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You keep using that word "oppression" Dave, I don't think it means what you think it means.

"Inconvenient" (for the seller) might be a better choice of word.

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There's no such thing as hobbyists selling stuff to other hobbyists in the EU. The only exception is selling used stuff at flea market. All other sales must be cone with a registered business and then all these CE, RoHS, WEEE, warranty things apply from sale #1 on. Europe is not particularly founder friendly.

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Sounds like a PITA.
Then again, how do European regulators cope with hobbyists providing each other with hardware at cost?
In the US wee wouldn't even consider that a sale, more like compensation for an expense or a transfer of goods w/o profit.

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Imagine the electronic device you made and sold that hasn't been tested to comply with safety standards exploded one night and burned down the house and everyone in it died in the blaze.

You'd be held liable for causing the fire and the manslaughter of the victims probably.

The right of people to live in peace and safety trump the right of others to sell junk.

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Well, there are cases of items being sold as either "non-operational" and / or purely for "decorative purposes", which allows to circumvent certain restrictions / obligations that would otherwise apply.

That said, electronics are very special in the sense that a) they can potentially hurt people / pose a fire hazard even while not in use, b) they can severely interfere with other electronics devices, and c) often include many dangerous materials that need to be properly deposed so they do not cause harm to the environment / people.

Are there any good reasons to exclude anybody who plans to sell electronics from being required to test and guarantuee proper operation or from ensuring the cost of proper waste disposal is included in the price of goods? If there are any, how do you ensure they do not get exploited on a large scale?

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Any diverse region with a similar amount of countries and languages would be difficult to navigate for entrepreneurs aiming to sell their physical goods in as many areas as possible. I am not sure Europe is really special in that sense.

Furthermore, even in single countries like the US you have substantial differences with regard to the waste regulations in individual states (see California display recycling fee).

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A company like Apple during their early start up phase would have been in serious trouble in Germany/EU. The WEEE thing for example is not
bad per se (I am rather an eco fundamentalist), but the maintainace overhead in doing so is pretty high. Look to switzerland for example there it is way easier: You have no fix fees, you apply for a number and then pay as you sell. All done via a simple web based form.
In Germany you have steep costs for registration (at least it decreased a lot for small companies with some service companies, I use a Bitcomservice): I have to pay around 700 EUR this year for bureuacracy, while the actual recycling cost is just about 20 EUR.

For CE it's smilar: I need to provide all my test files (done to some not even public regulations, i.e. you have to pay for reading the test protocol that you have to conduct) publically while as a company outside the EU I just can print fantasy CE sign on my goods and voilá. Illegal, but hard to trap. Or exporting even within the EU: I need to report each month how many goods are send to where and whom (B2B). All the tax things come additionally.
It's not that I think this is all total BS, but some things could get simplified. In the US it's way easier to start a business, to grow from a very small scale to something bigger. Here you have to think big from the beginning to scale the cost and effort.

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Maybe deservedly so if one considers them selling illegal "blue boxes" for making free phone calls a part of their "start up phase"

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Have you looked into Take-E-Way? Unless this is your first year of operation and the number includes set up fees, the cited amount sounds like a lot.

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I understand that this is time-consuming but imagine how complicated all of this would be if there was not a supranational organisation that encouraged 25 nations to harmonise their rules and regulations.

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It very much depends on the state. The US is not nearly as homogeneous as people tend to perceive it to be. For instance, California is known to have a lot of 'red tape' although it merits mentioning that at the same time they are also the most productive in terms of economic output.

I think it is also worth remembering that you are discussing what is considered by some to be the land of lawsuits... Each country has its pitfalls for small entrepreneurs. Personally, I would be hesitant to make blanket statements about where it is easier to found and grow a small business.

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It's my first year and the overall offering from Bitkom was meeting my requirements better and cheaper. But Take-E-Way as first of the kind of those service providers deserves all my praising.
And not to get me wrong: I am all for EU, fair taxes and saving the environement, but there is plenty of room for easing up things and improvements. In case of WEEE I suggest to read the mikrocontroller.net forum or the according law blogs who provide all nightmare stories. Many very small companies gave up when the WEEE regulations acme into effect. The actual implementation is serving the big companies way better than the small companies.

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Before posting, I did research on them but did not find a lot of information on their website or elsewhere.

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I signed up in 2010 when there weren't too many alternatives around. The way you described the Swiss model is how they have handled things since then. You have a simple custom web form and you just need to fill in numbers in regular intervals. The administrative overhead is negligible once you move past the initial set up phase.

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There is always the option to avoid WEEE altogether by partnering with someone locally or in foreign markets who will take care of it and in return charge a fee on top of whatever you would normally charge.

I've been using my Vampire 500 in a 2000 for several months now and have to say I am impressed with it. While it does lack a LOT of compatibiliety, it is fast in what it does. It nearly keeps up with my 75Mhz 060 in my 4000T. It doesnt touch my G5 MorphOS machine, but not much does.

As far as price, i think the $300 I paid for it was fair. I got 128MB of very fast RAM, an RTG card, fast CPU, good speed IDE and even a network adapter by putting in this SDNet thing into the SD card slot. If I were to add all that up and put it into my 2000 in stand alone card it would be a lot more.

>>> Slower that commodore protypes

>> (I guess you mean prototypes) which never existed, and you cannot
>> provide any proof of them or the benchmarks they could run.

