The natami looks very close to completion.

[Karlos]

I don't think an Amiga is defined in one dimension, be it the OS, custom hardware or any other single aspect. It is the combination of these and the overall experience that defines it, IMHO.

No disrespect intended to the NatAmi team, or Dennis but if the native chipset were the sole deciding factor in the definition, then the NatAmi and MiniMig are no more "real" than UAE is. The only tangible difference being that they are a hardware, rather than software realisations of the original.

If, on the other hand, you base the definition on the overall user experience, there is no doubt that the minimig (and presumably the natami) are every bit as real as anything as commodore released. However, since that is a subjective definition, you have to accept that the other amiga compatible systems out there are equally "real".

[Karlos]

@karlos: i have only two conditions i need to acknowledge an amiga as such on any machine you throw on me.
1) amigaos should not be hosted on any foreign os especially if it is an commercial closed source. i would accept an abstraction over a kernel used to provide hardware support such as amithlon if i dont have to deal with it as a user but i prefer 68k native hardware that doesnt introduce jit precompile lag each time i start a 68k application, which applies as well to os4 as to winuae.

Like it is even measurable on modern hardware. Physically reading the m68k code from disk takes longer than the translation.

What's more, hotspot based JIT tend to have no real lag since they interpret anything that isn't cpu-bound. Naturally, this is slower to execute than compiled code but that slowness is completely hidden by the fact the code isn't time critical to start with, else it would end up translated anyway.

2) the backwards compatibility should be assured as far as possible, custom chipset inclusive. i know even back in the day it wasnt well taken care of, but that time there was still an evolving market, whereas today we mostly have to rely on 10-20 years old legacy.

There comes a point when emulation is the easiest option for legacy support. If you are honest with yourself, we passed that point more than a few years ago. An emulation realised in VHDL or Verilog and implemented in generic FPGA hardware is every bit as much of an emulation as one written in software. Nobody is making chip masks.

[Karlos]

Obviously this won't last forever, but I firmly believe this is the only sensible course of action for now.

Off topic, but do you have any ideas about where you'd like to see it go long term? MorphOS x64 perchance?

[Karlos]

MorphOS needs a Wii port!  Then I will finally try it.  Now that is good cheap hardware with millions around.  Until the hardware gets that current, a MacMini is still a timebomb.  Bounty anyone?

What's so good about the Wii? Less than 1GHz of customised PPC, less than 128MB main memory, proprietary graphics hardware that needs driver support etc.

Sounds like a royal pain in the rear to me. If MOS wants to stay PPC for the time being, they are being sensible in going after old mac hardware.

[Karlos]

I have several Amigas and I have a PegII with AOS4 and MorphOS both installed.  But I haven't turned any of them on in nearly a year.  There simply isnt anything that they have to offer me that I can't have on another cheaper, more robust architecture.  As an investment, I can certainly say that my Amigas and PegII are liabilities and I'm not going to put any more money into them.  I simply cannot justify the exorbitant price for an X1000 or for upgrading MOS or AOS.  I WILL get a Natami to use all of my legacy Amiga software and games.  I enjoy Amiga for the sake of nostalgia.  For those who think that AOS or MOS is the bleeding edge, well, you're either a relative of Rip Van Winkle or you've been living in a cave for the past 20 years.  AROS will be the future of AOS, not obscure, over-priced, low tech PPC cast offs.

That's an insane proposition.

You've just explained at length how you can get a newer, more powerful machine for $500, an example of which (or better) I assume you already own and why you refuse to invest any more money in PPC offshoots.

Why on earth, then, would you buy a "new" classic machine (the natami) to run your old software catalogue when you could run it anyway on your cheap and cheerful PC at speeds far faster than any real 68K? It doesn't matter that the natami has SuperAGA, if all you are going to run is your existing 68K catalogue of old games and apps. None of them will be able to take any advantage of them other than perhaps higher screen resolutions for system friendly apps.

UAE is free. You can't get a more cost effective way of indulging your classic habit than that.

[Karlos]

Aw come on guys, you make it sound as if 576i isn't the pinnacle of display resolutions...