potential PPC Amiga REAL CHEAP

[jarrody2k]

And if you read  http://stuffo.howstuffworks.com/gamecube.htm , you will see that a GC is designed like an Amiga.  A true gaming machine unlike those PC's (PS2/XBOX) posing as game machines.

Hold on, I need to vomit...

.. right.  PS2 is like a PC?  I write software on the PS2 for a living and nothing is further from the truth.  More research, less zeal, buddy.

Jarrod

[Karlos]

@whoever bloodline was replying to

It's clear you don't understand where current PC hardware is at.

We each have our preferences, personally I prefer (for various reasons) PPC over x86, but I'd never suggest for a second that the current generation PC hardware was fundamentally crap, flawed or inefficient.

Lastly, you seem to refer to PC and x86 as interchanagable terms. This is like saying 680x0 and amiga (or apple) are interchangable. Just as many 680x0 based systems have moved towards PPC, so the PC has moved to a 64-bit clean architecture in the guise of AMD64.

Comparing an AMD64 running in native 64-bit mode to a 32-bit x86 is about as sensible (architecturally speaking) as comparing PPC to 680x0.

[Waccoon]

I know I should stay clear of this, but...

I worked on a lexican analyzer in college back in '91 when I was a computer engineering student at UMass-Amherst. It essential is a dos-like command line interpreter. Wrote it in ADA as well as the 'dos' functions it was designed to respond to. This was for a VAX VMS system. I do have a stong computer programming background and some engineering background on the hardware side too.

Well, I'm genuinly surprised.  The trouble is, that was '91,
and you were dealing with application-level stuff, not OS-level stuff.  Your little DOS/shell thing works just fine with no real OS underneath.

If you don't want multitasking, memory protection, virtual memory, and the ability to run applications without recompiling them for each hardware platform, then Gamecube is fine.

OS4 is designed to bring the Amiga world out of those dark days, even if it isn't designed all that well.

mdma:  The dreamcast ran WindowsCE, NetBSD, and Linux 7 years ago.

Were they stripped down versions?  To say a console can run a modern OS implies that the OS retains all its original functionality.

You can run Linux on a cell phone.  It just can't do a fraction of what it can do on properly built PC hardware.

I've been on this site long enough to know that when someone says 'PC' they mean a Wintel box.

Things have changed a lot since the "IBM Compatible" days, buddy.

The Mac is a PC too, you know.

Hell, the machine is based on all the same standards, too.  :-)

http://www.gc-linux.org

How does the functionality of that OS compare to a "real" Linux?  How many lines of code did they have to rewrite to get it to work?  Are they using Nintendo's APIs or are they writing their own drivers?

You can get Linux running on anything.  You just have to strip it down to a toothpick to do it.

It's also worth pointing out that Linux is a kernel, and full builds of Linux are actually GNU/Linux.  There's a lot more to an OS than just the kernel.

The 81MB/second transfer rate of the GC's high speed parrallel port is no joke.

What's the buffer on that?  Is it DMA?

Come on now. You don't think that an ATI chip designed for a game console doesn't have optimized drivers? How is using an API for graphics on a game different from using is in another application such as a gui for an OS?

Very.

Does the Flipper support overlays?

I don't believe Apple will be handing out a license to run another OS on there machine. So the Mac-mini is not a legal option.

*Snort*

Getting legal permission from Nintendo is looking easier by the second, eh?

I believe it's these API's that will let Revolution be backwards compatible with GC.

Maybe, but only the usage may be similar.  You'll still have to re-compile all your software for the new hardware.

This is all part of the HAL that they had to write for the A1.

A modern HAL makes a lot of assumptions about the underlying hardware, and is built around a lowest common denominator.  HALs are easy to port to other PCs.  Rewriting the HAL for a console machine that doesn't follow most PC standards is a HELL of a lot of work.  You'd also have to write a new BIOS for each machine on which the HAL has to run to do it "properly."  If you're not sure why a BIOS has to be written from scratch for each system, think about what "BIOS" stands for.

XBOX is not PPC based so it would be a major rewrite of OS4 and as I've stated before is off-topic.

Only if Hyperion didn't do it properly (and likely, they didn't).

I think you're a little confused over the fact that Gecko != PPC.  The core is similar, but not the same.  If you have to completely recompile everything compared to AmigaOne, then why should the CPU architecture matter at all?  You're definately not going to be able to run software compiled for AmigaOne or AmigaPPC on Gamecube directly, and vice-verca.

