I've been a user since 1986. I just tossed most of my Amiga shit in the dumpster. Fuck it. I've spent more time performing repairs than anything else. Time to move on. Winuae.
Can't say I blame you, lol. My first Amiga was a 16mhz A3000 the day they came out, it changed my world. Went through 2 A4000's after that, including a very expanded PPC/060/CV one I sold in the late 90's, along with a few A2000's.
Few years ago, I got the bug back up my ass for some nostalgia. Bought an A1200 off ebay a year or two back, invested in a PPC board, BVision. Waste of time and money, for me. When it did work, it didn't bring much nostalgia for me. Bought a SAM after that, and not even getting much use out of it lately. I was constantly screwing with that A1200 to figure out what the issue was. Sold the parts off, the 1200 mobo is in the shed covered in dust.
Way I see it, there's 2 distinct camps of Amiga users. The 'Click and clackers", the guys that get a groovy feeling off hunting and pecking on an all original Amiga. Then there's guys like me, and I suspect you - that like to sit down and play a game, write a bit of code, run a BBS in my case - with reliability, small footprint, and relative silence under modern hardware with no dodgy patches or things, USB, CD, NIC support all in there from tits to tail. I respect anyone who has fun with this old stuff, whether it is via old hardware or emulation.
WinUAE is great for guys like me, because it does exactly that
Honestly, the most fun I've had in a long time is this old mini itx box I built that boots right into WB 3.1 off a stripped XP install. Best of all, it's no bigger than a Mac mini, my G19 keyboard and G 9 mouse work on it. The reason I like it is also the reason purists dislike WinUAE - this mini itx rig doesn't feel like an Amiga in the least, makes no clicking and clacking sounds or floppy clicks, etc. Just a wee little box hooked to the back of my KVM that runs better than any amiga I could ever have bought.
Different strokes for different folks. Respect the past while expecting the future.
