Silica Shop or similar 'reduced' Mega STE advert?

[oky2000]

I did actually have a page scan of that advert I got via google searching half a decade ago but that laptop drive is long dead now sadly. Tried to find it again but I can't find any Mega STE adverts.

 

The reason I am interested in this is simply because I was doing some research in what families could purchase as a PC option in the High Street electronics/computer store and the sort of thing on sale that families could buy in such places was 800 bucks for a branded 286 16mhz Adlib sound original VGA (386,000 palette not 16 million) and a 40mb hard drive and 1mb RAM and some crappy dime store speakers and the usual 14" monitor to play PC games on in summer 1992.

 

 

[calimero]

Did you try: www.archive.org ?

 

You will find lot of magazines and then you can search inside magazines for Mega STe ads. 
 

e.g.

 

https://archive.org/details/ST_Format_Issue_039_1992-10_Future_Publishing_GB/page/n1/mode/2up?q=Mega+ste
 

On page 2 you have ads for Mega STe. (Note that you can search inside every magazine!)

 

 

[Mr. Undo]

I’ve found also this ad from “ST APPLICATIONS” #17 - May ‘92

[Mr. Undo]

More MEGA STE offers from Gasteiner technologies adds in “ST APPLICATIONS” magazines. For example here: http://www.atarimania.com/mags/pdf/1992-08-ST-Applications-020.pdf

[calimero]

What I find quite odd is price difference of:

Mega STe 1

and 

Mega STe 2

it is 250£ !! (Difference is only 1MB more RAM, right?)

 

Then in same ad you see that 4MB RAM for STe cost as low as 139£?!?!!

[snarkdluG]

1 hour ago, calimero said:

What I find quite odd is price difference of:

Mega STe 1

and 

Mega STe 2

it is 250£ !! (Difference is only 1MB more RAM, right?)

 

Then in same ad you see that 4MB RAM for STe cost as low as 139£?!?!!

Bigger difference between 2 and 4 Mb Mega STe. Could have bought a Mega STe 1 and then bought 4Mb ram for a STe and pop in.

[oky2000]

Thanks for all the replies

 

Was kinda holding off trawling PDFs online etc. My internet is flaky these days (lockdowns!!) and PDFs when loaded finally in browser still need to be downloaded if need be and then the pages extracted to PNG for my video editor. I had to do this in order to get some stuff for the 1992 High Street DOS/Windows rivals at the time which was the Amstrad PC 2286 (286-16mhz, 1mb RAM, 40mb HDD, 1.44mb 3.5" FDD, VGA, Adlib sound, monitor and speakers for 799inc VAT or less off the shelf in person). Fancied trying my hand at a video to see what were the five options but needed some benchmark prices.

 

I seem to remember a 4mb Mega STE for £599inc VAT in Silica Shop? Silica Shop had branches in the high end London "West End" and central city areas near megastores and Harrods etc. I did actually visit one of their shops I think. Bit hazy now on memories. 

 

I used to live about 2-3 miles from Gasteiner....I do believe I got a SCART RGB cable from them and looked at their branded external hard disk drives in the shop window.

[Mr. Undo]

On 3/4/2021 at 1:20 AM, oky2000 said:

Thanks for all the replies

 

Was kinda holding off trawling PDFs online etc. My internet is flaky these days (lockdowns!!) and PDFs when loaded finally in browser still need to be downloaded if need be and then the pages extracted to PNG for my video editor. I had to do this in order to get some stuff for the 1992 High Street DOS/Windows rivals at the time which was the Amstrad PC 2286 (286-16mhz, 1mb RAM, 40mb HDD, 1.44mb 3.5" FDD, VGA, Adlib sound, monitor and speakers for 799inc VAT or less off the shelf in person). Fancied trying my hand at a video to see what were the five options but needed some benchmark prices.

 

I seem to remember a 4mb Mega STE for £599inc VAT in Silica Shop? Silica Shop had branches in the high end London "West End" and central city areas near megastores and Harrods etc. I did actually visit one of their shops I think. Bit hazy now on memories. 

 

I used to live about 2-3 miles from Gasteiner....I do believe I got a SCART RGB cable from them and looked at their branded external hard disk drives in the shop window.

