Amiga 1200

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.
Amiga 1200
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The Amiga 1200, or A1200 (code-named "Channel Z"), is a personal computer in the Amiga computer family released by Commodore International, aimed at the home computer market. It was launched on October 21, 1992, at a base price of £399 in the United Kingdom (equivalent to £880 in 2021) and $599 in the United States (equivalent to $1,300 in 2023).

History

The A1200 was launched a few months after the

disk drives (including the option of an internal 2.5" hard disk drive) in one physical unit. The A1200's hardware architecture was later used as the basis for Commodore's Amiga CD32 game console in 1993.[2]

Initially, only 30,000 A1200s were available at the UK launch.[3] During the first year of its life the system reportedly sold well, but Commodore ran into cash flow problems and filed for bankruptcy.[4] Worldwide sales figures for the A1200 are unknown, but 95,000 systems were sold in Germany before Commodore's bankruptcy.[5]

After Commodore's demise in 1994, the A1200 almost disappeared from the market but was later relaunched by

Escom in 1995. The new Escom A1200 was priced at £399, and it came bundled with two games, seven applications and AmigaOS 3.1.[6] It was initially criticized for being priced £150 higher than the Commodore variant that had been sold for two years prior. It also came with a modified PC floppy disk drive that is incompatible with some Amiga software. The A1200 was finally discontinued in 1996 as the parent company folded.[7]

The machine is reported to have sold 95,500 units in Germany.[1]

Design improvements

The A1200 offers a number of advantages over earlier lower-budget Amiga models. It is a 32-bit design; the

AGA chipset used in the A1200 is a significant improvement. AGA increases the color palette from 4096 colors to 16.8 million colors with up to 256 on-screen colors normally, and an improved HAM
mode allowing 262,144 on-screen colors. The graphics hardware also features improved sprite capacity and faster graphics performance mainly due to faster video memory. Additionally, compared to the A600 the A1200 offers greater expansion possibilities.

Popularity and criticism

Although it is a significant upgrade, the A1200 did not sell as well as the 500 and proved to be Commodore's last lower-budget model before filing for bankruptcy in 1994. This is mainly because the 1200 failed to repeat the technological advantage over competitors like the first Amiga systems. The AGA chipset was something of a disappointment. Commodore had initially been working on a much-improved version of the original Amiga chipset, codenamed "

Escom
models.

The gaming market, which had been a major factor in the A500's popularity, was becoming ever more competitive with the emergence of more advanced and less expensive

IBM PC compatibles
. As a result, fewer retailers carried the A1200, especially in North America. The A1200 also received bad press for being incompatible with a number of Amiga 500 games. Further criticism was directed at the A1200's power supply, which is often inadequate in expanded systems, limiting upgrade options that had been popular with earlier Amiga models. Due to fewer sales and short lifetime, not as many games were produced for the A1200 than for the previous generations of Amiga computers.

The Amiga 1200 was developed and released during the waning days of the home computer market its manufacturer once dominated. While Commodore never released any official sales figures, Commodore Frankfurt gave a figure of 95,000 Amiga 1200 systems sold in Germany.[5] Worldwide sales of the A1200 would have been less than 1 million units.[9]

Technical information

Processor and RAM

An Amiga 1200 main board

The A1200 has a

68EC020 CPU. It is noteworthy that, like the 68000, the 68EC020 has a 24-bit address space, allowing for a theoretical maximum of 16 MB of memory. A stock A1200 has 2 MB of in-built "chip RAM". (Chip RAM cannot be expanded beyond 2 MB). Up to 8 MB of "fast RAM" can be added in the "trap-door" expansion slot, which approximately doubles (~2.26×) the speed of a stock machine. Various CPU upgrades featuring 68020, 68030, 68040, 68060 and even PowerPC processors were made available by third-party developers. Such upgrades typically utilize faster and greater capacity memory (up to 256 MB).[10]

Graphics and sound

The A1200 shipped with Commodore's third-generation Amiga chipset, the

Advanced Graphics Architecture
(AGA), which features improved graphical abilities in comparison to the earlier generations.

However, the sound hardware remains identical to the design used in the

sampling rates for sound playback, either by using a video mode with higher horizontal scan rate
or by using the CPU to drive audio output directly.

Peripherals and expansion

A Blizzard 1230 Mk III accelerator board

Like earlier models, the A1200 features several Amiga-specific connectors including two

mice, and light pens, a standard 25-pin RS-232 serial port and a 25-pin Centronics parallel port. As a result, the A1200 is compatible with many existing Amiga peripherals, such as external floppy disk drives, MIDI devices, sound samplers and video capture devices
.

Like the

SRAM cards, CD-ROM controllers, SCSI controllers, network cards, sound samplers and video capture devices. Later, a number of compatible laptop peripherals have been made to operate with this port including serial modems, network cards, and CompactFlash
adapters.

In addition the A1200 features a 32-bit CPU/RAM expansion slot and a unique feature, the so-called "clock port", which is a remnant of an abandoned design feature for addition of internal RAM and a real-time clock. Later, third-party developers put it to use by creating an array of expansions for the A1200, such as I/O cards, audio cards,[11] and even a USB controller.[12] Several CPU boards also have integrated SCSI controllers or even the option to add a graphics card.

One problematic factor for expanding the A1200 is the rather limited 23-watt power supply. Hard disks and even external floppy drives can stress it leading to system instability. The problem can be mitigated by replacing the stock power supply with a higher-rated supply, such as the one supplied with the A500.

The A1200 became a popular machine for "modding". If one is willing to forgo the A1200's form-fitting desktop case in exchange for further expansion options it is possible to rehouse the hardware into alternative casing. Several third-party developers built and supplied popular kits to "tower up" the A1200 and, in essence, convert it to a "big-box" Amiga. These expansion kits allow use of PC/AT keyboards, hard-disk bays, CD-ROM drives, and Zorro II, Zorro III, and PCI expansion slots. Such expansion slots make it possible to use devices not originally intended for the A1200, such as graphic, sound, and network cards.

