Looking for Amiga hardware

[pulpfan]

Hi All-

 

Looking to get back into the "old school" scene, and have expanded my wishlist to Amiga stuff (I've already went nuts with Intellivision stuff/picked up a C64 & 1541). I used to have an A500 about 20 years ago--it's painful to type that--and it went dead. About 10 years ago, I picked up one off e-bay and then sold it about 8 mos. later for like $21...and still kickin myself. I'm trying to get my hands on an A500 off e-bay (they keep getting snatched up last minute), but what I'd really prefer to have is an A1200. If anyone has a spare laying around (they don't want a small mint for ), please let me know. I might be inclined to go the A600 route if someone has one for a reasonable $$$. Thanks, in advance.

[Seob]

I have a broken a1200 without hookups if anyone is interested, but i live in the Netherlands, so it's pal and uses 220v.

[marcfrick2112]

I have a broken a1200 without hookups if anyone is interested, but i live in the Netherlands, so it's pal and uses 220v.

 

pulpfan, you may want to goto http://www.amiga.org/

 

and see if someone has a 1200 for sale...

 

BTW, I am an Amiga addict.. I have 2 4000's, 2 1200's, a 1200T with '060, and a non-working 4000T ..

[desiv]

Don't overlook Craigslist.

That's how I got my first (well, first this century) Amiga 500...

 

Problem with some of that (especially monitors) on e-bay is shipping.

Also, remember, the A500 (if you don't get it with a monitor) is monochrome composite output.

You need an A520 or something better to get color without a monitor.

 

I'd say go for a 1200 for sure, as you can get an IDE laptop hard drive or, what I (and most 1200 owners) have done is used an IDE-CF adapter and are using a Compact Flash card as the HD. (The adapter was $3) Memory expansion is pretty easy to get for the 1200...

 

RAM expansions above 512k and/or sidecars for the A500 are harder and more expensive to get a hold of.

 

That being said tho, Jens of Individual Computers (who made a great set of new accelerators for the 1200 and 600) is apparently making an accelerator/RAM card for the A500 as well...

 

And tomthul on Amibay has made some great RAM expansions and IDE adapters too...

 

So what am I saying you should do?

Hmm.. What am I saying?? er..

 

Get one of each!!!

 

er.. no, that's not it (although you should!!)...

 

Just that the 1200 is great, but the 500 is looking pretty decent also...

 

And really, if you don't need a HD, an A500 with an extra 512k and external floppy is a great machine.

You can use a serial cable and a PC and transfer disk images pretty easily (if slowly) with ADF Sender Terminal.

(The 1200 has a PCMCIA slot that can hold ethernet or a CF/SD card reader to make that easier on the 1200 tho..)

 

Aarrgh.. I'm so conflicted!! :-)

That's why I have an A500, A1000 and an A1200 tho..

 

desiv

[+save2600]

The flaky-fruitiness of Craigslist has gone international?

[desiv]

International?

 

I know Oregon seems pretty far away, but..

 

Hey, you're in WI. That explains it. You're still mad at Oregon for that great Tilimook Cheddar cheese!

 

 

desiv

[+save2600]

Whew! Saw Seob from the Netherlands and other European references and had a guitar freakout.

[pulpfan]

Thanks for the replies, all.

 

I managed to snag an A500 with a 512K expansion off ebay. The pictures were too small to tell, but it evidently belonged to a smoker. It was badly yellowed, not to mention it smelled like the "Marlboro Piss Palace". I tried to clean it up, but the stink in the case/keyboard was too bad to tolerate (and it looked like it had NEVER been cleaned). So, I have a case and a keyboard coming from the UK that I am going to transfer the guts over to. The shipping was pretty salty, but the outside of that A500 was just too nasty to even want to touch. Now I just need to find a mouse that doesn't look like it resided in the oil pan for someone's car... I'm still trying to make up my mind whether I'm going to go the Indivision of A520 route. It'll likely be the Indivision, since A) I remember the RF output being pretty crappy, and B) I don't want to have to have another monitor on my already crowded desk.

 

Still going to try to pickup an A600/A1200 someplace, because I can't do anything half-assed when I start collecting stuff (type A personality and all)...

[desiv]

There's 2 parts to the yellowing..

Smoking can definitely be a factor, and that smell can be difficult to get out.

 

However, exposure to light and air will cause yellowing, which was always thought to be pretty much irreversible.. Until retrobrite.

There were some nerds who were lamenting over their yellowed cases and someone mentioned peroxide tests and varying results...

 

And it turns out, at least one of the nerds was a real scientist type who understood chemical reactions and, long story short, peroxide with a catalyst (Oxyclean) in UV light can reverse the yellowing.

 

The results can be astonishing...

(You can also overdo it an burn (creates a "bloom" they call it) it if you're not watching..)

 

If you're interested, the guys who worked it out are on amibay and there are several threads dedicated to it there..

 

I have to do that to some of my older machines, but I haven't tried it yet..

 

desiv

[amiman99]

Thanks for the replies, all.

