The history of Amiga icons from Workbench 3.0
Desktop icons have always been important for the Amiga since Workbench has always been GUI based since the beginning. IBM-PC users in the 80′ies worked in MS-DOS text-mode while Amiga users had a lightweight operating system and an efficient graphical user interface. In comparison with Windows and many other operating systems, Amiga icons can have two different images, one normal image and one clicked image, they can also have different shapes than typical icons ranging from very big to very small even in non-proportional size.
Workbench -the operating system of the Amiga- comes with a different set of icons depending of the version of the operating system. The earliest Workbench, 1.x came with the original set. In 2.x the icons where upgraded to a much more modern look, the operating system was also upgraded back then and became much better than 1.x ever was. Workbench 3.0 and 3.1 used the same icons as 2.x but when Workbench 3.5 and 3.9 was released the icons where completely redrawn in color.
Commodore original icons 3.x
The original workbench icon set is in 4 colors only. Opinions about the look of these icons are very broad, some hate them and some like them. I happen to like them, they are very basic but they look all right even high resolution and in low resolution. They are the fastest icons to run if you want Workbench to be snappy and responsive because of their limited use of the palette.
Magic Workbench
MWB -short for Magic Workbench- was released in 1993 and was instantly crowned as one of the most important add on for Workbench ever, many claimed a future release of Workbench needed to have MWB installed by default. Commodore folded a year later in 1994 and there would be many years until a new version of Workbench was officially released.
Magic Workbench is an amazing icon package where the icons are based on only 8 colors. Not having to run Workbench in more than 8 colors meant the tradeoff between a good looking desktop and a fast desktop was minimal. With the fastest 060 turbo board a switch to MWB can bring an amazing speed boost over a PNG or GlowIcon Workbench. Many claimed that Magic Workbench looks dull, but I have to disagree, the icons are very detailed and have a professional look and most important, the original icon set from the main MWB-package just flows together to form a unified and great looking Workbench.
New Icons
New Icons where an icon set that made it possible to run color icons on the Amiga. NI was released around the same time as Magic Workbench and while MWB users claimed that NI icons looked like ketchup and mustard, New Icons users claimed MWB was a dull and gray icon set. While New Icons definitely did show it was possible to have a colorful desktop with nice looking icons most of the icons lacked quality and did not look as good as Magic Workbench. NI was also much slower than the original Commodore and MWB icons so you had to have a fast Amiga and preferably a graphics board to keep the Amiga from slowing down. New Icons did show in which way the future for Workbench would lead but in the end it was a hack and you needed to have a very beefed up Amiga in order to not experience much slow downs.
Glow Icons
A revolutionary icon pack was released on Aminet in 1998. It was called Glow Icons and consisted of a set of New Icon compatible icons with a nice effect, when an icon was clicked a nice glow was added around the image. Icon sets for MWB and NI was not something new, there are many of them on Aminet but Glow Icons had style -much thanks to the original author being a designer- something the default amateurish New Icons lacked. The images where deliciously dithered by hand and the colors where calm and easy to look at, it was obvious that there was a real designer who had created this icon set. Glow Icons got the official approve by the Amiga world when the icon pack was integrated into the new official update of Workbench called Workbench 3.5. While the original Glow Icons did look very good, many of the third party icons released by Amiga fans did not live up to the high standards of the original set, also the glow effect did not fit all icons but overall GI was a superb update and a realistic alternative to MWB.
PNG
Amiga could not use PNG icons until there was a patch released called Powericons. With the patch installed the big world of PNG icons opened up and Workbench changed the look from dithered pixels to smooth photoshopped faded icons. While the hardware requirements for New Icons could be claimed steep back in the day, nothing compares to the hardware requirements needed to run PNG icons, it requires the fastest CPU and graphics board you can get your hands on for pleasant experience, the author claims the best Amiga to run the patch on is an emulated one. But users have been reported they have got reasonable speed on a 060 based Amiga with the right system-speedup-patches.