Non-PPC machines are most certainly not off topic.  You just don't want to expand your options beyond Nintendo.

My key point is that OS4 is ALREADY a PPC OS so porting it to the GC should only require a rewrite of the HAL

My key point is that there is more to a hardware platform than just the CPU.  A modern OS can't run with the capabilites you'd expect from a modern OS (or even OS4), running on console hardware.

The heart of the Amiga is a games machine.

Oh.  Well, you obviously don't want a modern OS with all the things that made the Amiga special, like multitasking and multimedia.  You want a game machine.

If all you want is games, then porting OS4 (with all the "OS" parts ripped out) is certainly feasable.

But... why bother with an OS at all?

The A1 is a PC design and has the same inefficencies as a PC (x86)...it's single shared system bus architeture.

Name it.  Then tell me the difference between PCI and ISA (for starters).  What you know about IRQs and DMA is a thing of the past on the PC (excuse me, I mean IBM Compatible).

What's really damned ironic is that most consoles are really single bus machines, here.  A unified memory architecture means all the chips share the same memory and must work in perfect syncronization.  PC's are asyncronous machines tied together with multiple busses.  There's many good reasons for that, but I don't think you care, seeing how you keep saying, over and over, that the PC has a single bus, when it certainly does not.

Much of the Amiga's multi-tasking capabilities came from the fact that the custom chips could access memory on there own while the cpu was doing other things.

I don't suppose "GPU" means anything to you?  Oh, look, my Radeon has its own 256MB block of memory.

adolescent:  OS4 will not run on 24Mb of RAM. It's simply not possible.

That's arguable.

Revolution to use same API as Gamecube...

That's "compatible"...  not "same."  You still have to recompile everything.

[Louis Dias]

bloodline wrote:

My key point is that OS4 is ALREADY a PPC OS so porting it to the GC should only require a rewrite of the HAL (licensing issues included). Going to x86 is a much bigger issue. Also, I like the fact that consoles are better for games. The heart of the Amiga is a games machine. The A1 is a PC design and has the same inefficencies as a PC (x86)...it's single shared system bus architeture. Much of the Amiga's multi-tasking capabilities came from the fact that the custom chips could access memory on there own while the cpu was doing other things. The GC is also built that way. It's truly very Amiga-like from a hardware point of view.

The Above quote is meaningless...

I think you study PC architecture before you post crap and prove that you are an idiot.

You are so far behind the tech curve you can't see how wrong you are... even busses in the traditional sense have been superceded by point-to-point packet based transport layers... Do the words Hypertransport and PCI-express mean nothing to you?

If I look at the PC sitting next to me, The CPU has three independant busses; a dual channel RAM interface (that means 2 separate busses dedicated to memory access) and a single hypertransport link.

The Hypertransport link connects to the PCIe (PCI-express) tunnel and to the PCI bridge.

On my PCIe bus I have a Graphics card, which I shall come to later, and some integrated system features like SATA, Gigabit-Lan, USB2, Firewire etc...

On the PCI bus, I have some standard southbridge features, IDE, FDC, BIOS, RTC, PS/2 ports, Serial etc... and I have a sound card and a TV card plugged in there too.

Ok back to the Graphics card; This is a separate Processor (aka the GPU) dedicated to graphics generation, it also has its own memory, 128megs on a dedicated bus that has nothing to do with anything else in the computer.

Ok, lets count up those busses! I counted 6, not counting the USB2 (With my digital camera, keyboard, mouse etc...) or the Firewire with my Edirol FA-101 audio module.

Now what were you saying about single busses? oh years that's right the amiga has a single bus...[/quote]

And you are a bigger idiot because the A1 has none of those features except the fact that a video card has it's own ram but that only gets filled through the main system bus so when that is happening, the CPU is probably already processed all it can in it's cache and is just waiting...

You are also getting confused with what a bus is...all the info that you receive from USB 2.0 etc goes through the system bus to be stored in RAM or HD.

[Louis Dias]

jarrody2k wrote:

And if you read  http://stuffo.howstuffworks.com/gamecube.htm , you will see that a GC is designed like an Amiga.  A true gaming machine unlike those PC's (PS2/XBOX) posing as game machines.

Hold on, I need to vomit...

.. right.  PS2 is like a PC?  I write software on the PS2 for a living and nothing is further from the truth.  More research, less zeal, buddy.

