AMIGA 1400T
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BRIEF DESCRIPTION
The A1400T is basically an A1200 - with the easy expandability of
the "big box" Amigas such as the A4000T
It consists of an A1200 main board, a built in 150watt power supply,
an expansion board with 5 zorro II slots & 1 inline video slot, one
standard Amiga 880k floppy drive, standard 1200 keyboard in a seperate
case, and a mouse. The A1200 board has the 3.1 workbench ROM installed,
and the A1200 manual and 3.1 workbench manual are included.
AUTHOR/COMPANY INFORMATION
Manufactured by:
- Name:
- Micronik
- Address:
- Brukenstrase 2
D-51379 Leverkusen
GERMANY
- Telephone:
- +49(0)2171-72 45 24
- Fax:
- +49(0)2171-72 45 90
- World Wide Web:
- www.micronik.de
I purchased mine from:
- Name:
- Software Hut
- Address:
- Folcroft East Business Park
313 Henderson Dr.
Sharon Hill PA   19079
- Telephone:
- Info- 610-586-5703
Order 800-932-6442
- FAX:
- 610-586-8640
- E-mail:
- softhut@erols.com
- World Wide Web:
- www.softhut.com
LIST PRICE
$849.95
MACHINE USED FOR TESTING
- A1400T (USA - NTSC version)
- 2M chip ram
- 4M fast ram (on the HD card)
- Trifecta 2000 ide/scsi/memory expansion board
- Connor 450M ide hard drive
- Toshiba 4x scsi CDROM
- Commodore A2320 flicker fixer
- Panasonic E15 multi-synch monitor
INSTALLATION
The A1400T comes in an Infinitiv case which has an extra floppy drive bay,
a 3.5" hard drive bay, and 2 5.5" bays included, and more snap on modules
are available if this is not enough for your needs. The case can even be
expanded in height if you need more 5.5" bays. There is also space at the
back for several more 3.5" bays but the actual bays are not included, so
you would need to get these separately. All the 3.5" HD bays have removable
face-plates at the rear of the case. The face-plate for the second
floppy drive is moulded into the front of the case rather than a snap out
panel like the 5.5" bays have, so you might have to do some surgery to
install a second floppy (such as remove it's face plate).
All the above mentioned extras were formerly used in my now dead A2500,
and were removed and installed in the new tower. Installation of all of
them was quite simple, easier even than the installation in the old 2500,
as the Infinitiv case is very well designed, and all the panels snap in
and out. The only problems I encountered were due to the fact that the
plastic drive bays are thicker than the metal ones in the 2500, I had to
replace the mounting screws for the hard drive and CDROM with slightly
longer ones. In my case this was a simple matter of a dig through my
junk box, but if you don't have one of these you will need to go buy some
appropriate screws.
Of course if you are not comfortable with working on the innards of your
computer you will want to have any hardware additions or transfers done by
a qualified service man or a knowledgeable friend, but if you have done this
kind of thing on a "big box" Amiga before, you will have no trouble with
this one.
FIRST IMPRESSIONS
The first thing I noticed when I turned my new system on was how quiet it is.
I immediately put my hand over the fan outlet on the power supply, thinking
the fan was not working. It was! The fan on my 2500 was quite noisy, and
was one of the only things I did not like about that machine.
Since the A2500 I had previously been using had a FPU, MMU, and 4M 32 bit ram
which I could not transfer to the A1400T (they are all on the 2620 accelerator
card) I expected some initial loss of performance compared to the A2500. I
was surprised to find that everything seemed to run just as fast as before.
In fact, some things seemed to go faster! For example, web page graphics
seem to load faster, probably because it is easier to remap the pictures to
256 colours than to the 16 I was restricted to with my old ECS system. And
a multi-coloured workbench screen goes just as fast as the 8 coloured screen
I had used with the 2500. On the 2500, I had tried a 16 colour screen, but
this had produced a noticeable slowdown. The A1400T can handle 256 colours
with no performance loss!
Please note than these are subjective comparisons, and programs such as SysInfo
do report the expected loss in speed. My impressions might be due to the way
I use my system, the efficiency of the AGA chipset, the difference between
theoretical calculations and "real world" results, or a combination of all.
And I do plan to add an accelerator as soon as finances permit.
REVIEW
I will not spend a lot of space reviewing the basic A1200 part of the system,
as the A1200 has been around for a while, and most people are familiar with
it by now. If you have never tried an Amiga with the AGA chipset, I will
say that it is a huge improvement, and makes available to you many programs
which won't run without it. The extra Meg of chip ram is also a big improvement
over the 1M I had previously.
As far as software compatibility, I have found very few programs that worked
on my old system that gave problems on this one. The few I did find problems
with were easily corrected with degrader, or by booting in ECS emulation on
the Early Startup menu. These were all old PD games.
