Why? All because of the wireless PCMCIA network card I got from AmigaKit. I have not been able to write anything for my blog due to the fact that I am so busy with it. Currently I am writing about it which I hope to post later today. It was a bit of a journey which you can read all about it later on. It is up and running and boy what a joy. The possibilities it suddenly gives you. Being able to get all those games and write them back to a floppy disk and play them like there is no tomorrow. I really have to force myself to stay away from it at certain times so I can at least write about it and have some sort of normal life.
After reading the article at Old School Game Blog in which he talks about his Amiga 500 having died I got worried and I wanted to try out mine. It has been almost 10 years in which I have not even switched it on once. After taking it out of the box and setting it up I flipped the switch and there was the famous hand “waving” at me as it did for so many years already. Phew! I was really relieved it was still working but also took a moment of silence for the other Amiga 500 that died. Brothers in arms, eh?
Besides the article about the setting up of the wireless card on my A1200 I also have a game review in the pipeline. Actually a lot but I am about to start with one first. I am aiming to have it done this week. Another great thing I am (and really need to) about to do is to get Amos Professional installed so I can work on the disk magazine. Playing games and writing code… just like old times. The geek factor in my house is at a all time high. I really have that “old” feeling back. At moments when I am playing games in my room it feels like I am still in that period of time. What also happened is that I have not fired up my AmigaOne with OS4 for some time but only had the classics on. Well time to write some more and play games.
One thing that could drive you crazy when playing games on several floppy disks was all that swapping of the disks. So having an external floppy disk drive was for many a gift from heaven. It also was such a great gift when copying floppy disks. And copying we did. The program I used the most for copying disks was X-Copy.
X-Copy for the Amiga
I bought my external disk drive in October 1992 for the sum of 169,95 guilders. At the time a lot of money especially when you consider I was still going to school. But I earned some money working in my free time.
Receipt showing it was bought in October 1992
Warranty card
Front cover of the manual
I bought the Golden Image Master 3A-1 manufactured by Jin Tech Electronics Corp. from Taiwan. I used it together with my Amiga 500. Unfortunately it does not work any more. It has been a long time since I tried it for the last time. Once I have my Amiga 500 up and running again I will perform some tests with the drive.
Top view of the drive
Bottom view of the drive
Front view of the drive
Back view of the drive
I do miss the days of the floppy disks. Having this huge collection of floppy disks and somehow trying to archive it all. At first the floppy disks still had a really expensive price tag. I still paid around 80 Dutch guilders for 10 pieces of TDK or Sony floppy disks. Later it changed to around 40 Dutch guilders for the good brand. It changed when the white label floppy disks came out which had a price tag from at first 10 Dutch guilders to later under the 5 Dutch guilders. I still have all my floppy disk boxes stuffed full with floppy disks. 880Kb on one floppy disk.
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