@hazydave

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And no vector math unit

I understand that Freescale will be adding Altivec to QorIQ in the next few years. Not that this negates the fact PPC is expensive.

@hazydave

It's clear that PPC doesn't have offerings that would allow a desktop system using one to compete with PCs in "performance per dollar". But x86 Macs also can't compete in that regard yet they have a sustainable market. And suppose A-EON/Hyperion released some x86-based AmigaOS system, it still wouldn't attract people over from the PC/Mac user base, since the OS still has a long way to catch up and the software offering is poor, so it would still have nothing to offer to someone outside the keen Amiga-enthusiast market.

There's clearly a lot more work to do before any AmigaOS4-based system can appeal to people who moved on to other platforms. Until then the best Amiga companies can do is to deliver to keen Amiga enthusiasts more of what they want and that's what the machines currently developed are trying to achieve. Considering that a couple of years ago the Amiga scene seemed doomed and dull with hardly any hope for a future, what we have now is a huge step forward, with new hardware coming out every year and OS development continuing at a steady (if not so rapid) pace.

@COBRA

x86 on commodity hardware would bring in more hobbyists and more devs. That's what's needed the most. More users/devs, faster development, more apps. If the price of entry is (too)steep and hardware not being able to run anything mainstream it will most likely scare people off...

Sure, it caters to the current amiga audience. But that market is shrinking, not growing.

Maybe the solution that would please all sides would be a amithlon-like x86 AOS4 edition and dedicated OS4 PPC hardware for hardcore PPC amigans.

Last edited by WolfToTheMoon on 18-Apr-2011 at 01:00 AM.

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@Rob

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imx6 appears to be a future product and there are no indications of how many PCIe lanes it has. The main problem with ARM and OS4 is that OS4 is a desktop oriented OS and ARM hardware is primarily mobile. If there are no readily available ARM desktop boards

Here's 2 to get you started:

http://www.pandaboard.org/
http://www.igloocommunity.org/

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Whyzzat?

@WolfToTheMoon

Quote:

x86 on commodity hardware would bring in more hobbyists and more devs

Would it? Why would someone even remotely consider using and developing for an OS on their x86 hardware that has no memory protection, supports only a handful of old gfx cards with limited or no 3D support with old outdated APIs and hardly any software of interest and it even costs quite a bit of money around 100 EUR, when there are plenty of alternatives with far more capability, many of which are free? MorphOS is also available on cheap Mac hardware and yet it's not like Mac developers are now moving over to MorphOS as their platform? AROS is available for x86 and it doesn't look like it's winning over the PC developer community.

@COBRA

Quote:

Would it?

It would certainly bring more then expensive PPC hardware. Just how much more is dependent entirely on Hyperion and their work, which is, IMHO way too slow, to justify the price at this point. At least with a x86 edition one could "justify" those 150 euros as a hobby investment much more easily - see what I mean

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@WolfToTheMoon

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It would certainly bring more then expensive PPC hardware.

Does AROS have more developers than OS4?

@COBRA

Quote:

COBRA wrote: @ferrels Quote: The Natami isn't "stuck" with OS3.1/3.9. AROS 68K is being ported to the Natami and new extensions to OS 3.1/3.9 and AROS are being added As far as AmigaOS is concerned it is stuck with 3.9 at best. And yes I know that open-source OS'es like AROS or even Linux can be ported, those can be ported to any hardware... By the way is it known, which OS it will be shipped with? Will they have some sort of license to ship NatAmi with AmigaOS? How will the machine reach the users? You call NatAmi the successor of the A4000, but you forget that the A4000 was not just a piece of motherboard with custom chips on it, it was a complete system, including the OS to make it usable. Quote: And the X1000 team will have to do a better job at promoting the X1000. And why is that? They have stated from the beginning that it's a machine specifically for the Amiga enthusiast market and their plan with it is not to exploit markets outside the Amiga community. In the same way as NatAmi is not aiming to win over the PC/Mac community. Both target a certain segment in the very small Amiga community. There'll probably be a number of people buying both. So I fail to see why the X1000 needs more promoting than NatAmi.

