💻 Nine Times as much Memory

➤ Martin Döring, 18th of June 2022
CloudyStorm ST

I got the CloudyStorm ST from the Thunderstorm team today. And I have to say, I am very excited. The card is like the Storm ST and the Cloudy on one board. So now I have in my Atari 260ST additional 8 MB AltRAM and 4 flashed TOS versions of 256 KB each, which I can switch per software. The Cloudy had only two versions so far. The old ROMs should be taken out, they only would eat power.

On the side of the card are some pins for to connect cables with switches for your case. Then you can switch your TOS versions via switches.

But if you put a small add-on board on the side, then you can even do this switching by software. I think this is cool, because then one can change TOS versions at any time, but I don't have to install any switches in my case and also I don't have to open the case.

If you have flashed something that doesn't run at all, you can always put jumpers on the outside, so that you have the "emergency system" EmuTOS 1.1.1 as a fallback. EmuTOS is of course no emergency system, but anyway the best and most developed TOS at all. The card says "Powered by EmuTOS" and that alone is a reason to buy the card ;)

CloudyStorm ST top view

I have attached some photos. The coolest thing about this card is, of course, that it doesn't bulk up so much. You can either solder a socket onto your CPU or, as I have it done, remove the CPU, solder in a socket and then put the CPU ontop of the card. This makes it possible to exchange the CPU later for a PAK or similar. Very nice: No cable mess, only card and CPU. I am also an aesthete ;)

CloudyStorm ST from below

I can absolutely recommend this card. With it, simple STs then have nine times as much memory available, without having thick nasty cable mess and tinkering. Though, you have to take into account, that this AltRAM is not reachable by the DMA chip and the shifter. 9 MB is more, than the original Mega ST 4 had. Also 256KB TOS-ROMs become possible for older mainboard versions, without having to change anything on the board itself.

Links

The CloudyStorm ST does not have its own wiki page yet. But there are wiki pages for the Storm ST and the Cloudy. Also for the Lightning ST:

🌐 Storm ST - 8 MB memory expansion for DIP64 socket
🌐 Cloudy - TOS adapter
🌐 Lightning ST - IDE-INterface with two USB 1.1 ports

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