What would an Amiga be today?

[mdwh2]

Would we buying a PC branded as an Amiga such as there are PC’s branded as DELL and Scan?

Like Apple, today's Amigas would probably be pretty much standard PCs branded as Amiga. However, also like Apple, marketing could still distinguish them from being "PCs". They might also have some minor differences so they weren't "IBM compatible" PCs as such.

The OS would either be one of today's existing OSs, or possibly they might do as Apple did, and modify another existing one. Either way, it would probably not be the classic AmigaOS. Moreover, I would _hope_ it wasn't, due to the deficiencies such as lacking memory protection. Do today's Mac fans wish they were still running the original MacOS, or today's Windows fans wish they were still using DOS/Win 9x, instead of the NT derived Windows?

Didn't Commodore have plans, shortly before going bust, for new Amigas to be using HP RISC processors, running Windows NT? If that had happened, the break from the "classic" line would have been far sooner.

If you want an Amiga of today, just get a PC, slap an Amiga sticker on it, and run UAE if you need some backwards compatibility. It's just as much an Amiga as today's Macs are to the classic Macs

SamuraiCrow wrote:
Management at Commodore towards the end was outright anti-Amiga and pro-PC.

But only in the same sense as Apple were "anti-Mac" for wanting to ditch the classic technology. However, no one looks at them this way. Similarly, if things had gone that route, no one would think of Commodore of being anti-Amiga (well, except for the few die hards who also thought an A500+ didn't count as an Amiga); rather, the new machines would be Amigas.

persia wrote:
The Amiga graphics card was built onto the motherboard so it couldn't be easily upgraded and they tried to do the speciality chips themselves. It was a closed system. There was no development money to advance the OS.

These days, an increasing number of PCs make do with only graphics on the motherboard, so in that sense PCs have become more Amiga-like. But yes, a Commodore of today would likely be using standard chipsets, rather than trying to make them themselves.

[mdwh2]

kreciu wrote:
This means that today people eat, buy, do what the mighty TV, newspapers, advertisement will tell them to do etc... and they are free? Children "attached" permanently to TV's with game consoles, game pads ... "killing, shooting, and destroying "monsters" in "real 3D". Parents exited in buying new 100" LCD TV and watching football game. Live "on cell phone", people who can't live without it.

I am amused that you criticise new technology by posting about it on a web board - shouldn't you be out being free in the real world, rather than being permanently attached to the Internet with it telling you what to do?

The question is what kind of new value give us new computers? Can we do something better, productive today that 15 years ago, or even 1000?

Of course we can. For any meaningful definition of productivity, it has increased in the last 1,000 years, and in the last 15 too. How that translates into quality of life, or whether that means people are happier or not, are another matter (although I know I'd rather be living in a nice warm flat, being able to use computers and the Internet in my large amounts of leisure time - as opposed spending all day living in cold mud trying to grow minimal amounts of food just to stop myself starving...)

What development of computers change in human nature, how it helped in personal development?

Well, let's start with you - presumably you must like using the Internet, if you're here?

What else do you use the Internet for? What work do you do, or what interests do you have?

For me, my interest and livelihood of programming wouldn't be possible without computers. The Internet makes things much easier, from buying or banking online, to organising my social life and keeping in touch with people. That's not to mention mobile phones - when I'm out, I can use them to contact people or access the Internet anywhere. I can call up maps anywhere on Earth, or listen to music without having to carry around 100s of tapes.

If you're better without technology, why do you use it?

[mdwh2]

But that wasn't a problem for the Mac - and the Amiga only really started having problems after Commodore went bust.

Even if Commodore had switched to using modern PC components instead of the classic Amiga, they could still be using the Amiga brandname (as Apple have done with the Mac brandname).