Ime considering buying an Archimedes on Ebay. Id like to play some of the 4th Dimension games such as E Type. which model do you reccommend? Ive seen a few A3020s for sale??? Can i link these to a PC monitor??
I used to have the A5000 and never had a problem with any games on it, other than one fighting game that came on 4 floppy disks.. Sadly, I can't remember the name of it now (being only 4 at the time!) but for the rest of what I remember, A5000 was the beast for games :)
I had a A3000 which ran all the games on this website fine. The one problem i did have was a little slow down when playing Dune 2 and I had the maximum number of tanks moving all at once. I do remember needing to use the lower "graphic-settings" on some of the later games like Alone in the Dark. A friend of mine had either an A3010 or A3020, his computer seemed a little faster. A kid who lived down the street had a parent that actually worked for Acorn, (this was in the early to mid 90's). They always had the latest stuff but found problems when trying to run games on the A5000 and Risc PC. If you really want to be sure and have time and money. My advice is this:
Get a A3000 type model (the type you mentioned should be okey), if you have any trouble with slow-down that really bugs you; get the ARM 3 processor put into it. I remember the ARM 3 used to retail for about 200 pounds, (although this was over 10 years ago, and God only knows where you would get that chip from now).
As for the monitor question, as long as the monitor you have is one of the older "vacuum tube" (i.e.; not plasma), you should have no trouble. Just remember that Acorn A3020's are from a time before USB ports and that may effect what perferals you can use, like joysticks.
Hope this helps.
By the way, if you manage to get a copy of Chopper Force (4th Dimension), please send a copy to this website; that game was the greatest game in the whole **** world!!!