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A propos d'Obligement
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David Brunet
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Interview with Filip Dab-Mirowski
(Interview conducted by Lionel X and from Obligement 31 - January 2002)
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 Could you introduce yourself?
My name is Filip Dab-Mirowski, I`m 21 years old. I`m the owner of Matay. I`ve born and I live in Warsaw, Poland.
Except the work in Matay I`m studying law, on one of the Warsaw`s universities.
Could you tell us how did you discovered
Amiga computer, and what is your history with this computer?
My father bought me my first Amiga in 1991, it was A500+ with 1084S monitor. My previous computer was C64, so you can
imagine how the colorful gfx and great sound of Amiga astonished me. Next was an A600 with 2Mb ram and 120 Mb hard disk,
CD32, A1200 and finally A4000. In 1996 I began my cooperation with polish "Magazyn Amiga" (sister of the German one)
and stayed with it as a (mainly) games editor to the downfall of this great paper in the end of 1999.
I`ve always wanted to create something for this computer, I`ve been a part of few development teams from which the
last one was LCS. I gave the ideas, wrote a lot of scripts, stories, worked out details and tried to coordinate the
work of the group, but as it happens usually, it didn`t work. Meanwhile I`ve been betatester of several programs and
games, like for example WipEout 2097. On spring 2000 I`ve decided the time is up to make something serious and early
summer Matay is born... ;-)
What is your current configuration?
Oh it`s a PC, Celeron ... ermm... *grins*
Well that too but except this I have an Amiga 4000 tower with Prometheus (Voodoo3, Fast Ethernet/Ethernet cards and
tuner TV card) with CyberstormPPC 060/50 233mhz card and 96 Mb RAM.
Why are you still using Amiga computers?
Because it suits my needs. Further more, AmigaOS is the most user friendly system I`ve ever seen, it`s a lot more pleasant
to use an Amiga than PC. So I don`t use it, if I don`t have to and there are not many reasons left to use a PC if I have
an Amiga with Prometheus, right?
Let's talk about Matay... Where does the name
"Matay" come from?
That`s how my 3 years old brother called my father, instead of Maciej (Matthew) he kept saying "Mataj". We lacked the
ideas for name and this one sounded pretty original ;-)
Could you talk about the (short) story of Matay?
Matay history is pretty short, it`s offically running from 01.09.2000 It was started earlier to give a legal base for
Prometheus development. For the first few months Matay was known to public only as an internet shop. Prometheus
was developed in a full secret so not many people invloved in Amiga community had any knowledge about it.
How many people are currently working at Matay?
We have 6 contract workers and people who cooperate closely.
What are the current Matay products?
Prometheus PCI bridge and Boing`em! PDA game.
Could you tell us genesis of Prometheus card?
Grzegorz Kraszewski worked on a project called AmiPCI since the early 1999. He was not moving further because of lack
of funds, technical equipment and because that was only his hobby. After talking with him on an IRC channel (we knew
eachother earlier) I`ve decided the experience he had with AmiPCI and his education (Grzegorz is an engineer) plus
the money I gathered to start up the company will be enough to construct a decent PCI resolution for Amiga computers.
Zorro3 seemed the most flexible way of connecting the device so we`ve decided to go for it. Some people gave us a lot of help
for which I`m truly thankful, we wouldn`t make it without their help.
Which are the main advantages of Prometheus
Card compared to Other Amiga/PCI cards?
Price, open SDK, high quality design, real customers support, free drivers.
And compared to future Computers? AmigaOne or Pegasos?
The only way to bring your old Amiga into the future is to buy a Prometheus and add a PPC card later.
What are current drivers available for Prometheus?
2D/3D S3Virge, Voodoo 3 2000/3000, Voodoo4 4500 (no official 3D driver), NE2000 compatible ethernet cards.
Working developer versions of Fast Ethernet and Tuner TV drivers (note to editor: it`s possible that before when you
will publish this article such drivers and some other software will be already avaliable).
What is planned for the future of Prometheus?
AmigaOS 4.0 support, which means a PowerPC board. That`s for sure. What else? More and more drivers for different types of PCI cards.
Are you satisfied with the number of Prometheus
sold? Does it cope with planned figures?
We`ve sold over half of our stock. Planned figures are when we will sell the last board ;-)
What are your other projects at Matay? Will we
see hardware for next generation Amiga, from Matay?
As for now we will focus on Prometheus and games for AmigaDE (PDA). It`s a bit too early to talk about next generation
Amiga. We will see what will the market need. We will suit the needs :-)
Are you still developping for AmigaDE?
Yes.
What are you thinking of Amiga Inc. (project,
strategy, current situation)?
The idea is great, still, it needs a lot of effort. The operating system is the most important thing in Amiga, that`s its
soul. The body - hardware - is too old, we have to search for a new host... hm, I sound like an alien ;-)
Are you working with Hyperion for AmigaOS 4.0 compatibility?
Yes.
And what about MorphOS/Pegasos?
If Prometheus could be compatible with MorphOS, it would be great.
Could you talk about the Amiga market in Poland?
It shrinked rapidly during last few years. Once, it was one of the biggest markets in Europe. In 1998 there were at least
40.000 users, now, I don`t think there`s more than 3000-4000 active users. We still try to support the remaining group
by giving them a possibility to buy Amiga software.
Is there is a question I didn't ask you, and
that you want to answer to?
Erm... not really ;-)
Do you have a message for our readers?
Stay with Amiga, support Amiga companies and stay tuned for more news from Matay.
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