@ExiE

Quote:

But for the desktop, i dont see any future which is based on undepowered (well that is the thing i can live with after all), overpriced (that is the reason why I wont buy A1, even if A1 was missing some 'features' making it even less usable)

I agree 100%. I just hope that IF Hyperion has plans for the desktop apart from a costly developer machine for embedded projects, that they will swallow their pride and seriously consider an x86 port.

With Eyetech apparently out of the picture, for Hyperions sake I can't understand how they believe they'll get more OS4 users on PPC.

Apart from the fact that Hyperion seems to like PPC processors, I think their OS4 license might be one of the reasons why they are so strongly opposed to all the talk about an x86 port.

I see no valid reasons for staying on PPC if they're targetting the desktop.

Hyperion is welcome to comment on this thread..

Vidar

@hazydave

My exposure to PC systems is from the very low level (I used to write device drivers as a hobby back in the MSDOS days, the one I'm most proud of is a dma-capable 82077 fdc driver) and from the very high level (writing and testing C# code is my current day job), so I must admit that the "administrative" innards of an OS are not my forte. I bow to your superior knowledge there.

About the Z80 line though, Zilog still seems to be making them. I know because I'm slowly teaching myself digital electronics, and my "course project" is a simple 80s style SBC, so I've been doing research (so many cool chips have been discontinued ). My point was not that these chips are viable desktop candidates, just that embedded chips have a *much* longer shelf life than desktop parts. I would not be surprised to see toasters powered by Athlon chips in 20 years time (when everything's connected to an IPv6 network, and we need a firewall to prevent the fridge from getting 0wned by some kid)

I must say that I'm slowly becoming more and more disturbed by this thread... are we *really* avoiding x86 *just* for 'religious' reasons?

@VidarL

if they would dump PPC, and go x86, I am sure that lots of people, who have bought AmigaOnes, will leave... And then people would begin trolling about "why does AmigaOS not run on xyz hardware"... the most of the "we want x86 people" will not be pleased when it does only run on a few special motherboards...

_________________
Best regards,
hnl_dk - Henning Nielsen Lund [Denmark]

Please send no PM to me, email me if you want to contact me. See you somewhere else.

@hnl_dk

Its only US that will run it to begin with. Chose some common hardware config to begin with and let the diehard community develop drivers. Look at this community! It would surprise me if there wouldn be drivers out within some time.
The amiga community is the most reliable one in the world. I think we have proven that over and over. No other community would stand out what we´ve been through.

Just have a look at aminet!
Look at the forums!

Allmost everyone of us can run WinXP and Linux but still we´re here as eager as allways.

@hnl_dk

There's where a Steve Jobs would get handy so we could have a straight path, perhaps Jim Collas could do it as it had the Carisma to do it, or even...
BBRV themselves!

Last edited by pixie on 13-Jan-2006 at 09:40 PM.

_________________
Indigo 3D Lounge, my second home.
The Illusion of Choice | Am*ga

Quote:

hnl_dk wrote: @VidarL if they would dump PPC, and go x86, I am sure that lots of people, who have bought AmigaOnes, will leave... And then people would begin trolling about "why does AmigaOS not run on xyz hardware"... the most of the "we want x86 people" will not be pleased when it does only run on a few special motherboards...

I'm sure a lot of people that have bought PPC Amiga's will be pissed if they just dump PPC. But they don't have to dump PPC in order to make a port to x86.

While it's likely that the PPC version will fade away IF the x86 version turns out to be popular, I don't think that's to bad, because if that happens the Amiga market will be growing for the first time in many years. If growing the market means that some people will get no more OS updates for hardware they bought several years ago, then so be it.

As for an eventual port to x86 only running on a few special motherboard, did you read anything of what Dave Haynie has been writing here?

You support a couple of chipsets from the start, which means that all motherboards using those chipsets will at least function, but depending on the extra chips like firewire controllers, SATA RAID controllers etc, it might be with reduced functionality. How is this different from the soundcard compatitbility lists for OS4 at the moment? As time goes on, you write more chipset drivers, and more motherboards will be supported. If this is communicated clearly from the start, I strongly believe it will be a non-issue.

Let's say Hyperion writes drivers for the RD580 chipset from ATI (will be launched on the 24th) and the nForce4 chipset from nVidia. Suddenly you have many dozens of motherboards to choose from.

