the 80s and 90s.
From a technical standpoint, the machines lacked the specialized hardware like DMA and co-processors, which Amiga had plenty of and Atari had some of. Access to hardware through low level coding in assembly language was difficult, especially with a hardware abstraction layer sitting on top of the bare metal in the OS. On the plus side, this layer made the transition from 68k processors to PPC processors much easier.
From a commercial standpoint, 68k machines were more expensive than 32-bit x86 systems. Wikipedia says the introductory price of the Quadra 650 was $2699. x86 systems could be had for much, much less and more off them ended up in more people's hands.
All good stuff!
CC_333
Well-known member
That sums it all up pretty well.Lots of neat replies! Thanks for the insight, everyone!
So, the 68k machines did not have much of a presence in the demoscene in the 80s and 90s.
From a technical standpoint, the machines lacked the specialized hardware like DMA and co-processors, which Amiga had plenty of and Atari had some of. Access to hardware through low level coding in assembly language was difficult, especially with a hardware abstraction layer sitting on top of the bare metal in the OS. On the plus side, this layer made the transition from 68k processors to PPC processors much easier.
From a commercial standpoint, 68k machines were more expensive than 32-bit x86 systems. Wikipedia says the introductory price of the Quadra 650 was $2699. x86 systems could be had for much, much less and more off them ended up in more people's hands.
All good stuff!
c
MrFahrenheit
Well-known member
While other platforms offered better “direct write to screen” allowing games and some demos to run smoothly, the Mac still had a superior usable interface and platform.
Additionally, while 486 clone PCs were available cheaper, they weren’t cheaper if they offered the same features of a comparable Mac. Things like SCSI cards and drives, which were standard on the Mac but expensive add-one for other platforms.
With Mac, you got a nice looking sophisticated operating system that offered superior ease of use, as well as WYSIWYG display and printing. Built-in networking on pretty much every Mac, and the ability to use that advanced GUI on even a machine with just a single floppy drive and no hard drive made it a no brainer for a lot of people.
Today the differences between the Mac and other platforms such as Windows are mostly erased. But take Windows 3 for a spin next to Mac OS 7.5 and you’ll see where the value went.
Additionally, while 486 clone PCs were available cheaper, they weren’t cheaper if they offered the same features of a comparable Mac. Things like SCSI cards and drives, which were standard on the Mac but expensive add-one for other platforms.
With Mac, you got a nice looking sophisticated operating system that offered superior ease of use, as well as WYSIWYG display and printing. Built-in networking on pretty much every Mac, and the ability to use that advanced GUI on even a machine with just a single floppy drive and no hard drive made it a no brainer for a lot of people.
Today the differences between the Mac and other platforms such as Windows are mostly erased. But take Windows 3 for a spin next to Mac OS 7.5 and you’ll see where the value went.
MrFahrenheit
Well-known member
Oh, my bad. Yes, Macintosh totally sucks. You’re right.
Here’s a comparison chart of any Mac released after 1998:
Amiga 600 wins. Let’s all toss out our inferior trash. All hail the Amiga.
Here’s a comparison chart of any Mac released after 1998:
Amiga 600 wins. Let’s all toss out our inferior trash. All hail the Amiga.
Nixontheknight
Well-known member
for a fairer comparison, let's compare an amiga 1000/2000/1200 to an LC or II series mac (preferably not the 500 series LCs, and stick to 68k)Oh, my bad. Yes, Macintosh totally sucks. You’re right.
Here’s a comparison chart of any Mac released after 1998:
View attachment 52459
Amiga 600 wins. Let’s all toss out our inferior trash. All hail the Amiga.
Phipli
Well-known member
We... could just talk about the mac demo scene instead? It is a mac forum?
What does exist? What "demo like" things do people remember?
There are a few fractal generators, and some of the video benchmarks are quite fun.
Did Radius. SuperMac, RasterOps, emachines or anyone else ever make any demos? SuperMac made SuperPaint to show off their hardware.
@MacOSMonkey @Crutch? Did either of you ever make any fancy graphics demos?
Yeah, the graphics benchmark in Speedometer is a decent demo in itself and runs super quickly with built-in Quadra video.
I mentioned the Daystar PowerCache demo earlier as it draws stars and you change the settings, again a good way to demo the capabilities of a 68030/68040 Mac, albeit in a basic way.
I mentioned the Daystar PowerCache demo earlier as it draws stars and you change the settings, again a good way to demo the capabilities of a 68030/68040 Mac, albeit in a basic way.
LaPorta
Well-known member
The only demo I remember seeing was way, way back in the 80s when my dad got our Mac Plus. We lived in Massachusetts…I think he took me to an expose of the BMUG. I was all of 4 or 5 at the time. All I remember is seeing the machines and Manhole set up on display at the time.