> Checking, checking, search function on morph.zone available.
> Thats all about progress on hombre in Commodore.

Exactly: http://morph.zone/modules/newbb_plus/viewtopic.php?forum=3&topic_id=11696&start=158

> it does lack a LOT of compatibiliety

In anything except FPU-based software?

@thread

Just in response to thread title:

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worth a read to understand some of his difficulties, imo

#6

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I'll give you three guesses who is doing all that reporting on eBay. His nickname here in MorphZone starts with PPC, and ends with a numeral 1. What a low life jerk (I'd use many other worse adjectives to describe him, but might get banned for doing so).

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There is no way in hell that someone selling 4,000 units x €300 EUR = a turnover of €1,200,000 EUR can get away by calling their business "a hobby". That's most certainly a lot more money than AeonKit collected from all their X1000 sales in total. At that kind of money, without a registered business with annual reports, filing VAT reports and paying other taxes, you are probably facing a considerable amount of time in prison. And *of course* the products (targeted for consumers) should be safe, follow the regulations and have all the approvings and certificates, and have full guarantee as required by law. At €1,200,000 there are no moral excuses to slip on this.

[ Edited by takemehomegrandma 28.07.2017 - 07:54 ]

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I would agree, but now I am doubting that the group producing these accelerator boards has actually shipped all 4,000 accelerator boards. I am also beginning to doubt that they have even manufactured that many accelerator boards, but probably have gotten requests to purchase over 4,000 boards.

Even with the recent information that batches of 200 accelerator boards are being made, that would equal 20 batches, and a lot of money and time to pay for the parts, test the finished boards, etc. Obviously the demand for the boards has far outpaced the ability of the small group of people making them, and they are feeling the stress of trying to meet the demands of their customers, plus figuring out all of the legal requirements for safety and tax payments, now that their little hobby project has grown into a full blown business enterprise.

I hope they can cope with the popularity and growth, as I want to order my own Vampire500 v2 this coming month of August (in just a few days), and I am hoping to have it delivered before the AmiWest Show happens in October, so I can take it with me to the show.

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There are many people who buy vampire crap, and after spending few hundreds euro, get that vampire is slower than 68060 which they already have.
Movies for example, with riva little faster but with support only for MPEG1, and other players many time faster on 68060.
LV without FPU on v2 vs LV with FPU on 68060.
etc, etc ...
Dear Dave You should search in unsatisfied owners of vampire crap.


[ Edited by ppcamiga1 29.07.2017 - 17:20 ]

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I might see this from a relatively fresh perspective.
I don't know about Natami, etc.
Directly comparing the Vampire in my A600 and the A4000D with 68050@50MHz with Picollo-SD64, 256MB.
I have to say the Vampire system feels a lot faster. Packing and unpacking LHAs is also feels a lot faster. Compiling stuff feels is a lot faster.
It is not as compatible, that's my only complaint. Some apps just crash or make the system crash.

Manfred

Really?
And how fast is LV without FPU on v2 vs LV with FPU on Your 68060?

I have a v600 from a few months and since then I have not turned on my Amiga1200 060.
You can call it crap, shit and all you want. I'm very happy with its performance and compatibility.
Don't care about LW. The only fault was that didnt work with amiblitz. Now with femu works very good.

@ppcamiga1

I'm very greatful of my Vampire2 in my A500.

It actually kicked new life in the old b*stard and having the "free" RTG-solution and later also AGA-support (also over HDMI + new Audio handling) will make it really kick any other accellerator card in that price range way of the road.
When comparing to my old A4k with 060/PPC it actually feels way faster although it was a long time I sold it, but it's not crap, far from that. I really don't know your aggressive attitude here, it's a great project which bring new life in old machines.

[ Edited by Develin 30.07.2017 - 00:06 ]

It is simple.
10 years ago gunnar von boehn und munchausen, announced natami.
Wonderfull natami may will run workbench faster than uae on fast pc from 2008, graphics will be better than current ppc AGP solutions. as fast as PS2.
gunnar von boehn und munchausen gruoppies state that 68070 200 MHz will be faster than 600 MHz G4.
After 10 years gunnar von boehn und munchausen has faster 060 wih graphics on PCI performance level without MMU,FPU,3D.
Yes it is faster than 060 with Z3 graphics. But!!!
Compared vampire to what was announced 10 years ago it is crap.
CPU is 100 times slower than promised. There is no MMU,FPU,3D.
Since year 2000 out community has fast uae with jit, faster than vampire crap.
Instead of revolution vampire is big step back.

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You can certainly see it like that. And in that case you certainly would be disappointed with the Vampire cards.
But I think you should not. Hit the reset button and see from a new standpoint what they give the classic owners.

Manfred

[ Edited by asrael22 30.07.2017 - 11:00 ]

Perhaps is not what he promised. I dont know. But is better than all we can buy today. I only can thanks to the apollo team for the work. Why should I be worried or angry? Amiga with a vamp is funny.

> faster than uae on fast pc from 2008 [...]. [...] 68070 200 MHz will be
> faster than 600 MHz G4. [...] CPU is 100 times slower than promised.

http://morph.zone/modules/newbb_plus/viewtopic.php?forum=3&topic_id=12103&start=37

> graphics will be better than current ppc AGP solutions. as fast as PS2.

PS2 graphics is better/faster than Radeon R200?