AmiBrowser brings 21st century web to 20th century Amigas
- Reference: 1756400593
- News link: https://www.theregister.co.uk/2025/08/28/amiga_web_browser_amibrowser/
- Source link:
[1]Amibrowser [PDF] from [2]Amigakit tackles one of the requirements to use a 20th century retrocomputer in the world today: a modern browser. Thanks to the raw speed of modern emulation, it's possible to create an Amiga that's thousands of times faster than the original 1980s hardware. This makes it a viable computer even in 2025, but it leaves one big hole in the software catalog: a web browser compatible with 2020s WWW standards.
Before looking at how Amibrowser functions, we need to explain the hardware it targets. The browser comes bundled with AmigaKit's new [3]A1200 NG , which is a modern motherboard designed to slot into a classic A1200 case. (The [4]Amiga 1200 Wikipedia article is a good start if you're young enough that you can't instantly call the A1200 to mind. It was the late Commodore's high-powered all-in-one model.)
[5]
Amiga 1200
As it happens, there's an A1200 next to The Reg FOSS desk's right knee at this very moment, but if you don't happen to have a dead one lying around, several companies will sell you a brand-new empty case, such as [6]Retropassion or [7]A1200.net .
The A1200 NG motherboard is the same shape as the original from Commodore's 1992 machine, and has ports that line up with the case cutouts. You can even connect an Amiga (or PC) floppy drive, and the board will drive it so you can read original 3.5-inch media – but there's no Motorola 680EC20 processor here. Instead, mounted on it as a daughterboard is an [8]Orange Pi Zero 3 , with 4 GB RAM. It's driven by an Allwinner H618 Quad-Core Cortex-A53 and an Arm Mali-G31 MP2 GPU.
[9]
AmigaKit told The Register:
The emulation is built on top of Linux. However, we have built a series of native Amiga libraries that 68K programs can use. These libraries talk directly to the ARM SBC bypassing the emulation. One such library is the ARM Graphics Lib which implements graphics functions that are native ARM that the 68K emulated programs can use. It has let us speed up graphics functions and consequently classic Amiga applications that are using them.
On top of that, it runs a customized Amiga emulator:
The emulator is [10]AmiBerry . The author is part of our development team. We have adapted AmiBerry in several instances. Many of the useful extra features and bug fixes we have found have gone back into mainline AmiBerry releases.
Amiberry is an [11]open source project if you want to run it on your own Raspberry Pi or similar. On top of that, the A1200-NG runs a custom OS called [12]AmiBench . This is based on the 68000 edition of AROS, the modern FOSS recreation of AmigaOS that we [13]looked at in some depth in May.
So this is an Amiga-compatible computer, which achieves its Amiga compatibility using a FOSS Amiga-compatible OS, running on a FOSS emulator, running on top of the equally FOSS Linux. AmiBench contains code libraries that call native Arm code running underneath the emulated environment for (much) better performance, such as faster graphics.
[14]
[15]
AmigaKit told us:
We have allocated 1 GB Fast Memory to the Amiga with the remainder left for graphics memory and the Linux system. AmiBench is the desktop running in 1080P/32 bit Amiga RTG modes. It uses a pseudo Zorro 3 graphics card to achieve this.
That's also how the new AmiBrowser works. The user interacts with a native 68K AmigaOS app, but that app calls down to the [16]Chromium Embedded Framework running on Linux. The native Arm Linux app talks to web servers, executes JavaScript, decodes video and so on, and then AmiBench passes the results through to the AmiBrowser app.
This has two benefits. The users gets a faster and more capable emulated environment than just running 68K AmigaOS on a conventional emulator. However, the combination of multiple layers of mostly open source software means that AmigaKit is free to sell it, without dealing with companies who hold the rights to the original Commodore OSes.