If Hyperion is afraid of some users complaining of the fact that it doesn't run on their PC, they can do the Apple thing, and only sell complete x86 systems, with a custom BIOS in order to prevent Windows from running on this x86 Amiga, and from running x86 AmigaOS on other x86 motherboards. They would still have plenty of hardware to sell, and at vastly lower prices than any desktop PPC solution that looks likely to emerge in the next few years.

Vidar

And who said they had to dump the PPC?

They would still benefit from the developers software for whatever they wanted to do with PPC. Simply crosscompile!

Use the right cpu for the right device, ie PPC5200 for system-on-a-chip computer the size of a matchstick box, and common PC hardware for the high end desktop.

We should follow the stream instead of fighting it because we´re to few people nowdays. Maybe we can make that change if we´re given the chance.

And to all of you who thinks of x86 as a turnoff, you would love it, you just dont know it yet!

@VidarL

Quote:

...As for an eventual port to x86 only running on a few special motherboard, did you read anything of what Dave Haynie has been writing here? ...

Yes I have, but I am realistic...

_________________
Best regards,
hnl_dk - Henning Nielsen Lund [Denmark]

Please send no PM to me, email me if you want to contact me. See you somewhere else.

@umisef

Quote:

@syrtran [Quote] I wasn't making a timeline, rather it's about a single point in time - the point that Hyperion decided to make OS4 for a new processor (i.e. not 68K). I was pointing out that there were only two "dual-ISA" options, yours, and Phase 5/DCEs. My -only- point was that PPC was really their only option -at that time-.

And there we disagree. AT THAT TIME, nobody at Hyperion had the slightest clue there was any problem with Amithlon. Nor did I, or Harald. Or anyone else, for that matter, with the possible exception of H&P. Also, there wasn't much of a problem with Amithlon itself, just with Amithlon as distributed by H&P. There certainly was no problem whatsoever with the underlying emulation technology (which would have been the part interesting for a hypothetical OS4/x86).
[/quote]
Yes, you are right, which I pointed out in my very next sentence:
Quote:

Actually, as your timeline points out, they could have -started- using Amithlon to port it to x86, but the subsequent public firefight and your "take-down" order(*) would have made it very difficult for them to continue on that path.

For all we know, somebody -did- try it.
Quote:

Are you sure there ever was any version of OS4 which ran the kernel on the PPC, but used the REAL(!) 68k processor for 68k code? I am always willing to learn, but unless you can point me at some documentation of such a version,

Again, you are right. I don't know for sure if they were using the actual 68k. I only figured they did 'cause I thought it would've taken them even longer to write an emulator that would switch in/out only when necessary. Since I've got that right here on OS4, maybe they did write the emulator first.

In any case, they still needed access to the custom chips while they were doing the port. Other than Amithlon, there was no way to do this for x86, unless someone made a special bridge board (PCI or ISA slot to Amiga CPU slot).

_________________
Tony T.

People who generalize are always wrong.


1989 - 500 / 1991 - 3000 / 1997 - Genesis Flyer 1200T / 2003 - A1XE

@ExiE
I think we can forget about the conventional
notion of a "desktop computer" in that the
original Amiga was able to expand that notion
far beyond what the other players in the industry
had in mind at the time. This notion of a multi-
function device/computer is finally catching
up to what was envisioned over 20 years ago.

Can that still be accomplished with what we
have in the works now? The mainstream
stuff has evolved into something like we would
want, only it comes at the cost of a lot of M$/
Apple or Linux bloatware and computer HW
that has to be be 800x faster to do what we
hoped it might be able to to do 20 years ago.
Is this progress?!!

The other reason I always admired the original
Amiga was that the people behind it seemed to
be able to accomplish a great deal more
with a lot less $$$ (and Mhz).

@hazydave
Respeck
Ali G mode off

Last edited by Maczilla on 13-Jan-2006 at 11:38 PM.

@hnl_dk

Quote:

hnl_dk wrote: @VidarL if they would dump PPC, and go x86, I am sure that lots of people, who have bought AmigaOnes, will leave...

