Hello to everyone! My Amiga history and more...

Hello, I am Thomas from Germany.
I can't believe how time has passed, but it is now over 25 years since I bought my first Amiga.

This a longer read, while it scratches only the surface of my computer history:

The start of my gaming and computer career was an Atari 2600 at the age of 10 for christmas in 1983. I quickly got bored and sold it only 6(!) weeks later, because I saw the C64 running "Impossible Mission" and "International Soccer" at a local computer store. It was completely jaw dropping, compared to the clunky graphics of the 2600.

Three months later I finally convinced my parents to get a C64 with a Datasette (for homework and school, you know!)
It was followed by a 1541 floppy drive next Christmas and a 1702 monitor the following year.
While I did play A LOT of games, I too was always interested how things worked, so I started learning programming Basic and made some litte programs to impress my friends and even my math teacher.
At that time I did not suspect this would set the path for my career as a software developer. So... in retrospective I did not really lie to my parents.

Then something happened, which I still can't put my finger on exactly why - I assume puberty - but in 1988 I sold my C64 in order to buy a stereo and had no computer for a longer period. My hair grew and I joined a metal band as a drummer (which I still am 30 years later)

Around 1991 I was at a friend, right when he set up his second hand Amiga 500 for the first time. It came with some dozen discs. So we took one randomly and inserted it. It was "Hostages". Coming from the C64, the game looked mind blowing unreal. We were gasping and cheering of the sheer amount of graphics beauty and the new level of immersion this game gave us. I. Needed. One. Too.

It took only one week to check my funds and I reentered the computer realm by buying an Amiga 500 with 1 MB extension. I replaced it in 1993 with an Amiga 1200 with an unbelievable big harddrive (110 MB!!!). I was never able to fill it for more than the half capacity.

In late 1994 I started to study computer science and sadly replaced the 1200 with a Pentium 90 PC, because - despite rumors - "Day of the Tentacle" never arrived at the Amiga and Doom and Wing Commander 3 called for duty.
I did not sell the 1200 like my machines before, but put it in a box in the cellar, were I revisited it from time to time.

PCs came and go, 3D accelerators came and go and I am still a frequent gamer today, always looking for the next level of immersion and jaw dropping experience.
Consequently, today I am playing with an Oculus Rift (I love Elite Dangerous in VR as much as I loved Frontier on the Amiga) and my brand new Touch controllers on a highly equipped i7 / GTX 1080 machine.

But there is still a big and warm place in my heart for all the classic machines I met on my journey:
I bought a C64 again three years ago, equipped with an 1541-Ultimate II
Last year I built a little raspberry pi emulation machine, soldering a DB9 connector for classic competiton pros to it.

I stumbled over this forum, because my current project is to preserve and improve my beloved Amiga 1200.
Currently it is away for a capacitor exchange, while I am waiting for the new kickstarter case to arrive. The old one was still in nearly mint condition, but I don't want to drill holes into it for the HxC drive and display.

While waiting, I set up and perfected a 16 GB CF card with WHDLoad in WinUAE and bought a ACA1221ec accelerator card.
This should be the best Amiga I ever had!
Hopefully everything will work flawlessly, when assembled during the next weeks.

It is always fun to remove my 10 year old daughter from her 3DS or smartphone and and watch her reaction to some classic hardware and games.

[Pat the Cat]

Welcome back.

Check out the Vampire releases, next one on the list is for the A1200. Although production is slow, and plenty of people who ordered already are still waiting patiently for the A600 and new A500 versions. Get your head around this - a software upgradeable processor unit, dedicated to running Motorola CISC code at lightning speed.

It is a mind blowing concept, and things are really different now to those times. AROS, WInUAE are really good now. FS-UAE is pretty good, and things are looking up for the old Spanish girlfriend.

No flame like an old flame, which probably does not translate too well, it is idiom. Es gibt keine Liebe wie eine alte Liebe. That gives you the meaning, "There is no love like an old love".

In those days of the early 90s, I knew a Thomas from Würzburg. He was very, very tall. 7 foot., 2 meters and 17 centimeters? We went to the Monsters of Rock at Donnington. Mutual friend was a guy called Stumpy.

[adonay]

Nice story :-) Makes me think I need to do the DB9 hack on my amibian pi. Thank you totally forgot about that.

Originally Posted by Pat the Cat

Welcome back.

I was never really gone!

Originally Posted by Pat the Cat

Check out the Vampire releases, next one on the list is for the A1200.

I have already discovered it and I am watching the development for some time now. While it is a fantastic piece of hardware with an excellent power price ratio, I am unsure if this power is needed for my purpose, when only playing old games. I am more a retro game fanatic than a "let's run programs now, never meant for the amiga" guy.
So it might be a high price for "just an HDMI output" in my case.

But I discovered that Individual Computers is working on an FPGA Amiga, which I find quite interesting. I skipped MIST, so this might be something for me.

Originally Posted by Pat the Cat

AROS, WInUAE are really good now. FS-UAE is pretty good, and things are looking up for the old Spanish girlfriend.

I am revisiting WinUAE since the late 90s, when it was more a dream than a working thing. For FS-UAE I soldered a building kit for a usb to classic joystick adapter last year. Works great!

Originally Posted by Pat the Cat

No flame like an old flame, which probably does not translate too well

It translates perfectly into german, where "Flamme" has exactly the same ambiguous meaning as in english.

Originally Posted by Pat the Cat

In those days of the early 90s, I knew a Thomas from Würzburg. He was very, very tall. 7 foot., 2 meters and 17 centimeters? We went to the Monsters of Rock at Donnington. Mutual friend was a guy called Stumpy.

That's a big Thomas, but not me...
But could be someone, how might have been at the same places, concerts, discos as me.

Originally Posted by adonay

Nice story :-) Makes me think I need to do the DB9 hack on my amibian pi. Thank you totally forgot about that.

I used Retropie, which is a bit more universal for that:
http://blog.petrockblock.com/forums/...imple-project/

[adonay]

Interesting I will study that a bit more. I guess main problem is the gpio driver for the emulator. I like to boot directly into my workbench were I can run the whdloadgames . I have another card with recalbox and kodi but mainly use it as an Amiga as I don't care to much about the selection screen. Plan is to get a new 1200 case as well and maybe use the pi with a keyrah adapter for the keyboard and digital joystick ports. As for now the pie is easier to use than my real Amiga 1200 .hdmi etc

Great guide and pin diagram. I think you will find this forum to your taste with your skills