No, it isn't stuck with OS 3.9 at best. They're extending OS 3.9 to take advantage of the new hardware they've developed. And I've aleady mentioned AROS 68K. You're still missing the point of the Natami. It was designed for hobbyists to be a 68K successor to the A4000, so why do you insist on negatively comparing it to complete PPC systems running OS4? The whole point of the Natami was to provide a 68K hobby board for retro users who have dreamed of a successor to the A4000. Go to the Natami site and look at the postings from the development team. All your questions about which OS it will run, ship with, and have ported to it in the future are there. They initially plan to ship the Natami with copies of Amiga Forever so that users have licensed KS ROMs and Workbench. Extensions for the new hardware are to follow and AROS 68K is being ported as well. And this is a hobbyist system. Why would the Natami team, who have stated that this is a hobby board, try to send out a complete system like Commodore did with the A4000. The Natami dev team isn't trying to win anyone over or exploit any markets or any of the other things you're talking about. You keep acting like the Natami team is in some sort of competition. They're just a bunch of hardware enthusiasts who have developed something really interesting for the retro-68K fans out there and you keep talking about markets, communities, and targets. The Natami isn't about any of that. And the X1000 needs a lot more promotion if they hope to have sell more than 40-50 systems. The price/performance ratio is just too out of line. No one in his right mind is going to pay $3000+ USD for 7 year old technology using a discontinued CPU, with no applications software, especially when it doesn't offer me anything that I can't get for a fraction of the price in the PC market. And stop buying all that crap from A-Eon and Hyperion about an Amiga market. It no longer exists.

@COBRA

Quote:

Does AROS have more developers than OS4?

If you mean active developers, that would be a good question indeed.

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Dammy

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KingKong wrote: @hazydave Europe has to develop its own hardware (CPU, GPU, ...) and own OS because anything from USA is out of option (for security reasons).

Given that the most popular CPU architecture in use today, the ARM, is British, I don't see this as any sort of issue. And Linux is really without any single country or company.

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Important are infrastructure, military use, communication, industrial control ...

Which of course, precludes the AmigaOS as it exists today. And suggests Linux.

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I think it would be a good idea to buy the P.A. Semi stuff (all rights, patents, knowhow, ...) as a starting point to develop CPUs for Europe.

Given that ARM is already supplying CPU cores of similar performance, and has already announced a much higher performance core in development today (the ARM Cortex A15), that would be a foolish waste of money. If Apple even had interest in selling off the technology. Several European semiconductor companies are already ARM licensees: NXP... (I have used their ARM7TDMI chips in several designs for Nomadio), ST Microelectronics, etc. Infineon even holds an ARM architecture license: like Samsung, Apple, nVidia, QualComm, and a few others, they can design their own variations.

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All there is left to do is to convince enough politicians and maybe the X1000 is a good start.

There is zero chance of that happening.

@ferrels

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No, it isn't stuck with OS 3.9 at best. They're extending OS 3.9 to take advantage of the new hardware they've developed.

Last time I heard only Hyperion had the right and license to develop AmigaOS, so unless Hyperion is extending AOS3.9 for the NatAmi, then it will be stuck with version 3.9 of AmigaOS, perhaps with some patches and drivers developed to support the new features of the NatAmi board, but the OS will still be 3.9, which is not necessarily a bad thing of course, it may be perfectly sufficient for the NatAmi users.

Quote:

so why do you insist on negatively comparing it to complete PPC systems running OS4?

I'm not negatively comparing, I'm simply being realistic and stated some facts about both systems. I'm very happy that NatAmi is being developed and I hope it will do well and I feel the same way about the X1000. No need to get all defensive... get your facts right. 40-50 systems? $3000+? Do you have any valid source of such information or are you just spreading FUD?

@TrevorDick

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Not everyone want to march to the same drum or follow the herd. Personally I am not particularly interested in a "me too" x86 box.

The PPC restriction, coupled with the No Mac restriction, are making it very difficult to have OS4 in a conveniently portable laptop. I find this troubling and a big obstacle to using OS4.

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All glory to the Hypnotoad!

@Arko

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Before they coul fund AOS4 they have to buy it first, and you might know, the parts that existed in AOS3 still belongs to Amiga Inc. and the part that is new in AOS4 belongs to Hyperion. Taking something Open Sourde might be easier.

The legal stuff has to be resolved. Would 100 Million Euro be enough?