[17]GhostBSD 25.02 adds 'Gershwin' desktop for a Mac-like twist
[18]VirtualBox 7.2 fixes flaky 3D guests and adds Arm-on-Arm support
[19]Thunderbird 142 lands with modest upgrades – plus talk of Pro service ahead
[20]Saved you a click: Firefox 142 offers AI summaries of links
The modern PowerPC [21]AmigaOS 4.1 is from Hyperion, which also offers [22]updates to classic 68K AmigaOS 3.2 – we looked at the [23]latest update, 3.2.3, in April . AmigaKit's product doesn't use either. It also doesn't use any of the code from the copyright holders for Classic AmigaOS, Cloanto, which offers the [24]Amiga Forever emulation suite, which The Reg looked at [25]way back in 2009 . Amiga Forever is an easy way to play classic Amiga games on a modern Windows machine – we used it to create some of the screenshots for that April story. (Our apologies to Cloanto for mistakenly describing its [26]AmigaOS 3.X as Haage & Partner's AmigaOS 3.9.)
Amiga Forever is very much designed to be an easy way to play Amiga games on Windows, though. We found that it wasn't so easy to customize the emulation settings if you want to run a modern AmigaOS desktop, and we completely failed to get it running on Linux. The fact that there's now a maturing FOSS emulation stack is permitting the development of a new generation of Amiga-compatible computers.
If you don't need something that goes into the original case and looks like an Amiga, AmigaKit also offers the [27]A600 GS , which is a tiny standalone machine running AmiBench. You'll need a USB keyboard and mouse, though.
[28]
Looking more like a miniaturized replica of an Amiga 500 is [29]THEA500 Mini – the odd capitalization and spacing carefully avoiding infringing any copyrights. This is another device based around an Arm SBC and emulation, aimed purely at gaming – its tiny keyboard doesn't work.
It's getting a full-sized sibling some time soon, too. [30]Retro Games Ltd (RGL) is working on a larger machine, with a full working keyboard. It's styled to resemble the Amiga 1200 and is called "The A1200." According to a [31]roadmap , its release was planned for earlier this year, but in March RGL [32]announced that the machine's release would be delayed. RGL [33]said on X that it would exhibit the new machine at [34]Gamescom 2025 in Cologne, and we've seen some reports, such as [35]this from Time Extension , that people saw it. The company already offers a [36]suitable USB mouse .
One of the RGL team lives near the Irish Sea wing of Vulture Towers, and we've met him and asked for an interview. If the company agrees, we hope to return soon with an in-depth look at the tech behind making new computers that are compatible with 20th century ones, without using any of the original code. ®
Get our [37]Tech Resources
[1] https://www.a600gs.com/news/News_Release_AmiBrowser.pdf
[2] https://www.amigakit.com/about.php
[3] https://www.a1200.com/index.php/the-a1200-ng/
[4] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amiga_1200
[5] https://regmedia.co.uk/2023/03/08/shutterstock_amiga1200.jpg
[6] https://www.retropassion.co.uk/product-category/commodore-amiga/amiga-a1200/amiga-1200-cases/
[7] https://www.a1200.net/amiga-1200-case/
[8] http://www.orangepi.org/html/hardWare/computerAndMicrocontrollers/details/Orange-Pi-Zero-3.html
[9] https://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/jump?co=1&iu=/6978/reg_software/applications&sz=300x50%7C300x100%7C300x250%7C300x251%7C300x252%7C300x600%7C300x601&tile=2&c=2aLDRdiyOs7CxP-czG1G2zAAAAMY&t=ct%3Dns%26unitnum%3D2%26raptor%3Dcondor%26pos%3Dtop%26test%3D0
[10] https://amiberry.com/
[11] https://github.com/BlitterStudio/amiberry
[12] https://wiki.amiga.org/index.php?title=AmiBench
[13] https://www.theregister.com/2025/05/22/aros_live/
