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Author Topic: I have a new in box Commodore Amiga 1000 Prototype  (Read 18503 times)

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Offline mknktTopic starter

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Re: I have a new in box Commodore Amiga 1000 Prototype
« Reply #89 from previous page: May 26, 2010, 03:04:37 AM »
Quote from: Pentad;561009
I'm looking at the pics (Thanks!!)

What's taped to the 68000 CPU?

-P

Some sort of jumper...:confused:
 

Offline mknktTopic starter

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Re: I have a new in box Commodore Amiga 1000 Prototype
« Reply #90 on: May 30, 2010, 03:57:31 AM »
The auction ends SOON... Don't miss out...:hammer:
 

Offline hishamk

Re: I have a new in box Commodore Amiga 1000 Prototype
« Reply #91 on: May 30, 2010, 09:18:00 PM »
Haynie was gracious enough to shed some more light on this find:

"It looks fairly reasonable. It's clearly not the early prototypes...
the, based on the "Zorro" motherboard, were in black steel cases with
5.25" floppy and expansion "chimney", though the top of the board. This
was the state of the protoype shortly after Commodore bought Amiga.

The plastic here all looks correct, but it's clearly not the final
plastic -- it say "Commodore" not "Amiga", and there are no signatures
in the lid.

I'm not disturbed by the laser-printer label.  I didn't see this sort
before, but assuming this is using early plastic and all, it was
probably a unit sent to developers. There's some date code, 6/28...
presumably, June 28, 1985, which would reinforce that idea. These would
have been fairly small in number, and yeah, for this kind of thing, we
often just printed up labels in the lab, or even hand-labelled them.

Chip-wise, it has the 6526, which was the predecessor of the 8520. The
8520 is basically a MOS HMOS-III version of the 6526, with a few tweaks
requested by the Amiga software team. You can see the 8362 Denise, 8364
Paula, and 8361 Agnus chips, all of which are the right vintage for a
pre-production Amiga... all with mid-early 1985 datecodes.

Curiously, it's a Hitachi 68000, but that's possible... Commodore went
shopping. We were paying $2.50 for a 68000 while Apple was paying over
$8.00 for the same chip."

"My guess, this is one of the units that went to developers. So,
basically a pre-production unit, not an engineering prototype. You can
see that kickstart is in ROM, two 8-bit EPROMs rather than the WCS board
used in A1000 production. That also makes some sense.. the WCS was a
late idea."

Hope this helps any potential bidders assess its true value.
2x A1000, 2x A2000, 1x A3000, 4x A1200, 3x A500, 1x CDTV, 1x CD32, 2x Pegasos II, 1x EFIKA
 

Offline TjLaZer

Re: I have a new in box Commodore Amiga 1000 Prototype
« Reply #92 on: May 30, 2010, 09:28:27 PM »
Quote from: mknkt;561994
The auction ends SOON... Don't miss out...:hammer:

Looks like some rich European is winning (with the Euro to USD advantage to boot, even with the money market problems over there too) LOL  Too rich for my blood.
Going Bananas over AMIGAs since 1987...

Looking for Fusion Fourty PNG ROMs V3.4?

:flame: :banana: :banana: :banana:
 

Offline mknktTopic starter

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Re: I have a new in box Commodore Amiga 1000 Prototype
« Reply #93 on: May 30, 2010, 09:53:05 PM »
Quote from: hishamk;562122
Haynie was gracious enough to shed some more light on this find:
 
"It looks fairly reasonable. It's clearly not the early prototypes...
the, based on the "Zorro" motherboard, were in black steel cases with
5.25" floppy and expansion "chimney", though the top of the board. This
was the state of the protoype shortly after Commodore bought Amiga.
 
The plastic here all looks correct, but it's clearly not the final
plastic -- it say "Commodore" not "Amiga", and there are no signatures
in the lid.
 
I'm not disturbed by the laser-printer label. I didn't see this sort
before, but assuming this is using early plastic and all, it was
probably a unit sent to developers. There's some date code, 6/28...
presumably, June 28, 1985, which would reinforce that idea. These would
have been fairly small in number, and yeah, for this kind of thing, we
often just printed up labels in the lab, or even hand-labelled them.
 
Chip-wise, it has the 6526, which was the predecessor of the 8520. The
8520 is basically a MOS HMOS-III version of the 6526, with a few tweaks
requested by the Amiga software team. You can see the 8362 Denise, 8364
Paula, and 8361 Agnus chips, all of which are the right vintage for a
pre-production Amiga... all with mid-early 1985 datecodes.
 
Curiously, it's a Hitachi 68000, but that's possible... Commodore went
shopping. We were paying $2.50 for a 68000 while Apple was paying over
$8.00 for the same chip."
 
"My guess, this is one of the units that went to developers. So,
basically a pre-production unit, not an engineering prototype. You can
see that kickstart is in ROM, two 8-bit EPROMs rather than the WCS board
used in A1000 production. That also makes some sense.. the WCS was a
late idea."
 
Hope this helps any potential bidders assess its true value.

Thank you very much for your post...:)
 

Offline Pentad

Re: I have a new in box Commodore Amiga 1000 Prototype
« Reply #94 on: May 30, 2010, 10:42:07 PM »
Boy, we really need to get a copy of the Kickstart in this machine.  A great historical find and I would like to preserve all we can before its gone.  What a rare treat!
Linux User (Arch & OpenSUSE TW) - WinUAE via WINE
 

Offline tone007

Re: I have a new in box Commodore Amiga 1000 Prototype
« Reply #95 on: May 30, 2010, 10:46:19 PM »
Quote from: Pentad;562135
Boy, we really need to get a copy of the Kickstart in this machine.  A great historical find and I would like to preserve all we can before its gone.  What a rare treat!


