Difference between the two available A4000t's

[tonyvdb]

my understanding is that there were two A4000 towers made. One by Commodore and the other by Amiga Tech?
Other than the cosmetic difference in the front of the tower are the insides the same?

[zipper]

Original floppy drive was HD, AT had a DD drive.

[fondpondforever]

The Amiga Technologies Model had hardware that ran the computer a bit faster and had more ram since it was released a few years later the Commodore Machine.

[tonyvdb]

AT only had a DD floppy? That's dumb
Was the SCSI standard in both? What kind of ram did they use? The same as the A4000d?

[QuikSanz]

BBoAH says "1 x Internal 880K (Actually a PC 1.44MB drive converted for Amiga use)". I wonder how "converted", still function as 1.44?

Chris

[psxphill]

BBoAH says "1 x Internal 880K (Actually a PC 1.44MB drive converted for Amiga use)". I wonder how "converted", still function as 1.44?

They did the same thing in the A1200, I would imagine http://aminet.net/package/docs/hard/HiDensity works as well.

GCR fits more data in the same space as MFM, however on the DD floppy drives you have to then slow it down because of reliability issues. I believe on the HD drives you don't have to & this is how you end up with more usable space.

tldr; it is physically a PC 1.44mb floppy drive, but the floppy controller on the Amiga can only write at DD speed. The conversion they do is just to get disk change etc working, which is just a wiring change. A "1.44mb drive" is the wrong name for it though, you can fit more data on it that that it's just the floppy controller on the PC by default uses a layout which gives you that size.
 
On the A1200 they did the wiring change on the motherboard, so the drive wasn't even converted. I thought they did it like that on the A4000T too, but they might have changed the drive.

[Oldsmobile_Mike]

I think the C= model only came with an '040, the AT you could get with that Quikpak '060 card that used EDO RAM, was pretty zippy from what I recall, but since processor cards are swapped all the time, there's no telling what you'll get.  Otherwise, just the fascia and drive, as others have mentioned.  The C= model still goes for a lot more though, because it is "rare".  

[tonyvdb]

The C= model still goes for a lot more though, because it is "rare".  

Ya, and that's what I don't get. I saw one NOS original going for $5000USD where an AT model is at $2000

[QuikSanz]

They are really going up. Bought my 4000T AT for $1k fully loaded. Toaster, CyberstormIII-060, Cybervision64/3D W/FF,USB card, Catweasel w/pc floppy, USB full memory and more in the early 2000ish time.

Chris

[mechy]

The Amiga Technologies Model had hardware that ran the computer a bit faster and had more ram since it was released a few years later the Commodore Machine.

Uh no, this is not true. all a4000t's could have 16Mb on the motherboard,exception was if it came with the quikpak 060 accelerator which could take 128MB(+the 16 on motherboard still) .
the basic hardware was pretty much the same in the Commodore,quikpak and Amiga technologies towers.
.

[fondpondforever]

mechy, the thing you said about the amiga technologies quikpak 060 accelerator is what I meant by saying the hardware was slightly better and faster for this machine.

[mechy]

They did the same thing in the A1200, I would imagine http://aminet.net/package/docs/hard/HiDensity works as well.

GCR fits more data in the same space as MFM, however on the DD floppy drives you have to then slow it down because of reliability issues. I believe on the HD drives you don't have to & this is how you end up with more usable space.

tldr; it is physically a PC 1.44mb floppy drive, but the floppy controller on the Amiga can only write at DD speed. The conversion they do is just to get disk change etc working, which is just a wiring change. A "1.44mb drive" is the wrong name for it though, you can fit more data on it that that it's just the floppy controller on the PC by default uses a layout which gives you that size.
 
On the A1200 they did the wiring change on the motherboard, so the drive wasn't even converted. I thought they did it like that on the A4000T too, but they might have changed the drive.

All amigas used the standard amiga controller,the wiring was changed around on some At 1200's.
the 4000t had same wiring as any amiga, but they hacked the cable and many came with a sony 1.44MB pc drive, they can and are only used as 880K.. they will not work as 1.76M amiga high density.
the original 4000t from commodore came with a true high density amiga drive.
these days its easier imho/better to solder a few jumpers and cut a trace or 2 on the pc floppy drive than hack the cable-this is still for 880K.
paula cant run at full speed for high density 1.76MB,so they modded the drives to run at half speed.

[danbeaver]

The assumption in that the Commodore version is "available;" $5000 for one that no one will buy (it's been up for sale for around 2 years off and on) that differs by the shape of the plastic vents on the lower front plastics, is not only unavailable but unreasonable.

Having sold one of my A4000Ts, for $1200, the extra $800 is for shipping outside the states, and due to having to package it in a Sherman tank to prevent the USPS from using the box in a demolition derby.

Within the states, the packaging has to be reinforced with concrete, but runs $50

[danbeaver]

Oh, of the two A4000Ts I bought from Software Hut in the 1990's, one has a HD drive and one a DD drive; both were $1195.00 with 4 MB RAM, no HDD, and an A3640.

[fondpondforever]

The Commodore Amiga 4000T that I have seen for sale (and I've only seen one for sale) was selling for $6000. Must be extremely rare now, only 200 machines were manufactured back in 1994. :eek: