--- title: Commodore AMIGA 1000 categories: - Computers types: - Home Computer origins: - U.S.A. years: - '1985' cpus: - Motorola MC68000 params: name: AMIGA 1000 company: /companies/commodore company_name: Commodore specs: - label: NAME value: AMIGA 1000 - label: MANUFACTURER value: Commodore - label: TYPE value: Home Computer - label: ORIGIN value: U.S.A. - label: YEAR value: July 1985 - label: END OF PRODUCTION value: January 1987 - label: KEYBOARD value: full-size typewriter style, 89 keys, 10 function keys and numeric keypad - label: CPU value: Motorola MC68000 - label: SPEED value: 7.16 mHz - label: CO-PROCESSOR value: '3 : Denise (video), Agnus (memory manager, blitter & copper), Paula (sound and disk access)' - label: RAM value: 256kb, upgradable to 512k internally. Extensible to 8.5 MB with extension card (512 KB CHIP RAM + 8 MB FAST RAM) and to 10 MB - label: ROM value: 8 KB (The Kickstart isn't in ROM but loaded at the boot in RAM, where it takes 256 KB) - label: TEXT MODES value: 60 x 32 / 80 x 32 - label: GRAPHIC MODES value: 320 x 200 and 320x400 (32 colors), 640 x 200 and 640 x 400 (16 colors) - label: COLORS value: |- up to 64 colors among 4096 (EHB mode)\ The Amiga can display 4096 colors simultaneously (HAM mode) - label: SOUND value: Four 8 bit PCM voices, 9 octaves - label: SIZE / WEIGHT value: 4.25'' x 17.75'' x 13'' / 13 lbs - label: I/O PORTS value: RGB, RF & composite video ouputs, external floppy disk port, Centronics, RS232c, Expansion port, stereo sound, Atari Compatible joysticks (2), RAM expansion port, keyboard connector - label: BUILT IN MEDIA value: one 3.5'' disk-drive, double sided double density, 880k formatted storage capacity - label: OS value: AmigaDOS (1.0/1.1/1.2/1.3) + WorkBench (GUI) - label: POWER SUPPLY value: 120V, 90 Watts, 60Hz, 1A nominal - label: PRICE value: £1700 (UK, 1985) - $1500 (USA, 1986) - £1285 (UK, Nov. 1986, 512K RAM) tabs: - photos - adverts - hardware - connectors - emulators - links - videos photos: - title: AMIGA 1000 subtitle: '' text: '' image: null - title: REAR subtitle: '' text: '' image: null - title: BOX subtitle: '' text: '' image: null adverts: - title: AMIGA POSTERS subtitle: '' text: '' image: null hardware: - title: EXTERNAL 3.5'' DISK DRIVE subtitle: Model 1010 text: |- The Amiga 1010 was introduced with the original Amiga 1000 as a second drive option. It contained a Matsushita drive mechanism and a pass-through port allowing the user to chain other drives or floppy port peripherals. Type : 3.5" Floppy Disk\ Media : Double Density\ Capacity : 880K per disk\ Interface: Amiga "Floppy" bus image: null - title: 256K RAM EXPANSION subtitle: '' text: This expansion plugs into the front panel of the Amiga 1000 and gives a total of 512k RAM to the system. image: null - title: MICROBIOTICS RAM EXPANSION subtitle: '' text: Microbiotics sidecar 2 MB memory expansion with pass-through SCSI connector. image: null - title: MIDI GOLD 500 subtitle: by Golden Hawk Technology text: |- This is a MIDI interface for the Amiga 500, 2000, or 3000... It features :\ \- one MIDI In\ \- two MIDI Out\ \- one switchable Out/Thru\ \- one MIDI/Serial Switch\ \- one Out/Thru Switch image: /media/museum/hardware/commodore_amiga_golden-hawk-midi-interface.jpg - title: AMIGA 1300 subtitle: Genlock text: '' image: /media/museum/hardware/commodore_amiga1000_1300-genlock.jpg - title: MEMORY EXPANSION BOARD subtitle: '' text: 2 / 4 / 6 / 8 MB expansion card here fitted with 2 MB. image: /media/museum/hardware/commodore_amiga1500_memboard_1.jpg - title: VIDEO BOARD subtitle: '' text: This board featured 2 MB of RAM and allowed the Amiga to be connected to a standard VGA monitor. All the video modes could be displayed, including the interlace one. image: /media/museum/hardware/commodore_amiga1500_videoboard_1.jpg - title: A570 CD-ROM subtitle: '' text: Thanks to David Griffith for this picture image: /media/museum/hardware/amiga_cdrom_a570_1.jpg - title: HARD DISK CARD subtitle: '' text: |- 40 MB SCSI card from SUPRA CORP. Additional SCSI devices could be connected in chain trough the back connector image: /media/museum/hardware/commodore_amiga1500_hdboard_1.jpg connectors: - title: 'CUSTOM CHIPS #1' subtitle: '' text: Complete system (top) and Agnus chip. Agnus is an advanced address generator. It also manages all DMA (Direct Memory Access) channels. image: null - title: 'CUSTOM CHIPS #2' subtitle: '' text: |- Paula's two main functions are sound and and the various I/O.