The Amiga is a family of personal computers sold by Commodore in the 1980s and 1990s. Based on the Motorola 68000 family of microprocessors, the machine has a custom chipset with graphics and sound capabilities that were unprecedented for the price, and a pre-emptive multitasking operating system called AmigaOS. Although early Commodore advertisements attempt to cast the computer as an all-purpose business machine, especially when outfitted with the Amiga Sidecar PC compatibility add-on, the Amiga was most commercially successful as a home computer, with a wide range of games and creative software.
https://youtu.be/7Ih4V90CqiE (https://youtu.be/7Ih4V90CqiE)
Amstrad Plus ftw!
I have an Amiga 600, and I think it complements very well the Amstrad machines.
And there are cheap expansions nowadays that makes it even more enjoyable.
Only today I found an A600 and a A500 shell, just going through random stuff😀
Anyone wants a pretty white shell?
Quote from: Gryzor on 17:05, 26 January 22
Anyone wants a pretty white shell?
Mine is in pretty good shape, no major yellowing. Which is quite surprising, actually :)
Quote from: Gryzor on 17:05, 26 January 22
Only today I found an A600 and a A500 shell, just going through random stuff😀
Anyone wants a pretty white shell?
A pretty white shell, yes please...
Quote from: Gryzor on 17:05, 26 January 22
Only today I found an A600 and a A500 shell, just going through random stuff😀
Anyone wants a pretty white shell?
I would take the A600 case If it's still available ;D
It was a full 600 and a 500 case, sorry about the phrasing.... And it went within the hour I'm afraid, sorry guys😓
If I find anything else of note I'll let you know.
The first time I could see an Amiga 500, in a store, I was impressed, they were testing the game Shadow of The Beast, those graphics, that sound, that music... it was a dream, I was at that moment with my Amstrad CPC hehe, I hope one day to buy an Amiga 500.
My grandfather bought my brother an Amiga 500 to take to uni, must have been around 1989-1990.
It had the Batman pack and I was just amazed by the games on it, I'd never seen anything like it.
Probably why I have an A1200 on the desk next to me now...
My brother, who is 5 years younger, had (and still has) an amiga 500. We had many great hours playing games and watching demos on it but I always loved and love my CPC.
Back then there were also those Commodore-Kids, who did not have one original game and on the other side us few schneider-kids.
Nowadays, when I read the story behind the Amiga and these enthusiastic people (Jay Miner et all) who did this stuff years before the others I'm really into it and I'm "angry" that commodore bought them and messed it all up.
In my point of view (today) they had the technology to rule them all but they (commodore) failed.
Well absolutely, but also commodore gave them the bloodline needed to launch it in the first place... I now realize that in all the histories I've read, there's not another suitor other than Atari and Commodore.
I own an A500, A600 and A1200, but I bought them all in the last 15 years, never owned one back when they came out.
Bryce.
Interestingly the A500 was among the very first 'old' computers I got when I started my collection. First was a 464 and then I think the A500 with a sidecar HDD.
Two of my friends owned the A500 in the late 80's thru to the mid 90's.
This gave me the chance to look at it "close up and personal" - I drooled over the game/demo graphics and sound but hated what it represented - to me it was THE "CPC killer". >:(
No, you had to be vary well off, they werent cheap. Think about £370.00 in 90/91 when I got an Atari ST, which was £300.00.
Also you had to have a spare tv too.
Mind its nice getting to play some Amiga games via Amiga Live and Ant Stream. As Im not paying a £120.00 for an Amiga mini.
Didn't have one back in the day. Have an A500 now with a Gotek and an accelerator card (extra RAM, CF loading etc)
Definitely a rich kids machine in the late 80s though but I was never overly impressed with it at the time I'd see games. It was all style and very little substance.
Obviously that's a 15 year old kids opinion at the time and looking at it now, there were a lot of good games that came out for the machine, but the earlier titles were naff at best. It suffered a lot of bad ST ports during the 87-89 period but most of the Lotus games were awesome on it. Pinball Dreams and Pinball Fantasies obviously rule the school too.
I never liked Zool though.
Quote from: ComSoft6128I drooled over the game/demo graphics and sound but hated what it represented - to me it was THE "CPC killer". >:(
Ha ha! I call it The Demo Machine, or the Turrican Machine - whatever you prefer. If you are through with part 1 and 2, I recommend playing The Adventures of Quick & Silva! It's from the same dev team, music also by Chris Hülsbeck and they were using the Turrican engine to build that game!
BTW: this is the only production I made for that machine: https://www.pouet.net/prod.php?which=33627
Quote from: Nworc on 10:15, 28 January 22
BTW: this is the only production I made for that machine: https://www.pouet.net/prod.php?which=33627
That's a nice retro screen :) Vid?
Quote from: ComSoft6128 on 09:12, 28 January 22
Two of my friends owned the A500 in the late 80's thru to the mid 90's.
This gave me the chance to look at it "close up and personal" - I drooled over the game/demo graphics and sound but hated what it represented - to me it was THE "CPC killer". >:(
I'd have blamed that more on the Sega Megadrive to be honest. CPC sales and game sales were still doing well the first few years after the Amiga's launch.
