In contrast to the other system, support for native x86 is known to be available. Which means, rather than using emulated 680X0 code, the system can happily run native code with the obvious improvement in performance. However, it isn't a native port of the OS - if you want that, you'll either need to pester Amiga themselves, or take a look at the work of AROS which has successfully implemented an x86 native AmigaOS compatible operating system. I seriously hope the authors join AROS and MorphOS in communicating about APIs and compatibility - it would benefit everyone.
In the meantime, both projects further open up the field - expanding upon the work of UAE to recapture interest in the Amiga as well as offer AmigaOS running on PC hardware (such as laptops). While I've seen some comments that this may harm the Amiga market, I don't personally see this as being a problem - although I admit I'm not basing this on a lot of research, others may have done more in-depth analysis. Far from it, the result should be to open further doorways without necessarily sacrificing compatibility or fragmenting the marketplace.
Have Amiga made a u-turn again? I don't think so, in fact that's really a No when you think about it - AmigaOS 4.x is still apparently on course, and there's PowerPC hardware coming from a variety of sources such as Eyetech, Merlancia and bplan. While the allure of cheap and widespread x86 hardware can't be denied, PowerPC enjoys a considerable interest and attraction - not just from the Amiga community.
Nonetheless, Amithlon is an interesting development, and one that requires careful scrutiny over the coming months. In fact, it's still early days for both systems, and it'll be interesting to see how they fit into the evolving plans over the next few months.
Briefly, while still roughly on the subject of hardware, I was able to visit the office of Ideas2Reality at the weekend and actually hold a prototype RealityStation. If you need more proof, I've taken an exclusive snapshot of the RealityStation with proud parent Bernard Giltrap of I2R - check the link below.
Unofficial Amithlon FAQ: http://byron.csse.monash.edu.au/amithlon...
RealityStation prototype: http://www.snowcrash.u-net.com/downloads...
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