*BSD News Article 26906


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From: essenl@aztec.swindon.rtsg.mot.com (Lee Essen)
Newsgroups: comp.os.386bsd.questions
Subject: Re: UltraPro/Stealth Pro VLB cards
Date: 4 Feb 1994 10:58:35 GMT
Organization: Motorola Ltd., European Cellular Infrastructure Division
Lines: 52
Sender: essenl@aztec (Lee Essen)
Distribution: world
Message-ID: <2it9or$t3f@zeus.swindon.rtsg.mot.com>
References: <2ir0a1$gp5@newsserv.cs.sunysb.edu>
NNTP-Posting-Host: aztec.swindon.rtsg.mot.com

In article <2ir0a1$gp5@newsserv.cs.sunysb.edu>, rick@cs.sunysb.edu (Rick Spanbauer) writes:
|> I would like to upgrade my Gateway DX-66 to include a VLB graphics
|> board.  Does anyone have experience running with the VLB versions
|> of the StealthPro or UltraPro under NetBSD or FreeBSD?  Which is
|> the faster card when running *BSD?  Thanks -- Rick Spanbauer, SUNY/Stony Brook

I'm running a Stealth Pro 24 VLB with NetBSD 0.9 (soon to be -current) and
XFree86-02.0.

There are a couple of problems mostly caused by the fact the Diamond won't
disclose their programming information without a non-disclosure agreement.

Basically, the clock generator on the card isn't directly supported by
XFree (although I have recently heard that the newer cards may word, I
haven't had a chance to check it yet), so you have to use another method
of setting the clock.

This can be....

a) By booting dos and running something that sets the screen into the mode
   you want. I.E. Windows or STLMODE.EXE, then warm-booting your machine
   back into NetBSD and firing up X.

b) By using a clock setting program, like ds3. I've spent loads of time on
   this and can't get it to work with NetBSD. (I even turned it into a
   device driver!)

c) By hacking the boot blocks (this is what I've done) to call the VESA
   BIOS function to set the screen to 1024x768 and then back again.

Also, you will probably find that when you exit X the screen is messed up.
I believe this is a font problem that would probably be ok if you used
syscons (since you can reload the font), there are some linux routines
around that save and restore font info, these could probably be ported.

Before deciding against the card I must say that performance once you are
in X is exceptionally good (I'm comparing it against my old Prodesigner II).
Screen updates used to be a major bottleneck with my system (4/33) but
not any more.

If you want a copy of the hacked boot blocks let me know, or if you wait
until after the weekend I should know whether I can get my card working
without any sort of external influences!

Lee.

-- 
MIS Technical Support		Email: essenl@aztec.swindon.rtsg.mot.com
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