Well readers,  hello,  good  evening  and  welcome  to  "Dr Jekyll's domain, firstly, I  must  apologize,  not  only to the other staff members for the bloody  long delay for me not doing nowt at all for this good up  and coming diskmag, but more so to you "The Readers" who  without  you,  The  Ripper wouldn't have needed to be created.

Firstly, I would just like to  say that if, in his opinion, this article steps over the mark from a normal text article and into our Technical Editor's realm,
I'm sorry, the techie stuff is your department, I'm only just a part-time Staff writer.

    Right, so with the grovelling, and  arse licking out of the way I'll get down to the business at hand, and try to elaborate
on the above title  of  this  file  which  should  have read as "Things you might not know  about  hardware FOR YOUR AMIGA,
but space for the long  title  was/is  limited, hence the shortened title.

    Ok, so I expect that most  of  us,  say or reckon that they know more than  enough  about  hardware  for  there babies, but there is an almost equal amount  of  people amongst us who know hardly nothing apart from the basic's, so in the end, I'm going to try to enlighten the lesser knowledgeable users amongst us a few tips about what hardware "Add-Ons"  they can buy and use on
their precious machines, and you  mustn't forget folks, that at one time or another, even the  more expert users amongst us was merely novices.

    One of the most  important  things  to remember when adding new bits of hardware to your  system  is  an item that has been covered many many times before  in  the  annals
of our old but gone CU Amiga mag, and  the  still  strong  Amiga Format is the matter of PSU's, or Power  Supply  Units  for the not so techie minded,
if you've got any Amiga below an A1200 then upgrade NOW to an A1200, and even on  a  bog  standard 1200 dump the piddly lightweight PSU that came with  your  machine,  and opt for the
more stable, heavier and beefier A500  PSU, or better still, if your adding more hardware to  your  beloved machine, get one of the many advertised 200  plus  PSU's  from  most Amiga dealers, Eyetech and Power Computing being the top two in my book.

    On a bog-standard A1200  system,  the  "A500 Brick" PSU (as it's been nicknamed) from time to  time is more than adequately powerful to cope with  a  basic  1200  set-up,
but more hardware needs more power, even if it  is  only in DC voltage, 5 V's here and there soon add up, and in  time  will start to put a strain
even on "The Brick" A500 PSU, so a more beefier 230 or 250 watt PSU is highly recommended in order  to  stop or ease the system guru's caused by lack of power.

    As I've said earlier,  the  last  one  or two paragraphs on bigger PSU's has been covered loads  of times before in various sources, so I'm sorry to go  over  old ground again, but if you read past letters in AF, you'll still see the odd person having system crashes through lack of a  decent  PSU, ok, nuff said on that subject.

    Next on  the  list  is  hard  drives,  and  are  almost  as important as PSU's, well, unless  you  fancy  going back to the  old days of loading  all  software  from  floppy disk (phew) no thanks, boring or what, ok,  so,  hard  drives,  as most of the more techie minded amongst us  should  know, the A1200 was only ever really designed to  be  used  with  slower, more expensive
byte for byte IDE 2.5" hard drives running directly off the IDE interface from the motherboard,  then  is  was eventually found out that with such devices as buffered interface and/or step-up boards, there was access to  the  bigger  and bloody damn sight cheaper and certainly faster PC 3.5" hard drives.

    Of course, in the earlier days, via a proper connector, the very expensive SCSI hard  drives  were  also available, but you needed a second mortgage to  be  able  to  afford one, the SCSI ones have since dropped considerably  in price, and compared to earlier days, the Mb  (megabyte)  and  Gb (gigabyte) sizes have shot up to amazing ones,  and  although slightly slower but far
more cheaper the PC 3.5" hard drives are the more commonly used drives I think, I use a  Senate Medallist 4.2Gb one at present, but PC EIDE hard drives  in  excess  of  13Gb are very much the thing nowadays, however, that  size  of  HD  is  great on a PC, being a PC user myself  some  time  ago  only  for a short time though, but I reckon that a 6Gb or 8Gb one should suit even the
more heavy Amiga users amongst us.

    For the less technically minded  folks amongst us, the term IDE stands for "Intelligent  Drive  Electronics",  and the term SCSI stands for  "Small  Computer  System  Interface", an Amiga
with an IDE system such as hard  drive  or drives and an IDE CD Rom drive will work out far  cheaper than an equally sized SCSI HD and CD ROM drives, a system  can  be  all SCSI or all IDE or even part SCSI and part IDE,  but the latter causes some longer bootup times while the  computer  recognizes both the different devices, price-wise and  IDE  system  is  the  better, for less
problems  concerned  with  lengths  of  leads  and  cables  and upgrade ability, as SCSI one is the better, but with the arrival of such new devices as  the  Power  Flyer from Power Computing,
which completely take over the  old  A1200's IDE interface, and IDE system is now the  better  one  to  have in my opinion, but that's only my opinion.