Jarrod

Sony calls it "Playstation 2 COMPUTER Entertainment System".  It has an archetecture just like a PC bus uses a different processor.  Just like the A1 uses a PPC and an 'IBM PC-compatible' computer uses in intel chip.

Now go call Sony a liar and make them stop calling it a 'computer entertainment system'.

[bloodline]

lou_dias wrote:

jarrody2k wrote:

And if you read  http://stuffo.howstuffworks.com/gamecube.htm , you will see that a GC is designed like an Amiga.  A true gaming machine unlike those PC's (PS2/XBOX) posing as game machines.

Hold on, I need to vomit...

.. right.  PS2 is like a PC?  I write software on the PS2 for a living and nothing is further from the truth.  More research, less zeal, buddy.

Jarrod

Sony calls it "Playstation 2 COMPUTER Entertainment System".  It has an archetecture just like a PC bus uses a different processor.  Just like the A1 uses a PPC and an 'IBM PC-compatible' computer uses in intel chip.

Now go call Sony a liar and make them stop calling it a 'computer entertainment system'.

I'll ignore your pointless response to my post... and focus on the fact that the PS2 is nothing like a PC in anyway...

Look here: Arstechnica

[Louis Dias]

Karlos wrote:
@whoever bloodline was replying to

It's clear you don't understand where current PC hardware is at.

We each have our preferences, personally I prefer (for various reasons) PPC over x86, but I'd never suggest for a second that the current generation PC hardware was fundamentally crap, flawed or inefficient.

Lastly, you seem to refer to PC and x86 as interchanagable terms. This is like saying 680x0 and amiga (or apple) are interchangable. Just as many 680x0 based systems have moved towards PPC, so the PC has moved to a 64-bit clean architecture in the guise of AMD64.

Comparing an AMD64 running in native 64-bit mode to a 32-bit x86 is about as sensible (architecturally speaking) as comparing PPC to 680x0.

Please read the whole thread in future responses.  On this site, people refer to there Amigas as 'my Amiga' not 'my PC' so when I say PC, I mean wintel running Windows.  I also didn't start this thread to debate what is the best architecture for a future Amiga.  I started it draw support for a licensed version of OS4 on the GC as a quick and low cost alternative to the overpriced and outdated A1.  I don't care that there are better (and more expensive) alternatives, nor do they need to be discussed in this thread.  As I'm sure they have already been discussed in other threads.

[Louis Dias]

Waccoon wrote:

Well, I'm genuinly surprised.  The trouble is, that was '91,
and you were dealing with application-level stuff, not OS-level stuff.  Your little DOS/shell thing works just fine with no real OS underneath.

If you don't want multitasking, memory protection, virtual memory, and the ability to run applications without recompiling them for each hardware platform, then Gamecube is fine.

OS4 is designed to bring the Amiga world out of those dark days, even if it isn't designed all that well.

It's the kernel that give you multitasking, why would that change with a GC port?  Why does most software written for an A500 run on an A1200 without a recompile?  OS4 software written for OS4 should be able to run on a GC running OS4 or an A1.

mdma:  The dreamcast ran WindowsCE, NetBSD, and Linux 7 years ago.

Were they stripped down versions?  To say a console can run a modern OS implies that the OS retains all its original functionality.

You can look up the details of this in Microsoft's own MSDN library: http://search.microsoft.com/search/results.aspx?qu=dreamcast&View=msdn&st=b&c=0&s=1&swc=0

I've been on this site long enough to know that when someone says 'PC' they mean a Wintel box.

Things have changed a lot since the "IBM Compatible" days, buddy.

The Mac is a PC too, you know.

Hell, the machine is based on all the same standards, too.  :-)

yes but I'm sure you refer to it as 'your MAC' not 'your PC' on this forum...

http://www.gc-linux.org

How does the functionality of that OS compare to a "real" Linux?  How many lines of code did they have to rewrite to get it to work?  Are they using Nintendo's APIs or are they writing their own drivers?

You can get Linux running on anything.  You just have to strip it down to a toothpick to do it.

It's also worth pointing out that Linux is a kernel, and full builds of Linux are actually GNU/Linux.  There's a lot more to an OS than just the kernel.

These are all good questions and you can direct that to that website.  The amazing thing is that it was all done through reverse-engineering.  Never the less a point has been proven.  The GC can be a 'PC'.

The 81MB/second transfer rate of the GC's high speed parrallel port is no joke.

What's the buffer on that?  Is it DMA?

