What would it bring that the Pi 2, Android TV, Apple TV (well, Apple TV doesn't have its store yet, but it should be coming) do not ?

What would an Amiga dongle bring ?

If you want to sell something to the outside world, you have to market it. And as you describe it, I don't see how you could market it outside this tiny community, especially if it runs some kind of AmigaOS (because, let alone things the OS lacks like modern 3D stack,.., it lacks games/apps), and needs a PowerPC (which is expensive, and you don't want to make it expensive of course).

The only thing I can see that could sell a little, is a small machine bundled with Amiga (OCS/AGA) games, just like the C64DTV. And be it an FPGA, an emulator running x86, ARM or whatever, it wouldn't matter to the end user.

Last edited by Leo on 06-Aug-2015 at 11:12 PM.

_________________
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@Leo

I got a Wii here that I run homebrew apps on since many years. Once I got a DSI error, wanna know what I did? No I didn't throw it away and bought a Linux based mediaplayer, I rebooted the Wii and tried again .

But then, I might be insane......

Nintendo are insane too for releasing hardware without Linux on it but they seem to have done pretty well for themselves!

Things like the mplayer port needs to be a lot better though. RunInUAE is rock-stable.

Hmm... something that everyone who's used an Amiga remember is Guru Meditation. How about adding a small GM-anim with the Grim Reaper? As awfull as it is and should hopefully not be seen it sure is nostalgia so might be better than the grim reaper window alone. If not anim, maybe change the appearance.

I love amigans... any new idea to improve the userbase gets resistense imidatly. People must be very happy about the current situation then... only that it's the same people complaining about the current situation... sanity...

@hotrod

or sane terror? Seen a very similar situation like tihns in the "who moved my cheese?" booklet

Last edited by saimon69 on 07-Aug-2015 at 12:31 AM.

_________________
Scarabocchi Binari - Italian AROS Blog
Binary Doodles - English language AROS Blog

@saimon69

If you see nothing but problems you should probably go do something else for awhile. It's not a very good sign of the mental health.

@Chris_Y

Quote:

Chris_Y wrote: This would be a relatively small/cheap PPC device running OS4, with HDMI output and some USB ports.

Look, I love the PPC, but for this purpose (and many others) it is one of the least suitable.

Quote:

Chris_Y wrote: Upon boot you would be presented with a custom TV-friendly interface showing everything that is currently installed. By default there would be icons for some pre-installed classic games, which would launch and run transparently via emulation. There would also be an option for AmiStore where more classic Amiga games could be purchased, as well as modern OS4 titles. There should also be a hidden option to drop into Workbench so it can be used as a full computer.

A workable approach; The old 'buy it for one purpose and then "what's this?!?!", I can do all this other cool stuff, including some fun development of my own widgets'.

Quote:

And then Chris_Y went on to write: Most of the building blocks are in place already. The only hurdle I see is that it needs to be an attractive price point, but if enough interest can be raised in advance then a larger production run should be viable.

That is a major hurdle. Here's what you can do: Put it on Kickstarter and see how much early interest you can generate for this device.

Quote:

Then Chris_Y wrote: It could be a good A-eon/ACube/Cloanto/Hyperion joint project?

True, not one of those companies can do this on their own, so collaborating on something like this "could" be good for all. In reality though there just isn't enough collective energy to pull of something like this.

Quote:

Chris_Y dared to write: Without something like this there's no way the Amiga userbase will expand.

Please don't write statements that read like only this and no other idea can expand the Amiga user base; It's very arrogant.

Quote:

Chris_Y continues to write: It doesn't need to just be games on the PPC side; you could write a news/weather app, commission a Netflix client, or whatever - it's a computer, do what you want.

By George you've cracked it. Brilliant! That's exactly what people are looking for: Yet another device on which they can stream Netflix on. I especially like the "or whatever", statement; That should be on the box.

Quote:

With complete disregard for cost of development Chris_Y wrote: With an appropriate amount of sandboxing/abstraction, you could even avoid people having to learn the AmigaOS API. Maybe something like Hollywood would work well here.

You'd have to sell a million of these at the 'attractive' price point to just cover the development of this device.

Quote:

Chris_Y contradictingly wrote: I'm not saying my idea is the answer,

Actually that's exactly what you said "Without something like this there's no way the Amiga userbase will expand."

