The Amiga 1000 was unveiled to the world by Commodore in a grand launch in 1985. This computer truly was a machine for breaking past limitations. A device with full-color graphics that could display 4096 colors simultaneously — using HAM display mode — while the Apple Macintosh released a year earlier still used black-and-white graphics. The Amiga had stereo sound; most other machines at best had mono output. This modern and different computer had a multitasking operating system. The Amiga was a revolution that predicted the future.

It is difficult to explain to ordinary people how revolutionary this device was at launch — and indeed, Commodore struggled to figure out how to advertise it, but unfortunately they did not succeed.

This image shows the first Amiga 1000 model. The custom chips that were the beating heart of the machine were introduced as OCS — the Original Chip Set. Read about the Agnus chip in the exclusive AmigaStore article.

Kickstart and Workbench

Due to the rush to bring the new Amiga to enthusiasts, the core of the Amiga operating system — Kickstart — was on a 3.5-inch floppy disk that had to be inserted every time the machine was powered on. Kickstart would then load into a special area of memory, writing to that memory location would be disabled, and the system would restart. At that point, the new Amiga was ready to load software like the Amiga desktop, games, or any other software the user wanted to use.

This method was somewhat cumbersome, but the advantage was that newer Kickstart versions could be easily distributed. Software experts could continue working on Kickstart, add new features, and fix problems they found. Then a new Kickstart version would be released, and ordinary users didn't have to open their machines to use it. The new version was simply transferred from disk to Amiga memory.

There were ways to combine Kickstart and Workbench disk contents so no disk swap was needed to load Workbench. Kickstart occupied 256KB of the Amiga's 880KB disk space, leaving 624KB free on the floppy. Early Workbench 1 versions were relatively small, so Kickstart and Workbench could easily fit on one disk. Read the Workbench 1.3 guide in the exclusive AmigaStore article.

Early production Amigas shipped with a revised DENISE display chip that could not display the Amiga's special 64-color EHB mode. It had 32 colors selectable from the 4096-color palette, but then shadow-like copies of those 32 colors would be created at half brightness.

The Amiga Base Unit

The Amiga did not have a closed system like the Apple Macintosh. It included a socket for RAM expansion and a general-purpose expansion connector. This was the first member of Commodore's Amiga line, priced at $1,295 with base unit, keyboard, and mouse. The base unit included 256KB of RAM and an 880KB floppy drive. The system was initially sold under the exclusive name "Amiga," but Commodore renamed the original machine to Amiga 1000 after the Amiga 500 launched in 1987. Read about the Amiga 500 history in the exclusive article.

The Amiga series ran a 32-bit graphical multitasking operating system known as AmigaOS. AmigaOS also included a command shell called AmigaDOS for keyboard-based commands — more powerful than the graphical interface.

The Amiga shipped with two user ports that could accept a mouse, joystick, or other pointing devices. To the right was the only official Amiga development tool: an expansion slot that allowed complex peripherals like external RAM upgrades, SCSI controllers, and IBM emulators.

Input/Output Ports

The detachable, well-designed Amiga keyboard stored under the machine when not in use and connected via a telephone-like cable to its socket. Like many machines of the time, standard parallel and serial ports were added for printers, modems, and various other devices. But unlike any other device, these ports had reversed pins — the DB25 serial port had holes instead of pins, and the DB25 parallel port had pins instead of holes. Therefore, great care was needed when connecting peripherals to these connectors, as wrong-port connection could damage electronic components. Read about hardware maintenance in the exclusive AmigaStore article.

This machine led to changes like later Amiga models. The Amiga 1000 also had an interface for connecting up to 3 external floppy disk drives.

Audio and Video

Here you can see the ports that turned the Amiga into a multimedia powerhouse: stereo audio outputs and three separate video output connectors with display quality increasing from right to left. While the Atari ST line found its place in audio thanks to MIDI ports, the Amiga specialized in live video production.

Recognizing the Amiga's graphics capabilities, numerous TV studios used Amigas and their successors for on-air weather maps, station logos, subtitles, and other on-screen text for live news broadcasts — until the late 1990s and nearly the year 2000.

Opening the Case

Now it's time to remove this part. After unscrewing a few screws at the bottom, the lid lifts off and the RF metal shield must be set aside. The first view inside the chassis appears: a tall brick-like power supply on the left side of the case and the floppy drive on the right. And then — the green stuff! That's where all the action happens.

The team that designed the Amiga, like the original Macintosh builders, signed the mold used to cast the upper half of the computer's plastic case. As a result, the names of everyone involved are permanently embossed in every Amiga 1000. The most prominent signature belongs to Jay Miner — father of the Amiga — and his dog Mitchie's paw print.

