Web browser in 2021?

I have a Sam440ep running 4.1FE, fully patched.

It's been five years or so since I used it much, though.

Are there any web browsers I can get for it that don't kinda suck? Everything I've tried is either insanely dog slow and doesn't work, or just doesn't handle modern web sites, or crashes every other click.

I'm open to suggestions!

@jbni
The only browser which can render something at least more or less on Amigaos4 is Odyssey. Latest version there:
https://kas1e.mikendezign.com/aos4/ody ... odyssey_1.23r5_beta07.lha

But WebKit core in it pretty old, and so many modern sites will not render. But it still better in terms of rendering in comparison with Ibrowse, Netsurf & Timberwolf. But because it renders more, handles javascript and other crap, it also can be slower than Ibrowse (of course), and Netsurf. Both of which didn't support half of what even our old WebKit core in Odyssey support.


If you wants it all be fast on sam440: then only Ibrowse. It will then render not many sites (and almost none from modern ones), but will be fast. Then if you want to render a little more sites and lose a bit of speed, then Netsurf. If you want to render even more sites, then Odyssey, but it also means it will be slower.

The modern bloated web is not designed for sam440, or sam460, or pegasos2, or classics, or anything which is less than 2ghz and has all the modern memory speeds, L caches and stuff. No modern websites will render fast, good, with all the bloat which modern web provides on the sam440ep. Sadly :( If one wants speed, he should skip JS, DOMS, modern CSS, and co. If one wants to render everything properly, then it means raw CPU power to cope with all the bloat crap which is WEB today.

Who can imagine that WEB fucks that heavy? Now the browser is not a browser like before, but some kind of VM or another OS, or dunno what.

@kas1e I'll give that Odyssey version a try. I'm far more interested in 'works' than 'fast'.

I can't really be mad about how resource-heavy web sites have gotten. The problem is that I'm using a ten-year-old computer that was slow compared to PCs at the time I GOT it.

I'd probably get a faster AmigaOS 4 experience emulating it on my PC instead of using the Sam440ep-flex. I just haven't done the fiddling to set it up.

@jbni
Quote:

I have installed on fast PC latest WinUAE and os4 classic on it: it slow. In some areas it surely slower than even Sam440EP. And if you have in your Sam440EP a Radeon RX, then WinUAE will not only slower but also didn't allow you to use all that accelerated video playback, compositing, proper 2D/3D, etc. Also, it has some random crashes due to its not 100% perfect emulation nature.

@jbni

Quote:
I can confirm that you won't. I run an emulated environment on a recent Lenovo laptop, and the system is much slower than my Sam440ep-Flex.

I mostly use Netsurf with my Sam Flex.

@kas1e
It is nice to read that you somehow tried 4.1 using winuae.
It certainly can't compare to real hardware
But I can assure you that it works well considering that there is no support for a graphics card and its acceleration.

It would be very nice to create a winuae optimized version of Odyssey and who better than you could do it.
I've always hoped for this but I never asked you anything about it because obviously you have the real hardware and you have no interest in optimizing a possible version of Odyssey

The system I am currently using works well is fast and if we ignore the limits that are there due to the absence of a dedicated graphics card in winuae.

every time I record a video dedicated to 4.1 and less than 50% fast
in reality the real speed can only be demonstrated when I record videos with the mobile phone because somehow any video capture program I use conflicts with winuae especially the audio and this leads to false results but in reality the speed is excellent .

Sorry again for my post I have a lot of respect for your work.
I understand that those with real hardware are not interested in 4.1 emulation of course

But people who emulate 4.1 with winuae have no idea how to really configure it until today I still haven't found anyone who emulates 4.1 with whom to share experiences together and improve its emulation.

here you can see Odyssey how it really works without the video capture program:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bOj2HxT3uRo

and here E-UAE Emotion-Player and AIO Streaming work simultaneously without any slowdown always using the mobile phone to record the video.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qvX21LL4vCg

I can provide you the complete 4.1 system setup if you would have some time to improve Odyssey even more with your skills.

Thanks and sorry for my request, but even using the emulation I buy what I need to make it work.

I would also buy the latest version of Enhancer Software but I would have no benefit unfortunately even buying it.

Thanks for a possible answer.

And given my limited knowledge of 4.1 having never had a dedicated real machine everything I learned was explained to me here on this forum which I always thank.

Most likely the system could certainly be improved even more.

