Quote:

I fixed it for you.

Or have the developers said otherwise?

@minator

No need to "fix" anything. AFAIK, *nobody* is building viable and affordable PPC desktop and/or laptop motherboards, because simply there is no point, and I see no reason whatsoever to believe this will change. The PPC Macs were the last of its kind, Apple *was* the PPC desktop/laptop market, and when they left it behind, they left it with no pulse, no future. But I'm sure these new CPU's will make excellent routers and printers or whatever...

@ takemehomegrandma,

While i appreciate your opinion, and consider the point about affordable PPC based computers valid, I seriously disagree with you on the potential of these new CPUs.
Have you checked the specs on them? They're hardly limited to use in routers and printers.
Did you notice the quote Andreas mentioned on AltiVec enhancement?

>Page 12 of FTF11_NET_F1176 document mentions "Improved load /store to ease bit alignment" and "New instructions for video analytics".

Instructions designed for video are not intended for router or printer applications.

To be sure, high volume, affordable PPC motherboards seem to be a thing of the past. But Acube is making PPC boards. Aeon is (sooner or later) supposed to be making PPC boards.
And these new processors are more powerful than the APM processors used in the Acube boards and more then powerful enough to suit our purposes.

Quote:


I wasn't talking about any of that. I was merely pointing out that the MorphOS devs haven't publicly said anything about any other architecture.

Actually I entirely agree, the CPUs may be perfectly usable but until someone does a PPC beagleboard any new boards are going to be far too expensive to be interesting.


Edit: Wrong quote, fixed.

[ Edited by minator 26.06.2011 - 20:17 ]

> The PPC Macs were the last of its kind

I think the PowerStation was it. Complete 2.5 GHz quad-core G5 machine for 1250 USD seemed like a nice deal, being both viable and affordable.

https://morph.zone/modules/newbb_plus/viewtopic.php?forum=3&topic_id=7001&start=145
https://morph.zone/modules/newbb_plus/viewtopic.php?forum=3&topic_id=7001&start=137

Quote:

Tech specs of these CPU's couldn't be more irrelevant when nobody is going to use them to try to create a viable PPC desktop market (and why would anyone want to do that? Madness!)

Quote:

I'm sorry, but some guys building a few batches x30 boards at a per unit price of a used car doesn't really count. If that's your idea of a future, then it would be better to spare everyone the misery and take down the sign and close the shop right now.

It's dead, Jim.

@ takemehomegrandma,

Your perspective is fueled by your desire to see a change in ISAs.
Since we haven't received Powerbook or G5 Mac support, there is still plenty of room for expansion.
I'll license either model (maybe both).
We don't need to consider an ISA change for at least a couple years.
And who knows what will happen during that period.

With IBM and Frescale's continued focus on further development of Power architecture, my vote is that we stay where we are.
Like X86 needs yet another alternative OS.

> Like X86 needs yet another alternative OS.

I don't believe the proponents of an ISA change for MorphOS think that any other ISA needs MorphOS but rather that MorphOS needs to support another ISA.

I myself wouldn't mind an ARM port.
But the developers only have so much time available and right now there is no ARM processor as powerful as a G5.

Quote:

No, I couldn't care less what CPU MorphOS runs on, as long as it will continue to be developed in the future for a HW platform that has some kind of pulse. So it's really the other way around; my desire to see a change in ISA comes from my perspective that PPC is dead.

Quote:

"We"? Perhaps not you and me, but a "proper" migration (in parallel to the "normal" development) would probably take a couple of years at the current "hobby development pace", so an ISA change is something I hope the developers has already decided upon some time ago already.

Quote:

But right now there are ARM processors capable of giving the user a generally faster experience than Efika 5k2, which many MorphOS users (including me) already feels is more than adequate for most usages, and playing any kind of media files you throw at it in 1080p through HW acceleration on top of that, which I think would be the main selling point for G5 to general users, but without the heat and noise. So that is already covered. And you can buy new HW as well, from more than one manufacturer, and it's really cheap. Perfect for a hobby platform. And the future ARM evolution is very interesting, probably the most interesting and dynamic of all architectures right now, with the architecture going through a transition far into territories it hasn't been in before. I read somewhere that more and more laptop manufacturers are considering building ARM machines in the future, when coming generations of ARM CPU's are released, and Windows 8 is released for it. It won't be any shortage of cool HW.

> ARM [...] architecture going through a transition far into territories
> it hasn't been in before.

