TI's folly

[2600problems]

​the TI-99/4A was an odd computer, i'll admit that much, the BASIC was slow and it's original intent was for math, not games. that's not why I wrote this.

 

​I need to understand 3 things:

 

​1. why the hell did TI try to enter the computer market without realizing most computers were for games, not math or writing?

​ 2. (and I am going to receive flak from someone out there) why in the unholy name of god did they release such a slow version of BASIC? now granted, Commodore's BASIC isn't any better, but still.

​ 3. this connects to number 1, how were they expecting to market the 99/4A when people wanted Good games, good graphics and a fair price?

surely, it fills 1 of those requirements, but still, the sound is below average and the BASIC is also below par. it makes Commodore's basic look godly.

 

thoughts

 

(also someone fix the backwards text bug, it's driving me nuts)

[matthew180]

Why are you trolling the 99/4A forum? Actually after looking at your other posts, it looks like that's what you do. Awesome (that is sarcasm by the way).

Edited May 5, 2017 by matthew180

[digdugnate]

boy this is flamebait if I ever saw it- it doesn't appear to me that you are offering cogent, rational discussion points other than wildly inflammatory statements.

 

I can only make assertions based on historical data, not having actually *worked* at TI or been privy to their business decisions. I tried that in the previous thread.

[Shift838]

Maybe he is just irritated that the 99/4A forum seems to be one of the most active around.

[bpatte02]

*Senfield impression* And how about those Timex people? I mean I can get pass the black and white, but no sound? How's a guy to stay entertained?

Edited May 5, 2017 by bpatte02

[+Vorticon]

Now now... Easy on that fellow people. Just because he's rather, ah..., direct should not immediately make him an outcast.

A bit puzzled by the math bit and TI BASIC actually had a very well rounded set of features as compared to other contemporary Basics. But otherwise I have to admit that he's got a point. To be honest, I also have always wondered why TI allowed the 99/4 to ship with such a slow BASIC instead of revamping the architecture.

Regardless, deeds are better than words 2600problems. Start by checking out a sample of the amazing games that have come out for the TI 99/4A at the http://tigameshelf.net then come back and give us your thoughts

[bpatte02]

Now now... Easy on that fellow people. Just because he's rather, ah..., direct should not immediately make him an outcast.

A bit puzzled by the math bit and TI BASIC actually had a very well rounded set of features as compared to other contemporary Basics. But otherwise I have to admit that he's got a point. To be honest, I also have always wondered why TI allowed the 99/4 to ship with such a slow BASIC instead of revamping the architecture.

Regardless, deeds are better than words 2600problems. Start by checking out a sample of the amazing games that have come out for the TI 99/4A at the http://tigameshelf.net then come back and give us your thoughts

This is true, I was just trying to be some comic relief. However, I suggest the Atarisoft games. I enjoy Pac man a lot, also PB Qbert is great as well.

[Shift838]

I personally found the TI basic language easy to grasp and thought it was nice. The exposure I had to Commodores basic, in my opinion I thought was a nightmare.

 

I do know that TI's main goal really was education. I remember walking into my junior high and seeing TI-99/4A's. It was not until I got to high school that Apple started the education market takeover in schools.

 

Ti had quite a few good games like MuchMan (one of my favorites!), Popeye, Frogger, Qbert and and don't forget Parsec.

 

TI's speech capabilities were second to none among the systems at the time.

 

I will say that the TI was probably one of the priciest systems you could buy and that was one of the big reasons many users would go with Commodore, Atari and others.

Edited May 5, 2017 by Shift838

[matthew180]

Vorticon, I would agree with your position, however the OP is not interested in having a conversation, debate, or anything. They started the previous thread the same way, did not participate, then started this thread in the same condescending way. Not sure what people get out of posting this kind of stuff?

[brain]

Not to feed the troll per se, but Commodore's decisions are easy to grasp if one looks at the economics:

 

Jack wanted a games machine that would do just enough to be considered a real computer.

