Amithlon (Haage & Partner, 2001) was a project capable of running 68k AmigaOS on IBM compatible PCs. It was comprised of a 68k just-in-time emulator that was the only program on top of a trimmed-down patched 2.x Linux kernel. The source code for the emulator was never published, but the patches to the kernel were. I always wanted to try Amithlon but I never got hold of the required PC hardware.
This project started with the goal of understanding and documenting how Amithlon worked, and over time ended up being able to run the unmodified original emulator on a current Linux kernel, supporting modern computers, booting from a USB stick.
Please, note NOTHING of Amithlon or AmigaOS is in this repository, and nothing of it is ever distributed by this project. You need your own original Amithlon CD ("AmigaOS XL") because the emulator files, the Kickstart ROMs and disk image are taken from it on your computer and checked against runtime/payload.sha256.
- It works. Booting from a USB stick it has run on ten different computers already, with AMD and Intel CPUs, laptops, desktops and small boards, from a range of 2011 to 2023: a Lenovo IdeaPad with a Ryzen 5 7530U, an ASUS Rampage V desktop with a Radeon RX 7900 XT, a Dell Precision M4600, an ASUS TUF Dash F15, an Intel NUC 11, an ASRock Z590 desktop, a ThinkPad X270, a MacBook Pro 2019 through a dock, an industrial board with a Celeron N2930, a Mini-ITX board with an Atom D2550. Screen in the panel's own resolution through Linux's graphics drivers for AMD and Intel chips, USB and laptop keyboards, touchpads, sound, wired and wireless networks, the power button, CD-ROM drives.
- Works in QEMU too, and a test of 45 parts
(
runtime/regress.py) runs all of it in QEMU, on a plain PC and on one made to look like a current UEFI machine. - What has not been tried, or does not work, is listed: docs/REAL_HARDWARE.md, section 9, and docs/TODO.md. The driver for NVIDIA graphics, and giving the Amiga the machine's own disks, have not yet been tried on a real machine.
docs/TESTING.md is for testers: the stick kit, which
holds everything that may be given away, and its mkstick.py, which
makes a stick image from it and your CD image on any Linux computer. It
also says what to send back.
cd runtime
python3 extract_payload.py --cd "/path/to/AmigaOS XL.iso" # once: the original files
make kernel && make && make initramfs
python3 boot.py # in QEMU
python3 mkusb.py # a USB stick image, build/amithlon-usb.imgruntime/README.md has the requirements and
everything else (make wifi for wireless networks, mkos39.py to install
AmigaOS 3.9 from the CD onto a disk image, the tests).
- docs/ARCHITECTURE.md: how Amithlon works, how this port works, and what is and is not done. Read this first.
- docs/REAL_HARDWARE.md: starting it on a real PC, what each machine did, and what to do when it does not work.
- docs/IMPROVEMENTS_OVER_ORIGINAL.md: this port against the Amithlon of 2001.
- docs/CHANGES_SINCE_HANDOVER.md: the history of the port.
The initial investigation of the original code, and the first boot of the
emulator on a modern kernel was done by Manuel Montoto over the years. In
2026 the project got a big push by incorporating AI to the investigation and
testing process. Documents are in docs/ (ARCHITECTURE names them). The system
in runtime/ and the documents above were written afterwards by means of AI,
and tested on real machines by the project's owner and its first testers.
The code of this project is under the GNU General Public License, version 2 only (LICENSE). That covers this project's programs, kernel modules and scripts, not Amithlon's files or AmigaOS.