Piccolo SD64 (CU Amiga March 1995)
The Bad News
All is not quite rosy with the SD64, though. One major bug rears its head all too often – after opening an EGS full colour screen (for PicoPainter or a viewer program) and then closing it, memory is not fully released. OK, so only 20KB aren’t freed – nothing in a 10MB system. However, this 20KB fragments memory badly. From having a largest free block of 6.5MB of memory, this drops to 3.2MB – literally halved. Whether this is just for my particular configuration I can’t say, but it is something to watch out for as many image processing functions require a large chunk of memory.
Despite that bug, the card is still stunning. The speed is great, especially on native EGS screens. 24 bit windows can be thrown around with impressive speed. Text scrolling on the workbench is superb – useful for those who use CLI/SHELL a lot. Other workbench operations are fast, but not as quick as they should be – yet. Workbench emulation is stable and well implemented. The manuals are excellent. To conclude, a great buy for anyone in the market for high colour and high resolutions. They’re not getting this one back either: I’ve bought it…
| Ratings (in 1995 context) for Piccolo SD64 | |
|---|---|
| Requirements | 2MB RAM, Kickstart 2.04, 6MB hard drive space |
| Recommended | 6MB+ RAM, 68030 or better, multisync monitor with 48KHz scan rate or higher |
| Performance | 86 |
| Fast, with more to come promised. Z2/3 autosense, too. Let down by memory bug. | |
| Value for money | 93% |
| Workbench emulation, 24 bit painting, EGS, 2MB of memory and a decent chipset for under £300! | |
| Reliability | 10/10 |
| Still working perfectly in my Amiga 3000 in January 2011, 16 years later… | |
| Ease of use | 92% |
| Easy to install, set up and use thanks to the manuals | |
| Overall | 90% |
| A star performer: fast and stable with goodies included too! | |