It's called a high-speed parrallel port which leads me to believe that it functions like.........a parrallel port.  Why do you want the specific details?  Are you going to code something on the GC?  Either way, I'm sure the details can be found on the Linux-on-GC site and definitely in an official Gamcube developer's kit.

Come on now. You don't think that an ATI chip designed for a game console doesn't have optimized drivers? How is using an API for graphics on a game different from using is in another application such as a gui for an OS?

Very.

Does the Flipper support overlays?

LOL, 'very' indeed...  You are a comedian now?  Overlays?!  Wow, you would think overlays are some secret feature of the OCS/ECS/AGA and can never be done again by any other GPU...  Again, for details get a GC developer's kit.

I don't believe Apple will be handing out a license to run another OS on there machine. So the Mac-mini is not a legal option.

*Snort*

Getting legal permission from Nintendo is looking easier by the second, eh?

It is.  I've been making that point.  Nintendo has publicly stated that they are looking to expand into new markets.  They are the only console that will and has published 'non-game' games.

I believe it's these API's that will let Revolution be backwards compatible with GC.

Maybe, but only the usage may be similar.  You'll still have to re-compile all your software for the new hardware.

I answered this at the beginning.  Again...why don't I have to recompile A500 software to run it on an A1200.  You must have forgotten that I've owned Amigas and would know this.

I'll go out on a limb here and make another prediction for the GC/Revolution backwards compatibility thing:

I'll bet there will be atleast 1 software title that will run on either system.  BUT!  Yes, big 'BUT', it will know if it's running on the GC or Revolution and will run in a higher resolution mode AND with better texturing as well, taking full advantage of the extra processing power of Revolution vs. GC!  Only time will prove me right or wrong.

This is all part of the HAL that they had to write for the A1.

A modern HAL makes a lot of assumptions about the underlying hardware, and is built around a lowest common denominator.  HALs are easy to port to other PCs.  Rewriting the HAL for a console machine that doesn't follow most PC standards is a HELL of a lot of work.  You'd also have to write a new BIOS for each machine on which the HAL has to run to do it "properly."  If you're not sure why a BIOS has to be written from scratch for each system, think about what "BIOS" stands for.

In a licensed product, Hyperion would have this information available to them.  It didn't seem to be much effort for them to write the A1 bios and even threw in an x86 emulator to boot.  Again, all this stuff is details that would be in the developer's kit.  We know the issues, they are no different than the issues they've had with the A1 except the hardware is proven and known, no mystery bugs like the VIA IDE DMA bug that surprised them and Eyetech.  So in effect I see an easier time of it.

I think you're a little confused over the fact that Gecko != PPC.  The core is similar, but not the same.  If you have to completely recompile everything compared to AmigaOne, then why should the CPU architecture matter at all?  You're definately not going to be able to run software compiled for AmigaOne or AmigaPPC on Gamecube directly, and vice-verca.

Non-PPC machines are most certainly not off topic.  You just don't want to expand your options beyond Nintendo.

What rubbish.  I swear, with every post it seems your IQ goes down.  You are going to tell me the a PPC cpu is not a PPC cpu.  Gekko is a PPC cpu.  This one has a faster bus speed and some Altivec instructions thrown in.  It's a better/newer core than the Apple G4 (oh wait, according to your logic the Apple G4 must not be a PPC cpu) and has some Altivec capabilities to boot (which is the only reason to want a G4 over a G3 at the same clock speed)

My key point is that OS4 is ALREADY a PPC OS so porting it to the GC should only require a rewrite of the HAL

My key point is that there is more to a hardware platform than just the CPU.  A modern OS can't run with the capabilites you'd expect from a modern OS (or even OS4), running on console hardware.

That's your opinion.  And you'll stick to it to your death I am certain.

The heart of the Amiga is a games machine.

Oh.  Well, you obviously don't want a modern OS with all the things that made the Amiga special, like multitasking and multimedia.  You want a game machine.

If all you want is games, then porting OS4 (with all the "OS" parts ripped out) is certainly feasable.

But... why bother with an OS at all?

A game machine's hardware multitasks better by design.  'Why bother with an OS at all?'  Good question.  I supposed it's about simplicity.  If I could own one system (vs. PC, game machine and stereo system, etc...) that could do it all, it would save me desk space and money on investing in multiple platforms.  I'm also not happy with Windows.  And I still have a fondness of Amigas.  I'd like to see the platform succeed.  Yes, it's wishful thinking but hey, we can dream, right.  Remember, Amiga is a software company now.  Look at Amiga-Anywhere...  Anyway, if the OS4 partners could profit from a console port and broaden there appeal at the same time, why not consider the option?

