Armiga Review // Amiga 500 Hardware Emulation Console
950The Armiga is a new Amiga emulating microconsole which emulates the original Amiga 500 and brings a raft of modern console features to the table. Built around a Dual Core ARM CPU, the Armiga outputs 720p emulated Amiga game footage over HDMI with spot-on emulation and stereo sound, all in this gorgeous 3D-printed case. Amiga games can be run from the included microSD card or loaded from a flash stick in one of the two USB ports. PC-standard mouses, keyboards and game pads are all supported over USB.
When compared to a lot of recent emulation consoles, already the Armiga is leagues ahead with a host of modern outputs as well as an ethernet port for networking and updates. But the heart of what makes the Armiga the bee’s knees is the custom Amiga floppy controller. The guys at the Armiga project have developed their own Amiga floppy controller, capable of reading, decoding and even ripping original Amiga game disks. The Armiga can read and backup your collection of old Amiga disks, which is becoming more and more important as those discs slowly knacker out. Each Armiga comes bundled with a fully legal licensed copy of Kickstart 1.3 so all operations are above board and legal.
Once booted up, the Armiga’s graphical menu is sensible and no-nonsense. Browsing for Amiga roms and games and adding custom game covers is easy if you have even a basic knowledge of PCs. The USB stick support is just the ticket if you don’t have an SD card reader or can’t be chuffed to muck about with it. Provided your USB stick is formatted to FAT or FAT32 you’re off and away.
As I mentioned before, The Armiga OS has been optimized for that ARM CPU, giving us an upscaled 720p game output and perfectly emulated Amiga sound. The video output can be enhanced with post-effects which is grand for getting that old telly look which some retro gamers are fond of. The Armiga also supports savestates which is a Godsend as a lot of Amiga games can be a tad hard and take ages to load.
Amiga ROM gameplay from what I’ve seen is tickety-boo. Loading times can be sped up and the only slowdown or dropped frames I’ve witnessed is in line with the original Amiga 500 machine. Gamepad support is brilliant; I’ve tried EVERY CONTROLLER I COULD FIND, INCLUDING THE AWESOME JAB USB NES PAD FROM RETRO FIGHTERS, and it all works. There is a virtual Amiga keyboard and Amiga mouse so everything can be controlled from a joypad, but it’s a bit dodgy in honesty. It’s great for when you need to navigate the menus, but don’t try to play UFO with a controller.
The Armiga console emulates an Amiga 500 with 1MB of RAM, but the latest update has added mild Amiga AGA SUPPORT, which is top drawer for Amiga fans as this adds the Amiga 1200 library to the supported Amiga games list. Amiga 1200 emulation support is a bit wonky at the moment, but updates are always coming out. Besides, the Armiga is sold as an A500 emulator so there’s no grounds to whinge about A1200 support. Every game or ROM is a bonus. Speaking of updates, the unit can update itself over the included Ethernet port or manually by adding the update file to the SD card.
As if all of that isn’t reason enough to buy one, booting an Armiga without the microSD card boots into Android 4.2! With this dual-boot feature you could load more retro emulators and ROMs, you can run Kodi - you can do anything you’d do with an Android device, in addition to it being an Amiga emulator console!
If you’re serious about Amiga emulation, Amiga gaming or curious about retro computers, the Armiga is a fabulous purchase and is worth every penny of the €120 price tag. That’s about what the Spectrum Vega cost at launch but this comes with about 1000% more features. The €170 floppy-drive unit is a great purchase for the Amiga aficionado who wants to salvage their Amiga floppies before Father Time buggers them up for good.
Check out www.armigaproject.com for support, updates and purchasing and please subscribe for more old PC gaming videos.
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