Amiga Chipsets: OCS, ECS & AGA 

Superb. I was hoping to see a video on this subject someday and here it is! Actually owning all those machines you're the ideal candidate to show all this, much better than just still photos. And now I have a video to point others to when they ask me these questions!

Hey Steve, Great video! The memories are flooding back. I've got a few machines still which I really ought to dig out someday as they certainly deserve some love after what must be about 10 years in storage. Apart from the C64 nothing comes close to the affection I have for the Amiga. After the A1000 I upgraded to an A1500 followed by an A500+ and an A1200. last Amiga used was an A4000 10 years ago.. Getting all nostalgic now.. ;)

What a great vid...I've always wondered what the differences were. Cheers Steve

Super video steve job job in explaining the chip sets. I wish Commodore had lived long enough for us to see the AAA chip set, as far as I am aware there are only 2 prototypes

Great video Steve, really enjoyed this one, very informative

Great vid as usual, keep up the good work!!

Really interesting video, well done on getting so much knowledge into one video

Beautiful, this video had everything i love: You, amigas, the gubbins of amigas, your mega 1200 tower and an F1 game demo that looks so unfinished its sexy. AWESOME!

Ah yes the special chipsets that helped the AMIGA make magic! My favorite 80's computer platform!

Great topic. I can only recall differences between OCS and ECS in the demo scene. Some of the demo's made in the late 80's would lock up on the latter ECS chipset.

I like how they printed the names of the chips on the board on the 500. Amiga rules. For anyone who is confused, most of the popular games are more or less standard, it says on the box 500 or 1200.

Nice video, very informative for those who are new or know little about the Commodore Amiga. This is a truly classic computer system. My next project next year will be to build an Amiga 1200 tower but I need to say up the funds as that will be one expensive project.

Great AMIGA times back then... I´m also a Fan of this fantastic computer. Have lots of MP3 soundtracks from the AMIGA that I listen to quite often. Great to see the A500 motherboard. Designers put all their love on this machine. My A500 still works since 1987... So does the 1084S original monitor that came with it... Those were the days, dear Steve. Regards from Spain.

wow awesome video i like amiga vids and this one was get hereing you talk about amiga chip's and hardware in great depth good stuff

I love the amiga, too - I still have my A500 in good shape ^^

You should get an old 486 low profile heat sink and put in on the 060. I've seen them only a few mm's high and shouldn't have any problem clearing the case. Great video, very informative.

Yes! Finally! Thanks a lot Steve! Now I know what the hell you're talking about when you say the different chipsets. Great work as usual. I wonder why they named a lot of the chips after women.

@SteveBenway I wish Commodore had kept the A1000 design as I think it was such a nice bit of kit and looked much better on the desk than the A1500/2000 ever did. Do you remember the A500 drive add on, the A590 I think it was called? Something like 20Mb storage which was huge back then for an Amiga.

I was just looking into this because I was running FS-UAE and some demos for AGA. Very interesting, but nothing like today's PCs. I had a 500 at one time I left at my parents and they threw it out I am sure.

Good video :) Can you mention the most talked about and contentious chip in your next vedoe? It is of course the Kickstart :P

Great review. The Amiga 500 was far ahead of its' time. I admit to buying an Amiga because of the great graphics, but eventually found myself interested in the software and how things worked.

Nice video, very informative, thank you. Have you done much playing with 68k programming? I'd like to have a bash, if only my Amiga 500 hadn't popped a cap and died a painful hot death!

@SteveBenway Ah right just as i thought, lovely machine you have though, though i bet with all the added stuff (especially the 68060 processor) that it would be somewhat unstable at times for more demanding tasks like using a 3d graphics package?

inside of an old amiga much nicer than that lot, youll probably look on your system with the same nostalgia in 10+years

This was a fantastic video! I've never used an Amiga firsthand, only playing games through emulation. Any plans to make a video covering the OS? I'd love to learn more about that. In some of your vids, you mentioned compatibility issues with games across the different Amiga models. Is there one configuration that you'd recommend for the most highest compatibility?

Noticed you mention OctaMED Soundstudio, if I remember, you did need a 1200 (os 3.1) for Med to run. Also, don't forget on the earlier versions of Med, they did their work, so you could have an 8 channel output (mono), unlike Soundstudio where you could have 64 stereo channels.

Haha good point! Now if only I could get that floppy drive working hehe!!

Hey Steve!nice video mate,it is the first time i seen open amiga mate!!heehe nice work mate!!by the way you have a cute cat!i hope he/she is fine and well!!my regards to you and family mate!!hope all is well!!cheers!

"My god, that sounds nerdy" 10:34 I believe the cards in the Zorro 3 port(s) reached past the slots on the left of the image, and connected only to the one slot on the right. From the outside of the case, it reaches to the far port, skipping over the close one(s). 10:52 is slightly concerning. A standard BIOS button cell is 3VDC, and those two batteries are giving the right voltage...just, clock batteries are generally rechargeable, I'd be afraid to put non-rechargeables in a charging situation.

