How many Amiga are left in the world?

[YouKnowWho]

A thought crossed my mind: How many Amiga are left in the world?

We saw the video below, which told us 4.91 million Amiga were made. But how many are left?



How many were tossed in the 2000s? How many more went straight to e-recycling in 2010s? How many were killed by the battery?
Since wedge Amiga were 80% of sales, and since they tend to be easier to justify throwing out/recycling, then add to this big-box Amiga with battery damage/failure and especially those owned by businesses, which would have no attachment and be discarded/replaced/upgraded with other systems and then thrown out/recycled, I'm thinking that a number like 70% to 75% of Amiga ever produced being in the landfill/scrapped is a guess I'd go with. I mean, even I'm guilty of declining an offer of a yellowed 500 back in 2007 and as a result it got put in the e-waste bin. That's 25-30% of original Amiga made by Commodore left today.

Leaving a population of 1.25-1.45 million Amiga left in the world today by my guess. What do you guys think? More? Less?

P.S. Great topic ahead of May 6th, right? Oh sure, May 6th, 1994 Channel Tunnel got connected, but another event occurred that is not listed on the May 6th Wikipedia events page - Commodore declared bankruptcy that day of course.

 

[miggymad]

I can vouch for 9 of them, all working A1200's ... plus enough spares to build another 6

 

[Buzzfuzz]

Less, way less, if you see the amount owned here and not many for sale anymore, I would be amazed if world wide there are more than 200000

 

[Flyerdommo]

My estimate would be that about 5 percent of all Amigas have survived to the present day, which would be about 250,000. Mostly Amiga 500s of course, considering their production numbers and build quality relative to other models. I own a perfectly working, as-good-as-new Amiga 500+ and a 1200 which I haven't powered up in ten years.

 

[Xanxi]

I would say 25 are in my hands in working state ou easy to rejuvenate in working state, but some have changed into something else (ReAmiga 1200, new A4000 mobo or A4000TX).

 

[Flyerdommo]

A lot of the surviving Amigas won't be fully operational either, I would guess.

 

[8bitplus]

Are we only counting full systems, or just working motherboards? I've got about 10 including motherboards. A1200's, 500 and CD32.

 

[Rakeim132]

I would say 25 are in my hands in working state ou easy to rejuvenate in working state, but some have changed into something else (ReAmiga 1200, new A4000 mobo or A4000TX).

Probably close to that same number....

 

[Flyerdommo]

I would put the machines in the count only if they comprise a case, a keyboard, and a motherboard, irrespective of their working order. The machines shouldn't have any major physical damage to be included.

 

[YouKnowWho]

Are we only counting full systems, or just working motherboards? I've got about 10 including motherboards. A1200's, 500 and CD32.

Ahhh...details. I think we could get down to working motherboards, as long as they are working. I mean, even the "Re" anything needs a chipset, and in the grand scheme probably wouldn't make a difference.

I'm a bit surprised that a few of you think it's just 5% left. I hope it's a bit more.

I can vouch for 9 of them, all working A1200's ... plus enough spares to build another 6

Nice trick to keep your total Amiga single digits @miggymad. I tried that trick, but somehow I need them all to be in a working state, in their full glory and can't find a way to escape the double digits.

So...you're going to let those 6 realize their potential, or keep them down to keep your total single digits?

 

[Buzzfuzz]

Ahhh...details. I think we could get down to working motherboards, as long as they are working. I mean, even the "Re" anything needs a chipset, and in the grand scheme probably wouldn't make a difference.

I'm a bit surprised that a few of you think it's just 5% left. I hope it's a bit more.


Nice trick to keep your total Amiga single digits @miggymad. I tried that trick, but somehow I need them all to be in a working state, in their full glory and can't find a way to escape the double digits.

So...you're going to let those 6 realize their potential, or keep them down to keep your total single digits?

It's not hope for me, I just don't think there aren't many out there and Commodore didn't keep the records nice and tidy.
And if you look at the numbers overall with the C16, Vic20, C64, C128 and so on I doubt much survived in total.
When PC's became more dominant and later the rise of the consoles and handhelds, most Commodore's where dumped at the local recycling sites.

The thing is, when I came back to the Amiga scene late 2009 I could find some at local thrift shops, even found a Blizzard 1260 once as an unknown PC card
But once social media became more mainstream and Google began playing a more dominante role, it quickly became less and less.

I believe thrift shops are now holding a lot of things once they have verified what it is and how much it's worth, I also believe that some people are called before these things even hit the shelves and are bought without ever being on the shelf.

And I also believe we are responsible for it our self's, while price discussions are a no go here, I believe it is safe to say that increase over the last decade has been quite steep to put it mildly.
I also don't believe the story of everything becoming rare or not being replaceable, few examples, reramsey, bluster and so on, ReAmiga boards and even new turbo cards.

And yes I have owned everything from the A1000 to A4000T including all expansions and turbocards, even the Cyberstorm PPC and Blizzard PPC, but I also scaled down to single digets, 9 in total now and only spare chips and other stuff, like cables and keyboards

The future ?
I don't know, but I guess as long as we are here, it will go on

 

[qz3fwd]

All of my Amiga's are Re's. Only the custom chipsets are original NOS. Even the custom chips are being Re-Implemented like the ReSDMAC this year. New sheetmetal cases, keyboards, front fascias, injection molded cases. I have never owned nor even physically seen an original Amiga. I sure as heck never saw them in the stores when they were "mainstream".
I currently have 6 systems, the most recent being a purple A1200 build I decided to build back in December. Purple motherboard, translucent purple case, black mechanical keyboard, black accelerator and HDMI scandoubler. Amazing times.

New Amiga's are being born every day!

