yellowTab Announces Complete BeOS/Zeta Systems

Allman writes "The return of the BeOS? Seems like Bernd Korz is delivering what he had promised (and more). After all these years it seems that yellowTab ("the new BeOS company") is finally ready to release and sell new BeOS-based products. Surprisingly, they're not only selling software, but in some way following the footsteps of Be Inc. by also selling hardware - will these things eventually become the new Be Box-es? Hehe.. who knows? From their website: yellowTab is proud to announce the "Complete Zeta Solution". Both in laptop and desktop forms, yellowTab will sell, to Europe only, complete and compatible systems. All systems come with a 2 year Warranty included.""

Comments

BeOS FAQ

[Anonymous Coward]

For those of you like me, that know nothing about BeOS, here is the FAQ

Davak

Tech-Recipes.com

Re:BeOS FAQ

[Anonymous Coward]

Yellow Tab Faq

Re:BeOS FAQ

[0x0d0a]

Oh, I think it can be pretty much summed up in one word, sans FAQ. Amiga.

Re:BeOS FAQ

[guile*fr]

I think Jean Louis Gassee described the Bebox as the Amiga of the 90'

Re:BeOS FAQ

[ls -lR]

Wow, a FAQ last updated nearly five years ago. That's like, what, 25 years in internet-years.

Re:whut? no comments yet?

[dead sun]

I'd comment but can't even get to the article. No, I'm not new here...

Mirror

[Anonymous Coward]

Please? Someone?
2 posts and already can't read the site!

Google Cache

[OctaneZ]

knocked over in record time...
http://216.239.39.104/search?q=cache:YaXZiyaAKTQJ: www.yellowtab.com/+&hl=en&ie=UTF-8

Re:Google Cache

[ScottSpeaks!]

If "no one cares about BeOS", how did YellowTab getted /.ed so quickly? Surely they're not running the site on PoorMan (the itty-bitty web server bundled with BeOS)?

Where is the market?

[Max Romantschuk]

Is there really a market for these solutions? Sure, BeOS was great a while back, but Mac OS X, Linux and even Windows have all catched up in many respects. There's also OpenBeOS, even though it's not finished yet.

So, is there a market, or not?

Re:Where is the market?

[ninthwave]

Having been a big BeOS fan and trying to work with the OpenBeOS project I would say there is a need for someone to takes BE's place in the market. My BeOS system is still my favourite machine. The Audio tools in Windows and Mac have caught up but the power per machine spec has not. The things you could do AV with BeOS on lower spec machines is the same as the comaparision of Linux server's power per processor spec versus Windows.

An operating system taylored around just AV file system and hardware access concerns is not a bad thing. Windows is too generic, MAC too resource intensive, Linux lacking but catching up in the AV realm.

But the problem with this a company such as Yellow Tab needs to take the BeOS product and have it sit on modern hardware and software improvements it can not just be BeOS 5 professional released on modern hardware.

As the page is dead will not complain about the new product until I read the specs but is there a market yes there is, is it a large market no, should Microsoft be worried no, should Apple yes and the sad thing about Be being killed by MS OEM scare tactics was MS saved Apple's market share more than their own.

Re:Where is the market?

[jacksonyee]

Judging by the volunteer efforts to restore BeOS and to port applications over to it that we have seen since its demise, even if there isn't much of an initial market, there is still a developed niche of people who will purchase this, and as you know from the gaming and Linux communities, they can be quite vocal about it.

If I remember correctly, the original BeOS was suppose to be a highly multithreaded OS designed to excel in multimedia applications. It actually didn't do too poorly considering the stranglehold Microsoft has over most of the computer builders in the industry. The most important thing is that there are people out there who believe in the concept and the vision. As long as there is, you never know what might happen with a piece of software.

Re:Where is the market?

[Max Romantschuk]

The Audio tools in Windows and Mac have caught up but the power per machine spec has not. The things you could do AV with BeOS on lower spec machines is the same as the comaparision of Linux server's power per processor spec versus Windows.

An operating system taylored around just AV file system and hardware access concerns is not a bad thing. Windows is too generic, MAC too resource intensive, Linux lacking but catching up in the AV realm.

But will this solution really be cheaper than a more powerful machine running Windows/OS X and suitable audio software?

Also: Can you get Logic/Cubase/Cakewalk/Reason/Sound Forge/[comparable product here] for BeOS?

I'd suspect the budget-concious consumer would end up opting for Linux, at least after 2.6 is with us (major realtime app speedups I've understood).

Re:Where is the market?

[CoolVibe]

I love BeOS too. But the spellchecker sucks. Your post proves it. *ducks*

But you are right. For multimedia purposes, BeOS is really well suited. It's one of the few OS'es I know that can smoothly play 8 (probably more) avi's at the same time on modest hardware :)

Also, nice to see something Europe-centric on slashdot :) (Guess what, I'm European, woohoo). Guess I gotta have a look-see and maybe exersize the ole creditcard for one.

Re:Where is the market?

[whataputz]

Oh, there is a market indeed.

To explore it or not, that's the question. People want new things, filled with coloured stuff and bla bla bla's but they want their work done. They also wanna see ads and people saying "Hey, I use BeOS" and then, they'll be convinced it's worth using it.

When I first saw the BeOS a few years ago I was so impressed that I immediatelly purchased it. I never regreted it. It's an awesome system even for today's standards. I love it and use it till today.

The problem, as I see it, is that it has to have software that people will need to get their work done, just like they do in any Windows.

If it's compatible enough, and with enough software to make whatever people make with windows and the company explores all it's potential and all, I think it can actually survive.

The BeOS I run has still many features still to be really implemented on most operating systems. I won't uninstall it anytime soon.

Re:Where is the market?

[mmu_man]

There is already a niche market for BeOS, with the TuneTracker radio automation system, the one that runs http://BeOSRadio.com :
Check it at http://www.tunetrackersystems.com/ !

Re:Where is the market?

[MrAl]

If you take a look where yellowTab is doing demos and promoting Zeta, it appears that they're really looking more at the areas where people cannot afford the Windows tax or places where PC's are outdated enough that running XP would be an exercise in futility.

I think they've got a good idea there. BeOS shines on older hardware, and it looks like yellowTab is trying to supply a more rounded solution (software-wise) than picking up older copies of Windows and having to purchase additional software to make it useful. I think yellowTab is trying to position Zeta as the x86 man's version of OSX.

Re:Where is the market?

[ninthwave]

I am American living in England and any idea I have of spelling is lost in confusion. Spellcheckers who needs the it will all be Phonics someday anyway.

What is the meta tag for sarcasm.

Re:Where is the market?

[Stanwalters]

The BeOS I run has still many features still to be really implemented on most operating systems. I won't uninstall it anytime soon.

Not taking a stab here, and not trying to elicit abuse: Can you give some examples?

I'm curious about the AV aspects specifically, I've just built a 3.06G/1G/4x200GB machine to run Cubase and video editing software, and I was going to use XP on it. My wife has to be able to use the machine, and I'd prefer it not require a PHd to configure.

Re:Where is the market?

[whataputz]

Hi Stan. I don't know about the video editing software for BeOS, because I've never used them. Try looking for those software in the BeBits. One of the coolest features, is that the instalation of the OS is as simple as possible. If your hardware is supported by the system it'll configure itself during the instalation and It'll boot with everything already up and running. The BeOS is as simple to use as it gets, but if you're used to windows, you can change its "looks" to look like windows, but it's tracker interface is definatelly pretty easy to use. I personally think it's easier to use than windows and alot smoother too. If you need more specific information I can try to give it to you.

Re:Where is the market?

[ninthwave]

Having to use the cache can't see the products page and am wondering if the OS will be seperate some day. As for Logic and such, Logic is now an Apple only product, and the companion products for BeOS were comparable at the time some better and I think TrackS was a great finaliser. And you don't mention Cool Edit or Samplitude which in my opinion though not as popular as the editors you mentino for Windows/MAC the power and efficiency were top notch. And if we are talking about in the studio you still need ProTools.

