DCE Viper 520

Amiga: A500

CPU: 68020 @ 33MHz

FPU: optional 68882

Features:

Description:

Wow!! I've used several accelerators in my A500, but the Viper 520 CD is simply one of the best ever made. It was manufactured by DCE and released in 1997. It has Kickstart 3.0 ROMs on-board which means the 68020 CPU had 32-bit access instead of the A500's regular, slower 16-bit bus. A jumper is present that allows you to switch between the original Kickstart ROM on your A500's motherboard and the 3.0 ROMs on the accelerator.

The Viper 520 came in two different versions, one with 4MB and one with 8MB of memory on-board. Memory is not user expandable. I have the 8MB version. It's possible to fit an optional 33MHz 68882 FPU, though I don't have one installed at the moment. I am looking out for one in order to max out the card. 

I am fortunate enough to have acquired two working Viper 520's. One has serial number 270 and the other number 17, so I assume it was one of the very first produced. They're both 8MB models and the only difference is that the one with serial number 17 has socketed Kickstart ROM chips while the other one has them soldered to the board.

I have used this card with a CompactFlash card that I hooked up to the 2.5-inch IDE port using a cheap CF-IDE adapter. My A500 just flew!! I was so impressed with the responsiveness of my A500. If you're looking out for an accelerator for your A500 you just can't go wrong with the Viper 520. It doesn't come up for sale that often, so you're probably going to have to be patient, but it's nowhere near as rare as its bigger brother, the Viper 530. And although it won't be very cheap, it won't break the bank like a Viper 530 probably would.

There's just one down side I could find with the Viper 520 and that is that it doesn't have a 68000 fallback mode, a feature most accelerators do have. I like to use my A500 for gaming and some games just won't run properly on anything else than a 68000 CPU or Kickstart 1.3 or both. No Lotus Turbo Challenge II.....

If you don't really care about backward compatibility and badly programmed games of the pre-2.0 era, then there's really no reason not to jump on that Viper 520 as soon as you see one for sale or auction. Good luck!