> They don't do that out of the box, and it took people a while to really exploit the things.
I never really had much problem programming the Atari, the Apple II was simpler but it sure is a less capable machine overall. Music and graphics are pretty simple on the Atari once you get the hang of it (which I don't think takes very long given the right book) and you can do things the Apple just cannot do.
Having 80 column text, a nice office type suite, lots of expansion options: test & measurement, industrial control, etc... made an Apple quite a nice machine.
In terms of entertainment, games, etc... yeah. Totally. Though I have to admit, many of the greater game experiences on an Apple are pretty darn great. But, there were a ton of things done on more capable machines with custom chips that were better. No argument.
But, when it came to getting shit done, making money?
I made a ton of money with an Apple computer. Money that was off the table with the Atari one, unless I was going to write a killer game. Plenty did.
But plenty more did things that were not so much entertainment too.
I love my Atari machine and spent long hours on it making it do all sorts of spiffy things with graphics and sound, and I really loved the bi-directional game ports. It is a nice machine.
We need to be careful about "less capable" in this context though. While I didn't spend the same hours on that Apple in the same way, because the simpler design didn't require it, I did spend them getting lots of things done for people, and for myself. Often somewhat boring things, compared to fun graphics and sound, but important things. The software was there, storage etc...
> They don't do that out of the box, and it took people a while to really exploit the things.
I never really had much problem programming the Atari, the Apple II was simpler but it sure is a less capable machine overall. Music and graphics are pretty simple on the Atari once you get the hang of it (which I don't think takes very long given the right book) and you can do things the Apple just cannot do.