Amiga A600 maintenance

[Tetlee]

Hi all,

 

I'm soon to be sending in my A600 to retropassion to have it recapped. I've owned this system since new and having got back into it of late I thought I really should look into giving it a once over to avoid the risk of causing any damage from neglect(has some sentimental attachment on top of having some great games) and hopefully keep the thing ready for many more years of happy (now retro)gaming.

 

I plan to have the recap(haven't yet decided if I should plump for the premium capacitor option or not) but while it is there are there any other tweaks I should consider to improve the base A600? I can see several drop down options but the fact that most people seem to go straight for the A1200 over the 600 I wonder if doing anything outside of essential maintenance is even worth bothering. Would really appreciate thoughts though as once done I wouldn't want to be sending it in again in future.

 

For reference I'm unlikely to ever code so it's purely a game machine for me.

 

I know a 1200 gives you way more possibilities, but with limited desk space and also limited funds and sentimental attachment I will stick with my old trusty. 

 

Thanks in advance.

[+OLD CS1]

I am not sure what all is available right now at dealers or direct from iComp, but I know there have been accelerators and RAM expansions for the 600 which would make it a formidable WHDLoad machine.  Comparing at a basic level, the 1200 is a 68EC020 and gives you AGA and 2MB of ChipRAM, versus the 600 which is a 68000 with ECS and 1MB (2MB capable with an appropriate expansion.)

 

From my perspective, which machine I would want for games would depend upon what games I want to play and the availability of expansions.  If your 600 is a base machine, you will spend a few clams on a CPU accelerator with RAM expansion.  Same with a base 1200, really, since it has no FastRAM on-board.

 

Your other option would be to stick with the base 1MB ChipRAM and 68000, and get a floppy emulator and play straight OCS/ECS games on the base hardware.

 

If the Vampire is still available for the 600 you could just go to-the-wall with it with HDMI output,  680x0 equivalent running at ludicrous speed, RAM, the works.

[Tetlee]

Thanks @OLD CS1CS1

 

Most of that terminology flew straight over my head but will look in to the floppy emulator you mention which I assume is something to allow me to use an SD card. I'll go find out.

 

Appreciate the reply.

[+OLD CS1]

5 hours ago, Tetlee said:

Most of that terminology flew straight over my head but will look in to the floppy emulator you mention which I assume is something to allow me to use an SD card. I'll go find out.

I am not sure which people use for the Amiga, because I am still using regular floppies, but I think you will look at the Gotek or the HxC.  They use USB sticks, but the idea is the same.

[Pokeypy]

Changing the capacitors is really useful. The A600's original ones are known to become bad during the decades and may even damage the rest of the hardware. You probably should check out first, if your A600 is even still alright at the moment (I'm even not sure, if switching it on is a good idea - the power supply probably should be exchanged too). Here's a video of a capacitor change, which covers the details of these problems:

 

 

And here's a video, where he didn't like the A600 in 1992, but finally really like it today, after expanding it with modern enhancements:

 

 

This is part 3 of the series, part 1 and 2 would be here and here.

Edited May 18, 2021 by Pokeypy

[Pokeypy]

20 hours ago, Tetlee said:

I know a 1200 gives you way more possibilities, but with limited desk space and also limited funds and sentimental attachment I will stick with my old trusty.

If you just want to play good old Amiga games, I think, the A600 is fine.

I once had an A1200 (in 2005 or so). My impression was, yeah, it was a bit faster when doing Workbench-stuff. With a hard-drive it already felt quite PC-like (which wasn't what I was looking for). Those AGA games were alright, but not really worth it IMHO. I still play them in fs-uae at times. Having to switch to OCS/ECS in a menu, when wanting to play older games, was somehow annoying. Also to remember, which older games worked and which didn't.

So, yeah, the A1200 has advantages, if you want to do more modern stuff. Like going online or seriously producing music with Octamed and working with samples for example. (I once compared working with music and samples on the A1200 with HD to the A500 with floppy disks, and, yeah, you wouldn't want to use the A500 any more for that, when you could have the A1200).

But if you just want to play the good old games, the A600 is fine. If the game works, it runs it just as good as the A1200.

I didn't have an A600 (just 500 and 1200). So I'm not sure, how big the problem with ECS and newer Kickstart with older games is. Could be just as annoying as on the 1200. But as you have the A600, you probably already know these problems.

Edited May 18, 2021 by Pokeypy

[Tetlee]

Appreciate the replies guys. I'll go ahead and get the recap inc. power supply as soon as I'm ready. Will probably avoid using it until then just to be safe. Won't bother with any upgrades, I only really want to play the old classics on it anyway I think, just started Cannon Fodder again, love that game as much as I always did.

