Mac PPCs and Amiga PPCs - OS compatibility?

[bloodline]

So from my point of view the best thing for the Amiga would be AmigaOS 5.0 on x86!!!

Then use AROS!!!!


oh, and um... yes, I'll hype AROS to all who will listen... and since it's free, and runs on the most common, most powerfull and cheapest hardware avaiable for the desktop... I see no harm in what I do  :-D

[Melaure]

The idea of an Amiga OS 4 running on PowerMac sound great but seem irrealistic. Sure I would buy one if it was the case. But First Apple protect it's hardware, second it's a big job to develop the kernel and drivers for Mac hardware ...

[Staticman]

doing that would clash with the whole OS4 licensing issue to prevent piracy.

despite it being a nice idea it is unrealistic.

[bloodline]

Melaure wrote:
The idea of an Amiga OS 4 running on PowerMac sound great but seem irrealistic. Sure I would buy one if it was the case. But First Apple protect it's hardware, second it's a big job to develop the kernel and drivers for Mac hardware ...

The only real thing in the way of running AOS4 on a mac is AOS4's reliance on uBOOT firmware... any chipset issues could be overcome by looking at the Linux sources.

Already the PPC version of AROS should be able to boot older OF based macs.

[Iggy_Drougge]

Sadly, the PC is the only machine which actually does run AROS. The Amiga port has been abandoned for a long time, though I do hear news about someone investigating its re-portability once more.

What would actually make AROS useful right now would be a port to m68k Macs. They're extremely cheap, and use the same processor, so there should be a high degree of binary compatibility with cleanly written Amiga software, at least if you fill out the blanks in AROS with bits and pieces from your own copy of OS3.

[bloodline]

Iggy_Drougge wrote:
Sadly, the PC is the only machine which actually does run AROS. The Amiga port has been abandoned for a long time, though I do hear news about someone investigating its re-portability once more.

What would actually make AROS useful right now would be a port to m68k Macs. They're extremely cheap, and use the same processor, so there should be a high degree of binary compatibility with cleanly written Amiga software, at least if you fill out the blanks in AROS with bits and pieces from your own copy of OS3.

Hmmm, good point.

Booting an Original 68K is a serious issue though... does any one still have the knowledge required to boot these things?

68K port of AROS is fine by the way, it boot the Palm (which uses the 68k compatible Dragonball CPU) fine and also runs (now with touchcreen support)!!!  :-o

Also AROS can now boot OF based PPC boards too... :-)

We're getting there

[Iggy_Drougge]

Cold booting a 68k Mac straight into an alien OS is a bit difficult. It's not undoable, but there is a lot of hardware out there which needs to be set up before use (much like most VGA cards, which have a ROM with x86 code used to set the card up, making their use on non-PCs next to impossible), but once MacOS has done its job, nothing prevents you from using a second OS loader to throw MacOS out.
NetBSD has been ported to the Mac since ages, and it uses this approach (though a bootloader not involving MacOS at all has also been investigated). And since it's BSD, it's free for your use.

Another path is that one used by MagiC, a reimplementation of Atari's TOS. While it's originally for the real Ataris, it's been ported to the Mac, but runs inside MacOS, on its own screen. This makes porting much simpler, since you're addressing MacOS interfaces, instead of the hardware devices themselves. Much like Shapeshifter et al on the Amiga. I've always wondered why no-one just ripped the CPU emulation out of UAE and compiled it for the Mac. After all, there is already a MacUAE, just not for the 68k ones.

(On another note, the only way to play MP3s on a 68k Mac is by running an Atari MP3 player under MagiC; Mac users themselves have always claimed that a 68k processor can't handle the load. ;-)

[Kronos]

@Iggy_Drougge

Not sure where you were pointin at ...

Something like running AmigaOS in an UAE where the 68k-emu
is replaced by the actual 68k in the Mac ?

Sounds good, won't work ...
There are alot of dependancies between the chipset-emu and
the 68k, which just wouldn't work with the real 68k.

One could try to start from the point were the Draco left,
but that would require lots of work in that machines
Hard and Software.

My advice (properly useless): Port the x11-hosted version
of AROS to Mac(68k)/BSD.
Dead slow, but possible.
Port that one to MacOS.
Still slow, but fun.

Or just wait for Bernie to release the 68k_2_PPC-JIT
for UAE he has been working on lately.

[Iggy_Drougge]

Kronos wrote:
@Iggy_Drougge

Not sure where you were pointin at ...

Something like running AmigaOS in an UAE where the 68k-emu is replaced by the actual 68k in the Mac ?

I'm pointing at either an AROS port or a UAE port without CPU emulation.

Sounds good, won't work ...
There are alot of dependancies between the chipset-emu and the 68k, which just wouldn't work with the real 68k.

Why would I want to emulate a chipset which I don't ever use on my Amiga? Amithlon doesn't emulate any more chipset than necessary to please the Kickstart.
Once again, think of Shapeshifter, Fusion and AMax on the Amiga, or the lesser-known Atari emulators.

One could try to start from the point were the Draco left, but that would require lots of work in that machines Hard and Software.

So it might, but it might turn out a lot easier than writing an entire emulator, especially since someone has already done that for you.

My advice (properly useless): Port the x11-hosted version of AROS to Mac(68k)/BSD.
Dead slow, but possible. Port that one to MacOS.
Still slow, but fun.

Exactly why would AROS be dead slow? Have the programmers been lazy?

Or just wait for Bernie to release the 68k_2_PPC-JIT for UAE he has been working on lately.

Once again a CPU emulator. Why buy an expensive PowerMac and waste all of its processor on emulating a lowly 680x0, when people are paying you to take their old Macs with real 68k processors?

[Kronos]

@Iggy_Drougge

AmigaOS and even AROS-68k in the latest Amiga-version relies on the chipset.

Amithlon has a minimal chipset-emu to be able to boot AmigaOS, and as minimal as it
is, it would stil be hard to implement on a real 68k.

AROS on x11 on 68k would be dead slow, cos AROS on x11 is allways slow (compared to the
power of the host), and X11 alone on an 68k is a pain.

Why run it on a PowerMac ? Cos it would be faster than any 68k  ;-)

[bloodline]

Exactly why would AROS be dead slow? Have the programmers been lazy?

No, the suggestion was to run Linux/BSD and then run AROS over that using X11 as the "Hardware interface" for input/output... X11 crawls like a new born baby with no arms and legs (this is most noticable on the 68k :-) ).

[meerschaum]