I'm lazy. I don't like to read pages of text. I like a flying start. I'm not one of those 'nerds' wanting a full control on everything, carefully picking every piece of software. So, I'm lazy.
For Aros to have a little bit of a chance for me, I'd better start with something rather well pre-configured. Something I can install and start using. While lurking Amigaworld.net it was near impossible to avoid the news about Icaros Desktop, a ready configured Aros distribution, aimed at lazy bums like me. So I downloaded the Live ISO and started VMWare.
woensdag 22 augustus 2012
AROS - Amiga Replacement OS: What?
Yup. AROS - Amiga Replacement OS. It says it all... or does it?
We'll have to go back in time, just a little bit. Let's hop on the DeLorean and let Doc set the dial on 1988.
In (or just about) 1988 my dad got a nice bonus for being treated like shit by elementary school kids for 25 years. He decided it would be wise for him, for my mom, my sister and me to have some sort of computer at home. His colleague back then had a Commodore 64 and he was interested in that. My sister had some training at school using some stone-age Apple and she said an Apple would be wise to have. My dad thought a IBM machine would be smart move. But I had done some research. I collected some leaflets about the Commodore Amiga. I told about it. How it could do so much more than the Apple and IBM. Naturally I told about how easy it was to use and that it was not only capable of pushing out pages and pages of text but that one could also draw with it and make music. I don't think I mentioned the possibility to play games.
On a saturday my dad and mom visited the V&D, a store which also sold Commodore computers. There they managed to get a nice deal on a complete set consisting of an Amiga 500 computer, a Commodore 1084S monitor and a Star NX1000 Rainbow color matrix printer.
Needles to say that it didn't take long for the first joystick to enter the house. A real Arcade joystick: Impossible to break... well... almost. Oh, and games entered the house as well. It didn't take too long for the memory to be upgraded from 512 kB to 1 MB.
Years of 'sharing' the A500 went by until I got enough money to get me an Amiga 3000. We're talking 1992. It was a rather modest version, the one with the 16 MHz 030 processor and a whopping 52 MB harddisk and just 2 MB of CHIP RAM. This machine was my main machine for the best part of 7 years, serving as a tool to write my graduation document and learning me the basics of HTML, JAVA-SCRIPT, BASIC-programming and 3D modelling. Oh, and gaming. Good old Formula One Grand Prix.... Sigh.
I said main machine as it got some sisters as well. I mention an Amiga 2000, CD32 another 500 (for spares) and another 2000... for spares. Nah... for fun.
Somewhere 1999 I got me an Amiga Technologies 4000T as well. At that point, Commodore and Amiga were virtually dead. In 2000 I got the opportunity to get a AMD K6 system nearly for nothing and that little bastard started to become a main machine, leaving the Amigas untouched for a long time.
Now, this blog should be about AROS. Now, I'm writing this from memory and won't bother my self to do research on facts. When Commodore fell different developments took place. In a nutshell (not being complete here) four streams of development started to flow:
We'll have to go back in time, just a little bit. Let's hop on the DeLorean and let Doc set the dial on 1988.
In (or just about) 1988 my dad got a nice bonus for being treated like shit by elementary school kids for 25 years. He decided it would be wise for him, for my mom, my sister and me to have some sort of computer at home. His colleague back then had a Commodore 64 and he was interested in that. My sister had some training at school using some stone-age Apple and she said an Apple would be wise to have. My dad thought a IBM machine would be smart move. But I had done some research. I collected some leaflets about the Commodore Amiga. I told about it. How it could do so much more than the Apple and IBM. Naturally I told about how easy it was to use and that it was not only capable of pushing out pages and pages of text but that one could also draw with it and make music. I don't think I mentioned the possibility to play games.
On a saturday my dad and mom visited the V&D, a store which also sold Commodore computers. There they managed to get a nice deal on a complete set consisting of an Amiga 500 computer, a Commodore 1084S monitor and a Star NX1000 Rainbow color matrix printer.
Needles to say that it didn't take long for the first joystick to enter the house. A real Arcade joystick: Impossible to break... well... almost. Oh, and games entered the house as well. It didn't take too long for the memory to be upgraded from 512 kB to 1 MB.
Years of 'sharing' the A500 went by until I got enough money to get me an Amiga 3000. We're talking 1992. It was a rather modest version, the one with the 16 MHz 030 processor and a whopping 52 MB harddisk and just 2 MB of CHIP RAM. This machine was my main machine for the best part of 7 years, serving as a tool to write my graduation document and learning me the basics of HTML, JAVA-SCRIPT, BASIC-programming and 3D modelling. Oh, and gaming. Good old Formula One Grand Prix.... Sigh.
I said main machine as it got some sisters as well. I mention an Amiga 2000, CD32 another 500 (for spares) and another 2000... for spares. Nah... for fun.
Somewhere 1999 I got me an Amiga Technologies 4000T as well. At that point, Commodore and Amiga were virtually dead. In 2000 I got the opportunity to get a AMD K6 system nearly for nothing and that little bastard started to become a main machine, leaving the Amigas untouched for a long time.
Now, this blog should be about AROS. Now, I'm writing this from memory and won't bother my self to do research on facts. When Commodore fell different developments took place. In a nutshell (not being complete here) four streams of development started to flow:
- pOS, a replacement OS for the Amiga using the Amiga Kickstart as a base. It never came past the 'preview' version I believe.I've got that version and to be honnest, I only recall playing Chess on it as it was the only Chess-game I actually could beat.
- Amiga OS4, the next generation OS aimed at the rather expensive and exotic PPC platform.
- MorphOS, some sort of split to create an Amiga-ish OS, also aimed at the PPC platform but aiming at more affordable PPC hardware. Still expensive compared to x86 hardware.
- AROS, Amiga Replacement OS (or Amiga Research OS). A project aiming at reverse engineering Amiga OS 3.1 to eventually create an Amiga OS that was independent of hardware.
Well, pOS never commercialized. OS4 hardware has been way too expensive for me to get my hands on. Although I must admit that I'm hoping to get the Amiga Netbook which was 'revealed' by Steve Sollie a good year ago. MorphOS... also needs rather exotic and rather expensive PPC hardware. Although it does run on old Apple hardware, I'm not a fan of Apple hardware. Owned a couple of G3 machines and was not too thrilled by build quality and design decisions. Leaves AROS.
When I got the AMD K6 system, Amiga emulation using UAE was next to useless. UAE was often translated into Useless Amiga Emulator. I seem to remember trying 68k Aros on the 040 powered A4000T and I was not too impressed. Sorry guys. I did not look at it for a long time.
Right now, I don't own an Amiga. The boxes have been sold or given away. Computing needs are taken care off with Windows 7 machines. One of them being rather powerful. Capable of using VMWare quite well. So the other day I decided to have a new encounter with Aros. I must admit, I'm impressed!
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