 

I managed to snag an A500 with a 512K expansion off ebay. The pictures were too small to tell, but it evidently belonged to a smoker. It was badly yellowed, not to mention it smelled like the "Marlboro Piss Palace". I tried to clean it up, but the stink in the case/keyboard was too bad to tolerate (and it looked like it had NEVER been cleaned). So, I have a case and a keyboard coming from the UK that I am going to transfer the guts over to. The shipping was pretty salty, but the outside of that A500 was just too nasty to even want to touch. Now I just need to find a mouse that doesn't look like it resided in the oil pan for someone's car... I'm still trying to make up my mind whether I'm going to go the Indivision of A520 route. It'll likely be the Indivision, since A) I remember the RF output being pretty crappy, and B) I don't want to have to have another monitor on my already crowded desk.

 

Still going to try to pickup an A600/A1200 someplace, because I can't do anything half-assed when I start collecting stuff (type A personality and all)...

There is a guy I know who is selling 4MB RAM for A500 for $60, also IDE controller for $60 which plugs into the side expansion slot.

 

If I new you need a A500 case, I have one in my broken 500, I keep it for parts.

 

As for monitor, guys at amiga.org found that Dell SR2320L works great with Amiga resolutions, just got one, it's perfect. You only need passive DB23 to DB15 converer.

[marcfrick2112]

OK, a couple of points.

 

pulpfan, there is a fairly easy way to hack the 520 to S-Video here,, but alas it mentions only the PAL version of the 520. (I wish more monitors went down to 15)

This site may give you some more info:

Here

 

 

And regarding Retrobrite, I can say that it works... Now, when I did it, I didn't have concentrated H2O2, and used a UV lamp, as the sky was overcast... Guess what, the process still de-yellowed a trackball shell, by several shades!!

With the proper supplies, I imagine it gives amazing results...

 

 

(An Atari ST/Amiga switchable, light -up trackball, no less... )

[pulpfan]

Thanks for the RetroBrite pointer - I checked it out and I must say it is impressive. I think I'm going to try it on the case and see what happens...not like it's a big loss if I dick it up, since it is/will be a spare. If I can manage to do it without ruining anything, will have to try it on the mouse shell.

 

@amiman99: I'd definitely be interested in the IDE controller - seems pretty reasonable a price. Shoot me a PM when you've got a sec, thanks. I don't need the A500 case right now, but I'll keep you in mind in case I ruin my spare during RetroBrite testing

 

As far as the Dell monitor goes, that'd be a great idea, but having another 23" monitor on my desk would cut into my workspace way too much (I've already got a 27" one as my main). Aside from that, the 23" looks like it's going for the same $$$ as I could get an Indivision for. On the other hand...I suppose if I went the SR2320L route, I could hook an A600/A1200 to it in the future (whereas the Indivision limits me).

 

Just curious - does anyone out there already have the Indivision that could comment on their experience with the product? It looks mind-numbingly simple to install, I just don't want to shell out the $$$ if someone says its worse than the A520 adapter LOL

[amiman99]

the retrobrite works, I did few of my cases. I did leave my C64 in the garage for a year and the yellow color came back, so I guess you need to store your hardware in the cool place.

As for monitor, we were surprised that it worked. I got it, because I want only one monitor on my desk for all computers, and this one is perfect.

[pulpfan]

Well, I'm one step closer to getting my Amigas setup. I went ahead and picked up an A520, and while it worked OK, it definitely looks worse than I remember (of course, I wasn't looking at it on a 50" TV back in the 90s, either). Well, and err...my bright idea to plug the NTSC A520 into my PAL A600 didn't look too pretty...but I digress...

 

Anyway, I bought a 1084S, and a GBS-8220 just to test those out. I'm expecting I'll get the best looking picture with the 1084S. Anyone have any experience hooking the GBS-8220 to an LCD?

 

Thanks.

[Prab]

ahhh it sucks you live in ntsc land, i'm guessing your tvs dont have RGB scart, i have my amiga hooked up by rgb scart! the a520 with composite out did the job but the scart works perfectly on my viera plasma tv, although i prefer having it hooked up to a CRT, your best bet is buying a used CRT for your amiga, or sourcing a monitor!

[amiman99]

Well, I'm one step closer to getting my Amigas setup. I went ahead and picked up an A520, and while it worked OK, it definitely looks worse than I remember (of course, I wasn't looking at it on a 50" TV back in the 90s, either). Well, and err...my bright idea to plug the NTSC A520 into my PAL A600 didn't look too pretty...but I digress...

 

Anyway, I bought a 1084S, and a GBS-8220 just to test those out. I'm expecting I'll get the best looking picture with the 1084S. Anyone have any experience hooking the GBS-8220 to an LCD?

 

Thanks.

I got the GBS-8220, it works, but only in NTSC mode, not PAL, so no EURO demos or games.

I put mine in a box and added a 9pin connector for easy hookup.

[MoreBITS]

.

 

As for monitor, guys at amiga.org found that Dell SR2320L works great with Amiga resolutions, just got one, it's perfect. You only need passive DB23 to DB15 converer.

 

Great Tip on the monitor, should this also work with an old Apple, ie Apple IIGS?

 

I've got my original A500 still, but I am not sure if I still have the monitor. It is from when I was a kid, it may be at my parents house, or they may have tossed it.

 

I can always use another LCD on the desk!

[Tempest]

Great Tip on the monitor, should this also work with an old Apple, ie Apple IIGS?

They should, but you'll need the proper cable. I have a 1080 monitor that I want to use with my IIgs, but I don't have the proper cable adapter to do it.