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From: gt8134b@prism.gatech.EDU (Howlin' Bob)
Newsgroups: comp.os.386bsd.development
Subject: Re: V86 mode & the BIOS (was Need advice: Which OS to port to?)
Message-ID: <108707@hydra.gatech.EDU>
Date: 13 Aug 93 19:33:52 GMT
References: <245jrfINNrc0@bonnie.tcd-dresden.de> <hastyCBLnIF.Cyq@netcom.com> <1993Aug11.164429.6015@fcom.cc.utah.edu> <hastyCBMB3K.JBG@netcom.com>
Organization: Georgia Institute of Technology
Lines: 28
In <hastyCBMB3K.JBG@netcom.com> hasty@netcom.com (Amancio Hasty Jr) writes:
>In article <1993Aug11.164429.6015@fcom.cc.utah.edu> terry@cs.weber.edu (A Wizard of Earth C) writes:
>>In article <hastyCBLnIF.Cyq@netcom.com> hasty@netcom.com (Amancio Hasty Jr) writes:
>>I am concerned about the use of a VM86 to do S3 card initialization. What
>>happens when I take the same card and put it in a machine where a VM86 is
>>either not possible or requires writing an entire hardware emulation?
Well, I think we've seen that none of the X developers are afraid of a little
hard work. The best use of the VM86 BIOS box would be for cards which
are otherwise impossible to initialize, such as the Diamond cards
with programmable clocks.
>Certain manufacturers, such as Diamond do not publish publicly their
>initialization routines. for those cases users lose, or may have
>to resort to shady methods to initialize their cards which outright
>are in the border of being illegal
Exactly. We don't have the effort to spend on reverse engineer every
anal retentive manufacturer's proprietary deliberate incompatibility.
Robert
--
Robert Sanders
Georgia Institute of Technology, Atlanta Georgia, 30332
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