Outline:
an overview of Amiga Inc's plans
This is an outline of Amiga Inc's plans, which hopefully
will make things a little clearer.
Erik Elgersma
still hasn't got a clue, and Chris Hanretty
is also left wondering.
|
Fact 1: The next "Amiga" will not have a Motorola processor inside it. It will have a x86 processor, and will be a PC/Amiga hybrid. The x86 processor will not be made by Intel. The x86 decision is believed to be because of Gateway being a PC company and it will enable Gateway to support Amiga Inc. to get the new developer machine ready as soon as this Autumn.
Fact 2: This new Amiga will have a new OS. This will be OS4. OS4 is a stop-gap to OS5. OS4 and the new, or next, Amiga, will be targeted at future developers. It will be available to normal consumers, but only if they pay for it. OS4 will probably be available in Autumn. It is at the moment intended as a developer platform only leading up to the new OS/machine, and as such will not be supported as a normal home personal computer.
Fact 3: At the end of the road, the next generation Amiga. As of this time, the CPU for this has not been chosen. However, what has been mentioned is a SuperChip, the purpose of which is not exactly clear at this moment, but it appears to be programmable, and not a central processing unit as we know it.
Fact 4: OS4/5 will include a new kernal, possibly based on the Linux or Be kernel. As far as I can gather, Amiga Inc., is in talks with Be, yet I have heard that Darreck Lisle claimed the new OS was not influenced by BeOS.
Fact 5: The Amiga in its current guise (AGA, 68K, OS3.1) has been declared legacy by Amiga Inc., or if you wish obsolete. They now call it "Amiga Classic".
Fact 6: OS4 is planned to support memory protection, SMP, PCI, AGP and DVD among others, so these are the kind of features that should be standard come OS5.
Fact 7: OS3.5, the stop-gap OS Amiga Inc. had planned has now definitely been shelved and so it will be 18 months before a new Amiga OS is widely available to the public. This leaves the door nicely open for the likes of SCALOS, Directory Opus, and even AROS.
Fact 8: OS5 will be compatible with "Classic" and "Bridge" systems through emulation. It will be aimed at the "Digital Convergence" platform, which has still to be defined/unveiled. The whole lot is planned for a release near the end of '99, so it really will be a Millenium Amiga.