A-500 Plus - 3.1 in A500 case with an A590 on the side.
Note the blue dot. Which basically means
things are not what they seem. In this
case this means an A-500 Plus that once
housed an A5000 accelerator but now doesn't.
Why the previous owner decided to use an
A500 case I have absolutely no idea.
Chequered history with failed CPU and
identifying that the A5000 was removed.
The machine does not now have any expansion.
The original case was made in West Germany.
Note the A590 grounding clip.
Always use the correct tools on these computers.
The case has the special star screws.
Always open an A500/Plus case from the rear.
Never the bottom edge or you will
break the case here over time.
For now I lower the keyboard to the rear.
And there she is the A-500 Plus motherboard.
Revision 8A.
The battery was removed a long time ago.
The computer is fitted with the 3.1 ROM.
She has the ECS Super Denise.
Also 1MB of installed chip RAM
supported by the FAT AGNUS. ECS.
[ Enhanced Chip Set ].
I generally take the cover off when
installing a sidecar.
I have seen so much damage to sidecar
ports due to failed connecting. Just
take the cover off so you can see the
connector. Makes it so much simpler.
The A590 has a 20MB XT drive and
around 2MB of Fast Ram.
Note that the A590 has its own power
supply with round connector.
Not all are fitted with a switch.
Before powering up the Amiga always
have the A590 switched on. Nothing
will happen until the Amiga is powered
so understand the switch position for
the unit to be in the ON mode.
OK she powered up. Wonderful.
She has the 3.1 ROM and the 3.1 Workbench.
OK let's rewind a bit to the reason why
I am here today. So I need to check if
that 2.04 disk works. To do this I
unplugged the A590 and booted off the
2.04 disk that failed on the A3000.
The process on the A3000 halted at the line.
'copy ENVARC: ram:env all quiet noreq'
none of the lines that follow this load
appeared on the A3000.
So there is nothing wrong with the disk.
I never even got to this stage in the load
when I used the A3000.
And so the floppy boots no problem albeit
with a 3.1 ROM and a 2.04 Workbench.
Next up I try R-TYPE II.
Absolutely zero graphical glitches.
No nasty colour bars and the game
played just perfectly. So again the
R-TYPE II disk works under 2.04.
Proving that the A3000 has a hardware issue
and is no way superior to the A-500 Plus.
Why Commodore continued to produce the
A3000 after they released the A-500 Plus
is baffling.... or not. Scrub that last bit.
Back to the 3000 and I need to check the
memory on the machine. A bit tricky without
the 2.04 booting. I've had worse problems.
The A-500 Plus on the other hand works fine.
OK back to the A590 and the 3.1 installation.
Amazing when you think that the drive
in this machine is not IDE or SCSI but
good old fashioned XT. What a drive !!
And confirmation again of the 3.1
ROM and Workbench ... The magic 40.x.
OK let's record today's event.
I saved the file onto disk.
And this was the A5000 that I removed
from the machine a good while back.
Now here is the thing. I also have
an A500 in an A-500 Plus case. Dare I
consider swapping them out. I think not.
Everything happen for a reason as
Adriana from Colombia would say. And
trust me you don't want to argue with Adriana.
That's that.. Time for a cuppa tea.
