Ay up! from Derbyshire in't UK

[skintt]

Hello everyone!



I grew up in the era of 8 and 16 bit microcomputers. My dad's C64 was the first computer I ever used and still have fond memories of waiting 15 minutes for a game on tape to load only for it to fail!


I graduated to an A500+ which lasted a couple of years before I upgraded to an A1200 which eventually got expanded to include a whopping 40MB HDD and external CD-ROM. I regrettably swapped it for a Pentium P60 in about 1997 when it seemed like the Amiga brand was finished.


I'm really glad to see that although there was never much success after Commodore's bankruptcy, the Amiga community never dissapeared and seems much stronger than it ever was in 2024!


I've been dabbling with emulation for the past few years but recently bought an A500 from Ebay for which I'm eagerly awaiting delivery!

[Paulee_Alex_Bow]

Hi, Greeting’s from Birmingham

Amigans are like boomerangs, everyone always comes back eventually!

[skintt]

Indeed! There's never been another computer that quite captures the same sense of excitement and possibility.

Kids these days can keep their "AAA" games and their raytracing graphics cards!

[alexh]

'ow do? aint seen likes o' yow fur ages. Grand 'ere 'init?

Colloquial pleasantries over, welcome to EAB.

[skintt]

Am alrate ta! 'tis grand 'ere.


Any advice for my newly purchased A500? It comes with PSU and workbench but not much else. I've ordered an RGB to Scart cable from amigakit so I'm hoping the old LCD TV I've got in the loft that has Scart inputs will work ok at least for now.


I'll probably get a gotek drive as well but ultimately I'd like to be able to run some kind of hard disk in it.


Does the Pistorm work well for providing at least a storage volume, or am I better looking at something like the ide68k?

[alexh]

Originally Posted by skintt

Any advice for my newly purchased A500? It comes with PSU and workbench but not much else.

It really depends what you want to do with it?

The best bang-4-buck upgrade is a RaspberryPi based PiStorm which adds :

• a faster processor (arguably THE fastest processor)
• 128MB FastRAM
• Kickstart ROM switcher
• SuperFast uSD based HDD (again THE fastest Amiga HDD)
• RTG Graphics card

and soon

• Wifi
• Native OCS/ECS HDMI passthrough.

But with a PiStorm you've departed somewhat from the ethos of Amiga A500 and moved into the realms of Supercomputer.

An IDE68K would add a HDD and FastRAM giving you a good base A500. Maybe add an RGBTOHDMI using a Raspberry Pi Zero?

[skintt]

Originally Posted by alexh

It really depends what you want to do with it?

Probably playing games but I do love the demo scene and playing mods so having access to a permanently installed WB would be ideal.


Does the pistorm have issues with compatibility?

[AlphaAmiga]

Welcome!!

[chip]

Welcome to the forum !

[StevenJGore]

Hello from Yorkshire!

[skintt]

Thank you for the kind welcomes everyone!

[alexh]

Originally Posted by skintt

Does the pistorm have issues with compatibility?

With disk images yes. WHDload installs not so much.

[Paulee_Alex_Bow]

Originally Posted by skintt

Am alrate ta! 'tis grand 'ere.


Any advice for my newly purchased A500? It comes with PSU and workbench but not much else. I've ordered an RGB to Scart cable from amigakit so I'm hoping the old LCD TV I've got in the loft that has Scart inputs will work ok at least for now.


I'll probably get a gotek drive as well but ultimately I'd like to be able to run some kind of hard disk in it.


Does the Pistorm work well for providing at least a storage volume, or am I better looking at something like the ide68k?

Are you looking to keep Kickstart 1.3? That’s really going to affect what kind of drive/ram/accelerator solution I might recommend

[Simmo76]

'Ey up mi duck! Welcome to EAB, from a fellow Derbyshire Amigan.

[skintt]

Originally Posted by Paulee_Alex_Bow

Are you looking to keep Kickstart 1.3? That’s really going to affect what kind of drive/ram/accelerator solution I might recommend

Probably not looking to keep it, no. Is the main reason for doing so to maintain compatibility?

[alexh]

Originally Posted by skintt

Is the main reason for doing so to maintain compatibility?

Yes, with bootable floppy disks (images).

Such floppy disks usually also require 7MHz 68000 CPU too. (e.g. an accelerator that can be turned off)

Kickstart and CPU compatibility is not required if you switch over to running such programs from HDD using WHDload

[skintt]

Originally Posted by alexh

Yes, with bootable floppy disks (images).

Such floppy disks usually also require 7MHz 68000 CPU too. (e.g. an accelerator that can be turned off)

Kickstart and CPU compatibility is not required if you switch over to running such programs from HDD using WHDload

I see. Initially then I'll be mostly running from floppy images on the gotek but would probably look to upgrade to a HDD solution in the future.

Originally Posted by Simmo76

Ey up mi duck! Welcome to EAB, from a fellow Derbyshire Amigan.

Ey up! Y'alrate?

[alexh]

Originally Posted by skintt

Ey up! Y'alrate?

All this is talk is making me nostalgic for the North

Originally Posted by UrbanDictionary

Twerk - Description

(Southerners) To move your behind rythmically up and down in time to music
(Northerners) Where you go 9am-5pm weekdays

[freehand]

Originally Posted by Simmo76

'Ey up mi duck! Welcome to EAB, from a fellow Derbyshire Amigan.

I was just about to say the same thing my mum used to call me that bless her she was from same place.

Op welcome to the forum.

[S0ulA55a551n]

Originally Posted by skintt

Hello everyone!



I grew up in the era of 8 and 16 bit microcomputers. My dad's C64 was the first computer I ever used and still have fond memories of waiting 15 minutes for a game on tape to load only for it to fail!


I graduated to an A500+ which lasted a couple of years before I upgraded to an A1200 which eventually got expanded to include a whopping 40MB HDD and external CD-ROM. I regrettably swapped it for a Pentium P60 in about 1997 when it seemed like the Amiga brand was finished.


I'm really glad to see that although there was never much success after Commodore's bankruptcy, the Amiga community never dissapeared and seems much stronger than it ever was in 2024!


I've been dabbling with emulation for the past few years but recently bought an A500 from Ebay for which I'm eagerly awaiting delivery!

ahhh chesterfield the start of the North Welcome