\ Denise handles most of the video output. image: null emulators: - title: Amiga Forever url: http://www.amigaforever.com/ platform: Windows text: Complete but commercial Amiga emulator - title: AMIthlon & AmigaXL url: http://amigaosxl.haage-partner.de/index-e.html platform: Windows text: Powerful commercial emulators - title: WinFellow url: HTTP://FELLOW.SOURCEFORGE.NET platform: Windows text: Probably better at some games than UAE, but not as versatile. - title: WinUAE url: http://www.winuae.net/ platform: Windows text: The best Amiga emulator ? :-) - title: Max UAE url: http://maxuae.de/ platform: Apple text: UAE for Mac OS X - title: AmigaSYS url: http://amigasys.fw.hu/ platform: Unix / Linux text: AmigaSYS is a pre-installed full Amiga OS for WinUAE - title: Pocket UAE url: http://pocketinsanity.sourceforge.net/ platform: Other platform text: Amiga Emulator for Pocket PC - title: Experimental UAE url: http://www.rcdrummond.net/uae/ platform: Multiplatform text: Standard UAE enhanced with features from WinUAE. - title: MESS url: http://www.mess.org platform: Multiplatform text: MESS now emulates the Commodore Amiga - title: UAE url: http://www.freiburg.linux.de/~uae/ platform: Multiplatform text: '(Ubiquitous Amiga Emulator) for BeOS, Mac OS, Linux, NextStep, MSDOS, OS/2 and Win95/NT : Homepage.' links: - title: Amiga animations url: http://www.randelshofer.ch/animations/ text: A collection of Amiga Animations. This is the only site where you can see them online! - title: Amiga Interactive Guide url: http://amiga.emugaming.com/ text: Excellent site ! A lot of very interesting infos there. - title: Amiga Island url: http://www.virtualpast.de/ text: Excellent site with ROMs to download! - title: Amiga Web Directory url: http://www.cucug.org/amiga.html text: '' - title: AMIGART.COM url: http://www.amigart.com text: Nice site with Amiga news - title: Back to the Roots url: HTTP://WWW.BACK2ROOTS.ORG/ text: Amiga culture, guides, huge collection of legally downloadable software, and much more. - title: Lex Site - Amiga Hardware Database url: http://amiga.multigraph.com/ text: The website title says it all! - title: NetBSD-Amiga url: http://www.netbsd.org/Ports/amiga/index.html text: '' - title: Old Computer Mags url: http://www.old-computer-mags.com/ text: Scans of old computer and videogames magazine - title: Recorded Amiga Games url: http://www.recordedamigagames.org text: Speedrun, longplay and misc videos of Amiga games and more. - title: RetroPack url: http://www.retropack.co.uk/ text: Website dedicated to selling original Amigas, CD32s and Amiga/CD32 Games. - title: The Amiga Monitor url: http://ourworld.compuserve.com/homepages/MikeWebb/amhome.html text: '' - title: The Big Book of Amiga Hardware url: http://www.amiga-hardware.com/ text: Pics & info (pinouts, jumpers etc.) for just about every piece of Amiga related hardware there is - title: The English Amiga Board url: http://eab.abime.net/ text: Community site for Amiga fans - title: World-Wide Amiga - Online!! url: http://www.amiga.org/ text: '' - title: Web Wiz CAPTCHA url: http://www.webwizcaptcha.com text: Reviews of Amiga software, hardware videos: - title: Commodore Amiga commercial - EXIT url: http://video.google.com/googleplayer.swf?docId=8721405286052618769&hl=fr text: 'Length: 41 s' - title: Commodore Amiga 500 commercial url: http://video.google.com/googleplayer.swf?docId=5737538578208665725&hl=fr text: 'Length: 29 s' - title: Commodore Amiga 1000 commercial url: http://video.google.com/googleplayer.swf?docId=5356507595228759374&hl=fr text: 'Length: 32 s' - title: Commodore Amiga 600 italian commercial url: http://video.google.com/googleplayer.swf?docId=-768109352967297990&hl=fr text: 'Length: 19 s' - title: Commodore Amiga packs commercial url: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fdaMq8JLyHA text: 'Length: 21 s' - title: Commodore Amiga TV Ad - Celebrities url: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iEFoj6sbDjU text: 'Length: 29 s' - title: Commodore Amiga 500 promotional video url: http://video.google.com/googleplayer.swf?docId=9038863557655975739&hl=fr text: 'Length: 15 min 06 s' - title: 'Computer Chronicles: Amiga & Atari (1985)' url: http://video.google.com/googleplayer.swf?docId=8978343825632445107&hl=fr text: 'Length: 29 min 18 s' comments: - author: Amigaman date: Monday 1st May 2017 text: |- Its a shame people in the below comments have to lie