What's really damned ironic is that most consoles are really single bus machines, here.  A unified memory architecture means all the chips share the same memory and must work in perfect syncronization.  PC's are asyncronous machines tied together with multiple busses.  There's many good reasons for that, but I don't think you care, seeing how you keep saying, over and over, that the PC has a single bus, when it certainly does not.

Well, the GC is cetainly not a single-bus machine.  That's one of it's pluses.  There are pluses and minuses to syncronizized operation as well as asyncronous.  We need not discuss them.  Arguments there go both ways.

Much of the Amiga's multi-tasking capabilities came from the fact that the custom chips could access memory on there own while the cpu was doing other things.

I don't suppose "GPU" means anything to you?  Oh, look, my Radeon has its own 256MB block of memory.

Yes, I know.  Today's GPU are cpus in there own regard.  A real Amiga could access fast-RAM while it's blitter was accessing 'chip' RAM.  That's where the Amiga shined in it's heyday.  That's why it was the first multitasking computer...down to the hardware.

Revolution to use same API as Gamecube...

That's "compatible"...  not "same."  You still have to recompile everything.

I repeat - not so.

[Louis Dias]

bloodline wrote:

My key point is that OS4 is ALREADY a PPC OS so porting it to the GC should only require a rewrite of the HAL (licensing issues included). Going to x86 is a much bigger issue. Also, I like the fact that consoles are better for games. The heart of the Amiga is a games machine. The A1 is a PC design and has the same inefficencies as a PC (x86)...it's single shared system bus architeture. Much of the Amiga's multi-tasking capabilities came from the fact that the custom chips could access memory on there own while the cpu was doing other things. The GC is also built that way. It's truly very Amiga-like from a hardware point of view.

The Above quote is meaningless...

I think you study PC architecture before you post crap and prove that you are an idiot.

You are so far behind the tech curve you can't see how wrong you are... even busses in the traditional sense have been superceded by point-to-point packet based transport layers... Do the words Hypertransport and PCI-express mean nothing to you?

If I look at the PC sitting next to me, The CPU has three independant busses; a dual channel RAM interface (that means 2 separate busses dedicated to memory access) and a single hypertransport link.

The Hypertransport link connects to the PCIe (PCI-express) tunnel and to the PCI bridge.

On my PCIe bus I have a Graphics card, which I shall come to later, and some integrated system features like SATA, Gigabit-Lan, USB2, Firewire etc...

On the PCI bus, I have some standard southbridge features, IDE, FDC, BIOS, RTC, PS/2 ports, Serial etc... and I have a sound card and a TV card plugged in there too.

Ok back to the Graphics card; This is a separate Processor (aka the GPU) dedicated to graphics generation, it also has its own memory, 128megs on a dedicated bus that has nothing to do with anything else in the computer.

Ok, lets count up those busses! I counted 6, not counting the USB2 (With my digital camera, keyboard, mouse etc...) or the Firewire with my Edirol FA-101 audio module.

Now what were you saying about single busses? oh years that's right the amiga has a single bus...

Yes yes, you can ramble on about the wonders of the modern PC but in the end the A1 will not have Hypertransport, PCI Express, USB 2.0 (1.1 last time I checked) and some other things out of the box or ever.  I am about a low cost alternative to the A1 PPC platform.  Read the entire thread next time before you butt in with off-topic info and watch who you call an idiot as well.  It's one thing to state facts or opinions.  Name calling is just childish.

[Louis Dias]

From GamesIndustry.Biz:

Nintendo president Satoru Iwata has revealed more details of the next-gen Revolution console, focusing on the company's plans to make online gaming more accessible and overhaul the way controllers are designed.

Speaking to Japanese weekly Nikkei Business in an interview partially translated by US website GameSpot, Iwata-san confirmed that Revolution will feature wireless LAN capability and said he hoped it would make playing games online easier for consumers.

"The next-generation console will follow along the same line as the DS [for wireless LAN]," he said. "The ideal is for users to be able to connect to the Internet without having to think about it."

Iwata-san touched on online play in his recent speech at the Game Developers' Conference, where he confirmed that the Revolution would feature wi-fi technology as a standard feature.

He went on to reveal that the Revolution had received more positive response from developers than expected, partially due to Nintendo's intention to do everything possible to keep development costs low. As part of these plans, the Revolution will use the GameCube's software libraries and application program interfaces.

