GFX card for A2000

[Cronos]

Hi

 What would be the best GFX card for the A2000 and how much should I pay?

[Skyrunner]

Picasso IV.
You better have an accelerator board with RAM as well

[Cronos]

I have a G-Force 040 33 with 12 meg ram, is that enough?

[SamOS39]

My amiga1200T has a CyberVision 64/3D and that works a treat!  :-D

its a zorro card and you can use it no problem in your machine!

CHEERZ

SAM OS v3.9  :-)

[J-Golden]

Both Cybervision and Picasso card are the best you can get for Classic Amigas.  I've had both and can say it's a dead tie in my book.  They both have built in Scan Doubler / Flicker Fixers (sometimes the Cybervision doesn't come with it so ASK before buying!!) and autoswitch between ff/sd and video card (VERY NICE!!!!)

In the seperate but equal area, the Picasso has an audio pasthrough so you can connect your CD audio to your Picasso and have everything come out of one Stereo Headphone jack.  The Cybervision has 3D options that ROCK for games that can use it.

There are more add-ons available for the Picasso but they are SOOOOOO hard to find.  There is also still an active Yahoogroup for the picasso but don't know about the Cybervision...

There!  Way more info then you'll EVER want  Good luck and happy hunting!!!

J-Golden

[x56h34]

Some facts:

- CV643D optional scan doubler module doesn't work with non-AGA amigas (and it's only a scan doubler...no flicker fixing ability)
- Picasso IV has a built-in multi-compatible SD & FF module (meaning works with any Amiga display chipset)
- Picasso IV requires breakout cables so that the SD/FF part could be cut off (yep, don't laugh) and inserted away from the rest of the card into the video slot which is on the other side of the motherboard, that is if used in A2000. For other Amigas like 3000 and 4000 this is not necessary as the video slot is aligned with a zorro slot.
- CV643D is overall a cheaper option. Picasso IV is guaranteed to be pricey.
- CV643D's 3D part is a joke performance and ability wise... :-)

[Cronos]

Thanks for all the info, now I just have to decide which one to get.

[zipper]

- CV643D's 3D part is a joke performance and ability wise... :-)

Not totally; I could play Descent with my A500T/Bliz2060/CV3D quite snappily on 320x400...3D acceleration on A500;-)

[J-Golden]

x56h34 wrote:
Some facts:

- CV643D optional scan doubler module doesn't work with non-AGA amigas (and it's only a scan doubler...no flicker fixing ability)

Yup,  Noticed after I posted that this was all about a A2000.  Are you SURE it doesn't FF?  I never had a problem with it in that reguard...

- Picasso IV has a built-in multi-compatible SD & FF module (meaning works with any Amiga display chipset)

And the latest version has Onstar so you can get into your computer if you forget the password... :-)  IE, Fancy way of saying it'll fit and work in ALL style of video slots...

- Picasso IV requires breakout cables so that the SD/FF part could be cut off (yep, don't laugh) and inserted away from the rest of the card into the video slot which is on the other side of the motherboard, that is if used in A2000. For other Amigas like 3000 and 4000 this is not necessary as the video slot is aligned with a zorro slot.

And, not that it'll help you w/ A2000, the Cybervision connects to the FF/SD modual by a standard ten pin header.  No snipping requiered...

- CV643D is overall a cheaper option. Picasso IV is guaranteed to be pricey.

True and true, unless ther ehasen't been either on E-bay for months and ppl. start getting desperate

- CV643D's 3D part is a joke performance and ability wise... :-)

 :-o There ar  a handful of games that take and use this chip very well.  Shogo, Hexin II, Decent, etc.  So this is more of a choice on if you ever plan on playing these types of games.  Not many programs use the 3D cause this is the on Video card that has it, and the CV63/3D came out in the waning years of Commodore...

[Argus]

You're best bet, imho is a GVP 28/24 Spectrum card.  It's ZII/III so if you upgrade to a 3000/4000 you can migrate with the card.  And it seems more tolerant of SuperBuster 7s found in a lot of 3000s than other ZIII cards.  It has a built in monitor pass thru to pass the signal from a real A2000 flicker fixer like a Microway AGA2000 or Commodore A2320 card.  The Spectrum is a 2MB card using the Cirrus Logic 5428 chip which is just a step down from a Picasso IV (5446 chip, iirc).  The Speccie uses only 2MB of your precious fast ram which is better than the 4MB the PIV and CV3D will gobble up.  That is, unless you have a rare accelerator board with more than 16mb 32-bit fast ram on board like a Cyberstorm2060 or a GVP Combo 040 w/ 4 of the very rare 16MB GVP 64-pin simms.  The Spectrum has about the same specification as a Picasso II, but I like it better because it has mostly surface mount technology and unless you can find the rarer Picasso II+ board, the memory access is equivalent if not better, afaik. The Picasso II/II+ series is also ZII only.  I think there were a lot more Spectrums produced out there as well, if you live in the North American market, GVP being a US outfit.  There was/is even a re-production run of Spectrums by GVP-m, the successor to GVP.  I think the going rate for one is probably US$70-90 on eBay lately.  Picasso IIs seem to go for much more ($120+), though I don't know quite why.