about Jay and the Amiga ,and say the above info in this case isnt right. As of this writing.To promote the lies and to go so far as make Jay a non creator oh Illuminati u have gone even unto Amiga\ Screen grab taken. its Lorraine 1979-80\ hightorro 1980-81\ Amiga/inc. 1982 Yes, Amigas prior name can be a project or a code name apple or any othere company had code names or projects . That where there product also. Amiga was one such code name. Really ,guys you say it was just inc then wait its high toro then..you conflict ..you cant have your cake and eat it too,and guess what that is a code/project inc ,and a product as well.. oopss conflict of what was and has been said prior.\ late 87 earl 1988 Amiga 3000 was released\ 1986 Amiga cdtv was released\ Amiga CD32/ Amiga 1200 1990 Aga chipsset chip was ready by 1988 they where moving on devleoping the aaa .The corrupt management Wanted to delay the AGA by another 2 years.So the ECS was released .REally, guys all you have to do is take away 8bits oh bing the 16bit ecs is there the zorr3 was ready.\ Dave said the CDTV was ready 2 yeas prior.\ I went to Mass Brothers in Gasinvelle ,Fl in 1988.TO see and purchase 3 parts to make whole.\ Thee a1200 I bought from the UF book store owner in 1991 New the people in Amiga. Sterling S.New people in Amiga also as he got the /a 1990 cd32.it seems we have inundated apple/atari $ Illuminati influenced / one in the same people That are against people like me. That tell the truth. That prevent , any and all from correcting any info on wiki,or anywhere else for that matter. That leads to the Truth on Amiga this includes the Mass Brother link Sad indeed. Nor do they want to hear it. Yes, they want to make a video of the lies.or print the lies Me I won''t allow the lies to continue as I promised Jay as he asked.RIP - author: smf date: Sunday 10th April 2016 text: The Atari/Amiga deal was over before Jack Trammel arrived at Atari. He only discovered it when commodore sued Atari for stealing IP when he poached the commodore engineers who took from commodore the designs for CBM 900 (which turned into the ST). Atari countersued and the case was eventually settled out of court. - author: Malcolm Ramage (England) date: Saturday 17th October 2015 text: |- There are a number of mistakes here. Jay Miner was indeed instrumental in the creation of the Amiga''s architecture, much of the machine in a more simplified form was proposed by Miner while still at Atari, however as the current home computer and console ranges were selling well, the current overlords Warner, were not interested. Frustrated, Miner left and came across a group who were looking to create a next generation gaming system. This group became known as Hi-Torro, who created and sold game controllers to help fund the new Lorrane project. Funding was a problem, Warner''s Atari became interested and funded the development with a few strings attached, one of which was the investment needed to be repaid by a certain date or the technology became property of Atari. Then something weird happened... Warner feared the home console/computer market would never recover so put Atari''s home division up for sale (While keeping the profitable Arcade division). Jack Trammel had previously left Commodore and wanted a company to help launch a new computer which he was planning and realised the Atari brand and identity was just what he needed for such a machine. The deal was done and Trammel took over Atari, which was not what the group developing what was now known as the Amiga wanted. However they were contracted to Atari and now had a problem... Trammiel had seen the contract and knew the company could not repay the money, but he also knew the technology would be of little use without its creators, so he offered to buy the company. The Amiga creators did not want to do this but felt they had little choice, then Trammel $ped his offer... Then something else weird happened... Commodore, anxious to get one over on their former boss, came in at the last minute, bought the company for more than Trammel had ever offered, giving the developers all the money they needed to pay Atari back, which they did. Atari lost the Amiga and Commodore gained it. Trammiel sued to try and stop Commodore using the technology citing breach of contract, but as the contract was with the Amiga company and staff, and Amiga company and staff officially paid the money back in time, the case was