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Author Topic: Articia I, AmigaTwo, 970  (Read 9694 times)

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Offline Waccoon

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Re: Articia I, AmigaTwo, 970
« on: January 05, 2004, 07:05:35 AM »
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Piru:  (G5) is not going to happen for some time.

Not with Apple in the way, that's for sure.  It cracks me up to hear people complaining about x86 and competition from Microsoft, when x86 chips run more operating systems than any other CPU in the world.  No matter what hardware you use, you'll have to compete with SOMEONE.  That's business.

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Downix:  Can it all of you. We need to stop acting like children here.

Aw, c'mon.  You know Internet forums aren't a place for serious discussion.  :-)

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Argo:  I don't think anyone outside of Eyetech would know anything about the "AmigaTwo". It's probably far in the future, computer timewise.

God, it still amazes me that people bought Amiga hardware so long before any software was available.  OS 4 on AmigaTwo is a scary thought.  Even an OS 3.95 would have been welcome!

Admit it, how many people would have turned down the opportunity to buy OS 3.95?  Instead, we got $50 coupons...

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On the other hand, if MAI can get the new chipset out bug free, it could possibly be used for the Pegasos III!!!!

OK, I haven't followed up on this, but wasn't the bug related to the VIA southbridge and not the MIA northbridge?  Besides, I thought the southbridge was responsible for handling DMA, timers, and the hard drive controller.

Any way you slice it, somebody is denying responsibility... and VIA is still crap hardware (and I speak from plenty of experience).

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But lets be realistic (or overly optimistic if we look at the delays round ArticiaS/P).
MAI has just licenced those techs, and it will take atleast a year to get a minimal
working chip. Another 6 months to get a eval-board ready and cure the chips from
it's major flaws (and those will be there as they have have 0 experience in fast busses
and DDR-interfaces). 6 months for developing a retail-ready version of said eval-board
and to get OS4.x working on it.

And remember, this was all done to make sure the Amiga had a supirior platform to the PC, because those evil x86 guys know nothing about making a good computer!

OS developers and Microsoft bashers should take notes...

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reflect:  I'm a little surprised by the negativity here.

Four years under the rule of Amiga Inc... and no products... will tend to do that.

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The offical "Amiga" technology is now generations behind the leading edge. Had the orginal machines been in such a position I would never have bought one.

The original Amigas were fully working systems with both hardware and an OS ready at the same time.  Just think what would've happened if you had to run a C64-type system on the Amiga 1000 a year before Workbench 1.0 arrived.

Nobody buys computers in parts.  People want prebuilt systems.  For every do-it-yourself computer built in the world today, how many Dells, Compaqs, and Gateways are sold?

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DrFloppy:  I think that Eyetech should make a new stand and new policy to get concentrate to the latest technology that is still in development if they do that hardware wouldn't be out of date.

The closest thing they can offer is a trade-in deal.

Given that the AmigaOne was shipped with a ROM, and not a flashable EEPROM, I think that should say something about the support commitment of Amiga companies these days.

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Amiga hardware should be more modulised.

Try hiring someone to build such a machine, and you'll get quite a sticker shock.  For years, companies have been working towards integrated systems.  Now that many CPU engineers are putting northbridges into the CPU core, I wonder how long it will be before it becomes common practice to solder the CPU into the motherboard, therefore "matching" a CPU to a chipset and thus offering a "guarentee" for the best possible performance.

See?  Amiga isn't as backwards as you might think!  :-)

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there should be flash disks to be used as bootable devices and Amiga would be operational in les than few seconds

The reason computers take so long to boot up is because of hardware tests and verification.  So long as a system has to check to see if you've swapped your video card since the last time you boot up, systems will always take a minute or so to start.  Instant boot times are possible only on highly integrated systems where the hardware configuration never changes and bootup times are absolutely critical, such as PDA's and cell phones.  Desktop computers will probably always use sleep mode instead of an instant-on feature.

Finicky licenses and piracy concerns will probably cease any ability to boot from removable media.  It's not really a technology issue.

For those who haven't figured it out, marketing and personal issues usually trump technology issues... even on Linux!

PS - I tried Gentoo Linux today, and I can't get it to boot.  I boot from the CD, hit enter to start the kernel, and it locks up immediately with no feedback.  This is the *NINTH* distro I've tried to install and run into a problem.

Any advice?   :-?
 

Offline Waccoon

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Re: Articia I, AmigaTwo, 970
« Reply #1 on: January 05, 2004, 11:13:05 PM »
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Minator:  BeOS could boot in 20 seconds or less, MorphOS boots in 5 seconds, both check the hardware. So, no thats not the reason bootup time takes so long.

I have BeOS R5 Personal installed on a Celeron 400, and it always takes 4 mintutes to boot up.  All it takes is one piece of hardware to get in the way and your boot times are shattered.  Anyone know how to get Be to show diagnostics when it's booting, so I can figure out why it takes so long to boot?  It would be nice if it did the "press F1 for advanced mode", like many Linux distros do.

[EDIT]:
Turns out, BeOS and Linux didn't like my Zip drive.  Once I put a blank disk in the Zip drive,  Be boots up in 30 seconds, and Gentoo Linux doesn't lock up.  I found out because Mandrake Linux (unlike Gentoo) prints a log as it boots, and told me hd0 was losing an interrupt, which meant my Zip drive (1st channel, master) was stalling the system.  Windows always worked fine, though.

Of course, I decided to swap my IDE cable to put the Zip on the 2nd IDE channel, and the HD on the first channel, and now Be won't boot at all.  It goes into kernel panic, shouts it can't find a Be partition, and dumps me into the debugger!

Eh, I thought Be sucked, anyway.  I think I'll just dump it.  I dont' see what all the fuss was about.
[/EDIT]

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It depends on the hardware. Some PCI hardware seems to take ages to return after it's been probed.

Yes, and that's why today's computers don't seem to boot any faster than the computers released five years ago.  My home computer takes about 40 seconds to get through the POST screen while it performs diagnostics.  An IBM system I used to use at work, by comparrision, starts booting only 1.5 seconds after hitting the power button.

Like I said, it's all hardware tests, not raw speed, that determine bootup time.

It's also worth nothing that I've seen Windows2000 systems boot in 20 seconds, too, if they're clean and have really fast hard drives, like my WD 1200JB.  :-D

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4xG4 Amiga with 4 GB DDR2(or better) RAM and some 7.1 Digital Audio System, firewire, bluetooth, IrdA and wireless ethernet would be great.

Definately not from "A ROM BIOS is much better" Amiga Inc.  :-)