Itawa-san did not discuss recent rumours of a DS-style touch screen controller, but did say that controllers for current consoles "may satisfy the hardcore gamers, but they've become too difficult for more casual gamers."

"For the next-generation console, we plan to introduce a friendly user interface so that, for example, a mother who's watching her child playing a game might say, 'Oh, I'd like to try that too,'" he said.

"However, user interfaces are devices that can easily be imitated by other companies, so I can't reveal any details right now."

The full unveiling of the Nintendo Revolution is expected to take place at this year's E3.

[Waccoon]

And you are a bigger idiot because the A1 has none of those features except the fact that a video card has it's own ram but that only gets filled through the main system bus so when that is happening, the CPU is probably already processed all it can in it's cache and is just waiting...

The "main" system bus is the memory controller.  It's a hell of a lot faster than PCI/AGP/PCIX, and does allow more than one chip to access main memory at a time (limited only by the speed of the memory).  The whole reason why this controller exists is to make sure that each sub-bus (including the CPU itself) gets a fair share of the memory.

You make it sound like the CPU has to spend 90% of its time at idle waiting for something to do.

It's the kernel that give you multitasking, why would that change with a GC port?

Because the hardware looks different to the kernel.  If Nintendo's APIs aren't designed to run in user space, you can't really use them to write an OS better than OS3.

Also note that there's many kinds of multitasking.  Which one you can use depends on your kernel design and drivers.  Again, Nintendo's APIs may be more harm than help.

Why does most software written for an A500 run on an A1200 without a recompile?

Because AGA is almsost fully binary compatible with OCS.  The AAA chipset was supposed to be a departure from OCS compatibility, but we'll never know by how much.

These are all good questions and you can direct that to that website. The amazing thing is that it was all done through reverse-engineering. Never the less a point has been proven. The GC can be a 'PC'.

No, the point proven is that you can force Linux to run on GC, albiet in a heavily stripped form.  How stripped it has to be is the real question that you keep dismissing.

Why do you want the specific details? Are you going to code something on the GC? Either way, I'm sure the details can be found on the Linux-on-GC site and definitely in an official Gamcube developer's kit.

More questions you don't want to answer.

You never did give me the name of the "single" bus in the PC (sorry, I mean, "Wintel").

Wow, you would think overlays are some secret feature of the OCS/ECS/AGA and can never be done again by any other GPU...

I'm not asking you if overlays are a rare feature.  I'm asking if you're aware that Flipper != Radeon.

Oh yeah, and overlays are not a feature of OCS/ECS/AGA.  The Amiga used playfields, instead.

It didn't seem to be much effort for them [Hyperion] to write the A1 bios and even threw in an x86 emulator to boot.

You are aware that UBoot is an open-source project and was not written by Hyperion, right?

I swear, with every post it seems your IQ goes down.

Thank you.

Gekko is a PPC cpu.

No, it's based on a PPC core.

There are pluses and minuses to syncronizized operation as well as asyncronous. We need not discuss them.

Why not?  One of the biggest tasks of an OS is to make sure than multiple processes don't stomp all over each other.  Is this also off topic in a thread about porting an OS?

I am about a low cost alternative to the A1 PPC platform.

You get what you pay for.

He went on to reveal that the Revolution had received more positive response from developers than expected, partially due to Nintendo's intention to do everything possible to keep development costs low. As part of these plans, the Revolution will use the GameCube's software libraries and application program interfaces.

So?  A kernel needs to run below libraries and APIs for them to work with each other corerctly.  Otherwise, the programmer has to do everything manually, and you are programming for Nintendo's APIs, not the OS.

An OS is supposed to make things portable and make a programmer's life easier, you know.

[bloodline]

LOL, 'very' indeed... You are a comedian now? Overlays?! Wow, you would think overlays are some secret feature of the OCS/ECS/AGA and can never be done again by any other GPU... Again, for details get a GC developer's kit.
 

The Amiga never had Overlay support.

Well, the GC is cetainly not a single-bus machine. That's one of it's pluses. There are pluses and minuses to syncronizized operation as well as asyncronous. We need not discuss them. Arguments there go both ways.

what are you trying to say here, because I am unable to parse it.

As Waccoon correctly pointed out, a Games console will probably use a simple unified memory architeture for simplicity and cost reasons. Such an architecture is useless for a General purpose (read desktop) machine, but perfectly acceptable for a Games machine.

