Hello everyone,
I am a new Amiga user having recently purchased my first Commodore computer, an A600. My main interest is in using this as a computer rather than as a games machine. I didn't experience the 16bit computers when they were in their prime (I went from 8bit computers to PCs with only games consoles inbetween) and so I am interested in finding out what they are really capable of. I am hoping that over the coming months I will be able to benefit from the knowledge and experience of you long time Amiga users to keep me going in the right direction and hopefully prevent any serious mistakes on my part.
My research before buying the Amiga suggested that the A600 was the best choice due to the availability and ease of data transfer due to the PCMCIA slot and so far I have been quite pleased with this machine. I have spent the last few months making steady progress and now have my A600 set up with a CF hard drive and clean Workbench v2.1 installation. I was also able to pick up a 4MiB PCMCIA RAM card which brings it up to 6MiB total (it came with a 1MiB Chip RAM slot expansion).
I saw some reports that a current BenQ LCD monitor supported 15KHz signals and so I picked one up. I am happy to say that it works great with a simple VGA adapter and so I run Workbench with a normal PAL:HiRes screen mode.
My current focus is now in learning the Amiga operating system and trying out some of the software from Aminet. LHA files I can deal with but ADFs are still something I have to learn about. So far I have a music player (HippoPlayer), terminal software for logging into my PC via the serial port (Term 4.8) as well as a simple Minesweeper game and a NoClick commodity to stop the floppy drive from driving me insane.
I think my only frustration so far has been the amount of online tutorials and guides that make use of WinUAE. I want to do as much as possible on the real hardware and it can be difficult knowing what applies to a real Amiga when the only source I can find is someone using WinUAE.
Apart from that, I have been having great fun and it is truly amazing what this machine is capable of.
Thanks to intric8 for providing this great place!
Talk to you later.
8bitSheep