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Amiga computer related discussion => Amiga Hardware Issues and discussion => Topic started by: Miked on May 07, 2006, 07:48:03 AM
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It's been 18 years since I dusted off this computer and began the arduous task of upgrading it. Its a nice computer, but I think my disappointment lies in its graphics capabilities. I forgot how advanced computers have come in the last 18 years. The ECS is a slight improvement over OCS, but barely.
Don't get me wrong I love my A500, but I really had visions of using it as a primary computer. I don't know if its going to have the 'guts' to perform.
Maybe an Amiga 1200 maxed out could live up to the task?
-Miked
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To be honest, I'm not surprised if you were expecting to use your A500 as a main machine. I know some people do, but I think an upgraded A1200 will give you a much more enjoyable experience. Get yourself an A1200 and a fast accelerator to start off with. If you feel like upgrading the graphics capability at a later date, you can put it in a tower and add a graphics card.
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moto
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I tend to agree. That 500 is really only good for games.
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Methuselas wrote:
I tend to agree. That 500 is really only good for games.
It was good enough for Miki Berenyi of Lush though wasn't it ;-)
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moto
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What do you want to do with your 'main computer'? A maxed out 1200 will also not perform nearly as quickly, or do nearly as many tasks as recent computers, and will also cost more. It depends on what you want to do though.
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motorollin wrote:
Methuselas wrote:
I tend to agree. That 500 is really only good for games.
It was good enough for Miki Berenyi of Lush though wasn't it ;-)
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moto
OMG, don't *EVEN* get me started on that. *laughing*
That woman *STILL* gives me a hard on.
I remember meeting her in 94 at a show and all we did, was talk about Amigas, while getting drunk to Weezer. :crazy:
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Methuselas wrote:
That woman *STILL* gives me a hard on.
Lovely... :lol:
I seem to remember AP interviewing her. Didn't read the article at the time though.
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moto
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If you like the a500, you should try to max it out. Nowadays it's hard to find powerful expansion boards, but can be possible. Also, if you manage to get a converter for the expansion port to zorro, you could add a graphics card to it, i saw on the net long time ago a guy that had his 500 with rtg. But finding a500 parts nowadays is very hard. It's easier to get parts for a a1200, hence some suggestions made to you by mates on this forum, but if you really like the idea of having the 500 maxed out, go for it.
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Miked wrote:
Its a nice computer, but I think my disappointment lies in its graphics capabilities.
When you were first starting your A500 upgrade, I think about seven of us suggested that an A1200 would be better. So as I said, get youself a brand new A1200 from Amigakit and you'll probably have much more fun.
As for the A500 - having only 16 colours in high-res (only useable A500 WB mode) is a bit of a disappointment, but if you use those colours well, things can still look nice (take a look at my screenshots if you haven't seen them).
I use my A500 as my main (only) computer and the only disappointment I have is running out of RAM on huge webpages with javascript and a recent unexplained memory freeing problem (probably dying RAM chip). Besides that, I had years of fun using my A500 as my main computer.
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Also, if you manage to get a converter for the expansion port to zorro, you could add a graphics card to it, i saw on the net long time ago a guy that had his 500 with rtg.
I didn't know it was possible to add a graphics card to an Amiga 500. This intrigues me.
-Miked
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@Miked
I think finding a zorro busboard for an A500 will be more difficult than finding an accelerator for the A500.
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double post
Mods, please remove
/double post
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All you need is to find a Bodega (sp?) Bay expansion box :lol:
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>but I think my disappointment lies in its graphics capabilities.
You naughty fellow! Now go and load up Elfmania immediately and then wash your mouth out with soap. Twice. :)
That aside, a 1200 with a Mediator and Voodoo give a nice visual result, when I've been forced to revert to AGA for serious use I was surprised at what a difference there is.
OCS/ECS/AGA is still great for games though IMO.
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Just do yourself a favor and get a 2000 or better yet 3000/4000. And get a Gfx card.
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TjLaZer wrote:
Just do yourself a favor and get a 2000 or better yet 3000/4000. And get a Gfx card.