Once the Master System dropped in price with it's instant loading, from what I could see, the C64, Speccy and CPC owners gravitated towards those.
But once the Megadrive was announced it's UK/Euro release in Summer 1990 it was game over for all of the above. It was way more affordable than the Amiga.
Amstrad dropping the ball with the Plus range was essentially Sugar putting the final nail in his own coffin regarding the Amstrad 8bits, but by then he no longer cared, the PCW was his way forward.
Yes, I got a second hard A500 after my CPC 6128 (which replaced my 464), and later on an A1200.
Sadly all of these were sold on. I now only have a 464 and A500 I bought in the past few years. Amigas sell for crazy money these days, but PiMiga is a good alternative.
And what is it with that annoying bleep-ping noise here?
It's the Amiga running our forum notification system😀 Will disable it today when I get home.
By the time the Amiga came out I had started university and had my first contact with PC's (and other exotic systems of the time such as VAX etc.). I lost my interest in the entire "Home Computer" scene at that point, especially as I was never a gamer.
Bryce.
We had a VAX at uni running rooms of terminals. After going from my 1040ST toa 486/120 I just couldn't comprehend it. But it did teach me the wonders of CLI :D
Quote from: Shaun M. Neary on 13:17, 28 January 22
But once the Megadrive was announced it's UK/Euro release in Summer 1990 it was game over for all of the above. It was way more affordable than the Amiga.
Not when you factor in the software costs - and that's even before we mention piracy. But even so, it didn't matter that much, because computers and consoles have always been different concepts, even though they shared some of the games. Back then, I didn't want a NES, Megadrive or SNES, simply because I wanted to be able to do computer things and play computer style games. And for that Amiga was an undisputed Queen, circa ~1987 - 1992, before PC finally came down in price and up in gaming capabilities. When I first saw Defender of The Crown & Lost Patrol at some computer fair in the late 80s I knew the 8-bit era is over and I just have to beg/steal/borrow to get on that crazy 16-bit train.
For the ground-breaking memories from that heady period it's still my favourite micro ever. Currently have an A500 with Gotek & ACA500+. Pity they skyrocketed in price during the Covid era, especially the A1200...
Quote from: arkive on 14:48, 28 January 22Not when you factor in the software costs - and that's even before we mention piracy. But even so, it didn't matter that much, because computers and consoles have always been different concepts, even though they shared some of the games. Back then, I didn't want a NES, Megadrive or SNES, simply because I wanted to be able to do computer things and play computer style games. And for that Amiga was an undisputed Queen, circa ~1987 - 1992, before PC finally came down in price and up in gaming capabilities. When I first saw Defender of The Crown & Lost Patrol at some computer fair in the late 80s I knew the 8-bit era is over and I just have to beg/steal/borrow to get on that crazy 16-bit train. For the ground-breaking memories from that heady period it's still my favourite micro ever. Currently have an A500 with Gotek & ACA500+. Pity they skyrocketed in price during the Covid era, especially the A1200...
For you maybe, but for a lot of the consumer market by the time 1990 rolled around, they wanted to game and that was it.
Why do you think Amstrad attempted the console market?
Also the Amiga's were skyrocking pre-Covid as well. I got my A500 in 2018 I think and the prices were starting to soar even then.
Quote from: arkive on 14:48, 28 January 22Pity they skyrocketed in price during the Covid era, especially the A1200
Damn, should I sell?
Quote from: Shaun M. Neary on 14:52, 28 January 22
For you maybe, but for a lot of the consumer market by the time 1990 rolled around, they wanted to game and that was it.
Why do you think Amstrad attempted the console market?
Also the Amiga's were skyrocking pre-Covid as well. I got my A500 in 2018 I think and the prices were starting to soar even then.
I'm glad I had single handedly kept the Amiga scene alive for a few more years, and also supported that lil' thing called PC gaming. Go me! 8)
Gaming in 1990 was not much different than in 1977 or 2022. Some people prefer consoles, some computers, some even do it on both (crazy, I know). The 8-bit machines died because 16-bit ones appeared, and these in turn folded when the PC model steamrolled everything in the computer zone. Consoles did not have much to do with it...it's really not a big mystery.
Before Covid prices of old hardware were steadily rising, which is natural for any retro stuff, but not skyrocketing like in the last 2 years (we're talking 100-200% rise).
Oh absolutely, I won't disagree with any of that. I did my stint of PC gaming during the mid 90s myself, Doom, Duke Nukem, Quake, Worms, GTA etc. All I was saying was not all homes had the space or the money for a PC or an Amiga and having a Megadrive (and later a SNES) under the living room TV was a more affordable option for homes. Even if the cartridges were twice the price, it didn't stop the actual units from selling. I wasn't knocking the Amiga, just don't believe it was the 8bit killer by itself.
For as long as there's more and more devices to load games from SD cards for each device, the games are easily accessible, people will go back to get the older machines to mod them. Covid gave a lot of people a lot of free time and the prices flew up. I haven't actually looked at the prices (I don't really have space anymore) but I'm certainly not surprised.