A Comparison of 68k-Based Vintage Computers
Vintage computing is a hobby that has been growing in popularity. It has evolved from something practiced by a handful of old techies who didn't want to let go of their favorite old platforms, to a vehicle for people to explore the nostalgia of their youth, and even for younger techies to explore what came before.
One of the more interesting segments of vintage computers to explore are the platforms that featured the Motorola 68000 processor, and its descendants. These entered the market in the 1980s, at a time when the first generation of home computers, which featured 8-bit CPUS and could do little more than process text, basic spreadsheets, small databases, and simple games, was giving way to a new generation that could tackle increasingly sophisticated problems.
The plethora of CPU architectures of the 1970s was whittled down to two main ones (in the US, at least): the Intel 8086 and its descendants, and the Motorola 68000 family. The architecture of the 8086 took off when a lower-cost variant of it, the 8088, was featured in the IBM PC, which proved to be wildly popular. The 68000, by contrast, was considered faster and easier to program, with its flat memory model (compared to the 8086's segmented memory model).
The most successful platforms that featured the 68k were the Apple Macintosh, the Commodore Amiga, and the Atari ST.
Introduced in 1984, the Macintosh was the first home computer to feature a Graphical User Interface. Although its predecessor the Lisa also featured a GUI, it cost $10,000 and was marketed to businesses. The Macintosh, on the other hand, cost $2,500 at launch. Although it was initially well-received for the pioneering concepts it introduced, sluggish performance and the need to constantly swap disks would hamper adoption until an upgraded model with more RAM and an optional external floppy drive was released later in the same year. These computers were widely used in education, and would go on to lead a revolution in desktop publishing, where its WYSIWYG applications and selection of quality included fonts made it a natural pick. Today they're often used as distraction-free writing machines, where more modern platforms make it too easy to give in to the temptation to check a social media feed, or some headlines, and it is also often used to revisit vintage educational software, as well as a few unique games that debuted on that platform.
Released a year later in 1985, the Atari 520ST had comparable specifications to the Macintosh, added an optional color monitor, and featured a similar GUI called GEM. It was considerably less expensive than the Macintosh, though, at $800. With its included midi port the series found a niche in music production, where it continued to be used well into the 2000s. The popular Cubase application, for example, was originally released for the Atari ST. It also had a wide array of well-loved games, but most can also be experienced on the Amiga with much better sound.
The last of the three platforms to hit the market was the Amiga, in 1985. It featured 256K of RAM, and custom chips that offloaded the processing of graphics and audio from the CPU, and it cost $1,300. It was the first to feature pre-emptive multitasking. Supply issues and poor marketing got it off to a slow start, but it became a well-loved home computer, featuring many advanced games and home productivity apps. It also was a nexus at the birth of the demoscene, a culture that celebrated the intersection of good programming, art, and music, and would launch the careers of many people involved with some of the most prominent games of the 2000s. Finally, it found a niche in 3d rendering and video production, where it was considered a considerably lower-cost alternative to Silicon Graphics workstations, and was used to create the special effects for shows like Seaquest DSV and Babylon 5. Although this platform tragically died off right as the rest of the world was coming to embrace the features that it offered, it still has a lively community, with new software and hardware being developed to this day.
These 68000-based platforms represented a pivotal moment in computing history, when personal computers first became capable of serious creative work. While Intel-based PCs would eventually dominate the market, these machines pioneered many innovations we take for granted today: graphical interfaces, pre-emptive multitasking, and dedicated multimedia hardware. Their influence can still be seen in modern computing, and their preservation by the vintage computing community keeps this history alive for new generations to discover.
The Amiga, of course, was the best one. I always wanted one when I was a kid. I paid for a professionally recapped Amiga 1200 and Atari 1040STe this summer, hopefully they will be arriving sometime in the next few weeks.