I'm the type of person that will lament about something, but still go ahead with it anyway. With regards to the Amiga 500, if I could retrofit a graphics card, Id be a very happy man :)
I know an Amiga 2000/3000/4000 would really make things a lot easier but I like "underdog" products like the A500. I think thats why I bought it in the fist place (or maybe it was because I had little money :)
-Miked
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It depends on what you are using your primary computer for. But yes, i believe it is way outdated if you intended to use it for things like web browsing, video playback and so on.. A heavily upgraded a1200 on the other hand is quite capable. You should use a gfx card instead of aga though if you want to for example browse the internet with it.
The a500 is just not very upgradable. If you want an upgradable classic amiga for daily usage, then you should either get the a3000, a4000 or the a1200. I think the a4000 is the best bet if you want a gfx card and so on, as you need to tower your a1200 to be able to do the same with that.
Btw.. Most a500 had the OCS chipset and not the ECS. Only the a500+ and last revision of the a500 had the ECS.
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Miked wrote:
It's been 10 years since I dusted off this computer and began the arduous task of upgrading it. Its a nice computer, but I think my disappointment lies in its graphics capabilities. I forgot how advanced computers have come in the last 10 years. The ECS is a slight improvement over OCS, but barely.
10 years ago the A500 was almost 10 years old already. I think your comments are unfair. For a 20 year old computer you can't really do much better. Unless you get an A2000 :-D
An 68030-50MHz, 32MB A1200 with HD and CDROM is still a nice machine for various tasks but you shouldn't expect AGA to offer you the experience you are getting from VGA cards and monitors the last 10 years. If you are after desktop applications rather than video/gfx/multimedia/games or you can't stand your old 1084S' PAL frequencies I would suggest a BlizzardPPC/BlizzardVision combo, a Mediator/Grex/etc, or a big box Amiga (A2000/3000/4000).
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Use the A500 with extra ram and a harddisk and you have a very nice machine for games and utilities. Adding more stuff, like for example a turbocard and such, is imo a bit overdone.
As mentioned above, the A1200 is a much more capable machine, although without a videocard graphics are not a big improvement compared to your A500: on a 1084 you're still confined to the lower resolutions. Combined with a flickerfixer and a 15" CRT, you can use (much) higher resolutions, although the speed of the graphics subsystem is becoming a bottleneck for total systemperformance, even when using a fast turbocard. I like the improved image it gives me, although there are many Amigans who dislike the flickerfixers for A1200s as most (all?) of them do not display all colors the A1200 is capable of.
Use the A500 for what its good at in 2006: a very capable retro gamesmachine, with the capability of snooping around in 'the-good-old-days' insides of a classic OS. Adding both a hardddrive, extra ram and maybe an extra diskdrive (for diskcopying) will make your A500 a happy camper, adding more is not worth it and will most likely not give you the extra performance you expected.
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@Miked
Don't even bother with the A500. Just sell it and buy an Amiga 1200. Your disapointment for its limited graphics abilities is completely justified. The AGA chipset of the A1200 is a BIG improvement over the OCS: Much higher resolutions, 256 colors in all of them (all of the "Amiga native" resolutions, anyway) and it's also faster.
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@everyone: just my 2 cents worth: I used my Amiga 500 from when I first bought it with my Tax refund in....(anyone know when the first A500 'bundle' came out, with Tetris, and Where in World is Carmen S.?) I used, expanded, and literally beat that machine to death, only then did I get an A1200.
That machine gave me much pleasure, sure I can't brag about it to PC-owning friends, but it did what I needed it to do at the time. As for graphics, well it didn't do anything for WB, but I was loading, editing, and saving 'near' 24-bit pics with DCTV unit on my A500 for quite some time....
And I miss the better (early) game compatibility that the A500 had over the 1200 (Yes, even with WHDload...)
Only downside IMHO, is some difficulty in finding A500 add-ons....(or A1200 accelerators, or new Amigas, etc. ad nauseum) (Sp?)