Who said anything about dumping PPC? There are alot of PPC AmigaOnes in use, they're not going to dissappear. AmigaOS4 PPC would still work, there's still PPC boards being planned, there's still PPC in embedded stuff. There's alot of x86 in embedded stuff too, this could even make AmigaOS4 more attractive in that market too.

Quote:

And then people would begin trolling about "why does AmigaOS not run on xyz hardware"...

Big deal, we just enter the thread, slap them around and make them look silly, I mean, c'mon, if it ran on PPC AND x86, it would be a rediculous troll

Quote:

the most of the "we want x86 people" will not be pleased when it does only run on a few special motherboards...

Why? You're afraid that the people requesting reasonable measures to keep the platform alive, are going to suddenly become unreasonable?

edit - screwed up quote tags

Last edited by T_Bone on 13-Jan-2006 at 10:07 PM.

_________________
"If you want to tell people the truth, make them laugh, otherwise they'll kill you." - Oscar Wilde

@hnl_dk

Quote:

hnl_dk wrote: @VidarL Quote: ...As for an eventual port to x86 only running on a few special motherboard, did you read anything of what Dave Haynie has been writing here? ... Yes I have, but I am realistic...

Well, assuming that an x86 AmigaOS port, worst case scenario, only manages to run on the same boards AROS runs on, well, that's most motherboards. I haven't found one yet that won't run AROS.

If it's already been done before, I'd say that's realistic.

edit: Plus, Eyeam would come back!

Last edited by T_Bone on 13-Jan-2006 at 10:17 PM.
Last edited by T_Bone on 13-Jan-2006 at 10:13 PM.

_________________
"If you want to tell people the truth, make them laugh, otherwise they'll kill you." - Oscar Wilde

@Maczilla

Quote:

if they would dump PPC, and go x86, I am sure that lots of people, who have bought AmigaOnes, will leave...

uh what's realistic about that? There are people who bought A1s and keep asking about faster processor boards ie. more powerfull machines... theoretically if they can get whole computer that is faster than the processor board for A1 for the same price, they wont complain...
I said theoretically coz there presumably wont be any faster processor cards in the future for A1...

Few other A1 owners stated they would buy completly new system if it would be more powerfull, so whats the difference between ppc and x86 (AMD for exmaple)

@Maczilla
Quote:

I think we can forget about the conventional notion of a "desktop computer"

well i used the DESKTOP computer notion just to point out there is huge difference between using AmigaOS4 as desktop OS and OS for some other devices...

I believe Hyperion is in fact primary heading for the "other devices" and this should explain a lot

Couldn't the choice that Hyperion sticks with PowerPC be due to the fact that the know it, with their history in game developing for PPC?

In 2001 the choice for PPC must have been pretty obviuos. There was PPC-hardware to develop on, Amigas with Phase5-cards, so they could start with it right away, and also get beta-testers directly. If they'd opted for x86 in 2001, of course they might be ready with it by now, but it probably would have been harder.
With the Phase5-PPC-cards they could slowly move to all PPC. Not ported software still worked on the hardware, with a few modules as PPC. With x86 the 68k-programs wouldn't work at all and there'd be a longer initial developing (getting a kernel to load).
Perhaps it would have been possible to use UAE. I don't know.

Actually, I don't have a clue about anything, but it seems likely that they choose PPC as the inital processor since there wers machines to develop on. And Hyperion know how to do PPC-programming.

But, I'll say it again, I don't know.

_________________

@hazydave

First, I want you to know that I am a big admirer of your work (looks over at 3000 sitting unpowered next to A1 that is slowly replacing it).



That being said:
Quote:

I think the big problem is that Hyperion's chasing this dragon of PPC, and the hardware's not something they really do control well. They could have done a straight port to the PC in much less time...

You've repeated this a couple times in this thread. I just want to say:

WRONG!

(Boy, first I'm, er, "discussing" with Bernie, now, you. I'm taking shots at all my heros, today )

To start off, I'm a professional programmer. I've been a professional programmer for 25 years. At one point I was sysadmin on a small IBM mainframe (a 4361, if anyone cares). I even got to do sysgens. I started programming in high school in 1972 on an 1130.

And I still get torqued when non-programmers decide that a software project should've happened faster.

