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View Full Version : Damn the Amigas were fast!



tom66
July 27th, 2008, 09:49 PM
I've got two of them. And they are really fast.

Here's a video-out of them: (captured using a TV card)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=01Vf-u-idG8

Why can't all computers be that fast? We have much more power than the 14mhz Motorola 68000k. If one were to build a computer today they couldn't even achieve the 7 second bootup, but why not? I believe the closest you can get is to image Linux onto a BIOS chip.

Riffer
July 27th, 2008, 10:02 PM
I've got two of them. And they are really fast.

Here's a video-out of them: (captured using a TV card)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=01Vf-u-idG8

Why can't all computers be that fast? We have much more power than the 14mhz Motorola 68000k. If one were to build a computer today they couldn't even achieve the 7 second bootup, but why not? I believe the closest you can get is to image Linux onto a BIOS chip.

More stuff to load?

stinger30au
July 27th, 2008, 10:05 PM
the amiga 500 come stock with a 7 Mhz 68000.was a computer wwwwaaaaayyyy ahead of its time

tom66
July 27th, 2008, 10:26 PM
But why is there more to load. I guess we can't expect them to load in 5-7 seconds, but at least 20 seconds to load everything.

I guess a good source of optimization would be only loading what is absolutely necessary. For example, a computer with a wifi chipset only needs to load the driver and have that on its HDD, it doesn't need the other wifi chipset drivers.

Meh, I'm a speed freak. I would like a fast computer.

Yes
July 27th, 2008, 10:34 PM
23 seconds here. I think the thing slowing me down most is GDM, I should really use something else.

There was less to load back then - about 10 seconds of my boot up time is loading the GUI, the Amigas weren't messing around with any of that stuff. I'm not sure what's been added over the past 20 years (other than the GUI), but most modern OSs probably wouldn't even fit in the Amiga's HDD.

markp1989
July 27th, 2008, 10:37 PM
23 seconds here. I think the thing slowing me down most is GDM, I should really use something else.

There was less to load back then - about 10 seconds of my boot up time is loading the GUI, the Amigas weren't messing around with any of that stuff. I'm not sure what's been added over the past 20 years (other than the GUI), but most modern OSs probably wouldn't even fit in the Amiga's HDD.

mine is 23 seconds aswell (According to bootchart)

I think its modprobe and udev thats taking the time on this machine

back on subject, the amigas were abit before my time, i have one in the wardrobe that my neighbor gave me, but i havnt got around to playing with it yer

toupeiro
July 27th, 2008, 11:08 PM
No joke, the A500 was a super advanced machine for its time. It was the first computer I ever used, and I still remember what I could do with it that parallels some of the things I do now, especially in the realm of digital music creation.

K.Mandla
July 27th, 2008, 11:26 PM
14 seconds at 1Ghz here. If you want a faster boot, do something to change the software you use.

And +1 to the "Amigas were way ahead of their time" comment. :)

Daveski
July 27th, 2008, 11:29 PM
The first video only shows Kickstart loading, and then asking for the OS disk. Would the modern equivalent not just be a computer running the BIOS tests and then asking for an OS?

Have you seen the PC's with the 'LinuxBIOS'?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nuzRsXKm_NQ

tdrusk
July 28th, 2008, 12:29 AM
Try an optimized distro like Arch Linux.

johnlvs2run
July 28th, 2008, 01:43 AM
14 seconds at 1Ghz here. If you want a faster boot, do something to change the software you use.

And +1 to the "Amigas were way ahead of their time" comment. :)

How did you get a 14 second boot. :o

Around 1990 a friend of mine had a computer repair business in his garage, and a 1/2 dozen Amigas set up in their family room.

As demonstration of their speed, he loaded an intensive game on one of them, then another, and another, till he had the screen full of all these different three dimensional games running on the same screen, all at the same time - no glitches or pauses at all, it was amazing, easy and fast. I was getting my first computer at that time and wanted to get one. Sadly Amiga went down the tubes, but were a great example of what COULD be done with computers.

tom66
July 28th, 2008, 08:18 AM
I guess it is only loading Kickstart. But if you place a floppy disk in the drive then it loads that in about 10-15 seconds. I should post a video, but the tvout from my card often is 40mb for just 10 seconds.

K.Mandla
July 28th, 2008, 02:44 PM
How did you get a 14 second boot. :o
I use Crux, and compile everything from scratch with processor-specific flags and so forth. And I carve the kernel down to nothing, so I can milk as much speed out of it as possible. It's quite satisfying, actually. :)

johnlvs2run
July 28th, 2008, 10:25 PM
I use Crux, and compile everything from scratch with processor-specific flags and so forth. And I carve the kernel down to nothing, so I can milk as much speed out of it as possible. It's quite satisfying, actually. :)

That sounds fantastic.

Wish I could learn how to do things like that.

It's probably like being in the Olympics, not everyone qualifies. :wink:

K.Mandla
July 28th, 2008, 11:33 PM
Give it time. When you're comfortable with Ubuntu try Arch, and when you're comfortable with Arch try Crux. It's a natural progression, particularly if you're a fellow speed freak. :biggrin:

Edit: Or now that I think about it maybe I should just buy an Amiga. :)

Npl
July 29th, 2008, 12:44 AM
Gonna see how fast your Linux-Box boots if you run from Floppies :)

I got a A1200 with a HDD and it boots to Workbench (a graphical OS) in less than 5 seconds, but I`m cheating as I`m running on an incredible 50MHz 68030 CPU aswell

Daveski
July 29th, 2008, 10:40 AM
Anyone got Linux on an Amiga and can let us know how quickly that boots?

TenPlus1
July 29th, 2008, 12:40 PM
My Amiga 1200 had an awesome GUI system called MUI (Magic User Interface) that had so many plugins available for any job, and ran so quick on 14mhz... What happened to that simplicity, and the fact that is was only 800k in total for everything...

K.Mandla
July 31st, 2008, 01:30 AM
My Amiga 1200 had an awesome GUI system called MUI (Magic User Interface) that had so many plugins available for any job, and ran so quick on 14mhz... What happened to that simplicity, and the fact that is was only 800k in total for everything...
It's still available, you just kind of have to do it yourself. Of course, I don't know if you can pare down a manageable and functional PC system to 800k, but proportional performance is possible.