@hite
Quote:

You saying it like i (and others who have real hardware) didn't use it :) As i say i have winuae with all latest stuff to emulate amigaos4 : it works _SLOW_. Not dog slow, but very slow in compare with real hardware. Opening of windowses, move of them, reszing of them, everything just really, really SLOWER MUCH. and can't be compare with real hardware.

And that of course not related to love or not love of emulation. I for myself will be happy for good emualtion on fast PC of latest amigaos4, which will give me speed of X5000. But it can't currently, and i tried it on different fast PCs.

And i didn't say of course about 2D and 3D, which is out of question with WinUAE.

Quote:

As i say i have full normal setup of os4 classic on winuae. It just too slow in compare with even my old Pegasos2, not saying about sam460 and x5000. And there is only one way to optimize Odyssey for WinUAE : 10GHZ cpu :)

@kas1e
Thanks for the reply

The other day i tried "OWB" with qemu (morphos)
without the use of overlay and works fine probably because qemu engine is based on 6.0 while winuae is based on qemu 2.0.
Then I wondered if with odyssey you could optimize something on the "software" side because OWB works well
I would be satisfied even with small steps
but this is not my field and I could say wrong things.

here OWB with qemu (morphos)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mGM4y04DxOM

@white

You use/tried MorphOS on QEMU?

You can try AmigaOS4 too on QEMU: http://zero.eik.bme.hu/~balaton/qemu/amiga/

@jabirulo
I had tried 4.1 two years ago with qemu 3.1
The test was carried out with an I5-2400
here the test:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-nYX2t5d6lk

Today with the qemu 6.0 version I did some tests there is no improvement at least on the surface the speed seems identical.
(the test was carried out with a ryzen 5800x)

@Javier
I tried the latest QEMU about 2-3 months ago with installing SAM460 ISO on it. Not only it slow, but it also brings quite a lot of issues just at the moment of installation. SFS no supported, random crashes when copy files, etc, etc => unusable.

In comparison, WinUAE (even if its uses qemu core to emulate PPC), fewer crashes and a little bit faster.

As a strategic point of view. Netsurf is most important browser for a Amiga, for a several reasons.

A) It is targeted systems like Amiga, so it woun't ever be impossible or too difficult to maintain.
B) It is possible to influence it's goals and targets.
C) There is a roadmap to HMTL 5 etc.

For me it seems to more and more difficult to get browser to support Amiga. When support is added they make startegic decisions wich makes Amiga support near impossible in future.

The problem with websites is not HTML and CSS support, but the Javascript, which is driven by browsers like Chrome. Even Microsoft stopped developing it's own engine and is using chromium for the Edge browser.

I am not so optimistic that Netsurf will be any more useful when the websites are build on Javascript, and a lot of them are turning to that direction, I am afraid.

@walkero

Sorry, you got me wrong. I didn't mean that Netsurf will be better, I meant that in few years it is only one wich is left.

I'd argue that CSS is still more important than Javascript. You need CSS first for Javascript layout to function.

The majority of websites need CSS to even display correctly. A lot (far less, but increasing as you say) need Javascript for navigation/display/functionality.

NetSurf has the CSS, and the Javascript is basic currently - there are thousands of bindings that need to be written, and only a couple of developers working on them. The layout engine needs rewriting too, as the current one isn't dynamic - so dynamic content changes cannot work at the moment.

It's slow progress, but web browsers are complicated and NetSurf is written by a handful of people in their spare time - massive difference to Chrome or Firefox. Contributions are welcome.

@jbni

"Are there any web browsers I can get for it that don't kinda suck?"

Yeah you got Odyssey which I use every day on my X5000 which is my main computer.

Now stop whining about browsers on underpowered motherboards and get on with life....

Stupid question:
Some time ago I thought Timberwolf was running well on my X5000. But when I tested it yesterday it did freeze after some seconds.
Deleted folder, and did a frehs install, including setting up the suggested font cache.
Started again: Now it does not immediately freeze and I can e.g. enter a search string but after then nothing happens. The same if I enter an Internet address.
Question: Does anybody have Timberwolf running at all?

@Primax

I tried it when it became available and tinkered with it a short time.

Then it started to annoy the hell out of me because of random crashes, extreme memory and cpu hogging and trashing some of my data due to write fails/crashes.

I deleted it and never bothered to try again...there wasn't *any* progress regarding bug fixes or development after the initial release anyway, so it was a bugged piece of mess back then and it's even worse now.