Download issue 9 - Total Amiga Magazine

4NEWSWorld of Amiga South EastPreparations for the World ofAmiga South East have beengoing very well, we now have alist of exhibitors and a floor plan as youcan see here. In addition to the mainhall, the venue boasts a bar which willbe staffed throughout the show and asmaller hall that will be used as a caféand presentation area.This is the current list of exhibitors, asusual with these things there willprobably be some minor changes by theday of the show but this is what to expect:1-2 Kicksoft3 Pagan Games4 HAUG and Blackpooluser groups5 To Be Announced6 Amiga7 Cloanto8-14 Eyetech15-16 Formatt Home Computing17 100% Amiga18 SEAL19 ANT20 Kickstart21 ASA22 Elbox23-24 Mediator Support25-27 Virtual Programingand Amiga Active28-30 Weird Science31-33 Stellar Dreams34 Hyperion Games Area35 Gloucestershire Amiga GroupWe also have an assurance from Haageand Partner that they will be there todemonstrate the Amiga OS XL packagebut we don’t know exactly what formtheir attendance will take yet.Apart from the bar other highlights of theshow will be several presentations includingone from Fleecy Moss of Amigaand several games tournaments. Keepan eye on the show website for furtherdetails and a time table of presentations.The show is taking place on Saturdaythe 3rd of November 2001 at:Poplars Hall,Poplar Drive,Hutton,Brentwood,Essex, CM13 1YU.It will run from 12:00 until 17:00. If youhaven’t bought your tickets already theywill be available on the door at just£3.50 each. Full details including directionsfrom the M25 and on publictransport are on the show website:http://www.worldofamiga.comCLUBBED - Issue 9AmigaOS onIn the Amiwest update sheet includedwith issue 8 of Clubbed we weresurprised to find that two, ostensiblysimilar Amiga Emulators were beingdeveloped in tandem. One wasAmithlon, developed by Harald Frankand Bernd Meyer, which was demonstratedby Bill McEwen at Amiwest andthe other, previewed in Amiga Activeissue 23 turned out to be AmigaXL fromHaage and Partner.SimilaritiesBoth emulators run on a host OS, Linuxfor Amithlon and QNX for AmigaXL, buthide the fact from the user. They areboth derived from UAE althoughAmithlon’s developers sayalmost every aspect hasbeen rewritten, we don’tknow yet how much ofUAE remains in AmigaXLalthough H&P do say ituses a “modified and highlyaccelerated 68k emulator”.Another common factor betweenthe two is their claimed speed, on afast x86 PC speeds of up to 20 times‘060 have been quoted, which is quiteamazing! Finally both will read your existingAmiga hard disks allowing easytransfer of programs and data. With bothemulators offering such similar facilitiesand Amiga and H&P being partners invarious developments it seemed clearthey would have to come to some sort ofagreement. The end result is that Haageand Partner will publish both emulatorsin a package called AmigaOS XL whichincludes all the necessary licences,neither will be available separately.DifferencesUntil the package is released or at leastdemonstrated it is hard to know how theemulators will compare in performanceand the “feel” of their emulation. Fromthe specifications and other informationreleased so far it seems that the maindifference between them is how muchuse they make of the services offered bythe host OS.Amithlon seems to make very little useof its Linux base, it uses Linux drivers toaccess basic motherboard resources(mouse, keyboard, IDE and SCSI controllersetc.) and to initialise graphicscards. From that point on you must haveWinter 2001x86Amiga drivers to support your hardware,for example if you want to print on amodern inkjet you would still needTurboPrint. From what has been saidUsing Amithlon will be very much likeusing a very fast 68k Amiga, it will stillhave the limitations of an Amiga such aslimited driver support, but on the otherhand it you like your Amiga driver softwarefor scanning, printing, CD writingetc. you should be able to continueusing it, just much faster.AmigaXL is said to make much moreuse of the underlying QNX operatingsystem, for example it uses QNX printerdrivers and network access is via theQNX TCP/IP stack. From whathas been said it doesn’tseem possible to accessthe various interfaces ofthe PC as Amiga devicesfrom AmigaXL, the FAQstates that several applicationsrequiring devicelevel access to interfaces (forexample CD burning and scanning)will not work under the emulation.On the plus side being more relianton the host OS means that AmigaXLcan offer features like USB support andeven access to QNX programs likeOpera and Voyager web browsers (completewith SSL, Macromedia Flash,MPEG, RealAudio, JavaScript and Javasupport)within the emulation.From the FAQ it seems that AmigaXLwill also have some what better supportfor programs using the Amiga chipsetthan Amithlon which is purely for programsthat run on a graphics card.However with a fast PC there is noreason why one couldn’t run UAE withineither of them to support older software.The AmigaOS XL package with bothemulators, licensed OS 3.9, 3.1 ROMimage, QNX and Picasso 96 will cost299DM which is about £100. For loadsmore information visit Haage andPartner’s AmigaOS XL web site at:http://amigaosxl.haage-partner.de/Note: The detailed information is underthe “Products” link at the top of thepage.The UK distributor for the Package isVirtual Programming:http://www.vpltd.com+44 (0) 1202 411117NEWSNew LookAminetThe main Aminet website has beengiven a make over, the site is still simpleand quick to load (if anything I think theone graphic is smaller than before) butnow all the common functions are easilyavailable on the main page. Straightaway you can see the list of the lastweek’s uploads and the search functionis in the side bar along with direct linksto the top level directories.At the moment the new look only seemsto be available on the US site at:http://us.aminet.net/pub/aminet/MediatorFastEthernetElbox has announced new drivers forEthernet cards based on the RealtekRTL8139 chipset, which supports10MBit/s and 100MB/s operation, thiswill be the first 100MB card available forthe Amiga. The new drivers are availablefor Elbox’s Mediator range of PCIbus boards and will also require the userto own the recently released MediatorMultimedia CD (see our preview onpage 24 for further details). TheRTL8139 is used on many PCI Ethernetcards and tends to be very economicallypriced, you should be able to find acompatible card for well under £20.Mediator boards and the MMCD are distributedin the UK by Power Computing,for further details visit:http://www.powerc.comor telephone them on (01234) 851500.Elbox have a website at:http://www.elbox.com5