Amiga CD32 inquiry (amiga in general)

[Poofta!]

i was looking through games tm ( a uk gaming magazine) and noticed some interested amiga cd32 games... so i went on ebay and noticed that the console itself isnt too expensive (around 100 bucks) however i couldnt find a single game listed.

what games does this system play?

where can i get these games?

does it play disk based amiga games?

the consoles are all ntsc, are there region protected games? are there pal games?

is this a consolized version of the commadore amiga pc system?

thanks for info!

[courtesi96]

i was looking through games tm ( a uk gaming magazine) and noticed some interested amiga cd32 games... so i went on ebay and noticed that the console itself isnt too expensive (around 100 bucks) however i couldnt find a single game listed.

what games does this system play?

where can i get these games?

does it play disk based amiga games?

the consoles are all ntsc, are there region protected games? are there pal games?

is this a consolized version of the commadore amiga pc system?

thanks for info!

I'll try and answer some of your questions.

The system obviously plays CD32 games. It can also play quite a few CDTV games. I've also heard of people making compilation discs with hundreds of Amiga games. The CDTV compatibility is sort of a let down as the only 2 A+ games on the CDTV (Turrican and Turrican 2) are not compatible with it.

You can get these games off ebay. Also stores like www.softhut.com and others stock quite a few titles.

I don't know if it plays disc games but I know the CDTV could.

The way I understand it, the system really took off in Europe. So most of the games are PAL. However, if you use a RGB monitor they should work. Some of the games need a RAM upgrade, however to improve performance.

It is a console vision of the Amiga 1200 I believe.

It's generally a nice system. Unfortunately quite a few developers were lazy and what you end up getting are basically floppy versions of Amiga 1200 games. The most unforgivable being the port of Syndicate.

[Poofta!]

thanks a lot for the quick reply, im still a little hazy... i havent found a single cd32 game on ebay.

so, as i understand this, it is a consolized version of a computer amiga 1200 desktop?

would it be better to get an amiga 1200 then? does the 1200 play cd32 games?

whats a cdtv.


i have a lot of questions as im pretty much totally unfamiliar with the Amiga(s). so if there is a place to go read about this, please let me know.

[courtesi96]

thanks a lot for the quick reply, im still a little hazy... i havent found a single cd32 game on ebay.

so, as i understand this, it is a consolized version of a computer amiga 1200 desktop?

would it be better to get an amiga 1200 then? does the 1200 play cd32 games?

whats a cdtv.

Actually if you go on e-bay now and search, 'Commodore cd32' you will see quite a few games.

Yes, the CD32 is mostly a 1200. However, you do have to buy a specific cd-rom plus appropriate RAM I believe for it to work on a 1200. I'd stick with a CD32 for simplicity and the cool factor.

The CDTV is basically a consolized version of the Amiga 500. Very few good games on it. Even fewer of those games actually take advantage of the CD-ROM.

[Princess-Isabela]

onto the answers!

what games does this system play?

it plays naturally cd-32 software, quite a bit of cdtv titles, audio cd's and video cd movies(with an fmv add-on), it also plays floppy disks like a real amiga computer(it requires a speciall add-on such as sx-1, promodule, etc...),

where can i get these games?

from internet auctions/collectors, I have quite a selection of games so if you're interested I might sell some to you ^_~

does it play disk based amiga games?

with special add-on, yes.

the consoles are all ntsc, are there region protected games? are there pal games?

games aren't region protected, some of the games are in pal, there is an option to boot system either in pal or ntsc mode before playing it.

is this a consolized version of the commadore amiga pc system?

this is a amiga based system(console version), it is basically an Amiga 1200 with Akiko chip(chip never took off as a special improvement but some games such as wing commander did use it), think of it as a Amiga 1200 with internal cd-rom but without floppy drive, games are really great, for the most part they do contain extra features such as audio tracks, fmv(full motion videos) and extra levels.

thanks for info![/QUOTE]

Amiga Forever!!!

[Poofta!]

i actually can only see like 4 games on ebay when i searched Commodore cd32... am i doing something wrong? those games are all under teh ebay stores logo too.

quick question: i have an lcd tv 1080p... i live in north america so everything i ever hooked up to it was ntsc, anyone know if it would take a pal signal?

[Ze_ro]

does it play disk based amiga games?
Yes, but the CD32 doesn't have a build-in floppy drive, nor does it have a port for one. There are a few add-ons for the system that provide this port (along with many others), but these add-ons are very expensive, to the point of making the whole thing far more expensive than just buying an Amiga 1200.


the consoles are all ntsc, are there region protected games? are there pal games?
NTSC games are extremely hard to find, and finding out if a game is NTSC or not is almost impossible (it's not written on the spine or anything). So, if you want to get into the CD32 scene, you HAVE to be able to handle PAL video. There is a way to switch between PAL and NTSC mode, but an important thing to note is that a PAL system will ALWAYS output PAL colours (which will probably be black and white on an NTSC TV), and an NTSC system will ALWAYS output NTSC colours. Even though the menu option may say NTSC/PAL, it's really just a 60Hz/50Hz switch. Don't let anyone feed you some BS about hooking the system up in S-Video to get colour or anything like that... trust me, it won't work. If you mod the system for RGB (or use one of those expensive add-ons which have an RGB port), you can supposedly get around this colour problem, but I haven't tried it myself.

A lot of PAL games will still work in NTSC mode, but sometimes there will be about an inch of the screen missing from the bottom. Depending on the game, this may make things difficult (Project X) or completely impossible (Nick Faldo's Golf). Other games will get severe graphical glitches, which may make the game impossible to play (Disposable Hero, Super Skidmarks, etc). Some games will refuse to boot at all (Bubba 'n Stix, Alien Breed, etc). Many games will happily display their title screen and menus, and then mysteriously crash when the game starts (Alfred Chicken, Universe, Dragonstone, etc).


thanks a lot for the quick reply, im still a little hazy... i havent found a single cd32 game on ebay.
The CD32 died hard in North America (and by some accounts, may have never actually been released), so finding stuff in the States is next to impossible. You'll have to be prepared to buy stuff from Europeans, but there's always some stuff on there (http://search.ebay.com/search/search.dll?sofocus=bs&sbrftog=1&dfsp=32&catref=C12&from=R40&_trksid=m37&satitle=cd32&sacat=1249%26catref%3DC6&floc=1&sargn=-1%26saslc%3D2&sadis=200&fpos=R2V+3C2&sabfmts=1&saobfmts=insif&ftrt=1&ftrv=1&saprclo=&saprchi=&fsop=32%26fsoo%3D2), you just have to click on "Worldwide" to see them.


would it be better to get an amiga 1200 then? does the 1200 play cd32 games?
That really depends on what you want from the system. The main appeal of the CD32 (such as it is), is that you can play Amiga games in a console setting. If you don't mind going the computer route, the Amiga 1200 may be a better choice. Aside from a handful of games, every CD32 game was also released in disk form for play on "normal" Amiga's. In fact, most of the games were originally made in disk form and then ported to the CD32 with some enhancements like CD-Audio, FMV, etc... then again, many games didn't get ANY enhancements at all, so you're usually not missing out on much.

Playing most CD32 games on an Amiga 1200 *IS* possible, but honestly, it's more trouble than it's worth. Don't even bother.

