AROS is really great and getting better every day but there are things I tell any new user to consider.
First, hardware support is limited so don't expect everything in aros native to work on any pc you try and run it on. For video you can always use vesa but if you don't have proper network/sound hardware those won't work.
If you use a supported soundcard sound works great. If you use a supported network card, networking runs great and supported accellerated video card gets you great video right after initial install, if the supported cards are there, everything generally just works, in my experience anyway.
Sometimes people just dump aros on any pc and complain this or that dosn't work. For the easiest installation with almost no aggravation, spend a couple bucks on ebay getting supported support cards and your experience will be SO much better and almost hassle free.
CPU/motherboard so long as its x86 dosn't seem to matter much so long as you have supported cards, just look for a computer with 3 or more pci slots and you'll be able to install supported cards.
Its alot like back in the linux beginning days. Back then, you really needed to make sure that your video, network and soundcard was supported by linux then very limited drivers to prevent alot of hair pulling and aggravation.
I've learned that yes you can look around and find a motherboard with supported stuff built in, but I have always just had a spare pc laying around and chosen to just get supported add in cards. In my experience this worked out to be much cheaper than buying a new cpu/motherboard and so on. Most pc's I have tried have been 2ghz+ and all have worked great once supported add in cards and installed and aros is installed.
Hardware to run os4 is like 500+ even used, so I think 50$ to get a few pci add in cards isn't so bad in comparison. Maybe this is just my lazy way to make sure everything works, but trust me, this method works very well if you really want a great working almost no hassle AROS box.
As far as usability, I think AROS is worlds ahead of os3.1/3.x you can play movies, browse the web on a farily modern browser that handles most sites,
run dosbox games, run almost every AOS68k application I have found in seamless mode with emulation, 16 bit sound tracking with milky tracker, and so much more. If its set up right, it can look and feel really close to AOS3.1/3.x but have much more modern capabilities and speed. Its usability is rapidly approaching a use it as your everyday computer kind of thing, in my opinion anyway. I suppose that depends alot on what you do.
Aros really needs - A really good video editing application, a really good sound editing application, Better word processing/spreadsheets (though you can use google docs or web based stuff in the meantime) Needs more art/paint programs, needs printing. In the meantime, many users use aros for most things and dual boot windows xp or linux in the meantime.
Good luck and feel free to post your experiences here!
Steven
