Amiga 500 Rev 5. and ECS chip set...??

[Matt_H]

As far as new screen modes, doesn't Super Denise also provide EHB?  I think that's why I upgraded, EHB for some game (Death Mask?  Don't really remember now; it's been about 14 years.)

Only the oldest of the oldest of the oldest Denises in the first A1000s don't have EHB. Every other Amiga should have it.

[Matt_H]

ECS stands for Enhanced Chipset or something yes?  And "ECS" machines from Commodore came with a Super Denise, correct? Now, if you don't want compatibility with the couple of ECS games that use the new graphics chip out there, sure, stick your 2MB Agnus in. That's not ECS, though.  You need a Super Denise or you've got a hybrid.

I think that's pretty much right.

I think later A500s came from the factory as hybrids - a 1MB ECS Agnus and an OCS Denise. Only the 500+, 600, and 3000(T) shipped with Super Denise, but you could drop one into a 500 with the 1MB Agnus and have full access to ECS screenmodes (albeit with only 1MB of chip RAM).

[Matt_H]

One other quick question,
will the 8372B (2meg fatter Agnus) work on my REV 5 Amiga 500?
I have the opertunity to get that instead of an 8372A (1 meg version)

Cramming a 2MB Agnus into a 500 without a MiniMega Chip or similar requires a lot more work. I don't think the process is very well documented, it may not work with all board revisions, and there might be some side effects. Even then it's a whole lot more work to install the full 2MB of RAM.

Bottom line: I recommend either the 1MB Agnus or a full 2MB chip RAM expansion board (MiniMega/MiniMegi/whatever).