Classic HW, SAM440 or EFIKA ?

[Ruud]

Hi,
What you go for all depends what you want from an Amiga-like machine. I used to have an A1200 tower with BlizzardPPC & Blizzardvision etc. a few years back but I found it too unreliable to use as a main machine so I broke it up and sold it off.  I currently own both a SAM and an Efika.  The SAM has become my main computer, so much so that I'm getting rid of my Athlon64 tower pc and replacing it with an Asus Eee Box.  I still need a pc around for a few things but I don't want it taking up a load of space. I like playing with the Efika and Morphos and I will register it in the new year. But as a package it doesn't cut it as a main computer.  If you got a Peg with Morphos then sure that could be a main machine or the Macmini but not the Efika, it is too limited.  Macmini does sound good, keeping half an eye out for one myself!
The SAM of course is a lot of money but I'm fine with that because I'm using it more than I would a PC because Amiga stuff is a hobby. If you think you are still going to use a PC/Mac as a main computer I would get the Efika because of the price but if you want a main machine buy the SAM or wait for Macmini Morphos.

Just my thoughts.

Cheers,
Rudi.

[Ruud]

Everblue wrote:
This maybe a stupid question, but can you watch a dvd on SAM?

Yes you can, assuming you install a dvd drive  :-) . DvPlayer is included with os4.1 although it doesn't seem to support dvd menus.  I've been using Mplayer to play avi files but I haven't tried playing a dvd with it.

Cheers,
Rudi.

[Ruud]

takemehomegrandma wrote:

And that is in full screen with no frame skipping of course? (Just to be sure about the details... ;-))

Now that is a good point.  I must admit I haven't tried much with playing dvd's, it's not what I bought the SAM for  :-)  and I have dvd players coming out of my ears (a quick count reveals 8  :crazy: ).  I will do some tests and report results.

Cheers,
Rudi.

[Ruud]

gazgod wrote:

Having 2, 3, and 4 (and a g4 macmini that's currently my itunes server) I would say that the Peg2 + Morphos 2.1 is still my favourite.

Gaz

Do you prefer the Peg over SAM because of performance or because it runs Morphos?
Just curious.

Cheers,
Rudi.

[Ruud]

@amigadave

Yes it's difficult not to be biased.  I have to be honest and say that I don't yet know Morphos well enough to make a fair comparison of it to AOS4.1.  At the moment AOS4.1 feels closer to the Amiga experience that I am familiar with but that is not nessesarily a good thing. It may just prove a lot of peoples point that Morphos has evolved further.  For myself the SAM offers a more rounded hw setup compared to the Efika.  On my main computer I want a dvd drive/burner so that I can rip CD's to mp3 and burn discs.  The Efika's options are some what limited in this area.  The SAM's SATA gives me more hard drive options than the Efika.  The standard formfactor of the SAM means it's easy to change the case for a bigger/smaller just plain different one if I feel the need.  My SAM still has its PCI slot free, the Efika on the other hand is using its one for a video card.  And lastly the Efika is too light on memory for a main machine.
Don't get me wrong the Efika is a nice little machine and I wouldn't part with it (I just turned down an offer) but it's the hardware I find more limited than SAM NOT Morphos.  For a lot of people the Efika will meet their needs perfectly just not mine, and I certainly recommend it to anyone who wants a more cost effective next gen Amiga to go along side another machine.

Cheers,
Rudi.

[Ruud]

recidivist wrote:
Has anyone used one of the Iomega or similar USB CD/DVD drives on efika?

I'm hopefully going to be able to try one as there's an Iomega dvd burner at my girlfriends work (i'll just borrow it, for a while...). I'm not expecting great performance though. To be fair the performance on the SAM (running os4.1) will be poor as well due to the lack of usb2 drivers but you're not forced to go the usb route.

Cheers,
Rudi.

[Ruud]

takemehomegrandma wrote:
Well, the Sam does have the interfaces you'd expect from a desktop machine. Unfortunately, it doesn't have the CPU performance you'd expect, and AFAIK all external controllers (including the GFX) shares the same PCI bus/bandwidth. So you could connect more gizmo's to the Sam than the Efika, but after that you will sit with about the same low computing performance.

I agree with you. The Sam is short on cpu performance, ram and video ram (unless you use the pci slot).  A bit like my A1200 when I got that!  Maybe that's why I like it  :lol:
I would prefer something approaching the spec of my Asus Eee Box for a small form factor AOS4.1/Morphos2.1 machine but that doesn't yet exist so I accept that and use/enjoy what I have.

Cheers,
Rudi.

[Ruud]

takemehomegrandma wrote:

Well, it wasn't designed to be a desktop computer, but for industrial customers AFAIK.

I'm not sure many industrial customers would pay that kind of money for a board with Sam's specs.  I wonder if the whole industrial angle was a back up plan if the AOS4.1 deal didn't happen or maybe it was the other way around?

I would prefer a 8640 (the single core version) + SB600 combo (if it can be done). SNIP

This would essentially be a 2-chip computer, and I'm sure it could be made quite cheap.

Yeah that sounds more like it. But what are the chances?  The flex version of Sam seems to be next and it offers nothing over the current model performance wise.

Cheers,
Rudi.