But as it is the software was a hodge podge but you could get focused apps that you could work with and get the job done you just needed to stack your apps which the OS handled well. Instead of One do it all app you had a collection of apps. With the rise of virtual synths though some new apps need to come into this market.

http://www.hitsquad.com/smm/beos/AUDIO_EDITORS/

http://www.hitsquad.com/smm/beos/COMPUTER_AIDED_ MU SIC/

http://www.hitsquad.com/smm/beos/DRUMS_PERCUSSIO N/

http://www.hitsquad.com/smm/beos/MIDI_SEQUENCERS /

And I don't see av getting it in Linux the same as BeOS. The point I was making was BeOS did AV everything else was an extra. On other OS's AV is the extra. What this does is give the OS an efficiency when dealing with that type of data. Linux can do it but the tools are not there and the data is not handled the same plus some of the ability to handle multiple AV streams would need to be addressed in the kernal or kernal space and monolithic kernals are not designed for that. Maybe a recompiled specialist kernal could do the same job and efficiency. On a AMD K6 300 with 128mb of RAM and 256 swap I could open more AVI files than I can on my Linux 1ghz with 256mb RAM and 512 swap, before skipping and lag. And the quality is excellent. And to me that was the efficiency of the OS if this can be repeated on new hardware than the efficiency will create a better studio. But that is the question is what is the efficiency and how does it affect the end result.

Re:Where is the market?

[Anonymous Coward]

You know, as huge BeOS fanatic from way back, this has always bothered me. Maybe BeOS could play 8 avi's at once, but it couldn't even play a single avi smoothly. In order to play mpegs smoothly, you had to install a port of a linux player (can't remember the name) because the built-in player wasn't up to the task. Maybe the framework for multimedia on BeOS was great, but the actual performance was really not. Probably, this was largely due to lack of full-featured drivers.

As previously stated, I was a huge BeOS fanatic. I loved the design, the useability, and the community, but whenever I would point out flaws as above, people would stick their fingers in their ears and pretend that "it works fine on my machine, yours must be broken".

Okay, old pet peeve revealed, now I feel better.

Re:Where is the market?

[Anonymous Coward]

I think yellowTab is trying to position Zeta as the x86 man's version of OSX.

If that's the case, they're going to have to do better than the "3 shades of grey and jaggy text" GUI look they're using now. We x86 people aren't quite as colorblind as the Apple crowd likes to think we are.

Re:Where is the market?

[Max Romantschuk]

you don't mention Cool Edit or Samplitude

Cool Edit happens to be my editor of choice, but I suspect mainstream software availablilty to be more essential than the availability of less widespread software.

Even though the solutions might exist a large enough mass needs to want the product for the cashflow to sustain the business. Critical mass is seldom achieved unless there is a clear market niche, and AV software in general is not really a niche anymore.

And I don't see av getting it in Linux the same as BeOS. The point I was making was BeOS did AV everything else was an extra. On other OS's AV is the extra.

True, but the amount of development that goes into Linux, even just on the AV side, probably already surpasses the comparative efforts for BeOS. I believe consumers will opt for Linux in hope of a promising future on the software development front. I'm not convinced BeOS can deliver the same.

Please don't see this as a bashing at BeOS. I have great respect for BeOS, but I'm merely trying to hypothesise based on what little I know of market economies.

Re:Where is the market?

[Anonymous Coward]

As a Be user for several years I can say there definitely is. The particular approach to the OS design allows it to be customized into different specializations (developer's edition, audiophile's edition, etc) with almost no effort. More importantly, it's multimedia handling capabilities are unmatched to date (several things that the new window$ longhorn touts as 'new features' appear to be the same things Be showed off in trade shows in the late 90's). Case in point: my job this last summer required me to work heavily with sudio (recording, mixing, etc.) I had a relatively modern (P4 based) workstation and a very nice, brand new software suite. I soon found out that what took me a day or so to do at work I could take home and do on my Athlon750MHz machine in about 2.5 hours. And 100% of the software involved didn't cost me a penny. For an office that doesn't have a ton of money to toss around, being able to use older hardware with cheap or free software is invaluable. I talked to the tech manager and he was impressed with what Be could do, he said they had tried a Linux-based approach before and had to abandon it due to the learning curve (true, BeOS has a learning curve too but you have to admit it's not near what linux's is).

In summary: the market is anywhere that people are who want a computer system that does what they need it to do for as cheap as possible, and who aren't as vain to have a certain "brand name" of software over a just as powerful free alternative. While big wealthy companies keep their hardware cutting-edge, smaller companies could buy their old machines for a fraction of what they'd pay for new ones and have them suit their purposes for years. Linux is the only other option that could reasonably claim that, but many people are scared off by the bulk and bloat of it.

Re:Where is the market?

[Anonymous Coward]

One thing you're missing is that it's not just how many people you throw at a task, the underlying system the AV people build their stuff on top of also affects some things. The 2.6 kernel has improved some things, but it's still nowhere near what BeOS has the potential for. Just as an example, 2.6 kernel with low-latency and preemptible enabled on a P2-350 is still more sluggish when working with video than BeOS 5.0 on the same machine(Yep, I tested that on a spare machine I have lying around)

Re:Where is the market?

[Anonymous Coward]

It looks to me like Apple's in the neighborhood, given that the G5 system is designed for efficient multiprocessing, the audio latency is tiny, and they can play 1000 stereo tracks simultaneously at 25% processor usage.

What I'm pining for is the Be filesystem...

Re:Where is the market?

[Anonymous Coward]

I'm pining for the fjords

Re:Where is the market?

[Jaysyn]

Damnnit man your post is hard to parse. Never start a sentence with *And*!

Jaysyn

Re:Where is the market?

[ninthwave]

Thats funny because it did work fine on my machine but I didn't stick my fingers in my ears and say it, it was a case of drive support and getting specific hardware to work with the OS to the full advantage the OS offered.

But than I bought hardware to work with it and optimised my system around recording audio with it.

The only major problem I had with it was Net Positive as a web browser. But again if I wanted to browse the web I wasn't using my BeOS machine I was using my MAC, or Linux Machine. If I wanted to play games I was in Windows.

But I agree hardware support was flakey and there was only a handful of pieces of kit that it worked awesome on another score or so it worked really well on and most everything else it worked ok on.

Re:Where is the market?

[ninthwave]

What we need is the linux community to get development from Syntrillium if you go way back Cool Edit core was free ware on single track functions only as a multi track functions did you have to pay. I would pay for it all over again if they supported the Linux Community to just get audio editing equal to Windows Level let alone BeOS levels.

A problem I see in the Linux community, is Linux used to run on 386 kit and was meant to be economic not just in cost of software but in choice of hardware. More and more it is getting bloated. I believe specialised kernals need to come out that offer the api structure for other software but control resources for various platforms. My main audio editting system is still a SCSI AMD K6 350 with 256mb my 1G machine is used as the game machine for the kids. I tweaked the 350 so much it does everything I need and to get the hardware to make the 1G a recording station was not economical. But prices on the Layla stuff are nice now, but I digress.

I like OS's that run well on minimal kit, Amiga's, BeOS, OS/2 and Linux but I fear Linux has some bloat going on from being a general OS. The source is there so I could modify it if I knew where to begin.

But I will take a living Linux over a dead BeOS.

And the question that started this circle of argument was is there a Market and my answer is still yes there is a market be it a small one and they would need to update the OS to at least can a year or two of the time lost before it would be worth the purchase.

Re:Where is the market?

[ninthwave]

Yes the G5 is there but the economy of price and the processor power versus efficiency of the OS is different.

BeOS did much on little

G5 is alot to do alot.

BeOS pushed technology to do the most out of the hardware. Mac focuses on scaling up the hardware and the OS to do more. Linux goes between all of these because of the different coding styles of the applications.

But yes MAC is where I will purchase from next.

Funny the Be lot were people fleeing MAC to pursue something different how I wish Apple would have bought that OS instead of Palm

Re:Where is the market?

[ninthwave]

And your point is???

Sorry couldn't resist.

Try parsing from my brain to the keyboard.

Something happened when I started using electronics to communicate with, my spelling and sentence structure got worse. I have never understood the psychology of it but computer based communication has in my mind an urgency that causes me not to proof read or even think as I would if I were writing a letter or story.

Forums and chat are the worse for me. Even without karma systems I just feel I have to get my great internal thoughts out first before anyone else.

