Amiga 2000 Technical Question

[mrnukem]

I am now the proud owner of an Amiga 2000 I found at a local thrift shop. I had some question about it though. It says Amiga 2000 Supra drive on the front, inside it has 2 hard drives, one mounted on a controller card and one mounted in the drive bay.

I was looking up what a stock Amiga 2000 has but when I ran a system information program I got the results below. Has this unit been upgraded or was this configuration one of the standard versions commodore released?

I am more familiar with the Amiga 500 which I already own.

Thank you

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C O N F I G U R A T I O N:
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^

Basic Information:
==================

CPU: 68030
FPU: 68882
MMU: 68030
GFX: OCS
ROM: 2.04 (37. 175)
MAPROM: No
Quantum: 4
Clock: NOT FOUND


Memory Information:
===================

Chip Memory : 2096128
Fast Memory : 8388608
Total Memory: 10484736

[mrnukem]

It looks like 1 of the hard drives is not mounting. I think each is a 50 MB drive. I have 2 partitions each 25 MB but I get a drive 1 not mounted error-message when the machine boots up loading the Supra II start up sequence

[mrnukem]

Here are some pictures. Also a very odd little 9 pin plug was in the far right front joystick port, just a 9 pin F encased in small black plastic and a printed label that gives a long serial number.




As far as the hard drives go this is what I have so far:

When I run a program called Sysinfo that I found online under SCSI it says this

ID 0 DISK Quantum LP52S Model 950509405 Ver 2.6E Max Blocks 0 SCSI-2 Real ? Format ?

ID 2 DISK Quantum LP52S Model 950509405 Ver 3.1 Max Blocks 102170 SCSI-2 Real 49MB Format 49 MB

On same screen ID 1,3,4,5,6 all say IO Error or HD_SCSI Command Not supported by the device driver.

On another part of the sysinfo program it says I have a 68030 running at 51.80 Mhz not sure if that will help ID the upgrade. The hard Drive is my main concern, hate to have a 2nd drive in there not being used.

Thanks!

[mrnukem]

Hmmm....it's interesting that Sysinfo says you have a 68030 CPU when there's no CPU accelerator card in the CPU slot (or did you just take it out before taking the photos?).

In the first photo, all I see is a RAM expansion card and a hard drive controller card.  The slot to the right of the hard drive controller card is the CPU slot.

No I never touched the CPU, jst took out the 8 MB memory card but other than that nothing has been changed or removed. Could Sysinfo be wrong?

[mrnukem]

I was wondering the same thing about the CPU.  I have to assume he has something like this:
http://www.amiga-hardware.com/showhardware.cgi?HARDID=63

It is a 68030 & FPU card for the A2000 that actually plugs into the CPU socket rather than the CPU slot.  It also has a jumper to switch it between 68000 and 68030 mode.

That is the one I have with the 50 MHz CPU.

This is the memory card : http://www.amiga-hardware.com/showhardware.cgi?HARDID=973

This looks to be the Hard drive Controller: http://www.amiga-hardware.com/showhardware.cgi?HARDID=1247

funny thing is this Amiga 2000 was bundled with a complete Coleco Adam computer system, with printer, keyboard and game controller. The thrift shop folks thought it was all a single system and the Coleco Adam works too so it was a good day to have gone thrift store shopping.

I have Amiga Explorer on my Windows 7 system and transferring stuff across has gone very smoothly.

Thanks for all the info everyone!

[mrnukem]

I've got to ask, what did you pay?

I got the Amiga and Coleco systems for $150 total

[mrnukem]

Under Workbench About function it says I am using Kickstart 37.175 and Workbench 34.28. and just wondering about the best option to upgrade the OS.

I do have copies of various Workbench disks but not sure which one would be best and also do not want to accidently loose my hard drive functionality when upgrading the OS.

[mrnukem]

Workbench 3.1 and Kick start 3.1 (both version version 40.xx) would be nice upgrades OS wise.

