MorphOS ahead of AROS?

[XDelusion]

Indeed it is. Far less crashes, a much better method at backwards compatability, MUI just works, USB works (including writing to NTFS), the GUI (Ambient) is AMAZING!!!

I think the only thing AROS has that is fully worth mention is the 3DCard Support, but even most of the drivers have bugs and the screen flakes out.

But hey, AROS is free, if you are interested, download it, install it, and submit bug reports.

[XDelusion]

In short I will say this.

MorphOS feels like a polished commercial project that only gets better with each release. It feels like the next step in Amiga OS progression and is fully configurable. So for instance if you don't like Mac OS then you can configure the new Mac like prefs to work like they did on Workbench. Likewise no one is forcing you to use BoingIconBar. So as far as being Mac like, that's where it ends. Everything else behaves like an Amiga with a form of Magellen installed.

AROS: feels like a ssslllloooowwwllly evolving hobby/toy OS with a few cool bells and whistles to lure you in, but under the hood it can be temperamental, flakey, and crash happy, not to mention that unlike MorphOS rather than feeling like an evolution from Workbench 3.1, it feels like a major step backwards. One release may fix things, the next breaks them and so forth. Unlike MorphOS or Haiku, there does not seem to be a unified strategy amongst developers as to where to take it next. Though again, as I said before it is free and maybe in 5 to 10 years it may become more matured And will able to be used as a serious dedicated OS, but as for now I stick it in the ReactOS camp...

...a nice dream for another day.

[XDelusion]

P.S. I am not paid by the MorphOS devs to spread propaganda, my stance is that of an alt OS user who has high hopes for both options.

[XDelusion]

I completely agree, as does (probably) most people who has MorphOS experience coming in contact with AROS.

Anyway, since you already gave such a good answer, I'm going to dedicate my post entirely to speculations! Maybe the future way forward for MorphOS will be to abandon the integrated, seamless 68k emulation at some point, together with the ambition to maintain the API as tight to the original Amiga OS API as they do today, maybe changes will be necessary at some point, if you are to make a jump to a different architecture/ISA. While it would lead to some sacrifices (turning it more into AROS, but still more than that), it could also lead to many great things, like a better HW platform, true SMP, true MP, true 64-bit, etc.

Then you would have to run the old Amiga apps through UAE or whatever, like they do on AROS, maybe that will be good enough on a x86 machine (it's not much fun on PPC). It will be a completely different manner than what we are used to on MorphOS (or OS4) today, it won't be integrated, it wont be as seemless, it's a different philosophy on "Amiga backwards compatibility" altogether, but although the thought might be a bit shocking to us at first, it seems to be enough for AROS people? Anyway, it wouldn't stop by just becoming a new "AROS Copy", since most new (and most interesting) MorphOS SW are in PPC, and is still maintained and could probably be ported to a new MorphOS "v4.0" architecture without greater troubles. Some good SW has even been brought under the MorphOS Team's wings for integration into the MorphOS package, and I think this strategy might continue.

So MorphOS would (probably) still have most of its native SW stack available, but you would have to run Amiga apps in the AROS way. MorphOS will of course still have its unique polished look and feel, the same features (and  more), the feeling of a real, usable desktop, etc from MUI4, Ambient, etc, not anything like AROS. And somehow I doubt the MorphOS Team will ever settle with running MorphOS in some process on top of another OS (as they seem putting a lot of pride into building a complete OS themselves)? And as a result, it could have a better HW platform, true SMP, true MP, true 64-bit, etc, a package completely new to Amiga, a "2nd Next Generation" (meaning Third of course :lol:, "3D miga"), which neither AROS or OS4 could match. But who knows, these things are *highly* hypothetical speculations, and might not happen at all (though they have been suggested by some MorphOS developers as one of several plausible ways to a future). I guess we'll learn in time...

From what I read, I do believe this basically is the game plan.

