3000 vs 4000?

[Damion]

If you find one in good condition with no/minimal battery leakage, I wouldn't pass on either.

Both stock, I'd prefer an A3000. Expanded, A4000 might be a better choice. Much more room in the case, AGA. A good accelerator will have faster SCSI than the A3000 onboard. (Or, use a DENEB, 4091, or Fastlane. The latter two are often problematic in an A3000.)

Potential problems with battery leakage aside, keep in mind the 4000 will almost certainly require (at minimum) repair in the form of all SMD capacitors replaced.

[Damion]

IMHO SMD caps and IC's are generally easier to replace. I'm not an electronics tech, but I've had no problem at all keeping my motherboards working flawlessly. It's time consuming (for me at least), requires good eyesight and a steady hand... from that perspective, I can understand the sentiment of not wanting to do it for a living. I'm not an expert and have much to learn, but I've never had to send a motherboard off for repair, especially for caps or other easier repairs. (Shameless plug - if I felt I couldn't do the job perfectly myself, I'd without question send it to Anthony Hoffman in NZ.)

[Damion]

I agree with you.  That is exactly why I sold off my 3000T and my 4000's.  Didn't use them anymore...  My original logic for having the 4 3000's was spare parts frankly... But over the years I started cleaning them up and adding to them... Sound's like an addiction problem...LOL


I will sell off one or two of them...  I have been planning to use one with the phonepak to answer the phones again...  One kick butt phone system :-)

I try to make use of what I have, but I admit to keeping spares of hardware I find especially valuable/enjoyable like the Picasso IV. Fortunately my kids enjoy the hobby too, so that helps keep them (kids and Amigas) busy. I've also gone through the process of keeping one for "spare parts", that eventually gets repaired and upgraded to another nice system.    

All this talk about the A3K is motivating me to finally get off my butt and finish putting mine together. I think all I'm missing is a good accelerator w/scsi that fits correctly (somewhat limited options there, LOL). The Phonepack is also a great idea, especially now that I'm going back to a landline. (Ditched the cell entirely - feels great!) One thing I like about the A3000 over the 4000 is the keyboard - the latter is mushy, only marginally better than the desktop models. :-/ Regardless, I still say buy based on condition first, trivial details aside either one will be very nice.

[Damion]

Hi Damion,

You have a Picasso IV, now I'm jealous ...  My kids really enjoy their 3000 it has ton of educational games and they have fun with it.

I have always been partial to Macrosystems and the 3040 for Amiga accelerators.  The cyberstorm mk3 is also good choice.  There is a MK3 on ebay now if you want to snatch it.

The Warp Engine 3040 looks like an excellent choice. Great SCSI chip and apparently a fast memory interface. I wouldn't mind an MK3, maybe even an MK2 - and deal with motherboard SCSI, which honestly isn't too terrible. For what it'll be used for, I'd be content with a nice '040 card. The educational software is a good idea... might be more productive for the kids than WHDLoad (LOL).

Have you ever used a phonepak?  They really have more features than many home systems you can buy today.  GVP did an awesome job with it...

Not yet - I have yet to use (let alone obtain) the PhonePak. I never gave it serious thought until you mentioned it. It looks awesome! I noticed this note at amiga.resouce:

in order to use the PhonePak in an A3000 or A4000, a Zorro II RAM expansion has to be added in another slot because these machines have problems with Zorro II DMA to Chip RAM

Did you experience this issue? My understanding was that this shouldn't be a problem with a Buster 9 or 11, or anything other than an early 3640 WRT the A4K.
 

What parts do you have for the 3k stored up?

So far, just the usual bits. Buster 11, DMAC 4/Ramsey 7, the upgraded WD chip, and a load of ZIPs to finish populating the motherboard. These were all a very generous gift from a good friend and fellow Amiga nut a few years back. I have an Ariadne and PIV set aside, though I might end up going with a CV64 - seems a shame not to make use of Amber. (There's the old Spectrum 28/24 I've considered using, a decent enough card IMHO.) Being left on for long periods, I'll probably re-cap the PSU and use some kind of HD surge protection. Aside from that, I'm trying not to get too carried away as I often do. I'm sure you know how that goes...

[Damion]

Demoscene!!! http://ada.untergrund.net

This is really the main reason IMHO. Although - there are are a surprisingly fair number of AGA-era demos that run under CGX. I remember watching most of the ephiderina and elude demos on my A2K, they ran great!

[Damion]

@matt3k

Thank you! :-)

@save

I agree, the cap leakage is a bummer. A few years ago, I bought some A600 boards that were so bad, a number of traces had simply disintegrated. Sadly it often goes unnoticed, they usually still work long after the electrolyte has been eating away at the board. :-/

I think they went cheap on some parts towards the end. I've seen one early A4K board with Panasonics, not surprisingly they hadn't leaked.