It's worth pointing out that there are TONS of great games on the Amiga that never got ported to the CD32. If you can find a good Amiga 1200 with a hard drive and some extra RAM, install WHDLoad (http://www.whdload.de/) on it, and you'll have yourself a pretty fun little system.


whats a cdtv.
It was an earlier system released by Commodore. It was meant to be more of a multimedia system like the CD-i. It looks a bit like a VCR, and was based on the earlier Amiga 500 hardware. It was a miserable failure, and most of the software was nothing of any interest (lots of kiddy titles and garbage multimedia collections), but it did get some games like Lemmings, Turrican, Xenon 2, SimCity, Battle Chess, and others. The CD32 can play most of these. CDTV stuff seems to be harder to find than CD32 stuff though, so this probably won't be a big incentive.


i have a lot of questions as im pretty much totally unfamiliar with the Amiga(s). so if there is a place to go read about this, please let me know.
Well, the usual places are good starts... Wikipedia has tons of info of course. There are a few people around here who know a lot about Amiga stuff if you have questions. The best Amiga forum I've managed to find is "English Amiga Board (http://eab.abime.net/)".

--Zero

[Mobius]

I've been thinking about picking up a CD32, but what's the best way for someone in NTSC-land to play all the PAL games?

[Bojay1997]

I've been thinking about picking up a CD32, but what's the best way for someone in NTSC-land to play all the PAL games?

I just have a Commodore 1084S monitor and it works fine. You also need a mouse to put the CD32 into the video standard select mode. You should be able to get a 1084S in good shape relatively cheap off Ebay, the Amiga forums or Craigslist.

[Princess-Isabela]

I just have a Commodore 1084S monitor and it works fine. You also need a mouse to put the CD32 into the video standard select mode. You should be able to get a 1084S in good shape relatively cheap off Ebay, the Amiga forums or Craigslist.

yes, those monitors are the most popular and everything will be displayed as it should(s stands for stereo - built in speakers).
and other old school systems played on it will look great.
about the pal/ntsc switch mode, there was actually time when I was doing it with regular cd-32 joypad plugged in, in the second port(by making "circles" on it hehe), but mouse is the best and proper way to do it.

[Graham Mitchell]

Nobody's talking about the actual games. The machine came with Microcosm, I think, which is an FMV-based shooter taking place inside the human body. It's quite creepy, but otherwise underwhelming. The game that all the US magazines talked about was D/Generation, which I've played for the PC and it is really quite cool. It's a really fun game with a cool soundtrack and a nice ambience. If you get one be sure and try that game.

[Poofta!]

Ze_ro, thanks a LOT for your info. really, really informative.

*how* expensive are these floppy expansions to the cd32? (as well as the RGB) ?

lets say i do get a 1200, i dont mind going through the trouble of getting cd32 to work on it, i heard all i need is some ram and a cd drive -- anything else?


i have a 1080p LCD TV, im not sure if it accepts PAL (honestly i thought the whole idea of pal/ntsc was irrelevant w/ hdtv technology) i never hooked up a PAL source to it... does anyone know if i can, or how it will look?

so, my understanding is that lets say most games are PAL, but they will run on an NTSC console no [problem, as long as i use a mouse to switch output mode.

[Poofta!]

Nobody's talking about the actual games. The machine came with Microcosm, I think, which is an FMV-based shooter taking place inside the human body. It's quite creepy, but otherwise underwhelming. The game that all the US magazines talked about was D/Generation, which I've played for the PC and it is really quite cool. It's a really fun game with a cool soundtrack and a nice ambience. If you get one be sure and try that game.

im not really asking any questions about games, and frankly it doesnt matter. whats important is how to get the hardware working here in the US and the type of software it will play.

i know the games library pretty well, as its essentially a DOS port box with some other exclusives which were similar to DOS games at the time, all that will come later, im pretty sure ill buy games indiscriminately as long as they fun to me.

i had microcosm for the pc back in the day, it was poop.

[Bojay1997]

im not really asking any questions about games, and frankly it doesnt matter. whats important is how to get the hardware working here in the US and the type of software it will play.

i know the games library pretty well, as its essentially a DOS port box with some other exclusives which were similar to DOS games at the time, all that will come later, im pretty sure ill buy games indiscriminately as long as they fun to me.

i had microcosm for the pc back in the day, it was poop.

It's not a DOS port box whatever that means. I suppose you could call it an Amiga port box, but only a small percentage of the games were ported to the PC and always in inferior versions. I'm starting to suspect that this was just a troll post as you apparently had no ability to check Ebay and no ability to do a simple Google search which would have yielded all the info you needed in like 30 seconds.

[Princess-Isabela]

im not really asking any questions about games, and frankly it doesnt matter. whats important is how to get the hardware working here in the US and the type of software it will play.

i know the games library pretty well, as its essentially a DOS port box with some other exclusives which were similar to DOS games at the time, all that will come later, im pretty sure ill buy games indiscriminately as long as they fun to me.

i had microcosm for the pc back in the day, it was poop.

lol, back in the day games were ported from Amiga to Pc, those conversions were quite disappointing when compared to Amiga originals.
there were many exclusives on Amiga you couldn't find anywhere else and they hold up extremely well.
it is by all means no dos port box.

[Poofta!]

ok my mistake... nevertheless, like i said, ill deal with games later.

just to reiterate my last post before it got off-topic:

""Ze_ro, thanks a LOT for your info. really, really informative.

*how* expensive are these floppy expansions to the cd32? (as well as the RGB) ?

lets say i do get a 1200, i dont mind going through the trouble of getting cd32 to work on it, i heard all i need is some ram and a cd drive -- anything else?


i have a 1080p LCD TV, im not sure if it accepts PAL (honestly i thought the whole idea of pal/ntsc was irrelevant w/ hdtv technology) i never hooked up a PAL source to it... does anyone know if i can, or how it will look?

so, my understanding is that lets say most games are PAL, but they will run on an NTSC console no [problem, as long as i use a mouse to switch output mode.""

[Soviet Conscript]

hmmm...for a minute i was excited about the possibility of a consolized Amiga. i have Amiga 500 and a CD32 on its way (i hope). sitting in front of a small PC monitor and gameing has really fallen out of favor with me lately and i was hopeing with the cd32 expansion and a external floppy i could set something up to play my amiga 500 games in the bedroom on my big screen TV through S-video and with an acual controller.

looking on ebay external Amiga floppies seem to be in the 25-40 doller range

can't seem to find any of the add on ports for the CD32 so i'll have to assume they are rare and insanely expensive

[Bojay1997]

hmmm...for a minute i was excited about the possibility of a consolized Amiga. i have Amiga 500 and a CD32 on its way (i hope). sitting in front of a small PC monitor and gameing has really fallen out of favor with me lately and i was hopeing with the cd32 expansion and a external floppy i could set something up to play my amiga 500 games in the bedroom on my big screen TV through S-video and with an acual controller.

looking on ebay external Amiga floppies seem to be in the 25-40 doller range

can't seem to find any of the add on ports for the CD32 so i'll have to assume they are rare and insanely expensive

You need to not limit yourself to Ebay. Spend a little time getting to know folks over at the Amiga forums (Amiga.org is a good place to start) and I guarantee you will find someone selling an SX-1 in relatively short order for a reasonable price. The expansion boxes with accelerators and extra RAM are more expensive, but not necessary since very few games ever took advantage of them.

