[UserReview] Vampire V2-128 received and it's just pure p0rn.

[wawrzon]

That's however how I understand the situation. It is a P96 driver that can be used through the AROS CGfx emulation, which again has a P96 driver emulation. This is *not* legit. It should really go directly through AROS (or, depending on what the situation with the CGfx emulation is, through CGfx).

i see. you must be better informed in this respect, so if it is like you say i fully agree with this statement.

Neither CGfx nor P96 drivers interacted with the system through patches. Both have a native interface. The patches are done by P96 and/or CGfx core components.

my understanding is that rtg systems on amiga were implemented patching appropriate functions of graphics library. is that wrong?

[wawrzon]

No, that's completely correct. It is, however, not the driver that patches the graphics.library. It is - for P96 - the rtg.library (core component) or - for CGfx - the cybergraphics.library. The driver goes through a well-documented API of the rtg.library.

i think its self explanatory that its not the particular driver client but the main library that patches the system. same way it would have to be implemented if aros cybergraphics was to be used instead of p96.

[wawrzon]

I *really* wonder whether Gunnar is fair enough to release the sources of his FPGA, or rather whether he wants to sell his own work on the back of free software developers. I personally would not want to work for free to fill somebody else's pocket. But again, that's just me. As said, I'm an old fashioned guy.

of course it might be interesting to have open source fpga core. however i dont recall gunnar promising something like that ever and he might have his reasons, its not for me to judge. espacially he is in proud company of almost all hardware developers, including amiga(like) systems. you probably can count the open source hardware projects like tg68 or strims 030 decelerator card on the fingers of one hand.

however there i and probably will be also open source initiatives following. fpga arcade has been announced to be open as example. are they paying license fees for their p96 driver by the way? ao why is gunnar getting all the flak again;)

btw. thomas, i think if anybody feels his rights have been compromised, they will certainly speak up. i think the interested parties have been informed or at least approached. it should be left for them to act.

[wawrzon]

Depends what that extra expense entails.

170-180 for 060++ performance is still dirt cheap.

if one is acustomed to os4 hardware level prices.

then + 50$ for network stack
+50$ for usb stack
+50$ for icon set
...
+50$ for desktop backgrounds pack
...

[wawrzon]

True, but the problem is the survival of AOS4 depends on the growth of its userbase, which primarily comes from the pool of classic users.  With significant growth and advancements on the classic side to keep users interested the move to a NG platfrom is not nearly as enticing.

so who are the actual vampires here? the whole years of indoctrination, that amiga is outdated and obsolete and was never good to start with, and that os4 is a real thing is going to fall in the water now? and it is again our fault or of those who provide alternatives that os4 doesnt grow winning the remaining amiga users over to postpone its decline?

[wawrzon]

i love changing backgrounds, and getting things to work, like mplayer, google drive, printer, etc...

But thats about it.

changing backgrounds.. how weird.. i think its much more interesting and rewarding tryin to help others in a group of people of different interests working towards something independently. instead of sitting there alone pushing icons around you kind of socialize with complete strangers. i just joined the apollo dev irc yesterday, not even having the hardware and it really feels good because you contribute and receive. common problems are being solved.

[wawrzon]

Why? Why should Gunnar implement it in first place? Just open source the core, and somebody else will implement it for him.

thomas, is this sarcasm? outta the suddden you postulate to open everything and start to playing devils advocate for the open source developers who out of their free will and with their own professional knowledge support gunnar and his core?

first thing is none ever said open source is healing all wounds. in our particular situation as community it is means to work together, contribute and preserve code in which companies may not have interest in. this doesnt neccesarily translate to hardware, even if id prefer it to be open as well, but have you ever seen me saying x1000 should be open sourced? however amiga hardware in fact becomes open thanks to private hacking, reverse engeneering, emulation and fpga projects.

now you also need to be pragmatic and justify expenses against contributions. this isnt even an option with os4 or the entities behind. however taking part in apollo irc i sense it helps a good deal to push apollo and aros forwards independently of each other. calculating interests, there might be some better, more satysgfying, more popular and cheaper future solutions for amiga fans than currently. software and hardware wise. and everybody needs to calculate his interests and investments himself. i do, certainly, as much with apollo, which i dont have btw, as with aros.

[wawrzon]

Err, what? Of course the sources for 3.X exist. It's not developed because everybody here tells me "go away, we have no interest in it". That's a difference.  Again, I've no problem if people prefer AROS - that's a choice everybody can make - but don't tell me that there are no sources for 3.X. There most certainly are, and they would be most certainly be used if there would be interest in a - albeit closed source, paid - development.  So please, let's be honest about this. If you prefer Open Source - good. But that doesn't mean that the closed source sources are lost in time and space and that there would be nobody that would work on them.  

I afraid not quite so.

cmon. thomas, its not like those sources werent there all this time. has anybody developed anything amiga upon them? nope. you are the only one who ported over some of your own improvements just lately. i dont know on what deal. the people have been approached before with proposintions and there was only one replay if any: they are not interested in supporting or letting others support amiga, come over to os4/ppc. i was banned from amigans sharing some experience because i was simply mentioning 68k in the context.

above all else you yourself said, you had no time to work on amiga, so who would be those people who would? maybe now, seing interest in vampire someone suddenly woke up somewhere there sniffing cash, but we had no any positive experience let alone support from whoever claims the access to the sources for te past years except olsen (who commercially releaed his rapid road for amiga) and you.

this is the result.