Even though I've been a hardware hacker on and off those past 30 years (I built my own -working- parallel port card and 4k RAM card for a Heathkit H8 I built way back in '80 - from individual components, I might add), you don't see me telling you that the PIOS-1 should've appeared 6 months sooner. You don't hear me telling you that you take too long developing your digital R/C controls (you work for Futaba?). That's because I -don't- know how long it will or should have taken. While I -understand- the process, I don't -live- it.

This is the kind of attitude that I would expect more from the PHBs you had to deal with back in the "good ole' days" than from the h/w guru who did the dealing.

What you are suggesting is that the OS4 port could have been rewritten, almost from scratch, without endian problems, without CPU dependencies, without Agnus/Alice dependencies, without CIA dependencies, without your own Zorro 3 dependencies, in less than five years. Linux took longer than that. Beos took longer than that. Heck, even Windows NT took longer than that. And those are from companies/groups that had something Hyperion doesn't: lots of programmers.

Where's SkyOS? Where's AROS? Where's Syllable? These projects have taken even -longer- than OS4. Why? Lack of resources. Lack of programmers, money, and time.

I don't know how much of the history of OS4 you know about, but there were times in the last 5 years that Amiga Inc. appeared to have -no- money to give Hyperion. During those times, work on OS4 obviously stalled. The Hyperion crew had to go and do jobs that made them money. Any work on OS4 during those times was more a labor of love. These guys did it 'cause they WANTED to.

I still respect you, but don't go telling programmers how to program, especially when it's not putting food on the table.

_________________
Tony T.

People who generalize are always wrong.


1989 - 500 / 1991 - 3000 / 1997 - Genesis Flyer 1200T / 2003 - A1XE

I think the whole point of Mr Haynie is no more than, in resume, that there is no good enough hardware available just here-just now in order to get a properly named AMIGA board, to run AOS in desktop flavour, because the performance wise would be some times better that the best personal computer you could buy.

I usually dream with an Amiga board with a dual core G4 for general calcule purposes and a CELL for the multimedia job ( doing the jobs of the old good amiga custom chips )

That would be stunning, even compared to the current AMD and Intel CPUs performance

Hello Mr.Haynie! ( where is the reverence smiley? )

Last edited by FrankBrana on 13-Jan-2006 at 11:05 PM.
Last edited by FrankBrana on 13-Jan-2006 at 11:03 PM.
Last edited by FrankBrana on 13-Jan-2006 at 10:59 PM.

So why are so many eager to dump the PowerPC?

We are finally at the stage when AmigaOS is almost finished. So hey! Lets dump the PowerPC, port it over to some PC that by the time you finish your port to it will be again out of date. Oh, and lets not forget that NOTHING will run on it from the old Amiga as everything would have to be emulated. I am sorry, but what a waste of time that project would be. Not to mention that the X86 or whatever it is will probably not scale all that well.

G4's, and G5's are nothing more than a spring board. I look at my A1 as a development board. Not the killer all doing and computer envy board, just a platform that allows the development of applications and allows me to run OS4.

Half the people that have these great powerhouse CPU's do not even use them with the exception of running spyware and viruses.

Just perhaps we should give these new companies a chance to see what they come up with. If you want run UAE on your PC and stick with the past and rely on Microsoft to keep you running. Don't think that the PC is any great machine. They can keep their duel core, then what is next Quadruple core. Why is it that this approach is needed. For what? So you can surf the web? Give the Amiga hardware developers a break will ya and stop judging the Amiga One as a top of the line PC. It is just a developer board, nothing more.

@Cyborg

Note that AMD’s Yamato laptop reference is being develop by AMD, NVIDIA and IBM Japan.

_________________
Ryzen 9 7900X, DDR5-6000 64 GB RAM, GeForce RTX 4080 16 GB
Amiga 1200 (Rev 1D1, KS 3.2, PiStorm32lite/RPi 4B 4GB/Emu68)
Amiga 500 (Rev 6A, KS 3.2, PiStorm/RPi 3a/Emu68)

my mustache is bigger than yours Dave Haynie....




and i have more and better computer than you..., you have no chance to compete with my x86 computers!!!!..

Last edited by d0c on 14-Jan-2006 at 02:46 AM.
Last edited by d0c on 14-Jan-2006 at 02:45 AM.

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I was a ZX Spectrum owner....