You mean like the "general desktop arena"? ;-)

The problem with all of these discussions about "cool hardware" or what "ought to be supported" is the time required to create the port and the likely lifetime of the target platform.
ARM is mutating faster than a virus and what is current now will be dead in only a year or two.
Also there's a great deal f variation in platforms. What do you support? The choice would be crucial as (just as in AROS' case) it would not be possible to support all the hardware available.

Right now we have equipment that is low priced and performs more than adequately.
The G5 will greatly increase our processing power with a negligible increase in cost.
At this point we still have at least a couple of years before we need to worry about moving to another ISA.

I would hope that the developers are thinking about what their future plans will entail.
But, since the choices to be made will be crucial to the success or failure of MorphOS, these choices need to be made very cautiously.

I for one am very satisfied with the direction the development team has chosen to follow. We have well made, highly available, low cost hardware that works and performs quite well. The useful life span of the Apple hardware we're using has proven to be quite long. Even now, the performance of a G5 system is still relatively competitive.

Once the move is made to another ISA, will the target system(s) have similar longevity?

I'm not disagreeing with any of your point. I'd only advise caution as the decisions to be made are vital to our success or failure.

So Andreas, now that you've had time to look a the preliminary data on the new AMP T4240 with its e6500 multihreading core, what do you think?
Is the PPC dead?
Is this device unsuitable for desktop use?
Without SMP, I can't see MorphOS making much use of this, but I would like to see a Linux implementation.
Just a dual core model would allow four concurrent threads, with enhanced Altivec support, and 64 bit addressing.

Virtualization has come to the PPC in a big way with this one.
Maybe some clever tweaking of Quark could allow multiple copies of MorphOS to run at the same time.

[ Edited by Jim 27.06.2011 - 18:29 ]

Quote:

Eh? The ARM ISA is very stable, it's certainly not evolving any faster than x86 or PowerPC, probably slower in fact.

Quote:

In the embedded space this isn't much of a problem however as ARM moves back into desktops it becomes a major problem. However this is a recognised problem so you can be sure they are thinking about solutions.

Quote:

If you're talking about ARM, then by the time a port is done then I would imagine, yes.

> Andreas, now that you've had time to look a the preliminary data on the new
> AMP T4240 with its e6500 multihreading core, what do you think?

I think that for our purposes the QorIQ T5 with its fewer, higher clocked, single-threaded e6500 core(s) would be better suited than the QorIQ T4.

> Is the PPC dead?

Power Architecture is definitely alive.

> Is this device unsuitable for desktop use?

Technically, I'd say the T4 is suitable for desktop use. As outlined above, even more suitable for a non-SMP OS like MorphOS would be the T5 though (preferably a T5010, which has been indicated to be planned). Economically, the suitability also depends on the price of the chips, which is an unknown factor yet.

> Without SMP, I can't see MorphOS making much use of this

Yes, that's why I'd like a QorIQ T5010 with one 2.5 GHz single-threaded e6500 core to appear. This would ensure the best exploitation of the available T5 processing power for the lowest T5 cost.

> I would like to see a Linux implementation.

Linux support for QorIQ AMP has already been announced:

http://www.mentor.com/company/news/mentor-announces-embedded-linux-platform-support-freescale-semiconductor-64-bit-processors

> Just a dual core model would allow four concurrent threads

With the T4, yes. A dual-core T5 however would only allow two concurrent threads. Four concurrent threads with a T5 would require a quad-core chip.

> Virtualization has come to the PPC in a big way with this one.

PPC has had virtualization and partitioning capability also before the e6500, namely with the PPC970MP, PA6T, POWER4/5/6/7, PPC A2, e500mc, e5500.

> Maybe some clever tweaking of Quark could allow multiple copies of MorphOS
> to run at the same time.

From a user's standpoint I don't see much sense in running several ABox instances in parallel, but for developers this could come in handy, i.e. developing in ABox #1 on core/thread #1 and testing the software in ABox #2 on core/thread #2 (which could run a virgin installation of the ABox and wouldn't require rebooting the other ABox in case of a crash).

Quote:

Me too. It was surely the best they could do, given the situation were they woke up one day to see all desktop/laptop HW manufacturers suddenly leave PPC behind.

But I think most people understands that this current path is about to reach its end. There aren't coming any more PPC Mac's, and nothing else to replace them either.

I think we will see a MorphOS Powerbook release. I honestly *doubt* we will see a G5 release. And that's pretty much it! The End!

I don't know if you have noticed the differences between Hyperion and the MorphOS developers regarding PPC? Hyperion has time after time publicly denounced the idea of migrating OS4 to a new architecture. It won't happen, possibly because they are bound (?) to PPC by their license (not that they have honored that contract to a greater extent before, but anyway).