 

[YouKnowWho]

@Buzzfuzz - you make a lot of sense. I agree that there was a lot of Amiga dumping (let's call it "surrender" to be nice) at that time. Even we who supported it, left. It would be interesting to find out who always kept an Amiga. I let go of my 2000/040 33Mhz loaded system in 1995 and didn't even feel sad about it. I didn't get a 1200, just to have an Amiga again until around 2007 if memory serves me right. It was dirt cheap and I bought a brand new original replacement keyboard for it for the price of a few pints. And indeed, now nice examples are precious. There is a reward in getting these things back to clean presentable working condition. Toughest thing for me is retrobrighting these 1084s! (only occasionally).

And congratulations to get down to single digits. I WILL get down there eventually! Do FPGAs count? I think you make sense that about 5% of what was manufactured has survived. Those late 90s and early 2000s were brutal to the Amiga, of that there is no doubt. I was hoping it was more, but as I think about what you guys said I think it 200-250K original Commodore/Escom systems makes sense. Maybe a poll would be in order...not sure if that's possible here.

@qz3fwd, I think I've come across some of your posts and your skills in photos, so I understand you like to build these. If I had your skills I would too. As it is, I tend to lean toward original Commodore builds, with some fun added. But all my Amiga are C= original stuff. It's all these 1200s that are here that are causing the trouble pushing me into double digits. They are just so beautiful! Gotta have a PAL, an NTSC, a 1200HD/40 a black one, a warranty sealed one, custom case one, or two, or maybe three...arrrr! . I will find a path to single digit Amiga collection...one day. Maybe if the project I'm working on turns out well, it will help.

 

[zcacrgw]

@YouKnowWho Late 90s were brutal but WoA `99 had ~1000 attendess IIRC and when CU Amiga died the ABCs in the last issue were still over 20k and AF was still going. My guess is you're looking at thousands who've continually had one in service since the early nineties or before but I'd be surprised if it's much higher than that.

 

[Buzzfuzz]

@Buzzfuzz - you make a lot of sense. I agree that there was a lot of Amiga dumping (let's call it "surrender" to be nice) at that time. Even we who supported it, left. It would be interesting to find out who always kept an Amiga. I let go of my 2000/040 33Mhz loaded system in 1995 and didn't even feel sad about it. I didn't get a 1200, just to have an Amiga again until around 2007 if memory serves me right. It was dirt cheap and I bought a brand new original replacement keyboard for it for the price of a few pints. And indeed, now nice examples are precious. There is a reward in getting these things back to clean presentable working condition. Toughest thing for me is retrobrighting these 1084s! (only occasionally).

And congratulations to get down to single digits. I WILL get down there eventually! Do FPGAs count? I think you make sense that about 5% of what was manufactured has survived. Those late 90s and early 2000s were brutal to the Amiga, of that there is no doubt. I was hoping it was more, but as I think about what you guys said I think it 200-250K original Commodore/Escom systems makes sense. Maybe a poll would be in order...not sure if that's possible here.

I did the same thing in 2009, in 2010 I was coming up to 20+ Amiga's, by the end of 2010 I had most systems, in 2011 I completed the quest, finalizing the rare towers. In 2012 most systems were up and running and fully loaded, every system had a turbo card, memory expansion and most of them also graphics cards and scan doublers.

Amigamap.com - The global map of all known Amiga, MorphOS and AROS computers and their users

The global map of all known Amiga, MorphOS and AROS computers and their users, Amiga, CD32, CDTV, pegasos, sam, amigaone, aros, morphos, 500, x1000, amiga2500, amiga2000, amiga1200, amiga500, amiga600, amiga4000, amiga3000, amiga1000, gba1000

amigamap.com

That site is a good reference, but if it's up to date ?

 

[YouKnowWho]

Amigamap.com - The global map of all known Amiga, MorphOS and AROS computers and their users

The global map of all known Amiga, MorphOS and AROS computers and their users, Amiga, CD32, CDTV, pegasos, sam, amigaone, aros, morphos, 500, x1000, amiga2500, amiga2000, amiga1200, amiga500, amiga600, amiga4000, amiga3000, amiga1000, gba1000

amigamap.com

That site is a good reference, but if it's up to date ?

WOW! Thank you for sharing. I cannot believe such a site exists. It's amazing. I guess I should register my 11 Amiga. I'd have to cut 2 to get to single digits. I can't choose right now.

EDIT: So multiply this site 25x or 30x? For every registered Amiga there are 25-30 not registered? It does make sense. I have a few and this is the first time I heard of this site.

 

[YouKnowWho]

We saw the video below, which told us 4.91 million Amiga were made.

8-bit Guy just posted a C128 video, and at the top notes that 5 million Commodore 128s were sold.

My first thought was...so...more than all models of Amigas?!

 

[Flyerdommo]

According to journalist Mark Jordan around 4 million C128 variants were sold (Run, Vol. 7, No. 3, 1990, p. 47).

 

[YouKnowWho]

Have you seen all the C128 prototypes/versions? He shows them in the Alternate Universe video. Really cool to see "new" stuff I never saw before from the times past. But sales numbers are quite surprising...potentially more 128s than ALL Amiga maybe true.

 

[Flyerdommo]

Nice video by the 8-Bit-Guy. Commodore experimented with a lot of designs, but they knew the C128 would be their last 8-bit machine and, consequently, put most of their energy into the Amiga. When evaluating Amiga sales, one shouldn't forget that for two years, the Amiga existed only in the form of the very expensive A1000 model. Only in 1987 did Commodore bring out the much cheaper A500. Only then did the Amiga get a boost in sales numbers. By then, the Amiga's technological advantage over the IBM PC architecture had already begun to diminish though. By the late 1980s, the Amiga line could no longer beat out a standard IBM compatible in terms of graphics performance.