Do I need to upgrade the kickstart ROM chip in the computer to get Workbench 3.1 working?

[mrnukem]

Check again and see if your SCSI card is the one I first mentioned as possibly being in your machine.  The BBOAH entry mentions something about an issue with 3.1 ROMS.

ClassicWB has a nice setup that works with 3.0.

This is the SCSI controller I have

http://www.amiga-hardware.com/showhardware.cgi?HARDID=1247

[mrnukem]

I don't think there is a 3.0 ROM for the A2000 (same as the A500) so just go for the 3.1. The 3.1 kills a few bugs that 3.0 had anyway - it's a better setup by far.
I have an A2000 with very similar specs, except that it runs OS 3.5 and larger hard drives. I use that for graphics work, DTP, and of course the occasional game.
BTW - do not loose that dongle in the joystick port. It may be needed for software already on your hard drive!

If I boot to the hard drive then use the WB 3.1 disk sets to upgrade will it over write the current version of work bench and leave the hard drive mounting sequence intact? I am afraid of accidently messing up the SCSI drivers for the hard drive when doing the upgrade.

[mrnukem]

Upgrading to 3.1 will not mess up your SCSI setup, or anything else. It will only replace the old workbench with the newer 3.1. Actually you will start by booting from the 3.1 floppy disk "Install" first, than just follow the prompts. It's a snap.
The only difference installing 3.5 is that you must already have a CD-ROM drive setup. I don't like 3.9, because it eats so darned much RAM.

I tried to upgrade to 3.1 with the Workbench 6 disk set and when I used the install to HD option it said I needed Kickstart 3.0 and would not let me upgrade, after that only option is to exit. Strange thing is I can boot to a 3.1 floppy and it seems to work just fine, even sees my HD still so for now just going to leave the OS alone and if something requires 3.1 I will boot using floppy and keep the 3.1 boot disk in my external floppy drive.

[mrnukem]

Personally I wouldn't upgrade. The computer is a classic machine and really the less you do to it the less likely you are to break stuff. The kit is getting real old now. Dunno if anyone mentioned the battery. Just hope you have checked and made sure its not leaking. I don't think you showed a picture of the front of the machine... Doesn't look like this does it ?

http://www.commodore-amiga-retro.com/amiga/a_scuzz_jan05/a_scuzz_jan05_36.jpg

The case is the same but the name plate says Amiga 2000 and above that is a plastic Supradrive name plate that I assume the previous owner put on when they installed the Supra controller. When I had it open I checked for battery corrosion and it was clean, shot some canned air in it and in the power supply fan to clean it out too.

Just that I have the Quantum drive in mine...

http://www.commodore-amiga-retro.com/amiga/car_0807/car_3108_002.jpg

Great thing about the Amiga is that you can simply copy the whole of your Workbench to another part of the hard drive and then if you upgrade and don't like it just copy it back.

http://www.gregdonner.org/workbench/wb_204.html

I backed up the HD partitions as an .HDF file via Amiga Explorer so have a back up of them on my PC.

Can you verify that Workbench version by the way ?


The trick with older computers, if you do want the computer to survive is not to try too hard to make it into something it isn't. No upgrade really will give you the jump that makes you think it's getting more modern. The hardware just isn't up to it. So before you start fiddling and then bust something I would reflect on the classic nature of what you have and preserve and look after it. Well done.

I just use the older computers for games and let demos run on them, not trying to do anything outlandish on the Amgia. I do admit to using my TRS-80 Color Computer 3 to play online MUD games via a serial cable and a serial to telnet bridge program on my PC...

I have a sizeable collection of vintage computers and do try to preserve them but I also do have 2 or 3 set up for use at all times and cycle them every few months. Right now Its the Amiga, Commodore 64 with uIEC SD card and Atari 130 XE with a SIO to RS232 interface for using disk images right off PC

Thanks for the info!