[Poofta!]

You need to not limit yourself to Ebay. Spend a little time getting to know folks over at the Amiga forums (Amiga.org is a good place to start) and I guarantee you will find someone selling an SX-1 in relatively short order for a reasonable price. The expansion boxes with accelerators and extra RAM are more expensive, but not necessary since very few games ever took advantage of them.

sx-1 is the floppy expansion? how much does that go for ? gimme a range.

how about an RGB expansion.

[Soviet Conscript]

sx-1 is the floppy expansion? how much does that go for ? gimme a range.

how about an RGB expansion.

no, the sx-1 is an add on that lets you add a external floppy.

[Bojay1997]

no, the sx-1 is an add on that lets you add a external floppy.

Correct. The SX-1 provides the following capabilities:

IBM-PC AT keyboard port.
9-pin serial port.
Amiga standard parallel port.
Amiga standard RGB port.
Amiga standard floppy drive (use an external drive as DF0:. For more
drives, daisy chain them from the first one).
2.5" internal IDE connector (drive fits inside the SX-1).
3.5" external IDE connector.
SIMM socket for up to 8 meg additional RAM (restricted to 4 meg if
you intend to use the FMV cartridge too).
Audio input (karaoke).
Internal battery backed clock.
Pass through connector (for other devices, eg. FMV cartridge).

You are looking at $50-$150 depending on the seller. Often, they come bundled with a CD32 and a drive which puts the total price at $200-$250.

In reality, you can get away with just buying an Amiga 1200 if you plan on running games off floppy. 95% of Amiga games are on floppy anyway. Some of the later stuff came out on CD-Rom, but it's not enough to justify buying a CD-Rom drive for an Amiga 1200.

[icbrkr]

Furthermore, if floppies aren't your thing, getting a A1200 with an 030 expansion with a few extra megs of fast ram and hard drive will allow you to run WHDLoad (www.whdload.de) - hard drive installable games. My 4000T is loaded with slave files for quick Amiga gaming.

[Princess-Isabela]

yes, in this day and age floppies are rather uncomfortable to use, whdload is the way to go(fantastic application), $30 for registration and you're ready to get your favorites onto the hard drive and never have to worry about floppy getting corrupted.
the same thing is possible on Amiga cd-32 with an sx-1 expansion(with hard drive in it naturally).

[Poofta!]

Correct. The SX-1 provides the following capabilities:

IBM-PC AT keyboard port.
9-pin serial port.
Amiga standard parallel port.
Amiga standard RGB port.
Amiga standard floppy drive (use an external drive as DF0:. For more
drives, daisy chain them from the first one).
2.5" internal IDE connector (drive fits inside the SX-1).
3.5" external IDE connector.
SIMM socket for up to 8 meg additional RAM (restricted to 4 meg if
you intend to use the FMV cartridge too).
Audio input (karaoke).
Internal battery backed clock.
Pass through connector (for other devices, eg. FMV cartridge).

You are looking at $50-$150 depending on the seller. Often, they come bundled with a CD32 and a drive which puts the total price at $200-$250.

In reality, you can get away with just buying an Amiga 1200 if you plan on running games off floppy. 95% of Amiga games are on floppy anyway. Some of the later stuff came out on CD-Rom, but it's not enough to justify buying a CD-Rom drive for an Amiga 1200.




Bo, thanks for a great response! very informative.

i was asking about the 1200 cd drive so i could play cd32 games. basically i want one amiga hardware to play as much of all other amiga software possible (whether i should get cd32 on 1200 or 1200 on cd32 is pretty much what im asking about).


any info on how i can hook up a cd32 to dvi or vga? (or component)

and anyone have an answer about the PAL on 1080p LCD televisions? if not ill make a thread about it.

[Soviet Conscript]

Bo, thanks for a great response! very informative.

i was asking about the 1200 cd drive so i could play cd32 games. basically i want one amiga hardware to play as much of all other amiga software possible (whether i should get cd32 on 1200 or 1200 on cd32 is pretty much what im asking about).


was the bulk of Amiga games made for the 500 model? and if so i heard there was compatability problems playing games ment for thr 500 on a 1200. how bad is the compatability problem?

[Mobius]

yes, those monitors are the most popular and everything will be displayed as it should(s stands for stereo - built in speakers).
and other old school systems played on it will look great.
about the pal/ntsc switch mode, there was actually time when I was doing it with regular cd-32 joypad plugged in, in the second port(by making "circles" on it hehe), but mouse is the best and proper way to do it.

Does the plain 1084 have built in speakers? I can't quite tell from the pictures I've found.

[Ze_ro]

*how* expensive are these floppy expansions to the cd32? (as well as the RGB) ?
There are four different expansions for the CD32, you can check out the whole list over here (http://www.amiga-hardware.com/showcat.cgi?CATID=9). The bottom of the line is the SX-1, but even this often goes for over $150 on eBay. It also sticks out the back of the CD32, making the setup about twice as deep. The top of the line is the SX-32 Pro, which has a faster processor in it, and actually turns the CD32 into a pretty high-end Amiga (Though this extra speed is meant more for actual Amiga tasks rather than CD32 games).... though SX-32's can easily go over $200.

Not to mention you still have to buy an Amiga floppy drive on top of that (about $30 or so). Honestly, it's far more sensible to just buy an Amiga 1200 at that point.


lets say i do get a 1200, i dont mind going through the trouble of getting cd32 to work on it, i heard all i need is some ram and a cd drive -- anything else?
I've never actually gone through it myself, but you need a special program to actually boot the CD. You'll also probably need a good working knowledge of Workbench and AmigaDOS to set the whole thing up. Seriously, it's not worth it... if you go the computer route, just play the disk versions of the games instead. The only games I can remember off-hand as being CD32 exclusive are Microcosm (which sucks anyways), and The Misadventures of Flink (which you can get for the SegaCD).

There is another option that is worth mentioning though; there are a lot of WHDLoad installs that will support the CD32 versions of the games. The way WHDLoad works is that it rips the game data from the disk (or CD in these cases), and copies it to a hard drive. Along the way, it patches the game to fix various bugs in the programming, removes copy protection, and sometimes adds extra features like cheats, and an "exit key" to return to Workbench. Doing things this way, you wouldn't have to screw around with funky CD boot programs. If it sounds like this method is complicated, then you're right. It's probably not worthwhile.

There are also a handful of games (probably less than 5) for the CD32 that make use of the Akiko chip. This chip was only used in the CD32, so you'll never be able to run those games on an Amiga 1200.


i have a 1080p LCD TV, im not sure if it accepts PAL (honestly i thought the whole idea of pal/ntsc was irrelevant w/ hdtv technology) i never hooked up a PAL source to it... does anyone know if i can, or how it will look?
It depends on the brand and model of TV. You might want to check the manual, but North American TV's will never bother telling you if they can handle this kind of stuff, so it's kind of a crap shoot. And no, LCD's are not immune to NTSC/PAL differences, unfortunately.