Might already be gone, given the problems booting. Evil bitrot!
3 Commodore file cabinets, 2 Commodore USB turntables, 1 AmigaWorld beer mug
Alienware M14x i7 laptop running AmigaForever
 

Offline B00tDisk

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Re: I have a new in box Commodore Amiga 1000 Prototype
« Reply #96 on: May 30, 2010, 11:14:22 PM »
Quote from: Pentad;562135
Boy, we really need to get a copy of the Kickstart in this machine.  A great historical find and I would like to preserve all we can before its gone.  What a rare treat!


Why?  What could be done with it?
Back away from the EU-SSR!
 

Offline TjLaZer

Re: I have a new in box Commodore Amiga 1000 Prototype
« Reply #97 on: May 30, 2010, 11:23:43 PM »
Quote from: B00tDisk;562139
Why?  What could be done with it?


zapped EPROMS?  25 year old EPROMs? Bitrot?  Many possibilities.   Hmmmmm lol
Going Bananas over AMIGAs since 1987...

Looking for Fusion Fourty PNG ROMs V3.4?

:flame: :banana: :banana: :banana:
 

Offline tone007

Re: I have a new in box Commodore Amiga 1000 Prototype
« Reply #98 on: May 30, 2010, 11:42:13 PM »
B00tdisk's question was probably more along the lines of "what good would the KS code be," practically not much, just something to look at for curiosity's sake.
3 Commodore file cabinets, 2 Commodore USB turntables, 1 AmigaWorld beer mug
Alienware M14x i7 laptop running AmigaForever
 

Offline mknktTopic starter

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Re: I have a new in box Commodore Amiga 1000 Prototype
« Reply #99 on: May 31, 2010, 01:38:38 AM »
SOLD:hammer:
 

Offline Gulliver

Re: I have a new in box Commodore Amiga 1000 Prototype
« Reply #100 on: May 31, 2010, 02:16:26 AM »
Congratulations!

Just out of curiosity, How much was the final bid?
 

Offline CaptChaos

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Re: I have a new in box Commodore Amiga 1000 Prototype
« Reply #101 on: May 31, 2010, 02:20:28 AM »
So what is the backstory to this Amiga and how did it come into your posession?
 

Offline Pentad

Re: I have a new in box Commodore Amiga 1000 Prototype
« Reply #102 on: May 31, 2010, 02:27:01 AM »
Quote from: B00tDisk;562139
Why?  What could be done with it?


Well, its apart of the Amiga's history.   There is nothing that can be 'done' by any average user but its apart of the Amiga's history and to those who enjoy the Amiga's history, its something to analyze.   To see where they were then and where they went.

I personally would like to look at the code to see what changes they made from this revision to the earliest Kickstart that is archived now.

You know, if people don't record this stuff, it will be gone forever much sooner than anybody realizes.

I feel very strongly about preserving and archiving not just Amiga history but basically the last 30 years of technology.   The software, the computers, the articles, the magazines, the actual history of the computer revolution is quickly disappearing.

I can't name another 'industry' that changes so much and so quickly.   I can still buy parts for a '65 Ford Mustang, but look how hard it is to get dips for an Amiga 3000 that is so much younger...

Copyrights and patents be damed, I would like to see it all archived by somebody so that in the future, if a student (or hobbyist) a hundred years from now wants to write a research paper on the 8 Bit Computer Revolution, they have a broad selection of archived material to look at.

Once its lost, its lost to the future, I think that is kind of sad...

-P
Linux User (Arch & OpenSUSE TW) - WinUAE via WINE
 

Offline scuzzb494

Re: I have a new in box Commodore Amiga 1000 Prototype
« Reply #103 on: May 31, 2010, 03:00:39 AM »
Quote from: Pentad;562164


Once its lost, its lost to the future, I think that is kind of sad...

-P


Fortunately there seems to be more and more people collecting the computers now so there is more of a chance of the technology surviving. My collections will stay safe till I die at least but after that.... well who knows.

scuzz
http://www.commodore-amiga-retro.com

Offline Pentad

Re: I have a new in box Commodore Amiga 1000 Prototype
« Reply #104 on: May 31, 2010, 03:42:28 AM »
Quote from: scuzzb494;562169
Fortunately there seems to be more and more people collecting the computers now so there is more of a chance of the technology surviving. My collections will stay safe till I die at least but after that.... well who knows.

scuzz
http://www.commodore-amiga-retro.com


Scuzz,

I appreciate what you are trying to say and I think its great but you are also an example of one of the issues that I see.   Your collection could be awesome but its a private collection.  I'm not saying that you wouldn't be kind enough if somebody was doing some sort of research that you would help them out but your archive is invisible to researchers.  

Please, don't think that I'm saying anything negative but as you stated who maintains your collection after you're gone?

I wanted to share another example with all of you.  I was writing a paper linking fear, computers (technology) and nuclear war in the 1980s.   I wanted some articles from some big name magazines from the time:  Creative Computing, Compute!, Byte, etc...

I emailed the head of the university library where I worked for help.  You know what?  I couldn't find any of the articles through easy to use regular channels anymore.   I had to jump through a whole bunch of hoops but when I asked why the librarian mentioned a new term to me:  Extinction through popularity.   These magazines had been so popular, so large, that many libraries just threw them out thinking others will carry them because they are were popular.   Well, it turned out none of them kept them.

I mean I understand why from a current technology point of view but if you wanted to look back it became problematic.

So, anyway, there is my rant...  :-)


Cheers!
-P
Linux User (Arch & OpenSUSE TW) - WinUAE via WINE