For a new system let alone an OS the become successful in this climate requires a few things in my opinion.
The hardware must be competative in performance.
The hardware must be at least as reliable, or more so than current hardware.
The system must be competative in the pricewars, unless it holds an advantage of some kind to offset the price disadvantage.
The OS must be capable of running most of the software available, and darn close to running all the "essential" software available.
That being said what an OS/system need to have a chance at carving out its own niche is a full office suite that can read and work with all the major document types.
It must have full network capability from the server down to the user(average Joe)
It must be stable, easy to use and forgiving of user error with a good backup/support progam behind it.
It must have good security features.
Where are we with Amiga?
Well the hardware is competetive in performance.Most computers in use in the world are not 3GHZ x86's they are closer to 1.5GHz at best.
As for reliablity....yet to be proven but thing look cautously optimistic...
Pricing...only really competative with the Mac at this point...we shall see if pricing will come down as promised, the Alite may be a good step in that direction
Running software big failure here.
full office suit...another failure here too
Networking capability this area looks promising, yet I believe this area needs much more development
The OS is not out yet so stability issues are still to be seen.
All that being said:
The machine will run linux so that is an advantage for many things such as server farms and so on, if the price/performance/ongoing costs become competitive.
Amiga DE and OS5 have the potential to bring much of the software to the Amiga, and attract developers.OS5 will be hardware independant removing the hardware side of the equation, it is also supposed to be a 64 bit OS.
My conclusion is that Amiga has the potential to make it back, especially with the TCPA thing making alot of people worried about the future.In my opinion is is Amiga DE that is the key here, it is the vehicle to bring software to the platform, new developers and they key to making OS5 hardware independant.One of its big advantages is that it can attract software developers because it will run on windows Mac and Linux and hence leverage that userbase for itself.It is very very risky though.
In my opinion, if Amiga Inc. do go down the Amiga has lost its chance to become a mainstream system again, though it will likely succeed in becoming a niche market machine.
IF Amiga Inc can somehow stay alive, then Amiga has the CHANCE to become a mainstream machine again, but only if it can hijack enough developers from windows Mac and Linux.
The hardware between Peg and Amiga is kinda a non issue, they are very similar.The OS's will eventually seperate into two different machines, and the community will have completed the split.I suggest this will happen about 1-2years after OS4 is released.
Like it or not Amiga Inc and its solution IS the inheritor of the Amiga Legacy, and even if Amiga Inc goes under and Genesi get the chance at all the IP etc, they have already stated they have no intrest in the hardware, the OS they will farm out to open source GPL.The only thing they are interested in is Amiga DE.This is provided what they have stated in public forums is in fact true and accurate.
Anyway I have rambled long enuff, but I really dont hold much hope for the Amiga platform if Amiga Inc goes down unless some truely benevolent company picks them up.The Pagasos to me is not a replacement to me, merely another machine and I thinks its only hope is in industrial applications at this point.
