First Natami MX boards produced

[spihunter]

You've got me wrong. I'm not being grumpy. I'm just saying that we are all well aware of how much vapor has come from Amiga projects from any stage of develpment. Look at Red's "Giant list of Amiga vapor thread"

I've never made any of those "in your face" comments and I'm not an OS4 user so I'm not sure why you seem to be linking me to any of that?

"You guys"?!

Hehe, look, the few people responsible for the flooding of Commodore USA threads are a handful of loud Hyperion supporters starting thread after thread about how much they don't want to see Commodore USA threads! :lol: :lol: :lol:

Look, someone made some statement like: "in your face, you people who thought this was vapor ware", and I simply responded that it still is! Because it is! And so is "x1000" BTW. And Clone-A. And..., and..., and...

Edit: http://www.amiga.org/forums/showthread.php?t=29050

Many are the Amiga related HW projects that was shelved after the first PCB's were made, but before real commercialization. *Most* projects in fact, much more than the few examples I showed pictures of above. Maybe it is because when you have your prototype ready, you have to start thinking about the economic reality. Commercial Viability, Risk Assessment, etc. Possibly this is a *much bigger challenge* than doing the engineering stuff, and that's why almost all projects fail in this stage. I'm not saying that the NatAmi will fail. I'm just saying it's way too soon to lift the "vapor" label from it. It has yet to face its biggest challenge...

That doesn't mean I don't like the project (I honestly do), so please quit the grumpy comments...

[Franko]

"You guys"?!

Hehe, look, the few people responsible for the flooding of Commodore USA threads are a handful of loud Hyperion supporters starting thread after thread about how much they don't want to see Commodore USA threads! :lol: :lol: :lol:

I was one of those who flooded the "those who shall not be named" threads but I don't give a frig about Hyperion either...

At least the NatAmi developers have shown us the actual hardware that they have created and not just some empty cases that "those who shall not be named" have displayed...

[biggun]

Many are the Amiga related HW projects that was shelved after the first PCB's were made, but before real commercialization. *Most* projects in fact, much more than the few examples I showed pictures of above. Maybe it is because when you have your prototype ready, you have to start thinking about the economic reality. Commercial Viability, Risk Assessment, etc.

Yes, but there was a major differance in those projects and the NATAMI.
Thomas does this whole project as his personal quest to revive the AMIGA -
The NATAMI project is not done to make any money.

All of the team know that we will not make any money on this.
But money is not our goal.

[nicholas]

I wonder if either the MorphOS Team or Hyperion are going to backport their OS's to the Natami?

Whichever gets there first (AROS, MorphOS, Hyperion OS4) could become the new defacto standard for 68k Amiga OS.

[amigadave]

I wonder if either the MorphOS Team or Hyperion are going to backport their OS's to the Natami?

Whichever gets there first (AROS, MorphOS, Hyperion OS4) could become the new defacto standard for 68k Amiga OS.

Since both OS4 and MorphOS are PPC only they will never be "back ported" to the Natami board.  AROS 68k is very probably though, but I think AmigaOS3.1 to 3.9 will be used by most people on the Natami when it is first released.

[nicholas]

Since both OS4 and MorphOS are PPC only they will never be "back ported" to the Natami board.  AROS 68k is very probably though, but I think AmigaOS3.1 to 3.9 will be used by most people on the Natami when it is first released.

Both OS4 and MorphOS are written mostly in C AFAIK.
The work required to port either to 68k would be considerably less than a port to x86.

[kolla]

Could you lot stop quoting takemehomegrandma so much? He's on my ignore list for a reason, you're not helping! :laughing:

Would love to see a video of this Natami board actually running AmigaOS and demoing some applications, like Deluxe Paint for example. Oh, and next to the Amiga checkmark, the Natami logo is IMO the coolest one in the amigasphere

[Franko]

Well I heard takemehomegrandma said this and that and something else as well...

[takemehomegrandma]

Yes, but there was a major differance in those projects and the NATAMI.
Thomas does this whole project as his personal quest to revive the AMIGA -
The NATAMI project is not done to make any money.

All of the team know that we will not make any money on this.
But money is not our goal.

That's not what I'm saying. I fully understand that money isn't your motivator, but that doesn't take money out of the equation. Making a few prototypes can't be much of a problem, you could probably take some spare cash from your last monthly salary. Volume usually makes the per-unit price lower (which is of great interest to potential customers), but to produce a batch as low as 100 motherboards would require a considerable sum of cash up front, with many months until you have it back, with a substantial risk of not getting it back at all. Maybe you can do like Minimig, either offer a plain empty PCB with a Bill of Materials or hand it over to someone like Acube who might be willing to take the risk for you? They did that for the Minimig, remember? Just a thought.

Anyway, it's good to see the progress you are making, and I'm looking forward to see some videos of the thing running! If prices aren't too steep when it gets here, I'll probably buy one just of curiosity! It's a real cool procejt!

