New amigan

[Akiko]

Hey good choice keep us updated! Will you be keeping it stock? Really has amazing upgrade potential. I'd make my first priority finding a good graphics card like the picassoIV and then upgrade to 3.1 Roms. http://www.amiga-hardware.com/showhardware.cgi?HARDID=468

Good luck..

[thedaemon]

I will be upgrading after I learn how to actually use the system. You have to remember, I am new to Amigas in general. But yes, I will be upgrading to 3.1 rom and video card. They will probably be my first upgrade. Thanks for the suggestion. BTW, any idea on hooking up my wacom to my amiga? I have a usb one, which I doubt will work, but my roommate has a bit older serial model. I could trade him if it would work. Thanks

[SamuraiCrow]

Don't plug a serial device into the mouse ports of an Amiga.  Amiga mouse ports are a derivative of the old Atari 2600-style game ports and are a totally different pinout and you could fry your complex interface adapter chip that way.

There is a serial mouse driver on the Aminet that may work with a serial mouse compatible tablet (plugged into the 18-pin serial port presumably with a 9-pin adapter).

Also, you might have to remove the Video Toaster 4000 card to install a graphics card into the A4000 depending on what graphics card you get.  A Video Toaster 4000 is a desktop video editing package which was used for a long time in television studios across the country.  You may even have the Video Toaster software installed on the hard drive.

[drewz21]

Welcome!  I live in the Birmingham, AL area.  Please let me know if I can help you with anything.  I've got lots of Amigas, spare parts, software, books, magazines, etc...

My main Amiga right now is an A1200 with an 060 in it.  Great machine!!!

[Rabbi]

Get yourself Breadbox Ensemble for that 486 and remove that Windoze 3.1.  Breadbox Ensemble is a 16 bit GUI that just needs M$-DOS to run on top of.  It's actually the latest incarnation of GEOS/New Deal.  You can check it out at:

http://www.breadbox.com/ensemble/geocats.asp?category=Ease-of-Use


by thedaemon on 2006/8/19 15:31:38

Greetings. I am pretty much completely new to Amiga. I was born in 83, so I didn't really have a choice nor an opinion when we got our first computer. We picked up an old pc 486/33 with 4mb ram. I remember trying to get windows 3.1 to display 256color with no luck at all. From that day forward I have always strived to get more color and resolution from my computers. (1920x1200 32bit now ) But, as of lately I have been diving into programming and have had an inclination to get an old computer, when things were much simpler and fun.

[pierre]

good choice , the a1200 cute as it is just can't be upgraded without putting it into an ugly tower.  the 4000 (with that hiflyer) is very easy to upgrade!  enjoy.
Pierre
Yes the 1200 has all kind of upgredes including the ppc boards, but you just can't put a graphics card in there and enjoy a decent resolution... I HATE screen flickering!  The toasterscan can help...but it just easy with the 4k.

[Daedalus]

USB is a very long shot, but if it behaves like a normal mouse, and you had money to burn, you could put a PCI adaptor in there, put a USB card in that, and use it. Far easier to swap with your roommate ;-) The serial ports on all Amigas are fairly compatible with the standard 25-pin PC serial ports, and anydecent computer shop should have the 9-25 pin adaptors you'd need. I'm sure there are plenty of drivers out there for serial mice and serial graphics tablets, aminet'd bewhere I start looking!

[recidivist]

Rabbi wrote:
Get yourself Breadbox Ensemble for that 486 and remove that Windoze 3.1.  Breadbox Ensemble is a 16 bit GUI that just needs M$-DOS to run on top of.  It's actually the latest incarnation of GEOS/New Deal.  You can check it out at:

http://www.breadbox.com/ensemble/geocats.asp?category=Ease-of-Use


 Ah ha!
  I used PC-Geos on my Emerson 286/12.5 with 20m hd and 8 m ram, and it was great. Got the demo version for $9.95 in some computer store around 1992. Months ago found/bought several copies of full GEOS for use on older PC but discovered ubuntu linux so GEOS still in the box.

  Not many people are going to spend $99.95 on the breadbox to use an old PC when $299 will buy a new computer with lots more ram,hard-drive,modem,networking,colors and latest Windows.In fact,it would be a foolish purchase! This is exactly why PC-GEOS didn't take off 15 yearsago,because then as now,the program cost too much compared to a new bundled system. And the people who are hanging onto old PC computers are likely either too poor or disinterested to know about breadbox or spend the money.
 
 Ensemble is a great piece of software and has been since it was started ,it was originally(still is?) written in machine language so it is fast.

 I think if breadbox would/could price it at $29.99 for individuals and maybe $10 a seat for corporations and schools THEN it would really take off. You need to get a critical mas of users .

  On a jarring note Amigabasic was originally a Microsoft product :boohoo:

[recidivist]

 And for really cheap computers of the IBM-PC and Mac variety try Goodwill,Salvation Army,independent thrift sores,"Trading Post" type classified newspapers and amateur radio "hamfests"."Hams"  love the newest electric toys and have been on the leading edge of computing even before gamers.
 You ought to find Pentium 2 and 3 for very little ,with 486 free for the taking. Private sellers often don't erase the OS as do the thrift stores and school sellers.
  Personal examples of cheap "mainstream" computers from the mentioned sources

  HP 550mhz P3 with Win98/hd/128ram $45
  p2 generic,no OS $20
   iMac 333 hd/128ram /no OS $40
   P1 133 laptop free
   G3 450 B/W tower hd/mem no OS$20
   P1 166 Win 95 $15
   Microsoft optical mice $4 each
  PS/2 mice 50cents
   memory from 25 cents a simm to $12.50 for 256meg sdram.

  Plenty of PC/Mac stuff gets thrown away every day,and can be had for the thrifty computer user.

   Only old AMIGA hardware holds its dollar value!

[Tomas]

Needless to say its a bit confusing on how to install apps on it.

That is one of the good things about AmigaOS. If there is no install script, then you just drag and drop the files to wherever you want them. If you for example want to install a driver for a device, then you simply just drag and drop the file to the devs drawer.

[magnetic]

thedaemon

Welcome to the community!

We actually have an Amiga 4000 Desktop in stock for $300! Great starter item, even comes with manuals!

magnetic


magneticsystems

[thedaemon]

Well I am now the proud owner of an Amiga 4000D Highflyer. It came with : Highflyer case, Video Toaster, DPaint 4.5, adpro, propixelXL, quarterback, vga monitor with sync strainer, keyboard, wizard 3 button mouse, all manuals and software. dataflyer scsi board(which is NOT working) 2 scsi drives, ide harddrive, scsi cdrom. it has 16mb fast ram I think. Playing with DPaint . Now I need to I guess get another scsi controller, or get an ide cdrom.

Board:
Rev C, 40cpu rev 3.0 rom 3.0 ks 39.106 wb 39.29

I need help with a few things. main thing, it has a startup script that "i think" looks for the scsi drives which are not hooked up. How do I edit this script?

I am glad to join the club!

[Amiduffer]

Standard text editors that come with WB are ED, EDIT, MEMACS, & notepad (3.5 and up).

Also, be aware that there is the Startup-Sequence and there is User-Startup, which, when you add programs, get small scripts to assign the programs and do other tasks. The Startup-Sequence, you shouldn't really modify. Check both, just in case.

Otherwise, browse Aminet and see what catches your eye. I can recomend AZ.

IDE CDrom drives are cheeeeap.