Edited May 18, 2021 by Tetlee

[Daedalus2097]

From a different perspective, having extra RAM and a cheap hard drive solution allows games to be loaded from there instead of from floppy or Gotek. When this is done, any differences in hardware or OS are dealt with by WHDLoad, so you don't have to worry about switching to OSC or ECS mode on boot, using a Kickstart degrader or any of that stuff. Convenience is nice, and once I started using a hard drive in mine in the '90s, I never looked back.

 

Depending on the games you play, there are actually quite a few that benefit from the extra speed of the A1200 (or an accelerator in the A600). Anything 3D, such as flight sims, Frontier, Zeewolf, F1GP, will start to become playable on an A1200. And even 2D games where there's a lot going on, like Syndicate, Theme Park, Settlers, Dune 2, will also benefit from the extra grunt. It's mostly simpler arcade-style shooters or platformers where you won't see the difference, so your experience, and whether you think more power is worth it, depends on what sort of game you play.

 

Regarding accelerators, the Furia is probably the go-to device for the A600. It's an excellent bit of hardware that gives you more RAM and a significant boost in speed.

 

As for capacitors, I would go a bit further and say it's essential to change them. If they're not already leaking, they will soon enough, and when they do they cause all sorts of nastiness that'll need potentially expensive repairs. Having said that, using it for a short while isn't going to make a difference - if it's already damaged, it's already damaged, and if it's not, it won't happen overnight but after weeks of use. Power supplies are less of an issue though. Unlike many 8-bit PSUs (the C64 in particular, or the ingot A8 PSU), it's very rare for them to fail in such a way that it causes damage. Normally, either the machine crashes or fails to turn on at all when they go.

[Pokeypy]

It seems, there's also a more affordable accelarator called "PiStorm" now. It's in an early stage though, so maybe not that easy to install at the moment.

It uses a small RaspberryPi to give the Amiga a faster (emulated) processor and much more RAM. And also a huge virtual storage device that can be accessed either by WiFi or by ssh (so, by network). The rest of the computer is powered by the original Amiga hardware (by the custom chips and such).

This video about it was just released yesterday:

 

 

[Daedalus2097]

Yeah, the PiStorm is an interesting one. It also provides RTG for some tasty high resolution screenmodes, and a video passthrough mode (using the camera input of the Pi) is in the works.

[amiman99]

If you are planning to play games from floppy drive and nothing else, at least add 1MB chip ram to it.

If you planning to do more than playing games, then you need accelerator. The A600 feels very slow in other tasks.

Hard drive is nice to have.

 

Also, check your keyboard if all keys are working, in the future you may need new keyboard membrane. I chose PCB replacement instead plastic membrane.

[shoestring]

Yes. Check the membrane. I picked up a nice A1200 recently, unfortunately the membrane could not be saved. It looks to have suffered from a spill. My heart sank when I saw it but luckily the motherboard is OK and corrosion free.

 

 

 

The PiStorm is a good alternative, an A1200 version is planned. 

[Tetlee]

Wow I did not expect so many detailed and helpful replies. Thank you all once again!

 

I think I have settled now on just getting the recap and power unit sorted, and I will add in getting the keyboard membrane checked. I don't think I'll bother with anything else as I've always been happy enough with performance for my needs(purely a gaming machine) and so long as I can fire it up now and again to play some classics I'm content with that. My money can be better used elsewhere(I have a Spectrum Next waiting for me and plans to rebuy another Speccy +2 the same as I used to own as that has by far the most happy memories for me). I'm also having my TI99 recapped at the same time.

 

Really appreciated all the thoughts, cheers guys.

Edited May 20, 2021 by Tetlee

[carlsson]

I would think that anyone who offers professional services in recapping use quality components, since the labor costs often greatly exceed material costs. I recently had my 1200 recapped and the invoice came to 76% labor, 11% material, 13% return shipping from a well renowned repairman. Perhaps there are good enough (for another 20-30 years) and premium (for those who doubt caps ever get bad again) choices. Cheapest possible simply wouldn't be worth it for any party unless you're qualified to DIY and don't think the computer is worth spending much on anyway.

[Daedalus2097]

You'd be surprised - you regularly see people complaining about the cost of (cheap) parts and looking for cheaper alternatives.

 

Having said that, Commodore used the absolute bargain-basement, cheapest capacitors they could find. Even basic spec capacitors from any branded manufacturer these days will easily outlast them. Premium capacitors in this context are typically polymer capacitors, which do have the advantage that they don't contain liquid electrolyte and so should never leak and corrode the board as conventional electrolytics do, but their useful lifespan isn't typically any longer than their standard aluminium counterparts.

[carlsson]

FWIW, I paid ~$60 in labor, ~$8.25 for the new caps and ~$10.75 for return shipping for the motherboard only (prices including 25% VAT). I suppose you might be able to find someone who does it quite a bit cheaper, and in that case the cost for parts of course is a bigger factor.

Edited May 26, 2021 by carlsson