A Commodore 1084S monitor works great on a CD32 if you can get your hands on one.


so, my understanding is that lets say most games are PAL, but they will run on an NTSC console no problem, as long as i use a mouse to switch output mode.
Unfortunately, it's not quite that simple. Some games are nice and will actually have an NTSC/PAL option built-in. There are also games that seem to just ignore the setting and force whatever video mode they want. I honestly don't think it's worth getting a CD32 unless you know you have a good way of handling a 50Hz signal, there's just too many good games that you'll probably have trouble with.

Zool will actually detect what video mode you're running in, and will give you an error message if you try to play it in NTSC mode... but if you switch into PAL mode, it'll work fine. Now, if the programmers were smart enough to check the video mode, why didn't they program the game to compensate for the difference? Jerks.

As far as I can tell, F17 Challenge will not work on an NTSC CD32 no matter what you do. This is very strange, since the game actually lets you choose which video mode to use via an option in it's own menus... but it still locks up when you actually try to play. I tried it on my PAL CD32, and it worked perfectly though. Bad programming? Or hardware problems? Who knows.

So yeah, there's some fucked up shit going on with some of the games.


i was asking about the 1200 cd drive so i could play cd32 games. basically i want one amiga hardware to play as much of all other amiga software possible (whether i should get cd32 on 1200 or 1200 on cd32 is pretty much what im asking about).
Ah, the dream of the Amiga scene... unfortunately, it's pretty much impossible to have one Amiga that can run EVERYTHING. Many, MANY games have bugs and quirks that mean they only work with specific versions of Kickstart, or on specific versions of the 68000. Some will freak out if you have too much memory installed, or if obscure timing properties of your system aren't what the game expects. In many cases, the games are meant to run on an Amiga 500, and subtle differences in the Amiga 1200 hardware cause trouble. However, the Amiga 1200 introduced a new video chipset called AGA... so there are games that will run on the Amiga 1200, but not on the 500 (which uses the older OCS chipset). There are even games that were written for the Amiga 1000, and won't run on any other Amiga.

This is where WHDLoad comes in. There are three main purposes for WHDLoad... 1) Allow the games to be run from a hard drive, regardless of copy protection or bizarre disk formats, 2) Transparently load an appropriate Kickstart ROM into memory if necessary, and 3) Fix bad programming that triggers bugs on other Amiga hardware. In general, the best way to get the most compatible Amiga system is to install WHDLoad on an AGA machine (1200, 4000, or CD32 with appropriate expansions). However, even this setup doesn't guarantee you can run EVERYTHING.


any info on how i can hook up a cd32 to dvi or vga? (or component)
The CD32 generates a 15kHz video signal, so in order to get VGA (31kHz), you'd have to get an upscan converter... these are extremely expensive ($200 or more). Component might be possible with a mod, but it wouldn't solve the 50Hz problem if that's what you're thinking, and probably wouldn't be much better than S-Video.

If I'm not mistaken, all the signals to do an RGB mod are on the expansion port, so adding an RGB port should be trivial... of course, finding an RGB monitor becomes the problem.

--Zero

[Ze_ro]

Does the plain 1084 have built in speakers? I can't quite tell from the pictures I've found.
The 1084 has one speaker, the 1084S has two speakers (The "S" stands for stereo here).

--Zero

[j_factor]

I have a CD32 myself. You can usually get CD32 games from online stores that have Amiga stuff. Not that they'll have a great selection, but they'll have a few games. There are actually a surprising number of CD32 releases, considering how short-lived the system was. Granted, most of them are no-frills ports, but even so. Even the straight ports are nice to have on CD rather than floppy.

I have an SX-1 too. It cost me $75. It's the "worst" of the three add-ons, but the other two are extremely uncommon. With the SX-1, you can put in a hard drive, connect the system to an RGB monitor, and upgrade the RAM. I've upgraded the RAM but I've yet to get a monitor or hard drive. It's a real pain in the ass to get all this stuff, not to mention expensive. I do have a floppy drive, but I only have one floppy disk game so far.


was the bulk of Amiga games made for the 500 model? and if so i heard there was compatability problems playing games ment for thr 500 on a 1200. how bad is the compatability problem?

The compatibility is pretty bad. Basically, if the game came out before the A1200 itself (which was 1992), you can't assume it'll work. However, any Amiga game from 1992 on should work fine. A lot of games (well maybe not that many, but certainly some) were compatible with both but enhanced when played on an AGA machine.

However, those older, uncompatible games can still be made to run on the A1200 and similar machines. There are three ways. Number one is with a kickstart switcher, which is a device that switches the system's Kickstart to the old one of the A500. They were pretty common back in the day, but no one seems to use them anymore. Number two is with Relokick, a software program that basically does the same thing. And lastly there's WHDLoad, but with that you can't run the game off the floppy, you have to have the full game data on hard drive. All of these are complicated solutions, unfortunately.

[Poofta!]

Ze_ro, youre info is amazing. thanks so much. you pretty much cleared everything right up (j_factor thanks too!!!)

but of course i still have a question or ten.


were there amigas released after the 1200/cd32? would those be easier to get and have play WHDLoad versions of games? will they play 500/1000/1200?

also, is there a way i can play amiga on my home pc? this is just part of my curiousity -- i doubt ill bother with it. im really interested in messing around wiht amiga hardware since im a techhead and more or less a pc wiz, but somehow i never touched an amiga, i would love to play around on one. it seems like ill go the 1200/WHDLoad route... or cd32/whdload just for shits and giggles.


btw, these harddrives, can i use any ata or only special amiga ones?

[Ze_ro]

were there amigas released after the 1200/cd32? would those be easier to get and have play WHDLoad versions of games? will they play 500/1000/1200?
The CD32 was actually the last Amiga released. The chronology goes something like this:
1985 - Amiga 1000 released
1987 - Amiga 500 and Amiga 2000 released
1990 - Amiga 3000 released
1991 - CDTV released
1992 - Amiga 600, Amiga 1200 and Amiga 4000 released
1993 - CD32 relesed
1994 - Commodore declares bankruptcy
As you can see, the numbering scheme doesn't make much sense. Commodore always insisted on having two tiers of computers, so casual users had a cheaper alternative, while power users could get the best. The 1200, 4000 and CD32 were the only machines with the AGA chipset.

The Amiga 4000 is the best of the bunch, with some extra features the 1200 lacked, and was far more expandable (the 1200 really only had the trapdoor slot and PCMCIA, while the 4000 had Zorro3 slots, a video card slot, and a CPU Fast slot*). Naturally, the 4000 is also the most sought-after Amiga, so if you can find one, it's likely going to cost you a lot.

(* - Notice how the 1200 and 4000 have no common expansion port? This kind of hardware incompatibility really hurt the Amiga's, making upgrading a real bitch. The 500 doesn't share any of these ports either.)

The 1200 is a nice alternative. It's very small (no "case" as such, it's all built-into the keyboard), relatively powerful, and accelerator cards for the 1200 are relatively cheap (around half the price you might expect to pay for an equivalent accelerator for any other Amiga). There is also a ton of other weird (http://amigakit.leamancomputing.com/catalog/product_info.php?cPath=35&products_id=789&osCsid=09fd3bf774015a6ed66cdab2e5981d7f) hardware (http://amigakit.leamancomputing.com/catalog/product_info.php?cPath=26&products_id=137&osCsid=09fd3bf774015a6ed66cdab2e5981d7f) available for the 1200, though that stuff gets really expensive.

