Frankenstein's Amiga 500

This was my computer until I got my first PC in about 1996 or '97. I used Frankenstein's Commodore Amiga to gain access to the internet in the days before the world-wide web became prominent.

The expansion box on the left is called the Tool Box. It allowed one to use Amiga 2000 cards on the Amiga 500. I think the upside-down stuff I was talking about was before I got the Tool Box and had connected the 500 motherboard to a Byte by Byte PAL expansion box for the Amiga 1000 (which I also still have but is not shown here).

The 40MB hard drive shown here was not my first drive, I think, for I've also discovered a loose 20MB drive (Seagate ST-225), though that may have been on my first PC. I'm really not sure anymore! I don't even remember what I may have saved on the Amiga hard disk other than one Animaniacs screenplay that Peter Hastings had sent me so that I could get the lyrics right in the Animaniacs Mega Lyrics File.

The software you see here, and all the developer manuals, were taken by a friend of mine who thought he might know someone who would be interested in them. I still have Frankenstein, though, and an additional hard drive as well (the aforementioned Seagate). If anyone is interested in them, please get in touch with me. I'd rather get rid of it before I move to Nevada on the 21st of March 2009. I'm tempted to take it to electronics recycling, but I'm holding out hope that someone would like to give this stuff a good home.

Because the monitor, the AT power supply, the hard drive, and the expansion box all had separate power switches, someone once commented that watching me turn on my computer was like watching a pilot start a jet engine -- switches everywhere, all needing to be turned on in a specific order, and with pauses to wait for things to spin up before the next thing can be activated.

If anyone knows whether one of the Amiga emulators for the PC supports MIDI output, please let me know. The only reason I keep the Amiga around is because I want to save all my Deluxe Music Construction Set files that were made for MIDI output. If I can do that without having all this old hardware taking up space, that would be great.

Category:

Science & Technology

Tags:

• commodore
• amiga
• 500
• amiga 500

[ComradeZX]

at 1:14 the A520 video adapter is used so that your tv can be used as a monitor uou attach an RF cable from one end of it to your tv through the port beside the power input. (thats what th UK ones are like anaway)

[Keeper1st]

@ComradeZX Oh, that's right! The Amiga 500 couldn't do colour RF output for some stupid reason. The older Amiga 1000 could.

[solverh]

Just good memories. My favourite game was Their Finest Hour. Played on the Amiga the game was fantastic, but played on a normal PC the graphic and sound quality was horrible in comparison to the original platform.

[Keeper1st]

@solverh Oh yeah! That was a great game!

[alex76gr]

I hope you didn't have to send this beauty to recycle.

There is always people who are interested in using Amiga hardware.

[Keeper1st]

I think I ended up keeping it. I'm not sure! I know I kept my A1000, at least.

[TableWolfMusic]

@Keeper1st Thank goodness! The whole thing is a precious gem. Those expansion boards are rare.

[yogibear2k10]

@Keeper1st Rock Lobster is a song by the B-52's. It was on the b side of the single Love Shack.

[blakespot]

Dude, Fat AGNUS!! lol @ Fat Angus.

[jay55also]

Inside jokes by the designers,I forgot a lot of the stuff. I got tech books on the Amiga computer,dlls and software development disks ,I got some amiga junk,that's the truth.