UK 1200 in the US?

[Ilwrath]

So what I am hearing is that aside from changing the power supply and booting to NTSC the A1200 PAL and the A1200 NTSC are functionally the same.

I thought this for a long time, but NO, they are not.

Amigakit is correct about the differences between a PAL A1200 and an NTSC one.  

As I understand it now.... While you can switch to NTSC or PAL in the boot menu, it doesn't change the color encoding, only the display timings.  So when you put your native NTSC Amiga into PAL, you don't get true PAL.  You get PAL-N (PAL resolutions and timings with NTSC color).  And the inverse is also true.  When you soft-switch your native PAL Amiga to NTSC, you get PAL-M (NTSC resolution and timings with PAL color).  

The support of any PAL modes may be considered spotty at best on US TVs -- and which ones of these modes will work on your TV is anyone's guess.  :-(  If you're shopping for a new TV, it's probably best to simply try it and see, as the documentation won't say, and any salespeople you corner will most likely treat you as if you suddenly grew an additional head as you try to explain the question.

[Ilwrath]

Please explain why my 21" Sony Trinitron video monitor (no UHF decoder) displayed Never Twice the Same Colour hue changes when using NTSC screenmodes, and correct PAL colour when using PAL screenmodes, from the composite output of my A1200.

Well, that is a very good question.  Without knowing for sure the details of what signal is being outputted and what the monitor is doing with it, I couldn't really tell you.  Heck, maybe even something in one of the motherboard revs or RF/Composite boxes is different between various A1200s.

This is a topic that confuses me, and honestly, I don't know the answers.  My empirical data consists of one TV that can supposedly accept PAL or NTSC by changing a couple settings in a hidden unlock menu.  When set to PAL, I get erratic lose color losses out of my NTSC A1200's PAL mode.  It worked fine with my friend's native PAL CD32, though.

Take THAT ball of confusion for what it's worth.  The PAL-N/PAL-M explanation was the only thing I've heard that made sense, but it may well be in error.  I don't have the equipment or experience to really say for sure.

ETA: Actually, a lot of the color encoding hassles may be limited to the A1200 RF port only, but I'm not sure.