AmigaROM for AmigaOS4

[DavidF215]

Back in the day, the Commodore 64/128 and Amiga would boot to a ready state in less than 5 seconds from cold boot. The one thing that always impressed me about the Amiga was how fast it booted and the high responsiveness of the GUI. We need a computer today that can be ready within 5 seconds of a cold boot. Waiting for the computer to boot to a ready state is old and time-consuming.

Is there any possibility that this will ever be achieved again? Particularly with AmigaOS4 or AmigaOS5? AmigaOS has a small footprint, so how about an embedded ROM that works with AmigaOS4 like previous ROMs worked with previous versions of AmigaOS?

[sundown]

@DavidF215

No, you would lose the ability to customize the looks &
functionality of the system. I don't want my system to
look like everyone elses. Would be fine if it was only a
game machine.

[Trooper]

It could be made flashable, A bit like the GP32 (www.gp32x.com), Which has a flashable firmware and can be customized by attaching a program or two on to the bios to create a completely different interface (Gui).

Trooper

[AdMartin]

Kickflash.
Algor Pro.

Edit: Of course, the AOne already has a flashable BIOS, like all modern desktop computers. I don't have an AOne, but I guess with a minimum Workbench setup, you could boot in a matter of seconds.

sundown wrote:
@DavidF215

No, you would lose the ability to customize the looks &
functionality of the system. I don't want my system to
look like everyone elses. Would be fine if it was only a
game machine.

??

What planet are you on?

You can "customize the looks and functionality of the system" on EVERY Amiga released so far.  And they all have a boot ROM. (A1000 excepted)

[sundown]

@mdma

Go read the original post again. He was talking about booting an Amiga like the C64/128 which
had a boot ROM. The C64 required no HD or floppy to boot & was not configurable.

Or did I read the post wrong?

[Ross_Geller]

@Sundown

DavidF215 wrote:

AmigaOS has a small footprint, so how about an embedded ROM that works with AmigaOS4 like previous ROMs worked with previous versions of AmigaOS?

[Rogue]

Amiga would boot to a ready state in less than 5 seconds from cold boot

Huh? Only if you would just switch it on and let it skip startup-sequence. "Back in the day" there where 3.5 inch floppy disks where the seek already took 5 seconds.

We need a computer today that can be ready within 5 seconds of a cold boot. Waiting for the computer to boot to a ready state is old and time-consuming.

Not really, if the machine and OS is stable you will not reboot too often.

Is there any possibility that this will ever be achieved again? Particularly with AmigaOS4 or AmigaOS5? AmigaOS has a small footprint, so how about an embedded ROM that works with AmigaOS4 like previous ROMs worked with previous versions of AmigaOS?

You can boot OS4 from solid-state memory, like a CF card or a ROM, and from things like a USB stick (although not with the current pre-release). The initial hardware init will take some time, though.

[DavidF215]

Rogue wrote:

Amiga would boot to a ready state in less than 5 seconds from cold boot

Huh? Only if you would just switch it on and let it skip startup-sequence. "Back in the day" there where 3.5 inch floppy disks where the seek already took 5 seconds.

My A1200 would boot to Workbench from a slow 80MB drive in about 6 seconds (I timed it a few times.) That was several years ago. Now, it should boot in less than 4 seconds and maybe even less than 3 seconds.

We need a computer today that can be ready within 5 seconds of a cold boot. Waiting for the computer to boot to a ready state is old and time-consuming.

Not really, if the machine and OS is stable you will not reboot too often.

That's not my point. It doesn't matter if the OS is stable or not. The desired solution is a system ready to use fast. Today's memory speeds are faster than those in the 80's. So the boot speeds should be faster today as a result. What are some ROM solutions in which this can be done using AmigaOS4 (or any other OS)?

[SamuraiCrow]

My MicroA1-C (AmigaOne) can boot quickly but not that quickly.  The network initialization slows it down somewhat, and the kickstart is booted from the drive like the A1000 and early A3000s.  The warm boot is really fast though and anyway it boots faster than Windoze or Linux or even MacOSX.

[Rogue]

My A1200 would boot to Workbench from a slow 80MB drive in about 6 seconds (I timed it a few times.) That was several years ago. Now, it should boot in less than 4 seconds and maybe even less than 3 seconds.

With nothing on it, yes. Even starting a TCP/IP stack takes longer than that. Of course I can also cut the startup-sequence down to a "LoadWB", but face it, that doesn't turn up anything useful.

That's not my point. It doesn't matter if the OS is stable or not. The desired solution is a system ready to use fast. Today's memory speeds are faster than those in the 80's. So the boot speeds should be faster today as a result.

Quite the contrary. Peolpe come to expect more from their OS than a few years back. If I turn on my machine, I expect it to load the TCP stack, start AmiDock, load a few fonts (with anti-aliasing) and a fancy backdrop for Workbench. Life isn't four color solid-grey workbench anymore. In the same amount that people's expectations grow, the boot time will grow.

What are some ROM solutions in which this can be done using AmigaOS4 (or any other OS)?

ROM solutions for AmigaOS 4 (for the classic) will prevent you from the required re-boot when you switch on your machine by putting the new kickstart modules into a flash rom.

[Rogue]

The network initialization slows it down somewhat,

You can speed it up a bit but adding a "run" in front of AddNetInterface.

[Thomas]

Quite the contrary. Peolpe come to expect more from their OS than a few years back. If I turn on my machine, I expect it to load the TCP stack, start AmiDock, load a few fonts (with anti-aliasing) and a fancy backdrop for Workbench. Life isn't four color solid-grey workbench anymore. In the same amount that people's expectations grow, the boot time will grow.

I don't think anyone is complaining about AmigaOS being slow. What is really slow is UBoot. It needs about 10 seconds to initialise the IDE drives, waits one second for me to stop it, needs another three seconds to load the Kickstart, then the Kickstart seems to initialise all the hardware again which needs 6 to 8 seconds again and then finally it loads Startup-Sequence which only lasts 3 or 4 seconds until the desktop becomes usable.

So it is *not* Startup-Seqeuence and all the AmigaOS parts loaded after hardware initialisation which makes it slow. It is the pre-boot phase which is annoyingly slow.

At least after Ctrl-Win-Win my A1 is much faster than my A4000. It is a little bit irritating, though, that there is no reaction on Ctrl-Win-Win on the A1. You have to wait all the 6 to 8 seconds until the Kickstart initialises the gfx card for knowing that it still works and has not crashed completely. (I think I did not manage to crash it completely since pre-update #1).

Bye,
Thomas

[mikeymike]

From what I've seen of OS4 startup times, in terms of a modern operating system, it is impressive (about 15 seconds as people have already said).  Short of a change of storage medium, I doubt a decently/fully-featured OS could load much faster.