Quote:

Chris_Y amazingly wrote: Something like a Roku with more capabilities, and a huge games back catalogue that can be loaded onto it, and the Amiga name proudly displayed, would be an attractive proposition if it isn't outlandishly expensive.

You mean like the Amazon FireTV with optional Game Controller? OK, so it doesn't have the Amiga retro game catalogue but have you looked into how many people actually care for Amiga retro gaming? What games would they like to play again? How much would they pay for a game? How much would they pay for a device like this?

There are so many layers to this. This isn't some closed system with a handful of games built into a TV connectable joystick. You're talking about a platform, and that is orders of magnitude more challenging and costly.

_________________
All the way, with 68k

@ferrels

Quote:

ferrels wrote: I wish I had a dollar for every ridiculous and delusional thread about how to make a new Amiga that will take the world by storm.....

You'd have what, like $67?

_________________
All the way, with 68k

@ Chris_Y

I actually like the idea but there are problems.

Designing a PPC board for this is the easy bit, and needn't be expensive. If it's for the mass-market, then sticking an all-in-one embedded PPC on a board with no need for PCIE or anything is easy. It just needs to run E-UAE, after all, no 3D needed. The board could be little more than an RPi but with a PPC on it instead of an ARM.
Marketing it is not too difficult in Europe, as the Amiga is still fondly remembered.



However...
The Spectrum VEGA and the Elite keyboard have a huge advantage in as much as they're imitating something small and very distinctive. The a500 is not small and is a rather less distinctive than a Speccy, which most recognise immediately even today, because of its grey rubber keys and rainbow logo. A Commodore Amiga logo is just a logo, the Spectrum is a real design that caught the imagination. This is why the C64 DTV is shaped like a joystick, but the Vega is mimicking a Spectrum. What would this new machine look like? If it looks like a joystick, no-one's ever going to know it runs AmigaOS. If it's shaped like an Amiga, it'll be too large for people's living rooms these days.

People are out there who would buy a recreated Amiga as long as it's small and cheap, but they really don't care what OS it runs. As soon as you start to turn it into a real computer, the costs quickly escalate and you end up with a Sam440ep!

TL;DR: Nice idea but it has to be either retro console or computer. It can't be both, the outside market isn't interested in AmigaOS any more, sorry.

Last edited by Spirantho on 07-Aug-2015 at 07:37 AM.

>Behold, the AmigaOne XG.
>This would be a relatively small/cheap PPC device running OS4,

Interesting to see how it compares to my idea...

> with HDMI output and some USB ports.

So far the same.

> Upon boot you would be presented with a custom TV-friendly interface showing everything that is currently installed.

I had idea of boot selector.
It can be set to delay 1...60s for user input.
During that time user can select where to go. (KIDS/GAMES/Amiga/...)

>By default there would be icons for some pre-installed classic games, which would launch and run transparently via emulation.

That would be on GAMES side on my idea.

> There would also be an option for AmiStore where more classic Amiga games could be purchased, as well as modern OS4 titles.

Same.

>There should also be a hidden option to drop into Workbench so it can be used as a full computer.

Not so hidden in my idea.

>The retro side of things will make it marketable to the masses and ensure a decent userbase - the Amiga can truly "be back" with a proper launch, just look at all the ZX Vega publicity and even the "Recreated Spectrum", which was only really a Bluetooth keyboard!

Retro market is far bigger than our niche, so it must be considered as one of the targets.

>....The only hurdle I see is that it needs to be an attractive price point, but if enough interest can be raised in advance then a larger production run should be viable.

Low component price enable larger production run with sane funding. Like 10 000 units for EUR 2M. (pocket money for kickstarters... )


The hard part is to do the SW & HW R&D with no money. 8)


(Started to put something online a while ago, but no juice to keep on going for now...)
https://communitycomputer.wordpress.com/about/techspec/

Last edited by KimmoK on 07-Aug-2015 at 07:46 AM.

_________________
- KimmoK
// For freedom, for honor, for AMIGA
//
// Thing that I should find more time for: CC64 - 64bit Community Computer?

@Spirantho

regional differences there, though. In Norway, hardly anyone knows what a spectrum is.

