Amiga 600 Uses?

[Ral-Clan]

Ummm....er....running all the Amiga stuff you already run on your other "wedge" Amigas?

Seriously though.  With a internal hard drive it makes a nice little computer for doing Tracker based music (ProTracker, OctaMED), MIDI sequencing (Music-X, Dr. T's KCS), or Deluxe Paint pixel animations.

The 68000 would be able to handle all of those tasks pretty well.

Of course it's also great for retro-gaming.

[Ral-Clan]

No offense meant, but if you have several Amigas and boxes of software, but still can't figure out what to do with them, then no Amiga (not even a big box one) is going to help you with that.

Computers are tools. You first come up with an idea then apply the tool to get it done.  The tool doesn't control you.

[Ral-Clan]

I really don't understand all you guys telling Gwion that the A600 is useless and that he should spend lots of money upgrading it (or even his A1200) just so it can do a bad job of the everyday drudgery jobs that any cheap windows box can do (web browsing, email, mp3 playing, etc.).

Instead, he should celebrate what the "stock" A600 CAN do.  Instead of trying to get it to do stuff it wasn't designed to do, use it for what it excels at.  I mean, that's why I still use my Amiga!  For the neat, quirky software and hardware that, while old, can still perform today.

Don't compare it to modern machines or expect it to do what a modern computer can do, ever.  You don't drive a VW bug expecting it to be a Ferrari.  You drive it because it offers its own, unique, special experience.  The same with the Amiga.

I am under no illusion that my Amiga will outperform a modern PC or MAC - but it can do some other things well if I approach it from a retro-computing point of view.

Heck, it can do a lot!  All an A600 really needs is to put an internal Hard drive in there and one can accomplish a lot.

If you put me in a cabin for a week with a stock A600, DPaint, Brilliance, and a tracker program I'd have an album's worth of music and all the artwork produced on this little bundle of fun.  Heck, I might even produce a cool retro-looking video on it in Anim format, superimposed over video with a genlock (cheap nowadays on Ebay).  To take a break I'd play some great classic ECS games.

Gwion is trying to learn what he can do with an Amiga - in this case the A600 is almost perfect.  A great starter system.  Cut your teeth on it, Gwion, and explore.  

To use an analogy: when you decided to learn guitar, you start on a decent economy model and see how well you do. You don't immediately go out and buy a $4000 deluxe Stratocaster (that comes later when you have gained your chops).  Those who do usually find that it's the player (or user), not the equipment, that makes the music sparkle.

If anyone thinks his or her A600 is so useless, please give it to me....I'll put it to great use.

[Ral-Clan]

Your going to GET the Apollo 060?  Don't you mean your going to TRY and TRACK DOWN an Apollo 060 to buy?  I know in north America, these 060 cards don't grow on trees (by any stretch) and are not available from dealers anymore (maybe in the UK it is different).

Also, will 200 pounds even begin to cover the cost of one?  I know the 060 boards for the A2000 start around $500.  

[Ral-Clan]

Gwion wrote:
In the end Amiga is just a Hobby so I bought a iMac G4 700mhz 15" for £132.
And I will use it for Media Studies

*sigh*.  I give up.  This thread is pointless.  You really don't know what you want - it seems every five minutes you are onto something new - and there is no point asking us here.

Good luck though!