But have you seen anyone from the MorphOS team saying that MorphOS will never migrate to a different architecture? I think not! Instead, here are some scattered MorphOS developers comments on the subject:

About choosing PPC as target architecture in the first place, one developer said something in the lines of: "if we would have known back then what we know today, we would have chosen differently" (not an exact quote)

In a response to the comment "I only regret that again we have an announcement about old hardware", a developer said: "Fair enough, but don't whine if it ain't a PowerPC based box "

In a response to the comment "Due to lack of another new PPC-based hardware, I can make the only conclusion: this is the end of MorphOS ", a developer said: "IMHO Apple hardware is the only target that makes sense for PowerPC MorphOS at the moment." (and no, the emphasis was not put there by me, but by the dev himself)

In a response to the comment "Were MorphOS to be rewritten in X86 machine code, program code compiled for MorphOS would have to be specific to MorphOS", a developer said: "First, assembler code is rarely used for the PowerPC-compatible versions of MorphOS." (Insinuation that PPC versions aren't the only ones?)

OK, all this is highly speculative from my side of course. But I have yet to see *any* MorphOS developer publicly rejecting the thought of an architectural migration the rabid way Hyperion does. For all we know, someone could very well have been working on a non-PPC version of MorphOS for a long time already.

Or maybe not, who knows...?

Quote:

I think these processors will perform great in the various network communication applications where they will be used. I don't see Apple *or anyone else* using them to rebuild some kind of new PowerPC based desktop market though. Do you? The 8641 was also a very "suitable" CPU. And the 8610. And the 8640. Genesi had plans to build a new Pegasos and a Netbook based on these, they had some development work done, Matt Sealey (8641D) and Konstantinos Margaritis (8610) had the reference boards and had software up and running, etc. But eventually they shelved it. No-one else did it either, despite them being great CPU's back then (and still are, to a degree). I think they have been used in lots of applications. But not in general desktop computers, despite their "suitability". Ask yourself this question: Why?

@ takemehomegrandma,

I don't think we really have a significant difference of opinion.
I like these new Freescale processors, but even if used in computers they're more suited to a server role.
Andreas has mentioned the one that would be suitable for MorphOS (the T5010), but if it has the same PCIe limitation as the P5010 then we're stuck with X8 & x1, X4 X4 & x1, or X4 X4 &x$ (i believe, Andreas could correct me on this). It's better than an Acube motherboard would have, but its still not as good as the defunct PA6T.
A move to ARM would not present that much difficulty. As most ARMs support either endian solutions, emulating a 68K would be easier and more efficient then with an X86 (as would PPC code, but I don't anticipate emulating PPC code).
The boards are alrady available and the processors are becoming more powerful each year.

I've already mentioned the Pandaboard here and Andreas has pointed out other ARM based SBCs. Compared to a lower end Powermac or an Efika, these systems already have a performance edge.
If, as you believe, we don't see G5 support, then the natural next step would be something like the Cortex A9 or its successor.

Btw - I too looked at the 8641/8640. It just wasn't fast enough to make sense building boards with (not when cheap G4 Macs were available).
While I do like the T5010, I can't imagine limited production with it would be much cheaper then the X1000. This makes the ARM boards with their low prices really attractive.

> possibly because they are bound (?) to PPC by their license

Since the 2009 settlement agreement, which took over from the 2001 contract, with Amiga Inc. they're allowed to port OS4 to whatever they want, including other ISAs than Power Architecture.

"an ARM/X-Scale version of AmigaOS 4.x is perfectly possible."
http://amigaworld.net/modules/newbb/viewtopic.php?topic_id=33800&forum=25&start=40#618192

> not that they have honored that contract to a greater extent before

In terms of the settlement agreement there is no "before" the settlement agreement.

> Andreas has mentioned the one that would be suitable for MorphOS (the T5010)

*Most* suitable. Current MorphOS users with dual-G4 PowerMacs don't seem to care too much that their second G4 CPU lies idle :-)

> if it has the same PCIe limitation as the P5010 then we're stuck with X8 & x1,
> X4 X4 & x1, or X4 X4 &x$ (i believe, Andreas could correct me on this).

It's 'x8' or 'x4 x4 x1 x1' with SATA or 'x4 x4 x4' without SATA*.

https://morph.zone/modules/newbb_plus/viewtopic.php?forum=3&topic_id=7183&start=177

> its still not as good as the defunct PA6T.