Silly it is but that is what happens.

Re:Where is the market?

[Anonymous Coward]

Linux IS getting slower....if you use mandrake or redhat. But custom-configuring and compiling your kernel is the answer ;)

Re:whut? no comments yet?

[dknj]

Then you know the drill...

-dk

Complete Zeta Solution?

[Ciderx]

Wow, even Hollywood actresses are into open source.

Oh, hang on...

Re:Complete Zeta Solution?

[eclectro]

don't worry about the down mod. It's a tough room tonight.

Re:Complete Zeta Solution?

[telstar]

"Wow, even Hollywood actresses are into open source."

• I think it was a typo ... she's actually into open
• sores on her aged husband.
  Between him, and her baby ... she's got to spend most of her day changing diapers.

Maestro3 support?

[anuj]

I installed the new release (Max v3) - but I guess it was too new for most OSS developers to fix outstanding issues - the ESS Maestro3 drivers remain incomplete.

(more fyi, than anything - i'll be getting in touch with the guys who're working on this once i get this record out of the way).

~A

Re:Maestro3 support?

[GreenHell]

Max v3 is not the same as yellowTab.

yellowTab is a commercial venture designed to produce the next BeOS. (I don't know what they used as a basis for the code.)

BeOS Max Edition is a free (as in beer) project done by BeOS fans that is based on the old BeOS R5 Personal Edition.

Re:Maestro3 support?

[JosefK]

BeOS Max Edition is a free (as in beer) project done by BeOS fans that is based on the old BeOS R5 Personal Edition.

And it's primarily a hack to the kernel to allow it to run on modern processors, and to the installer to allow it to install to its own partition, which the PE release didn't (directly) allow.

Re:Maestro3 support?

[Anonymous Coward]

And it's primarily a hack to the kernel to allow it to run on modern processors, and to the installer to allow it to install to its own partition, which the PE release didn't (directly) allow.

I remember getting PE to install onto it's own partition back in the day. It wasn't too hard but it sure was annoying that you couldn't do that from the original installer.

To un-US centric

[Anonymous Coward]

"... yellowTab will sell, to Europe only..."

To Europe centric, wait a minute, I live in Europe.

Weeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee

Re:To un-US centric

[arcanumas]

Maybe they focus in European sales but i don't think they would deny you a sale if you were from the US and asked.
I mean what could they do:

Us citizen: Could i have a BeOS please?
yellowTab: No! Go away Capitalistic scum! We do this for the honor!

Slashdotted Already?

[Davak]

CGI-limits reached, please try again later!


Great for highbandwidth stuff. Right. :)

Re:Slashdotted Already?

[Anonymous Coward]

Note that their server is Apache on Linux. Maybe they should have been using BeOS after all :P

Somewhere, somehow...

[vasqzr]

"Richard learns to quit being sarcastic"

Marketing/Sales meeting - yellowTab corporate offices:

"So, any idea on how we're going to increase sales and save this company?"

"Anyone?"

"Richards? What's your idea?"

"We could sell....BeOS systems....I guess"

*snickers*

"Great idea, Richards. Lets get started this!"

"Sir, I was just..."

"You were just saving this company! You're going to go places here! I like your style!"

Re:Somewhere, somehow...

[RevDobbs]

and in other news...

Theo de Raadt & Linus Torvalds have both left their pet projects to start coding for Plan 9, another great operating system that never was.

Re:Somewhere, somehow...

[Anonymous Coward]

That was, indeed, a Dilbert episode. Except, Dilbert asked for a marketing department (well he didnt, but they thought he did).

Re:Somewhere, somehow...

[jellomizer]

Things like that happened to me. I was programming an application that stared to get way to many features then it ever needed. So I made a sarcastic remark "Why not make an animated staple that gives you help topics?" Unfortunately the liked the idea so I had to program an animated staple.

Re:Somewhere, somehow...

[rifter]

Theo de Raadt & Linus Torvalds have both left their pet projects to start coding for Plan 9, another great operating system that never was.

Maybe the OS never was, but they had one hell of a mascot! :)

Re:Somewhere, somehow...

[Afrosheen]

You?! You're responsible for the birth of clippy?

Man, I'd never admit that to anyone, ever.

Re:Somewhere, somehow...

[jellomizer]

No clippy was a paperclip. I said an animated staple (to poke fun of clippy and how dumb of an idea it was) But making an animated staple take less art skills then a paperclip.
__ __
+--O--O--+
| /_ |
|-_____- |
| |

Re:whut? no comments yet?

[dknj]

I take that back.. the site unslashdotted itself.

-dk

Audio

[Anonymous Coward]

Cool. So, when does Cubase, Pro Tools and other cool nice audio software get ported? That's why I became interested in the OS, and why I gave up when they changed direction so set-top vapourware.

Re:Audio

[Anonymous Coward]

Have you ever used BeOS? Trust me, it had 'cool nice audio software' long before those tools were ever released.

Hell, the default install came with a audio editor that let you do 3D sound.

Re:Audio

[Anonymous Coward]

According to the website Cubase is expected to be available in the first quarter 2004. Pro tools is already available, go get it from here.

Re:Audio

[Anonymous Coward]

The parent post is an outright lie. Just so you know, he made it up without checking any facts whatsoever.

Re:Audio

[bdeclerc]

Long before? I kinda doubt it.

Cubase was first created on Atari ST more than a decade ago, long before BeOS even existed...

Comparing the default tools of BeOS to Cubase is like comparing notepad and (Emacs/vi), since they both edit text...

Re:Audio

[Anonymous Coward]

comparing notepad and (Emacs/vi), since they both edit text...

vi should come before Emacs because it's a superior editor.

Re:Audio

[rifter]

vi should come before Emacs because it's a superior editor.

And both are far more fully-featured (and easier to use) than notepad.

Re:Audio

[Anonymous Coward]

snoop around on bebits.com, there are some extremely nice tools on there (i can only speak for my own needs, I don't know what yours are). Plus, xentronix.com's SampleStudio is an easy free replaement for a lot of the $700+ applications I use at work for audio processing (it's faster too). And no, those things won't get ported, writing a new app that is BeOS native and takes advantage of its multimedia capabilities is the way I think it will go, ports of apps like Cubase, Photoshop, M$Office, etc may "work" but are vastly outpowered by their "BeOS native" counterparts (at least that has been the general rule thus far)

Europe only?

[hamster foo]

I didn't get a chance to search the site to see if they had any reasoning for it listed. I see the domain lists a Denmark address in the registration so is this just a matter of it being inconvenient to ship over here, shipping cost, or something of that nature? Or is there some other reason for it?

Eliminating markets outside of Europe is a pretty large number of possible consumers to alienate.

Re:Europe only?

[mutende]

Denmark? DE is Germany.

Re:Europe only?

[C_nemo]

YellowTab is based in Germany. They have both software and hardware for sale. I belive they will ship you the software anywhere (they haven't stated othervise), but sending hardware all over the world is quite expensive. Scince Zeta will run in (almost) any x86 machines, you could just order the OS and install it wherever you like.

Re:Europe only?

[fiddlesticks]

>Eliminating markets outside of Europe is a pretty large number of possible consumers to alienate.

Eliminating customers outside of America is an even larger number of possible customers to alienate. Doesn't stop most US tech companies from NOT delivering outside the US.

Maybe you'kk get used to it. We [in euerope] do.

Re:Europe only?

[Anonymous Coward]

That's because you people in Europe (not counting the Baltics) are second-class humans. If we (the USA) didn't need bases to keep an eye on the USSR, we wouldn't fuck with you people at all. We've got plenty of trading partners in South America and Asia, so we really don't need you anymore if you're going to shit at us when we try to protect ourselves (ie, the Middle East).

Re:Europe only?

[Anonymous Coward]

well, you shit all over us when we tried to protect ourselfs against jews, communism and the french.

Re:Europe only?

[Afrosheen]

I remember when Be was about to be Apple's new OS, back in 1997-8. There was hype hype and more hype in MacWorld, month after month. My favorite box ever was the prototype BeBox that made the cover one month.

I wonder what things would've been like if BeBoxen had actually hit the market, Apple adopted BeOS instead of OSX, etc. Back in the day, the BeBox looked pretty tight, but looking back now, they aren't that cool after all. Times have changed.

