aharon@WISDOM.BITNET (Aharon Shtull-Trauring) (03/08/88)
After all these years of drooling I am finally about to take the plunge and buy an Amiga (or at least I will in the next few months). An a500 is all I can afford, but I need some answers to the following questions: (1) If I buy a 110/60 hz. a500 with a Commodore or multi-sync monitor rated the same, and run it here in Israel where power is rated at 220/50 hz. will the flicker be much worse or no different? I've read all the discussions about running Amiga's in Europe and Japan and I realize the 220 - 110 is no problem. What worries me is the monitor - does the Hz rating of the power supply affect the quality of the display? Are there any displays immune to this problem if it is one? (2) I remember reading that the European version of the A1000 used PAL RGB (I hadn't even realized there was such a thing, or maybe I didn't understand it correctly?). Is this true of the european version of the a500, or is the PAL vs NSTC only relevan for the A510 (or whatever the composite output thingamagig is called)? If there is a differnece does most software support both, or am I better off getting the NTSC version since it has better software support? (3) What is the going discounted price for the a500 and some good monitors and what is the current rev number for the mother board (I am going to the far east in a few weeks and if I can pick up a bargain there I might buy it - I just don't want to get stuck with some outdated model that Commodore dumped). Thanks for your help. aharon shtull-trauring aharon@wisdom.bitnet
yann@ai.toronto.edu (Yann le Cun) (03/12/88)
In article <8803080925.AA22735@ucbvax.Berkeley.EDU> aharon@WISDOM.BITNET (Aharon Shtull-Trauring) writes: >(1) If I buy a 110/60 hz. a500 with a Commodore or multi-sync monitor >rated the same, and run it here in Israel where power is rated at 220/50 hz. >will the flicker be much worse or no different? The flicker only depends on the video rate of the machine, not on the power frequency. You get more flicker with a 50Hz PAL machine, but on the other hand you get more scan lines. >What worries me is the monitor - does the Hz >rating of the power supply affect the quality of the display? Are >there any displays immune to this problem if it is one? It is not a problem, the video rate is NOT related to the power frequency. >(2) I remember reading that the European version of the A1000 used PAL >RGB (I hadn't even realized there was such a thing, or maybe I >didn't understand it correctly?). Is this true of the european >version of the a500, or is the PAL vs NSTC only relevan for >the A510 (or whatever the composite output thingamagig is called)? >If there is a differnece does most software support both, or am I >better off getting the NTSC version since it has better software support? RGB is RGB. "PAL" or "NTSC" refers to the way the color information is coded onto a single wire. RGB uses 3 wires. The only difference between European and American RGB is the refresh rate (50Hz or 60Hz). PAL and NTSC A500 are neither PAL nor NTSC, they are just "RGB" with different refresh rates. So yes: PAL and NTSC are only relevant for A510 (or whatever....). Get a European machine, you will get a larger screen.. >aharon shtull-trauring >aharon@wisdom.bitnet Yann le Cun yann@ai.toronto.edu, yann@ai.toronto.cdn AI Group, Dept of Computer Science yann%ai.toronto.edu@relay.cs.net University of Toronto, Canada M5S 1A4 {uunet,watmath}!ai.toronto.edu!yann