Best Amiga for speed and cost

[bash]

Hi guys

Been lurking here for a few months now since I was made unemployed in March

Still havent managed to see all the threads so I'm hoping some experts can explain briefly what the best hardware upgrades for a A600 or A1200. I'm just talking so you can plug it into your monitor or TV (I'm guessing no HDMI but what about S-Video or Scart RGB?) and play all your games with one click with the fastest loading times ?

Do you just need to get a IDE adapter and a pre setup 4gb CF card with WHDload games on it or can you upgrade the RAM and video memory too for even faster performance or nicer (AGA?) graphics?

Apologies if there is some guide explaining this all already, I havent seen any myself :s

Cheers

 

[-Acid-]

If you just want to play games a ram board is usually more than enough for whdload. If you want to play 3D games (Gloom, Doom etc) then an 030 accelerator is your best bet to keep the price down (060 if you can afford it!).

If you want VGA output you need a scan doubler or indivision, both of which are costly and offer practically no benefit to old school gaming. A simple Amiga video cable does RGB/Scart (cost £10 or under usually) or you can use RCA for composite/audio output (£1-2 off ebay).

You only need an ide adapter if you want more than one drive attached to the ide port. You can buy a 2.5" hard disk or CF adapter and connect it directly with an ide cable if you only want to attach one at a time. See fitzsteve for cheap CF drives setup to order.

Finally you can use wdhload with no extra ram but the games you can run will be limited. Video memory is not really upgradable except for graphics cards but very few games use these.

I'd recommend an A1200 with some ram/030 and a hard drive or CF card for your WB and WHDload needs.

 

[bash]

Cheers -Acid-, I dont think theres many 3d games for the Amiga apart from the ones you mentioned right? Any great 3d games that make the upgrade worthwhile?

Unfortunatly I dont have a CRT anymore, what does the RGB Scart look like on a plasma/LCD? I bet its not great?

I'll check out the CF drives as the speed and size interests me. It would be great to have all my old Amiga games running at the touch of a mouse button with no loading times.

I guess I dont need to upgrade the video, how much ram would you recommend? Is 32mg the norm now? How fast and smooth could I run Beneath a Steel Sky for example with no disk swapping and full sound? Generally it would be for games like Sensible Soccer, Cannon Fodder and Shadow Fighter.

 

[CrazyC]

Cheers -Acid-, I dont think theres many 3d games for the Amiga apart from the ones you mentioned right? Any great 3d games that make the upgrade worthwhile?

Unfortunatly I dont have a CRT anymore, what does the RGB Scart look like on a plasma/LCD? I bet its not great?

I'll check out the CF drives as the speed and size interests me. It would be great to have all my old Amiga games running at the touch of a mouse button with no loading times.

I guess I dont need to upgrade the video, how much ram would you recommend? Is 32mg the norm now? How fast and smooth could I run Beneath a Steel Sky for example with no disk swapping and full sound? Generally it would be for games like Sensible Soccer, Cannon Fodder and Shadow Fighter.

If you get a decent RGB scart then I found it to be fine - certainly for gaming and a noticeable improvement over the RCA output.
I have an Indy Mk2 and whilst yes it lets me have a fancier workbench if you are only going to play games I would question the point/value.

If you get a ram card then you are talking 8mb max I think. For more than that you will want an accelerator. I think some of the new cards come with lots of ram without being anything like as expensive as a 1230.

If its just for whdload and normal gaming then I think an 8mb ram card will be fine. See my signature for what I have but it is major overkill I reckon now that I have it. icard I just couldn't help myself.....

 

[57Chevy]

Speed and Cost vs Amiga "Experience"

Speed and Cost vs Amiga "Experience"

Did you mean an "Amiga Experience" or a true hardware Amiga?

 

[AmiNeo]

Graphics on the amiga dont normally 'improve' the way modern ones do when you slap in a new graphics card or something. Not unless you go the whole hog and slap the miggy in a tower and start throwing expensive expansions at it, then you can add a PC type graphics card... but even then it is more increased resolution than anything.

Best bet is to get an A1200, its the best 'all rounder' and most will agree its best for WHDLoad setups. It's also the most upgradable should you ever come into some money in the future and the expansion cards are more common for it. A small memory upgrade and you'll have WHDLoad running on an A1200 like a dream.

If that proves too much funds wise still, nab an A600 which will prob cost you half as much or less. A small memory upgrade on that and it'll do all but AGA games.


Not sure if an A500 is an option here, I don't have much experience with them personally. Can these do WHDLoad with a memory upgrade guys? I've honestly not heard of anyone doing this...

