Resurrecting old files

[Matt_H]

Welcome back!

There are a few methods of dumping Amiga disks to disk image files for use in emulators. Kyroflux is probably the best option at the moment. There's also the SuperCard Pro but I haven't heard any reports on how well it works. You'll probably see recommendations for a Catweasel MK4, but those are very hard to come by these days. If you have a PC with a floppy controller on the motherboard, there's an option for that which requires the use of 2 floppy drives. Name escapes me, however. I'm sure someone here knows it.

Once you get the disk images, you can load them into your emulated Amiga. A package called Amiga Forever is an easy way to get started.

Aminet should have some tools to convert your anim formats to something more accessible, although not necessarily fully modern. Alternatively, you could play the animations under emulation and record the emulator's video output directly to a modern format.

[Matt_H]

I think there are some Northern California people here who could help you out. Later in the year there will also be the Amiwest show in/near Sacramento where you can find a whole bunch of other users.

Depending on how many disks you have and what needs to be converted once you have the disk images, it could be a lot of work. Be prepared for the possibility that you'll have to do some of this yourself. The best emulator on OSX is called FS-UAE. If you have Bootcamp or Parallels or VMWare Fusion you can run Windows and therefore WinUAE, the gold standard in Amiga emulation. (FS-UAE uses the same emulation core, but its frontend/UI is not quite as powerful yet). Amiga Forever includes WinUAE and a preconfigured Aniga environment so you can get going in just a few clicks.