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Amiga computer related discussion => Amiga Software Issues and Discussion => Topic started by: XDelusion on April 16, 2012, 01:16:40 AM

Title: Amithlon Explained on Aminet
Post by: XDelusion on April 16, 2012, 01:16:40 AM
Just found these, thought I'd share:

http://aminet.net/search?query=Amithlon+explained
Title: Re: Amithlon Explained on Aminet
Post by: vox on April 16, 2012, 01:40:16 AM
Interesting, should be put to a single video on You Tube. User Group of Melbourne?
Title: Re: Amithlon Explained on Aminet
Post by: XDelusion on April 16, 2012, 01:45:06 AM
Working on it... :)
Title: Re: Amithlon Explained on Aminet
Post by: Minuous on April 16, 2012, 02:39:59 AM
This would be more useful in another format, eg. ASCII. As it stands, it is hundreds of megabytes which is unfortunately just not practical.
Title: Re: Amithlon Explained on Aminet
Post by: XDelusion on April 18, 2012, 04:54:13 PM
I have uploaded the video in two parts to Youtube.

[youtube]9_zegFb_fkA[/youtube]

[youtube]gcN25No_RwQ[/youtube]
Title: Re: Amithlon Explained on Aminet
Post by: fishy_fiz on April 18, 2012, 05:04:47 PM
Ironically one of the 1st videos I ever watched on OS3.9/Amithlon 10 or so years ago :)
Title: Re: Amithlon Explained on Aminet
Post by: XDelusion on April 18, 2012, 05:21:06 PM
And I think this is what you were talking about the other day isn't it?

Amiga OpenPCI Radeon 68k (new version - march 2012)

[youtube]G6aS0g4ZDZk[/youtube]
Title: Re: Amithlon Explained on Aminet
Post by: fishy_fiz on April 18, 2012, 06:02:29 PM
Ah, ok, cool. I hadnt seen that one. Seems its running on a real '060 based amiga. Id only seen the other videos he did with it running on Amithlon. Even supports multiple monitors (both with different display/apps).
Cant wait to get ahold of it. Ive been trying to get to 300fps on Quake2 for a while. Maxed out at 298, never quite hit 300 yet without dropping resolution and I think these drivers should get me there (and then some). When he does implement 3d acceleration it'll be crazy fast (not that 300fps isnt fast enough already, but theyre good ways to benchmark a machine against its former configuration) :)
Title: Re: Amithlon Explained on Aminet
Post by: XDelusion on April 19, 2012, 12:32:39 AM
Amithlon just won't die will it? :)
Title: Re: Amithlon Explained on Aminet
Post by: Duce on April 19, 2012, 12:52:22 AM
Amithlon really needs a bounty for it, assuming that's even a viable option with eventual open source roots.

The fact Amithlon was cut short is one of the saddest stories since the demise of the original Commodore - running a well put together Amithlon system is simply staggering and would win over even the most devout "classic" fan.
Title: Re: Amithlon Explained on Aminet
Post by: Digiman on April 19, 2012, 12:54:02 AM
I always felt sorry for Bernie because Amithlon was such an amazing product but he was treated so badly. If Amiga Inc had one brain cell between them they would have tried their hardest to get this product back on the shelf and financed even more updates. He deserved to become a wealthy man for his genius idea.

Such a great loss for the future of Amiga :(
Title: Re: Amithlon Explained on Aminet
Post by: XDelusion on April 19, 2012, 01:01:44 AM
Quote from: Digiman;689462
I always felt sorry for Bernie because Amithlon was such an amazing product but he was treated so badly. If Amiga Inc had one brain cell between them they would have tried their hardest to get this product back on the shelf and financed even more updates. He deserved to become a wealthy man for his genius idea.

Such a great loss for the future of Amiga :(


Agreed!
Title: Re: Amithlon Explained on Aminet
Post by: mihcael on April 19, 2012, 01:40:52 AM
Yes, very sad story for him.

And Amithlon 2 was very close to a release at the time too.
Title: Re: Amithlon Explained on Aminet
Post by: Digiman on April 19, 2012, 03:29:46 AM
I remember reading an interview about how it all ended and how Bernie had his fingers burnt so badly by the experience that he said something like he had moved all source files for improved update making it impossible even for some hacker to dial in and release it without his permission.
Title: Re: Amithlon Explained on Aminet
Post by: Bodie on April 19, 2012, 03:42:48 AM
Quote from: mihcael;689467
Yes, very sad story for him.

And Amithlon 2 was very close to a release at the time too.


What improvements did Umilator (was it called that???) bring?
Title: Re: Amithlon Explained on Aminet
Post by: HammerD on April 19, 2012, 05:02:24 AM
Quote from: Bodie;689494
What improvements did Umilator (was it called that???) bring?


http://www.umilator.net/blog/features.shtml
Title: Re: Amithlon Explained on Aminet
Post by: Bodie on April 19, 2012, 05:33:57 AM
Quote from: HammerD;689502
http://www.umilator.net/blog/features.shtml


Thx
Title: Re: Amithlon Explained on Aminet
Post by: fishy_fiz on April 19, 2012, 09:21:14 AM
I wonder if a bounty would be possible to release the amithlon sources. Seemed a bit of a tangled mess legally, but I dont recall who owned the sources. Same question of Umiliator. Apart from classics aros and amithlon/os3.9 have always been my drug of choice. Would be brilliant to be able to merge the 2 using aros kickstart replacement and big endian x86 to merge 68k and x86 seemlessly ala os4/mos. Granted it wont be as fast as "normal" LE x86, but amithlon using solely 68k code is competitive with os4 and mos running ppc code, so any extra speed it provides is just a bonus.

