@digitaldisaster
> Actaully, if you could license the IBM G5 northbridge then yes given a couple of competent
> ASIC devlopers and the cash needed then it could be done.

I know I'm coming into this thread a bit late, but that idea would be very very expensive. I work at Atmel designing FPGA and FPslic silicon, other people in the office to ASICs and ASSCs and I get to sit through their quarterly financial report meetings and see what things look like. With you at a company doing other things you might pull off a "build an embedded or industrial machine and sell a few extras as Amigas" trick, but wow. NRE (Non-Recurring Expenses, basically paying for the design to be put on silicon and buying the masks, package design if any, everything you only pay once that covers all die manufactured) costs on ASICs can run you a lot of dough, many hundreds of thousands of dollars. And then the manufacturing costs.

Why not just buy IBM G5 northbridge chips from IBM, as they're already done? Or MAI or Marvell or Tundra or Whoever??

It seems to make more sense to just buy already existing parts at this point, and build a system around those chips and connectors and standards.

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