wrote my first programs, accessed my first bbs and setup my first networks (midi and null modem) on the atari st.
the best part was that an open box 520st that plugged into the tv with a single sided 320k floppy disk drive was just barely cheap enough for my blue collar parents to afford to get me started.
i wonder what the story was behind the 68000. did they design a cpu core for the future and then wrap it with a compatibility layer to meet the market or was it simply all they had to ship given time and/or engineering constraints.
Packaging would have been one constraint, among others. It came in a 64-pin DIP, the largest available and broadly supported at a time. No room for 32 data and 32 address pins + everything else they needed, without muxing which would have eliminated some of the benefits of the wider bus.
the best part was that an open box 520st that plugged into the tv with a single sided 320k floppy disk drive was just barely cheap enough for my blue collar parents to afford to get me started.
it changed the course of my life forever.