amiga cdtv or cd32

[jimbob005]

hi all

i want an amiga for my living room i thinking of a cdtv or an cd32 i know the cdtv is just a a500 with a cd rom.

the cd32 is an a1200 dose it have aga ??


can i copy game on to cd and play them on the cdtv/32?
do you have to downgrade the cd32 to play old games like on the a1200 ?

can i use a mouse on them???
for lemmings and darksead????


thanks james

[Zetr0]

@James

hello there,

Okay the CDTV is basically an A500 with ECS and a dual speed CDROM,

the CD32 is AGA with a proprietary 2 or 4x CDROM

I would like to build a CD32 into a CDTV that .... would indeed be sexy!

[Harrison]

Spec wise the CD32 is the best to choose. It is basically the same as the A1200 in terms of compatibility with games. You can connect an A4000 keyboard to the CD32 directly as it has a keyboard/serial port that directly supports this. It also has the same two joystick ports as the A1200 so can use Amiga mice for games like Lemmings, or for using Workbench. The CD32 also has an SVideo socket as standard, so you can get a nice picture on a TV without needing an Amiga monitor.

You can also burn CD-R's and they work perfectly on the CD32. So if you have the ISO for a game it can be burnt and should work perfectly.

Some people have also created game compilation CDs you can download from places like Underground gamer. This contain loads of older A500 and A1200 game that you can run directly from the discs on the CD32. The largest of these compilations contains 888 games on a single CD. Quite cool.

You can also expand the CD32 using something called an SX-32. This is a unit that connected into the back of the CD32 and it allows you to add fast ram and an HD. And it is also an accelerator, with the best version containing a 68030 at 50MHz, basically turning the CD32 into the equivalent of an A1200 with a blizzard 1230 fitted. So a very nice setup.

The SX-32 also contains all of the ports missing from the CD32 to give you back all of the ports the A1200 has. So you can then connect and use an external floppy disk drive, printer, modem etc...

In contrast the CDTV is basically an A500 with slightly updated kickstart rom and chipset, 1MB of ram and a CD drive. For me the CDTV is a much nicer looking system and the design was much better, with the remote control pad being much better if the unit was being used as part of a home entertainment setup under the main TV. You can also add a floppy drive, keyboard and mouse to the main unit. But the CDTV is too limited compared to the CD32 if you want to get the most from the system. The CDTV is really just a collectors Amiga. If you want one to play games on and enjoy then get a CD32.

[TheCorfiot]

Hello James

Yes CD32 all the way, Mouse port on the side as well as Keyboard port, Has S-Video outputs & there are so many CD32 games on ebay going quite cheaply,

There are some compilations around on the net which include downgraders.

As far as writing your own Bootable CD's, you need to write a special CD32 Bootblock to acomplish this.

try a bit of googling, see what you find.

I agree with Zetro the CDTV does look better but the CD32 does outperform it, fitting a CD32 inside a CDTV would be the ultimate solution.


Too slow Harrison beat me to it & in greater depth, Nice one!!

[cane]

CD32 is better choice. As previously stated it's A1200 with CD instead of floppy.
You can burn whdload games on CD and play them on CD32. The only limit is that quite a few games won't work because of only 2Mb ram. And you have to make bootable CD with trademark file in it - it's quite easy thing to do.
Mouse can be normally connected and keyboard as well. You can hook A4000 keyboard directly (as Harrison already mentioned), but also others work with a little bit of soldering wires on connector - A2000, A3000 and also A500 keyboard can be used.
The CD32 is cool machine, perfect for use in living room. But when you hook up keyboard to it then it becomes a little bit space consuming - thing to also consider.

[Fingerlickin_B]

I have both & can't honestly rate one over the other.

Both have their better options, both suck in certain areas.

To be honest, if I had loads of money I'd go for an expanded CD32...if little money, then just a standard CDTV with a few cheap mods.

If I wasn't into collecting I'd just move another miggy next to the TV & leave it at that.

Short story long...unless you are keen to collect more miggy models, willing to go mod-crazy or spend heaps of cash, then they are both perfectly useless if you already have an equivalent Amiga "computer".

PZ.

[TheBoss]

I would also recommend the CD32 as the choice. You can always take a look at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amiga_CD32 and read about some interesting facts. Myself have a beefed up CD32 with an SX32 Pro, 1GB CF card as HD (check sig below) and I also use my CD32 to play some CDTV games

[jimbob005]

ok looking at this the nice lookin cdtv with an cd32 inside makes me think i want one

so if any one has a none working cdtv they want to give up pm me

i could all was use the a600 (that i found for £2 on the car boot) and zetro it

thanks for the info

james

[Harrison]

How would anyone doing a CD32 inside a CDTV case mod tackle the CD drive?

AFAIK both the CDTV and the CD32 use completely incompatible proprietary drive interfaces. So would standard IDE CD drives work with the CD32?

[jimbob005]

i dont know yet but there will be a way

[alexh]

Originally Posted by Harrison

How would anyone doing a CD32 inside a CDTV case mod tackle the CD drive?

Or the power supply, or the rear connectors, or the LED etc. etc.

What a waste of time for nothing.

If you want to do something worth doing... work out a way to get a tray/slot loading IDE or SCSI CD drive to be used to replace the CDTV's crappy custom mitsumi(?) caddy drive... that IS something worth doing.

[jimbob005]

you could sort that out and at the same time inport aga and a faster chip and more ram with a cd32 inside and put a slot loader on that

[alexh]

Or you could just use the CD32 "as is" and it will play just as well (probably better)

[Pyromania]

Both!

[Zetr0]

Hmmmmmmm

Zetr0: Ponders.....

If an A1200 motherboard would fit, then that would perhaps make a better option, although the backplane would require a rebuild, the front would be easier as a 5/14 IDE rom could be used... also there are some IR keyboard adapters and projects from Aminet for the A1200...

Also the A1200 has a larger (and cheaper) range of options for CPU upgrades as well.

just a thought....

using a CD32 in a CDTV would be cool, alas there would be some problems, like having to build a custom CD loading tray that would work with the existing CDROM of the CD32... that would be a chor to say the least but eminently awesome if you managed it!

I have been planning on making a CD32 into a laptop, I have looked at the signals of the device, but the schematics are non-existent so it would be trial an error and guesstimate, but I believe an ATMega8 interface could run as an interface between a basic IDE optical drive and the CD32, but still thats a few months research alone LOL.

[Paul_s]

I'd buy both to be honest and when not using the other use it to play music CD's whilst playing games

[Charlie]

CDTV is the nicer device, but as a CD32 owner I can assure you it is my most heavily used Amiga...
...there's really no competition:
S-Video
AGA
CD32 Games, A500/A1200/CD32 compilations...

@Zetr0:
An upgraded A1200 mobo in a CDTV case - now we're talking!

[Xenon]

CD32 is far better!

[Pyromania]

Which one did you setup?

[jimbob005]

ok wall i didn't get any insted i was thinking the cd32 is about the same size as an a600.. but the a600 has a keyboard in it.. so now iv started work on the a600 i want aga, cdrom, hdd, play games and whdload so it comes down to it put an a1200 in the a600 case with cf card hdd and cd rom for the cd 32 games (darkseed ). and try and fit an 030 card in there to

james