Amiga Emulator WinUAE 4.0 release

WinUAE 4.0.0 is a new major version of the Commodore Amiga emulator for Windows. The new version introduces virtual monitor support, latency improvements, and a host of other new features and improvements.

Commodore launched the Amiga computer in 1985 and discontinued production in 1996. The Amiga was a successful home computer, arguably one of the most successful home computers of the 16-bit era.

It featured a mouse-based graphical user interface, multi-tasking, 16-bit graphics and was used in Home and professional environments alike.

While you can still buy Commodore Amigas on marketplaces like eBay, even sometimes in pristine condition, emulation is an option as it makes things a lot easier in many regards. You can run Amiga games and applications on your PC, and don't have to free up space to set up the Amiga and monitor.

Emulation adds other features, more control over hardware features such as RAM, support for different Kickstart versions, multiple external hard disks, a hard drive, and more to the mix.

The main issue that you may run into is that you need to get your hands on a Kickstart ROM. An official source is Amiga Forever which comes in different editions; all include a Kickstart ROM and some games to get started.

WinUAE 4.0.0

The official project website lists all major new features that landed in WinUAE 4.0.0. Probably the most important one from a user's point of view is support for Beam Racing Lagless VSync which reduces input latency to values below 5 milliseconds and replaces the previous Low Latency VSync implementation.

Another new feature is virtual multi-monitor support which you may use to connect virtual Amiga output connectors to individual WinUAE windows to emulate connections to more than one physical monitor.

Other new features of interest include support for overlay graphics LED to indicate floppy or power activity, better fake device driver support to provide valid data to programs requesting it, and several other improvements:

• Host mode FPU emulation mode is finally full extended precision (80-bit) capable
• Debugger supports running Amiga executables from shell
• Harddrive imager now also supports native (mainboard/expansion board) IDE connected CHS-only drives.
• Directory filesystem harddrive fake block size dynamic adjustment now starts from smaller disk size
• Default WASAPI audio device automatically follows Windows default audio device
• Close confirmation option added to misc panel
• Windowed mode resize enable/disable option.

Amiga emulation is probably only interesting to users who worked on the Amiga or used it back in the days. It is great for playing some of the classic games of the Commodore Amiga or watch demo scene productions if that is what you like.

Now You: Do you use emulators at all?