new A3000, what upgrades should I get???

[roguebeck]

Today I bought an A3000, it's not here yet but I wanted to see what upgrades I should start looking into.

This is what it currently has:
Kickstart 2.04
Workbench 2.04
2 megs of RAM
Amifast adaptor (maxed out:16 megs FAST and 2 megs CHIP RAM)
keyboard
mouse
all manuals

As soon as it gets here I will be adding a 1Gb scsi harddrive (that's all I have on hand right now), I also have a 4X scsi cdrom/burner if that will work too.

What do you guys recommend to make this a more useable machine? I have a slew of PCs and I want to use the amiga for as much as I can.

TIA.

[B00tDisk]

Graphics card, CPU upgrade, USB - go with those and you're halfway home.

[roguebeck]

Any certain Graphics card or type? How about CPU upgrades, do they come on a card, or do I need to pop out the cpu on the board? Sorry to sound like such a noob, but I haven't tinkered with Amigas too long.

B00tDisk wrote:
Graphics card, CPU upgrade, USB - go with those and you're halfway home.

[Lemmink]

Have a look at here: www.amiga-hardware.com and look into the A3000 Accelerators and Graphics Cars (RTG) sections to get an idea.
If you want to use the Amiga seriously you need at first Kickstart 3.1 ROMs, so you can use the most recent OS Version 3.9.
A CD-ROM can only be connected externally to an A3000

[roguebeck]

 Can a cdrom only be connected externally due to space restrictions?

So I need to find myself some 3.1 Roms.... I am guessing they need to be A3000 specific.?.?

Also what do I look for, for USB in a 3000?

Lemmink wrote:
Have a look at here: www.amiga-hardware.com and look into the A3000 Accelerators and Graphics Cars (RTG) sections to get an idea.
If you want to use the Amiga seriously you need at first Kickstart 3.1 ROMs, so you can use the most recent OS Version 3.9.
A CD-ROM can only be connected externally to an A3000

[SyrTran]

@roguebeck

Any certain Graphics card or type?

Yes. A CyberVision 64 (-not- 3D).  With its built-in switcher, and the 3000's built-in de-interlacer, you can get -all- the Amiga's video modes on a PC monitor.

[Amigaz]

roguebeck wrote:
 Can a cdrom only be connected externally due to space restrictions?

So I need to find myself some 3.1 Roms.... I am guessing they need to be A3000 specific.?.?

Also what do I look for, for USB in a 3000?

If you check your machine carefully you'll see that you don't have a 5.25 inch bay to put a cd-rom drive in and that your machine also has a 25pin connector at the back marked "SCSI" which means you can connect an external SCSI cd drive there  :-D

[MskoDestny]

roguebeck wrote:
So I need to find myself some 3.1 Roms.... I am guessing they need to be A3000 specific.?.?

Yep.

Also what do I look for, for USB in a 3000?

Well you have three options from what I can tell. 1. Try to track down an Algor or Highway card. It's out of production so it might not be easy. 2. Get a Zorro card with an A1200 clock port on it and get a Subway card. 3. Get a Mediator PCI board and the Spider USB card.

I don't think you need to worry about USB unless there was a specific USB periphal you want to use.

[roguebeck]

Thanks all, I am sure with your help this Amiga will kick some major arse ;-)

Can anyone recommend some good shops in the US that I can look for these things? Accelerators, graphics cards. network cards?

TIA.

[amigadave]

Software Hut www.softhut.com - been around forever, I bought my first add-ons for my A1000 in 1987 from them.  The availability of items is the problem and you may have to buy some things used on eBay or elsewhere.

Good Luck!

[B00tDisk]

MskoDestny wrote:

Well you have three options from what I can tell. 1. Try to track down an Algor or Highway card. It's out of production so it might not be easy. 2. Get a Zorro card with an A1200 clock port on it and get a Subway card. 3. Get a Mediator PCI board and the Spider USB card.

I don't think you need to worry about USB unless there was a specific USB periphal you want to use.

Ah well there's the rub: there's so much you can connect via USB that IMO it's the peripheral connector to have.  Network, keyboard, mouse, scanner, external storage (both disk and firmware)...the uses are endless.  Go USB! :-)

[MskoDestny]

B00tDisk wrote:
Ah well there's the rub: there's so much you can connect via USB that IMO it's the peripheral connector to have.  Network, keyboard, mouse, scanner, external storage (both disk and firmware)...the uses are endless.  Go USB! :-)

Well for drives USB is going to be quite slow on the Amiga. SCSI would seem to be the way to go here. For keyboard and mouse, interfacing to the standard ports gives you better compatability with software like games. There's also the problem that not all USB devices are supported on the Amiga.

I don't know, for me USB on a classic Amiga wasn't all that compelling, but I'm sure others feel differently.

[roguebeck]

Will the 3000 work on a standard PC monitor or will I have to use my Commodore 1084S? How about PC keyboard/mouse? I've seen adapters but wasn't sure if they were needed with the 3000 series.

Thanks again