Amiga operating system?

[Kaijin]

I've been looking around at Amiga computers, and the Amiga OS 4.0. apparently, it's better than window's OS's, according to their website.... It also said something about being so small you could run it from a flash drive. Being that this forum so far is the largest community I've been a part of to date, I wondered if someone here might be able to point me in the right direction.

I've got quite a few questions about the OS, though, chiefly adding up to...

Is there a free version of it I can try on my Compaq-brand laptop running vista?


---  Sidenote: Sorry in advance to any mod that might have to move this if it's in the wrong place. I looked, but I couldn't find a tech section. Again, I apologize to you if you have to clean up this newbie's mess.

-- Edit: thanks, Kobunk. Sorry. 

[Varg the wanderer]

Cool! I wonder if it'll work on my old Amiga 2000...

[Kaijin]

I've actually been doing a ton of research on this....  there isn't really any way to get OS 4 on a non-amiga, that I can find.. I did find something called Amiga Reaserch Operating System, or "AROS". It's an OS biased on the original Amiga OS, re-built from the ground up by a team of developers. It's open source, so anyone can play around with it and format programs for it. They've made it so it can go on pretty much any computer...

It seems pretty good, but It's currently about 80% complete. I've been trying to get it to work on one of my computers, but I've got no idea how to get it to work on a Windows XP...


But, then again, I don't really know anything about this.

Anyway, back to AOS4, It was originally made for the AmigaOne, a computer made by some company in Europe, I think.. But, anyway, the computer's arn't made anymore and I've not been able to find any current information on Amiga Inc...... And knowing the Amiga's past, It's not really a surprise.

[Siege]

Windows XP is an OS. The question is whether the Amiga OS would work on your hardware; if you installed it, then it would replace XP, or require a dual-boot configuration, meaning you choose which one to use when you boot up.

However, I'm not so interested in running an OS that's only 80% complete, especially if there are few applications for it.

I will note that there is an Amiga emulator, which will allow programs written for Amiga hardware and OS to run on machines with a different OS.

[sniffswind]

first off, if anyone has any questions, you should talk to the main Amiga fur, the creator of Sabrina Online ™, Eric Schwartz.  I believe he can provide you with all the details you need.

[Firehazard]

Ha, does the Schwartz actually give advice to people about that?  I would have thought he's a little too busy and famous for stuff like that.

Anyway, to my understanding the final release of OS 4 was never made available to the public because of some breach-of-contract lawsuit between Amiga Inc and Hyperion, the company they farmed it out to.  I do know that OS 4 was made for the PowerPC processor, not the Intel x86 platform.  So, I dunno, maybe there's a firmware hack that can let you install it on an old iMac or something.  But don't count on it ever working on a PC.

[Kaijin]

yeah. I knew I'd get refered to E.S. He's the one that got me started on all this. XD


Ok, results of reaserch: Yes, OS4 was never publicly released. It was only sent out to buyers of the AmigaOne computer.

AROS is the only Native OS to-date that is Amiga style that also runs on a x86 that I've been able to find. and it's about 80% done right now, so it'll be awhile. It's able to co-exist on a dual-os system with windows, but I've not been able to follow their instructions on installing it, and I think I'll wait until it's done.

Their's something called MorphOS that E.S. uses, but I've not been able to find any info saying it can go on a PC.

and that's basically all I've found.

[Holley]

Amiga OS 1 to 3.9 - can run through an emulator under other operating systems and is very useable as such
Amiga OS 4 - will only run on the Amiga One, of which only a few have been built.  Its complete and useable but the originating company is dead to all intents and purposes.
MorphOS - will only run on specific PowerPC based motherboards, is complete and useable and has a good range of software for it
AROS - is written entirely by enthusiasts, runs on PCs.  I used to run the website for a 'distro' of AROS, which folded due to lack of time from both me and the other chap involved   Its a brilliant exercise in programming and worth checking out if you're a coder.

If you want something other than Windows and are not a programmer / computer mucker-abouter then check out Linux or Macs.  If you're asking 'how another OS runs on Windows' then changing OS probably isn't for you

[Ratchet]

I too was thinking about trying Amiga OS4 but i don't have a power PC computer or an Amiga (it runs on the old A1200, A3000 and A4000 series as well as the AmigaOne though i guess you could make it work on other power PC computers )
 
Version 4.1 actually came out about a month ago so there's still people working on the OS, i think it still only runs on Power PC chips so probably won't be suitable for what you want.

I'm also looking at running AROS on my laptop but it will just be as a project as there isn't a massive amount of software available yet, plus i believe its still in beta so there will probably be hardware issues to work around etc.

If you just want to try something other than windows I would do what Holley suggested and try Linux, if you do decide to go down this route i suggest trying Linux mint: http://www.linuxmint.com/

This is what I'm using on my dual boot laptop at the moment (alongside xp). Its based on ubuntu so its pretty stable and it comes with a good set of system tools and most of the software you need, so its a user friendly distro to start with, which always helps if you have only used windows before.

Another good thing about it is that you can run it as a live CD (or USB) so you can try it without installing it.