The amiga (with FastRam) used a unified memory architecture... And you'll notice that an Amiga without fast ram is generally only good for games...

I answered this at the beginning. Again...why don't I have to recompile A500 software to run it on an A1200. You must have forgotten that I've owned Amigas and would know this.

The AGA chipset supported all the OCS/ECS chipset registers, that meant that any software which poked values directly into the chipset would still work fine regarless of the chipset available... Commodore tried to discourage such practice as it halted the ability to introduce advanced new features into the chipset in a clean way.

yes but I'm sure you refer to it as 'your MAC' not 'your PC' on this forum...

You're not making sense again...

What rubbish. I swear, with every post it seems your IQ goes down. You are going to tell me the a PPC cpu is not a PPC cpu. Gekko is a PPC cpu. This one has a faster bus speed and some Altivec instructions thrown in. It's a better/newer core than the Apple G4 (oh wait, according to your logic the Apple G4 must not be a PPC cpu) and has some Altivec capabilities to boot (which is the only reason to want a G4 over a G3 at the same clock speed)

You critisize me for insulting you, which I accept was wrong, and now you do the same to Waccoon...

Gekko may well use a PPC core, but it is no more a PPC than a Mac is an Amiga (they share a CPU design, but are still incompatible).

What rubbish. I swear, with every post it seems your IQ goes down. You are going to tell me the a PPC cpu is not a PPC cpu. Gekko is a PPC cpu. This one has a faster bus speed and some Altivec instructions thrown in. It's a better/newer core than the Apple G4 (oh wait, according to your logic the Apple G4 must not be a PPC cpu) and has some Altivec capabilities to boot (which is the only reason to want a G4 over a G3 at the same clock speed)

A Gecko is a PPC, in the same way a Coldfire is a 68000.

or

A Gecko is not a PPC, in the same way a Coldfire is not a 68000.

Take your pick. :-D

[doctorq]

lou_dias wrote:

Name calling is just childish.

ROFL :-D

[Louis Dias]

Waccoon wrote:

You make it sound like the CPU has to spend 90% of its time at idle waiting for something to do.

In applications that constantly wait for user interaction such as dtp software and wordprocessors, that is what's happening...

It's the kernel that give you multitasking, why would that change with a GC port?

Because the hardware looks different to the kernel.

Hardware Abstraction Layer (HAL) - remember?  OS4 has one.

Why does most software written for an A500 run on an A1200 without a recompile?

Because AGA is almsost fully binary compatible with OCS.  The AAA chipset was supposed to be a departure from OCS compatibility, but we'll never know by how much.

Why can't you just admit it's the games that use OS system libraries that are the compatible ones.  What you are taking about only makes those libraries easier to recode for the better hardware.

These are all good questions and you can direct that to that website. The amazing thing is that it was all done through reverse-engineering. Never the less a point has been proven. The GC can be a 'PC'.

No, the point proven is that you can force Linux to run on GC, albiet in a heavily stripped form.  How stripped it has to be is the real question that you keep dismissing.

Look I don't study Linux.  I also don't believe it's a stripped down version just because Linux itself in not big.  It's when you want to run Apache, PHP, MySQL and a whole bunch of other stuff one one machine that memory requirements go up.  40MB is more than enought to run a gui and browser and a word processor...Linux is a memory whore like Windows.

More questions you don't want to answer.

You never did give me the name of the "single" bus in the PC (sorry, I mean, "Wintel").

Yo ask me questions like I am claiming to be doing the port myself.  I never said I wanted to,infact I've stated that I can't.  I've stated that I believe Hyperion should.  So I don't know why you want to keep asking me questions about hardware I have no interest in.  You just seem bent to prove me wrong on any ridiculous point.

Wow, you would think overlays are some secret feature of the OCS/ECS/AGA and can never be done again by any other GPU...

I'm not asking you if overlays are a rare feature.  I'm asking if you're aware that Flipper != Radeon.

Oh yeah, and overlays are not a feature of OCS/ECS/AGA.  The Amiga used playfields, instead.

Where did that come from?  You are asking me one question but mean another.  I think you are going insane now.  I know Flipper is not Radeon.  Flipper was design by AtrX before ATI bought them.  Amiga has a layers library but support video background with Amiga graphics overlay...what's it called - genlock or something...

It didn't seem to be much effort for them [Hyperion] to write the A1 bios and even threw in an x86 emulator to boot.

