OS4 moves to x86. What happens next?

[runequester]

So this comes up constantly. "Amiga should move to x86 and everything would be way better".

I don't think its all that simple really. Here's some things that'd at least warrant exploring:

1: Time and money required to port the operating system. I have absolutely zero idea how long this would take, but I am assuming it'd be a pretty significant endeavour.

2: Time and money required to port applications.Without app's, an OS is worthless.

3: Oh hey there AROS! What functionality does os4 give that AROS doesn't ?

4: Most overlooked:
Hardware support.
AROS has been around for years and still supports a fairly limited range of hardware.
When it comes to hardware there's two options: The linux way (support it all in the kernel, which requires massive amounts of work from a large number of people) or the windows way (have the hardware manufacturer write drivers for you).
OS4 would have neither.

The assumption in these threads tends to be "we could run amiga OS on any PC and it'd be rad". And that would rad, but it won't be reality.

5: User base.
Is there any actual user base in a world saturated with mature OS choices ? What do I get out of amiga os in the present day and age, that isn't already served by one of the big four (windows, linux, bsd or mac) in some flavour or form ?
I'd love to see data on this, but I heavily suspect that the amount of non-amiga folks using morph or aros is a distinct minority.
I have a hard time seeing how x86 amiga os would attract new people rather than just shuffle existing users around.


Pessimistic ? Maybe. But I think the choices that were made (powerPC) were good choices at the time. I think it's too late at this point to go back.

[runequester]

What makes people think that on x86 they would suddenly be in competition with Microsoft and that if you can't get to 50% marketshare you stop?

Compared to the Amiga market, a tiny piece of the PC market would be like striking gold.

The only thing that would change is that the number of people who could try AOS would suddenly be in the millions.

If a minute fraction of them bought a copy, the sales and user base increase would be exponentially larger than on high priced, hard to find (for the average user) PPC systems.

You have to already love it in order to invest in PPC hardware, so the market is doomed to only shrink.

You really need the hobby users that follow Linux, FreeBSD, etc. and ex-Amiga users with fond memories in order to get anywhere at all.

If AROS hasn't brought them in the past several years, I have my doubts the amiga name would.