Here you have a couple more adds (two sizes) from Gasteiner in case you still have problems with internet:

 

ST APPLICATIONS / August '92

 

 

 

ST APPLICATIONS / December '92

 

 

I haven't found any Silica Shop add offering the MEGA STE but take a look at this article: https://www.exxoshost.co.uk/atari/mirror/myatari/issues/sep2002/megaste.htm

 

Quote

Considering a 520STE Discovery Xtra pack could be had for Ł199, I was already pushing it with the Mega but in the end coughed up the necessary Ł550, never to regret going for 4 MB in the years to follow.

He said that MEGA STE was purchased at Silica

 

 

Edited March 5, 2021 by Mr. Undo

[ParanoidLittleMan]

Pretty silly price differences between 1-2, and especially between 2-4 MB versions. I bought RAM for much less in 1990.

But this is how sales go in some cases. Here, currently CPU prices gone extremely high, with explanation that all this vaccine shipments causing troubles for manufacturing and shipping for CPU manufacturers. They are even lazy to thinker some believable explanation - how's that that TV prices did not go up, and TV is good example here - approx same prices as PC CPUs, while their size and weight is about 100x bigger. It seems that in this country computer wholesale trade is now in hands of few people/company, and they can do whatever want. But people is not that stupid, and lot if it was/will be bought abroad, ordered from ...

[Atari74user]

Here we go, one from Silica here.  I very much remember these ads, Gasteiner I bought a few things from way back when, always wanted to visit.  I purchased a lot from System Solutions, they were pretty big along with Gasteiner in the UK, not forgetting Compo and the HiSoft peeps.  I remember buying some 8-bit stuff from Silica, so always scrutinised their glossy ads.

 

Anyway, memory lane aside, Mega STE at £449 which I vaguely recall, with 2mb.  I did a quick search circa 1992/93 in ST Format.

 

Edited March 9, 2021 by Atari74user

[hatter]

On 3/1/2021 at 7:42 PM, snarkdluG said:

Bigger difference between 2 and 4 Mb Mega STe. Could have bought a Mega STe 1 and then bought 4Mb ram for a STe and pop in.

Much more important difference - the 1MB model didn't include an internal hard drive nor the adaptor to even plug in a SCSI (or IDE ?) drive into.  So you could plug an external ASCI drive enclosure (a scsi drive in a box with an ASCI-SCSI adaptor.  Or you then had to buy your own internal adaptor and drive later - the internal physical mounting hardware was still included withe the MSTE.  I did the latter (still have that massive 1GB micropolis drive I used with mine, can't remember the 3rd party manufacturer whose board I used)

[calimero]

On 3/5/2021 at 2:18 PM, ParanoidLittleMan said:

Here, currently CPU prices gone extremely high, with explanation that all this vaccine shipments causing troubles for manufacturing and shipping for CPU manufacturers.

Next problem would be "neon gas" from Russia/Ukraine... or: lack of it.

 

At the end, they will really manage to bring civilisation to "food stamp" level.

[Goochman]

On 3/9/2021 at 10:15 AM, Atari74user said:

Here we go, one from Silica here.  I very much remember these ads, Gasteiner I bought a few things from way back when, always wanted to visit.  I purchased a lot from System Solutions, they were pretty big along with Gasteiner in the UK, not forgetting Compo and the HiSoft peeps.  I remember buying some 8-bit stuff from Silica, so always scrutinised their glossy ads.

 

Anyway, memory lane aside, Mega STE at £449 which I vaguely recall, with 2mb.  I did a quick search circa 1992/93 in ST Format.

 

If Im reading this right a 2MB STE was only 50 pounds cheaper than a 2MB Falcon?  Who wouldnt get the Falcon at that time?

[oracle_jedi]

5 hours ago, Goochman said:

If Im reading this right a 2MB STE was only 50 pounds cheaper than a 2MB Falcon?  Who wouldnt get the Falcon at that time?

I was thinking the same thing, but then started to imagine living with a single-floppy/no HD Falcon.    Not sure there was a market for that.

[oky2000]

That's an interesting point, for some reason I don't remember the 2mb Falcon being just 100 quid more than A1200 or same price as 1mb Archimedes A3010 (ARM 2.5 CPU version). 

 

I don't think you can do much non gaming stuff long term without a hard drive, probably not beyond casual pixel art dabbling/rubbish STOS game coding on any of those 3 systems I just mention. Even using a an Amiga 1000/520ST without a hard drive is a completely different experience and for a gamers only type option.