On the one hand, I can honestly say that even if MorphOS wasn't backwards compatible (as in not having to rely on some half assed WinUAE wanna be, but being able to install and run classic apps natively), I would cringe, but I can also say that the OS is awesome enough on it's own that I would still use it and still consider it Amiga in spirit, much like I do with Haiku which has NOTHING to do with Amiga except for that "in spirit" it feels like a continuation of the technology I have grown to love over the past couple of decades.

The only thing that worries me is that I don't see to many new software releases coming out. A stand alone OS that may at some point no longer support the MASSIVE software library from yesterday would suffer without a slew of new and original apps to replace the ones we had. ImageFX comes to mind.

Likewise, as you have said, UAE is not quite as exciting as it is on x86, though as it stands, unless you are running WinUAE, the experience still isn't the greatest. Sure you can run classic non-PPC games from disk images, and that it does well, but when it comes to running a virtual environment or integrating the emulation into the OS itself...

Well I'll just say that UAE is still lacking majorly in that department and the experience is NO WHERE near at good as using a real Amiga, or the MorphOS method for that matter (even with the added ability to emulate the old chip sets which is primarily just for old games anyhow).
UAE cuts off support for classic PPC apps and games, it wastes valuable resources, and again, if the OS it is running on is not stable, then the emulation is not going to be stable (though stability is not an issue MorphOS suffers from).
On top of that, I must once again state that no version of UAE can compare to WinUAE, and that's just sad because that means that if we want to emulate classic Amiga and do it well, we have to use the OS that many of use avoided for all these years. I mean wasn't it our loathing for Windows and Mac that helped inspire so many of us to chose Amiga in the first place?

Granted, I really hope things get better for the non WinUAE varients of UAE, but so far the progress has been TERRIBLY SLOW!!!!!!! And I can only imagine that bringing JIT to PPC UAE is only going to take longer, but then if MorphOS goes to ARM, won't JIT have to be ported to ARM too?!?!

All in all I don't like this idea. I have been looking for modern(ish) hardware that I could score at a cheap price, and be able to run a large chunk of my more resoure intensive classic Amiga apps on, and until my eMac died, despite it's limited resources, has been the answer to my praryers! I would only hope that in the future that the MorphOS team would strive to maintain classic support on what ever new hardware that they may be targetting, for as long as possible. I like not needing Amiga rom images, I like not having to load up an emulator, I like being able to run my old software as if it were native, and it does not bother me in the least that I am not able to play the old games without emulation because of the chip set because when you are gaming, you are not using the OS, so I could really care less. It's when I'm running classic apps that I don't want to be running an emulator.

As for that handful of classic Apps like OctaMED S.S. that MorphOS does not run (and OS 4 does for what ever reason), I can always resort to using Amithlon, which to me, was the prefered way of taking Amiga to the future in regards to using the x86 family of processors. It still pains me deeply that Amiga Inc. (Bill) killed the project off.

Anyhow, there is my UAE rant, and why I prefer MorphOS like it is. Backwards compatible. Though again, by the time all this takes place, we'll probably be at version 4.x which I'm sure is going to be VERY impressive, and I'm sure that when 3.x comes out, developers will get excited again and will begin to start coding fresh new apps and games for it.

Besides the FPGA and Natami should be out some day, so even if my classic Amigas die some day, I'll have those hardware platforms to consider for high end Amigaing.


On a final note, one comparison I can make between AROS and MorphOS is with FPSE. I was actually able to get the MorphOS port to out perform the AROS port that was running on a 2.6 Dual Core Intel Machine with GeForce Graphics, 2Gb RAM, etc. Ironically the MorphOS port was running on my crappy little eMac with 1Gb or RAM, a 1.2Ghz PPC CPU, and classic built in ATI graphics with 32Mb RAM. All using the same exact settings at that, go figure...

