Can anyone recommend

[Drake1009]

Well I'm seriously giving thought to getting that accelerator board for my Amiga 1200 now.

Can anyone recommend a place to buy one? I was thinking of maybe the Blizzard 1230-MKII.

[yadster]

Try Amibench http://www.amibench.org There are some cards on there at the minute and I've had a few bargains off there myself. Also Ebay is a good place to hunt. Hope that helps.

[ant512]

Originally posted by Drake1009
Can anyone recommend a place to buy one? I was thinking of maybe the Blizzard 1230-MKII.

Noo, the Mark II has problems with the PCMCIA-II slot (If I remember correctly, anyway). Go for the Mk-III or MK-IV.

[Dizzy]

You should try Kiwi multimedia http://www.kiwimultimedia.dk:8080/amig

Try http://www.vesalia.de/ they have much amiga hardware.

[Severin]

Originally posted by Drake1009
I was thinking of maybe the Blizzard 1230-MKII.

030? nnnooooooo!!!!!!! go for at least an 040, there's not that much difference in price in the second hand market, and the 040 will give you loads more speed, personally I would look for an 060... I've not looked on amibench for a while, but I remember seeing some 060 boards going for around £75 a couple of years ago, should be a bit cheaper now the A1's are out

[Drake1009]

Heh reason I wanted an update was a bit more speed and ability to pop more Ram into it so I could get WHD games working. If I could I might end up registering it too.
Kiwi multimedia looks good since it's in Denmark.

Is the Viper 1240/40 Mhz turboboard any good?

I can get the blizzard 1260/50 mhz + 64 MB for the double price though.

And what about compatibility?

Oh and what would I need for a bigger HD? Will a PC IDE or SCSI do?

[ant512]

Originally posted by Drake1009
Heh reason I wanted an update was a bit more speed and ability to pop more Ram into it so I could get WHD games working. If I could I might end up registering it too.
Kiwi multimedia looks good since it's in Denmark.

Is the Viper 1240/40 Mhz turboboard any good?

I can get the blizzard 1260/50 mhz + 64 MB for the double price though.

And what about compatibility?

Oh and what would I need for a bigger HD? Will a PC IDE or SCSI do?

The Blizzard 060 that Vesalia are selling will not fit in a desktop case. The RAM sticks out at 45 degrees from the bottom of the card, so you'd have to raise the computer a couple of inches off the desk.

Any processor above an 030 will introduce compatibility problems. If you just want to play WHDLoad games, don't waste your money on an 040/060. 060 boards still sell for £150+ on eBay; 040 cards sell for around £120. You can get Blizzard 030 cards for £70.

It is possible to fit a standard PC 3.5" IDE drive into an Amiga, but you may experience power problems and will have to get a 3.5" - 2.5" adaptor cable. A standard PC laptop drive (2.5" IDE) will work fine. You can't use SCSI drives unless you buy a SCSI interface. Remember that all pre-3.5 versions of Workbench can only use drives up to a maximum size of 4GB. It is possible to fix the problem with "IDEFix", but that means spending more money. It's doubtful that you'd find 4GB of decent WHDLoad games anyway.

[Drake1009]

Well I definately want something which fits in my desktop thing. How about the 1240 thingie? Would that fit?

And I think my current harddrive in the computer is a SCSI. How can I tell? When I boot up holding both mouse buttons and going to the device menu it lists it as SCSI.

and I think I read something about holding "2" when starting the amiga to disable the expansion card.

[SabreGolly]

I take it that it's impossible to find these things new. There is a shop north of Manchester (Classic Video) that sells loads of amiga stuff new and s.h. - no boards though.

I'd like to upgrade my A1200 too from its 020/28 with 4MB fast. It seemed such a neat bit of kit 10 years ago. I'm a bit wary of 2nd hand stuff - but I'm also terrified of my miggy dying. I dont mind paying a bit extra if the board will last.

There must be a warehouse somewhere with lots of these boards sitting in a box. We must find it.:theparano

[Amiga1992]

Originally posted by Drake1009
And I think my current harddrive in the computer is a SCSI. How can I tell? When I boot up holding both mouse buttons and going to the device menu it lists it as SCSI.

It's IDE. Dunno why, but Commodore liked to name that device scsi.device, even while it's IDE (anyone knows why is this?:P)

I have an 030@50 with 32MB of RAM and all WHD stuff runs swell. As ant said, it's great for WHD Games, you would only need more if you want to do stuff like play MP3s or watch videos or ehatever. I'm very happy with my 030, even while it;'s one of the cheesier accelerators. I would like to switch to one of those boards that have the SCSI board option though (you might want to look into these, I thionk they are the Blizzards?)


Happy upgrading!

[RetroMan]

Originally posted by ant512
Noo, the Mark II has problems with the PCMCIA-II slot (If I remember correctly, anyway). Go for the Mk-III or MK-IV.

This is bullshit I got the MK-II myself (two of them) and there never has been trouble in using PCMCIA Cards at all

But don´t get the MK-III, it´s limited to 32MB Ram (MK-II : 64MB and MK-IV : 128MB)

[ant512]

Originally posted by Akira
It's IDE. Dunno why, but Commodore liked to name that device scsi.device, even while it's IDE (anyone knows why is this?:P)

They wrote the SCSI drivers first. When they added IDE support, they just hacked it into the SCSI system.

It is possible to get 040/060 cards new - the Viper 040 and 060 cards appeared recently. Vesalia sell them, and Power Computing advertised them for a while (though I can't seem to find them on their website now). Dunno if they're any good, though, and you won't be able to disable the cards or use either of the best ROM rekickers (BlizKick and RemApollo) with them.

The Blizzard 040 requires a tower case - the 040 runs far too hot for the small desktop case, and has a whopping great fan on it too.

[Drake1009]

Hmm thanks for the info guys.

I guess I'll have to scout around for a smaller upgrade then. All I really want is a bit more memory and maybe a little faster workbench. No tower.

Didn't know how much I'd need for that. Just hoped that I could've ordered from the danish reseller. Apparently not.

[Amiga1992]

Get the 030@50 and add an FPU to it. It's the acceleration yopu need, fits in a desktop, runs WHDLoad just great... Pure bliss

[Drake1009]

Great. Time to go find a vendor and haul out my already worn credit card I guess.

Thanks Akira.

[yadster]

I'll second what Akira says. I have a 030/50 and WHDload and it works a treat. There's not that many games that would benefit from an even faster processor that I can think of apart from AB3D2 and other Doom clones.