If you have a Rev 6 A500 mainboard you can make the 512kb memory expansion part of the chip ram. It's a very simple soldering job on the mainboard. I believe it's also possible to solder the memory chips onto the mainboard, but that's a lot more work.

all went over my head lol but i liked it. good job squeezing all that into 15 minutes xD

The ECS could do 30kHz (VGA) display, albeit sluggishly, while the OCS could not, which is in my mind the main difference. The fast ram in the A500 is not at all fast, as it uses the same bus as chip ram, for example a nasty blit would lock it out for the duration. The A600 can address 2MB of chip RAM, even tho the machine was sold with only one. The 68060 is actually somewhat cooler than the 68040.

It's amazing how you could "run out of time" for a RU-vid video (at merely 15 minutes) in the year 2010, and yet in late 2011 you could post a stupid 10 hour video like that of the "Epic Sax Guy".

Now that's my kind of entertainment.

Unfortunately you forgot the fourth set called ICS ( Initial Chip Set ) , the prequel of OCS .

I'm sure someone already wrote this, but anyways: Basically every Agnus used in the A500 is capable of 1MB of chip RAM. The first one 8370/71 didn't have the expanded registers, so it was limited to 512KB of chip, while the other 512KB were connected like chip RAM and by this, only as fast as chip RAM, but could only be used by the CPU. This is called "ranger RAM" nowadays, since it is not as fast as true fast RAM. The newer ones 8372/8372A could use full 1MB of chip RAM, even in an A500

Thank you for your video, sir. I had an AMIGA 500 with the mammoth 4MB Trapdoor upgrade and I also installed a 68001 FPU/Maths chip!? OR it might have been a 68002! If my memory serves me correctly LOL :) The machine was in its day as fast as the Amiga1200, to me anyway, I did this upgrade to run The WING COMMANDER GAMES 1+2 at a faster/fluid gameplay mode. I also noted, and you also said, you have not installed a FPU and you should install a 68002! as this makes any maths calculations as fast as hell, crunching/uncrunching and such but most of all this would complete your fantastic A4000 and would calm my computer OCD to boot:). FPU chip are very cheap and I can promise you. you will notice these little components impetus I was impressed with my little FPU /Einstein! :) PS I only sold my AMIGA because I played DOOM on a PC With SOUNDBLASTER 16 :) And I was hooked. Please post more videos of your collection.

4:45, 5:30 Note that it came with not one but two built-in CIA spy chips! Don't be mistaken! Paula and Gary are agents that report directly to CIA! =P LOL!

@SteveBenway I heard Agnus was quite a fatty. But, with a few beers she was an easy lay, so they kept her around.

@SteveBenway Thanks.

Just one thing, I always thought the A4000 was fitted with an 040 rather than a 030, or did they come in different configurations?

And yet the Amiga's still way cooler than your system will ever be...

Hi Steve, did you ever make a CPU speed comparison video?

I was just wondering, the concept of putting a 'A1200 in a tower', did you get an A1200 motherboard, rip it out of the machine and basically shove it into a tower giving it the space for worthwhile upgrades or did you just buy a A1200 tower pre-made and just add gubbins of stuff to it making it a mega 1200? This element of the AMiga has always confused me, but intrigued me to the max.

Super agnus could take/address/use 2mb chip ram

It actually was the 040 on the 4000. But to sell more systems at a cheaper price, big C= came up with the 4000/30 a bit later. C= made so many mistakes along the way, especially developement on the Amiga was very slow and almost everytime "last minute", not ahead of time like the original Amiga was.

The old Gary Chip, I had to remove that B@$t@rD when I fit my £100 1.5 meg upgrade. I was only 16, talk about hot flush... Phew.

Did you ever do the video on the different speeds of the CPU?

Yep..your Amiga 4000 has a rev.D motherboard, so it should be battery leaking free, having a coin cell type battery. Always hope will find one for my collection, instead of rev.B, more common. Cheers, Mark

Yeah Amiga porn! Great information on the OCS, ECS and AGA. The Amiga - still amazing systems even today. Say did you ever tried that emplane software allowing you to run MacOS on the Amiga?

Isn't the 500 an ECS machine, with the 1000 being the ocs machine?

Well, good for you i guess. My Amiga1200 still kicks it thou.

@SteveBenway Cool stuff, but then again the A1200 (or mine at least) has trouble playing older games like Lotus 2 and Body Blows (though i think cos thats got a dodgy disk, got it for free though with my ebay bid and didnt expect it in the first place so cant really complain) so it's not like its really the fault of your tower in particular.

So the 1200 is better than the 1500 or 2000 or 3000. Got it. Makes sense.

aga went the wrong way; they should have had compatability mode, then simpler new modes i.e. byte-per-pixel, 16bit-per-pixel. The bitplanes idea didn't scale.

I like it! My 1200 is crap compared to your big bad tower 1200!!

Naked computers, pure geek porn, as blogtv buggered up, I thought I would catch up with your vids :o)

Your cat want attention...