A brand new version of Icaros Desktop is finally ready for everyone. What you have under your eyes is the result of a very long work of analysis and revision, which covers different aspects of the distribution, in its native soul and in the hosted one. We wondered what users would love and how we could make Icaros Desktop more useful and, thanks to the work of third-party application programmers, today we can offer you an operating environment that’s more useful and more beautiful than ever. The novelties to talk about are many: from the Leu spreadsheet to the SilkRAW image reader, from the incredible RNOPublisher DTP to new games, but, above all, the hosted version of Icaros Desktop is the one which has taken a decisive step forward, both for Linux and Windows. The news are so many that, this time, we will list them in different sections.
Icaros Desktop is effectively an AROS distribution, and AROS is the Amiga Research Operating System, an open source reimplementation of the Amiga operating system, version 3.x.
I am wondering which of the three systems is the most likely to have a future.
1. AmigaOS 4 obviously has the advantage of the brand name, but it seems like there hasn’t been any updates for a few years now, plus Hyperion Entertainment insolvency, so it looks like this OS is pretty much dead unless another company continues the work? Besides that, it only runs of exotic PPC hardware.
2. MorphOS seems to be a mature OS that works well, however it also has the disadvantage of only running on old PPC Macs, which very much limits the amount of users. I would think that unless they port it to x86 (or maybe ARM?) there is no long-term future for this system, because the hardware will just disappear over time, and is obviously limited in its capabilities. Even if MorphOS might run fast on 20 year old systems, browsing the web with a modern browser might be too much for the hardware.
3. AROS at first looks like the best choice, as it runs on multiple architectures including x86 and it’s free and open source software. However, from what I’ve heard it is actually less mature than the other two. Indeed I tried running Icaros Desktop in Virtualbox, which works well on the Live CD, but once installed the mouse movement is very slow and a right-click will crash the whole system. Meanwhile, MorphOS works fine in qemu (ppc emulation – so should be much slower than x86 virtualization).
I know there’s no objectively right answer, just wondering. What OS do you think is still around in 10
@1:
Hyperion had financial problems but landet a “hit” lately: they focussed on the old 68K line of AmigaOS and released version 3.1.4 for classic old Amigas (and emulation) – available as digital download or as real physical ROM chip.
Version 3.2 in under way.
The 4.x line of the system (PPC) is dying ….
@2
The MorphOS-Team is actively working on a transition to x64 – they have a good track record of reaching their goals.
@3
AROS – well you can test it easily with “Icaros”.
AROS is not binary compatible on different platforms -it’s like Linux: you have to recompile for every architecture.
BUT the 68K branch has become quite good and can be used as a full replacement for the 3.x line. And on 68K it is in fact binary compatible to AmigaOS (99%)
OS4 is hardly “dying”, there was an update released only a few days ago.
AROS cannot be used as a full AmigaOS replacement, as it only implements 81% of OS3.1 (according to their own site) and lacks support for the other OS improvements that have been made over the last 25 years.
OS4.x is dying, because the hardware base is obsolete and the user base is far to small to keep it alive. Even Hyperion could see this and focused on the retro-market with the 3.x line.
AROS 68K can very well be used as replacement – there is no official page and whatever you read about 81% is clearly outdated.
Watch this video running an FPGA-based Amiga with AROS:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Wqv_4IciF2U
Huh, what update for OS4.x came out? I have Classic set up on a system and was hoping it would become stable at some point…
Aros on the V4SA is pretty sweet, but something is ‘off’ about it that I can’t put my finger on. Then again I don’t really like using Dopus either because it is different than normal workbench.
Seems to me the real future of the Amiga would need to be
1) 68k based, or with a decent chunk of software being for the PPC, some form of FPGA based system + Accelerators. Problem with the V4SA, is it needs more expandability, as right now it feelslike it is only meant as a fast amiga game console, as they don’t have standard USB ports on it and only support a mouse and keyboard. Hell, the thing doesn’t even have a power switch. Which would be fine if I could find a cable with a power switch in a Mini USB…
Unfortunatley amiga os is ahorrible place to be and no one in their right mind would go into it these days.
Mearly vultures picking over the remainers.
Sad to see but has been thise way for 20 years.
If they cared about amiga they would have gone x64 (previously x86) or arm. They do not they just want money.
>there is no official page and whatever you read about 81% is clearly outdated.
There is indeed an official page: http://www.aros.org/introduction/status/everything.php
Yes, what I read was outdated, it is now 82%, whoo
>Huh, what update for OS4.x came out?
http://www.amiga-news.de/en/news/AN-2020-12-00059-EN.html
>AROS 68K can very well be used as replacement
No, it can’t. It doesn’t even support OS3.5 let alone anything later.
>Even Hyperion could see this and focused on the retro-market with the 3.x line.
Just because there is an OS3.2 project does not mean OS4 has been abandoned, they are separate projects.
No: aros.org is no official page, since there is no organized group of maintainers of the OS. And therefore no official maintainer of a page or a status.
It would probably be better to take that part of the page down, since the information presented there has not been updated for over 10 years.
So please do not spread this misinformation.
>No, it can’t. It doesn’t even support OS3.5 …
3.5 and later is nothing more than a bunch of patches and some GUI improvements, that is designed to work with the original 3.1 ROM
Most of it is ether obsolete or surpassed by AROS.
Since the 3.5 line of the OS was done by third party developers, Hyperion is now going back to the original 3.1 line with its 3.1.4 and 3.2 updates.
As my video-link in my last reply showed:
AROS-68k does provide high compatibility as of now and CAN in deed be used as a replacement – as shown and done in that video by running many apps and games in that configuration.
>Just because there is an OS3.2 project does not mean OS4 has been abandoned, they are separate projects.
I did not say “abandoned” – I said dying. And that it is, because of its dependence on PPC and far too few unsers.
AmigaOS 4 update: https://www.hyperion-entertainment.com/
quote: “Hyperion Entertainment is proud to announce the immediate release of update 2 for AmigaOS 4.1 Final Edition. “
Awesome! I’ll have to fire up the ol’ A4k to see if I can get it to be more stable. I mean if I leave it there for 10 hours, no issues, as soon as I start loading up software though it’ll hard lock. Or the applications will just crash. I think it’s due to one of the drivers (as it’s quite hard to get just the right mix of what hardware is supported in both 4.1 and 3.9.
As someone who owned an Amiga….God has it been that damn long ago? In the late 90s I just have to ask….what EXACTLY is the point of building a new OS for ancient hardware? I mean sure Commodore was ahead of their time with the Amiga but that was 30 years ago and you’d be hard pressed to find anybody that isn’t an Amiga fanboy that would say the Amiga OS is better from a usability standpoint than a modern touch enabled OS like Linux.
Don’t get me wrong I can see the point with keeping old hardware going, hell I had an old Win 9X box until it finally just disintegrated in 2018 because playing old DOS and win9X games was better and easier on actual hardware, I just didn’t see any point in trying to run a new OS on hardware that today a budget smartphone blows off the map.