There are some other goofy computers, like the DraCo (http://www.amiga-hardware.com/showhardware.cgi?HARDID=43), Pegasos II (http://www.genesi-usa.com/pegasos.php), and AmigaOne (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/AmigaOne)... but calling these "Amiga" is a bit of a stretch, and none of them can natively play Amiga games, so what's the point?


also, is there a way i can play amiga on my home pc? this is just part of my curiousity -- i doubt ill bother with it. im really interested in messing around wiht amiga hardware since im a techhead and more or less a pc wiz, but somehow i never touched an amiga, i would love to play around on one. it seems like ill go the 1200/WHDLoad route... or cd32/whdload just for shits and giggles.
WinUAE (http://www.winuae.net/) is the de-facto Amiga emulator. There are a lot of options (owing to the wide range of Amiga hardware), so it can get a bit confusing, but it should play pretty much everything.


btw, these harddrives, can i use any ata or only special amiga ones?
It depends on the model of Amiga. The Amiga 1200 uses a 2.5" IDE drive (commonly used in PC laptops. 3.5" will work, but won't fit inside the case), as do all of the CD32 expansions I believe. The Amiga 3000 uses SCSI drives, and SCSI cards were available for most other models as well. Some Amiga software and hardware can have problems accessing large drives (they still work, you just might not be able to use anything beyond 4GB).

By the way, while the 1200 has a built-in IDE controller, you can't use it to run an ATAPI CD-ROM drive unless you invest in some extra equipment (http://www.jschoenfeld.com/products/idefix_e.htm). A more common option for CD-ROM on the 1200 is via PCMCIA.

--Zero

[Mobius]

Hope I'm not beating a dead horse here, but I'd like to spell things out in no uncertain terms. If I buy the following...

1. One of the NTSC CD32s that are all over eBay
2. A mouse to switch to PAL mode at startup
3. A 1084/1084S monitor

... then I can play any PAL game perfectly? No parts of the screen cut off, no messed up colors, no flicker/scrolling screen?

[Princess-Isabela]

Hope I'm not beating a dead horse here, but I'd like to spell things out in no uncertain terms. If I buy the following...

1. One of the NTSC CD32s that are all over eBay
2. A mouse to switch to PAL mode at startup
3. A 1084/1084S monitor

... then I can play any PAL game perfectly? No parts of the screen cut off, no messed up colors, no flicker/scrolling screen?

already answered below.
I was using it with one of the add-ons through rgb as my other A's and it looked fantastic, going with either composite/s-video pales in comparison with native rgb.

[j_factor]

Hope I'm not beating a dead horse here, but I'd like to spell things out in no uncertain terms. If I buy the following...

1. One of the NTSC CD32s that are all over eBay
2. A mouse to switch to PAL mode at startup
3. A 1084/1084S monitor

... then I can play any PAL game perfectly? No parts of the screen cut off, no messed up colors, no flicker/scrolling screen?

No, not quite, you'd need more than that. The CD32 has s-video standard, but doesn't have an RGB output. You'd need one of the add-ons -- all of them have it -- to hook up RGB. I would assume that, alternatively, it's possible to mod the system with an RGB out, but I wouldn't know about it.

Also, I'm not sure if you even need to switch to PAL mode once you're using RGB. RGB is its own color system, independent of NTSC/PAL/whatever. One of the reasons RGB became so prevalent in Europe was because France and much of Eastern Europe use SECAM whereas the rest of Europe uses PAL, and with RGB you have one signal that works in all countries. A mouse would be good regardless though, if only because many games use it.

[Ze_ro]

Hope I'm not beating a dead horse here, but I'd like to spell things out in no uncertain terms. If I buy the following...

1. One of the NTSC CD32s that are all over eBay
2. A mouse to switch to PAL mode at startup
3. A 1084/1084S monitor

... then I can play any PAL game perfectly? No parts of the screen cut off, no messed up colors, no flicker/scrolling screen?
Yes. That's my setup exactly.

It's worth pointing out that a lot of CD32 games support the mouse, so you're not just getting it to change video modes. Ever read the write-up of Liberation in DP Advance? I guarantee you whoever wrote that wasn't using a mouse! The game is actually excellent, just incredibly complicated without a mouse.


No, not quite, you'd need more than that. The CD32 has s-video standard, but doesn't have an RGB output.
Well, you don't NEED to hook up in RGB. S-Video works perfectly fine (this is what I use, via a home-made cable), and composite should work fine too. The problem is finding a monitor that handles 50Hz properly, and at least if you buy a 1084S, you KNOW that it'll work because Commodore designed the monitor and the Amiga chipset to be compatible. There are plenty of other monitors that will work too (An Atari SC1224 should work), but finding out which ones handle 50Hz gracefully is not always easy.

Being able to do RGB is certainly a nice addition though.


Also, I'm not sure if you even need to switch to PAL mode once you're using RGB. RGB is its own color system, independent of NTSC/PAL/whatever.
Well, RGB can still be 50 or 60Hz, so you would still have to switch. The "colour problem" goes away, but as long as you're using an NTSC CD32, you wouldn't have the colour problem anyways.

--Zero

[Soviet Conscript]

since were kinda on the subject, i was wondering. are acual Amigas region locked? i have a Amiga 500 and i was looking to buy some games from the UK. would they play fine or not?

also is there any way to mod a 500 for s-video? or am i stuck with composite if i want to use my TV.

[Princess-Isabela]

since were kinda on the subject, i was wondering. are acual Amigas region locked? i have a Amiga 500 and i was looking to buy some games from the UK. would they play fine or not?

also is there any way to mod a 500 for s-video? or am i stuck with composite if i want to use my TV.

computers in general are not region locked to any specific region that would prevent you from playing majority of the games.
make sure to go to early bootup startup sequence(your tv though might still have trouble displaying pal signal).
s-video won't improve picture quality significantly, rgb is really way to go with Amiga's and old-school systems in general so it would be really wise to pick one of those awesome 1084s monitors and enjoy Amiga graphics in all its glory ^^

[j_factor]

Well, you don't NEED to hook up in RGB. S-Video works perfectly fine (this is what I use, via a home-made cable), and composite should work fine too. The problem is finding a monitor that handles 50Hz properly, and at least if you buy a 1084S, you KNOW that it'll work because Commodore designed the monitor and the Amiga chipset to be compatible. There are plenty of other monitors that will work too (An Atari SC1224 should work), but finding out which ones handle 50Hz gracefully is not always easy.

Being able to do RGB is certainly a nice addition though.

Ah. Actually, I still don't have a monitor yet. I totally forgot that those monitors accept s-video and composite. For some reason I had it in my head that they were RGB only. So, forget I said that. :p


Well, RGB can still be 50 or 60Hz, so you would still have to switch. The "colour problem" goes away, but as long as you're using an NTSC CD32, you wouldn't have the colour problem anyways.

D'oh, I forgot it was a speed switch. Although, a good number of games are perfectly playable without switching the speed. I used to know somebody who'd import European versions of games just so they'd run faster. He was pretty eccentric.