Re:Europe only?

[Anonymous Coward]

Spoken like a true jerk or rather in this case written like a true jerk....friends like you who needs enemies!!!

Re:Europe only?

[spectre163]

Speaking as a non US, non European (I'm Australian) alienating the rest of the world as a customer base by ignoring them doesn't seem to really worry most US companies...

Re:Europe only?

[spectre163]

Speaking as a non US, non European (I'm Australian), I can safely say that most US companies have no problem whatsoever alienating possible consumers in non domestic markets....

Yes!

[IWantMoreSpamPlease]

You can't keep a great OS down!!!

As an aside, I've installed BeOS on every laptop I've run across (to me, the ability for an OS to run successfully on a laptop is the ultimate test of the capability of the OS) and I've found far *fewer* laptops that BeOS *cannot* run on, than I have found in regards to *nix. Yes, I was surprised, but very pleased. Nothing looks cooler than firing up BeOS on a laptop.

Looking forward to an ultra-modern laptop with YellowTab.

Re:Yes!

[AKnightCowboy]

As an aside, I've installed BeOS on every laptop I've run across (to me, the ability for an OS to run successfully on a laptop is the ultimate test of the capability of the OS) and I've found far *fewer* laptops that BeOS *cannot* run on, than I have found in regards to *nix.

When I tried it, BeOS didn't even support my Nvidia GeForce 256 card in anything but black and white low resolution mode. That was probably 3 or 4 years ago with the BeOS 5 personal edition. I obviously never took another look at it since the GeForce was THE best card to have at the time. It's amazing a supposedly multimedia OS didn't support it. Worked fine in both Linux and Windows though.

Re:Yes!

[Jaysyn]

BeOS Max supports that card & newer now. Don't know about YellowTab, but they should as well.

BTW, BeOS probably wasn't being actively developed at the time you tried the GeFORCE. I think that was about the time when Be Inc. started circling the drain.

Jaysyn

Re:Yes!

[Saunalainen]

I've installed BeOS on every laptop I've run across

Only 2 out of 3 in my case. It would only run in `safe mode' on a laptop with an S3 ViRGE MX+ graphics chip. Support has been added for other ViRGE chips, but not this particular one, which was quite popular for a while.

Re:Yes!

[Anonymous Coward]

That's because NVIDIA doesn't support open source or third parties. So it's Nvidia's fault.

Re:Yes!

[BlackBolt]

Yeah, but the best thing is that when I pull the harddrive from one PC with BeOS installed, I plunk it in another PC with totally different hardware and "it just works", to steal an advertising propaganda phrase. BeOS is very Mac-like (OS9, anyway) in that there's no worries, no configuration, it just goes right out of the box. And it's F A S T.

Re:Yes!

[ekarjala]

..."BeOS is very Mac-like (OS9, anyway) in that there's no worries, no configuration, it just goes right out of the box. And it's F A S T."

Sorry, but I don't get the comparison at all

Re:Yes!

[angryelephant]

what about wireless networking? that is my biggest requirement.

Re:Yes!

[Anonymous Coward]

We got that. Look on BeBits.com and do a search for wireless. I've heard from lots of people getting BeOS as it is now to work with wireless networking, it's likely Zeta's new setwork stack may have made it easier.

Re:Yes!

[suss]

Nothing looks cooler than firing up BeOS on a laptop.

You need to get out more dude, seriously.

"Come look, son, an aurora borealis with flying spacemonkeys!"

"Not now, mom, i'm firing up BeOS on a laptop!"

Re:Yes!

[Anonymous Coward]

Try it on a HP Pavilion N5340? Couldn't get either the sound (Maestro3) or the video (Savage 4) to work... Mind you I only spent the better part of a day looking for a fix before I gave up and installed something I knew would run (FreeBSD).

Re:Yes!

[Anonymous Coward]

I do use beos (more r3 and r4), but r5 (pro and max v3) doesnt install on my laptop (doesnt play well with the tft or external monitor) and on my pc (amd xp, the reason why I couldnt try max before) it runs fast but also more unstable than before (3 lockups in 50 minutes)

I am really interested in the differences between r5 pro/max vs zeta (I hope there will be many)

Nice thought

[Dr.Seltsam]

I think it's nice to have folks around that support OSs away from the mainstream.
This might keep the pressure oin the major OSs to improve.

Quite a pity that the site is /.ed at the mom.

Re:Nice thought

[SmallFurryCreature]

Is it? I thought slashdots happened because a lot of people wanting to visit the site. Isn't the amount of people visiting the site directly relative to the number of people intrested?

I think it would have been a pity if it hadn't been slashdotted, that would mean nobody could give a toss. Just be patient and visit in a day or two or read the google cache link already posted :-)

Re:Nice thought

[Dr.Seltsam]

Alright, looking from that direction it's really NOT a pitty. But when I am the one getting a 'please return later', I'm not amused (but returning later :).

But?

[Anonymous Coward]

Have they fixed the file dialog yet?

Re:But?

[technix4beos]

What's wrong with the file dialog that needs fixing?

Yay BeOS!

[Kujah]

I can remember with much warmth in my heart the last time I tried BeOS on my desktop. Ah, the heartwarming partition-in-a-file. Oh, the wonderfully slow bootstrap. I remember how no matter how hard I tried, I couldn't get any sound or network support. And yet, the hours I spent playing with the tabs on top of the windows (you could move and stack them, much like some newer linux wm's) seemed to make up for all it's downfalls.

Bottomline: I'd buy a BeOS system, only if I wouldn't have to be the one to get it to work properly.

Review of Zeta Beta 5 on beosjournal.com

[invi]

http://www.beosjournal.org/index.php?ct=r&ru=2003- 06-03-zetab5

Re:Review of Zeta Beta 5 on beosjournal.com

[Rocketboy]

"The database server is offline"

Cripes, folks: we're even slashdotting secondary links now. How long before /. is reclassified as a DOS attack? :)

Re:Review of Zeta Beta 5 on beosjournal.com

[Anonymous Coward]

you fucker!

Re:Review of Zeta Beta 5 on beosjournal.com

[technix4beos]

The correct url for the Zeta Beta 5 preview that The BeOSJournal did on June 3, 2003.

Thanks go to Daniel "Daat" Teixeira for doing the preview when he worked for us. He now runs IsComputerOn and is expected to deliver a review of the upcoming retail version of Zeta.

Re:Review of Zeta Beta 5 on beosjournal.com

[Anonymous Coward]

Japanese version of this Zeta review available here at JPBE.net.

BeOS.

[Anonymous Coward]

I tried it in Summer 2001 . It still beats linux in a lot of apspects, such as decent screen resoution changing, boots in graphical mode, supports a lot of hardware and it good sound capabillities. All on a P3-450 with 64Mb of ram. Gnome crashes and burns, while kde is slightly tolerable on it. Even blackbox struggled on that machine, but BeOS really ZOOMED on it.

I think ill put it on my list of concideration for my next computer along with A64 and G5.

BeOS and VMWare

[Psiren]

Anyone managed to boot BeOS under VMWare 4? I thought it'd be nice to try it out, but it does something bad and VMWare complains about an illegal instruction.

Re:BeOS and VMWare

[Jaysyn]

It's a pain in the ass but it's possible

Jaysyn

Re:BeOS and VMWare

[mmu_man]

Still feels funny to be published by someone else :D
(yeah I wrote that stuff :p)

well it it true

[Anonymous Coward]

BeOS would be better if it were free. FreeBe.

Re:well it it true

[mmu_man]

The current plan at yellowTAB is to transition slowly from the BeOS code to code from the OpenBeOS project, which is currently moving at its own pace, and released under the MIT licence (tagged as Free by gnu.org). Btw, there are already parts of OpenBeOS in Zeta. So it's already a bit free :-)
There are also other projects to "clone" the BeOS: BlueEyedOS (BeAPI on top of Linux), BeFree, a fork of the former, and other AtheOS derivatives, but IMO none are close enough to the spirit of the BeOS. OpenBeOS chose to get its own kernel (forked from NewOS, from an Ex-Be engineer), and aims at source and binary compatibility.

bias

[BigBir3d]

I know that this shouldn't matter... but BeOS is too damn ugly for me to look at. I could never use it on a daily basis (major OS 8/9 flashbacks).

