RE: [OpenBIOS] New power-up graphics BIOS.

[Jamie Stanley]

Hi there,

Was wondering if I could help! At present (too be honest) not too 
familiar with the OpenBios stuff! But I know its sommit Id like to get into
;)

As for references - I am a software engineer (www.systolix.co.uk) and so
should
be able to contribute in some way ;)

let me know.

cheers - Jamie.

-----Original Message-----
From: Gavin R. Brewer [mailto:[e-mail]]
Sent: 16 August 2001 22:09
To: [e-mail]
Subject: RE: [OpenBIOS] New power-up graphics BIOS.

Ralph,

I am using a reference book on the VESA SVGA standard version 1.1 as a
source of code snippets etc:

EGA/VGA: A programmer's reference guide
By Bradley Dyck Kliewer
McGraw Hill Publishers.

I know this is really retro, but if we can stick to code which is a little
way back down the evolutionary tree of hardware, we might be able to create
'instant' graphics from the BIOS.

What would be crucial is some sort of power-up self-testing function, that
determines what kind of SVGA chipset is present, (only the largest families
considered),  and applies different code for each chipset.

Clearly this would be much better hand-coded in C++ rather than assembler;
lest things get icky.

All the best,
    		Gavin.

-----Original Message-----
From: [e-mail]
[mailto:[e-mail]]On Behalf Of Ralph Stickley
Sent: Thursday, August 16, 2001 9:14 PM
To: [e-mail];
'[e-mail]'
Subject: RE: [OpenBIOS] New power-up graphics BIOS.

SVGA may be standard, but which chip-set are you using ?

The system setup can be highly unique for each CPU (PII, PIII, Celeron,
Ultra-Low Power, etc),
"co-processor" (440BX, 440TX, et. al.) and/or Super I/O....
These devices must be initialized before DRAM, PCI bus, etc will get
started, even before the Video driver is loaded.

Interested observer....

Ralph

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