One last note. The 1084S may not be worth it. Prices vary a lot, but sometimes I notice a pretty big increase for the 1084S over the regular 1084. It may be cheaper to get a 1084 and a pair of computer speakers. If you want to save a little money, that is. I've found that the total cost of the CD32 is more expensive than it first seems.

[Mobius]

I'm raising this thread from the depths because I finally got a CD32, and now I'm even more confused! I went ahead and got an NTSC one from ebay, but I was just planning on holding onto it until I got a 1084 monitor and Amiga mouse. But much to my surprise, when I plugged it in and fired up D\Generation, it worked brilliantly with no display issues whatsoever on my NTSC TV over S-video. Did I somehow end up with an NTSC version of the game or what? What games actually received an NTSC release?

[robotriot]

I think it's almost impossible to tell which games had NTSC versions, at least I've never seen a list or anything. The only one I know for sure is Diggers, it even has NTSC written on the CD. I guess some games might be "dual" mode, and work both ways, maybe D/Generation is one of them? I've got almost a complete CD32 library, but only a PAL CD32, so I can't test the titles for NTSC compatibility :/

[tom]

Ze-ro, you forgot to mention the 500+ in your Amiga lifeline:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amiga_500%2B

Many Amiga to CD32 conversions had quite a bit of enhancement, eg sound was more/better on CD32 than Amiga computers due to the usage of CD media.
Here's my small CD32 collection:
http://www.videogamecollectors.com/gallery2/main.php?g2_itemId=201397

[robotriot]

Ze-ro, you forgot to mention the 500+ in your Amiga lifeline:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amiga_500%2B


... and the 2500, 1500, 3000T, 4000T etc ... but I don't think that was the point, the main variatons are more important :)

[tom]

... and the 2500, 1500, 3000T, 4000T etc ... but I don't think that was the point, the main variatons are more important :)

exactly

[icbrkr]

I'm raising this thread from the depths because I finally got a CD32, and now I'm even more confused! I went ahead and got an NTSC one from ebay, but I was just planning on holding onto it until I got a 1084 monitor and Amiga mouse. But much to my surprise, when I plugged it in and fired up D\Generation, it worked brilliantly with no display issues whatsoever on my NTSC TV over S-video. Did I somehow end up with an NTSC version of the game or what? What games actually received an NTSC release?

Many games will work 100% sans a small part of the bottom of the screen being cut off. Some will work with no problems at all... and... for all you know, your TV can display PAL ;). I found out my Sharp LCD can though there's no mention if it anywhere.

[Ze_ro]

I think it's almost impossible to tell which games had NTSC versions, at least I've never seen a list or anything.
Indeed. Some games are smart enough to detect what mode your hardware is, and will display in the appropriate mode. I don't know if D/Generation is one of these games, though like Ice mentioned, you might be lucky and happen to have a TV that can handle 50Hz signals.

To my knowledge, no one has made a comprehensive list of all the compatibility issues for each game. I've been keeping my own list with my own findings, but there are still lots of games I don't have, and since I'm using a 1084S, I sometimes can't tell the difference between 50Hz and 60Hz. One of these days, I'd also like to see a comprehensive list of which CD32 games work properly on Amiga computers.

--Zero

[robotriot]

Hmm, I wonder if I'd hook up my CD32 to my TV card and set the TV card to NTSC, would that produce any useful test results?

[Ze_ro]

Depends on your TV card I guess. Will the picture roll is the refresh rate isn't right, or will it just ignore the extra lines and patiently wait for a vertical blanking signal?

Also, you might end up with a black and white picture, depending on how smart your card is.

--Zero

[Mobius]

Some will work with no problems at all... and... for all you know, your TV can display PAL ;).

Now this is getting strange. I hooked this up to my other TV (an HDTV CRT) to see if this was the case, and iit still plays, but may be converting PAL to NTSC -- it just looks like crap with lots of ghosting and the colors are washed out. The only reason I'm not sure it's displaying in PAL is because the system menu screen still looks crappy, which I would expect to be NTSC.

But here's the kicker. I thought I had a broken controller because when I tried to play the game on the first TV, it was always acting erratically, like every button on the controller was being randomly pressed. But on the second TV, the controller functions just fine.

Why would the TVs have this effect? My first guess was that playing a PAL game on an NTSC TV was screwing with the game's timing and affecting the controller polling. But how would the TV make a difference? Is there actually any kind of a feedback loop where the system gets timing information back from the TV? I thought it was just a "send it and forget it" thing with video signals. The other thing is that the controller even behaves erratically on the system menu screen where you select languages and manage save files. Wouldn't that screen be in NTSC mode?

This is easily the most confusing console I've ever owned...


Edit: Okay, this is strange, too. I tried a Master System controller and it's not erratic at all with the first TV. D/Generation doesn't recognize any button presses, but the d-pad works just fine. Then on the system menu, it works perfectly, both d-pad and buttons. So it seems like there's some weird conflict happening in the combo of my standard controller+SDTV (and, potentially +D/Generation). What the hell is going on here... I wish I had more games and controllers to test with.

[j_factor]

I have no idea why the TV would change anything (other than problems like lag), but it sounds like it's the game. Some games are finicky with controllers, especially when you're dealing with these 9-pin ports that so many systems used. I don't know anything about D/Generation, but I do know that a few CD32 ports were extra sloppy and weren't really designed to work with the CD32 controller, as crazy as that sounds.

[Mobius]

Okay, mystery solved. When I hooked the system up to the HDTV again, it was doing all the same weirdness as with the SDTV, just at a slower rate. I got a new controller from the seller and it's working perfectly and now I get to enjoy D/Generation in all its glory! What a great game...

I think I'm going to start a compatibility list for what games work properly on NTSC systems, but I'm still confused about whether there are REALLY separate NTSC and PAL versions of the games. Can anyone confirm there are? As in "I own both the NTSC and PAL versions of this game, and the PAL version doesn't work on the NTSC system"? I'm aware that one game actually got released with an NTSC label (Diggers, I think) but are there actual separate versions for the other games?

[icbrkr]

Okay, mystery solved. When I hooked the system up to the HDTV again, it was doing all the same weirdness as with the SDTV, just at a slower rate. I got a new controller from the seller and it's working perfectly and now I get to enjoy D/Generation in all its glory! What a great game...

I think I'm going to start a compatibility list for what games work properly on NTSC systems, but I'm still confused about whether there are REALLY separate NTSC and PAL versions of the games. Can anyone confirm there are? As in "I own both the NTSC and PAL versions of this game, and the PAL version doesn't work on the NTSC system"? I'm aware that one game actually got released with an NTSC label (Diggers, I think) but are there actual separate versions for the other games?

I can say there may already be a compatibility list in progress... Give it some time...

There are very, very few NTSC releases and there is a miniscule amount of games that will not even boot on NTSC machines (like Zool.. it locks out when it detects a NTSC chipset). Most games run in what I like to call NTSC-C - or NTSC with the bottom cut off that usually work just fine. I haven't come across any games that are NTSC-only as of yet, just games that can detect NTSC/PAL and boot accordingly.