Re:bias

[BlackBolt]

Dear mods, I don't think that's really a troll; BeOS is *great* in many areas, but it really DOES lack in the GUI department. Look at OSX, KDE with Karamba, even XP with Samurize and WindowBlinds, then look at BeOS. They may have full theming, antialiased fonts, transparency, and cool widgets in this new YellowTab, but I don't see 'em.

BeOS is "good enough" for most users if appearance isn't important to you, but for MacHeads (the guy with OS8/9 flashbacks above), it doesn't cut it. OS X has spoiled them rotten. It would be like going back to dialup after having a T1 line. Can't do it no matter how hard they try.

Re:bias

[praxis]

Is it fair to compare a bare bones install of BeOS with Windows XP and KDE both running GUI enchancment applications? I'll cede that OS X looks pretty out of the box.

Re:bias

[BlackBolt]

Don't get me wrong; I *LIKE* BeOS. But are there any comparable apps out there? I've been running BeOS plain-vanilla with the hidden MacOS9 theme running. I forget how I got it, hold ctrl-alt-shift down while clicking on the Be Menu, a new thing called window decorations or something pops up, something like that. I forget the exact keys to hold down.

But transparency?

Beos

[Kandel]

...and I quote from the yellowTab website...

"Latest BeOS Software,
xstarfish
Pulse
GTKBeEngine
Office Vorlagen fur GobeProductive2
FreeCraft-1.18"

Now, correct me if I'm wrong, but the Freecraft project recieved a "cease and desist letter" from Blizzard and was shut down. What does this say about yellowTAB, as they are publicly announcing they have binary packages of Freecraft on their servers for BeOS?

Re:Beos

[mmu_man]

Hey, this is just an RDF feed from http://bebits.com and independant from yellowTAB's position about this.

Re:Beos

[Kandel]

Aaah...yes, very true.
Still, regardless of it's origin, the company is making a large announcement, and to have something like that (yes I know the feed is dynamic) on their front page, make cause some slight unrest. The last thing yellowTAB need right now is some bad publicity, and all it takes is something as small as this.

Re:Beos

[mmu_man]

Sure, even though this whole cease-and-desist letter story is plain BS...
Anyway it's not a problem anymore, there are 2 new progs on bebits, so this one won't be on the list :)
Who said the BeOS community was not active ? :D

BeOS on a laptop, Centrino and more....

[benmhall]

I think that it's remarkable that Zeta managed to get Centrino working for BeOS. I mean, I can't buy a new PC laptop because Linux doesn't like the chipset. I wonder how it is that some little, tiny company has drivers for the Intel wireless adaptor, when they simply DO NOT EXIST for Linux. Very strange.

Anyway, the systems are only for sale in Europe. Too bad for us Canadians. Well, maybe I'll have to give the new BeOS a spin. It's been ages.

BTW, I have an old NEC Versa LX that I've tried to run BeOS on. I can't find drivers for my DWL-650 wireless NIC, and the keyboard won't work unless I upgrade to Dano. Any reasons for this? I'd rather run straight 5.0 Pro (which I purchases) but find it rather challenging to use an OS with no keyboard.

Re:BeOS on a laptop, Centrino and more....

[mmu_man]

actually AFAIK the centrino wireless itselfs is not yet supported.
But it's high on the todo list.

finally...

[Codger]

I've waited a long time for this ... I'm sure I can wait another day or two for the slashdot effect to wear off.

Re:Slashdot mirroring

[Anonymous Coward]

I think you should read the FAQ.

Zeta RC1 can also be purchased

[Anonymous Coward]

The article didn't mention Zeta RC1 can now be purchased. YellowTab offers a special offer of the Deluxe version ($99). With this special offer they will send you RC1 and you can get the release 1 CD for Euro 10 when 1.0 is released. People who buy the special offer also get a YellowTab shirt. Look at the shopping page.

People who want to buy Home (Euro49) or developer (Eur69?) will have to wait till 1.0.

I ordered my Deluxe last weekend :D

-- Daniel de Kok

/. lags

[mmu_man]

Now, I've been wondering when /. would talk about it, it's days old already :P
Feels good to be /.ed anyway !

Interface widgets

[cosmo7]

I really like the hierarchical menus; they actually indicate where a complex selection begins and ends. Very nice detail.

Re:Interface widgets

[2nd Post!]

Hehe, and I love the hierarchical browsing in OS X; gives you a sense of path, location, and depth all in one compact space.

I wonder what the impetus for BeOS is; I perfectly understand the *hobbiest* drive, it's what keeps interest in Amiga alive... but is there a business demand for BeOS?

Re:Interface widgets

[Anonymous Coward]

KDE can either do or almost do both. What I mean is, you can do hirearchial browsing in KDE sort of. You can say rightclick on a link to save it and then to "Copy to..." and it will do open "menus" where each entry is a directory -- looks similar to the other guys CD browsing screenshot.

KDE can almost, maybe could with hacking a .desktop file or something, do the CD browsing menus. Without it, you have to go into Konq and then with your CD in either open the sidebar and go to devices/CDROM or go to the URI audiocd:/
It will then have a set of directories depending on how the audiocd kioslave is setup on your machine. But it could have a wav, ogg, mp3 directories including like a name directory. It uses freecddb to lookup tracks.

I know it isn't fully there, but perhaps with a small bit of tweaking and a little code hacking, KDE could replicate BEOS's GUI.

I bought BeOS twice

[heironymouscoward]

Each time struggling to get it installed and working on my hardware, and thereafter wondering what I was going to do with it.

I think it's nice to see alternatives to the mainstream, but this ranks alongside Kontiki as a sheer folly, in the Victorian sense.

Operating systems have become entirely commoditized, and now serve only as platforms for running applications, more than ever in the past.

The future operating system is invisible, boots onto whatever hardware you happen to have lying around, and lets you keep your work on cheap removable media. Take Knoppix 3.0 with USB memory plug as an example.

I don't think I will be buying a third BeOS.

Europe?

[greygent]

What's a "Europe"?

Re:Europe?

[Derwen]

What's a "Europe"?
Laden or unladen?

Re:Europe?

[Trolling4Dollars]

Ahhh yes. Another stupid American. Sounds like you have a lot in common with our appointed henchman Bush.

Re:Europe?

[Anonymous Coward]

"What's a "Europe"?"

• I think it's somewhere between New York and California ... only you start out by going east over the big pond instead of over the country that matters.

Re:Europe?

[BeCre8iv]

The Europe is an essencial component of a system that is entirely transparrent to most American users

- that system is the rest of the sodding world.

Closed source

[wowbagger]

Simple - BeOS is able to use closed source drivers, Linux drivers tend to be open source.

Due to the design of the Centrino chipset, Intel asserts they are unable to release the specs for the chip, or source for drivers for the chip, and maintain FCC type certification. For part 15 certification, the device cannot operate outside specified limits on frequency and power. For a closed source driver, Intel is able to insure that is the case. For open source drivers, the user could alter frequency and power outsiee the limits imposed by the FCC.

This was always the case for BeOS - it could play files, access hardware, and in general do more than a free system could, because Be could sign NDAs and the Free development community could not.

Re:Closed source

[bogie]

I don't think that's the answer. Linux just like Beos can use binary closed source drivers.

"This was always the case for BeOS - it could play files, access hardware, and in general do more than a free system could, because Be could sign NDAs and the Free development community could not."

That sounds a lot like revisionist history to me. Even compared to Linux at the time I wouldn't say beos could do more than a free OS could. In fact Beos was specifically notable in that it couldn't access certain files and severely lacked proprietary driver support(just as it does now).

When it comes to the things you mentioned as a whole the free software community although lacking compared to Windows has always been superior to Beos. If Beos had actually gotten better support for opening various files and working on more hardware, myself and many others would still actually be using it.

Re:Closed source

[wowbagger]

Go look again at the releases for BeOS. At the time BeOS was released, it could play DVDs, while Linux could not, because BeOS could have a licensed CSS decoder.

And read my post again. Yes, Linux *can* use closed source drivers, but tends not to, because of the problems with linking them against the kernel.

