Amithlon vs. IcAros

[Gulliver]

Hi everyone, i need some advice, i made up my mind, i want a new Amiga/Amiga clone/AmigaOSlike setup, i dont want to start a flamewar! After dealing with the fact that a Sam with OS4 is too expensive, an efika with Morphos registered too, i have decided to go either the Amithlon or IcAros route.
I have both CDs/DVDs with their latest incarnations. Which one should i choose?
I think IcAros rocks but Amithlon has WarpOS support. So which one boots faster? Which one performs faster? Need your opinions and advice. I dont care that both of them are picky on the hardware and the fact that Amithlon needs several updates to be applied to have reasonable hw support.

Hope you can help me decide

[Kronos]

I think IcAros rocks but Amithlon has WarpOS support.

Now that would be an miracle to say the least, since WarpOS is PPC and Amithon only does 68k (and to some extent x86).

Amithlon does run 68k-apps that don't require the chipset, and it does at speed unrivaled by anything on the same HW. Problem is it has been pulled from the market in 2002 and support for never HW dried up some time later.

AROS only runs x86 and the number of AROS-apps is limited. 68k-SW does run in a somewhat intregrated UAE but it's also slower/less developed than WinUAE.

Honestly, cut down WinXP and run WinUAE just as if AmigaOS was the  only OS running.

[Gulliver]

The thing is that i dislike Windows, i dont want to wait 30 secs to get windows booted and 10 more for an AmigaOS/WINUAE enviroment, and have to put up with windows propaganda while at it! Anyway thanks for your reply!

[bloodline]

The thing is that i dislike Windows, i dont want to wait 30 secs to get windows booted and 10 more for an AmigaOS/WINUAE enviroment, and have to put up with windows propaganda while at it! Anyway thanks for your reply!

If you don't want to go the WinUAE route... then Icaros it is

[stefcep2]

The thing is that i dislike Windows, i dont want to wait 30 secs to get windows booted and 10 more for an AmigaOS/WINUAE enviroment, and have to put up with windows propaganda while at it! Anyway thanks for your reply!

Hmmm, so you, like me, see the value of a fast booting OS.  The consensus of opinion by the intelligentsia here is that a fast boot is unnecessary, as you can juts leave your PC in standby indefinately, never ever turning it off.  Despite this its odd how often someone comes along and thinks a fast boot is A Good Thing.

Back on topic which you choose will ultimately depend on if you have Amithlon-compatible HW and what SW you want to run.  Amithlon runs 68k apps that are RTG only-so no games or demos, at an insane speed.
AROS runs 68 k software under emulation, and a limited range of x86 software.

[Gulliver]

How does IcAros perform using UAE compared to Amithlon using UAE? I guess it comes down to this, since i enjoy and mostly be using using 68k applications.

[Piru]

How does IcAros perform using UAE compared to Amithlon using UAE?

Amithlon is faster, mainly because you can use OS friendly apps directly without UAE. If you run UAE, both are pretty much identical (assuming there's UAE build which uses the x86 code under Amithlon, I have no clue if it does).

If you're only going to use UAE then you shouldn't bother with neither. Neither have UAE as good as WinUAE. Seriously, you should try suspending the windows box rather than powering it down. ;-)

[cicero790]

IcAROS is a living breathing Amiga OS, that is continually worked on and updated.

[kzin]

The 68k UAE works OK under amithilon, but you realy only need it for games. Most other apps can be retargeted with "Newmode" if they needit. I had amithilon running on a Athlon XP 1800+ it was like having a 2GHz 040, But I nolonger use it as the Hardware I wanted was not compatable, almost no ATI support and forget many of the SATA controlers, limit of 1GB mem max, seems to me that the best hardware was in the Athlon XP range. it just wont boot on my dual Opteron setup.

But On the correct hardware you wont look back.

[spihunter]

You could always get Amiga forever and use the cut down Linux kernal boot method.
This way you wont need windows and it boots right into workbench.

http://www.amigaforever.com/kb/13-129

[mpiva]

Hmmm, so you, like me, see the value of a fast booting OS.  The consensus of opinion by the intelligentsia here is that a fast boot is unnecessary, as you can juts leave your PC in standby indefinately, never ever turning it off.  Despite this its odd how often someone comes along and thinks a fast boot is A Good Thing.

Standby is fine for desktops but when it comes to laptops, I'd much rather power down to save my battery.  Coincidentally, using a laptop is precisely the time when fast boot time is desirable.  When you only have a 15min coffee break, a 30sec boot time is 29sec too long.

I used to use Amithlon on my laptop all the time.  Unfortunately I've got a newer laptop and Amithlon doesn't really work on it.    I sure wish Amithlon had never died. Personally I think Amiga Inc should have snatched up Amithlon and used it as a migratory path to AmigaOS 4.0 for x86 instead of going the PPC route.  But that's just my opinion and I hope this thread doesn't degrade into some "PPC vs x86" flamewar just because I stated my opinion.

[Crumb]

Get a Mac Mini G4 and run MorphOS this year :-)

If you are interested on Amithlon you could get an old peecee from the trashcan.

[jj]

Standby is fine for desktops but when it comes to laptops, I'd much rather power down to save my battery. Coincidentally, using a laptop is precisely the time when fast boot time is desirable. When you only have a 15min coffee break, a 30sec boot time is 29sec too long.
 
I used to use Amithlon on my laptop all the time. Unfortunately I've got a newer laptop and Amithlon doesn't really work on it. I sure wish Amithlon had never died. Personally I think Amiga Inc should have snatched up Amithlon and used it as a migratory path to AmigaOS 4.0 for x86 instead of going the PPC route. But that's just my opinion and I hope this thread doesn't degrade into some "PPC vs x86" flamewar just because I stated my opinion.

 
As long as lapop lugged in to power suppply where is the problem

[the_leander]

Hmmm, so you, like me, see the value of a fast booting OS.  The consensus of opinion by the intelligentsia here is that a fast boot is unnecessary, as you can juts leave your PC in standby indefinately, never ever turning it off.  Despite this its odd how often someone comes along and thinks a fast boot is A Good Thing.

Standby is fine, personally I prefer hibernate (zero power state).

And there are any number of cut down linux systems that boot extremely fast if that's what gets you going. Personally I prefer a more rounded system such as Elive.

And yes, a fast boot is unnecessary when you have options such as suspend and hibernate at your disposal. Why should I waste my time booting up from cold when I can come out of hibernation and have the added bonus of all my applications being just where I left them?

Back on topic which you choose will ultimately depend on if you have Amithlon-compatible HW and what SW you want to run.  Amithlon runs 68k apps that are RTG only-so no games or demos, at an insane speed.
AROS runs 68 k software under emulation, and a limited range of x86 software.

Games that support re-targeting should work just fine, how many of those there are however is an interesting question.

Tbh I think XP having had BartPE run over it would be fine - the end result would be an extremely cut down windows system that would still allow the use of WinUAE. Or, if you absolutely must have something other then windows, a cut down linux operating as a launch platform for UAE would do much the same.