A1200 / A4000 / A600 retail in Canada?

[Ral-Clan]

Hi,

I live in Canada and have been and Amigan since purchasing my first A500 in 1987.  I even lived near the largest population centre in Canada (Toronto) with the Commodore headquarters nearby.

A500s were for sale in common stores like KMart, the Bay, Eatons, Zellers, etc. and of course the A2000 and A3000 were available at computer-specific boutiques.  I saw these computers physically for sale in the late 1980s, early 1990s.

BUT - I NEVER saw a local computer retailer that carried the A1200 / A4000 / A600!

I know they must have been available, because even nowadays you CAN find these later Amiga computers owned by Canadians.  But honestly, they are MUCH less common than the A1000 / 500 / 2000 line.  I have only seen A1200s at Amiga shows in Canada, and they NEVER show up in garage / boot sales / thrift stores like the earlier computers used to.

So....for you Canadians out there (and maybe others)....when Commodore was still alive, where in Canada could you actually walk into a physical store and pick up an A1200 / A600 / A4000, right then and there?

I remember even the local computer dealer the large shopping mall near my house, the one that always sold Amiga stuff and stocked Amiga software, told me he wasn't going to stock the "new" A1200 when I asked him.

[mongo]

There were several Commodore dealers in Toronto where you could pick up an A1200 / A4000 / A600.

[kedawa]

Maybe for a couple of months, but it's easier to find a NeoGeo AES than it is to find any AGA Amiga here.

[Ral-Clan]

I just remark, looking around at this forum, how many UK'ers have A1200s and seem to pick them up at "boot sales".  They seem as common as A500s there. If I ever saw an A1200 here in Canada at a flea market, my heart would jump.  I never remember seeing them generally for sale in Canada like the A500 was.  I never knew ANYONE here in Canada who had an A1200 - I know some now, but not back then.

[magnetic]

rai clan

Yes, in UK and europe alot of "boot sales" (why they call trunks boots is beyond me lol) have a1200s is because in europe alot of a500 guys moved on the a1200. In usa, most people that had a500s "upgraded" to pc/mac. Anyone still left with amiga and were "serious" had a3000/a4000. so not alot of a1200 in usa. Very little a600 (practically none) in all the user groups I was in not 1 person had an a600. Alot of big box amigas in usa though unlike europe. So alot more a4000s here for sure. (due to Video Toaster as well)

[Bif]

The A4000/030 box I have under my desk originated from "Conti Electronics" here in Vancouver, which I think was big into Amiga's back in the day. Looks like they are still in business even ... maybe they still have some leftover Amiga stuff .

[prowler]

The A600/1200/4000 were all quite common in Australia. I remember seeing them in main stream stores and I also knew a decent amount of people who owned A1200's and a few with A400's. I bought my A1200 from a shop specialising in second hand x86 PCs which just happened to have a few Amigas as well.

Of course, once Commodore Australia went bust, the situation started to change.

[Merc]

Wonder computers, I think they were called, in Ottawa, was where I saw my first A1200/4000, this was in 93 or 94...  they had an A4000 running CGX which I drooled over.  At the time it seemed like the pinnacle of computing..  ah the good old days :-)

[slaapliedje]

If I recall correctly, my friend in Utah ended up having to mail order his A1200.  They weren't really sold here everywhere like the C64 was.  

I was more into the Atari hardware back then, and had always wanted an Atari Falcon, which admittedly has better hardware than AGA, but it died quicker than any other platform I can think of.  Atari made them for about a year than said "Screw you!" the the computer world and tried to make it with the Atari Jaguar, which only had support for a few years until the merger with a hard drive company...

But it really was as if they were already mostly dead by the time their next generation hardware was coming out.  

slaapliedje

[spaceman88]

There was Commodore (later Apple) dealer in Halifax where I bought my A1200 (I remember their phone number ended in 1541 from the C64 days). They were the only ones in Halifax. The A500 I bought came from Canadian Tire. I think it was Commodores' policy to try to drive more business to their dealers by not offering the A1200's everywhere like the C64 & A500's.

