Amiga, do I need it, why and which one?

[Grimakis]

New Poster here.

Right now, all I have is a Commodore 64. I've got no other 8-Bit computers, and I have no 16-Bit computers. I've been watching the Computer Chronicles on YouTube. I've seen video of the Amiga, the Atari ST, IBM PCs, etc. I have an urge to get a 16-bit machine.

Based on what I have seen, Amiga's tend to be more costly compared to Ataris, but they appear to have a bigger following, and a ton of modern-day support.

Based on a video on YouTube by Dan Wood, I came to the personal conclusion that an Amiga 1200 offers the best compromise between size, capability, availability and expandability. However, I'm having trouble tracking down a US model compared to the Amiga 500 or Amiga 500+.

If you were located in the US, looking for a US 16-bit computer, would you choose an Amiga? Would it be the 1200? What other peripherals besides the computer, display, and mouse would you get?

Best Regards,
Grimakis

 

[Sardine]

for a pure 16 bit experience I would go for an Amiga 1200

4mb or better 8mb ram expansion, some of the lower ACA12xx range of expansion seem better for price/ram/speedup

4gb compact flash setup or a real 2.5" HDD with a classic workbench and WHDLoad setup.

a good joystick and mouse, thats about all you need to start you off.


as your in the US, a PAL model would support more software but then you will need a monitor / TV with RGB Scart to get a good picture or even better but more costly an Indivision addon which gives you VGA output to a standard Monitor.


or....

get a gotek drive and just do it the old way of loading disk images or even real Amiga disks,,, 99% of all Amiga games don't require more than the built in 2mb ram. the extra ram is only needed if you want to use WHDLoad and or a classic workbench install which can eat 1mb-1.5mb ram just loading the operating system

 

[Grimakis]

Can you clarify a bit about Workbench or WHDLoad?

From what I understand, Kickstart is ROM firmware that bootstraps into the OS.(Workbench?)

Workbench can be stored either on a Hard Disk(or CF card) or booted from a floppy disk every time. Given that I would want to keep the OS on a Compact Flash cart(i think this is the easiest solution?), I would need the RAM upgrade?

If I don't have Workbench, are you saying I would be able to boot directly into software without the Workbench OS?

Sorry for being very Amiga-noobish here.

Best Regards,
Grimakis

 

[Paul]

If you buy an A1200 (which, I agree with Sardine, is the best choice) you should either get it with the Workbench floppies, or Workbench on the HD. If not, some people sell the OS separately, but it can be hard to track down, so best to buy with.

You are correct Kickstart is ROM firmware, Workbench is the OS.

You cannot boot without workbench.

No idea about a flash boot, but I'm guessing it will require work as the Amiga was not designed to boot this way (bet someone has tried it, and you will get better advice on that from someone else).

- - - Updated - - -

As to where to get one - A good place to look (but you may have to wait a while for what you want) is here:
https://www.amibay.com/forumdisplay.php?24-Amiga

 

[Sardine]

99% of all games don't require workbench they boot into the games directly when loaded from floppy disk or Gotek replacement and therefore don't require extra ram ,an OS or hard disk.

WHDLoad is a method of storing "game disk images" on the hard disk and you can store hundreds of games this way in an easy to use menu system called "iGame"

if for example "Secret of Monkey Island" is a 4 disk game, loading from real floppy is a pain swapping disks and loading times not to mention Monkey Island 2, 12 disks.

WHDLoad buffers the 4 disk images into available ram loading them from hard disk this obviously requires extra ram as you need to be booted into Workbench OS before loading WHDLoad and 4mb is a minimum, 8mb is much better but even better is a cheap aca12xx addon card which can come with 128mb ram and a speedup 28mhz i think.

as for hard disk, a cheap 4gb compact flash card setup is all you need, silent and fast (no moving parts) and easy to connect to you PC and setup on "winuae" amiga emulator.



Kickstart ROM = computer motherboard BIOS
Workbench = Operating system like Windows or Linux.

if all you want is to load games then a gotek or real floppy disks is the way to go.

as soon as you say "Hard Disk" then ram will be used (just for the buffers you lose 100-200k so you're down to 1.8mb or less before booting the system), then you load the operating system which depending on what you install can lose you a further 500k to 1mb so,

you boot your nice new A1200 2mb to Workbench with iGame and all required libraries (dont panic it comes ready done for you(classic workbench,, google it)) and to your horror it says at the top menu bar 800k ram free,,,, not enough to load even 1 game.

then you click iGame and the 800k drops to 0k as it loads the list of games you have stored....

there are workarounds to free up ram and menu shortcuts but they are a pain to setup...

either use real floppy's or a gotek or bite the bullet and buy at least an 8mb ram card or better an ACA12xx addon you wont regret it and makes your Amiga a joy to use.

 

[edd_jedi]

Above summaries it well, in a nutshell if you want to do anything other than boot games directly from floppy, you will need a RAM upgrade as 2MB is not enough to boot the vast majority of games once the OS (Workbench) is up and running.

 

[manic23]

If you need help setting up the CF card for use with WHDLoad on a real Amiga, then this video really helped me out, it's by a former member here and personal friend of mine fitzsteve, give it a watch it was really helpful to me.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Zd42RsKHm5Y

 

[demolition]

If you get an Amiga, I will also recommend an A1200 with a basic accelerator/RAM expansion, like the ACA1221, and some HDD/CF card to boot from. Amigakit sells all this.
For pure gaming, you can also get far with an A500 with ½+½MB RAM and a floppy emulator like the Gotek/HxC (don't bother with real disks). This is the cheap solution, however I think many people who go this route end up with a 1200 in the end anyway since it is more versatile, so might as well go there directly.

Display-wise you have the biggest issue. In Europa, a SCART cable is a very nice solution but since this does not exist in the US you are forced to use other methods. I think the best and cheapest option is to find a LCD monitor which can work with the RGB signal through the VGA connector and use a suitable converter (someone here on Amibay builds these, but due to the lousy search function I cannot find the thread atm). I have a Dell 2001FP which displays a nice picture this way with smooth 50 Hz scrolling. The same monitor is also very good with composite and s-video inputs, like from the C64.
It's an older model, but that just meant that I got it cheap.