[14] https://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/jump?co=1&iu=/6978/reg_software/applications&sz=300x50%7C300x100%7C300x250%7C300x251%7C300x252%7C300x600%7C300x601&tile=4&c=44aLDRdiyOs7CxP-czG1G2zAAAAMY&t=ct%3Dns%26unitnum%3D4%26raptor%3Dfalcon%26pos%3Dmid%26test%3D0
[15] https://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/jump?co=1&iu=/6978/reg_software/applications&sz=300x50%7C300x100%7C300x250%7C300x251%7C300x252%7C300x600%7C300x601&tile=3&c=33aLDRdiyOs7CxP-czG1G2zAAAAMY&t=ct%3Dns%26unitnum%3D3%26raptor%3Deagle%26pos%3Dmid%26test%3D0
[16] https://bitbucket.org/chromiumembedded/cef/src/master/
[17] https://www.theregister.com/2025/08/27/ghostbsd_2502/
[18] https://www.theregister.com/2025/08/23/virtualbox_72_fixes_3d_guests/
[19] https://www.theregister.com/2025/08/22/thunderbird_142/
[20] https://www.theregister.com/2025/08/22/firefox_142/
[21] https://www.amigaos.net/
[22] https://www.theregister.com/2023/03/08/amiga_os_322/
[23] https://www.theregister.com/2025/04/10/amigaos_3_2_3/
[24] https://www.amigaforever.com/
[25] https://www.theregister.com/2009/07/03/amiga_forever_updates/
[26] https://www.amigaforever.com/kb/15-107
[27] https://www.a600gs.com/a600-gs/
[28] https://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/jump?co=1&iu=/6978/reg_software/applications&sz=300x50%7C300x100%7C300x250%7C300x251%7C300x252%7C300x600%7C300x601&tile=4&c=44aLDRdiyOs7CxP-czG1G2zAAAAMY&t=ct%3Dns%26unitnum%3D4%26raptor%3Dfalcon%26pos%3Dmid%26test%3D0
[29] https://retrogames.biz/products/thea500-mini/
[30] https://retrogames.biz/
[31] https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=783936250204176&id=100057634233454&set=a.702114485053020&eav=AfY8hT6X8-Xwtj20SrHK5IInJacn2IWDV0oAfqWIjjuNskRd4l2FZdfV9LCETbi1tko&paipv=0&source=57&_rdr
[32] https://www.facebook.com/THEC64andMoreByRetroGamesLtd/posts/full-sized-amiga-release-updateas-everyone-knows-it-has-long-been-our-intention-/1095781225686342/
[33] https://x.com/thec64_rgl/status/1957741240063009230
[34] https://www.gamescom.global/en
[35] https://www.timeextension.com/news/2025/08/retro-games-ltds-full-size-amiga-replica-the-a1200-resurfaces-at-gamescom
[36] https://retrogames.biz/products/themouse/
[37] https://whitepapers.theregister.com/
> a shell runing on top of Linux underpinnings
No, not at all.
A full Amiga-compatible OS that can run most original Amiga software, including games _direct from floppy_, but implemented using a FOSS OS on a FOSS emulator on top of a FOSS OS.
Pretty clever way of doing it IMHO.
These are niche products for a niche market. They will not sell many. Therefore they need to make decent profit on each unit. That means keeping the costs down.
Compare with PiStorm:
https://www.theregister.com/2024/02/12/pistorm_accelerated_amiga_pi/
(I meant to link to that... oops.)
This puts a RasPi inside your real Amiga and the Pi emulates the Miggy's CPU.
No it is not "real". But it's much realer than an emulator.
If you want real Motorola silicon, you can have that.
Here's a modern such accelerator -- TerribleFire:
https://www.retropassion.co.uk/product/tf1260-terriblefire-a1200-accelerator-with-lc060-50mhz-cpu/
£300 to you guv.
Not quick enough? No bother. How about an FPGA replacement? About 4-6x faster still than a TF.
https://amigastore.eu/en/856-vampire-1200-v2.html
A little under €600.
You want a fast Amiga on silicon, you can have it, but it will cost you a lot.
These devices assume you own the OS and the ROMs already.
If someone wanted to built new computers around that sort of kit they'd need to pay Cloanto or Hyperion for the OS as well, and that won't come cheap.
Result, a new Amiga that is much faster than a real one, but costs £1000 a unit or something.
This way, you get something that looks like an Amiga and feels like an Amiga and runs Amiga software from Amiga media...
And costs £200.
And they make money on that.
It's not only a better way from a business POV -- given how entangled the ownership of the IP is, it's the *only* way.
