Back to the Amiga

[xcad]

I've got a burning interest in getting back to the Amiga. I was an Amiga 1200 user many years ago and enjoyed the delights of fast Cad drawings, desktop publishing and just pure fun.
 
I'm looking at all the options and was wondering if I'm just hankering back to my past or is there a real bonus in using an Amiga today.

[Speelgoedmannetje]

[Karlos]

I'm looking at all the options and was wondering if I'm just hankering back to my past or is there a real bonus in using an Amiga today.

Well it is certainly a fun hobby at least and there are a number of ways to indulge it.

1) Getting an original Amiga up and running. For me this is fun in the way keeping a classic car on the road is. However, like that example, it can be pretty expensive, depending on how far you want to push it

2) Getting a minimig system. If you simply want to relive the heady A500 days and do a spot of retrogaming, without resorting to emulation or tinkering with an actual machine, this is one way to do it.

3) If you want to explore a high end classic amiga of the sort you could (like me) never afford originally, emulation via UAE is certainly an option. It's possible to emulate a 680x0 machine at a speed that no actual 680x0 could ever attain, along with a high resolution RTG display, sound card, networking etc.

3.5) There is also a project to create an "advanced" Amiga compatible machine called the "natami". It aims to provide AGA compatibility but with additional hardware features. I'm not sure what the current state of the project is, but essentially the guys developing it appear to be creating what they hoped the original Amiga hardware might have developed into had C= not gone under.

4) If you want to explore the Amiga experience today, you are almost spoiled for choice. There are 3 platforms that are descended from OS3.x:

i) AmigaOS4. This requires dedicated hardware, either an original Amiga with a PowerPC board (A1200/A4000 are the ideal), one of the AmigaOne machines or a Sam. Release 4.1 is also available for the Pegasos 2. Should that happen, I may actually be forced to buy my first (and hopefully last) ever Mac :lol:

ii) MorphOS. Likewise this requires dedicated hardware. Again, an original Amiga with a PowerPC board (MorphOS v1.x only), or a Pegasos 1, 2 or Efika. The MacMini would seem to be the next PowerPC platform it will support in v2.

iii) AROS. This is essentially an open source AmigaOS clone that aims to be at least OS3.1 compatible at the source level. Unlike the above, it isn't tied to any particular hardware platform, but it is pretty much a given that x86 is the ideal target.

Each one of the above has various benefits and drawbacks. There have been many flamewars, particularly OS4/MorphOS, which I've no wish to resurrect. Ultimately, I plan to use all 3, alongside classics and emulation

[NovaCoder]

I've got a burning interest in getting back to the Amiga. I was an Amiga 1200 user many years ago and enjoyed the delights of fast Cad drawings, desktop publishing and just pure fun.
 
I'm looking at all the options and was wondering if I'm just hankering back to my past or is there a real bonus in using an Amiga today.

No, you're hankering for your past...but that's not always a bad thing

If you want a 1200, you can still buy them new at AmigaKit  or you can track down a 2000/3000/4000 on eBay if that's more your thing.

You should also checkout OS4/Morph/Aros/WinUAE.

[persia]

What is wrong with hankering back to your past?  Every time I fire up an Amiga or UAE it's 1989 again and I can feel the heady days of computing, the days before computers were just another tool that everybody has and uses.  Modern computing is fast and efficient, but retro is fun.  You've got dodgy equipment pushed to the max and an unforgiving OS, let one program crash and you're visited by the guru.  Floppy drives that wouldn't hold a single song actually holding programs and data or a neat demo.

The past is a great place to visit!

I've got a burning interest in getting back to the Amiga. I was an Amiga 1200 user many years ago and enjoyed the delights of fast Cad drawings, desktop publishing and just pure fun.
 
I'm looking at all the options and was wondering if I'm just hankering back to my past or is there a real bonus in using an Amiga today.

[xcad]

Very interesting indeed.  If I bought the A1200 (new!) running OS3.9 from AmigaKit can I get wireless internet with the necessary hardware/software?
 
What are internet speeds like on the Amiga?

[Karlos]

Very interesting indeed.  If I bought the A1200 (new!) running OS3.9 from AmigaKit can I get wireless internet with the necessary hardware/software?

Sure. I believe AmigaKit also stock a wireless PCMCIA network card for the A1200.
 

What are internet speeds like on the Amiga?

That depends on several factors, including CPU speed, drivers, TCP/IP stack etc. The PCMCIA slot is not the highest bandwidth port imaginable, however with a generic PCMCIA network card, cnet.device (020 version), AmiTCP 4 and a 68040 CPU I can download data at around 400-500KiB/s (I timed copying a 10MB file from a network share to the RAM disk)

That's a pretty respectable speed, I reckon.

[Tension]

I've got a burning interest in getting back to the Amiga. I was an Amiga 1200 user many years ago and enjoyed the delights of fast Cad drawings, desktop publishing and just pure fun.
 
I'm looking at all the options and was wondering if I'm just hankering back to my past or is there a real bonus in using an Amiga today.

You need to be a glutton for punishment.