Re:Closed source

[__past__]

Linux just like Beos can use binary closed source drivers.

Linux has two problems with binary closed source drivers BeOS doesn't have: Binary compatibility is frequently broken, and the legal status of it is rather unclear (yeah, Linus may say it's OK, but his opinion doesn't matter a bit. He isn't the only copyright owner.)

Where is Jean-Louise Gassee?

[Anonymous Coward]

The first thing yellowtab needs to do is beg Mr. Gassee to come back. He will of course need a hefty salary which is only fair. Then Mr. Gassee can start writing long winded executive reports. The company will be out of money in two weeks, then blame microsoft.

Re:Where is Jean-Louise Gassee?

[ElGanzoLoco]

Where is Jean-Louise Gassee?

Here. He writes chronicles about the computer industry in french newspaper Liberation.

Can they do this?

[Anonymous Coward]

I thought Palm bought up Be. They are using the Be OS technologies to help them build the next gen Palm OS versions. Is Palm licencing to yellowTAB, or what?

"Multimedia OS" was marketing's idea

[Anonymous Coward]

If I remember correctly, the original BeOS was suppose to be a highly multithreaded OS designed to excel in multimedia applications.

It was designed to be fast, easy to develop for, and fun to use. The multimedia focus was a marketing move, with the introduction of the Media Kit in R4. And we all know how well that turned out:

Q : Anonymous : What plans did Be have to improve the media kit [..]?

A : zero. it was a bad idea from the begining and the time spent developing it helped sink the company.

Re:"Multimedia OS" was marketing's idea

[Anonymous Coward]

Your quote is just a personal opinion from a forum. Great way to prove your knowledge.

Re:"Multimedia OS" was marketing's idea

[speter]

No, the quotation was a response to a forum question, but answered by Baron Arnold, a former Be, Inc., employee.

Moderators on Crack?

[Hakubi_Washu]

Why the heck is the parent "redundant"? "flame-bait", "troll", or "offtopic" I could understand, but "redundant"? Is Europe that unimportant?

My Cat

[jeepee]

Hey they have my cat on the frontpage... Oh .. wait .. they redirect to 127.0.0.1

Some thoughts

[Ianoo]

An argument I've heard quite often (not sure whether I agree though) is that if all these (very talented) programmers and designers who work on BeOS, AtheOS and so on switched to working on Linux or BSD or HURD, then perhaps these operating systems would be even better than they are today.

BeOS has some POSIX compliance but it's not as if I can use an autoconfigure script to go and compile something that would work on a Linux or a BSD system, which are much more compatible with eachother.

In any case, I'm also not sure whether I agree with the whole idea of task-specific operating systems. It seems like a step backwards to the days when each software program had to be coded for every possible piece of hardware rather than writing device drivers. If I install BeOS alongside Linux (my primary OS) and Windows and regularly use 5 applications from each it's going to mean a whole lot of reboots and a whole lot of hassle when I want to buy new hardware (where to find three separate drivers, whether the hardware is supported at all...). It reminds me of trying to find a printer that would work with my word processor and spreadsheet in the days of MS-DOS.

I respect and am in some awe at small teams who are able to go away and write a system that seems almost as complete as Windows or MacOS, but honestly I wonder where these systems fit in to the bigger picture.

Re:Some thoughts

[mmu_man]

> it's not as if I can use an autoconfigure script to go and compile something

Why not ?
The problem is not autotools, but the bad assumptions programmers make, thinking autotools will solve all portability probs.
The simplest example is libm. BeOS doesn't have that, it's included in libroot, which is linked to by default.
That doesn't stop me from porting stuff. I already ported (in no particular order) giFT (though the current cvs is broken), ffmpeg (which is used in VLC, which has been ported too and has a nice GUI, much nicer than the *nix version IMO), XEmacs (both tty & X11, still needs a native gui), bzflag (not finished), rsync, and some others.

Besides, there are many hac^Wfixes available for apps that use ugly things, even mmap() though it's not 100% working.
For ex, I wrote a setitimer() implementation for XEmacs.

> whether I agree with the whole idea of task-specific operating systems.
I respect the POV, however I prefer to use BeOS on my desktop, and Slack on the server, and the 2 fit my needs, so.

Re:Some thoughts

[Vancouverite]

In any case, I'm also not sure whether I agree with the whole idea of task-specific operating systems.

In many ways, this is the same problem that some people have in programming -- "I'm not sure whether I agree with the whole idea of task-specific programming languages"

However, no language yet does everything as well as a specialized language will. LISP does things that would send a C++ programmer into epileptic fits. C++ writes way faster code than VB. VB is great for doing those quick Windows UIs. APL is... well... it's APL (for whatever that's worth :-)

And we already have specialized O/Ss. Palm O/S is tightly written, designed for the tool. Should Palm users abandon it for the more general Windows version? How about Symbian -- abandon for Linux or Windows?

IMO, If designed correctly, and updated over the years, a special-purpose O/S should be more efficient in its task areas than a more general purpose O/S is.

inequal competition !

[mmu_man]

[troll]
Hey, what's this ??? How can /. claim to be independant if they put Linux ads when talking about a competing product ?
[/troll]

Nope, not PoorMan

[irenetheno]

From the header:
Apache/1.3.27 (Unix)

How it came to be.

[remor]

Some people here seem to not know, or be a little confused about how this company named yellowTAB came to be the BeOS people, and what is happening in the BeOS world at the moment. Also, I'm not associated with yellowTAB at all, this is all my observations.

yellowTAB
Bernd Korz first appeared in the BeOS community when he released a magazine named InsideBeOS. Only one or two issues were translated into english from the native German of the magazine (I purchased the first english edition!). This magazine stopped publication sometime around when Be flopped and as far as I saw, Bernd sort of disappeared again. When Be filed for bankruptcy, there were many outcries from the community for the source to BeOS so that it's legacy could continue. There were several formal proposals from people to purchase the source as well. Then came the announcement that Palm had purchased Be's intellectual propert(IP)... and were not going to continue development of BeOS. Luckily (in my opinion), Bernd was smart enough apparently to ask for a license to the source and not to purchase it. So, before Be sold their IP to Palm, they gave some sort of full license to yellowTAB to release new products based on the source code. Presumably that license just transferred to Palm's ownership with everything else.
So, here we are today, yellowTAB is about to release their new OS named Zeta (sort of BeOS R6) which contains unreleased code from Be plus new stuff and bug fixes that they have added. The article does not make it very clear, but yellowTAB is actually selling RC1 (Release Candidate 1) of Zeta now to the world. The R1 (Release 1) will be available to people who purchase RC1 for 10 Euros.

BeOS rewrites
There are a number of projects that are aiming their sights on rewriting the BeOS. Some totally opensource from conception, others planning on releasing their source after they have a public binary release under their belts. The main contenders that are around at the moment are OpenBeOS (soon to have a name change), BlueEyedOS , and Cosmoe .

OpenBeOS is taking the approach of totally rewriting the entire system. New kernel, new appkit, new interface kit, new storage kit... everything. They're not changing the basic structure of the system, in fact, they're attempting to completely duplicate the system even down to binary compatibility. As a basis for their project, they have used Be's old header files, and written API documentation. They are hosted at source forge and are using the MIT license for all their source.

BlueEyedOS is taking the approach that they perceive the Linux kernel and XFree86 as suitable for building less traditional system on top of them. They are using the Linux kernel as their Be kernel, and X windows as their display. They've released a demo CD so far that is quite interesting and appears very promising. Their code is not available to anyone but their developers at the moment because they've chosen to start their project closed. I've believe that I've heard though that they are planning for a source release later on. The demo CD can still be downloaded from their website.

Cosmoe is a primarily one man show that has taken the Syllable (was Atheos) source code and altered it to run on top of Linux and X. It's author's primary goal seems to be to give the Unix, Linux community a new user interface and the Be API. Code for this system is occasionally released under GPL and LGPL.

Re:How it came to be.

[Anonymous Coward]

that's exactly right...
someone's been doing their research..

kudos remor!

Re:How it came to be.

[Bo Diddly Squat]

Your history is a bit warped. Be never filed for bankruptcy.
The requests for the source of BeOS were made to Palm after Palm had bought Be's IP. Bernd already had contact and some sort of contract with Be before the announcement of the sale.

