Meet the 'Super CGA' Cards

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6300 footage courtesy of The Oldskool PC:

[deeiks]

I was born and grew up in ex soviet union. And it's super funny how the timeline was all skewed for us. Here even in the early 90s computers with VGA were super rare. When the soviet union collapsed they began popping up. But then again Hercules graphics were super popular. Most all 'home brew' I remember ran either hercules monochrome mode or CGA colour mode. When I was used to hercules graphics CGA looked a bit like a step backwards because of the lower resolution.

[curiousottman]

I worked in a computer store in high school in the 80s and I can tell you that ATI EGA Wonder card was the holy grail of video cards. We sold a lot of them mostly to high end users and businesses. Never could afford one myself at the time but even installing it for a customer was a thrill.

[javvyjavvy]

I remember my dad making the jump from Cga to Ega. He bought the card and the monitor. He hid it from my Mother. He thought his cover was blown when she came downstairs one day to check on us. She had no idea what she was looking at it made us both laugh after. Still remember making the jump from Cga to Ega then to Vga and higher. Kids today dont appreciate all of this. They have no idea.

Blast from the past seeing the title screens to any early Ultima game as well. Those boxes came with the most beautiful maps and books. I miss that in gaming these days.

Really enjoyed your video.

[alhuno]

With the work Benedikt did on Planet X3, the game is really becoming a Swiss army knife of DOS games. Super hyped for Petscii Robots!

[vjcodec]

My guy! 8bit guy episodes feels like making a warm cup of tea after a busy day and stretching out on the couch! :) ❤

[alexvar]

Great video! It's worth mentioning that IBM had also released the CGA-compatible PGA card in 1984 for the CAD market, would love to see one of those in a future video!

[nopenottalib]

I actually had an ATI EGA Wonder card when I was a boy. For me, at the time, it was a HUGE step up because prior to the EGA Wonder card, all I had ever had were monochrome CGA monitors & adapters. It was SO exciting for me at the time to be able to experience all the games and software I used at the time in full color. Microsoft Flight Simulator 4, Sharkey's 3D Pool, XTree Gold, etc., and so on ...

[Keatosis_Quohotos]

I love how you use your own games as one a Rosetta stone to show off all the graphics modes. It's what makes this channel special.

[retrotvtech]

Interestingly enough, I just bought a copy of Planet X3 to use with my Tandy 1000 TL/2 which has the high res Tandy Graphics mode. I was absolutely blown away by how good it looks using the VGA file. If I had seen this as a kid when we had this machine, I would have been amazed! Great work on this video, and hopefully, Petscii Robots will eventually support the high res Tandy Graphics.

[AlanCanon]

5:00 the CGA snow had me reaching for the VGA connector that connects my monitor to my desktop PC.... you got me! :)

[AshtonCoolman]

I grew up with a Turbo XT my dad got in 1987 that had an EGA Wonder. Some of my first computing memories was going through the EGA Wonder manual when I was 6 or 7 and changing the jumpers. I remember being wowed when I put it in non-interlaced mode, but simultaneously learned that it came with a performance hit. I’ve been playing with and benching video cards since.

[pedroTFP]

So good to see some Olivetti on the channel! Please give us some more of it! 😊

[CraigRodmellMusic]

As usual, thanks for making and posting. David, I always look forward to your interesting, enjoyable content coming out, and once again, this did not disappoint!

[sock_master]

The "136" color mode of the QuadColor card is most likely a visual trick rather than a real mode. The giveaway is the number 136, which happens to be the number of visually unique color combinations you get when you mix/dither/alternate two 16 color pixels. (16x16/2) + (16/2) = 136

[NeillRobinson]

I always get so pumped when I see there's a new 8-bit Guy video for me to sit back and enjoy.. Can't watch this one for a little while yet but in about half an hour I'm gonna be hitting play and sitting back to relax!

[SeekingTheTriple]

3:46 biggest reveal in 8-bit guy history. Genuinely shocked me to see that glorious card sandwich!

[BradHouser]

I had the original Plantronics Color Plus in my first PC, which I bought bare bones at Bussinessland (without cards or drives). The only software that took advantage of the additional memory that was even close to mainstream was Lotus Symphony. It supported the 4 color mode at 640 x 200 . BTW the original bootable Flight Simulator (the "acid test" of PC Compatibility) also supported a 16 color composite mode. My Zenith monitor had composite and CGA inputs, so it was an easy switch. Planet X3 looks great!

[teekay_]

Nice roundup! I had forgotten a lot about these modes, and around 1985, I switched to the Amiga.

[einokeskitalo]

Fascinating video! And the Olivetti footage was downright gorgeous!

[Paolo]

For your info, Olivetti also developed an optional card to extend the colors in high resolution. So Olivetti M24 (and AT&T PC6300) could have 640 x 400 in 16 colors, plus other nice features such as hardware scrolling, a look up table for the colors, possibility to mix a text mode plus the graphics mode in the same page, hardware dithering and hardware blinking. It could also allow to have one monochrome and one color monitor or two color monitors connected together. For example on one monitor it was possible to see a text mode and on the other a graphics mode. AT&T called it Display Enhancement Board (DEB), while Olivetti called it EGC2413 or GO329.