I'm lucky enough to own both an Amiga 500 and 1200 (thanks to a generous friend). However as the 1200 is backwardly compatible with the 500 whilst also offering more features and abilities, I've rather neglected the famous original mass market machine.

However the release of the PiStorm changed all that. Here was a device that was designed to super charge the A500. Finally I had a perfect excuse to play with this hardware which I did.

The trouble was my A500 was, well... a bit gross!

So it was time to carefully strip the entire unit down so that I'd be able to clean everything and retrobright the plastic casing and key caps.

Thankfully the A500 is well designed and it doesn't take very long or require any real hassle to completely take apart

Once I'd got the key caps off I was treated to a beautiful assortment of hair and other gross deposits!

As I was performing the retrobright work in the middle of the UKs winter sunshine was in short supply, I needed to look elsewhere for my source of UV light. So I decided to buy a cheap UV LED lamp from eBay and see how well it would work.

I also kept the whole thing in my airing cupboard in an attempt to keep the temperature raised. 

After all that effort, was it worth it?

Well... I think it certainly looks a little brighter, if not quite as much of an improvement as I was really hoping for.

At the very least the whole thing benefitted from a good clean, so I'm much happier using it now without fear of catching the plague.