thrown out. Trammiel continued with the machine he was already developing (Which became the ST), Commodore stopped development on their Unix machine (The 9000?) and created the worlds first multimedia system, at a time when no one really knew what it was, but they loved it all the same. - author: Stromasher date: Monday 6th January 2014 text: |- Please update the blurb as it''s totally wrong. An incredible machine deserves better than what is provided here. (how can I credibly believe anything else written on your site if you can''t be bothered updating this well known piece of Amiga lore?) - author: Stromasher date: Monday 6th January 2014 text: |- Please update the blurb as it''s totally wrong. An incredible machine deserves better than what is provided here. (how can I credibly believe anything else written on your site if you can''t be bothered updating this well known piece of Amiga lore?) - author: wolflarsen (France) date: Thursday 31st March 2011 text: |- It should be interesting to mention that the names of the conceptors where ''printed'' in the plastic structure of the top cover. I was surprised when i discovered this, after removing this cover (the 1st day of course ! :)\ There was also this strange RAM pagination, 256M being reserved for kickstart (no ROM) - author: Lee date: Monday 10th November 2008 text: i forgot to mention!! i have speedball aswell - author: Lee (England) date: Monday 10th November 2008 text: |- I have an Amiga 600 with a zipstick. some writing material and a fair few sensible soccer games (wow that was the best football game ever made!!!) i loved it.i won the premier league with plymouth argyle!!\ i have a mouse aswell.\ my honesty always shines brighter than anything else, the right hand button on the zipstick doesnt work and the letters ''e'' and ''n'' dont owrk on the keyboard but with some cleaning they will.\ if anyone wants to buy my amiga 600.\ let me know.\ happy gaming.\ lee - author: Lee (England) date: Monday 10th November 2008 text: |- I have an Amiga 600 with a zipstick. some writing material and a fair few sensible soccer games (wow that was the best football game ever made!!!) i loved it.i won the premier league with plymouth argyle!!\ i have a mouse aswell.\ my honesty always shines brighter than anything else, the right hand button on the zipstick doesnt work and the letters ''e'' and ''n'' dont owrk on the keyboard but with some cleaning they will.\ if anyone wants to buy my amiga 600.\ let me know.\ happy gaming.\ lee - author: chris (england) date: Wednesday 17th October 2007 text: |- i used to have an amiga 600 & 500A but when I moved house my dad droped them out of the loft )-: \*sniff\*\ it was murder - author: HOLDYS (POLAND) date: Thursday 8th December 2005 text: |- Amiga 1000 is very good and powerfull computer '80 Amiga demo scene is the best and AMIGA RULES !!! Amiga 1000 in ebay is very expensiv !!!! - author: j4ck (US) date: Monday 18th April 2005 text: One thing about the Amiga's name. Commodore used to discourage people from calling it the "Commodore Amiga" in the beginning, because of their toy computer/games image. they wanted you to call it "The Amiga, from Commodore" instead. The Amiga 1000, at least the US version, didn't say Commodore or have the C= logo anywhere on it - author: Petrvs (Argentina) date: Sunday 20th June 2004 text: In Argentina the Amiga 1000 and 500 were sold with a "PC emulator" that allowed the amiga to run some PC XT software (text screen based) like wordstar. All PC programs that needed graphic screens were not compatibles. - author: Nighthawk (Ontario, Canada) date: Tuesday 7th January 2003 text: I have an Amiga 1000. In fact, I use it as a Television. The machine is fully functional with an extra disk drive and a "Genlock" that attaches to the underside of the Amiga. With this I can run the Amiga \*and\* watch TV. Cool, eh? This also means that I can play a vcr tape and with a 2nd vcr add custom images using the Amiga. And all this on the the original 512K. - author: John Leifer (UK) date: Tuesday 24th September 2002 text: I have an A1000 with a "sidecar" (an XT clone) attached. Anybody know what the sidecar DIP switch settings are as I want to set up a dual OS hard drive. Have all the hardware but not the knowledge. - author: Chris (Maine) date: Monday 19th August 2002 text: I bought an Amiga 1000 second hand for about $800 in the late 80's. My youngest son (15 or so at the time) became