And for the note, I am not here to bash AROS and start the (My Amiga OS is better than your Amiga OS) war. I am just stating the facts from what I have experienced, having gone into both OS' with high hopes. On that note I wish ALL Amiga varients the best of luck. I hope the devs from all four camps continue to work together and help each other benefit from their knowledge and experience. If it were not my love for these OS's then I would not bother to write and complain when one of them or all of them fail to live up to my expectations.

[XDelusion]

And not to sound all pro MorphOS and anti-AROS again, but...

MorphOS is perfectly fine with your USB drives. It won't freak out, write slow as hell to it, nothing. And again if your USB drive is formatted to NTFS, not a problem.

Kind of an important thing in today's computing world where we like to put all our movies and musick on such devices. And on that note, I must say that FAB's port of Mplayer rivals all other ports I've used, and I'm not just talking Amiga OS varients. The user interface is sublime!!!

I won't even get into his version of OWB.

[XDelusion]

BOH... Now that's a game worth installing ArOS for!!!

I almost forgot to mention it.

[XDelusion]

I'm eager to try out the upcoming Linux/AROS distro that is supposed to come with Wine.

Sounds like an interesting approach.

[XDelusion]

Personally I'm kind of hoping that the MorphOS team goes with ARM. I can only see good things coming from that (portability comes to mind), and apparently Microsoft seems to think so too. Despite the fact that I HATE that company, I still have to take notice when they step up and decide that the next incarnation of their OS must be written for ARM at well, and who knows, maybe after JIT gets ported over to PPC, the transistion to ARM won't be that difficult since ARM and PPC are said to be somewhat similiar...

...or so I heard.

Also, assuming MorphOS goes to ARM, and assuming ARM gets JIT and all that Jazz, perhaps the brilliant minds behind the MorphOS team will come up with a way to make it seem that we are still able to run our old Amiga programs natively, but in a way much differently than how it works on AROS. A way that feels less like a hack job....


And I apologize to those who have put tons of hard work into Janus, I know there are people who love it, but as for me, there is something about it that just don't seem quite right, though again, maybe it's just AROS itself in its current state.

@XDelusion



Thank you for your long and well written post!

I agree that this route would be a big and non-trivial mental step of acceptance a MorphOS user would have to take, *should* it happen (which again is highly hypothetical, and something in the future anyway). There is a beauty in MorphOS's way of simply not caring if the binaries are 68k or PPC but treats them just the same, allowing them to truly work together in the same environment, they all using the very same resources, arexx communicating with them and binding them together (arexx being 68k itself even), etc, etc.

1) But if you want this to remain unchanged in the future, I think you must sacrifice the possibility of moving to a different architecture (due to big/little endian problems (at least on x86, not sure about ARM) *together* with the enormous effort it is to write a good 68k JIT native for that new ISA, which again would be pointless (at least on x86) due to endianness issues), and by that you will sacrifice the chance of having MorphOS running on future proof HW (the PPC is dead, and everything tied to it is bound to die as well). You would also sacrifice the possibility of having true SMP, true MP, 64-bit, etc, i.e. many of the things people have been crying for for several years now. You would also sacrifice the only chance for MorphOS of reaching a wider audience, outside this shrinking little community, or to even survive more than a couple of years ahead from now.

2) The flip side of the coin is that if you want to move the MorphOS platform to an architecture that still has a pulse and is future proof (meaning a chance of long term survival of MorphOS, the PPC is dead), and if you want to harvest the benefits of multiple CPU cores, memory protection, 64-bit, etc, then you are in for a break from the past. It means a new endian model and an Amiga API that is different in maybe few but way too fundamental ways for even trying to uphold any kind of backwards compatibility to the old Amiga API environment, a new set of API's, rules and guides would apply. The old (and current) 3.1 API centric applications have prerequisites, a way of function, and makes assumptions of their surrounding environment that simply wouldn't be true anymore. It would be a "3rd generation" system, and it won't be free of sacrifices to go there. To a user, it would look and feel the same, have much of the same features, the same Ambient, the same applications in a recompiled version (mostly, at least). It wouldn't at all be like the Mac's migration from OS9 to OSX, not even close, it would still be MorphOS with most of its advantages intact (and a couple of major *new* advantages on top of that). But we would probably have to settle with something like AROS is doing today for the 68k emulation part. And personally, I honestly think that would be an *acceptable* price to pay. And as has been construed by many people in this thread (including you), MorphOS is about so much more than just its superior 68k emulation...!