• BASIC v2 (bare bones) made sense and fit in a 8kB ROM.
• Graphics and sound were a focus, and ease for BASIC to access was not an issue (buy the games, people).
• Floppy speed was also not an issue (Buy a PET for business computing)

But, Jack wanted a cheap machine, so he could win the computing war:

 

• cart slot in back, as opposed to in front like Atari or TI
• Single board motherboard construction, no flying wires like on the TI, and no risers or other amenities.
• cheap boring case, tweaked from the VIC-20 case, which had been partially amortized for the VIC-20 run
• Single color, not expensive metal adornments (well, the name plate was an adornment, I guess)

 

Still, he had to make a few concessions as he had gotten burnt on previous machines

 

• real KB instead of chicklet, due to getting pummeled on reviews for the initial PET 2001 KB

And, part of the power of the c64 was accidental:

 

• Jack decreed that the 64 had to be compatible with MAX machine carts, which meant special logic to remap the entire address space. Commodore had no idea that small engineering extra would open the door for all kinds of things like accelerators, game save carts, etc.

[eightbit]

To the topic starter:

 

Nice try. Do some research if you really intend on learning the history and then come back with some intellectual conversation. I highly doubt that is your intent, but again...nice try.

[2600problems]

...this is why i rarely post. because people just can't be nice and civil when someone expresses their views. well, you win.

[Arnuphis]

2600 problems but posting regularly aint one!

[2600problems]

very funny. anyways, why am i receiving so much hate? all i did was question TI's decisions. yes, i was a bit mean spirited, and i apologize but how does this make me a troll. seriously? unless you can positively prove i am being unreasonable or in anyway hard to deal with, i will hear none of it. all i wanted to know was those 3 things, even if i worded it, somewhat...stupidly.

 

but really, let up with the insults

[Keatah]

From what I understand, Ti entered the market because they had a microprocessor and didn't know what to do with it. So hey let's build a home computer.

 

From a technical standpoint, the microprocessor was only allowed to access 128 bytes of 16 bit memory. Everything else had to go through the display processor first to get to main memory. Indirect memory access! Folks, this is 2x Atari VCS memory. A severe limitation on the architecture. Also the processor has no stack. And it was a 16-bit chip stuffed into an 8-bit mainboard. All decided upon by beancounters. Cost.. Cost.. Cost..

 

There's a thread about Basic being slow:

http://atariage.com/forums/topic/264317-thats-why-ti-basic-is-so-slow/page-1?hl=+ti%20+basic%20+slow

[Airshack]

I purchased a TI in 1980 and it seemed like a great machine back then despite the many faults we can list today. The problems with TI marketing and this computer are much easier to see some 37 years later. What is it they say about hindsight?

 

TI had no crystal ball. TI is still a company btw...

 

Atari? Commodore? Tandy? Sinclair?

 

<chirp>

 

Perhaps they were the wisest of the bunch after all?

 

 

Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

[2600problems]

thank you. its nice to see that some people are still nice in the world

[ZylonBane]

*Senfield impression*

 

Who the frell is "Senfield"?

[JamesD]

I don't think TI grasped what the market was.
Frankly, the market was littered with mistakes or failures because people didn't understand the market.

[Keatah]

The market was being invented during those times. The early micros were hot on the heels of pocket calculators - which were among the first consumer devices to use microchips. If not *the* first.

 

---

 

Much of my limited short experience with the TI was a downtempo, late-nite, laid-back experience. Like a game of chess or some other strategy game. That combined with the Vic-20 at my buddy's house made for some really good times. We had like 3 or 4 systems going at once, in a blanket fort we made out of the bunk beds. 2 different levels, one for programming, the other for games.

Edited May 5, 2017 by Keatah

[RXB]

At the time of the TI99 all the rage was educational Toys and Educations computers.

By the time the TI99/4A was introduced there were hundreds of types of Educational devices including Computers on the market.

This explains why TI had more Educational Cartridges then anyone else in the market.

Also why the Milton Bradly Speech Recognition system was made for the TI99/4A.

 

Gaming systems like the Atari and Nintendo owned the gaming markets.

Going head to head with these for gaming was a tough sell so Education was a better market with less competition.

 

Look the TI99/4A unlike other computers on the market did not need a Disk Drive to load a OS, nor did it need fancy expensive devices to work.

It came with some Cartridges like XB, Games and possible Educational Cartridges.

Using a Cassette tape for storage was cheap as almost everyone had one.

 

You have to look at the times to understand the history.

[apersson850]

...this is why i rarely post. because people just can't be nice and civil when someone expresses their views. well, you win.

It could depend on how you express them, perhaps...

 

There were several things that TI had to consider.