 

[Buzzfuzz]

The only 3D game that really takes advantage of a Blizzard 1230 and ACA1232, is Frontier.
Most games will also load faster and run better, but other than that, no.

A good scart cable will get you a good picture, but it's better to have it on a monitor, depending on 15Khz modes, a LED monitor can show it.
The only ones so far are the Dell ST2320L and the 24 version of it.

Any Amiga can run WHDLoad if it has just over 4MB, if you add a 68010 to it, the quit key is also usable, but you can also ctrl-amiga-amiga to quit :wink:

Here is what it comes down to; while the A500 and A600 are the true retro Amiga's to play games on but their expansions can cost a lot of money!

So get yourself an A1200, fit it with an ACA1220, or if you can afford it a Blizzard 1230, the Blizzard 1230 is just drop it in there and start playing, while the ACA1232 might need a few tweaks with the ACAtool before it runs good.

@Amineo, I have got it running on an A500 Plus with 8MB Alfapower IDE and 2 other plus verisons both with GVP A530, but that is 030 and 8MB, so that doesn't count I guess

 

[velourfog]

Not sure if an A500 is an option here, I don't have much experience with them personally. Can these do WHDLoad with a memory upgrade guys? I've honestly not heard of anyone doing this...

The A500 will do WHDLoad just fine, but it's a lot more expensive to deck out an A500 with fast ram and hard drive (not to mention it takes a lot of desk space!) so he should deffo go for A1200 IMO. Just slap a cheap memory expansion in the trapdoor and that's enough for most classic gaming.

 

[Justin]

WinUAE

 

[-Acid-]

The only 3D game that really takes advantage of a Blizzard 1230 and ACA1232, is Frontier.

Xtreme Racing, Gloom, Testament, Alien Breed 3D, Nemac IV, Doom etc all take maximum advantage of accelerators. Not to mention games like the Settlers, Jimmy Whites Snooker and the Premier Manager series all run a hell of a lot faster for example.

And to agree with Justin, I forgot to mention WinUAE. If you have a half decent PC this is the best value way to use Amiga software as it will cost you nothing. You can't beat real hardware though especially for that old school nostalgia feeling.

 

[Justin]

well i would challenge that, if you remember my "l'Amiga" project, no one could tell the difference.

i used a keyrah to let me use an amiga 1200 case, original keyboard, mouse and joystick so it looked like an amiga (although it was black) and all the user inputs were genuine so it felt right, Zetr0 will back me up on this. At Blackpool no one could tell it wasn't an Amiga until they read the info sheet behind it.

emulation has come a long way and a keyrah gives you the correct feeling, so an uber fast miggy is the cost of a keyrah imo

cheers, Justin

The only 3D game that really takes advantage of a Blizzard 1230 and ACA1232, is Frontier.

Xtreme Racing, Gloom, Testament, Alien Breed 3D, Nemac IV, Doom etc all take maximum advantage of accelerators. Not to mention games like the Settlers, Jimmy Whites Snooker and the Premier Manager series all run a hell of a lot faster for example.

And to agree with Justin, I forgot to mention WinUAE. If you have a half decent PC this is the best value way to use Amiga software as it will cost you nothing. You can't beat real hardware though especially for that old school nostalgia feeling.

 

[RED IMPACT]

Cant go wrong with an A1200 IMO

 

[bash]

Thanks for the replies guys, I guess the A1200 route is relatively affordable with a RAM and CF card upgrades. Will WHDloads be as quick as Winuae, I'm talking instant loading?

 

[Justin]

Thanks for the replies guys, I guess the A1200 route is relatively affordable with a RAM and CF card upgrades. Will WHDloads be as quick as Winuae, I'm talking instant loading?

pretty quick, not as quick as winuae, but it is amazing what whdload can do, i hope you have bought a key? it is a very worthwhile thing

 

[rkauer]

WinUAE

Never an emoticon fits so perfectly:
:slap

 

[Slayer]

hmmm, I dunno, I have a 7970 in one of my X1000s and I think that's a faster card than most dedicated PC gamers are running LOL

Sure it's not fully utllised yet but it plays a mean and wickedly vivid 1080p slow motion video where sound isn't that important! ;-)


The next graphics system of course is going to rectify that...


hmmm, the older Amigas, well, I haven't used one since I last used my A4000D 604e for Beta Testing AmigaOS4.1... very nice machine of course, it also has a prometheus with a voodoo3. Couldn't get any of my particular Radeons to run with it, just a hardware thing I think.


Honestly, I have about 5 x A1200s and I stopped using my 060 A1200T about 6 or 7 years ago I'd take an A4000D/T any day.