Smaller external Amiga power supply?

[Marle]

Hiya,

I was wondering in the interveaning years whether someone has designed and sold a smaller more compact power supply for the wedge Amigas?

I have a couple of the smaller Commodore ones (one beige one and one black one but with an A500/600/1200 plug on it, not a CD32 one that's been adapted, bit of an oddity!) but they are still quite bulky and would like to tidy the setup a bit when I have the A600 out.

It's still a vanilla 68000 A600 bar a 1meg chip upgrade, compact flash hard disk and a 2MB PCMCIA SRAM card so I don't need much grunt.

Thanks!
Vicky

[DanyPPC]

I purchased this on eBay.

It's small and good !

[Retro-Nerd]

In Forum 64 the typical hardware freaks says the C64 power supply from the same guy is crap. Any hardware experts here (with power supply knowledge) who would say the same about the Amiga power supply? Is it safe enough, or could i really burn my home with it.

[DanyPPC]

Originally Posted by Retro-Nerd

In Forum 64 the typical hardware freaks says the C64 power supply from the same guy is crap. Any hardware experts here (with power supply knowledge) who would say the same about the Amiga power supply? Is it safe enough, or could i really burn my home with it.

I read it. I think it's only an isolate case.
I own the C64 PSU too from the same eBay seller, and mine is perfect !

[demolition]

Originally Posted by Marle

I was wondering in the interveaning years whether someone has designed and sold a smaller more compact power supply for the wedge Amigas?

Perhaps this one:
http://centuriontech.eu/product/nuovo_amiga/

Looks relatively smaller (at least smaller than the original ones).

[Daedalus]

The specs on that eBay one match one of the common Meanwell PSU modules. They're pretty standard off-the-shelf industrial parts, so unlikely to burn your house down. It's also (if my assumption is correct) the very same module used in the Nuovo Amiga supplies, so the risk is probably the very same too. There's not a lot the PSU builder can do wrong really - putting those supplies together isn't that much more involved than wiring a plug... The C64 is a different matter since it needs 9V AC and therefore a couple of PSUs in one, but still shouldn't be a massive problem to put together for anyone with any common sense.

[Retro-Nerd]

Somebody on Forum 64 wrote today that this Amiga power supply from Poland has stability problems when additional hardware like turbocards are used. This would be a no-go for me.

[Hewitson]

At least these ones have a power switch. Still wouldn't necessarily recommend them though.

[Daedalus]

Originally Posted by Retro-Nerd

Somebody on Forum 64 wrote today that this Amiga power supply from Poland has stability problems when additional hardware like turbocards are used. This would be a no-go for me.

If it's the module it looks like it is, I can't see why it would have stability problems. As basic PSU modules go, it's pretty decent, and more than enough for almost any Amiga setup. Mind you, even the standard Amiga PSUs (yes, the light ones and the heavy ones) have enough power available for most turbo cards and accessories, provided everything's in good shape.

While these vague friend-of-a-friend or read it on a forum somewhere stories tend to be overblown hearsay, there are a couple of possibilities for problems with these PSUs. First, the Amiga itself. If the power supply contacts or trapdoor contacts aren't perfectly clean (and they aren't), you get a voltage drop across them that increases with load and with contact resistance. This means that it might work fine without a turbo board, but struggles with one. This isn't the PSU's fault as such, though the PSU can be adjusted to compensate for this. Most original Amiga PSUs run a fraction of a volt above 5V to compensate for losses such as across the contacts, and it's possible that these PSUs are giving out exactly 5V, which will need the Amiga's connectors to be in good condition. Finally, there's an outside chance the PSUs haven't been adjusted properly, which would really be a rookie mistake by the builder, but fortunately very easily rectified.

[FOL]

Originally Posted by Daedalus

While these vague friend-of-a-friend or read it on a forum somewhere stories tend to be overblown hearsay, there are a couple of possibilities for problems with these PSUs.

I agree, things get overblown alot. Think my favorite one was someone not recommending a type of cap because his physically blew. He neglected to point out he had put them in the wrong way around.

[Marle]

Thank you so much for your advice everybody. I'll look into the Poland example, I'm just conscious the wires look a mess at my desk when I have the Amiga out, I like to keep a tidy set up, as my desk has a Mac Mini, PS2 Slim, SNES Classic and NES Classic all tucked within it and the Amiga PSU has some considerable length to it and makes it look messy!

I should make a video about the setup for my channel. It's pretty simple really