_________________
This weeks pet peeve:
Using "voltage" instead of "potential", which leads to inventing new words like "amperage" instead of "current" (I, measured in A) or possible "charge" (amperehours, Ah or Coulomb, C). Sometimes I don't even know what people mean.

@KimmoK

For a 100-200EUR target price, doing batches of about 200 is probably the most sane option. This enables some savings in prices even on the first batch, and gives you headroom to shrink cost quickly. Sell a batch of those a week and you'll be a hero for sure

@wawa

Well, I used my savings to get married, buy a farm and have kids. I actually had 40k EUR sitting in the bank waiting for my design to finish before life happened.

Now I design them for money instead of _with_ money) and that's sort of easier to defend to the wife. But we're actually a WEE bit over-aggressive on the down payments of the farm these days, so I COULD still do it if I needed to. Being debt free at the age of 43 isn't so typical for the working class, you know. But when the response ALWAYS is "there's no market for that unless it has xxxxxxxxxxxxx" that sort of takes away the interest.

One guy here has very ambitious dreams but getting him to finalize on a spec so I can start helping him with the ACTUAL work seems frickin impossible.

Last edited by olegil on 07-Aug-2015 at 08:01 AM.
Last edited by olegil on 07-Aug-2015 at 08:00 AM.

_________________
This weeks pet peeve:
Using "voltage" instead of "potential", which leads to inventing new words like "amperage" instead of "current" (I, measured in A) or possible "charge" (amperehours, Ah or Coulomb, C). Sometimes I don't even know what people mean.

Chris has a point.

This thread has losts of negative points, what to say, they are all right. There is no point to have any new hardware for any Amigish OS, there is no point to hobby Amiga, or any way support it. Any way this is Amiga forum, most of us have pointless hobby; OK?

Chris is OS4 supporter / developer, so would be polite to keep this thread OS4 only.

What would be needed?

A) Someone produce some 20 000 units to get cost low. It is perfectly possible to produce PPC hardware for very low price, so that end user target price 100 - 200€ would be possible.

B) Better software support. Retro games wouln't last too long. Office is most important. We already have couple web browsers and nice video player very soon.

C) Case, keyboard and mouse! They are importand! Most of here woun't like it, but we are NOT target audience.

D) License to use Commodore name, to get this complete. Shouldn't be hard or expensive. That would make project more noticeable for general public.

Last edited by utri007 on 07-Aug-2015 at 09:12 AM.

@Chris_Y

ok but you need two things for that... new software that makes use attractive and you still have to explain why a new PPC based custom device would be better than existing alternatives. Custom always means more expensive and it would be a very risky venture. Better to port and adapt something to existing hardware.

Last edited by OlafS25 on 07-Aug-2015 at 10:19 AM.

@utri007

Quote:

This thread has losts of negative points, what to say, they are all right. There is no point to have any new hardware for any Amigish OS, there is no point to hobby Amiga, or any way support it. Any way this is Amiga forum, most of us have pointless hobby; OK?

People who use Amiga computers are people who has always used AmigaOS/Amiga computers, we accept that things is not perfect, but as soon as you market something to your granny and your 10-year-old kids, they expect things to just work.

A good potion of NG users is people who know how to program, and write programs, we programmers do not need things to be perfect, we are just happy GCC works.

On some programs, are not badly covered like music programs, but most people do not know how to use a tracker and don't care.

Most people are interested in getting on the internet, and watch youtube and play games. If you don't have product that can do that well, then you can't sell it to the masses.

What would be needed?

Quote:

A) Someone produce some 20 000 units to get cost low. It is perfectly possible to produce PPC hardware for very low price, so that end user target price 100 - 200€ would be possible.

Maybe you even need bigger batches, maybe you need to preorder 200 000 units.
Quote:

B) Better software support. Retro games wouln't last too long. Office is most important. We already have couple web browsers and nice video player very soon.

We have web browser that is slow, and sometimes crash.
We do not have office.
Games are old, and look bad.

Quote:

C) Case, keyboard and mouse! They are importand! Most of here woun't like it, but we are NOT target audience.

If you have this thing connected to TV as suggested, you do not want a mouse, and keyboard, at least if you're sitting in your sofa.

Quote:

D) License to use Commodore name, to get this complete. Shouldn't be hard or expensive. That would make project more noticeable for general public.