So the way I see it, there are basically two choices, leading in two different directions, and there are sacrifices to them both. Question is - which one do we prefer?

[XDelusion]

Here's a question, could some sort of FPGA based USB 3 or PCI expansion board be created to substitute for the lack of the classic chip set on future MorphOS hardware (in theory).

If possible, AROS and OS 4 could benefit from this as well.

[XDelusion]

Nice nice nice!!!
What's your bus speed?

[XDelusion]

Hi,

My bus speed is a little bit slower than an 18 wheel truck traveling on the interstates, this is usually around 70 mph.

smerf

VW?

[XDelusion]

http://www.amigahistory.co.uk/prototypes/amigaone1.html

added a linky to lando's post, he remembers correctly.

I would rather see a natami-on-a board add-on for os4 and mos machines than a standard aga add-on to be honest. That would be interesting.

exactly!!!

[XDelusion]

Currently 133MHz, but as of next Monday 167MHz.
I'm also sitting on a couple of R400 based cards that have been modified to work in a G4 Mac.

Impressive! It's amazing how fast machines with such low Bus Speed (by today's standards) can perform with the right OS/Software!

[XDelusion]

Just my 2 cents......  I like winuae better than ether of these  

And for that you must have a love for Windows...

...which again it is that lack of that love that many of us chose Amiga over Windows and Mac OS so many years ago.

Mind you, I do have a Windows machine for Video/Audio Editing, and Gaming, but I don't use WinUAE except as a means to read and write to my Amiga Hard Drives (SD/CF cards). It just feels wrong to use it for anything else when my machines are perfectly capable of playing all the games and running all the apps on their own, but alas, to each their own. Glad you are enjoying your self....

TRAITOR!!! He he he.

[XDelusion]

This doesn't bother me (yet). There are no apps or games for MorphOS that I was not able to run and run well even on my meager piece of crap eMachine.

What I expect from an OS is a fluid and flexible GUI, a stable environment, and for it to be friendly with the resources, not to mention to have a nice collection of practical software.

MorphOS delivers in that arena RIGHT NOW. AROS on the other hand is still catching up, despite it's ability to run on faster more modern processors.

Speaking of which, I have a 2.6Ghz machine at home that I've been able to over clock to 3.4Ghz. I use it to run Haiku and AROS, just as I run both on my Eee PC 900. So don't get me wrong, I am an AROS user, I do donate to the Magellan bounty, but I'm more impressed by MorphOS in the long run.

Aros runs on all x86 CPUs from Pentium 3 to i7 PCs but MOS will not run on a G5 Mac so if we compare progress of Aros Intel i7 vs Powermac G5 Mos config clearly the truth is Mos is still on a tiny scale compared to Aros's ambitious PC  configurations supported. When MOS is running on every Mac desktop and laptop from G3 to G5 and Intel x86 Macs let me know :roflmao:

For me the issue is the PPC requirement, Commodore never made a PPC Amiga, Native OS for PPC or even A4000 upgrade card so Mos + UAE running on smelly old 90s Macs from a dumpster is no more "Amiga" than Aros + WinUAE running on a brand new dodgy brand of PC.

Mos is a hobby OS which costs more than Win7 and needs the inferior [to WinUAE] UAE emulator to run 90% of Amiga software.

Each to their own, but OS4/Mos are a waste of money IMO (just like Clownto's Amiga [shaft you] Forever is)