SX32-Pro worth?

[Robert17]

I bought a whole SX32 System for around £300 about a year ago, I also had an SX32 on it's own once, and sold it for around £260 as far as I remember, I'd consider those prices to be reasonable, and like you guys say, it is a rare and good piece of kit :-)

Robert

[AmigaFun]

I bought a whole SX32 System for around £300 about a year ago, I also had an SX32 on it's own once, and sold it for around £260 as far as I remember, I'd consider those prices to be reasonable, and like you guys say, it is a rare and good piece of kit :-)

Robert

That is a reasonable price I think, and as it would happen, that is about what I offered (a bit less given it age now) for this SX32 Pro.

It was declined

[Cammy]

Years ago when I got my SX32 (not the Pro version) I paid close to $500AU for it from some guy in England that took nearly a year to post it to me. I was really happy to have found one for such a bargain. I've been searching for an affordable SX32 Pro since the 90s, but it seems there was such a small run of them made that they're rarer than hen's teeth. Any time one pops up on eBay I have no chance competiting against all these rich collectors, who can't wait to grab that Amiga gear and stick it in their closet, never to see the light of day again until the collector dies and his neighbour smells something and has to auction all his stuff, and then finds this "useless old computer junk" and burns it to save the trouble of going through and naming it all.

With the SX32 you can play some of the most high-end Amiga games on the smallest Amiga of them all! The CD32 is physically even smaller than an A600, and it looks so nice in its console shell. People want to walk up to their TV with their consoles under it, switch on their old CD32, quickly navigate through a games menu, and impress their mates with it playing DOOM full screen with a nice framerate, or even load up a game that needs over ten times as much RAM as a standard CD32 has, like Total Chaos! Hell, you now have a 030 with heaps of RAM and a serial port, so why not link the CD32 up to another computer and go online, browse the web, chat with friends, play online games (well, not sure how well Dynamite runs over a serial/modem-speed connection, but it might be alright).

The SX32 Pro is the ultimate Amiga games expansion. Even though there are a few games that don't run well even on a 030, 99% of Amiga games, including nearly all the ones requiring a faster CPU will work on a CD32 with a SX32 Pro.

030 chips haven't been produced for many years, and will probably never be made again. There is no chance of anyone ever making a SX32 Pro replacement with a 030 unless they were to source a huge lot of second hand CPUs. The best we could realistically hope for is for someone to bring out something more like a redesigned SX32 (non-Pro) which has a socket for 8MB RAM, FPU (if the sockets are still available), Real-Time Clock, IDE or CF header, and hopefully an A1200-style Clockport, or an Ethernet port or WLAN chip on board. An extra SD card slot on the back for transferring files quicker than CD (as well as backing up and saving off of the CD32) would be possible too, and maybe even USB (for I/O devices, maybe not mass-storage). And this design is totally possible if someone with the knowledge wanted to design it, and someone with the cash was willing to invest in a run of them. There is no doubt that every unit would sell if a run of 50 were made, and it might even help drive down prices of the SX32 Pro since some people shopping for a Pro might be happy with one of these instead.

[Cammy]

Oh, I forgot to mention that a CD32 with a SX32 Pro is fast enough to emulate a Sega Master System (as well as a few other 8bit systems) at full speed, something the Playstation couldn't do (the SMS emulator for PS1 doesn't need any expansions to work to be fair, it just sounds terrible and plays skippy) so you could play Sonic Chaos or some other genuine Sonic the Hedgehog game on your CD32 on the games room TV.

[Tripitaka]

I hear what your saying Cammy, perhaps another CPU might be viable, I don't know and I don't claim too.

TBH, provided the project gets finished (and it's going well, so it seems) Natami could make a mockery of caughing up huge sums for expanded (and rather old) AGA machines. I for one watch the Natami site with great interest.

Just for the record, as I know some people like to jump to conclusions, My Amiga interest is not solely "classic". I have a great deal of interest in OS4 machines too but Natami is just too cool to ignore.

[stefcep2]

An auction doesn't neccesarily reflect what something is worth, just what it is worth to the buyers who wanted in that 1 week the item was listed.  

I remember seeing a Retro gamer magazine with a copy of Amiga Forever Cover CD with ROMS and games that went for $80 Aus with 20 unique bidders.  I had one of these in mint condition, so i waited till that auction was over and listed mine straight after for a 3 day auction thinking the ones that missed out would jump on it.  Nope-I got $10.

So what its worth will depend on luck to a large degree.

[bbond007]

Years ago when I got my SX32 (not the Pro version) I paid close to $500AU for it from some guy in England that took nearly a year to post it to me. I was really happy to have found one for such a bargain. I've been searching for an affordable SX32 Pro since the 90s, but it seems there was such a small run of them made that they're rarer than hen's teeth. Any time one pops up on eBay I have no chance competiting against all these rich collectors, who can't wait to grab that Amiga gear and stick it in their closet, never to see the light of day again until the collector dies and his neighbour smells something and has to auction all his stuff, and then finds this "useless old computer junk" and burns it to save the trouble of going through and naming it all.

With the SX32 you can play some of the most high-end Amiga games on the smallest Amiga of them all! The CD32 is physically even smaller than an A600, and it looks so nice in its console shell. People want to walk up to their TV with their consoles under it, switch on their old CD32, quickly navigate through a games menu, and impress their mates with it playing DOOM full screen with a nice framerate, or even load up a game that needs over ten times as much RAM as a standard CD32 has, like Total Chaos! Hell, you now have a 030 with heaps of RAM and a serial port, so why not link the CD32 up to another computer and go online, browse the web, chat with friends, play online games (well, not sure how well Dynamite runs over a serial/modem-speed connection, but it might be alright).

