EXTERNAL LINK 
Bottom line:
While the PC was upgrading its capabilities continuosly, the Amiga did not change substantially between 1985-1992. It was the fault of Commodore management, because the Los Gatos team, the original Amiga engineers, knew perfectly the fact that the PC was always moving, so they had to move accordingly to stay ahead in the race.

Imagine quasi-AGA features in 1989 instead of 1993. That was "Ranger". Commodore did not listen to Los Gatos team. Worse than that, they marginalized the team and it disbanded. That's the sad story. The Ranger chipset design was finished but never released.

There is an especially interesting reading, an interview to Jay Miner:
Part 1: EXTERNAL LINK  Part 2: EXTERNAL LINK  Part 3: EXTERNAL LINK 

Regarding Natami, I suggest a bounty system be established as soon as possible. I think it could be a benefit for the developers, most of whom are juggling real jobs, families, and Amiga development. I think it could also benefit non-developer supporters of the project by giving them a chance to help from a financial standpoint.
 
  Anyway, I too share the hope that Natami succeeds.
 
  Regards, Michael
 
 
 
 
 

"Product success requires giving value to the product. Companies usually fail when they stop giving value and they become greedy."

I think that, in the context of the interview, he meant that Commodore was too obsessed with cutting costs down for every single component. This resulted in high margin, cheap products, but un-exciting in comparison with anything else, lacking the "value" Jay talks about. What he proposes, instead, is that some not-so-cheap components (cleverly chosen or designed) can give unique superiority to the machine, and a not-so-high margin is then justified because the product shines in contrast with the competition.

I think all bussinesses tend naturally to forget about this, after all, what they want is higher profits, even more than higher market-share.

Anyway, I think Natami is about some people building something for themselves. This is the exciting part of it, more than anything else. Remember what all evil character say in the movies:
"If you want something well done, do it youself".

The measure of success for Natami would be, for me, finishing this cool retro-computing gadget and combine it with AROS. I expect little cool things and experiments to be done with it beyond game-porting.

To me, NatAmi is what might have been way back in the late 1980's or early 1990's if the original development team with Jay Miner had stayed together and were allowed to continue improvements on a steady schedule.  So, the NatAmi won't be a computer to compete with the newest technology of 2009-2010, but will be more like the best Amiga system that could possibly have been produced in maybe 1990 if management had not screwed it all up.

If they succeed, I will happily run AmigaOS3.9 on a NatAmi at 2 to 10 times the speed of an 68060/50MHz using much of the old software, but hoping for some new 68k apps as well.  Hopefully OWB will work well and run fast enough to make browsing while using a NatAmi an okay experience, instead of a PITA.

That sums it up excellently, because we were.

I love what people here have to say.

I feel very at home.

Hi David,

Are you really concerned that new apps won't come out..... To me, how could they NOT????

Amiga to me is like clay/Plasticine, Lego, Mechano, Lite Brite, plastic (to assemble) models, and comic books all rolled up into one!

Maybe now you can all understand why I'm so excited, at the age of 42.

The Natami team (at least from what I can read from Gunnar's comments) is interested in a free, open-source Kickstart.

CLICK HERE 
If they create their own hardware, controlled by them, it sounds logical to me that they want an OS that is also controlled by them too.

The first Natami, though, will surely use a patched original Kickstart. But in the future, it could be very convenient to have an AROS Kickstart running on Natami.