Amiga 1000 Rejuvenator: Holy Grail of Upgrades

[intric8]

Hi Friends and Amiga 1000 fans,

I've been working on a project I wanted to share for Amiga 1000 fans. I was lucky and fortunate enough to recently acquire The Rejuvenator recently after a long time of searching.

TL;DR, this board made in 1990 replaces the 1000's original daughterboard. It is a non-destructive upgrade that pushed the 1000 from .5 MB Chip to 1 or 2 MB using the Fat/Obese Agnus, and to also provide a KS ROM (no more floppy KS loads).

I recorded a video explaining it all
[ Show youtube player ]

And also wrote an in-depth article about it for the curious:
https://amigalove.com/viewtopic.php?f=6&t=591

Bottom Line? It is my intention to have these boards made again (not for profit - only reimbursement costs covered) and brought back to the Amiga 1000 community. I am already in discussions with a local circuit board design and manufacturing company and more details will emerge soon. As such, I will likely be launching a GoFundMe in the next few days to see if there is an appetite by the 1000 community to bring this tech to 2018 and eventually improve it even further. Anyone interested?

Cheers!

[Valken]

Very Cool! I wish I still had My A1000 and would love to see it. I do wonder if you can stack a Vampire or other accelerator on top of the Rejuvenator though... Just for academic reasons.

[Jope]

Why go for the rejuvenator when we have the GBA1000? :-)

[intric8]

Originally Posted by Jope

Why go for the rejuvenator when we have the GBA1000? :-)

I mean, honestly that's a really good question. For me, it's like this.

The GBA is the "Phoenix 2.0". I am fortunate to have an original Phoenix. And I LOVE it. But it's worth noting it has serious caveats.

You pretty much can't use your front or side expansion devices anymore. Maybe you won't need them, but if you wanted to add that 2MB Microbotics Starboard2 it won't work. At least, it's not a plug and play situation anymore.

And so it's a complete motherboard replacement, just like the GBA1000.

What I think is really cool about the Rejuvenator is you can keep using anything/everything you have today. Everything just works. I mean, in many respects it feels like it was made by C= from back in the day. It doesn't require special cards just to use expansions. All the old retro 1000 stuff will still just work.

Speaking from just my own personal level of expertise (or lack thereof) the idea of the GBA is amazing. But do I think I could actually build one? Probably not. Thank god Andrew Wilson had a team to build the Phoenix boards, or I would have passed on that, too.

I still have a lot to uncover (and will know a lot more in 2 days), but I think this board won't be so bad - it's a lot smaller! . And there's even a shot it can be pre-built for folks - i.e. not sold as just a circuit board or a pile of parts. TBD, but I think that's certainly possible for much of the board/components.

[EzdineG]

Originally Posted by Jope

Why go for the rejuvenator when we have the GBA1000? :-)

I’d really hate to up and trash this A1000 motherboard. I have a hard enough time thinking about assembling it without the rf shield (ie. with a Rejuvenator.).

But I’m weird like that.

[Lorfarius]

What a fantastic thing to do, not many might be saying it but thank you intric8

[Jope]

Good points for the rejuvenator. If you only want a little boost to the A1k, then it is a good choice.

The GBA replaces most of your sidecar expansions with things mounted on the motherboard, so at least the RAM expansion can be sold to another good home after that to recoup some of the costs. :-)

[FastRobPlus]

I had either 4 or 5 Rejuvenators, one of which I got back in the day installed by Expert Services themselves in Kentucky. The have 2 big failure points form my observation: galvanic corrosion between the connectors that mate Rejuvenator to the motherboard's WCS pins, and the barrel battery which is somehow even worse in a Rejuvenator than in any of the production Amigas.
While these can be cleaned up and repaired, the Phoenix was a better all around solution. The Rejuvenator is a more of a nice collectible if you can preserve one. I have one with a Byte by Byte PAL JR zorro chassis and a Hurricane '020 to complete the "bleeding edge of Amiga 1000" technology theme.
If it's for pure collecting this is hard to beat, but I really think the Phoenix-derived GBA1000 is the most satisfying Amiga 1000 experience you can have.

Here's some fun trivia:
Expert Services eventually became a Microsoft Certified Solutions Provider.
Phoenix Technology is a cranky guy in Australia who hates Microsoft.
(I tried to order a Phoenix board from him many, many years ago and he denied me because he researched me on the web and discovered I'd been a manager in a game company acquired by Microsoft.)

[FastRobPlus]

Originally Posted by Valken

Very Cool! I wish I still had My A1000 and would love to see it. I do wonder if you can stack a Vampire or other accelerator on top of the Rejuvenator though... Just for academic reasons.

Rejuvenator does not really cover the 68000 socket, so a Vampire might work. I've had 020/030/040 boards made for the A500 in the socket, and even the ICD adpseed.

[McTrinsic]

We need more A1k cases and keyboards and mice.

... For all he the GBA and Phoenix and what have you stuff .

I'd take a new one out of Aluminum. .

[MartinW]

I'd take a keyboard - as long as it didn't cost me £200 and take 3+ years to be delivered.

I keep meaning to buy an adapter off of eBay to let me use my Amiga layout Ducky Shine USB keyboard since I'm just never going to find the missing keys for my A1000. It won't fit under the case neatly but never mind, better than nothing.

[intric8]

Quick update on this.

The company I was using to help us rebuild the board pulled out of the project a couple of weeks ago. We've found another - and frankly it may wind up being a good thing. We were kinda bummed at first but the new firm has a proven track record with these types of retro-computing projects.

We've got a couple of things to iron out up-front but then we should hopefully have things back on track (and in better shape).

More soon as things develop.

And @Lorfarius thanks, man.

[intric8]

One more thing: I got my own Rejuvenator working. [ Show youtube player ] where I ultimately demo the thing. It. Is. Awesome.