Has anyone seen the topic bought up before (if it'd be possible to obtain sources)? Id be interested to know if its worth pursuing.
Title: Re: Amithlon Explained on Aminet
Post by: Aussiholden on April 19, 2012, 09:55:53 AM
Wow, those videos of Bernie bring back memories, I was there when he was demoing Amithlon, went completely over my head, I gave him the game Foundation to try and see how it would go, after he had improved it, still crashed it, lol.
Title: Re: Amithlon Explained on Aminet
Post by: TheBilgeRat on April 19, 2012, 03:38:18 PM
Found this while reading up on the backstory of this disaster:

http://www.amigahistory.co.uk/emulators/hyperionblast.html

Wow.
Title: Re: Amithlon Explained on Aminet
Post by: Heiroglyph on April 19, 2012, 05:23:13 PM
What a laughable argument, lose all commercial developers because Windows is available.

Windows is ALWAYS available.  A Wndows PC is cheap enough to assume that you just have one.  It's like assuming you have a screwdriver when you buy hardware.

What does hurt is having no affordable hardware and for many years, no hardware at all.  I won't even go into how outdated the available hardware is at any price.

What are we left with using this strategy, less than a dozen commercial applications, most of which aren't actively being developed?

There are far more x86 developers, many of which would like a niche market to get away from windows competition, but aren't up for investing thousands of dollars to even test the waters.

When Amithlon was available, the last decent 3rd party development spike happened.  Remember all the people adding specific x86 extensions?

It seems like having any stake in "the name" drops your IQ immediately, taking any business sense with it.
Title: Re: Amithlon Explained on Aminet
Post by: runequester on April 19, 2012, 06:14:29 PM
Quote from: TheBilgeRat;689587
Found this while reading up on the backstory of this disaster:

http://www.amigahistory.co.uk/emulators/hyperionblast.html

Wow.


I guess someone needs to tell Red Hat and IBM that it's impossible to make money on non-windows software.
Title: Re: Amithlon Explained on Aminet
Post by: TheBilgeRat on April 19, 2012, 06:54:35 PM
An ability to promote 3.9 on cheap hardware to a community that still remembered Amiga... Sounds like a crap idea. :insane:
Title: Re: Amithlon Explained on Aminet
Post by: rdolores on April 19, 2012, 06:58:25 PM
Quote from: TheBilgeRat;689587
Found this while reading up on the backstory of this disaster:

http://www.amigahistory.co.uk/emulators/hyperionblast.html

Wow.


Ben Herman's was completely off regarding his comments on Mac OSX on X86.  Not only did OSX migrate to the x86 platform, but it became a great success more so than if it had remained on PPC.  The Amiga could have blazed the same path even before the Mac, with Amithlon as the bridge.  Cheap and available hardware did not kill OSX.  And the software developers did not abandon the Mac when it changed platforms.  He was even wrong on Linux.  Ubuntu and others have had quite a bit of success with Linux desktop.  And quite a bit of native software was developed for it (OpenOffice, Firefox, Flash and Acrobat, Java).  However, all was not lost.  AROS has made incredible progress in developing an x86 Amiga environment.  Every new release is more stable, faster, and feature rich.  I really like the OWB browser on the latest release of Icaros Desktop.
Title: Re: Amithlon Explained on Aminet
Post by: runequester on April 19, 2012, 08:23:01 PM
Quote from: TheBilgeRat;689625
An ability to promote 3.9 on cheap hardware to a community that still remembered Amiga... Sounds like a crap idea. :insane:


yeah, nobody wants cheap computers
Title: Re: Amithlon Explained on Aminet
Post by: Rodomoc on April 19, 2012, 10:02:02 PM
Quote from: Heiroglyph;689609
What a laughable argument, lose all commercial developers because Windows is available.

A strange argument at best. 68k needed to die (according to some) and the 'players' involved made sure it did exactly that. PPC was the deemed future, not a much faster 68K running on widely available / inexpensive x86 hardware. (makes way too much sense) So since then, any major momentum in 68k was snuffed.
 
Meanwhile, 68k is still alive despite the 'players' wishes and their many actions. People run the original hardware or emulate it on a variety of hardware platforms. And it does still recieve software and hardware development! Many thanks to those continuing to make these things 68K things happen.
Title: Re: Amithlon Explained on Aminet
Post by: number6 on April 19, 2012, 10:11:46 PM
@thread


Although there have been many retellings of the story, this one from Bernie is fairly complete:

October 7, 2007 (http://amigaworld.net/modules/newbb/viewtopic.php?mode=viewtopic&topic_id=24294&forum=2&start=40&viewmode=flat&order=0#405227)

Keep in mind this is years before the AI/Hyperion settlement.

A bit more about a month later (http://amigaworld.net/modules/newbb/viewtopic.php?topic_id=24264&forum=8&start=20&viewmode=flat&order=0#411841)

More from July, 2008 (http://amigaworld.net/modules/newbb/viewtopic.php?topic_id=26480&forum=25#448560)

#6