What was the Best and "not so good" Amiga Models?

[CU_AMiGA]

My personal favourite Amiga Model was the 1000. Simply because it was the first machine that brought the computer world to attention, and started all the later Amiga models. And, also it was well ahead of its time and miles better than the PC and MAC, with its graphics and Music capabilities. It will go down in history as a great computer system and a brilliant contirbuter to technology.

As for the worst model (dare i say it!). That would have to go to the 500+. What a waste of time (and money) that was, and all for what? 6 months! I cant see any point in it being released, it wasn't too much powerful than the original 500 and with the 600 and more powerful 1200/4000  just around the corner it had seemed pointless!

[xeron]

Best is a toss up between the 3000 and 4000T. The 3000 had scandoubling, SCSI, and was very well made.

The 4000T had SCSI *and* IDE, a nice big roomy case, AGA, and a certain amount of prestige that it commands.

Worst? They all have their faults. The A4000 has battery leakage problems, trouble with early buster models, and Paula-audio death seems fairly common, but otherwise they're really nice machines.

The 500+ was alright, it wasn't Commodores fault that game programmers relied upon certain undocumented features of the Kickstart 1.x ROMs (or worst of all expecting routines to be at fixed addresses).

At the end of the day, all Amigas are bloody great, imho :-)

[TheMagicM]

to say one model was the "worst" would be too rough.  They were all good.  I like the 3000 and its sexy case.

[CU_AMiGA]

TheMagicM wrote:
to say one model was the "worst" would be too rough.  They were all good.  I like the 3000 and its sexy case.

Okay then, it shall now be titled: What was the Best and "not so good" Amiga Models! :-) Hows that?

[TheMagicM]

thats it! You're banned!  just kidding...  :-)

I also liked the A600 because it was so compact..just too dang hard to find one.

[takemehomegrandma]

The A600 was IMO pretty meaningless. Something like the C16 and the Plus/4 ...

[CU_AMiGA]

I personally, had a soft spot for the 600. It had its good and bad points. The good obviously being a compact Amiga, and closest in being a laptop. The bad point being (again obviously) that it wasn't too powerful, and at a time in 1992 when the 1200 and 4000 was launched.

I love to see the sight of Amiga 600 running a game like Gloom/Doom or similar graphical standard. How far can up upgrade these babies?! :-)

[takemehomegrandma]

@ CU_AMiGA

How far can up upgrade these babies?!

Obviously quite far: http://www.amiga600.de/

 :-o  :-D

[Indoro]

If it had been launched with a 68020 it would have been superior to the A500 all around. The 68000/ECS combo was totally dead in 1991-1992.

That aside, the compct nature made it a better choice for people on the go, and it was a good starter system for people who were still hanging onto their C64 systems.

As far as expansion: The A600 lacks any type of reasonable expansion bus. The best you can add to it are RAM cards and some 020 (and if memory serves 030) cards that clip over and onto the 68000.

I believe Apollo made an 020 or an 030 card which was popular for people who wanted near A1200 performance, but no real graphics expansion was ever released, leaving the A600 in the ECS set of machines, not the AA set.

I also like the small compact and sexy design, but it was never a choice for me (Toaster user). I always stuck to the larger boxes and at one time had a Toaster 2000 and two Toaster/Flyer boxes running at once (A4000 and A4000T).

Overall the best Amiga model ever relesed was the A4000T. Out of the box it did the most, and had the most expansion capabilities. The A3000/T and A2000 are my next in line. The A1000 was probably the best in overall design though for what it did and what it could be made to do in 1985.

//R//

[Acill]

I would have to agree that the A3000 is by far the best Amiga ever. Sure the A4000T had IDE and scsi, but the scsi was just a Zorro card. Its built like a tank. Solid, even over the A4000T. No problems with mine once I put all the new chips in it. AGA is not all that. If you have a graphics card, who wants to run AGA?

The worst Amiga to me is the A600. It came to late. It wasnt that easy to upgrade. All the CPU accelerators are hacks that snap over the 68000 chip. It would have been better to just keep the A500 in production if they wanted to have a low end games amiga.

[takemehomegrandma]

@ Indoro

Well, AFAIK the A600 was released after the A1200, but it had much less features. It had a lower price, but that didn't seem to help much. A 020 and some fastmem would have made it faster, but it still lacked the AGA which everyone wanted at that time. That is what I meant with C16 and Plus/4, a downgrade when people asked for upgrades.

I actually have an A600 HD in my closet. I bought it second hand for a project that never come to be. I have not used it much (hmm, perhaps it's time to take it out, blow off the dust, and experience some nostalgia ;-)).

I agree however that it had kind of a cool case. Very small and all ...

The best Amiga made was without doubt the A4000T ...

[DoomMaster]

I personally like the Amiga 2000 Series of computers.  The Amiga 2000 is the highest quality of all the Amiga models.  It is such a nice computer that it is concidered by many to be the Flagship Amiga, because of its durability and expandability.  After the Amiga 2000 was released, Commodore had decided to cut the cost of production by lowering the quality of all Amigas, starting with the Amiga 3000.  The lowest quality and the worst of the Amiga models are the following:  Amiga 500, 500+, 600, and the 1200, but for some reason most Europeans like these low quality Amigas.  In fact, the Amiga 500 and 1200 are the most popular Amiga computers in Europe.  Even though my favorite Amiga is the Amiga 2000 Series, I have a great respect and love for the legendary Amiga 1000, the Amiga that started it all.     :-D

[xeron]

Well, AFAIK the A600 was released after the A1200, but it had much less features.

Nope. I personally know of two people who bought an A600 as it was the latest model, only to be really annoyed that the 1200 was announced shortly afterwards.

It had a lower price, but that didn't seem to help much. A 020 and some fastmem would have made it faster, but it still lacked the AGA which everyone wanted at that time.

There were no AGA machines when it was released. Not for a few months, anyway.

[xeron]

The A500 is not a 'low quality' computer. It is very well manufactured, and likely to last you a long time.

[DoomMaster]

To xeron:

The A500 is not a 'low quality' computer. It is very well manufactured, and likely to last you a long time.

Tell that to the cheap plastic case and the stripped out screw holes in the plastic stand-offs.  Also, tell that to the low quality Amiga 500 keyboard.  Just compare an Amiga 2000 keyboard to an Amiga 500 keyboard, you will readily see the difference in quality.  The Amiga 2000 keyboard has Cherry switches from Italy and the characters are printed on top of the keys.  The Amiga 500 keyboard has low quality Chicklet (rubber) key switches and the characters on top of the keys are decals.     :-o