OS4 moves to x86. What happens next?

[Amiga_Nut]

Porting the OS to x86 instruction set is one thing. Making it work on the millions of combinations of exact motherboard type, sound chip, video card, firewire/sata/usb devices is the problem.

Hyperion would never have the resources to write enough device drivers to support enough combinations of PC hardware to make it financially viable. People forget that no two PCs are alike and because of that recoding the OS to work on x86 CPUs is only the start. It's a tricky one too because your market is tiny but the number of different combinations of hardware that they need to support is massive. Bad business sense and I don't blame them for ignoring x86 really.

If you ask me they would be better off modifying OS4 so it runs on most recent Macs and provide a nice boing ball sticker to cover the Apple logo

[Amiga_Nut]

You have to remember OS4 going to x86 from PPC will be nothing like the experience for Apple Mac users.

1. Apple design their own computers, which have their own style. Hyperion make an OS and that's it. OS4 would be just a box on the shelf you install on some fugly PC.

2. Apple invested millions and still it wasn't a smooth as silk transition despite have totally locked hardware and bespoke BIOS. Hyperion can provide neither of these.

So unless someone buys the rights to Amiga and reverse engineers a version of AmigaOS to x86 (OS5? OS3.9? but these are just names not what features it could/couldn't have) then you will have a very slow painful process before you have a bug free useful OS to buy AND it will run on some crappy looking machine.

So what we actually need at the very least is....

i.   A stable motherboard as a platform.
ii.  A uniquely styled case that is "Amiga" to put it in.
iii. An OS converted to x86 and bug-free to run on the above.

Maybe now some people will realise just what it is you are asking. We have many ass-wipes like BS Altman and his Commodore USA crap but can you name one person even in the position to negate a deal to give you the complete package as listed above?

Putting OS4 for x86 on a shelf will do squat, build an Amiga styled computer and sell it cheap enough and we are ready to rock and roll and a few sales will happen off the shelf I reckon.

YMMV

[Amiga_Nut]

I know the PS3 uses 3 Cell processors. What I'm not sure of is are they full general CPUs or are they specific in function or somewhere inbetween?

There is only one CELL processor in the PS3. The CELL Processor has 8 'cores'. The main one, the PPU, is the same as one of the three cores in the Xbox360's Xenon CPU, the remainder 'cores' in CELL are weaker units called SPUs. Also I think the CELL PPU can only execute a single thread*, but the Xenon CPU cores can each execute two threads*

CELL probably isn't suited to running an OS unlike Xenon which runs some cut down version of a Microsoft OS already seeing as Xbox uses DirectX and standard ATI graphics controller. Also CELL is much more expensive to produce than Xenon for IBM. Neither are as powerful as an i7 but still Xenon is the ONLY CPU any one thinking of designing an OS4 compatible motherboard should be looking at, there is no excuse for G5 OTT priced or G4 underpowered stuff from the mid 00s

*never trust the internet