Commodore designed the Amiga to accept a user-installed 256KB RAM module shown here, increasing system memory to 512KB. It plugged into the front of the computer under a removable plastic panel. With other personal additions — usually connected to the external expansion bus shown earlier — the user could expand Amiga RAM up to 8 megabytes.

Writable Control Store

When the time came to release the Amiga in 1985, Commodore engineers realized the operating system was too buggy to place on internal ROM chips. (This was unfortunate, because having the OS on chip would have let the Amiga boot instantly like other early personal computers.) Instead, engineers devised a solution called the Writable Control Store — WCS — on a daughterboard connected to the motherboard via long multi-pin headers where chips normally reside. WCS contained 256KB of memory used specifically to hold the main operating system that had to be loaded from floppy at boot time.

Floppy Drive

The Amiga 1000 shipped with a disk drive that could store 880KB per 3.5-inch disk — impressive capacity for 1985. At the time, most IBM PC floppy drives stored 360KB on 5.25-inch disks, while Macintosh floppies held 400KB.

Processor and Custom Chips

On one side of the motherboard sat the Amiga's 16/32-bit Motorola 68000 processor running at a relatively fast 8 MHz. To its left was a pair of MOS 8520 CIA chips managing the computer's serial and parallel communications. Below that were the Amiga's bootstrap ROMs containing the system that tells the computer how to load a full operating system from floppy disk.

The Amiga's secret power lay in its custom processing chipset — three chips with feminine names: "Paula" produced the computer's sound and also controlled the floppy drive. "Agnus" performed memory management magic and several auxiliary graphics functions. "Daphne" — an early version of a more prominent chip called "Denise" — produced most of the Amiga 1000's impressive graphics output.

Together these chips formed the heart and soul of a powerful computer — one that quickly outpaced IBM PC clones in the market and was far ahead of its time.

The IBM Emulator

The Amiga was recognized by journalists and industry analysts as the most innovative machine introduced in those years, but like all new computers emerging from past technology, it might take a year or more to build a broad software library.

But Commodore seemed to have solved this problem with magic. On July 23rd, when officially unveiling the Amiga before hundreds at a media event at Lincoln Center in New York, Commodore announced an option making the Amiga compatible with the popular IBM PC and its massive base. The method was truly remarkable: the Amiga completely emulated the IBM PC in software.

In other words, no expansion board with an 8088 processor and support chips was needed to imitate IBM. Instead, Amiga users simply loaded an emulation program replacing the Amiga's proprietary OS with PC-DOS so the Amiga acted like an IBM. This was demonstrated in New York: an engineer loaded the PC emulator from a 3.5-inch disk, then booted PC-DOS from a standard 5.25-inch IBM disk on an external drive. The graphics-oriented Amiga OS disappeared and the usual PC-DOS startup message appeared:

After inserting another 5.25-inch disk and typing "Lotus" at the DOS prompt, the Lotus 1-2-3 spreadsheet appeared. The Amiga display looked exactly like a monochrome IBM display. This technical feat — complete IBM PC emulation in software — was best appreciated by advanced programmers and engineers. It seemed almost unbelievable, and even some witnesses doubted the Amiga could emulate IBM at a speed comparable to a real IBM.

Nevertheless, Commodore engineers believed the work was done and the IBM PC emulator would be available within a month of the Amiga's September launch. No price was announced, but Commodore stated they chose the software emulation method to reduce costs. The only hardware involved was the optional 5.25-inch external drive — and even that might be unnecessary, since some PC programs could be loaded from 3.5-inch disks sold for the Data General One.

The emulator did not require much memory. Excluding video memory, it consumed about 40KB of RAM. However, to run large programs like Lotus 1-2-3, Commodore would likely recommend users expand the standard 256KB Amiga RAM to 512KB — a $200 option. The Sidecar was the metal box that connected the Amiga to IBM.

The Final Memory Decision

Another surprise revealed on July 23rd was the Amiga's memory configuration. Commodore had initially planned to place the large Amiga operating system — Intuition — in 192KB of ROM. Then, to ease debugging and release on time, Commodore announced the first Amiga would load Intuition from disk, consuming nearly half of the user's 256KB RAM.

Now Commodore had a better solution: the standard Amiga would have 512KB RAM, but half would be dedicated to storing Intuition. This additional bank with 256KB of RAM called Writable Control Store would be write-protected immediately after the OS loaded. Even a system reset would not interfere with it. In effect, Writable Control Store acted like 256KB of ROM — except Intuition had to be reloaded from disk after powering off. As a result, the full 256KB of RAM was available for programs.

But Writable Control Store would not count as system RAM. The $1,295 standard Amiga would still be marketed as a 256KB computer, even though it actually contained 512KB of memory. Later, once Commodore was confident Intuition was fully optimized — critical components rewritten from C to machine language — the Writable Control Store would be removed and replaced with ROM chips. This change would enable near-instant booting, since Intuition would no longer need to load from disk.