My evening with Commodore USA, LLC

[brownb2]

It's a massive insult, imagine how Mac owners would react in the same situation, some pc clone maker starts making "Macs" and shoving Windows 7 on them.

That would be almost as bad as gutting their machine and running it on Intel with a Unix OS... oh wait.

The Mac owners got behind Apple eventually. I don't see how this would be much different. I'm not C= USA advocate, but afaics the way forward is to get something out doubly quick that at least as some heritage behind it. The longer the X1000 takes the less likely anyone will buy - I for one would expect at least a 4GB quad core jobbie for the price they are going to be charging, which mean's they're already behind

At the end of the day the real Amiga died in the 90s because the market changed, the PC evolved, and Commodore couldn't keep up. Any company attempting the same today and can't adapt/release new tech quickly will die as proven by Escom, Gateway etc. To have a realistic chance mass market penetration is needed and that means selling the brand first IMHO. Innovative new features for these "PCs" can come after.

[brownb2]

There's a world of difference between running on an x86 architecture and shipping Macs with Windows 7, the reason we were Amiga users/Mac users is because we thought Windows sucked generally.

My point being with Apple they changed the OS to Unix and IIRC they emulate the PowerPC for backwards compatibility. AFAICS that situation is not too different. We could use a custom Ubuntu + UAE file type integration to fire up an integrated emulator that shares the same disks.

Even if they manage to skin Ubuntu to look like Workbench, it still won't run Amiga apps.  Apple did a LOT more than just skin up a Linux distro, you cannot compare the two.

Why wouldn't it run Amiga apps? You could even throw in a Catweasel device or an Amiga floppy as an optional extra when you buy the hardware? Apple added their propriety UI on top of Darwin, for the most part the inners are raw Unix and the pretty Aqua UI is what the Apple guys define as owning an Apple now. The same could be said for Ubuntu + dedicated propriety Amiga OS window manager (which is probably do-able in around 6 months for a small team of well versed developers). A good window manager can do a lot of magical Amiga only things, it's not necessarily a theme. Having said that I'd want to work on one myself now

[brownb2]

Question:  What is so innovative about putting a PC inside a case that looks like a Amiga?  
 
Absolutely NOTHING!  

Why does it have to be innovative? I understand some people only want it to be innovative to honour the memory of old Commodore and the Amiga. You can do that without innovation by making sure the brand at least survives, think of it as selling Commodore branded PCs. Does that make you feel better?

Eventually Commodore (whichever guise) can invent the next ipod, ipad, iphone, idontgiveacrap but a startup company in a recession can't. You can't invest in research without the funds or investment in a sound business model.

[brownb2]

I don't care about the brand, and I don't come on here for the brand. I'm here because I like to use the Amiga OS, and it's associated hardware and software.

But building up cash by selling branded product, ok, I don't mind that. But they should not be muddying the waters about a new Amiga/AmigaOS, while at the same time as confusing it with someone elses product, I can't see it helping their cause -As this thread (and others on other forums) demonstrate.

I don't care for the hardware, sure the X1000 if sufficiently powerful sounds cool but I'm here for the nostalgia and the community I remember. I moved onto the no longer grey box PC and that fondness for the custom hardware faded a long time ago and based on a recent poll "would you buy an X1000" it did a long time ago for a lot of other people.  If you can't sell it to the die-hards  here who can you sell it to?
Now if we're talking retro Atari t-shirts and Commodore t-shirts then I'm all in, especially if merchandising nostalgia that would get a company off the ground. For what it's worth I don't like CUSA's new products except perhaps the C64x and I agree they shouldn't muddy waters because that's just going to piss people off...

[brownb2]

"Why does it have to be innovative?"  
 
Because this is what sells, not packaging a PC...

That's not to say they can't do both.

Going down the road Commodore USA is following will only end in a dead end.  There is no future in the past...  Companies don't have to be Microsoft sized to be innovative... I want Commodore and Amiga to have a future and that is why I posted under this topic...

I've built my own for years too (as I type I'm still on an 2.2Ghz Athlon XP "2700+") but that hasn't stopped me getting a Dell laptop and my better half getting a Dell PC. Some people just don't want to roll their own or want the support. As it stands currently any official Commodore company has no future at all because they aren't selling anything so any company is better than no company or vapourware.

I realise this is getting a bit heated this is not my intention. I just want to state that the Commodore / the Amiga needs a future, any future just as long as it starts the ball rolling and is not a set top box

[brownb2]

 I believe users have gotten much smarter and have learned to think for themselves today (look at what Apple has accomplished with the iPhone as an example) and if you give them something that does it better and faster and what others cannot do, they will buy it.  

That's very arguable -  their products are expensive and often under powered compared to competitors' and while Apple sometimes innovate (ipod wheel, Aqua - anything else?) they just advertise MUCH better.  I can't think of Apple without some black dancing silhouettes and a white ipod - how "cool". That says to me its attempted brain washing and what I (respectfully) think when I see words like "better and faster and what others cannot do" with the word "Apple". Perhaps I am wrong and it is true that others cannot do what they do because Apple patent everything!

I notice they quickly dropped the "Think different" slogan as soon as the mass market caught on with tons of advertising they do. Somebody who thinks different wouldn't buy Apple as they are the new Microsoft imho.

[brownb2]

Given that ipods account for something like 75% of the MP3 player market, I think its a safe bet that most people don't give a hoot.
 
To be fair, if people actually cared about this stuff, microsoft would be out of business just the same as apple.

Best thing is Apple nearly went bust in 1997 until Microsoft bought $150mil of their shares.

[brownb2]

I had this long diatribe basically outlining the same thing last night, but decided not to post 'cause I thought it would have just gotten lost among the pages and pages of BS. So thanks for this Bloodline!

Instead of posting this diatribe/bs an "I agree" would have been acceptable and shorter way of saying the same thing

[brownb2]

@ brownb2

:lol:

(PS:You look a lot better now in your new avatar... :lol:)

Cheers - my smug sh*t eating grin on the previous photo started irritating me, but oddly this thread didn't!