I'm pretty sure the answer is yes. I loved the Amiga for what it was, but it's hard to see why anyone would get a "modern Amiga" for any reason other than to say that they had a "modern Amiga." I don't think any Amiga has shipped in quantity since the Amiga 4000 in 1996; I don't know if it's fair to say that the PowerPC-based designs were obsolete before they shipped, but I don't know that it's unfair, either. (The X1000 became available in 2012, using a CPU that was released in 2007 and will never be updated again.) I could imagine someone whose business still depended on Amiga-specific software getting new hardware back in 2000, but 2014?

Personally, my nostalgia for old computers tends to last roughly long enough for me to download an emulator, get whatever virtual machine I'm trying to emulate working, and be disappointed. A computer may have been years ahead of its time for the late 1980s, but it'll likely still feel like banging rocks together in the mid 2010s.

I like old systems (80s/begin 90s non PC hardware) because you can understand them completely from the silicon level up. I have begin 80s systems which I know everything about on hardware and software level, which is a lot of fun (at least to me). I can read the OS code and understand and remember it; try that with win/lin/mac. I can remember (to enough detail) all the hardware layout, and, without any documentation, solder in more memory.

I think the question 'what is the use?' is akin to asking what the use is of many/most hobbies; it is a way to relax while getting intellectually stimulated. If I would do that with modern computers, the idea of 'maybe this can make money!' immediately jumps in my head and the nice, relaxed atmosphere is gone. I think it's a hobby for many and not a bad one at that. Ohyeah, and then I (and many with me) am weird; I think ps4/xbox one games generally suck; give me Metal Gear I or Nemesis-2 on the MSX-2 any time over those overrated graphical jerk off sessions (disclaimer: I have all PSs, to me they got gradually worse, game wise; more Crash, less FPS crap please). But that's a matter of taste.

Remember the feeling when you had your first bicycle? Can you get it again from another bicycle like that?

(Heraclitus' river, etc. Just trying to explain, the rest of your post is quite fair.)

[1] http://symbos.org

And yes, $3000 for an AmigaOne X1000 workstation... that takes a special kind of will.. Especially seeing as the nostalgia aspect would be far better served by getting an original A1200 via eBay equipped with a PPC extension; that way you could run newly released multitasking OS with Firefox and co. on a essentially 23 year old computer!

More than a handful of diehards still hack their ~30 year old 68k AmigaOS 3.1 and 3.9 systems so as to be useful in 2014. You'll find said Amigans surfing the web with A2000s, composing music, adding solid-state drives to SCSI-II controllers, using decades old office productivity software, creating state-of-the-art-for-1985 television overlays for local television stations, etc. Amigans, as a group, seem to revile the principle of planned obsolescence. They treat their computers like classic trucks and take pride in keeping them "on the road".

Thus there's a constant debate in the Amiga community over the "soul" of Amiga and how said soul can be retained while bringing the Amiga into the future. Some, such as those mentioned above, attempt to wring every ounce of possibility out of the ancient hardware and software. Others, prefer to run newer Amiga OSes (MorphOS, AmigaOS 4.X, AROS) on new platforms. While I'm in the former camp, there are passionate people in both groups.

Yes, I'm pointing fingers at Apple here, because they charge $1000-$1500 for laptops that have proprietary hard-drive connectors and soldered ram.

But at least Apple's stuff uses modern parts and they design using recyclable materials and in ways that plan for the end of life of devices.

Most of the choices you mention are a result of market physical size demands and are made by every phone and tablet vendor, as well as nearly all ultrabook and other ultraportable devices like the MS Surface, etc.

An argument could be made for the pre-retina MacBook Pro's, which were RAM/disk expandable, and still had most of the benefits of current modules.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=seznQmDp2pU

http://www.midwinter.com/lurk/making/effects.html

http://www.geek.com/games/cgi-first-introduced-to-tv-in-baby...

I thought JJ Abrams mentioned that he used the Amiga for something in the 1990's but I can't find anything in Google.

I still have this one on tape!

From the blurb: 'Capable of eight concurrent real-time threads with shared memory space, at up to 500 MIPS, Xena gives the X1000 a very flexible, very expandable co-processor. The uses are endless; control hardware, DSP functions, robotics, display - even SID chip and console emulators.'

Link: http://www.a-eon.com/index.php?page=nemo

(It reminds me of the 'Geek port' on the BeBox.)

If the number of Amiga developers reaches critical mass, an emergent 'killer app' could yet make this a compelling platform.

It's great to have it on there as an extra "bonus", because it's cheap (maybe $10 of the cost of the machine) and something different, but that's what it is.