After more than ten years without any update in term of controllers, giving impression that AMX is going to close down, at least a new generation of controllers is announced, but what a disappointment !!
Last major upgrade for AMX has been more than 20 years ago now with NetLinx release replacing AXLink systems. Netlinx system was very promising but has never been fully used by AMX as once released it has never really evolved. Duet system, based on Java that was quite strange choice, has been released with an old outdated version of Java and AMX never made it to update it at current release.
After a very long time that looked like a silent death of AMX, a new generation of controllers has been announced end of summer 2023 that would be multi-language and a breaking change. After a moment of surprise, mystery has fallen apart at the seams and has been a huge disappointment.
AMX has released a new platform that is just a cheap copy of existing since years open-source platforms as Home-Assistant among others. As a matter of fact, these new controllers can be programmed with Netlinx (the existing language of the old platform but with a big restriction as M2M Netlinx feature has disappeared) and or with Python, Node-Red, JavaScript, Groovy. Everything we have already in an open-source system (out of Netlinx that is a proprietary language and you can’t use the old language in same time than new ones… huge mistake as it’ll make migration of program and programmers just a nightmare.
That new platform keeps compatibility with old systems but has absolutely none innovation as all tools/languages supported exist since years on platforms well more common and used on market ! One more time, AMX is completely outdated in term of technology.
Last point not really a good sign too: there is none indcation anywhere about the type of processor and architecture used in these new controllers excepted they are 10 times more powerful than Netlinx ones and there is e-MMC inside (at least over with bad quality Flash cards AMX used in Netlinx controllers during years). For me it fits quite well description of a Raspberry PI or equivalent !! excepted price because of course AMX keeps tradition alive: 2 000 bucks for basic controller (MU-2300) which is insanely expensive compared at existing and efficient solutions avalaible on market since years !
I’m waiting quite impatient the first tear-apart of a Muse controller to find out what is hardware inside as I think it’s going to be funny 😀
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