Video: AROS 68K Booting

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There needs to be some serious optimization or other trickery applied to make it possible, as currently the image is way larger than 512KB.

Is that feat really needed? The only reason I can think for wanting AROS in classic amiga (expanded or not) is to get new features for the operative system beyond what 3.9 may offer. Instead of attempting to fit everything in less than 512kb, wouldn't it be easier to boot (from a hard disk) 68k AROS using the original kickstart ROM?

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Why be content with today's kickstart?

Why not? Look at the x86 bios, I can't think of any new features since the days of the 386, at most it supports new hardware, which is not an issue with classic amiga models. All new features can be implemented in the AROS. There might be some small issues, like having to create a boot partition in big hard disks or hard disks with newer filesystems, but having modern/free software makes it worth it.

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But Kickstart is way more than just the BIOS, it's also the core of the OS.

Personally I'd like to boot directly into my RTG screen without having to screw with flickerfixers or ancient monitors and you can't do that unless Kickstart includes RTG.

A more simple solution would be to get a "small" HDTV TV, you could connect the amiga RCA video out to one of the composite video in and connect the RTG card to the VGA port, you can get the best of both worlds, what you really need is an adapter that converts the amiga video port to scart or component to get the best screen quality.

No, please... let's not, look at EFI instead.

I prefer OpenBIOS, EFI was created by Intel with the evil intentions of removing the control you have over you own computer and giving it Windows or OSX (or any other closed source OS).

As I see it, AROS boot roms for classic machines should be able to boot from supported USB interfaces, boot from CD or DVD or USB drives, be upgraded to support other file systems, etc.

Booting from CD/DVD/USB sound nice until you ask yourself, what I am goint to boot besides Workbench/Wanderer? Linux and any other OS is dog slow and AROS is getting access to the same apps available in linux. ATM I cannot think of any other OS that would be available to boot in a classic amiga, so why bother.

Booting from other filesystem is not really needed, as I explained you can create a boot partition to access any other installed filesystem.

As I see it, all the hard work that would be required to cram AROS into 512kb can be used in other projects, it should be far easier to place only the real essentials in said AROS rom (that can include RTG, CD/DVD/USB boot, other filesystems) and load anything else from hard disk.

Mhh, maybe the AROS roms should fork into two, one rom for classic amigas so they can run the latest AROS and one for emulators/minimig/natami with the intention of reimplementing the original kickstart (even if it doubles in size to 1 Mb).

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What's the difference from a user point of view ?

I don't see any...

ATM there is none, but their plan it to eventually prevent you from installing free and open operative systems (i.e. linux, aros) using any excuse (like the lack of proper DRM) to justify the need for motherboard manufacturers to install said bios.

If the plan was to simply improve the bios they would have gone with openbios (like apple used to before switching to EFI).