I am considering to make the same move. Provided that someon already has a Mac Mini G4, besides MorphOS what else is needed to make it work as an Amiga PPC? My intention is to be able to run AmigaOS 4.1, but I'd also love to play and use classic Amiga software. Is the late even possible?

> My intention is to be able to run AmigaOS 4.1

On your Mac mini? :-)

> I'd also love to play and use classic Amiga software. Is the late even possible?

Of course it is. RTG/RTA capable software runs transparently under MorphOS, while chipset-banging software can be run via variants of UAE.

With OS4 you will have not much luck on a Mac mini. There are the unofficial Moana files, but it's outdated and drivers are missing. The good news though: there's no need for OS4 to fulfill your Amiga fix. MorphOS provides you all you need. You only need the Mac mini and the MorphOS ISO which is downloadable from www.morphos.de.
MorphOS is an Amigaish OS - read http://via.i-networx.de/wim.htm to get a quick impression.

MorphOS directly runs most system friendly Amiga 68k software as well as PowerUp and WarpOS software. You can use lots of Amigasoftware. Among other stuff I use TV paint, wordworth, Amiga Writer, CubicIDE, Turbocalc, Wipeout2097 and much more with MorphOS. For that software not running on MorphOS directly I use eUAE. It runs more or less everything.
And of course there is the ever growing pool of MorphOS software (much ported stuff, but also genuine applications).

I get the impression the original poster has not followed Amiga developments too closely over the years - a perfectly legitimate choice btw. But if they have a particular interest in AmigaOS and MorphOS I'd just like remind them that a PegasosII is the only system on which both OSes are intended to run.

ausPPC,
Quote:
I'm sorry for my ignorance. I'm a little too rusted. I was a big Amiga user who started in 1983 with my first C64, then later with an A500. But I parted ways with both in 1992. So my questions are intended to learn more about what is out there. I don't want to invest tons of money in upgrading a classic Amiga just to be able to use internet, use peripherals and have file ex-changeability.

MorphOS has OS4Emu which can run some (but not all) PowerPC AmigaOS4 software. It also runs other PowerPC Amiga software (WarpOS and PowerUP were already mentioned). There are also plenty of native MorphOS ports of Amiga software.

If you just want to try classic 68k Amiga software and games on modern hardware, check out the variants of UAE. WinUAE for Microsoft Windows is, unfortunately, far superior to other versions. Cloanto provide a commercial package called Amiga Forever which includes WinUAE, licensed ROM files and most models of Amiga ready to emulate out-of-the-box. For the free UAE, you'll either need to obtain Amiga ROM files (which are still under copyright, hence illegal to download), or try out the free ROM replacement based on AROS (a version of this is included with WinUAE and some other UAE variants).

For old games, WHDLoad can also speed up loading times by removing the need for floppy disks (real or emulated), though this also costs money for unrestricted use. WHDLoad works on real Amiga hardware as well as UAE (including MorphOS UAE).

Also, UAE only has JIT-compilation on x86 processors (regular PCs), so it's a lot slower on PowerPC. There is currently a bounty proposed to bring JIT-compilation to PowerPC UAE, for both OS4 and MorphOS (and Linux on PPC), however this doesn't seem to have gotten very far yet.

MorphOS uses transparent 68k emulation using JIT compilation (more efficiently than UAE), but this doesn't work for software which uses the original Amiga chipset. The MorphOS version of UAE lacks JIT, so won't be the fastest emulated Amiga, although is fine for many old games.

At the moment, OS4 only runs on extremely overpriced and underpowered hardware. MorphOS looks the better choice if you want a PowerPC-based Amiga-like system, preferably on a compatible old Mac. Registering MorphOS is not very cheap though, but still a much cheaper option than running OS4.

The unofficial Moana CD will get a very limited AmigaOS 4.0 desktop running on a Mac Mini G4 (1.5GHz/64MB VRAM model only, AFAIK). It's not really usable though.

There is also a port of AROS to PowerPC, as a nightly build. On a Mac Mini G4, this has to be run under Linux (e.g. a dual-boot of Debian or Ubuntu), and is pretty limited and unstable from my experience with it.

For x86 PCs, as well as UAE/WinUAE/Amiga Forever (for emulated 68k software), there are also distributions of AROS such as Icaros Desktop, which run natively or in a virtual machine. These are free, fast, can run UAE, but are not as developed as MorphOS or OS4 (which are both PPC-only), and won't work natively on all PCs.

That seems to have covered most modern Amiga options.

[ Edited by Mequa 14.06.2012 - 01:17 ]

> 1.5GHz/64MB VRAM model only, AFAIK

https://morph.zone/modules/newbb_plus/viewtopic.php?topic_id=8418&forum=11&start=7

Mequa,
Quote:
I am running Amiga Forever in my laptop PC. Is there a versions which runs in Macs with MorphOS? Or what about the UAE version for MorphOS, where can I find it?

