ScuzzBlog: Diaries June 2024 Entry 20th June 2024: Post 1: Amiga Technologies A1200 - Origins of Frankenstein. Amiga Technologies A1200 - Origins of Frankenstein. Dunno why I single out this particular Amiga 1200 as Frankenstein, so many of my Amigas are the product of many other Amiga parts. In my very early years of collecting is was my primary challenge to acquire broken computers and rebuild them. I guess the history of this computer goes back to my earliest collecting days. Before Ebay existed I purchased most of my kit through a newspaper rag called the Diamond Free adds. Later I moved on to the internet based Amibench. Was one wintery night I recall , probably 2002, when I saw someone selling an Amiga tower. Given that it was just up the road in Southampton I travelled over there. From this guy I acquired the EZ-Tower complete with its motherboard and Power-PC accelerator, plus another A1200, incomplete, some motherboards and tower kit, plus the Amiga Format last edition. I could never get the Power-PC working but from the other bits I had I put together an Amiga 1200. Enter Frankenstein. She had a 3.5 inch IDE with OS3.9 on and an Apollo accelerator. I later moved the accelerator to Spike who sits in the Workshop. The hard drive sits on a shelf in Graham. For several years the Amiga Technologies machines sat empty with just the IDE laying loose inside. No case screws or shielding, until I fitted an external IDE on a ribbon, repaired the floppy and exchanged the 3.1 ROM chips for 3.0. Thing is she isn't even an Amiga Technologies'. I so often say she is a whiter than white Escom machine and yet she isn't. It's why I think she has survived so well, given that the capacitors in European older A1200s have been less likely to leak. So what is the origins of Frankenstein. A cursory glance at the rear of the case shows both the corner plastic upstands have been rubbed down to ease fitting in the tower. On the floppy side there is a slot where the board sat in the tower case. There is a slot at the rear for a ribbon, showing she retained the IDE when she sat on a bench so that the drive could be worked on and removed and refitted to the tower. The real tell-tale sign of age and origin is the differing shade of ivory to the main top case. If you then turn the case over you see she was made during the Commodore era and in the UK. This motherboard is a Commodore product and not Escom. One downside from not having the shielding is that all kinds of debris can fall in and litter the rear of the motherboard. There is evidence on the board of flakes of tiny food particles having corroded the edges of some metal solder points. You could mistake it for capacitor failure but it is not. It has decomposed and reacted with the tinning. The particles are miniscule but still visible. Sadly I don't have a spare A1200 shield. I did clean the board a little and add a couple more pics from yesterday. One item that has become a real oddity with this machine and which is the same as with the actual Amiga Technologies machine I was testing with the busted hard drive, is this computer too will not boot without the 1942 monitor powered up. And yet I booted my A1200s in the workshop no problems without the Microvitec monitors switched on. Most curious. This computer works just fine and now resumes ADF duties. The other Amiga Escom machine is sitting disconnected fully from a monitor and has booted no problem these last two day. I do believe that that concludes my session with Frankenstein. Amiga Technologies A1200 - Origins of Frankenstein.

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Last updated 20th June 2024

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