Hi everybody!!

[songoku]

Well, this is going to seem strange, but heeeeeeeeeeeeere goes.  I'm Stan, a very loyal, dedicated Amigaphile who for the last oh 12 years or so has swallowed his pride and sold his principles ... but enough of thst Micro$lop crap.

My frist love has been and always will be my Amigas, and I've owned 4 of them over the last 2 decades... my original Amiga in 1986, a duplicate of that Amiga in 1992, a 1200 slimcase in ohhhhhhhhhhh 95-96 I think, and a 2000 IN 2000.  Why I hven't kept any of them I'm ashmed to say I don't know, but what's done is done.  My love for this little babies has always been around.  I've stood by them through Escom, Gateway, wondering when the next owner-du-jour would let me down.  But this is a happy post, I promise

I'm going back to my first love and getting an A1200 tower system.  I eventually plan to use my Intel system only for games that aren't available on the Amy.  A friend and I are getting ideas for our respective systems, and any ideas/recommendations would be GREATLY helpful!    See, told you it was happy  Not one to wait for OS4, I'll be content with 3.9 on a classic A1200 system, and I intend to add a PPC board later.  For the initial purchase\, being a poor grad student, I think a Typhoon or Blizzard 1240 with 16 meg or 32 meg would do me just fine.  Justin, my friend, brought up somthing I'd forgotten about though.  Gaming.

I can't rememebr if the AGA chipset would run the older games such as Starfleet (Interstel), Battletech, Archon, etc.  Or games in general,pre-AGA,  I don't think it would, though.

Also wondering about internet speeds and new AV abilities.  This was always one of the Amy's draws for me.  what kinds of graphix accelerators and/or monitors would anyone recommend?  I'vegot a spare SVGA monitor...

Okay, thqt's enough rambling for now.  It's great to be back among real computer users again!!  

Catch y'all later,
Tiger
 :-D

[songoku]

Oh you're in for a TREAT and a half!!  The Amigas are simply the best.  period.  Don't care what the day'sayers have to blabber on and on about.  I wouldn't tower mine but for the fact that eventually it's gonna be my main machine and for that I need at least a DVD-RW, USB, PCI slots, and memory.  Tons and tons of RAM.  A classic case just wouldn't work.

[songoku]

Oliver wrote:
Hi, welcome to the forum.  There have actually been a few similar queries to yours quite recently, so you should have  a look around to check some other answers.

I have been looking indeed!  and I wonder if a mod can move this post to the appropriate thread?

Graphics cards: Picasso IV and CyberVisionPPC seem to be very popular, though there are others.  These two are probably the most expensive.  You should also have a look at flicker fixers/scan doublers.  If you can't get one of these built in to your graphics card, you will probably want one to display native 15kHz screen modes on your SVGA monitor.

I remember my 2000 had a GVP board in, and when I used my Toaster the system would switch over to the 1080 monitor I had attached to the main unit.  I had a PCmonitor hooked up to the GVP card.  That was a funky setup.

As far as internet usage is concerned, many people are happy with broadband connections with 10Mbps ethernet cards, at least as far as downloads, email, ftp, IRC, etc are concerned.  However, web browsers are not Amiga's strong point.  Also, if you want to look at content such as movie

You ain't kidding!  The aforementioned A2000 I put OS 3,5 on and it may have been teh measley 7 meg of RAM I had but man was it ever SLOW.  I could start browsing a webpage, go out to Red Lobster for lunch and come back, and the browser still would be trudging along.  yeah I know, OS35 on an original 2000?  well, modified a TAD, of course.  but still...  I expect the 1200 will be a little faster, with the broadband connection.

If you want to replace a PC completely, I would suggest a PPC/060 accellerator, and the best graphics card you can get.  Otherwise, performance and features will probably dissapoint you.

I said eventually.  I have no illusions about still holding onto my  Intel box (which I mainly use Linux on... hehe) but it would be nice to eventually get back to my college days and only touch one of the Losedows systems if I hgave NO other choice.  And about WinUAE:  I have it, and Amiga Forever.  Like both.  I even have *looks around* Amithlon and AmigaXL.  they just cant replace the real thing.

The highly modified classic Amigas are still capable of pretty impressive tasks, and a lot of people enjoy using them.  If you can't afford to expand a system heavily, I expect you probably will end up still using your PC for a number of duties.

Like I said, the Windows box willstay around anyway.  Until I get a USB connection for the Amiga when I DO get it, my printer will be useless.  And I know HP doesn't make drivers for the Amy.... oh well.

One very contented Tiger

[songoku]

Dr_Righteous wrote:
Amigas are what you make of them... To modernize one will require quite a bit of capital, which will of course be a must for anyone wishing to use one as their main box.

Color me nostalgic.  I remember a time when it wAS my main box.  

An Elbox Mediator is certainly a must... With a Voodoo3 video card and a compatable network card (for your DSL/Cablemodem). A scandoubler would be wise... A video switcher (or dual-input monitor) between the scandoubler and your Voodoo3, so you can see both AGA and RTG screens. USB interface, of course, with registered drivers. Compatable sound card as well. Start saving your pennies for a Blizzard... You WILL need it sooner than you think... Like when you start thinking about MP3s!

Oh sh*t, MP3s... it's utterly amazing what you take for granted on a modern box, isn't it?  And I intend to acquite this system piecemeal anyway, as we poor grad students can't even afford a cup of coffee. the Blizzard and Mediator will come later on.  Course, if I wait TOO much longer I may as well GO with OS4  Cuz it'll BE here.  Supposedly.

Notice I aint holdin my breath.

All the things I wish I could get myself... But don't have that kinda cash. Then again, I'm unlikely to ever try to use my miggy as my main box. Too expensive, especially for my A4000D. Alot of fun as a second tho!

Welcome back to Amiga, welcome to Amiga.org!

Thanks, and I'm glad to be back!  If I winbd up being unable to use her as my main box, she'll be a fun second.  This is going to be one helluva year.  My first Amiga got me through college.  Will this one get me through grad school?  I dunno...  probably not unless I can get it to run SuSE.  hehe

[songoku]

Oliver wrote:

Hyperspeed wrote:
When people say they won't use their Amiga as their main machine I'm a little puzzled as to why this is...

I guess that depends what you do most.  I have to use MATLAB, LaTeX, MSWord, Excel, Access, pspice, LabVIEW, and Protel, which are a little problematic on the old miggy.  I guess my Amiga are really hobby machines for me.  If I could afford to improve them, then I would certainly use them a lot more.  I like a lot of features of Amigas, but they unfortunately just can't meet very many of my computing requirements.  I think it just depends on what you need though.  Right tool for the right job.

Come to think of it, the reason I got into computer science as a profession to BEGIN with was the miggy.  So as for things like Matlab/Mathematica, I suppose an overly-ambitious project would be write ne for the Amiga.  hehe
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edit- The Amiga community is probably also a major reason why I still enjoy the Amiga experience.

Me too, and Im checking out Troika as a possible board too, now.  But that'd still mean waiting on the OS release so sod that  I want somethig I can USE!
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