• Please review our updated Terms and Rules here

VGA Feature connector

Anonymous Coward

Veteran Member
Joined
Aug 11, 2004
Messages
1,553
Location
Shandong, China
I have a question about the VGA/VESA feature connector found on the majority of VGA cards from the late 80s until fairly recently. My understanding is that using a cable it is possible to disable the VGA BIOS on some accellerated videoboards, and pop in a second card that has fast VGA graphics (like a TSENG ET4000). Certain cards (like Matrox) were notoriously slow at displaying standard VGA graphics, but were lightning fast in accellerated modes. Using the feature connector allows you to have the best of both worlds.

Now...to get on with my question. Suppose I have TWO ACCELLERATED display adapters in my machine which are tied together through the feature connector. Assuming that the VGA BIOS is disabled on one of these cards, how is it determined which graphics co-processor is the default? Can I switch between the two coprocessors only by changing the driver? Has anybody ever tried this before? I am tempted to dig my 486 out of the closet to try it myself. The only problem is that all of my display cards are the same brand.
 
I was under the impression that the feature connection was there to get video input to overlay on the main screen (such as from a TV card).
 
Back
Top