The rest looks ok to me. :)

Hard to sell anything...

[BlackBolt]

when you're slashdotted to hell.

Re:Hard to sell anything...

[memph1st0]

the site's redirecting to localhost... fine t3kn1q.

Hands off!!

[Ratface]

Remind me not to let you anywhere near my laptop then! ;-p

Re:Hands off!!

[ekarjala]

Funny! Someone mod this up!!!

is BeOS Linux?

[neilb78]

I've never really looked at BeOS...and I'm wondering is BeOS Linux or Unix? Or is BeOS just BeOS.

If it's not Linux, then why are they running the yellowTab site on Linux?
Netcraft

Also, it looks they've changed their site to redirect to 127.0.0.1 to avoid the /. effect.

Re:is BeOS Linux?

[whataputz]

BeOS is BeOS. It ain't UNIX nor Linux. It's just BeOS. Their site is running on Linux because BeOS wasn't made to be something like Linux, it's a desktop OS, not a server in any way.

Re:whut? no comments yet?

[GotSpider]

Don't you know that not reading the article is a prerequisite for commenting?

Once you read the article, your comments are disregarded.

I guess you really are new here =P

Intel was a major BeOS shareholder

[DABANSHEE]

for a while.

That may have helped.

I think Yellowtap may have purchased axcess to the BeOS source from Palm or something, which maybe means axcess to Intel's contributions such as drivers 'n patches (mmx, etc?).

"All these years"?

[red floyd]

After all these years

Yeah, it's been what, two years?

Re:WARNING: OBSCENE LINK

[Anonymous Coward]

If you actually click on the link you'll see why it's called "beatjapan". Because you can't have spaces or an "@" sign. Having "Be at Japan" or "Be@Japan" won't work. "bejapan" is already taken. Guess they should've chosen something less confusing to the paranoid...

Specs and pricing?

[Hektor_Troy]

Did anyone manage to get to the specs and pricings of their hardware-offers before the site died?

Re:Specs and pricing?

[Hektor_Troy]

From The BeOS Journal:
The hardware choices that come bundled with Zeta Deluxe Edition RC1 are two desktop systems, and a laptop offering.

faet VX notebook (EUR 1,491.47)
- Intel Pentium M 1.3 through 1.7 GHz CPU (all 400 MHz FSB)
- 256, 512, or 768 MB DDR RAM (all 333 MHz)
- 30, 40, 60 or 80 gig drive
- 8/24 DVD/CD, or 24/10/8 CDR/CDRW/CD, or 2/1/16/10/8/24 DVDR/DVDRW/CDR/DVD/CD
- Intel 802.11b Wireless LAN or none
- Home Edition, or Developer Edition, or Deluxe Edition

Zeta PC Power (EUR 549.00)
Midi Tower; Lan; USB 2.0
- AMD Athlon XP 2000+ - 1,800 GHz - 266 MHz FSB
- ATI Radeon 9000 - 64MB DDR
- 256 MB DDR RAM (1x256 MB) - 266MHz
- 60 GB - 7.200u Harddrive
- 48x CD-R / 24x CD-RW / 48x CD / 16x DVD Drive
- Zeta Deluxe edition
- 24 Month Warranty

Zeta PC Deluxe (EUR 799.00)
Midi Tower; Lan; USB 2.0;
- Intel Pentium 4 - 2,66 GHz - 533 MHz FSB - 512kB Cache
- ATI Radeon 9000 - 128 MB DDR - DVI
- 512 MB DDR RAM (1x512 MB) - 266MHz
- 120 GB - 7.200 rpm Harddrive
- 16x DVD / 48x CD Drive
- 52x CD-R / 24x CD-RW / 52x CD Drive
- Zeta Deluxe Edition
- 24 Month Warranty

Specs

[mmu_man]

From http://www.ubix.org/cgi-bin/rhum?msg=1,854,1&limit e= (please don't /.):

With 2 years waranty.

* 'Faet' laptop (from Euro 1491):
- Intel Pentium M 1,3 to 1,7 Ghz
- 15' SXGA 1400 x 1050 pixels
- 256 to 768 Mo RAM
- 30 a 80 Go HDD
- CDROM or combo CD burner/DVD or DVD-R burner
- ATI Radeon Mobility 9000 with 64 Mo
- optinal Wi-Fi card (NOT the internal centrino stuff AFAIK)
- 3 * USB 2.0, 1 Firewire
- integrated ethernet
- S-Video out
- SD card reader
- Zeta standard edition

* Zeta PC Power (from Euro 538):
- AMD Athlon XP 2000+
- 256 Mo RAM
- 50 Go HDD, 7200 rpm
- combo CD burner/DVD reader
- ATI Radeon 9000, 64 Mo RAM
- Zeta Deluxe edition

* Zeta PC Deluxe (from Euro 799):
- Pentium 4 2,66 Ghz
- 512 Mo RAM
- 120 Go HDD 7200 rpm
- DVD
- CD burner
- ATI Radeon 9000, 128 Mo RAM
- Zeta en edition Deluxe

Re:Specs

[mmu_man]

Or get them there too.

We need a new OS

[Anonymous Coward]

We need a new OS. Windows is bloated and uses too many resources. Those using serious apps have loads of junk they don't need, taking up RAM and CPU cyles. Linux is great as a server, but not so great on the Desktop. People want an OS which will just install and runs their apps, making best use of the hardware available.

AmigaOS 4 looks good - can you imagine such a small footprint OS on such powerful hardware? An 800Mhz AmigaOS box would *fly*.

BeOS is similar, a friendly OS - where you can just install software and use it. You don't have to delve into the OS ...

I'm a unix admin - and a musician. I wouldn't normally use anything other than Linux (and a little XP) - but in the studio my priorities change. I need reliability and performance, with decent stable applications.

If Cubase/Cakewalk/Logic were available for AmigaOS4 or BeOS - I wouldn't think twice about changing OS.

BeOS Free?

[Anonymous Coward]

Is the new release Free Software? Didn't think so.

Wake me up when the 2.6 kernel is released.

Re:BeOS Free?

[mmu_man]

Linux isn't Free Software either, it's filled with parts from SCO.

I wonder

[justsomebody]

if that

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is a screenshot, because if it is, then BeOS has changed a lot since I last used him:)

But my thinking says that BeOS died somewhere along the way. And dead Software is better to stay dead, although it was a beatiful dream long (really, really, really long) ago.

Re:I wonder

[mmu_man]

I've been using The BeOS daily for 2 years now.
Call that dead if you wish.

Re:I wonder

[justsomebody]

Yep, I choose to call BeOS dead

Why Europe ?

[vlad_petric]

Maybe because Europeans (and I believe Asians as well) pay a little bit more attention than Americans to true quality and show less "herding" behaviour when doing purchases.

Re:Why Europe ?

[MegaHamsterX]

You must be an American yourself, either that or you have not traveled, people the world over believe their taste and judgement of quility if far superior to that of their neighbours.

blame that one on

[Anonymous Coward]

JarJar... he's to blame here. I distinctly heard a "Meesa gonna floods da servers till I get my pages all up like I want"

Speaking of BeOS

[Lord Kestrel]

I have a bp6 with a pair of 366's running 4.5.1. I've thought about purchasing BeOS 5, but from what I understand, you need the more expensive version to get SMP support, and I didn't see a need at the time to upgrade. Now I haven't powered that machine on in a year or so, but I've always thought about getting it up and running again. Does BeOS 5 have any "killer app/features" that would make it worth finding and installing, or is 4.5.1 still fine?

Re:Speaking of BeOS

[Anonymous Coward]

Lord Kestrel,
You CAN run BeOS 5 PE (personal edition) on that box just fine, IIRC. I suggest you head over to http://www.bebits.com and grab BeOS R5 PE. Then you can head over to http://www.betips.net and they have a couple of tips on how to get the SMP support and other things out of R5 PE. No need to purchase R5 Pro but if you REALLY want to, you can search the web for Purplus. They have copies for about $22(USD).
Enjoy!

too little, too late

[Cnik70]

BeOS was a great opsys, it had alot of potential. But I honestly believe that it's lost its chance to be much more than a curosity item. Sad too. I really enjoyed using it awhile back. Now, hopefully, the creative effort put into BeOS can be better applied to Linux.

