Is there something wrong with my Workbench 45.3?

[Foebane]

This version of Amiga Workbench I'm using came from the Cloanto Amiga Forever 2012 DVD, I copied it over into Windows 7 folders for use with WinUAE 3.4.0, and as far as I know the only loss has been Amiga-specific file attributes.

What bothers me is in these two pictures (attached):

001.jpg - Why does the colour wheel in Palette Preferences here look like it's missing colours in the middle?

002.jpg - Why do the Country flags look fragmented?

Is my Workbench install corrupted?

[Foebane]

What color screenmode are you running it in?

PAL Hi-Res, 640x256, 256 colours.

[Foebane]

This Workbench install, it turns out, has a more comprehensive palette editor which is better, I'd say. It's called FullPalette (pic 1).

The second picture (pic 2) is what happened when I ran Palette Preferences (PP) before running FullPalette again: the PP spectra are clearly in the palette, this time, but still not being shown in PP itself. Notice how FullPalette says "Locked", perhaps meaning that palette colours cannot be changed outside of the program?

The third picture (pic 3) is what happened when I set the ScreenMode to 64 colours and ran PP again: there's no colour in the wheel at all this time!

What do you know about FullPalette? Is it known to interfere with Palette Preferences in this way?

[Foebane]

FullPalette is great. It's what I've used for years. Check out this pretty neat guide, which mentions it:

http://www.mfilos.com/2012/01/guide-making-workbench-prettier-using.html?m=1

It's certainly more versatile than the standard WB Palette utility, which is always included in WB installs, but it seems that FullPalette supercedes it, so I wonder why I'm complaining.

EDIT: It's not FullPalette that is interfering with the standard Palette utility, after all. Must be something else, or maybe that particular Palette utility has always been this way?

[Foebane]

I have a second WB install (3.1) and that works perfectly in 3.1, so I figured I'd copy it over to the 45.3 WB install and see what happens. Guess what? The 3.1 Palette behaves exactly the same way as the 45.3 Palette, so something in 45.3 is obviously limiting what Palette can do in displaying the palette. I'm guessing it's down to the multicolour icons in 45.3.

[Foebane]

You're using UAE, so try changing your screenmode from 256 colors to something higher - like a 16-bit or 24-bit screenmode.  Even still it will probably look pretty similar - I don't know if the basic Workbench Palette tool was ever written to take advantage of more than 256 color screenmode.  It's 3am local time here, but I can check my setup tomorrow to see how it compares.  

Eh?

My Windows 7 is already 32-bit 1080p.
My WinUAE config for Workbench is A4000/060 with AGA at most. How am I supposed to get more colours from Workbench?

[Foebane]

Eh?

You're running WinUAE, you're not limited to standard Amiga screenmodes (i.e., AGA).

Emulate a 16-bit or 24-bit screenmode to increase you're color depth and see if it gives you smoother gradients.  If I understand correctly from your picture of the color palette wheel, that's what you think you're missing, yes?

How do I do that?

[Foebane]

SUCCESS!

Finally managed to install Picasso96 drivers and get WinUAE to work with them, all on my tod!

I've included a picture of my playing around with a 24-bit Amiga display, and I'm quite impressed by the speed, amongst other things! And finally, the Palette Preferences are finally working as they should! The Amiga is truly unfettered when it comes to 24-bit colour, and it's just a shame Commodore never finished a full 24-bit chipset, not one that was sold commercially, anyway. Yes, the Video Toaster (I think) is 24-bit, but not many home users got a chance to play with it. I'm just glad that the option of True Colour Workbench is open to us, via WinUAE. It's been fun!

[Foebane]

I stand corrected, Pat!