You are aware that UBoot is an open-source project and was not written by Hyperion, right?

and that's great, it's obviously not a problem for them and they have experience doing it already.

Gekko is a PPC cpu.

No, it's based on a PPC core.

Are you on drugs?

There are pluses and minuses to syncronizized operation as well as asyncronous. We need not discuss them.

Why not?  One of the biggest tasks of an OS is to make sure than multiple processes don't stomp all over each other.  Is this also off topic in a thread about porting an OS?

The implimentation is not my issue but Hyperion's.  I'm saying "Hey, wouldn't it be great if OS4 was ported to the Gamecube."  Why can't you understand that?

I am about a low cost alternative to the A1 PPC platform.

You get what you pay for.

Yes and I paid for a gamecube and love it.

He went on to reveal that the Revolution had received more positive response from developers than expected, partially due to Nintendo's intention to do everything possible to keep development costs low. As part of these plans, the Revolution will use the GameCube's software libraries and application program interfaces.

So?  A kernel needs to run below libraries and APIs for them to work with each other corerctly.  Otherwise, the programmer has to do everything manually, and you are programming for Nintendo's APIs, not the OS.

An OS is supposed to make things portable and make a programmer's life easier, you know.

This all depends on how much of the Nintendo supplied API's an OS4 port could reuse.  If OS4's graphics.library just called the cube's API then it should still work fine on Revolution just like I've mentioned before with A500->A1200 os compliant software.  Yes that's only one example and others may fail but work that could have been ongoing in getting this port done could have continued on Revolution without a need to rewrite alot of what had been done already.
Also, let's go back to the HAL here.  Hyperion has stated before that they designed the OS so that rewriting the HAL for another hardware platform (like a Pegasus) is all that would be required for getting it to run on something other than the A1.  However, they've never received a Pegasus board (etc...) and aren't working on it.  I'm sure, as an OS4 partner, Eyetech would have something to say about what hardware platform gets a port too.  So you really don't need to argue with me about technical details.

Instead of arguing technical details and just having people say "Hey, I'd like to see this happen!" then maybe it would.

I'm a consumer looking for a product to meet my needs.  That's all.  You nor I are going to write one line of code to get OS4 running on ANY platform.

[Louis Dias]

bloodline wrote:

LOL, 'very' indeed... You are a comedian now? Overlays?! Wow, you would think overlays are some secret feature of the OCS/ECS/AGA and can never be done again by any other GPU... Again, for details get a GC developer's kit.
 

The Amiga never had Overlay support.

Right, so you could never throw Amiga graphics over live video...mmmm k.

As Waccoon correctly pointed out, a Games console will probably use a simple unified memory architeture for simplicity and cost reasons. Such an architecture is useless for a General purpose (read desktop) machine, but perfectly acceptable for a Games machine.

And if you knew anything about the GC, you would know it has 2 completely different and separate memory banks.

The AGA chipset supported all the OCS/ECS chipset registers, that meant that any software which poked values directly into the chipset would still work fine regarless of the chipset available... Commodore tried to discourage such practice as it halted the ability to introduce advanced new features into the chipset in a clean way.

Yes, by luck, some non-OS compliant games ran fine, most didn't.  The ones that were OS-compliant ran just fine as should any OS4 software run fine on either the A1 or GC if the GC was running OS4 as well...which is what we are talking about here.  Barring any software that exceeds the physical limitations of the machine (ie requiring more memory than the GC has to offer).

You critisize me for insulting you, which I accept was wrong, and now you do the same to Waccoon...

I didn't name call.  I'm simply pointing out that his posts are dropping in quality.

Gekko may well use a PPC core, but it is no more a PPC than a Mac is an Amiga (they share a CPU design, but are still incompatible).

So what you are saying is that OS4 which is targetted at the G3FX chip would have to be completely re-written to run on a G4 equipped A1?  Does that make sense to you?  Ofcourse not.  Just like 68000 assembly can be run on a 68060 (yes I know some instructions are missing).  Now if you wanted a graphics library to take advantage of the Altivec instruction in the G4 or Gamecube Gekko, then you could rewrite that library to do so.

Remember, all I'm asking for is a licensed port of OS4 to a cheaper (and in some ways more modern) hardware platform.  In my case I have a preference for the Gamecube and forth-coming Nintendo Revolution.  I don't want to code it myself, but (especially after seeing the latest video of OS4 running on an A1) I am willing to pay for it (just not for an A1).