Amiga Returns With Lackluster Linux-Powered Mini PC

crookedvulture writes "Commodore has revealed the Amiga mini, a small-form-factor system that runs a custom Linux distro dubbed Commodore OS Vision. A trailer for the OS hardly inspires confidence, and the rest of the system doesn't help. While the Amiga mini features a high-end Intel desktop CPU and modern conveniences like Blu-ray, USB 3.0, and 802.11n Wi-Fi, it's stuck with one of the slowest graphics chips Nvidia makes. Some of the other specifications are head-scratchers, too. The mini comes with a whopping 16GB of RAM but only a terabyte of storage. You'll have to pay extra to get an SSD, which makes the $2500 asking price particularly onerous. The case, Blu-ray drive, and power supply are being made available separately, but at $345, they're hardly a bargain. Add this to the list of nostalgia-baiting remakes that don't live up to their inspiration." Update: It looks like Commodore has dropped the price after receiving a lot of negative feedback.

NOT AMIGA OS

[JoeCommodore]

Note these aren't the same guys working on the Amiga OS

The Amiga mini they use their own re branded Linux Commodore OS. Amiga OS is a totally different animal.

Amiga?

[SirDice]

If it doesn't run AmigaOS it's not an Amiga. Heck, AmigaOS 4.1 was released not too long ago. http://www.amigaos.net/ [amigaos.net]

Re:Oh wow.

[realityimpaired]

_Only_ a terabyte of storage?

Since when is that a little amount of storage?

In a $2500 computer? You can get a 2TB drive for about $15 more than the cost of a 1TB drive. The upgrade to 3TB still adds about $50 to the price, and 4TB even more, but in a system that's got a base price of $2500, it seems like a really bad decision made by beancounters to scrimp on something like the hard drive, especially when the *retail* difference in price to double the storage is less than 1% of the list price of the device.

Commodore history of a name

[basotl]

Commodore International went bancrupt in 1994. It was bought by Escom which also went bankrupt in 1996. In September 1997, the Commodore brand name was acquired by Dutch computer maker Tulip Computers NV. In late 2004, Tulip sold the Commodore name to Yeahronimo Media Ventures. Yeahronimo Media Ventures soon renamed itself to Commodore International Corporation. On June 24, 2009, CIC renamed itself to Reunite Investments. CIC's founder, Ben van Wijhe, bought a Hong Kong-based company called Asiarim, and Asiarim purchased the Commodore brand from Reunite. Asiarim then changed its name to Commodore Holdings Corporation.

Ownership of the Amiga line passed through a few companies, from Escom of Germany in 1995, and then to U.S. PC clone maker Gateway in 1997, before an exclusive lifetime license was made to Amiga, Inc. in 2000. On March 15, 2004, Amiga, Inc. announced that on April 23, 2003 it had transferred its rights over Amiga OS to Itec, LLC, later acquired by KMOS, Inc. On March 16, 2005, KMOS, Inc. announced it's change of corporate name to Amiga, Inc.

Commodore USA, LLC was founded in April 2010. Commodore USA licensed the Commodore brand from Commodore Licensing BV on August 25, 2010 and the Amiga brand from Amiga, Inc. on August 31, 2010.

TL;DR This is not the Commodore International you knew and loved.

Re:It goes without saying

[crazyjj]

This pseudo-Commodore company [wikipedia.org] (this is NOT the original Commodore company, which went out of business a long time ago) did the same thing with the Commodore 64 a while back, releasing a supposed clone [wikipedia.org] of the classic machine that was basically just a custom case fitted around a PC running Ubuntu. The world was underwhelmed, to say the least.

Re:It goes without saying

[Anonymous Coward]

Also, a the end of the trailer it says "Commodore OS Vision coming 11.11.11".
I suppose they were planning to release it but then they took an arrow to the knee.

You're able to grab an early beta... which is just a bastardized version of Linux Mint with a godawful ugly shell and cheesy robot voiceover... i thought maybe it would have some goodness centered around C64 emu, but nothing more then you can get from the FOSS community already...

http://www.commodoreusa.net/CUSA_OS_Vision.aspx

Could the real Amigas please stand up

[Anonymous Coward]

Please, please, please check out the "real" Amiga descendants that carry on the spirit of Amiga:

Amiga OS4 from Hyperion, MorphOS from, er, the MorphOS team and AROS from the, er AROS, team.

The first runs on custom built/designed PPC based machines - expensive, but unusual

The second runs on PPC-based MACs - cheap, but oldish

The latter is an open-source AmigaOS re-implementation and runs on x86, PPC and ARM.

ALL of them have far more to do with Amiga than this Linux on an expensive box nonsense.

Re:It goes without saying

[jandrese]

Amiga was also hobbled by the brain dead management at the time. Even if you have the best product in the world it is an uphill battle if your management is insane.

Re:It goes without saying

[jedidiah]

> Know what else has a Core i7 processor? a Mac Mini.

No it doesn't. This box outclasses a Mac Mini in every respect.

Still got a good excuse for that price tag though.

OTOH, these are all standard parts and you can build your own Mini stomping machine for a lot less.

Re:It goes without saying

[petermgreen]

Know what else has a Core i7 processor? a Mac Mini.

The chip in the Mac Mini is a mobile chip while the chip in this thing is an unlocked desktop chip. Don't let the fact that they share the i7 brand fool you into thinking they are the same thing.

Re:It goes without saying

[ILongForDarkness]

I found the iMac 27" a better deal a year and a half ago when I was looking for an all in one. At the time the only thing I found really worth comparing with it was a HP model but it only had a 19" screen, and i3 and less graphics for I think it was ~200 less. So for 200 I got 9" more of a higher res display, an i7 quad, and a better graphics card. Made sense to me at the time. It all depends on what you want sometimes apple is a bit more but gives you a better screen and a little boost somewhere.