If you have product, that is worth selling it will sell regardless of name stamped on it, the price of the product has to match the buyer's expectation. Or else he buys a different product from someone else with ARM chip. Most people do not care what OS it runs they care about content.
You need come up with some type of argument that for way your product is better than the compactors product, if you don't have that then no one will buy your product it's that simple.

Last edited by NutsAboutAmiga on 07-Aug-2015 at 12:02 PM.

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@utri007

I know why he prefers a PPC based device to run his favorite OS on it but he wants to sell it outside to new users and those are not interested in AmigaOS mostly so this new custom board would need obvious advantages compared to existing cheap hardware otherwise it will be a financial failure, For nostalgy you have UAE for almost every platform already so this is not something that brings a USP for it. OS is anyway only a tool, a platform for most users. Most people not even know what it is based on like most people using Android smartphones so OS is no selling point. To sell a new hardware you would need new attractive software that interests people outside and by this I mean new not just old software recompiled for PPC. I agree that cheap and powerful options are needed but I doubt the chances of custom hardware in 2015, as long as it not offers obvious advantages compared to existing hardware and even then you need the software for it.

As I wrote Raspberry 2 is a interesting hardware for that so a port of AmigaOS (if he prefers that) would make sense. I do not know of course if it is doable at all and how much it would cost.

"A) Someone produce some 20 000 units to get cost low. It is perfectly possible to produce PPC hardware for very low price, so that end user target price 100 - 200€ would be possible."

Hardware development and production is expensive, there are reasons why Trevor D. operates in low production numbers. Somebody has to sign the bills for all the materials, the development of the board, the production, development of new software, marketing and organize everything (perhaps even fulltime). Who will do that? I cannot speak for Trevor D. but I would personally not take such risks for what is basically a hobby even if I would have the money. The chances to just regain the investments are pretty dim, the financial risk high.

Last edited by OlafS25 on 07-Aug-2015 at 10:18 AM.

@NutsAboutAmiga

Quote:

Maybe you even need bigger patches, maybe you need to preorder 200 000 units.

Which means porting is going to be the cheapest option.

_________________
Dammy

@NutsAboutAmiga

to eastablish a new hardware you need a complete new set of software (both applications and entertainment including games). Would be very very expensive.

Even with low volume, EUR200 PPC system price is possible.

But higher volume could perhaps bring back some R&D "investments".

_________________
- KimmoK
// For freedom, for honor, for AMIGA
//
// Thing that I should find more time for: CC64 - 64bit Community Computer?

@KimmoK

I always read no problem to build cheap PPC hardware then I ask me why it is not done by anyone?

@OlafS25

It has been done before.
(for example: LimeBook, Efika)

It just needs time for a HW guru to design it.

(Alternatively one can pay someone to design it, as full time paid job.
For simple board, Varisys caliber competence is not mandatory.)

For silly BOM:
+ price of RPi2
+ PPC SoC
+ case+psu
+ PCIe connector(s)
+ SO-DIMM & connector
= below 200EUR

Ideas:
-HW design competition / poll to see what kind of low end is the most wanted
-bounties to pay ACube/someone else to design & deliver working prototypes
(there can be a few HW alternatives, and only the most funded is done (initially))
-"kickstarter" thing to collect orders for large production

+
In my view we can not target large audience before our SW offerings are much more polished and mature to use. Affordable HW enables a lot more HW to be given to developers and at least a few new user more, trying the system without investing EUR1000 in it.

Last edited by KimmoK on 07-Aug-2015 at 11:43 AM.
Last edited by KimmoK on 07-Aug-2015 at 11:38 AM.
Last edited by KimmoK on 07-Aug-2015 at 11:35 AM.
Last edited by KimmoK on 07-Aug-2015 at 11:27 AM.
Last edited by KimmoK on 07-Aug-2015 at 11:26 AM.

_________________
- KimmoK
// For freedom, for honor, for AMIGA
//
// Thing that I should find more time for: CC64 - 64bit Community Computer?

@KimmoK

I still do not see the advantage compared to existing hardware except being PPC and thus attractive to AmigaOS and perhaps MorphOS user. Outside that does not count. People use devices, most propably not even know what processor is inside of their tablet or smartphone.