Hmm, I forgot about the "backwards" viewing order in the new Xoops version (I made the update as an edit to the first post, the actual review), but here it is also:
[color=FF0000]UPDATE[/color][/b]
2004-03-07
It turned out that I was right when not doubting Genesi about the "catching up" with things in my last sentences above! :-). In late February Genesi made another production run of the Pegasos (earlier than expected), and those are now (or will soon be) available at dealers. I received my latest Pegasos (actually my fourth in order :-o) from GGS Data last Tuesday. I ordered a G3 this time. In addition to that, MorphOS "1.4.2" was released this other day.
Let's start with the G4 CPU processor card. I wrote in the review that the noise from the fan was not too disturbing, but after using it for a while I changed my mind about this and
made some changes. As I said, I myself ordered a G3 this time, but Gunne Steen from GGS Data has posted this image of the new cooling solution on Pegasos G4 cards …
… and reports that the noise level from these compares to a whisper. He also say that it's now possible to switch between the G3 and G4 CPU cards. A big improvement in other words, and certainly good news! :-) The 1GHz G4 speed is certainly welcome at my home, as long as it’s silent. On the G3 cards there is still a completely passive cooler (a nice aluminium colour one).
The firmware in the Pegasos has been updated to v1.1 (from 2004-02-24), and some differences are easily spotted. First, that annoying bug that made it necessary to reset the computer the first thing you did after cold boot to be able to access your IDE devices is now removed :-). In other words, it’s just to power up and play now!
I mentioned in the review that I randomly couldn’t boot MorphOS. For some reason that problem went away when I put both the HDD and the DVD as masters on their own respective IDE channels. On my updated Pegasos motherboard I have no problem in using the DVD and HDD on the same channel. I can also now use a DVD-ROM drive that previously didn’t work. It seems to me that some improvements has been made in peripheral tolerance! :-)
If you type the printenv command you will see some new variables as well. I haven’t researched this a lot, but it seems like it's possible to boot from networks.
A lot has happened on the OS front as well. Several Linux distributions are now available, and so is OpenBSD. A minor update of MorphOS with some (not so "minor" IMHO) bugfixes has also been released. The changes are:
- The IDE lockup bug in MorphOS has been fixed. :-)
- Real Time Clock load and save problems on Pegasos 2 have been fixed.
- The system clock no longer drifts on Pegasos 2.
- The Exec MEMF_REVERSE memory fragmentation bug has been fixed.
Needless to say, these fixes were very much welcome! Now we are waiting for MorphOS1.5 which is supposed to be a major update, including a PPC MorphOS native TCP/IP stack, Altivec, 3D for radeon 7xxx, etc.
To sum things up:
None of the “aber’s” I wrote in my review above remains now. According to my experiences, everything now works fully as expected right from the start, without any need for fiddling and workarounds. The Pegasos now also feels more tolerant to hardware peripherals, but I have not measured this “scientifically” in any way, it’s only my feelings based on my experiences.
The stability is excellent! I would now for the first time dare to claim that the Pegasos II with MorphOS is running more stable than *any* Amiga I have *ever* used. And it flies! :-D
In the review above I insinuated that the Christmas release of Pegasos II might have been a bit pre-mature. But that certainly is not the case anymore. In my opinion, the Pegasos II is definitely ready to hit the streets in the “real world” in this condition. I can whole heartedly recommend this to everyone! :-)
