Is this a question of power?
... or a question of taste?
Situation is odd (as usual in the past 20 years).
Price will not drop. You'll never get a chip PPC, aside used stuff or gifts.
68k is the only real Amiga? Well, i would have said so in the past.
Today i'd like to see a powerfull machine at reasonable pricing no matter what is under the hood. Even poorly ARM (in comparison to modern x86) has more than enough horsepower for daily small office.
The real problem, the mother of all f*ck ups, is the software.
AOS and 3rd party software is way behind being competitive or attractive, not so say "sexy".
During the last years everyone was eager to save state, to freeze.
68k compatibillity was preferred over all. That's dead end street.
There will be no new miggy with custom chipset. It's a risky and expansive adventure more close to financial suicide. Would be incompatible too.
Todays standard hardware with AOS would be affordable but lacks of "personality". Looks like all other linux or windows stuff, no big difference, except for desktop theme.
I've damned x86 ever since, but now it looks more and more attractive if only the OS would deal fine with it.
About FPGA, the bigger ones cost a fortune. The smaller units lack capacity. This can't be the way. It will bound users to 68k side, because it can, not because it makes sense. Remember, the OS has to catch up too.
it depends what you want to do with such a FPGA device. Will it be as fast as a standard PC? No. Will it ever beat a full-blown PC? Propably never. Is it a potential fun platform (next to Windows/Linux/Mac working system). In my view yes.