The only question is: could AmigaOS be the best possible EU-future-OS? If the answer is "yes" then there is enough money for everything - just think of all the money spend for MS, Intel, Apple, ...

Obviously AmigaOS has to be improved but than there is a good chance to have an excellent OS one day. Can you imagine MSwindows becoming an excellent OS?

There's a knack: if AmigaOS will really be very good, the USA would rather burn it than give it the EU. If the USA thinks the EU makes a great mistake in using AmigaOS and not Linux, they will happily give it them.

The strategie for the EU is simple: give us AmigaOS for a fair price or we'll use Linux.

The point is: Linux may be the easier way to replace MS but AmigaOS may be the better way (because of the chance to get something quite perfect done).

@hazydave

I must admit that I don't know much about ARM or the P.A. Semi chips but I do know that the EU must get away from buying US-stuff like Intel or MS. ARM and PPC may both be a good alternative (starting point). If ARM alone will do the trick - fine.

KISS: It's better to have something simple and stable to build on.

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There is zero chance of that happening.

Is this really an Amiga forum?

AmigaOS once had the chance to become a world-OS and because of MS went wrong AmigaOS may have a second chance. I have absolutly no interest in a hobby-OS for a bunch of loonies - AmigaOS has to become a chief-OS or it can get lost.

@hazydave

An Open Letter to Dave Haynie

Care to comment?

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Amiga Developer
Amiga 500, Efika, Mac Mini and PowerBook

@eXec

Quote:

AInc did not gave or sell those licenses so that they can not use them ifthey want? Or?

Exactly.

Amiga.Inc owns Amiga OS name, but it is EXCLUSIVELY licenced to Hyperion. Amiga.Inc can´t even use such names (eg. AmigaOS/Amiga OS/Amiga Operating System).

Also OS3 source code licence for Hyperion is exclusive - no-one (except Hyperion) can use original Amiga OS source codes.

@ferrels

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No one in his right mind is going to pay $3000+ USD for 7 year old technology

4 years, it is 4 years old technology!

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The price/performance ratio is just too out of line.

Considering PA6T (single core) will score at least 800 SpecInt2000 and the final price of X1000 will be around 2000 EUR - it is 0.4 SpecInt2000 per 1 EUR.

Compare it to Natami:
"68050" could be as fast as 700 MHz 68030 (according to Gunnar von Boehn) - roughly 30 SpecInt2000 (of course, I can give detailed calculations).
With price around 500 EUR - it is 0.06 SpecInt2000 per 1 EUR.

Natami will have nearly 10 times worser price/performance ratio in the CPU area than X1000!

@pavlor

Quote:

pavlor wrote: @eXec Quote: AInc did not gave or sell those licenses so that they can not use them ifthey want? Or? Exactly. Amiga.Inc owns Amiga OS name, but it is EXCLUSIVELY licenced to Hyperion. Amiga.Inc can´t even use such names (eg. AmigaOS/Amiga OS/Amiga Operating System). Also OS3 source code licence for Hyperion is exclusive - no-one (except Hyperion) can use original Amiga OS source codes.

What a stupid company to sell their intellectual property to some other alien company.
I have never heard for such stupid business move. Incredible. But hey, in Amiga world,
everything is possible. Even to have piracy and professional application free platform...



And what If hyperion bankrupts? the fully license goes back to Ainc?

Last edited by eXec on 18-Apr-2011 at 08:07 AM.

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...administration is for serious people only....

@pavlor

Quote:

pavlor wrote: @ferrels Quote: No one in his right mind is going to pay $3000+ USD for 7 year old technology 4 years, it is 4 years old technology! Quote: The price/performance ratio is just too out of line. Considering PA6T (single core) will score at least 800 SpecInt2000 and the final price of X1000 will be around 2000 EUR - it is 0.4 SpecInt2000 per 1 EUR. Compare it to Natami: "68050" could be as fast as 700 MHz 68030 (according to Gunnar von Boehn) - roughly 30 SpecInt2000 (of course, I can give detailed calculations). With price around 500 EUR - it is 0.06 SpecInt2000 per 1 EUR. Natami will have nearly 10 times worser price/performance ratio in the CPU area than X1000!

Still to expensive...far way too much... 1000¤ is the roof of the abnormal price..

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...administration is for serious people only....

@eXec

Companies sell their IP to other companies all the time.