    So, firstly the PC 3.5" hard  drives  that came out were of the same IDE and  SCSI  interfaces  as  our  beloved Amiga, but stop, then the PC  chaps  bought  out  a new sounding interface which was EIDE, huh,  don't  worry,  the  "E" doesn't stand for Etcasy, it stands for "Enhanced", so an EIDE hard drive is more or less the same as the normal  IDE, except for the EIDE is the
Enhanced one, and better still,  the  EIDE  big hard drives can still be used on your A1200's,  but  as stated by Amiga dealers such as Power Computing  and  Eyetech,  hard drives bigger than 4.3Gb  are  recommended  to  be   only  used  with  a  BUFFERED interface, in order to stop  or  almost  wipe out the chance of the A1200 CPU being knackered.

    For those amongst us  who  want  to  watch the pennies very closely, a 3.5" 3.2Gb  IDE  hard  drive  bought from most Amiga outlets will set you back  around  £100,  whereas, for the same price as an Amiga dealer, you'll most probably pick up a bigger HD for a cheaper price than £100 from a PC dealer.

    CD Rom drives, yes,  most  Amiga  users  have  one of these babies nowadays, again, buying a  decent  IDE one from an Amiga dealer will set you back around  £45-£55  for  a 36 or 40 speed
IDE CD Rom drive (internal for  Towers only), whereas, the same or similar CD drive from a  PC  dealer will set you back around £35 for a 40-speed one  with  p&p,  you  can  buy slower CD Rom
drives, but price per speed your better  getting a 32, 36 or 40 speed one, the loading  time  for  software  will also be quite noticeable on faster drives.

    One of the most commonly  asked  questions is "I would love to be able to buy and use the  cheaper IDE CD Rom drives, but I don't have a towercase, so I can't use one can I??", the answer nowadays is "Yes", but you'll  need  to know a bit electronics, or at least be  able  to  use  a  soldering  iron,  and if that prospect scares  to   death   with   the   thought  of  using a
soldering iron  on  your  miggy,  then  the  dearer  but better external SCSI CD Rom drives are  YOUR  best  bet, but if any of you who don't have either  a  towercase,  or an internal CD Rom drive would like to have the  latter,  but don't know how to go about fitting one to  their  system,  there  should be adequate info on the internet if you've got a modem, or, for the cost of
2 1st class stamps, I can supply you with the relevant docs and some added help in getting you  up and running with an internal IDE CD Rom drive.

    No, an internal  CD  ROM  drive  won't  fit  into  your bog standard A1200 casing,  unless  you  mangle  the  casing really badly, so and  really,  and  internal  CD  Rom  drive without a towercase  can  only  be  fitted   as  so,  after  fitting  and installing of an internal IDE CD  Rom  drive you'd be left with the internal unit sitting outside  very  close to the left-hand
side of your A1200 with both the  power leads and the IDE cable coming from the back of the  CD  Rom drive and into the A1200's casing via a slit you'll  have  to  make  just above the PCMCIA port with  a  Stanley  knife/trimming  knife  or  similar sharp knife, but it  should  all  work  ok  in  the  end, plus you'll hopefully save a few quid in the process.

    As I've said earlier, I'll  be  only  too pleased to supply anyone the relevant docs and  it'll  only  cost you 2 1st class stamps,
Or, the relevant docs can  be  found on one of the many Aminet D's.

    Right, there's loads of us who  want to take the Amiga even further into the more serious side of computing, we can do this in many ways  nowadays,  one  such  new-age  hardware add-on is flatbed scanners, hand scanners have  been around for ages, but being a user of one for a  short time, I decided that they were a crap add-on, however, with the  Amiga still going strong into
the millennium (try saying that  after   a few beers) the order of the day is now a  SCSI  flatbed  scanners,  which are really PC ones, Eyetech are selling  a   bundle  which  consist's of a UMAX SCSI 600x300 dpi (dots  per  inch)   plus an excellent art  package called Art Effect, which  is  like a mixture of Elastic Dreams (I think it's called)  on  the  PC   and  Image  FX, but
it's a  bloody  good  package,   Power   Computing   are   also selling   the Epson GT7000 for almost £200 or  just  over  with  p&p, or the Mustek SP6000 for just over £80 with p&p.

    Now, this little lot will  set  you  back almost £150, plus the cost of a Squirrel SCSI interface if you don't already have one, so your talking along the  lines  of nearly £200 the whole caboodle, or, alternately, buying  the  same  scanner from a PC dealer, will only set you  back  about  £60  tops, so £110 will hopefully give  you  a  part  decent  flatbed  scanner  plus  a Squirrel SCSI interface, or there  again,  you might be able to buy a similar flatbed scanner from   a  PC computer fare, or is it fair, huh, I don't know, I only write this stuff.

    You can also  buy  the  Mustek  6000SP  flatbed scanner for about £50 with p&p or  for  maybe  a  bit  less from a Computer fair/fare.