Daniël
Well-known member
Part of why the Macintosh didn't have a demoscene in my opinion, is that it's probably just a simple case of economics. The demoscene was mostly born out of bedroom coders, teens or young adults using their computers bought with their hard earned money to challenge their skills and seeing what the hardware could be made to do. While no computer in the 1980s would have been cheap, the Macintosh line was always quite a bit more expensive than, say, an Amiga, Atari ST, and so forth, especially the higher end models. That, and the later budget models that would arrive had some pretty killing limitations like a lack of any color or grayscale.
While you could probably do some fun demos despite that, I don't think many bedroom coders would pump their savings into a cheap Macintosh, if any of the other home computers could achieve far more in what they wanted to do, for far less money. The better user experience on the Mac wouldn't have justified it for them, especially if they're going to get into the nitty gritty of coding their own stuff. And there were more games, too.
If you were doing serious graphics works and such, yes, the Macintosh was the clear winner. But you probably did that professionally if so, and could either afford it, or even have one provided by your employer. Because of all of this, and the fact that the Macintosh doesn't have that "lost platform" nostalgia or mystique (the ST and Amiga died long ago, the Mac continued to evolve and still does to this day), make it unsurprising to at least myself that there isn't much of a 68k Macintosh demoscene, even today.
While you could probably do some fun demos despite that, I don't think many bedroom coders would pump their savings into a cheap Macintosh, if any of the other home computers could achieve far more in what they wanted to do, for far less money. The better user experience on the Mac wouldn't have justified it for them, especially if they're going to get into the nitty gritty of coding their own stuff. And there were more games, too.
If you were doing serious graphics works and such, yes, the Macintosh was the clear winner. But you probably did that professionally if so, and could either afford it, or even have one provided by your employer. Because of all of this, and the fact that the Macintosh doesn't have that "lost platform" nostalgia or mystique (the ST and Amiga died long ago, the Mac continued to evolve and still does to this day), make it unsurprising to at least myself that there isn't much of a 68k Macintosh demoscene, even today.
1200XL M.U.L.E.
Well-known member
You may be right in that buying a 486 system from scratch at the time would have come close to the cost of a Mac. Upgrading and transplanting is a different story.
I inherited my father's 286 machine in 1989 and upgraded that box over the next 10 years. When I upgraded to a 386 motherboard, I transplanted all of my ISA cards and my MFM drives, and they worked perfectly. Then I upgraded my MFM drives to IDE drives keeping everything else. That was followed by a 486 motherboard and transplanted everything one more time. I ended up keeping some of my ISA cards, my mechanical keyboard (whIch I sorely miss to this day), my mouse, and my monitor for several years. Heck ... I kept it all going up to a Pentium. Yes, there was new memory to buy, and I upgraded the video card every now and then. So, I ended up buying the final computer in piecemeal fashion over 10-ish years. I'm not sure I could have done that with a Mac. I'd have to buy the whole kit and caboodle each time. So, in my case the x86 system was far cheaper for me.
My Atari ST system was very difficult to upgrade due to the closed architecture. There were no expansion slots, and nothing was modular about it. Accelerator cards could be added but that was kind of like performing open heart surgery - and they were expensive and hard to come by. The non-standard ASCI port made external storage wickedly expensive. In going to the 286 system, I mentioned above, I had to throw the whole Atari ST system away in a sense. Nothing carried over.
I think a lot of youngsters followed this piecemeal upgrade path in the 80s and 90s and were able to cobble together some powerful systems for the time. The original Sound Blaster card coming out changed everything for x86 systems. It felt like the system was finally "starting to begin" to catch up to Amiga. This probably played a huge role in making the x86 system a platform of choice for the demoscene and gamers.
In my case, I missed the whole Mac experience in the 80s and 90s. It was too difficult/expensive for to get in. The B&W screens of the original Mac didn't astonish me, and the color Mac II machines gave my father a proverbial heart attack when he saw the price. Now that I'm older and less polarized by the "PC vs Mac" wars of that time, I want to explore the 68k platform and see what I missed out on. The user interface is one simple element I missed out. @MrFahrenheit, you are right in that the GUI is extremely sophisticated. Even back then I thought Windows 3.11 and earlier sucked.
It wasn't until Windows 95 when I thought to myself that I could begin using Windows for real. But it was so fragile and so buggy. It wasn't hard to crash. Macs just work. No futzing, no heartburn, no nothing.If there isn't much of a demoscene presence, then that's cool. Let's see what the Mac scene had that the other platforms did not.
Phipli
Well-known member
Let's see what the Mac scene had that the other platforms did not.
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