[AB Positive]

Ah crap... you know as an OS geek I've always been fascinated by the Amigas...

and I happen to have a 1084S

What Amiga OS can a 1200 run? I think the last I heard was it getting to OS 4? Or can only the expensive 4000s run those?

Man, I really shouldn't have read this thread. It's going to make me want an Amiga now that I know I can use it on that monitor.

[Mobius]

I can say there may already be a compatibility list in progress... Give it some time...

There are very, very few NTSC releases and there is a miniscule amount of games that will not even boot on NTSC machines (like Zool.. it locks out when it detects a NTSC chipset). Most games run in what I like to call NTSC-C - or NTSC with the bottom cut off that usually work just fine. I haven't come across any games that are NTSC-only as of yet, just games that can detect NTSC/PAL and boot accordingly.

Well, it seems D/Generation and Chuck Rock work perfectly with well centered screens, and Guardian works perfectly if you re-center the screen while the game is paused. Chuck Rock has a big black border around the picture, but it seems like a pretty shoddy port in general. (Music or sound effects, but not both at the same time? Lame.) Those are all I've tried, but I'll probably be trying Chuck Rock 2, Lotus Trilogy, Bubba'n'Stix and Fire and Ice before too long.

[icbrkr]

Ah crap... you know as an OS geek I've always been fascinated by the Amigas...

and I happen to have a 1084S

What Amiga OS can a 1200 run? I think the last I heard was it getting to OS 4? Or can only the expensive 4000s run those?

Man, I really shouldn't have read this thread. It's going to make me want an Amiga now that I know I can use it on that monitor.

A stock 1200 can run up to 3.1. An Amiga 1200 with 4MB can run OS 3.5. An Amiga 1200 w/8MB or RAM and preferably a 68030 or better can run OS 3.9. If you have a PPC card ($$$), you will probably be able to run OS 4.0 ;).

If you get a cheap adapter ($15), you can run an A1200 on most VGA monitors if it's in DBLNTSC, DBLPAL or VGA monitor mode though you won't be able to play games in those modes (you'd still need a 1084). Of course, to put it in this mode you would have to boot up on a 1084/TV the first time to set this.

[Ze_ro]

I run 3.1 on my Amiga 3000 (68030 w/ 11MB RAM). I'd say there's little point in upgrading beyond that. The later releases add some things that people these days expect to be part of the operating system (like a TCP/IP stack, better multimedia support, etc), but that comes with a large speed penalty, to the point where I wouldn't recommend 3.9 unless you have a 68040.

Amiga OS 4.0 and MorphOS both require a PPC CPU, and therefor will not run on ANY stock Amiga that Commodore released. Not even the 4000. PPC accelerators are incredibly expensive (think $300-$500 or even more, depending on the features), making this somewhat of a difficult road.

A stock 1200 would probably work best with 3.1.

I'd really like to see someone put together a cheap memory expander for the CD32 so you could run WHDLoad on it. It seems that people have actually looked into it though, and the edge connector that it would require is prohibitively expensive.


there is a miniscule amount of games that will not even boot on NTSC machines (like Zool.. it locks out when it detects a NTSC chipset).
The game actually works fine if you switch it into PAL mode... which I always thought was somewhat ironic. The programmers were obviously smart enough to know the differences between PAL and NTSC, smart enough to detect a mismatch, and smart enough to make both versions... why didn't they just make it check the video mode and adjust the video timings to make it work? Plenty of other developers managed to do this with their games.

Anyways, if you have a TV or monitor that can handle a 50Hz signal, then the only game I've seen so far that will cause you trouble is F17 Challenge. No matter what I did, I could not convince this game to work on my NTSC CD32, though it works perfectly on my PAL system.

--Zero

[tubeway]

I grabbed a CD32 off ebay around a year ago, but I have no games for it. I haven't even tried booting the thing up yet. I just need -A- game; does anyone know of any freeware or shareware titles for it that I could download and burn simply to test it out?

[icbrkr]

The game actually works fine if you switch it into PAL mode... which I always thought was somewhat ironic. The programmers were obviously smart enough to know the differences between PAL and NTSC, smart enough to detect a mismatch, and smart enough to make both versions... why didn't they just make it check the video mode and adjust the video timings to make it work? Plenty of other developers managed to do this with their games.

--Zero

Au contraire moonfraire... it doesn't work at all, whether in PAL mode or not (that was the first thing I tried). It flatly tells me I'm running on an NTSC system, it isn't supported, and go contact my dealer.

[AB Positive]

Ahhh, dang. Amiga 4.1 looks soooooo swank... alas.

I guess I can just hope that MorphOS gets ported to mac platforms I guess, or find a Gemini machine.

So... in that case what would be the best model Amiga for general gameplaying with compatibility... I'd be interested in playing Starflight II as well as Sensible Soccer '96 - does this mean both a 500 and 1200 or is there a 'specific' 1200 that can run most/all 500 games?

[El Metz]

I grabbed a CD32 off ebay around a year ago, but I have no games for it. I haven't even tried booting the thing up yet. I just need -A- game; does anyone know of any freeware or shareware titles for it that I could download and burn simply to test it out?

Some abandonware:
http://www.amigaland.de/component/option,com_remository/Itemid,26/func,select/id,19/

[tubeway]

Thank you very much, El Metz!

[icbrkr]

Ahhh, dang. Amiga 4.1 looks soooooo swank... alas.

I guess I can just hope that MorphOS gets ported to mac platforms I guess, or find a Gemini machine.

So... in that case what would be the best model Amiga for general gameplaying with compatibility... I'd be interested in playing Starflight II as well as Sensible Soccer '96 - does this mean both a 500 and 1200 or is there a 'specific' 1200 that can run most/all 500 games?

Check out http://www.whdload.de ... basically, these are 'slave' programs that will take a non-compatible game, make it hard drive installable and compatible. Many games will work with a stock machine.

3.9 can look good on the right system... here's an old screenshot of mine...

http://www.amiga.org/modules/myalbum/photo.php?lid=2758&cid=22

[robotriot]

So... in that case what would be the best model Amiga for general gameplaying with compatibility... I'd be interested in playing Starflight II as well as Sensible Soccer '96 - does this mean both a 500 and 1200 or is there a 'specific' 1200 that can run most/all 500 games?


Yea just get a 1200 and Whdload, it's the best overall solution. You should probably invest in some extra RAM at least though, or get an accelerator card.

[icbrkr]

I think a lot of 'slaves' might require an MMU to remap the kickstart properly? An 030 accelerator card with a few megs of ram should run under $200 I think.

[Ze_ro]

Au contraire moonfraire... [Zool] doesn't work at all, whether in PAL mode or not (that was the first thing I tried). It flatly tells me I'm running on an NTSC system, it isn't supported, and go contact my dealer.
Well, I tested it right before I wrote that reply, and it worked perfectly fine for me! When was the last time you tried? Perhaps there are several versions or something?


what would be the best model Amiga for general gameplaying with compatibility... I'd be interested in playing Starflight II as well as Sensible Soccer '96 - does this mean both a 500 and 1200 or is there a 'specific' 1200 that can run most/all 500 games?
As mentioned, WHDLoad is what you need. What WHDLoad basically does is take a game disk and installs it to your hard drive (most Amiga games didn't play nice like this, usually because of copy protected disks). Along the way, it has to modify the executable, so the guys who work on this stuff often go in and fix most of the compatibility problems that prevented games from working on newer Amigas.

