My AmigaOne Adventure
By Steven Solie

"Wow! That's really fast." were the first words out of my mouth when I booted up AmigaOS 4.0 on my AmigaOne-XE G4 for the first time ever on October 28, 2003. Not only was the boot time very quick but also were Workbench and all the usual AmigaOS bits and pieces that we're all so familiar with. Everything felt just like it should on an Amiga but just that much nicer looking and that much quicker. To be honest, I also encountered many problems but this should not be unexpected given the OS is in an `alpha' state at the time I write this.

What's all this about?

This new CAM feature will follow my personal adventures with AmigaOS 4.0 and my AmigaOne. The idea came about from Fleecy Moss who contacted me some time ago about an exchange of my ramblings for early access to the AmigaOS for the AmigaOne. It didn't take me very long to figure out what to do with that offer.

I also want to make it clear what this column is not about. It's definitely not about the CyberstormPPC version of AmigaOS 4.0 that is currently in beta testing and due any time now. This column is about the AmigaOne version. The AmigaOne version is quite far advanced since it shares a lot with the CyberstormPPC version but it also needs quite a bit of work before end users will be happy with it.

First, a bit of my own history so you'll know where I'm coming from. I've been working with Amiga computers as far back as the early CATS days. At one point, I was actually paid to help write Amiga software for Environment Canada. Over the years, I've been a bedroom coder of sorts but I've never delivered anything too earth shattering to the scene (yet). I'm also Chair of the Amiga Users of Calgary (AMUC), which is a local user group that once boasted over 300+ members at its peak but today has been reduced down to a dozen or so hard-core members. I ordered my AmigaOne on November 2, 2002 and I installed AmigaOS 4.0 for the first time on October 28, 2003. I'd like to think I'm pretty patient as well.

Installation

Installing AmigaOS 4.0 on my AmigaOne was an international team effort. Fleecy got the ball rolling with a request on my behalf for access to the various communication mediums and the software itself. David Rey dutifully granted me access to everything I would need. Stephane Guillard then helped me with the initial preparations and we exchanged emails regarding what equipment I have and what I needed. I was short one Voodoo3 3000 graphics card and a suitable Amiga with an IDE interface.

I first tried obtaining a Voodoo locally by phoning every used computer dealer in town (Calgary) and following various leads. It was just my luck that Voodoo cards turned out to be very hot commodities in the used market. Expanding my search, I eventually won an eBay auction. Too bad the guy selling the card insisted I use the US & Canadian postal systems. It was about this time that an AMUC General Meeting was held where I told my story of angst and glory. Ray Harrison, a voracious computer hobbyist, then piped up and hinted he may have what I need sitting at home. A few days later I had a Voodoo3 3000 plugged into my AmigaOne.

The IDE interface turned out to be a lot easier than I thought. After thinking about it for a while I realized that I have a X-Surf Ethernet board installed in my primary Amiga system. Anyone who knows of the genius of Jens Schoenfeld will know he likes to put a lot of features into his hardware products. Who else would think of adding "emergency IDE ports" to an Ethernet card? Thank you Jens!

While venturing onto an OS4 private IRC channel one evening I found Kyle Kivi. Kyle just happens to live right next door to me in British Columbia. Kyle also happened to be initiated by Stephane some time earlier and he was more than willing to help me install OS4 on my hard disk. In case you're wondering, the current state of AmigaOS 4.0 on the AmigaOne requires that you install the OS on the IDE hard disk without actually using the AmigaOne itself. The final product will just boot up from CD-ROM but for now, moving the hard disk between computers is the only way.

With the Voodoo card installed and OS4 on the hard disk I was almost ready to go. U-Boot cannot read AmigaOS formatted hard disks and therefore it cannot just boot up AmigaOS 4.0 all on its own. U-Boot needs a kernel image akin to the Amiga ROM chips from years gone by. After U-Boot executes this kernel image, it boots up the rest of the OS in less than a few seconds. The trick is how to get the image into the AmigaOne's memory without using the hard disk.

Booting Up

The currently recommended way to load the kernel image is to use TFTP via the built-in Ethernet port--very fast and easy. Since I couldn't find a TFTP server and I didn't have a PC handy, I decided to try my backup plan. Remember Kermit? No, not the frog or the ImageFX guy. I'm talking about the file transfer protocol. U-Boot has Kermit built-in. Using Term by Olaf Barthel and a VarIO card (Jens again) I was able to transfer over the image in less than 7 minutes. Not too shabby but obviously too slow for any beta testers let alone end users. The final system will have this kernel image on a hard disk partition, flash card or some other medium. But for now, the kernel needs to be transferred from an outside source.

I can now boot AmigaOS 4.0 on my AmigaOne. Whew! Anyone who thinks this was fun is absolutely correct. I love this kind of stuff. End users probably wouldn't be as enthusiastic. I'd bet even most beta testers wouldn't want to play with the system at this stage. It should be crystal clear to you now what `alpha' really means.

First Impressions

My first impression is very positive. This system feels just like an Amiga should feel. It is also very familiar with buttons where they should be. I was expecting the graphics system to be a lot slower given all the forum discussion but it simply wasn't that slow to me. If this is as slow as it can go then we are all in for a big surprise when SNAP and the PPC graphics.library are completed. I was disappointed with some of the applications that crashed. For example, FixFonts I expected to work but didn't. Overall, I'd say it is definitely an Amiga.

Next Time

Sorry, but that's all I could get done in three days. Tune in next month when I delve deeper into the system. Connecting it to my LAN is first on the list followed closely by testing out both native and emulated applications such as PageStream, Final Calc and SBase4. If this system is going to replace my trusted 68060-powered A3000T with UW-SCSI controller and Picasso IV it will have to perform very well indeed.