caught up in the "Amiga Cult" at that time. There were several Amiga users in our area and they got together often and traded software etc. The graphics capabilties were incredible at the time, we had a cad program and an animation program, as well as the usual stuff. My son has the computer still, and it is hooked up and \_still working\_!!! Great game machine! - author: Daniel Silen ((Earth)) date: Saturday 25th May 2002 text: The machine brings back memories. I remember my old neighbors bought one of these machines bran new back in early 1986. I was amazed at the 4096 colors at the time. It was such a slow computer. Compared to a IBM PC XT/w/MDA Display adapter, the Amiga at the time was high tech. I happen to have been seven years old. I loved the paint program. I was not familiar with it's enviroment. - author: Polyhead (Earth) date: Tuesday 5th March 2002 text: NO Amiga ever had ANY kind of text mode. EVERYTHING was displayed in a bit planed graphic mode. Infact this property spilled over into modern versions of linux. Linux has been ported to the amiga and was the sole reason that the ability to boot into a frame buffer was developed :) should also be noted was Amiga OS not only multitasking, it was pre-emptive, multithreaded multitasking. Should also be noted that the machine utulized a flat memory model. - author: Thom Heppleston (Earth) date: Friday 8th February 2002 text: On the Amiga 1000 page you state, "The Amiga can display 4096 colors simultaneously (HAM mode) but only for static display." This is not true. HAM modes could be animated. I once had a HAM hack for Amiga workbench which allowed for 4096 colour icons, and a game called "E-motion" ran in HAM mode during play. related: - /museum/commodore-amiga-1200 - /museum/commodore-amiga-1500 - /museum/commodore-amiga-2000 - /museum/commodore-amiga-2500 - /museum/commodore-amiga-3000 - /museum/commodore-amiga-4000 - /museum/commodore-amiga-500 - /museum/commodore-amiga-500-plus - /museum/commodore-amiga-600 - /museum/commodore-amiga-600hd - /museum/commodore-cdtv oc_id: 28 source: url: https://web.archive.org/web/20230629193156/http://www.old-computers.com/museum/computer.asp?c=28 date: '2023-06-29' --- The inventor of the Amiga 1000 was **Jay Miner**, who created the [Atari 800](/museum/atari-400/) many years before. He wanted to make the most powerful computer ever, then he joined a small Californian company called Amiga. He used the principle of the three coprocessors (again) to help the main processor. At the beginning, the Amiga had only 64 kilobytes of RAM! The original "Amiga" called the Lorraine was meant to be a game machine with some computer capabilities. Atari initially invested the money in the Amiga Corp. to do the R&D on the Amiga computer line. Naturally, when the design was finished, Amiga Corp. gave Atari the choice to purchase the technology. Atari passed in favor of their own project. Amiga Corp. then offered the technology to Commodore, Inc., who were quite pleased to purchase it, seeing that their own 16-bit computer was so far from reaching the shelf.\ After the loss of a major legal battle for control of the Amiga chip set design, Atari launched the [ST](/museum/atari-520-st-st-stm/) series (Sixteen-Thirty-two) as a competitor for the upcoming Amiga. The operating system (AmigaDOS) was done by MetaComCo, a British company who specialized in the 68000 processor (they also made languages for the [Sinclair QL](/museum/sinclair-ql-quantum-leap/)). It is a fully multitasking system which looks like UNIX with a graphical user interface.\ It was the very first personal computer with great graphics and sound capabilities with a GUI environment.\ The Amiga BASIC was written by Microsoft (like most other versions of BASIC), but the first models were shipped with a non-Microsoft BASIC called ABasiC. The Amiga 1000 was to lose popularity one year later with the creation of its two main successors: the [Amiga 500](/museum/commodore-amiga-500/) and the [Amiga 2000](/museum/commodore-amiga-2000/). There were two versions of the Amiga 1000. The first one sold only in the USA, had a NTSC display and no EHB video mode. Later versions would have this built in. The second one had a PAL display, the enhanced video modes (EHB) and was built in Germany. The official name for the A1000 was the Commodore Amiga. It was only when the A2000 was launched that they officially began to refer to the machine by its model number.