Retro gaming vs expense

[DaveMB]

Hi, just wondering, at what point for you guys/girls does re-living the retro dream become an expense thats difficult to justify?

EG: i recently aquired a Commodore branded A1200 for £32 which is a very good price.

The case was immaculate after a wash but the keyboard was a bit yellowed so i have oredered a new one from Amigakit.

My expenses for this A1200 currently are as follows.

A1200 £32
External floppy drive £12
New mouse £10
A500 heavy psu £12
Joypad £7
IDE Adapter + 4gb CF £15
RGB to scart £13
New keyboard £23
3.1 Roms £18
400 Floppys £8
PCMCIA transfer kit £17
1gb CF for transfer kit £8
ACA 1230 42/64 (in a couple of weeks £140 ish including delivery)

So my desire for retro hardware that started at £32 has now set me back £325

So at what point does it go from 'i will buy this' to 'i can't justify buying this'

[Dreedo]

My budget is fairly small, living on £5 a week, admittedly no responsibilities personally.

So far I've spent about £60 on my A600, got 2 SEGA pads, a Tank Mouse, WB 2.05 disks, PCMCIA-CF and a 256MB CF Card. Then got given a few floppies, and an A500+ with a floppy that doesn't read disks for whatever reason.

I'm reluctant to spend much more, a memory expansion for my A600, a CF HDD for my A600 and an internal floppy for my A500+ will keep me happy for a few months, grab a serial cable so i can play network, even though everyone i know kind of despises old Amiga games, except all of them love Settlers and Lemmings, because they're legendary.

Retro gaming is almost as expensive as modern gaming.

[Madcrow]

My retrogaming expenditures have actually been pretty low. I've bought a few classic PC games from GOG.com as well as a couple editions of Amiga forever (2006 back when I first got into Amiga stuff and just recently 2012 because of the new bonus features like the Walker prototype ROMs and Workbench image.

Everything else, I either got from Freecycle (my A500 and some ancient laptops) or already had to begin with (all my parents' old Atari stuff)

[Castelian]

It's all about patience. I check craigslist almost everyday looking for good deals on vintage computing parts and every now and then I find gold!

[Gordon]

Ive spent quite a bit on my Amigas but the way I look at it is that i feel AMIGA will be part of me for the rest of my life. Its not like buying a playtstion 3 for £300 then after a few years i wont use it any more. I feel i will use amiga a very long time. And if the unfortunate time comes where I wont be using Amiga anymore, i can still sell it on. Amiga is like Gold now, doesnt lose value.

So my point is Turrican, dont worry justifying the cost if you can afford it. Its £325 for something you will enjoy. And if the time comes when your bored of amiga, you could always sell it on and fetch most of what you paid if its about the money.

[DaveMB]

oh i can justify the cost (always can when i want something)

and when my ACA and my new keyboard arrive i will have a pimped up commodore branded A1200 that is 100% gleaming white with absolutely no yellowing whatsoever and a CF full of WHDLoad titles.

^^ tis all the justification i need

[slk486]

Unfortunately I find myself spending way more than I initially plan. Come across a good deal and I go for it, but never get around to sell stuff off again.

In periods retro stuff grabs me and I buy whatever I feel I need, which is usually way over the top.

However. I can always justify it by working very hard for long periods during the year, so when I finally decide to have a few weeks of relaxation I want to be able to do whatever I want - I don't want to be wanting At least that's what I tell myself and the missus

[Djay]

since coming back to EAB at the beginning of 2010, i have spent over £1000 on Amiga stuff... best £1000 ever spent

[Dunny]

Until recently I had an A1000 in mint condition with 256KB RAM expansion and an A1200 with Blizzard 1230-IV and 8MB RAM + 1.7GB 2.5" HDD...

But I really needed the room, so they went in landfill. WinUAE really does everything I need it to these days

D.

[Madcrow]

O.O You threw them out??? Surely there were people around who would want those. Even if you couldn't sell them, I find it hard to believe that you couldn't give them away.

[fitzsteve]

I done an audit recently and almost died of shock - can't give the figure out but lets say I could buy a brand new Car for less

[DDNI]

Originally Posted by Madcrow

O.O You threw them out??? Surely there were people around who would want those. Even if you couldn't sell them, I find it hard to believe that you couldn't give them away.

aaaarghhh you had to rise to the bait!

[Madcrow]

Meh. Right now I'm just annoyed because I missed out on a big Amiga haul. Somebody semi-local posted on a retrocomputing mailing list that they had a huge batch of Amiga stuff including a couple working 500s, an sideport HD for the 500, a CD32+SX-1 and a whole lot of software. All for free. I was the first person to respond and would have gotten it if it weren't for the fact that I couldn't find anybody with a driver's license willing to help me pick it up in return for a share of the loot...

[ChrisUnionNJ]

Originally Posted by fitzsteve

I done an audit recently and almost died of shock - can't give the figure out but lets say I could buy a brand new Car for less

I would not even bother to keep track of what I paid for stuff I might stop

[Retrofan]

Interesting thread. It depends in how much money do you have in your pocket and how much do you desire to buy retro hardware. I've spent enough money to have around 4 PS3... but I have none. Actually I'm playing newest games in my mini ITX inside my old C=64. You can postpose buyings as long as you enjoy what you already have.

I have a lot of things to do in my A1200, as to install a new PSU from Amigakit in it's box, unopened since a month or so, but I will keep in my new PC (C64) only, for a time, as I'm enjoying it A LOT

[roy bates]

im not really bothered how much ive spent on my retro gear,mainly because its brought me so much joy.and brought back alot of good memorys at the same time.

ive lost count of what ive got and how much went into it.but who cares?

regards roy

[DDNI]

It is very circular here, I generally spend, spend then sell, sell then spend spend again!

[Graham Humphrey]

It's been several years since I bought any Amiga hardware simply because my A1200 setup has served me brilliantly in that time.

But whatever money I've spent on it I don't regret. I spend much much more of my income on football and I don't regret that either. If you've got the cash and you enjoy it, it really doesn't matter how much it costs you because it's worth far more in the enjoyment it brings. Life's too short to worry about it.

[Jonathan Drain]

All those little purchases add up. £10 plus shipping here, £20 plus shipping there. Occasionally you make the mistake of buying broken joysticks, then you have to buy another... It's all good though.

[Dreedo]

Occasionally you make the mistake of buying broken joysticks, then you have to buy another... It's all good though.

Lol tell me, i bought a Lemmings disk from ebay that was faulty, upset me so much, that i got a PCMCIA-CF kit for my A600 and used ADF's copied onto floppies with TSGUI from now on.