[takemehomegrandma]

Could you lot stop quoting takemehomegrandma so much? He's on my ignore list for a reason, you're not helping! :laughing:

:lol: :lol: :lol:

Well some time ago I for a moment was playing with the thought of putting you kolla on that list, but I didn't. Not because your contributions to threads any valuable at all, they are mostly vitriol about this and that and just about anything.

But in a general way of speaking, I would honestly feel crippled knowing that there are discussions going, things said, news spread, etc which I haven't got a clue of, or that I might miss out on big chunks of the discussions that *I am part* of.

So since the concept of ignore lists isn't really working for me, I have decided that kolla is put on my "mental" ignore list instead. I am a grown up, I can usually handle kolla's vitriol, and when I can't I simply scroll past them quickly!

[Retro_71]

I was the one that said the comment about Vaporware and yes i know that they need to produce boards but considering people thought (and prob still do) that they would never even get to this stage because of feature creep or it was going to be difficult, (i have been watching Natami for years now so i remember all the crap people said about them....) so for them to come up with the bring up board which means its almost ready is great.
SO again i say to all those people :p:p:p:p:p:p:p:p:p:p

[vidarh]

I saw nowhere mention of it being inner dimensions for the cube, so i thought it was total; but anyway, consider the blank space between the plexiglass and the inner chassis, the chassis itself, the height of the whole chassis is around 2/3 of the total cube.

The dimensions I posted are the inner  chassis.

And yes, you would need to make changes - the easiest would probably be to cut out the part of the backplate with the connectors, rip out everything inside, and cut a new backplate to fit the Natami + some extension cables. Not a huge deal. The main thing is the Natami board is small enough to fit with a good margin.

[vidarh]

So, what are the main technical differences ?
Do they offer the same functionality ?
Are they meant to cover the same area of use ?
Price difference ?
Production difference ? (Handmade / Machine made)
What can A do that B does not ?

They're very different:

FPGA Arcade will offer 68030 to 68040 level performance depending how much performance they manage to squeeze out of the TG68 core. Not sure about the softcore performance on the Natami, but the (optional) CPU boards are 133MHz 68060's and I believe their aiming for higher performance with the softcore when its ready/integrated (better/wider memory interface, more work per clock etc.). The Natami also seems to have a far faster memory interface that'll completely crush any classic and leave the FPGA Arcade in the dust too if they manage to make full use of it.

Functionality wise, they're similar though there are lots of small differences other than that the Natami has lots more memory (512MB on the board vs. 64MB I think for the FPGA Arcade), "SuperAGA" - lots of new screen modes, massively faster blitter etc. and they're talking about other enhancements such as extra coppers etc., while FPGA Arcade is AGA with possibly some smaller extensions (higher resolution, chunky modes etc. - whatever yaqcube manages to squeeze into the smaller FPGA).

FPGA Arcade isn't Amiga specific, though - there'll be C64 cores, Atari cores and a bunch of others, while the Natami is aimed squarely at being a modernized Amiga.

Price estimates of the FPGA Arcade is in the 200 euro range (+/-), while I don't know the price the Natami will end up at (they don't know for sure either, though I'm sure they have a better idea than me, but they're holding off on announcing a price until they know spot prices for the components when ordering). I'd be surprised if it ends up lower than the 600 euro range, though, given the complexity and the size/cost of the FPGA's chosen etc.

Basically, I'd consider FPGA Arcade as a heavily upgraded Minimig replacement that could also likely take the place of a not-that-heavily-expanded A1200 level machine + offer ability to use with other cores, while the Natami is offering performance and features beyond most heavily expanded classics with the exception of lack of PPC expansions (so far anyway - it has the expansion slot they use for the current 68060 boards).

[Gryfon]

As a long-time fan and Amiga.org lurker, I've been watching the Natami project with great interest. If this lands I'm definitely laying down cash on one.  I'm looking forward to getting 3.9 on it and all the setup & config stuff - always was a pleasure to do on an Amiga.

Big thanks to the Natami Team for your efforts and I wish you all well!

[Crom00]

I love it when homebrew projects achieve a level of completion heads ABOVE ANYTHING ever produced by the IP holders. YUM YUM GIMME SOME! Will get this once it's available. How many of us here want a CLASSIC OS machine on steroids the 060 machine that was too expensive? AGA was cool but it needed a bit more oommmpphh... the A4000 needed an audio DSP well now we have it.

This is the Amiga that should have been released in 1993.

[spihunter]

And that folks is why this project will see the light of day. I think the Amiga curse will finally go away when the platform is totally in the hands of the hobbiest. Things only go wrong when someone steps in and thinks their going to make a buck on this small community.......

Yes, but there was a major differance in those projects and the NATAMI.
Thomas does this whole project as his personal quest to revive the AMIGA -
The NATAMI project is not done to make any money.

All of the team know that we will not make any money on this.
But money is not our goal.