The SX32 Pro is the ultimate Amiga games expansion. Even though there are a few games that don't run well even on a 030, 99% of Amiga games, including nearly all the ones requiring a faster CPU will work on a CD32 with a SX32 Pro.

030 chips haven't been produced for many years, and will probably never be made again. There is no chance of anyone ever making a SX32 Pro replacement with a 030 unless they were to source a huge lot of second hand CPUs. The best we could realistically hope for is for someone to bring out something more like a redesigned SX32 (non-Pro) which has a socket for 8MB RAM, FPU (if the sockets are still available), Real-Time Clock, IDE or CF header, and hopefully an A1200-style Clockport, or an Ethernet port or WLAN chip on board. An extra SD card slot on the back for transferring files quicker than CD (as well as backing up and saving off of the CD32) would be possible too, and maybe even USB (for I/O devices, maybe not mass-storage). And this design is totally possible if someone with the knowledge wanted to design it, and someone with the cash was willing to invest in a run of them. There is no doubt that every unit would sell if a run of 50 were made, and it might even help drive down prices of the SX32 Pro since some people shopping for a Pro might be happy with one of these instead.

Cammy,

I just bought a PAL CD32 about an hour ago.

Hope it works better than my NOS NTSC unit.

As far as new hardware - I think the future is in projects like fpgaarcade (aka Minimig AGA) because you don't have to worry about sourcing obsolete parts like the 68030. Failing CAPS. Plus you would really have the smallest AGA amiga ever

[ElPolloDiabl]

An auction doesn't neccesarily reflect what something is worth, just what it is worth to the buyers who wanted in that 1 week the item was listed.  

I remember seeing a Retro gamer magazine with a copy of Amiga Forever Cover CD with ROMS and games that went for $80 Aus with 20 unique bidders.  I had one of these in mint condition, so i waited till that auction was over and listed mine straight after for a 3 day auction thinking the ones that missed out would jump on it.  Nope-I got $10.

So what its worth will depend on luck to a large degree.

The auction probably had a shill bidder.

[Nostalgic_Amigan]

I don't think I could really add much to what Cammy said, I think she may have justified the 500 price tag and then some. I did want to make one point however. I think the 030 might be a bigger selling point than you may think. You constantly see 040 acceleraters selling for less than 030's because the 030 is generally more compatible with older software than the 040. If I remember rightly out of the box "Sensible World of Soccer" was unplayable on an 040. Also someone made a point about the hardware getting older so should be cheaper. Surely the reverse is true? Sorry if I missed the point, to be honest I mostly skimmed the thread.

[Tripitaka]

That's a very good point and also IMHO, a major reason for the price of 030 accelerators for the A1200 increasing steadily over the last few years too.

For an AGA machine with CD,HDD,030 & fast RAM it used to be the CD32 with SX32Pro that was the most economical choice. Fitting an A1200 out with the above wins out at the present time however.

If Gunnar and friends get it right on the Natami, then that could well be the most economic choice for classic Amiga hardware we will ever see (provided it gets finished of course).

I'll stick with my A1200 for now and my unexpanded CD32, but with the price of accelerators for both machines flying higher every month I can see Natami getting finished before I buy one. I should never have sold my 030 for my A1200, I deeply regret it. Oh well, c'mon Natami!

[recidivist]

Perhaps Amiga users ought to keep their radar going and intercept certain old 68K Macs in order to get spare 68030 chips?
 I think I just might.
 
And why not an expander card using an fpga '030(unless someone finds a few hundred or so NOS  68030),FMV chips,Ram,and either the ports available on the SX32 or maybe just USB?
 The FMV is another very pricey CD32 option these days.

[recidivist]

SX-1 on ebay now,ends if FIVE HOURS !!!

It not mine nor anyone I know.

[tone007]

SX-1 on ebay now.

Now that's what I'd be shopping for if I wanted to get a little more out of a CD32.  '020 is good enough for me!

[Nostalgic_Amigan]

The NatAmi is a project I've been watching with great interest lately. I remember reading about it years back and thinking it was cool but I never took it seriously. Its amazing how much progress they've made. I hope they pull off and affordable comsumer board.
 
An fpga board is interesting and would probably be affordable with faster fpga's getting cheaper! I imageine a fpga on a board that is amazingly fast (by classic Amiga standards) but fully 020 compatible with FPU/MMU and say 64meg as standard! Im a dreamer!

[AmigaFun]

I really did not set out to offend anyone, and I appologise if I have by my starting this thread.

Maybe my point did not get accross quite the way I intended. I was just saying and pointing out that quite simply how a SX32 can be worth more than the equivilant A1200 combo'.
I do now appriciate that it is a fairly rare piece, and maybe command a premium for that alone. Coupled with the fact it looks good (thats my own opinion)

So again..sorry to all offended.

Still, it raised the idea (again?) of an SX32 replacement, if that could be made up, think of the possibilities. The CPU could be emulated in software, FMV could be made to work as well, ethernet, Wi-Fi, HDMI output (!) Ah well, we can dream.

[Nostalgic_Amigan]

No offence taken Im sure. It is after all very expensive. Personally I would take the A1200 route. I think its more of a hardcore collecters item now.