[Ral-Clan]

Wonder computers, I think they were called, in Ottawa, was where I saw my first A1200/4000, this was in 93 or 94...  they had an A4000 running CGX which I drooled over.  At the time it seemed like the pinnacle of computing..  ah the good old days :-)

Ah yes!  Wonder computers!  I remember now, I ordered a HD floppy from them!
I know there was also National Amiga in Southern Ontario and I DID visit one store that was still selling Amigas after Commodore went bankrupt somewhere in the west end of Toronto (near the westernmost subway station on the east-west line).

[HammerD]

Ah yes!  Wonder computers!  I remember now, I ordered a HD floppy from them!
I know there was also National Amiga in Southern Ontario and I DID visit one store that was still selling Amigas after Commodore went bankrupt somewhere in the west end of Toronto (near the westernmost subway station on the east-west line).

How soon we forget There were a fair number of dealers over the years in Ontario, including National Amiga/Archtech, Comspec, Wonder Computers, "Computer & You" in Etobicoke, and various other places, all of them from which you could get A1200's or A4000's.  There were also dedicated console stores that sold the CD32, including the record store Sam's in Toronto, and other ones (there was one in Guelph, for example).   You could also go to the website http://www.amigasupport.com and http://www.amiga.on.ca that had all the new Amiga Technologies products and a dealer list, and prices.  Oh, and there was Randomize computers as well...and others too...

Sure, not as many back in the day when you could walk into K-Mart and buy an A500 But you could still get the A1200 and a4000, and there was even a World of Commodore show in December 1993 in Toronto - one of the last official C= shows (and certainly the last in Canada) before they went bust in April of 1994.  At that show they were showcasing the CD32 with the new Full Motion Video module and I believe the A4000/030, which came out after the original A4000/040.

[klx300r]

@ ral-clan

the 1200's were only sold at computer specific stores like the old Comspec on Wilson Ave, south of Steeles Ave but I never ever saw an Amiga 600 sold anywhere in Toronto. hekc even the 1200's were rare here and many of my friends actually drove over to the US border o buy one (& for cheaper too).

[RobertB]

Wonder computers, I think they were called, in Ottawa...

And Wonder Computers in Vancouver, BC.

Truly,
Robert Bernardo
Fresno Commodore User Group
http://videocam.net.au/fcug

[Duce]

Was never a lack of big box Amiga's in my neck of the woods in Canada.  Calgary and Edmonton had decent Amiga shops, but I don't recall the names atm.

Locally, my Amiga vendor was called Desktop Computers.  I got my original A3000 there, which I later traded in towards an A4000/040.  He always had a great selection of stuff, including an A3000T with a '040 in it which he ran their support BBS on.  I distinctly remember the Pee Cee guys always going into his shop and removing the mouse ball on that BBS machine to piss him off, lol.  He later moved the BBS machine into a back room so people couldn't keep stealing the mouse ball.  In later years he always had a good selection of A4000's and A4000T's with toasters in them, I think he did a fair bit of business with the local TV station in regards to sales.  I did a tour around that time of the production facilities of the TV station and vividly remember they had a pretty nice Toaster setup, multiple machines.

For the life of me, I can not remember ever seeing an A600 at his store, and don't ever really recall seeing them much period up here.  Most of my friends had A2000's kitted out, A3000's or A4000's.  We were BBS guys, so we didn't get into the wedge Amiga's all that much.

About a year before I sold the A4000, I came into some money and wanted to expand it.  The local dealers prices were far too high for my tastes, so I found Wonder Computers in Vancouver and mail ordered a '060 card, a CV64 3D card, and some additional RAM.  Ended up selling the machine (also with a 4091 in it by that time, with a 6 disc CD-Changer) about a year and a half later when C= was really on the skids and ended up with an Acer Pentium 200 machine.