The Infinitiv tower case itself is a work of art. It is good looking and
very easy to work on. It is coloured in what I call "computer off-white",
the same as most peripherals you will find. It matches perfectly with my
monitor, printer, modem, and speaker system. It has a nice sculptured look
without being overdone. The keyboard case is also more rounded and modern
looking than my old 2000 keyboard. I should say here that I never have
been a big fan of those industrial grey systems, nor the "bat-wing" style
of keyboards. To me, beauty and functionality must go hand in hand, and
Infinitiv has hit the mark here! You can also, if you wish, use a PC
keyboard, as the system has a built-in adaptor and the plug is the same.
Perhaps I am missing something here, but I never understood why you would
want to use a PC keyboard. Do they have something that is missing on the
Amiga keyboard? Maybe you need to do this if you have a bridge-board,
which the A1400T also allows.
The case has a front-mounted power button and power indicator light, and
below this a reset button which has a light for your hard drive included.
At first I thought this was rather silly, since the reset button does the
same warm-reboot as the [Ctrl][Amiga][Amiga] combination, but I have now
become spoiled, and use the reset button exclusively. (I do a lot of
programming on my Amiga, so I wind up re-setting much more often than most!)
The inside of the case is just as well designed as the outside, all slots
are properly aligned, everything snapped apart and together correctly, the
power supply has several of the standard size connectors you will need, and
all my peripherals fit easily into their intended locations. And all work
just as they did before.
Please note that the flicker-fixer I installed in my A1400T is not really
necessary, as the OS will allow you to mode-promote your screens to be com-
patable with a VGA or Multi-synch monitor, but this requires an adaptor to
attach the monitor's cable to the standard Amiga monitor port. The adaptor
is NOT included with the system, and I already had the flicker-fixer, so I
installed it - and it works fine.
So, in short, what I now have is the equivalent of adding the AGA chipset to
my old system, combined with the benefits of the new case, and the ability to
use one of the low-cost A1200 accelerators! This unit is the perfect upgrade
path for me. I have long wanted to upgrade my system, but couldn't afford a
new A4000 and didn't want to get an A1200 due to the difficulty of expanding
it even enough to just duplicate my old A2500.
If you are still using a 500, 600, 2000, or 3000 and have been wanting to
upgrade, here is the machine you have been waiting for! There are also two
other models, the A1300 which does not have the zorro slot board, and the
A1500 which has zorro III slots, and a processor slot for A3000/4000 accelerator
cards. And all for less than half the cost of an A4000T. If you currently
own an A1200, the case itself and all the internal components are also
available separately.
DOCUMENTATION
- A standard A1200 manual is included.
- A workbench 3.1 manual is also included
- No documentation for the case is included
- Also not included are the 3.1 DOS and AREXX manuals that come with the 3.1
upgrade kit.
LIKES
I like EVERYTHING about it (as if you couldn't tell by now!)
DISLIKES
My only (minor) complaint would be the lack of any sort of documentation on
the case. Although it is pretty easy to figure out, some brief descriptions
and diagrams would have been nice. Perhaps this lack was due to the rush
to get these out to the dealers or something similar, as I have one of the
first available units. (I ordered it the instant I saw they were available)
SUGGESTIONS
I am sure they have already thought of this, but I would like to see some
models available with a hard-drive, a bit of extra ram, and a software bundle.
A model like that could, with proper marketing, actualy sell to NEW Amiga
users. I am thinking especially of the old magazine ads for the Volkswagon
Beatle, which sold a ton of these small economy cars in the USA at a time
when everybody thought you needed a car the size of a battleship with a motor
capable of propelling a 100 car freight train. These ads did it not by
directly comparing the car to others available, but by subtly allowing you
to draw the only logical conclusion: that you really didn't want the big
gas-guzzeling dinosaur when your needs could be served just as well by the
Beatle.
VENDOR SUPPORT
I have had no need to contact the vendor, the unit was delivered on time
(actually less time than they said), properly packed, and in perfect
working order.
CONCLUSIONS
This is truly an excellent product, and I expect they will sell a lot of
these. If money is no object, an A4000 is still the ultimate Amiga, but
if you are looking for a lower cost option, this is the way to go! And
you still have the capability to upgrade as your budget allows. A new,
expandable Amiga in a beautiful tower case for less than the cost of a
"budget" PC? How could you go wrong?
I take my hat off to Micronik, Infinitiv, and Gateway 2000 for this excellent
product, and to Software Hut for their excellent service.
COPYRIGHT NOTICE
Copyright 1997 Curt Esser
camge@ix.netcom.com
Co dodat, prostě klon dvanáctikule, žádná Amča nový generace. Ale tý současný
asi jo. Díky tomu, že se do ní dá naprat (jak by taky ne) turbo pro dvanáctikuli, ani
tak moc nevadí, že je (nejspíš) hnaná JEN dvacítkou. No, stejně pro dvanáctistovkaře
nemá celkem vejšku kupovat (vo 4000řích ani nemluvím) něco takovýho, stačí přeci jen
trochu rozšířit tu svou...
Nicméně jak se dá vyčíst z řádků vejš, jsou i lidi kterejm A1400T vyloženě bodne.
To je sice moc hezký, ale nevím, že by se u nás tenhle klon A1200 prodával.
Jasně mám taky fotku, tak se můžeš mrknout.
BOLDA
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