Now, instead of ripping the games from disk yourself, it's probably a whole hell of a lot easier to just go here (http://kgwhd.whdownload.com/index.php) and download the games pre-ripped. All you have to do is decompress them and stick them on your hard drive.

Keep in mind that WHDLoad is shareware, and it'll cost $30 to register it (If you don't register it, you have to endure a nag screen... but you don't lose any functionality otherwise). You also need some Kickstart ROM images, though you should be able to find these easily enough on the internet.

Naturally, an Amiga 4000 is the ideal system... but good luck with that. A 1200 is the second best choice, and far easier on the pocketbook. It's fast enough for most things, but it only has 2MB of RAM, which isn't enough for most WHDLoad games (Actual memory requirements vary by game, but you'll ALWAYS need more memory than the original game required, because WHDLoad takes up some memory too and may need to load a Kickstart ROM). You can buy cheap memory expanders, but it's probably a better choice to buy a low-end 68030 accelerator, as they always have standard 72-pin SIMM slots for RAM. Luckily, accelerators for the 1200 are somewhat cheaper and easier to find than those for other Amigas... though be aware that some of the higher-end cards may require the motherboard to be transferred into a tower case.

Oh, and the 1200 comes with a very small hard drive (80MB? I can't remember). It's a standard 2.5" IDE drive, so it's easy enough to replace. I wouldn't recommend using anything over 4GB though, as there are some known problems with large drives.

If you prefer to deal with disks, and think all of this sounds like a whole lot of trouble, then your best bet would be to just get an Amiga 500 with a 1MB memory expansion (These expansions are cheap, like under $20). Most games were made with the 500 in mind, and I think the only games you'll be missing out on are the AGA games that were meant for the 1200/4000 (though in most cases, companies released AGA and OCS/ECS versions, so you'd still be fine). You might have some problems with Kickstart compatibility though.


I think a lot of 'slaves' might require an MMU to remap the kickstart properly?
I don't think any of it requires an MMU, though it will definitely take advantage of it if you have one. Though on the flip side, there are some games that will crash if you DO have an MMU (In which case you have to add the "NOMMU" tooltip to disable it).

--Zero

[icbrkr]

Keep in mind that WHDLoad is shareware, and it'll cost $30 to register it (If you don't register it, you have to endure a nag screen... but you don't lose any functionality
otherwise).



Actually, there's a few options disabled. I'm not entirely sure what they are, I sure don't come across it very often, but it'll throw up a 'you'll need the registered version for this game' on occasion.




. A 1200 is the second best choice, and far easier on the pocketbook. It's fast enough for most things, but it only has 2MB of RAM, which isn't enough for most WHDLoad games (Actual memory requirements vary by game, but you'll ALWAYS need more memory than the original game required, because WHDLoad takes up some memory too and may need to load a Kickstart ROM). You can buy cheap memory expanders, but it's probably a better choice to buy a low-end 68030 accelerator, as they always have standard 72-pin SIMM slots for RAM. Luckily, accelerators for the 1200 are somewhat cheaper and easier to find than those for other Amigas... though be aware that some of the higher-end cards may require the motherboard to be transferred into a tower case.


You could technically buy PCMCIA based memory to bring it up to a whopping 6MB (/sarcasm) if you're able to find it.



Oh, and the 1200 comes with a very small hard drive (80MB? I can't remember). It's a standard 2.5" IDE drive, so it's easy enough to replace. I wouldn't recommend using anything over 4GB though, as there are some known problems with large drives.


It will sometimes report the wrong filesize, but I have a 20GB in my A600 and my A1200.

You can't make over a 4GB partition under WB3.1, and anything over 2GB is just asking for trouble. I keep my 3.1 systems to 1GB.



If you prefer to deal with disks, and think all of this sounds like a whole lot of trouble, then your best bet would be to just get an Amiga 500 with a 1MB memory expansion (These expansions are cheap, like under $20). Most games were made with the 500 in mind, and I think the only games you'll be missing out on are the AGA games that were meant for the 1200/4000 (though in most cases, companies released AGA and OCS/ECS versions, so you'd still be fine). You might have some problems with Kickstart compatibility though.


As funny as this sounds, but I'd recommend the A600 (if you can find it in the states easy) before the A500. Before I get kicked, let me explain -

The A600 has the 1MB Agnus which is needed for a lot of games past 1990. Many A500s have 512K Fast and 512K chip which won't work in some cases. The downfall is that you occasionally have to run degrader or something to get games to work on the A600.

The A600 has a built in HD adapter....

And now the big reason... you can get a PCMCIA compact flashcard reader for cheap, use Amikit's EasyADF and create real disks without having to do much... no network stacks, no nullmodem, just easy file copies.

[Ze_ro]

Actually, there's a few options disabled. I'm not entirely sure what they are, I sure don't come across it very often, but it'll throw up a 'you'll need the registered version for this game' on occasion.
Ah. I registered quite some time ago, so it's been a while since I've tried it without the key file.


You could technically buy PCMCIA based memory to bring it up to a whopping 6MB (/sarcasm) if you're able to find it.
I'm not familiar with this option... are these standard memory modules, or is it something that was unique to the Amiga? How's the speed?

Honestly, I find memory to be the biggest limitation of my 1200, and if I could upgrade to 6MB cheaply (less than $40), I'd be perfectly happy with that.


It will sometimes report the wrong filesize, but I have a 20GB in my A600 and my A1200.

You can't make over a 4GB partition under WB3.1, and anything over 2GB is just asking for trouble. I keep my 3.1 systems to 1GB.
Do you just have the 20GB split up into a dozen partitions? Or are both machines running 3.9 or something?

My 3000 is sitting with a 512MB SCSI and a 1GB IDE drive, and that's more than enough space. I'd like to replace both of them with just a single 2 or 4GB SCSI drive, mostly for the sake of simplifying the setup (one less drive, and one less Zorro card) and maybe a bit of a speed boost, since my IDE controller isn't too fast.

--Zero

[icbrkr]

I'm not familiar with this option... are these standard memory modules, or is it something that was unique to the Amiga? How's the speed?

Way back when, if you remember, PCMCIA was supposedly to allow SRAM (?) where you could add 16 bit memory modules. It's not unique to the Amiga, but it's uncommon and it is 16 bit RAM so quite a bit slower.



Do you just have the 20GB split up into a dozen partitions? Or are both machines running 3.9 or something?

My 3000 is sitting with a 512MB SCSI and a 1GB IDE drive, and that's more than enough space. I'd like to replace both of them with just a single 2 or 4GB SCSI drive, mostly for the sake of simplifying the setup (one less drive, and one less Zorro card) and maybe a bit of a speed boost, since my IDE controller isn't too fast.

--Zero

Honestly, I have maybe 3 partitions under 3.1 and just leave the rest free. I'd rather do it this way with a newer drive than use a drive that's 15+ years old and on its way out. At least, I hope the newer one works better.

On my 3.9 system, I can format to whatever size. 3.1 had a 4GB limitation of partition size, but if you ever had to validate something that large you'd run out of RAM and the system would die... hence the reason why you want to keep a reasonable filesize.