QorIQ P5 can dedicate up to 12 SerDes lanes to PCIe 2.0. The PA6T provides up to 24 half-speed (compared to PCIe 2.0) SerDes lanes for PCIe 1.0 and GbE, which makes up to 23 half-speed lanes available for PCIe 1.0. So I'd say they're about on par overall. The only clear advantage of the PA6T in that regard is its better flexibility, as it can power one x16 PCIe 1.0 slot (which equals one x8 PCIe 2.0 slot) and some more slower PCIe slots whereas the QorIQ P5 can power either one x8 PCIe 2.0 slot and no more PCIe slots or just x4 PCIe 2.0 slots and some more slower PCIe slots.

> most ARMs support either endian solutions

Do we know for sure by now that ARMv7-A supports true big-endian?


* Edit: The SATA constraint may only refer to Freescale's P5020DS board and may not necessarily be there in other boards built around the P5 chip.

> here are some scattered MorphOS developers comments on the
> subject: [...]

And here's another one:

"Question is really is it worth of it. PPC is big endian platform allowing easy integration of old Amiga software to modern (in Amiga terms) PPC native operating system. With little endian systems that integration would be lost although it was more relevant ten years ago than it is today."
http://amigaworld.net/modules/newbb/viewtopic.php?topic_id=33868&forum=2&start=40#620205

>The only clear advantage of the PA6T in that regard is its better flexibility, as it can power one x16 PCIe 1.0 slot (which equals one x8 PCIe 2.0 slot) and some more slower PCIe slots whereas the QorIQ P5 can power either one x8 PCIe 2.0 slot and no more PCIe slots or just x4 PCIe 2.0 slots and some more slower PCIe slots.

yep, its definitely an advantage to have other slots than one dedicated to video (unless you're willing to go with an X4 compromise like Acube).

>It's 'x8' or 'x4 x4 x1 x1' with SATA or 'x4 x4 x4' without SATA.

I knew you'd tweak that one.

>Do we know for sure by now that ARMv7-A supports true big-endian?

No, I don't know about that.

I'd still favor a PPC solution, which is why I keep following these developments.
You've been right on top of all this for some time now, Andreas.
You must admit that things are looking more encouraging then they have for quite a while.

> unless you're willing to go with an X4 compromise like Acube

Just want to add that the x4 PCIe slot on the Sam460ex is first generation PCIe, so an x4 PCIe slot on a QorIQ P5 board (like this solution, which btw seems to be able to provide three active x4 slots and two active SATA controllers at the same time) would still provide twice the bandwidth, equalling an x8 PCIe 1.0 slot.

> No, I don't know about that.

Pity. Your statement made it seem like you'd know more in that regard.

> You must admit that things are looking more encouraging then they
> have for quite a while.

Yes, they do to me, mainly thanks to Freescale's decision to bring back AltiVec. Between January 2009 when I learned of the discouraging fact that there'll be no more new e600 based chips and September 2010 when Freescale announced its pleasant decision to have AltiVec back (this time in the QorIQ), the situation regarding Power Architecture looked worse, yes. Now I don't mind anymore the scrapping of the e600 based chip line. The e6500 core is probably no worse than what the e700 core with AltiVec would have been, and consequently the QorIQ T5 is probably no worse than what the MPC87xx would have been. It only gets a little embarrassing when you see how long it took Freescale to eventually realize what they had on the roadmap originally no less than 7 years ago ;-)
And on a side note, Nintendo's announcement to use Power Architecture in the Wii U is encouraging for the Power Architecture ecosystem as well. Whether any of those recent developments has the potential to benefit future MorphOS releases in any way remains to be seen, though.

Quote:

They handle big-endian data.


What is "true" big-endian? And why does it matter?

> They handle big-endian data. What is "true" big-endian?

That's the second time you ask this same question to me. And it's now the second time that I will answer it, or better: refer you to my answer from 5 months ago:

https://morph.zone/modules/newbb_plus/viewtopic.php?forum=11&topic_id=6726&start=119

:-)

> why does it matter?

https://morph.zone/modules/newbb_plus/viewtopic.php?forum=11&topic_id=6726&start=90

Quote:

That takes me to a page with links to another page with links to...

Couldn't you just answer the question?


I think you mean running code in big-endian mode. But, AFAIK how the code run is not important, it's the data ordering that is important and ARM does that fine.

The only time I think code ordering would make a difference is when you want to emulate something (e.g. 68K or PPC), but even there the emulator would handle that transparently, there might be a performance hit but that's not likely to be very big. OTOH a JIT based emulator would do the conversion once and so it shouldn't make any difference.