 

Memory space limited to 64 Kbytes, without additional mapping registers. The 990 was a pretty early 16-bit architecture, when memory was expensive. The TMS 9900 integrated the architecture on a chip, so kept this limitation. But TI wanted working RAM, cartridge slot, operating system, expansion devices and internal I/O, like sound and video. All these competed about the memory space. Then they also wanted a comprehensive BASIC, with several features inspired by the BASIC running on the TI 990.

 

To squeeze all that in, they got the idea to make byte-serial memory (GROM), which stored instructions in a special language (GPL), which was more compact than the native instruction set for the TI 990. A great deal of the operating system ROM in the console was then used to interpret this GPL language, something which added to the time needed to execute the programs. As I've shown earlier, in another post here, even the simplest interpreter typically has a speed penalty of seven times or so, compared to native code.

Since GROM are 8-bit devices, and the VDP as well, cost could be saved by using a scaled down CPU. The TMS 9980 was developed as a TMS 9900 inernally, but with 8-bit wide data bus externally, as well as an internal oscillator. The TMS 9940 is a TMS 9980 with the addition of 8 K ROM and 256 bytes of RAM inside the chip. This is exactly the configuration of the 99/4A console, and perhaps the CPU they were really considering. But it didn't get ready in time, so they had to use the TMS 9900 instead, and do the memory and 8-bit multiplexing externally.

 

There they ended up with an architecture which could handle quite a lot of memory, but at the cost of slower execution. In applications with a lot of user interfacing, it doesn't matter so much, since the user is comparatively slow anyway. Educational use must have been a tempting market, pretty new and well suited to the architecture. Games could be handled by having 8 K ROM space in the cartridges, if assembly language was needed, and otherwise everything could run from GPL.

The problem turned out to be that few outside TI wanted to write games for it, since it couldn't run assembly programs without additional memory. If the console had been like mine, which is modified to have 64 Kbytes of RAM in addition to the 16 Kbytes video RAM, then amazing games could have been written by anyone, for the 99/4A. They could even have been loaded from cassette, if you were patient enough to let them load.

 

BASIC became slow due to the design considerations regarding memory use. With an expanded machine, you could run a better Pascal than Apple had, but not enough people wanted to invest in that, when they could keep up with the Jones'es and buy their kids a cheap VIC-20, to make sure they had a computer too. Most of them didn't know what to use the computer for anyway.

[Omega-TI]

... If the console had been like mine, which is modified to have 64 Kbytes of RAM in addition to the 16 Kbytes video RAM, then amazing games could have been written by anyone, for the 99/4A.

 

Would you please expand on this a little, I'm intrigued.

[Casey]

Others have said it, but in 1978 when the 99/4 was being prepared and released in 79, computers were brand new to the marketplace. There weren't a lot of gaming machines available then (maybe the Apple II?) TI was already in the market of producing educational computerized products, with the Speak 'n Spell, the Little Professor calculator, and other similar products, so it followed that most of the initial cartridges released for the 99/4 were educational and home productivity tools, moreso than games.

 

TI BASIC was slow, and we've discussed its shortcomings in other threads. I think had TI been able to get the 99/2 and 99/8 released, people would have been amazed at the speed increase in TI BASIC compared to the 99/4 and /4A, because the BASIC built into the 99/8 is significantly faster.

[+Lee Stewart]

From what I understand, Ti entered the market because they had a microprocessor and didn't know what to do with it. So hey let's build a home computer.

 

From a technical standpoint, the microprocessor was only allowed to access 128 bytes of 16 bit memory. Everything else had to go through the display processor first to get to main memory. Indirect memory access! Folks, this is 2x Atari VCS memory. A severe limitation on the architecture. Also the processor has no stack. And it was a 16-bit chip stuffed into an 8-bit mainboard. All decided upon by beancounters. Cost.. Cost.. Cost..

 

There's a thread about Basic being slow:

http://atariage.com/forums/topic/264317-thats-why-ti-basic-is-so-slow/page-1?hl=+ti%20+basic%20+slow

 

Though your point was likely console RAM direct access, the CPU in the TI-99/4A actually directly accesses 8 KiB of 16-bit memory (console ROM) in addition to the 256 bytes of 16-bit RAM. It also directly accesses 48 KiB of 8-bit RAM/ROM, when present (8 KiB DSR ROM/RAM, 32 KiB expansion RAM, 8 KiB cartridge ROM/RAM).

 

...lee