MorphOS on Power Mac G5

[persia]

What about iBooks?  I have this iBook that I've replaced with a MacBook and it is just waiting for Morphos to give it a second life!

[Iggy]

What about iBooks?  I have this iBook that I've replaced with a MacBook and it is just waiting for Morphos to give it a second life!

You're amongst a large group of people who'd like to see support for those. But, right now it looks like only Powerbooks.

The MorphOS developer you need to bug goes by the name Bigfoot. Apparently none of the developers feels like writing the necessary routines for ADB keyboard/touchpad support.

[takemehomegrandma]

Which means you have even less reason to use MorphOS or AmigaOS. You can get a totally silent, low power usage PC for less than the price of a second hand G5 mac (let alone a new X1000!) that will play 1080p media, record TV etc. using completely free OS and software.

I completely fail to see your point. I have several x86 systems myself, laptops and desktops, including a core i7 running Windows 7. But that's not why we are here, right? Linux or other systems? It's rather the Amiga hobby, right? The only x86 capable *miga OS there is, is AROS. Maybe AROS will reach MorphOS's level at some point far in the future, but it's certainly not a worthy alternative *miga system for "Morphers" today. And chances are MorphOS has gone x86 itself before that happens. But for now it's tied to PPC, and the MorphOS team are making the most out of it by supporting all the Apple PPC hardware worth supporting. This G5 is the crown in this effort, it's as far as the PPC ever went. And MorphOS will support it! It's a great thing!

I mean no disrespect to MorphOS, but if you are trying to sell the concept of a buying a second-hand, power hungry G5 box

I'm not selling anything. As I said before, I won't be buying a G5 myself, I'm perfectly happy with my Mac Mini 1.5GHz G4, and I'll happily sell you the idea of buying one of *those*! But nevertheless, this Powermac G5 will be the fastest solution ever for people in need (or want) of power, it's as far as the PPC went, and it will be a so much better option than a "X1000". Better performance at a fraction of the cost. Nobody can argue about that.

[takemehomegrandma]

But to answer your question, for one thing, I would hope they could play 1080p x264 streams. The Mac Mini does 720p (on MorphOS)

I think it can. Some quick test bigfoot was kind enough to perform indicated it was fast enough for the provided x264 clip, at least.

That's great!

So, a G5 machine should a nice combo for viewing HD content during the cold winter nights, given its heating potential.

:lol: :lol: :lol:

[Lando]

But to answer your question, for one thing, I would hope they could play 1080p x264 streams. The Mac Mini does 720p (on MorphOS)

I know I'm OT here so please forgive me but, I have several G4 Macs, all running Mac OS X Snow leopard and not one of them can play 720p - not even close, it's like watching a slideshow.

On the Mac forums I frequent I was told that the G4, even at 1.5Ghz or 1.67Ghz just isn't fast enough to decode a 720p x264 stream in real-time.  If that is the case, how can MorphOS play back the same stream on the same hardware?

[Karlos]

I completely fail to see your point

My point is very simple. I asked "what amiga stuff does anybody do that requires G5 levels of performance that they can't already do perfectly well on a G4?"

You answered "play back HD content"...

I replied "why on earth would anybody pick a 2nd hand, power-hungry machine (G5) and pay for an OS to run on it to play back HD content, when they can get a brand new machine at a similar price or less, that draws less power and have the OS/software for free?"

It's a pretty obvious question, don't you think?

I find it amusing that you can't grasp this point when so many people say "oh yeah, but I have an XBox360 for gaming" but don't make the same connection that you equally can have dedicated computers for media centre purposes. And by far the best tool for that is an inexpensive x86 box with linux/MPlayer/etc.

So again, the only people that need a G5 class machine to watch HD content are those that simply refuse to have anything to do with any other system.

[spihunter]

Not to be to nit picky but Snow Leopard only runs on intel Macs.

I know I'm OT here so please forgive me but, I have several G4 Macs, all running Mac OS X Snow leopard and not one of them can play 720p - not even close, it's like watching a slideshow.

On the Mac forums I frequent I was told that the G4, even at 1.5Ghz or 1.67Ghz just isn't fast enough to decode a 720p x264 stream in real-time.  If that is the case, how can MorphOS play back the same stream on the same hardware?

[Karlos]

re: all the negativity

It's not negativity, just bemusement

MorphOS 3.0 on a PowerMac G5 will be insanely fast, stupid fast! I will be hobby computing at the speed of light for a bargain price? I'm there.

