Non-RPG General News - Amiga 500 Mini Review

My first computers were a Vic 20 and then a Commodore 64, and I loved my 64. Still do, when I think back to it. For a while, I really desperately wanted an Amiga. But right about the time I was going to ask for one it was also becoming clear that Commodore was going away (at least in the U.S.) and I grudgingly moved on to IBM PC clones instead. At this point, owning an Amiga would be purely for nostalgia, to own one at long last, not to play games on it. Since this product isn't actually an Amiga, it wouldn't serve any purpose for me.
 
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Amiga was expensive just for games, even if they were much better. It was even more expensive to create your own programs, you needed to buy the reference books and preferably a C compiler. A dream machine but not a cheap hobby. I had the 1000 and swapped it for a 500 later (the early 1000's were crashing a lot, hence the "guru meditation" posted earlier - that's the equivalent of a blue screen).

I liked it, but I must admit that I loved my C64 much more, it was the best bang for the buck and a pleasure to program because it was such a clever machine, yet very affordable. And since many friends had it, it was easy to borrow a ton of games.

It's always tempting when seeing those retro hardware products, but that time has passed for me, I'll resist. :)
 
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Nod, I also preferred the commodore myself. I never actually owned an Amiga, though I had friends that did, and it made me appreciate the system I had even more. Until I finally got an Apple. And even then I often missed the commodore, the bloody thing was a work-horse and never gave me any real troubles.
 
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I own a C64 to this day, but I haven't used it in recent years.

I sold my Amiga 2000 (with PC card !) in the early 90s, because I needed the money for a Pentium 60 back then.
 
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Nice. An Amiga 2000, that must be an impressive machine!

I didn't sell my C64 for the money, although it was welcome, but because I realized I was spending too much time on games! :lol: One of those rare lucid moments in life...
 
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I can't believe how much $$$ people are getting for used Amiga 500s/1000s/2000s on EBay!
 
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yes :)

I have programmed a lot on an Amiga 2000 (even in assembler). And I still like many Amiga games.

Maybe this will give you ideas. :)

The 8-Bit Guy is trying to put his game, Petscii Robots, on an arcade machine… and he chose the Amiga as computer. He also discusses other adaptations he or others have made for different platforms, it's quite impressive.



For those who don't check this channel, he's into old computers. For example, he made series on the Commodore (computers) history, one of his favourite being the iconic PET (one of the 3 big first successes with the Apple II and the TRS-80). He created a game for this computer and has been porting it to many others.
 
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I knew there were several projects to revive the Amiga, but here's a new discovery, the Vampire.



http://www.apollo-core.com/v4.html

The AC68080, the core powering the Vampire V4, designed by enthusiasts and implemented on FPGA (Altera Cyclone). Just look at the features of this CPU! And that box doesn't even seem to need a fan.

Of course, as you can see in the video, there are (were?) still some glitches and bugs.

PS: it's a nice channel, by the way, I just watched his video on the PDP series and the PiDP-11; he's apparently got a lot of revival hardware. Almost made me want to buy one. ;)
 
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