> I am running Amiga Forever in my laptop PC. Is there a versions
> which runs in Macs with MorphOS?

There's no version of Amiga Forever for MorphOS.

> Or what about the UAE version for MorphOS, where can I find it?

http://downloads.morph.zone/find.php?find=uae

This should be just right considering the available specs and all the hardware components available on the machine. I don't see any problem why this should not work well for you as this is just right. Most people would actually think of getting something that is a little more advanced but I don't think that is the best option to go with, considering the lot of other problems that are being faced by it.

Amiga Forever ROMs should work with E-UAE on MorphOS. The same for the Workbench disks, hard-drive images (as HDF and mounted directories), and some other Amiga Forever content. Note that Amiga Forever also includes the same version of E-UAE for Linux that is available for MorphOS, E-UAE 0.8.29 WIP4 (only the PPC version does not include JIT).

You can also use Amiga Forever ROMs with WHDLoad under E-UAE, which should also work under MorphOS - useful if you want to fire up a game (or application) which requires a different Kickstart version from a Workbench 3.x desktop.

Much Amiga Forever content is Windows-only, however, and some of it is pretty slow without a JIT-compiler (especially on a G4 or slower). There are some Amiga programs included directly on the Amiga Forever CD/DVD, but compatibility with MorphOS Trance is not guaranteed (to say the least) - I got some pretty garbage attempting to run Personal Paint.

[ Edited by Mequa 20.06.2012 - 03:14 ]

Zylesca, where can I go to download copies of TurboCalc and TVPaint?

> There are some Amiga programs included directly on the Amiga Forever CD/DVD,
> but compatibility with MorphOS Trance is not guaranteed (to say the least) -
> I got some pretty garbage attempting to run Personal Paint.

https://morph.zone/modules/newbb_plus/viewtopic.php?topic_id=3433&forum=16&start=11
https://morph.zone/modules/newbb_plus/viewtopic.php?topic_id=4403&forum=9&start=2
https://morph.zone/modules/newbb_plus/viewtopic.php?topic_id=5084&forum=9&start=1

> where can I go to download copies of TurboCalc and TVPaint?

As far as I'm aware, TurboCalc v5 is still commercial software and can not be downloaded legally.
TVPaint v3.59/v3.6 on the other hand has been declared freeware 13 years ago:

http://downloads.morph.zone/find.php?find=tvpaint

Andreas_Wolf,
Quote:
Andreas, I found TVPaint and installed it, but it's asking for a serial number? I thought it was a freeware.

Mequa,
Quote:
Could you please share with me how to install Amiga Forever in MOS3.0? Thanks.

Quote:

There's a serial number included in the package (legal & supplied by the program authors/distributors) . It's in the main directory when you unpack the .lha archive.

The first place to check for such information is the .readme file included with pretty much every program. You'll usually find your answer there.

Regards



Rich

boot_wb,
Quote:
Rich, I installed TVPaint using Grunch. All I got was an icon to launch the application. I have selected show All Files and there's nothing more. So I don't have the readme file. Any suggestions? download from another site?

Any suggestions? download from another site?

As Andreas Wolf already pointed out, download the TVPaint archive from downloads.morph.zone. A serial number is inside the archive.

>> I installed TVPaint using Grunch. [...] download from another site?

> As Andreas Wolf already pointed out, download the TVPaint archive
> from downloads.morph.zone.

But then, Grunch downloads TVPaint from morphos-files.net, which happens to share its backend with downloads.morph.zone :-)

Or alternatively, go to the TVPaint directory (where the program icon is found), right click and choose view>show all files. I believe serialnumber.txt is copied into that directory by grunch along with the program files.

If not, as Krashan says, you can download the archive directly from here, unpack the archive and find the serialnumber.txt inside.

Regards


Rich

PS - The default view for drawers can be changed in Settings>Ambient>Window>View Behaviour should you find that you prefer to see all of the files all of the time (instead of just icons). Alternatively you can use the 'snapshot' feature to set the default view for individual drawers.

[ Edited by boot_wb 21.06.2012 - 11:52 ]

But then, Grunch downloads TVPaint from morphos-files.net, which happens to share its backend with downloads.morph.zone

Yes, but it downloads it to some temporary location (T: probably), then installs the program automatically, probably not copying the serial number file. Automation sometimes has disadvantages .

The moana files iso works on my mac mini 1.42ghz 32mb vram. So it isn't limited to the 64mb ones, just in case any interested want it to try in his 32mbvram model.

Thanks Andreas. The version I downloaded from Morph-zone worked just find. I cannot say the same about the version I grabbed from Grunch.

Thanks Andreas. The version I downloaded from Morph-zone worked just find. I cannot say the same about the version I grabbed from Grunch.