rpiguy9907

To be fair all of the more sophisticated systems require a lot of fiddling to use the whole software library (Macintosh, ST, IBM PC), but I guess I am just attracted to the simplicity of the C64 where a stock unit with a disk or tape drive can run the entire software library so long as a dongle wasn't required. No configuration, etc. From a collector stand point, extremely accessible. The Amiga is pretty tough for folks who never owned one. Even as a long time Amiga owner, I constantly rediscover things I knew about AmigaDOS back in the day that I had since forgotten. The biggest plus to Amiga collecting is some superb box art I suppose.

The worst to collect for is the Amiga. So many incompatibilities. Want to run that public domain program? Oh it requires the AmigaDos Replacement Project libraries? What was that? AmigaDos 1.1 was so bad people took it upon themselves to write their own improved libraries. AmigaDos 1.3 and especially 2.0 made ARP unnecessary, but 2.0 broke a bunch of games. Oh you have an accelerator, out of luck half your programs won't work. You are pretty much stuck running cracked programs in WHDLoad. Blech.

To play Dark Forces of course!

Technically it’s just a Sega (or Spectravideo).

All it had were Character Graphics like the PET. The first model came out in 1979 so obviously they copied the graphics characters directly from Commodore.

I have one currently on offer to eightbit, if he isn’t interested I will ping you. I have a 13” that is really convenient, it even has digital RGB for the C128/CGA.

I live in central NJ and have a Sony PVM that accepts PAL and NTSC. It also has digital RGB if you want to hook it to a C128 or CGA card! I am reluctant to let it go, but I’m trying to reduce the number of CRTs I have. What do you have to trade?

Very nice setup. The difference the S-Video out makes is incredible.

This is an amazing deal. Someone please jump on this so I don't have to drive to MD all the way from NJ.

I had a similar project to the Model III on hold as well - I was going to gut a broken Commodore 8032 and put my FPGA Spectrum Uno and my Raspberry Pi emulation SBC in it, but then someone told me the 8032 was more repairable than I had assumed and now I am too guilty to gut it and it is just taking up space. I actually did obtain a TransWarp GS clone from Ultimate Micro, but I was laid off after I received it so I haven't opened it yet. If I stay unemployed long enough I will have to sell it. I prefer original hardware in most cases.

I always wanted an Apple IIGS with a TranswarpGS card... I wanted to benchmark what a 7-16mhz 65C816 could do against a 68000 processor. I was never terribly excited about the IIGS until I learned this card existed.

It is color...

Has it arrived yet? I hope you noticed that there is a capacitor or battery leaking on the right most expansion card. The top of the card is corroding around it. I would remove that one card if I were you.

Housing prices have far outpaced income but that is largely due to a credit bubble and modern building regulations. Mortgages used to be 10-20 years and you had to have even more than 20% to put down (30%-50% down). Easy credit has caused home costs to sky rocket and made suburban and urban real estate ripe for speculation. The average home was about $12K in 1961. In my area new homes sell for 30-40x that. The average home sold in 1961 was 600-1000sq feet smaller than homes today, did not have central air conditioning, and typically only had 1 bathroom. So making an Apples to Apples comparison is tough. What did a 2400 square foot house with 2.5 bathrooms and a central conditioning system cost in 1961? I have no idea.

Your question piqued my curiosity. The correct answer is that if you look at Average/Mean income then yes it has kept up with inflation. If you look at Median income (where most people fall within the distribution) it is woefully behind. In 1961 the Median income was $5700 per year. If it tracked with inflation the Median income should be $49000 today. The actual median income today in the US is 32K. Median income would have to be boosted 50% to match 1961. The average income is at 48K so almost right on track - when the average stays the same but the median falls it indicates that the distribution has changed. In this case it tells us that a smaller group of people are getting paid more and larger group of people are getting paid less, which makes sense as we have traded many blue collar jobs for far fewer higher paying white collar jobs.