Not another CrapOS...

[Anonymous Coward]

BeOS might be great or something... But every new OS wastes the resources called TIME and CODERS. I laugh at every old BeOS project - they've been all made for the trashbin (Troll but still Insightful).

BeOS and UNIX

[base_chakra]

The 'BeOS is dead' talk reminds me of the 'UNIX is dead' rhetoric with which we're all familiar. While the historical significance of BeOS is dwarfed by that of UNIX, it's my hope that an open BeOS will mature and grow in popularity just as Linux developed as a free UNIX alternative that eventually outshown its forefathers.

OpenBSD and FreeBSD have great port systems. BeOS could have a port tree that's just as good, if not better. At this point Linux may have a software base to be reckoned with, but I'd reckon that most of that software could easily be ported to Be. If the software base were there, even via a Lin/Win compatibility layer, I'd readopt BeOS in an instant.

I think today marks the first time I've seen so many harsh (and baseless) criticisms of BeOS.
I think it's worth noting that most of the critics who've spoken up thus far do not appear to have ever used BeOS. That's really a shame, because it should appeal to both Mac OS and Linux users alike. The interface is considerably more responsive than Aqua and XFree86; and, of course, the multimedia performance is astounding. If Mac OS X had 40% more function and 40% form, you'd have BeOS.

BeOS is available for both PPC and x86 platforms.
BeOS sports the lowest MIDI latency figures I've ever seen.
BeOS has great workflow and an innovative desktop.
BeOS runs well on old hardware.
BeOS has great GL performance.
BeOS apps are surprisingly portable.
Coding for the BeOS is, as some have described it, 'a joy.'
BeOS runs popular UNIX command interpreters.
BeOS's windows can interact with one another in a way that no OS has ever achieved.
BeOS rules.

Re:BeOS and UNIX

[bkakes]

We can appreciate your enjoyment of the system, but you're not doing anyone any favors by stretching the truth (or outright lying) about the capabilities of the system.

BeOS has great GL performance

BeOS has no GL performance. For all intents and purposes, there is no hardware accelerated OpenGL. You're probably quoting the age-old benchmarks that BeNews did with a beta of the OpenGL stack (again, never finished) with Quake 2. Those numbers are, what, four years old now, and were never relevant in the first place!

Coding for the BeOS is, as some have described it, 'a joy.'

Coding small apps for the BeOS is a joy. But ask any Be engineer (there are plenty of articles online, such as JBQ's comments here: http://www.osnews.com/comment.php?news_id=66) and they'll tell you how difficult/impossible it is to code large, commercial-quality applications for the BeOS. This is due to both certain design decisions and limitations within the OS and the lack of good developer tools).

the multimedia performance is astounding

The multimedia performance is not astounding. You claim that detractors must never have used the BeOS, but as someone who used it from R3 on, it was never easy to get movie files to play in sync. No one, especially not Be employees, think the media kit worked well at all. Those "multiple files at once" demos were all way back in the day with very simplistic codecs. Heck, the BeOS doesn't even support hardware video overlay on most video cards, so if you resize a movie, it plays slower (having to do the resize in software) and looks bad. The best media performance you can get is via mplayer or vlc. Yep, that's right folks...ports of Linux applications.

BeOS apps are surprisingly portable.

Since the BeOS API is 100% proprietary, I'm really curious what you mean by this. You're probably referring to the 99%-ish Posix compliance, which is missing a few extremely important functions such as mmap. (and, you know, even Windows has Posix in it.)

Nothing sours me on a good system that I used to love like diehard fans who lie about how good it once was, and make delusions of grandeur for how it will be.

Re:BeOS and UNIX

[Anonymous Coward]

Worth noting that I used to play Quake2 in BeOS 5.01
4.0 and above had GL support as the OS and bible came with tons of tools, apps, and yes games.
Great OS indeed, I recall it having support for up to 16 processors and the memory to go with it so I've no idea why you make your claims.

As for portability, yes, it is quite easy, there is a lot of built in compatibility as you could copy windows dlls into a folder and run Windows codecs! Granted, thats not really porting but its damn fast. On top of that you could fairly easily recompile and application for BeOS, depending on the size of the project not necessarily and easy task, but certainly easier than porting windows to linux.

Re:BeOS and UNIX

[bkakes]

Worth noting that I used to play Quake2 in BeOS 5.01

Yes, you used to play on a hacked OpenGL driver that was strictly for Glide (Voodoo) cards. Also of note is that that mode was much slower than Windows/Linux OpenGL. When he claims fast OpenGL, he was most certainly was referring to the review of the beta (which was never finished) that Eugenia posted on BeNews a few years ago. It was indeed fast, but it was never finished and never released.

I recall it having support for up to 16 processors and the memory to go with it so I've no idea why you make your claims.

I never made claims to the contrary, so I have no idea why you even mentioned these. I never said it didn't have applications or tools or games. With all due respect, did you even read what I wrote? Also, not that it matters, but if I recall correctly, they capped it at 8 processors. Still nice, of course. Further, more than a gig of RAM is not supported. The memory architecture wasn't built for it (you can read why from Be engineers such as Manuel here: http://www.freelists.org/archives/openbeos/09-2001 /msg00072.html). At the time this certainly was an acceptable limitation.

there is a lot of built in compatibility as you could copy windows dlls into a folder and run Windows codecs!

This is completely incorrect. The "DivX ;)" (yes, the smiley is a part of the name) project did indeed use Windows codecs, but that was a clever hack for all operating systems that wrapped around the Windows codecs for certain decoding that they couldn't have legally done otherwise. The BeOS certainly did not support Windows DLLs or codecs.

On top of that you could fairly easily recompile and application for BeOS

Yes, porting Posix applications to the BeOS was usually fairly straightforward, unless they required mmap, which held back some major application ports such as Wine). Windows, of course, has better Posix compliance and ports of toolkits such as GTK+. Of course, the original claim of the parent to my post was that BeOS applications are portable, which isn't really any more true than applications written for any other system (talking about moving an application from the BeOS to another system).

bochs?

[Unregistered]

I see a screen shot for bochs. Does that mean it's actually useful, or are they bundeling a broken project?

btw, i've been unimpressed with Be. I couldn't even get it to stop being monochrome.

The Amiga syndrome

[theolein]

As much as I like and love the idea of yet another competitor , and a professional one to boot, this reminds me so much of the Amiga saga, when Amiga, a few years after Commodore had gone tits up, was cheap enough that a German company bought up the rights to the OS and made big promises about launching the Amiga from the dead, so to speak.

The Amiga was always very popular in Germany and the company hoped to capitalise on that. sadly, the PC had caught up in the mean time and the company dies.

I am afraid that that is probably what is going to happen to YellowTab. Windows, Linux and OSX have all caught up (more or less) in features, file systems etc in the mean time, and there isn't that many people out there any more who would buy this as it lacks third party software almost completely.

I'm using BeOS MAX 2.1 right now to post this

[Anonymous Coward]

and it runs like a bat outa hell on my Barton 2500+ gigabyte GA7VAXP board. Realtek has drivers for the NIC and my dsl takes care of the rest. There is a driver for my 9500 Pro that works too, but no 2D accel :( To me Zeta is worth it for the driver updates alone, never mind the other stuff. I run a dual boot XP/BeOS box with Xp on one drive and Be on the other. I'm gonna buy Zeta and use that to replace the Be MAX edition I'm using now.

I'm surprised at all the negative comments regarding Zeta. Its not like anyone is holding a gun to your head and forcing you to use anything. I dont understand why /.er's feel like they have to trash everything thats not nix based or open source. Thank God for forward thinking poeple like Bernard K. - an OS does not have to be a Linux or a Windows. There's room for Zeta.

Cool, but let me get this straight...

[Zathras11]

to get a 100% compatible system I have to move to
Europe? I'm sorry, but I can't justify that. :^)

I thought the version I used had potential,
although some of my hardware wouldn't work.
The OS loads REAL fast. I liked that... Oh
well, maybe eventually we will get systems like
this in the U.S.

Re:First Post

[Anonymous Coward]

WRONG AGAIN, Tom!