Hello everyone,

I love the Amiga but I've never owned one (I have very fond memories of many, many hours of gaming on my best friend's A500+ when I was younger).

I've always wanted one and decided it's time to finally try and get my hands on one, but I really don't like how expensive they are on eBay.

I was wondering if anyone has any advice or recommendations on how to get a bargain on one? Any guidance would be greatly appreciated.

@CLXIV

The cheapest Amiga is an PC running UAE - this is an Amiga emulator that lets you run AmigaOS and associated apps and games.

Next to that, you can still find cheap Amigas, but not on ebay, try searching in local ads. Amiga 500 and 600 can still be had for around 100-150 euros.

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@WolfToTheMoon

Thanks but I'm really after authentic original hardware (though FS-UAE is really nice). It seems lots of people got lucky getting A500s for well under £100 but I might just not be in a great location for it (it seems the best deals are meeting local sellers).

@CLXIV

Quote:

I might just not be in a great location for it (it seems the best deals are meeting local sellers).

Well, telling which location that would be might be a start...


As for "cheap" A500s, sure the do exist but you won't have much fun with it alone.

No way to move data around, even hocking up to modern TV might turn problematic.

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- We don't need good ideas, we haven't run out on bad ones yet
- blame Canada

@Kronos

Profile updated with location (could have sworn I already entered it...).

No intention of using a modern TV - I'll be keeping it authentic with an old 14" CRT TV.

@CLXIV

Quote:

I'll be keeping it authentic with an old 14" CRT TV.

In that case an A500 + either an ACA500 or KyroFlux might be what you need.

_________________
- We don't need good ideas, we haven't run out on bad ones yet
- blame Canada

@Kronos

Yeah the A500 is what I'm mainly looking at. Other Amigas are quite a bit pricier and don't offer anything I'd want that I wouldn't get from the A500 (other than AGA, but I think I can live without it). I'll take an A1200 if I see a really great deal, but it's unlikely.

@Kronos

Quote:

Kronos wrote: @CLXIV Quote: I might just not be in a great location for it (it seems the best deals are meeting local sellers). As for "cheap" A500s, sure the do exist but you won't have much fun with it alone.

Well you need a couple of games and ideally a Workbench disk to get started

Last edited by spudmiga on 19-Nov-2019 at 07:17 PM.

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Founder of NWAG - North West Amiga Group

Night Operations

A1200 020/28MHz + 64Mb / 4Gb CF / OS 3.1.4.1 / 1438S
A500+ / 2Mb
A600

On my A500 I use Gotek internal. Replaced the floppy drive.
With Gotek you use a USB drive FAT32 Formated.
There you can put any adf file and run it from a nice user interface
when you boot up.
I have a Commodore, Amiga CRT monitor that I would also recommend
for this setup. As mentioned it is not always easy to hook up to any TV.

For more compatible, more easy solution I have A1200 with HDD, Gotek
8MB fast ram etc. Sure is more expensive too. A1200 also needs recap that
will add to the cost.

Last edited by nikosidis on 19-Nov-2019 at 07:31 PM.
Last edited by nikosidis on 19-Nov-2019 at 07:30 PM.

@nikosidis

Those Goteks are cool, but I'd prefer to keep it as faithful as possible to the original experience. Sure, loading games from floppy is slow and inconvenient but so satisfying to insert and eject, and it's all part of the experience!

The 1084s do appeal but there's several drawbacks. Firstly, the flybacks in them seem to be dying in most cases. Secondly, they're not black or silver like TVs so they'll mostly be yellowed / brown and I'm not about to Retrobrite a monitor to match! And thirdly they're ridiculously expensive. I can't justify well over £100 for something that will probably die before long.

I know TV via composite (or RF of course) will look worse, but I'm thinking RGB > SCART to get the best possible picture. It might not be SVGA CRT clarity but should do very nicely for gaming.

@CLXIV

Amiga RGB to Scart will be the best.
I'm just not sure every TV will accept the 15kHz signal?

Last edited by nikosidis on 19-Nov-2019 at 10:19 PM.

@nikosidis

You may be right, but I think 31KHz was more for PC monitors - I think Amigas were designed with TVs in mind (certainly from the A500 onwards).