"Nah. If I want an alternative OS to play with Haiku looks to have more of a future. It's usable as a daily driver on standard hardware."
That's running on emulation too! And proprietary emulation at that.
You do know that Intel and AMD chips are not x86 now and have not been for a while. They run their own microcode and emulate the x86 instruction set on the fly.
So let's not get too picky about emulating a CPU from nearly 40 years ago, especially since you are self-declared as not the target market.
> emulate the x86 instruction set on the fly.
That's not really how it actually works.
What you describe is a more accurate description of a Transmeta Crusoe.
Instructions are decoded into micro-operations, which are executed out of order and reassembled, but it's still an x86 chip executing x86 code. It can't run anything else. Nothing else can generate "raw micro-ops" and feed them into the CPU; there's no mechanism for that.
Interesting way of doing it, I wonder how compatible it is with older games that hit the hardware directly rather than going through Amiga OS though?
I tried out Aros ROMs on WinUAE a few years ago and compatibility wasn't as fantastic, but since I own a real Amiga which had been upgraded to 3.1 ROMs I can legally use the 3.0 ROM i took out on the emulator and just stick them in a drawer. Plus I think I have an copy of Amiga forever CD knocking around somewhere which might have come on one of the later post Amiga Format / CU Amiga magazines cover CDs? I should really go through them and make them into ISO files before they start to die of bit rot.
> I wonder how compatible it is with older games that hit the hardware directly rather than going through Amiga OS though?
Disclaimer: I am very much not a gamer. I do own an Amiga, but I only experimented with AmigaOS. I've never run a game on the thing.
Given my thus _very_ limited practical understanding of the Miggy and its games...
AIUI most Amiga games booted from floppy. They didn't load from hard disk, and indeed, to install them onto a hard disk and run them from Workbench, you needed a special tool called WHDLoad.
https://whdload.de/
If you boot a game from floppy disk -- or more likely a disk image -- then it's the real game loading into the emulator and AROS is not much involved. The emulator might have to do some sleight-of-hand to tell the game it has an AGA chipset and redirect the output to HDMI, upscaled, but that sort of thing is I believe not very hard to do these days.
I think -- but do not know -- that games compatibility will be very good to excellent.
That's what most people really want, after all, not to be able to run Wordworth and Pagestream at 1920*1080.
What a difference 40 short years make!
Used to be we needed a [1]z80 CP/M card , a [2]SunPCi x86 card , or similar hardware contraptions for our machines to run erstwhile incompatibles ... but with today's CPU perf and hypervisor extensions, even a $25 quad 1.5 GHz Cortex-A53 (eg. Allwinner H618 set in Orange Pi Zero3) can do it in software instead. Wow!
The Chromium-oriented HTML-5 Amibrowser's acrobatics are quite impressive in this, as it does the splits over a good chunk of the software layer cake, with its GUI (one leg) running within the AmiBench Desktop, on top of System Release V46 that emulates AmigaOS on a virtual 68EC020, and (the other leg) the actual Youtube video-playing, with sound, plus the likes of Blink and V8 (or similar) running through ARM code libraries executed by the underlying Linux host ... (iiuc)
That's just about as exciting as actual [3]French Cancan (to geeks at least!)! ;)
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Z-80_SoftCard
[2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SunPCi
[3] https://www.moulinrouge.fr/en/french-cancan-2/
Re: What a difference 40 short years make!
> hardware contraptions for our machines
All very true.
I did run full software-emulations of PCs on high-end PowerMacs in the mid 1990s and it did work. About as well as !PCemu on my Archimedes 310 nearly a decade earlier: you could use it but it wasn't great.
But nowadays, even a low-end Arm is several thousands of times faster. The problems become not performance, but latency and I/O response times.
Picture of THEA1200 found!
Hold the front page!
https://imgur.com/a/iR6CNNn
Actually, maybe don't...
It looks like it was just a 3D-printed replica.
Slightly more (terribly spelled) info here:
https://amigang.com/the-a1200/
So essentially a shell runing on top of Linux underpinnings. Nah. If I want an alternative OS to play with Haiku looks to have more of a future. It's usable as a daily driver on standard hardware.