The revision of the A1200 manufactured by

Escom was fitted with PC-based "high-density" floppy-disk drives that had been downgraded to double-density drives. This resulted in some software incompatibility as PC-style drives do not supply a "ready" signal, which signals the presence of a floppy in the disk drive.[13]
Escom released a free circuit upgrade to correct this issue.

Operating system

The first incarnation of the A1200 shipped with Workbench 3.0 and Kickstart 3.0 (revision 39.106), which together provide standard single-user operating system functionality and support for the built-in hardware. The later models, from Escom and Amiga Technologies, shipped with Workbench 3.1 and Kickstart 3.1 (AmigaOS 3.1), though earlier A1200 models can be upgraded by installing compatible Kickstart 3.1 ROM chips. The later AmigaOS 3.5 and 3.9 releases are software-only updates requiring Kickstart 3.1.

Blizzard PPC PowerPC board is installed. Likewise, MorphOS
, an alternative Amiga-compatible operating system, can be used with this hardware.

Variants of platform-independent operating systems such as

AROS
, an open-source alternative Amiga-compatible operating system can also be used with the A1200.

Specifications

Attribute Specification[10]
Processor
Motorola 68EC020 at 14.32 MHz (NTSC) or 14.18 MHz (PAL
)
RAM
 2 MB Amiga Chip RAM

Upgradeable by a further:

  • 8 MB in the expansion slot without CPU upgrade
  • 256 MB in the expansion slot with CPU upgrade
  • 4 MB in
    PCMCIA
    slot
ROM 512 KB Kickstart ROM
Chipset
Advanced Graphics Architecture
(AGA)
Video 24-bit color palette (16.8 million colors)

Up to 256 on-screen colors in indexed mode
262,144 on-screen colors in

HAM-8
mode
Resolutions from:

  • 320×200 to 1280×400
    i
    , 1504x484 overscan (NTSC)
  • 320×256 to 1280×512
    i
    , 1504x576 overscan (PAL)
  • 640×480 (VGA)
  • 800×600i, 1024×768i (not officially supported)
Audio 4 × 8-bit
PCM channels (2 stereo
channels)

28–56 kHz maximum

sampling rate
(dependent on video mode in use)

Removable storage 3.5-inch
DD floppy disk
drive (880 KB capacity)
Internal storage Housing for 2.5-inch IDE hard disk drive
Audio/video out Analog RGB video out (DB-23M)

Composite video out (RCA)
RF audio/video out (RCA)
Audio out (2× RCA)

Input/output ports 2× mouse/gamepad ports (
DE9
)

RS-232 serial port (DB-25M)
Centronics-style parallel port (DB-25F)
Floppy disk drive port (DB-23F)
44-pin

PIO-0
transfer mode (internal)
16-bit Type II PCMCIA slot

Expansion slots 150-pin local expansion port (trapdoor)

22-pin clockport

Operating system AmigaOS 3.0/3.1. (Kickstart 3.0-3.1/Workbench 3.0-3.1)
Physical dimensions 470 × 241 × 76.2 mm (W × D × H)

3.6 kg

Other Integrated keyboard with 96 keys (including 10 function keys)

Bundled software

Some software officially bundled with the A1200 included

Pinball Mania and Whizz.[15]

In the UK the Amiga 1200 was available in a Desktop Dynamite bundle which contained Workbench 3.0, Deluxe Paint IV AGA, Wordworth and two games: Oscar and Dennis. There was also a Comic relief version that came bundled with the game Sleepwalker. This also came with Workbench 3.0. Later packs included a cut-down version of the graphics software Photogenics.

See also

References

Wikimedia Commons has media related to Amiga 1200.
  1. ^ a b Bergseth, M. (November 25, 2014). "AMIGA SOLD IN UNITS BY COMMODORE IN GERMANY REVEALED". Distrita - Where to Go. Archived from the original on July 13, 2017. Retrieved May 15, 2023.{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: bot: original URL status unknown (link)
  2. ^ "Commodore Amiga 1200". Retrieved 30 November 2009.
  3. ^ Amiga Format "New Amiga 1200" (Issue 41, December 1992)
  4. ^ "Chronological History of Commodore Computer". Archived from the original on 20 July 2002. Retrieved 30 November 2009.
  5. ^ a b Gareth Knight. "Commodore-Amiga Sales Figures". Retrieved 30 November 2009.
  6. ^ "Amiga Magic bundle". Retrieved 30 November 2009.
  7. ^ "Amiga III Technologies". Archived from the original on 2009-07-25. Retrieved 30 November 2009.
  8. ^ "The AAA Chipset".
  9. ^ "Personal Computer Market Share: 1975-2004". Web.archive.org. Archived from the original on March 15, 2007. Retrieved 2016-01-30.
  10. ^ a b A1200 User's Guide (PDF), Commodore Electronics Limited, 1992, archived from the original (PDF) on 2012-06-13
  11. ^ Delfina Installation manual (PDF), individual Computers Jens Schönfeld GmbH, 2003, archived from the original (PDF) on 2014-05-23
  12. ^ Subway USB Controller for Amiga (PDF), E3B, 2002
  13. ^ Thor Bernhardsen. "Amiga floppy woes...". Retrieved July. 12, 2006.
  14. ^ Kevin J. Klasmeier. "Falcon030 -vs- 1200 -vs- Performa 400". Retrieved Oct. 20, 2006.
  15. ^ "A1200 Power Tower Features". Archived from the original on March 30, 2004. Retrieved September 9, 2010.
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