Amiga: Hobby or Everyday Computing?

[amigakidd]

I don't have a real Amiga, but use Amiga Forever and WinUAE
as my "software Amiga computing" needs. I love playing with my Amiga software every weekend (the only time I find time to play) I thought about this: This is just my hobby.
There are no limitations and no restrictions.

How many of you use an Amiga for everyday computing (I mean earn a living) using one.

Is owning an Amiga or emulating one just a hobby?
Why do we bother? What makes it so different to owning
a PC/Mac? Do we become special when we own an Amiga or a copy of Amiga Forever? Is it a cult following?

[VooDoo]

Here I using Amiga every day for all..And I dont have PC  :-D  only two miggy A1200 and  ua1c both whit OS4 :crazy:  ...and of course my brtoher have one a1200  :crazy:

[Jiffy]

amigakidd wrote:
Is owning an Amiga or emulating one just a hobby?
Why do we bother? What makes it so different to owning
a PC/Mac? Do we become special when we own an Amiga or a copy of Amiga Forever? Is it a cult following?

For most of us, the Amiga is just a hobbymachine.

The Amiga in itself is nothing really special as it is, ofcourse: just a pile of chips with some builtin software. But it's nice to use the hard- and software you used ten or twenty years ago when it was top of the line. That is why there are still so many old computers in use, all of them with a dedicated following.

Whether this be the C64, a ZX Spectrum, Amiga, Atari ST, MSX or whatever: people using them to this day, are using them mainly because they have fond memories about using them in the 80-ies and early 90-ies.

I like my Amigas (1200, 2000 & 3000) for two reasons: I can still use the software I used back then (games, demos, whatever) but I can now also use the soft- and hardware I was never able to buy when I was a boy. The same goes for my C64/128.

With the Amiga, I like its design, the functional combination of custom chips and the well designed OS. I prefer it very much to something like the Atari ST, but still there are many people having very fond memories concerning the ST.

[amigakidd]

I think because it has that 68K charm, unlike todays Winintellymac corey duo machines. Like you said 80s and 90s.
I grew up in the early 90s, didn't have an Amiga, but seen it in commercials. I had a Sega Genesis. Some Amiga games made their way into the Genesis.

I think of the Amiga as a Hobby, a retrocomputing experience
to get away from my stressful job. It's like fixing a vintage car on a Saturday morning.

Did you know that AmigaDOS was based on TRIPOS language?
Similar to UNIX.
Try googling it. I found it to be interesting

[uncharted]

From 1998 until late 2002, my Amiga A1200 was my main machine.  I used it for everything, email, web, word-processing - the whole shebang.  Actually, it's quite mind-boggling how well it held up (or how I much I was willing put up with if you want to look at it that way :-))

Really it was only my inability to get hold of a GFX card that ultimately led me to drop it in favour of a Mac.  The lack of CPU horse-power, was much less of an issue than you'd expect.  The slow AGA and small screen-modes was the real killer for me.

There are a lot of computing tasks that have barely changed in the last 20 or so years, that I think an Amiga could cope with pretty well.  I've yet to have a nice an email experience as I did with YAM back in the day.

With all that said, I always looked at my Amiga as a hobby as much as an every-day tool.  It was always obvious they'd be a day when I couldn't blag it anymore.  

But Life's no fun if you don't have a bit of a challenge ;-)

[spihunter]

For me its a hobby and a retro sound tool.

[Andeda]

I use my amigas for retrogaming and stuff like that,
using it for a everyday use for example web and mail is way too painful

[tonyyeb]

It is a hobby for me. If I had a network card and a decent web browser then I might use it more. But then it wouldn't have a flash player plugin, adobe reader etc...

I just enjoy playing the games on a real amiga and trying stuff out I never could when I was a kid due to no money. Now my miggy has all the things I wanted and more!

[uncharted]

tonyyeb wrote:
It is a hobby for me. If I had a network card and a decent web browser then I might use it more. But then it wouldn't have a flash player plugin, adobe reader etc...

Actually PDFs were never a problem, there were various PDF readers that seemed to do the job without problems for me.  And there are *REALLY REALLY* basic flash players that will help with some basic stuff - it was good enough for an online course I took back in 2001*

People tend to dwell on the negatives when it comes to the Amiga's abilities, but it really is surprising just how much stuff they can do (usually with a bit of effort though).

* I know I'm starting to sound a little nutty here - believe me, I wouldn't swap a modern Mac/Windows/Linux box for a vintage 1992 Amiga.

[taunusand]

tonyyeb wrote:
It is a hobby for me. If I had a network card and a decent web browser then I might use it more. But then it wouldn't have a flash player plugin, adobe reader etc...

I just enjoy playing the games on a real amiga and trying stuff out I never could when I was a kid due to no money. Now my miggy has all the things I wanted and more!

It's easy to buy a X-Surf netcard from AmigaKit :-)

Adope reader, try APDF get it from Aminet Link

I do have a PC.. But I use my A4000 as much as I can :-)
But I also have to agree, Amiga is one of my hobbys, that I could not afford when I was younger. I think it is a great computer and I hope that Natami and other developers lets our hobby live many years from this day!

When it comes to games, I mainly use my CD32. There are still somee of my friends that enjoy playing on it too :-)

[Ilwrath]

Hobby machine... For sure.  I haven't used an Amiga as my primary machine for about 7 or 8 years, now.  

The lack of CPU horsepower is noticeable, but it can be worked around.  The lack of current software... That's not as easy to deal with.  As mentioned, web-browsers, flash, reader, etc...  You just don't even think about them until all of a sudden you don't have them.  (Sure, you have AWeb and Ghostscript, and sometimes they even work for more than an hour or two before they drag the OS off into Guru Meditation oblivion...)  But I can't see using an Amiga as a primary system, anymore.  It's a fun machine for what it does, but what it doesn't do kills it from consideration for primary use.  

That's probably the only reason I didn't buy an EFIKA/MorphOS system.  The price is right, the horsepower is pretty impressive for an AmigaOS-type system...  (It'd drag my old A4000 out behind the barn and beat it senseless..) but again... The lack of software makes it not really usable as a primary system.  :-(

[alexh]

Hobby. As an engineer, always use the best tool for the job. Amiga is great for retrogaming.

[pVC]

How many of you use an Amiga for everyday computing (I mean earn a living) using one.

I think those are two different things. Most don't use home computer for earning a living, but home computer is used for everyday computing.

In any case, I use Amiga (and/or Pegasos, which I count as amiga in these kind of questions) for everyday computing and also for work on situations I have to do work at home.

[tonyyeb]

@uncharted
@taunusand

Still no decent web browser though. And yes I am aware of the X-Surf. Too expensive for occasional use.

[taunusand]

tonyyeb wrote:
@uncharted
@taunusand

Still no decent web browser though. And yes I am aware of the X-Surf. Too expensive for occasional use.

I agree, but some of us just spend way too much money on our hobbies  :-D
IBrowse is good enough for me, but again I agree, an update would be very nice!