Insanely fast at what, though? That's my whole point. What will you be doing with it where you can honestly say "wow, this is so much slicker and more responsive now that I have a G5" that isn't already on a G4 mac / Peg 2?

So far, we've seen HD playback suggested as an option. Ok, I am sure the G5 will play 1080p fine, but as I say, so will a dozen other systems that will cost you less.

Are there any amiga/mos applications out there that are just unusable on a G4 that I'm somehow unaware of?

If the motivation is simply "I just want to run MOS on the best, most powerful hardware it can run on", that's fine, I totally get it. But if the motivation is "I need a G5 because MOS on my G4 is too slow at X", then I don't get it, because I have no idea what 'X' is.

Is that any clearer?

[DaNi]

I have a power mac g5 1.8ghz (clocked to 2ghz) single core (no dual core), 900mhz bus and i play it without problems 1080p running mac os x leopard ppc.

[cv643d]

More speed/performance is always good cant understand why that is a problem. Just think how fast Photogenics5 would run etc...

[Karlos]

More speed/performance is always good cant understand why that is a problem. Just think how fast Photogenics5 would run etc...

What, like it's actually slow on a 1.5GHz G4, is it? I mean we are talking about software that ran respectably on actual RTG 680x0 machines here.

[spihunter]

It could open the door to port more powerful programs and games that may struggle on a G4. But, as you already said "Why not just use a $50 PC and be done with it! "

What, like it's actually slow on a 1.5GHz G4, is it? I mean we are talking about software that ran respectably on actual RTG 680x0 machines here.

[Karlos]

It could open the door to port more powerful programs and games that may struggle on a G4. But, as you already said "Why not just use a $50 PC and be done with it! "

Finally

I sense people are misinterpreting me as either being anti MOS or unhappy about it being released for G5 etc. I'm not, I just don't see the big motivation for it at this stage. It's clear that MOS is a polished - but incomplete - product that is nowhere near close to bringing a G4 to it's knees. There's also plenty of G4 machines out there, I don't imagine that supplies will dry up that soon.

So all considered, it seems odd to me that going to G5 should be a priority over things like expanding the gamut of drivers for video, audio, wifi etc.

[Iggy]

It could open the door to port more powerful programs and games that may struggle on a G4. But, as you already said "Why not just use a $50 PC and be done with it! "

Primarily because I already have a PC (with a power hungry AMD processor that's also useful as a space heater). It plays back HD video content fine.

Now I'd like similar capability on my PPC hoobyist computer.

What is actually more of a problem with HD content on Amiga related PPC systems is the lack of HD video decoding functions built into the older video cards we support. While my X86 processor could still decode these videos, CPU usage would be much higher without the video card I'm using.

While MorphOS plays DVD level content fine on G4s, I have no doubt it would struggle with HD. However, should anyone ever get ATI or Nvidia to fully document their later GPU releases, designing drivers to enable this playback on lower processors (thasn the G5) should be possible.

You don't think I want to waste all my CPU power on HD playback do you?

[redrumloa]

It's not negativity, just bemusement

Insanely fast at what, though? That's my whole point. What will you be doing with it where you can honestly say "wow, this is so much slicker and more responsive now that I have a G5" that isn't already on a G4 mac / Peg 2?

So far, we've seen HD playback suggested as an option. Ok, I am sure the G5 will play 1080p fine, but as I say, so will a dozen other systems that will cost you less.

Are there any amiga/mos applications out there that are just unusable on a G4 that I'm somehow unaware of?

If the motivation is simply "I just want to run MOS on the best, most powerful hardware it can run on", that's fine, I totally get it. But if the motivation is "I need a G5 because MOS on my G4 is too slow at X", then I don't get it, because I have no idea what 'X' is.

Is that any clearer?

Here's one for you, FLASH

But seriously, I don't "need" the speed for anything useful, just like I don't need to do any retro computing at all. Everything truly useful I can do on my PC already. The speed would be nice though, applications like MAME, blender, video conversion etc will benefit. Speed is nice and there will not be a huge price difference between a G4 box and a G5 box.

[Karlos]

Here's one for you, FLASH

But seriously, I don't "need" the speed for anything useful, just like I don't need to do any retro computing at all. Everything truly useful I can do on my PC already. The speed would be nice though, applications like MAME, blender, video conversion etc will benefit. Speed is nice and there will not be a huge price difference between a G4 box and a G5 box.

Sure, but the list of apps you just cited are all surely available for your PC already and, unless it is equally retro, it should be able to run them better than the G5?