    Now, before I waffle on anymore,  I'd like to say that I've had quite a few phone calls recently from contacts both new and old regarding how to configure CD ROM drives, now, I won't bore you with the various details,  but  will  only say that being a user of such a  device  for  some  time,  I  too  have had that configuration problem, and still do  get them sometimes after a
bloody system crash, I hate to think  of the many hours I spent trying to configure a CD Rom drive  or  even a HD, only to walk away from it for a few minutes to give my brain and eyes a rest only to go back a short while  later and find where I was going wrong, however, if any of you who still don't have CD drive and eventually get one but experience problems,  I will if I can be
always glad to be of any  help  if  and  when I can, but I'm no expert.

    So, to finish this article off  I'll be a bloody spoilsport by saying that all Amiga users alike will only get out of their system what they  put  in,  so  timeless  hours  spent  on your computer, reading Amiga mags, picking up information from other Amiga users  will  without  a  shadow  of  a  doubt  gain  more experience from their hard   labour,   if  on  the  other hand,
you want to sit there and use such a good computer as the Amiga for games only,  so  be  it,  in   which  case,  buy yourself a Gameboy and send me your A1200 for  free,  and  if anyone wants help in whatever way  to  do   with   their  A1200's,  my name,  address and telephone should appear elsewhere in this issue, if not, here's my info.
 

    I hope that all or at least some of the above info has been of some small help to you,  but  there again, you might already know all or most of the above, in which case, help someone else out FOR FREE who's not so lucky  as you, we must remember this, that although we all live so far  apart, we are all part of the very long established "Amiga  Family",  but  also we must watch
out and report to any of our  other contacts any contact who is a bad one to know, and one  such  name that not only myself but several other contacts have come across  as  a 'Bad Apple' is a lad called Gary Emery, this lad  alone  has  ripped off 2 of my contacts for large amounts of disk's,   so be warned and ignore him, he's a bad Mother Fucker to know.

    Up to some time ago, most,  if  not  all of us who had hard  drives in there  machine  were  using  the  more well-know 2.5" versions, which were slow in comparison to there bigger storage capacity PC counterparts, then it was found out that the bigger PC EIDE hard drives could be  used  on the A1200 providing that  the HD was used with a  buffered  interface, the reason for the
needing the buffered interface  was  that  the Amiga RDB (Rigid Disk Block) would be or could be overwritten with a bigger hard drive,  and  for  the   more   technical   minded  amongst  us,  overwriting your systems RDB is  definitely  a  bad thing to do because it will or very possibly cause major problems.

    And as it's be said  time  and  time again, the poor little  Amiga's motherboard IDE interface was  really only designed for 2.5" hard drives, apparently, having a bigger 3.5 hard drive on  your system than 4.3Gb without  a  buffered interface would, or  could cause major system  problems,  so  both Eyetech and Power Computing were, as far  as  I  can  remember,  two of the first
Amiga companies to bring  out  decent  buffered interface, with the IDE-FIX '97  software  and  buffered  interface being Power  Computing's first baby I think.

    Well, since those first days of IDE-FIX '97 Power Computing  has come up trumps again  some  time  ago with a completely new buffered type of interface  than  unlike  the IDE-FIX '97 which used the original  A1200  IDE  interface,  the  newer interface  which is called the  PowerFlyer  and  completely takes over the  A1200's IDE side  of  things,  and  apparently,  with what I've  heard from another contact that the £54.95 asking price is well worth it, he's noticed a  pretty considerable speed increase in  his 3.5" 4.3Gb PC hard  drive  and  with  the creation of other wonders of Amiga  hardware,  such  PC  stuff  as  1.44Mb floppy  drives, Zip drives etc etc  etc  have now become an established part of most Amiga users system upgrades.

    But don't forget though, that  for any new hardware add-off  to be most affective at it's best,  there is and always will be a small price to  pay  apart  from  the obvious various prices,  yes, that's it, I'm talking about you having to buy more memory for your A1200's, and  I  don't  know  if it's common knowledge with Blizzard card holders especially, but I've just been given
a tip that the more cheaper PC  72-pin EDO simm chip memory can  be used on these boards, and  as  always  I was willing to find out if that was possible,  especially  after  just buying a new  Blizzard SCSI IV kit which can take extra simms up to 128Mb.

    Well, with a young lad/mate  called Chris who's a neighbour  and who lives just over the road from us, and who also works in  a PC warehouse, I spoke to him  nicely  to see if he could pick me up for as cheap as poss  or  better still for "FREE", 4Mb of PC EDO memory at least, so  after eventually getting 2 separate 4Mb EDO simm chips from  Chris,  I  fitted one into my Blizzard
SCSI kit, and after re-booting my  system, found out with great pleasure that my once  32Mb  of  FastRam  had  now increased to 36Mb, which went to prove that  on  Blizzard boards only as far  as I know, PC EDO memory can be used, it's normally cheaper meg for meg bought from a PC  dealer  than exactly the same type of  memory bought from an Amiga dealer.

    Hopefully I'll be buying myself 2 new pieces of hardware in  one go during October, or, if  this  article isn't put into the  next issue by then I might have already got the two items, they are/were, the Powerflyer and a  Mustek or UMAX flatbed scanner,  and I'll let you know how I get  on with both of them next time  ok, so till then,  be  good  and  be  careful,  or,
be bad and  carefree....chow (Dr Jekyll).