Amiga Graphics Card Guide
The Amiga’s native AGA/OCS/ECS graphics were amazing in 1985. But by the 90s, we all wanted more colors, higher resolutions, and true 24-bit Workbench. That’s where RTG cards came in.
This guide covers the classic Zorro and modern graphics card options for your Amiga.
What is RTG?
Retargetable Graphics lets Workbench and applications run in true-color modes independent of the Amiga chipset. The two big standards were:
- CyberGraphX (CGX) – Released in 1995 with Phase5’s CyberVision64. Became the de-facto RTG standard because it was free and supported 24-bit Workbench【5090905968834454290†L73-L79】
- Picasso96 (P96) – The other major RTG API, widely used today
Most cards needed 2MB RAM and 4-5MB disk space to run【5090905968834454290†L58-L59】
Classic Zorro II / III Cards
These were the big guns for A2000, A3000, A4000:
| Graphic card | Expansion type | Graphic chip |
|---|---|---|
| EGS 110/24 | GVP LocalBus | INMOS G364 framebuffer |
| EGS 28/24 | Zorro II / III | Cirrus Logic GD5426 |
| Retina | Zorro II | NCR 77C22E+ |
| Visiona | Zorro II | IMS G300C |
| Piccolo | Zorro II / III | Cirrus Logic GD5426 |
| Piccolo SD64 | Zorro II / III | Cirrus Logic GD5434 |
| Rainbow II | Zorro II | Analog Devices ADV7120 |
| Rainbow III | Zorro III | Inmos G365 |
Source: RTG card list【5090905968834454290†L61-L71】
Modern Cards & Accelerators
New production cards keep the Amiga alive in 2026:
| Year | Producer | Name | VRAM | 24bit | 3D | Expansion |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1999 | 3DFX | Voodoo 3 | 16MB | ✓ | ✓ | PCI |
| 2000 | 3DFX | Voodoo 4 | 32MB | ✓ | ✓ | PCI |
| 2014 | Apollo Team | Vampire V600 | 64MB | ✓ | CPU | |
| 2017 | Apollo Team | Vampire V500 V2+ | ✓ | CPU socket | ||
| 2018 | VA2000 | VA2000 | 32MB | ✓ | ||
| 2019 | Apollo Team | Vampire V1200 | 64MB | ✓ | CPU slot | |
| 2020 | ZZ9000 | ZZ9000 | 1GB | ✓ | Zorro II |
Data from Amitopia’s card table【5090905968834454290†L152-L167】
Highlights:
- ZZ9000: 1GB VRAM, Zorro II, 24-bit. The current king for big-box Amigas【5090905968834454290†L166-L167】
- Vampire: FPGA accelerator with built-in RTG. No Zorro slot needed【5090905968834454290†L158-L159】
- VA2000: Modern FPGA Zorro card【5090905968834454290†L162-L163】
- Voodoo 3/4: PCI 3D cards for Mediator/T-Rex boards
AGA vs RTG
Native AGA in A1200/A4000 gives you 256 colors from 16.7 million【5090905968834454290†L173-L174】 and HAM-8 with 262,144 colors【5090905968834454290†L178-L180】. But it’s still planar and slow for Workbench.
RTG gives you chunky pixels, flicker-free high resolutions, and fast scrolling. Many users now remove old CyberVision cards and stick with AGA + Indivision for simplicity【5090905968834454290†L116-L118】
Which one should you get?
Think about the bigger picture【5090905968834454290†L267-L268】
- Just gaming: You probably don’t need RTG. AGA is fine for Lemmings and Cannon Fodder【5090905968834454290†L268-L270】
- Workbench, Internet, Graphics: Get RTG. 16 million colors and 1280×720 makes life so much easier【5090905968834454290†L291-L292】
- A500/A600: Look at Vampire or Z-500 + ZZ9000【5090905968834454290†L280-L282】
Notes
Most RTG software runs under CyberGraphX or Picasso96. Make sure you have picture.datatype v43+【5090905968834454290†L90-L91】 for modern image formats.
Written for Amitopia Amiga Magazine. Questions? Drop them below.