[wawrzon]

A company has to work on a profit basis - they saw the market in the PPC area. If you ask me, a stupid decision in first place, but that was their decision. Whether *I* invest my time into PPC is again my decision. I decided against it - as it seems, a wise decision.

same as mine. well, they decided, they were stubborn and aggresive about it, now its their problem, not ours.

You call it "sniffing cash", I call it "a business opportunity". What exactly is wrong with working for money, and earning money? There's a new interesting product on the market that triggers interest in users investing into the classics. Of course that also means that now the owner of the Os sees some interest in investing into the classics. It also means that some developers show again interests in the classics.

but it is not their product, they want to cash upon, ist someone elses. looks rather typical. if you ask me they are free to deliver commercial product supporting it, the market will show how succesful it would be. but demanding funding up front has proven wrong with os4 and everything else it was associated with. dont count with me on that.

Of course, nobody would be getting rich by this development, but in end, everybody could have had what wasn't possible before , a renovated Os, a renovated hardware, new software. Sounds like a win-win situation to me.

in contrary to you os4 team has not very good track report of delivering what has been promissed.

Yes, it is. Look, if OpenSource should be it, then please do that. No problem either.  

But again, then it should be *really* OpenSource. That is, the FPGA should be OpenSource, the interface should not depend on legacy interfaces that are not open. You cannot first negotiate with the owners on licensing the rtg graphics interface, and later on work around this negotiations and ignore the owners and forget the negotiations just because it now suddenly fits better to the plan to do so.

seriously, i dont care. im working on aros which is open source. whether the hardware is open source is another matter as i really am not associated with it. so far i really only sypmathize with it. what everybody else does is not my affair.

[wawrzon]

I can't think of a single reason to run it on a classic Amiga - even one accelerated by a Vampire.

so what do you need an updated os on 68k? aros has smaller foorprint than os4. difficult to judge if its slower or faster. its likely more buggy on68k, as most devs are on the x86 side. its has potentially more functionality. and it has developers interested in vampire as it occures. very skilled ones. the question is for how long.

I can't help but think that those in the Amiga community that don't consider either AmigaOS 4.1 or MorphOS as 'true' Amiga successors would  feel exactly the same way about  Vampire/AROS. If and when I do buy a Vampire, It'll be to run 3.9 - and if Cloanto, Hyperion or whoever wants to restart development on AmigaOS 3.x then I'd be more than happy to pay for that.

people who think anything that comes from hyperion is the only legitimate are lost no matter what. others will simply use their rom or buy one with cloanto. others may try aros. doesnt matter, as long as it runs amiga software if you ask me.

[wawrzon]

i dont get the whole drama. there is an accelerator that currently apparently needs an updated rom. but the consumers have acquired a license for legitimate use of that rom long ago with their machines. whatever software the users will use on this hardware is their choice. looks like people start being interested in aros in this context, but it remains to be seen what comes out of this. the os4 license holders wanted to collect money on this occasion but apparently again refused any further support. this is simply their decision and their policy not since yesterday. so the ship has sailed without them. thats all. no butthurt necessary..

[wawrzon]

Only A1200, A4000T and CD32 were ever sold with 3.1 kickstarts, AFAIK.

you could get 3.1 kickstarts for whatever amiga. i have my all 4000er upgraded. if the kickstarts bought from amiga dealers are legal, that is.

[wawrzon]

The simple solution is that Apollo Team make sure the Apollo core and Vampire boards are so compatible that they don't *need* patching exec and kickstarts. It is really that simple! With all the touting about compatibility, the Apollo core should run fine with any kickstart, 1.x onwards. Incidentally, I have a MIST, and it has softcore 68000/010/020 that does run unpatched kickstarts just fine. The apollo team can easily fix this situation themselves, it would even create a bigger market for them. But, whatever

that might be en course, thanks jason again, autoconfig and the like..

[wawrzon]

If that is so, good.

Another obvious limitation is of course the current production line, which from what I understand is kipper2k and his soldering iron.

omg.. what is wrong again??? will you ever run out of complaints? everybody is working here as much he can, but obviously it will never be satisfactory..

[wawrzon]

I can understand Hyperion's resistance at the moment. So many projects go nowhere.

afair its mostly their projects that go nowhere. instead, community based projects tend to succeed. and im a bit confused about what could they offer us under these circumstances.

[wawrzon]

I should have said "Hardware projects". Why are you a bit confused?

i see a number of community based hardware projects actually fluorish. mist, fpgaarcade, vampire, a number of projects by strim like the sonnetppc for mediator or 030-decellerator just to name few. okay, there are few projects that were actually obvious to fail like ultimate ppc or tina. but what does any of that has to do with hyperions constant denial of amiga as 68k platform and their habit not to deliver even what they have promissed?