Questions Questions

[Kay]

> Any corrections are most welcome.

Nah, I think you got most of you right. I'd just like to add something about the RISC/CISC issue. I think the story goes something like this: In the early days, CPU instruction sets were gradually getting more and more complex, with more and more instructions being added. I think some of the reason behind this was that back then, high level programming languages weren't all that common. More instructions meant less work for the programmer. However, as high level languages like C became the norm, the high number of instructions made compiler construction, and especially optimization, trickier. Furthermore, it turns out that out of the myriads of instructions in excistence, only a few were frequently used. This motivated the development of RISC processors. A simpler instruction set has the advantages that...
1. ...it makes it easier to construct optimized compilers for the chip.
2. ...it allows the chip designers to focus on getting a few really important instructions right, rather than having to implement a myriad of mostly redundant instructions.

Personally, I really like the RISC concept. While you probably are right that it makes the code somewhat larger (consider that fewer instructions should mean that each of them can be made shorter, though), I think the advantages outweighs it.

Kay

[Kay]

> There isn't any real distinction between RISC and CISC chips anymore. Pentium Chips are just as
> RISC as G4's, and vice versa. We have reached a middle ground and obliterated the extreme camps
> that gave the distinction any meaning in the first place.

While the distinction has been diminished, I don't think it has been completely removed yet. It is true, though, that modern processors are rarely (or never?), pure RISC or pure CISC.

Kay

[Kay]

> Come on, you guys, stop talking about RISC/CISC already and tell him about the REAL A1 stuff, the
> A1 hardware!

Heh, sorry about that. :-) It's easy to get carried away when someone brings up one of the biggest topics in computing history. You don't want me to get started on little endian versus big endian, do you (both have their advantages, but once again, I favour the PPC's way of doing things)?

Okay, I'll try coming up with something useful instead. Cyberus, if you are interested in a next-gen Amiga system, you should get an AmigaOne. I do not recommend the hybrid PPC acccelerator cards, as they are:
*Very expensive.
*A bit unreliable.
*Hard to get repaired if/when they break down.
*Surprisingly slow (mostly thanks to the need for switching forth and back between the 68k and the PPC).

The AmigaOne is the natural successor to the classic Amiga. It is basically a standard PPC motherboard. The PPC is in a sense a natural successor to the 68k series (Motorola went from 68k to PPC, Mac went from 68k to PPC, and now Amiga is going from 68k to PPC). It is somewhat slower than x86 processors at the moment, but still more than fast enough for anything on the Amiga. It tends to be revised in fewer, but more signicant leaps compared to the x86 family. It has lower power consumption and runs cooler, and it might be possible that you can do without a CPU fan for the slowest AmigaOne. For a good overview of the AmigaOne motherboards, look here.

The AmigaOne currently only runs Linux (and MacOS through MacOnLinux), but once Hyperion finishes porting AmigaOS to the PPC, the AmigaOne will be its main hardware platform. AOS4 is shaping up pretty well, and is the main reason why I have ordered an AmigaOne myself. I highly recommend that you go check out the feature list. This is probably the biggest revision of AmigaOS ever. In addition to the features on the list, Hyperion recently announced that SNAP will be integrated into the OS. This means AmigaOS will get highly optimized 2d drivers for all the popular modern graphics cards, and that 3d drivers can be developed quicker and more easily. For a list of chipsets currently supported by SNAP, look here. AmigaOS will also benefit from future development of SNAP.

After many years of disappointments, it finally looks like the Amiga has a chance to come back to life. You are very welcome to join us! :-)

Kay