Monitor type (color/monochrome) jumper

[iulianv]

On lots of 286 and 286 boards there is a jumper for setting the monitor type (color or monochrome). I have a board identical to this one - http://stason.org/TULARC/pc/motherboards/M/MORSE-TECHNOLOGIES-INC-386-M4-386SX.html - only on mine JP3 is just an empty placeholder (no jumper, no wire, only the two solder points labeled "JP3"). And yet I get color output from a Trident ISA VGA card... what exactly does that setting affect?

 

[SpidersWeb]

Mono / Colour setting tells the motherboard weither it should look for a MDA/MGA (monochrome) or CGA (colour) adaptor on boot up. It doesn't actually enable or disable the colours. EGA and VGA cards use a ROM so it's not relevant for those.

It's the same as the "MONO COLOR EGA/VGA" setting you find in a lot of older BIOS SETUP tools.

If you had a CGA card in there, and you set it to Mono, you'd likely get beeps and no display (and vice versa). With EGA or VGA it just always uses the ROM on the card to set it up. The VGA cards themselves should detect a monochrome VGA display.