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Unknown 8BIT ISA video card (BIOS reports: VIEAGA 1.27 ENHANCHED)

MBaNL

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Joined
Aug 20, 2011
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For my IBM PC XT I bought a 8BIT ISA Graphics card which does EGA mode (and apparently also CGA mode since Alley Cat is perfectly playable).

I don't know anything about it and after a couple of hours searching on the internet I give it up... There no information about it...

The card had no brand name on it... it only contains some numbers.

The BIOS reports (on my TV): VIEGA 1.27 ENHANCHED (111010)

It was after I did some trial and error and eventually set SW1/1 to ON to display a PAL output. It looks like when SW1/1 is OFF it displays NTSC.

Another side effect with this card is that when I turn on the XT it does a long beep followed by two short beeps. On the switch-bank on the motherboard I already set SW1/5 and SW1/6 respectively ON and OFF (80 column CGA).

Does anyone can tell what that side effect is and can someone tell me more about this graphics card?

EDIT: made a typo with the name...

The numbers between the "()" is the binary for the settings on SW1. I have now "VIEGA 1.27 ENHANCHED,AUTO (111000)" and I can also play Disgger...

IMG_2807.jpg

For more pictures: LINK to my website (bottom card.)
 
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Set your motherboard switches both to on (for "no video") since it's an EGA card. This should stop the beeping.
 
Set your motherboard switches both to on (for "no video") since it's an EGA card. This should stop the beeping.

Thanks! I think I was to focused on CGA that I forgot it is an EGA card with CGA support... with my 8BIT compatible 16BIT VGA card I have them set both to ON.

But now the other question... Can someone tell me more about this card and what all the jumpers and switches are for?
 

I must say it has some similarity's but there are also some differences... the swich-back on the back om mine has 6 switches and the one on that has has 8. Most of The jumpers are almost positioned exactly as mine and also numbered the same. The connectors are not numbered the same way. The other thing is that mine doesn't have DRAM banks and has 2 chips in the middle instead of 1.

By the way... Just doing some trial and error with the switches at the moment and with setting 100000 (looks like 40 columns) I can read VTEGA 1.28 (instead of VIEGA 1.27). VT sounds like the initials for VTECH...

Test all the 32 PAL combinations and came with the table that could be found at the link in the first post. it's a raw test and I hope I can spot some logic in it.
 
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Boot the machine with the card installed, run debug, and type the following:

Code:
d c000:0

...and hit enter. If you don't see anything, hit "d" "enter" a few times. The VGA ROM should be there, and you might be able to find a copyright string in the ROM that might give more clues as to what the card is exactly. (If there is still nothing there, try "d c800:0" although this is usually a hard disk controller)

While not guaranteed to find anything, you could also run the current topbench stub (ftp://ftp.oldskool.org/pub/TOPBENCH/tstub097.zip) and see if it outputs anything useful regarding the video adapter.
 
@Trixter, Couldn't find anything interesting in the DEBUG output... The only readable text is in the header and is the same as what the BIOS shows me when I fire up the XT.

Here's an output of the DEBUG: DOWNLOAD
 
I asked the last owner of this card if he has a sheet with the setting and he found them... according to him the card is a "Laser Auto EGA4+"...

AUTOEGA4+ is the same type as the VTECH card @Plasma pointed me earlier!

Here's the info I got:

RGB or composite sw6 off, sw5 off , sw4 on, sw3 off, sw2 off, sw1 off, toggle switch left
TTL monochrome monitor sw6 off, sw5 off, sw4 off, sw3 on, sw2 off, sw1 off, toggle switch left

enhanced color display sw6 off, sw5 off, sw4 off, sw3 on, sw2 on, sw1 off, toggle switch right

toggle switch looking from the rear side
sw 5 and sw6 on for ibm xt compatible
sw5 and sw6 on for ibm at compatible




sw5 and sw6 on for herculus (720 x 350 pixels mono)
sw5 off and sw6 on for cga
sw5 on and sw6 off for ega
sw5 off and sw6 off for automatic

j5 is for composiet color monitor
j6 is for composiet monochroom monitor
j3 9 pin sub D for ttl display
j2 6 pin for licht pen
j1 32 pin feature connector
j4 toggle switch for ega
 
When you mentioned 'Laser' ..... I remembered I have the same card !
.....mine has a sticker on the BIOS chip with the markings:

Video Technology Computers Ltd.
Laser EGA 4+ Card

Here's a couple of pics:
 

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@mikey99, Could you send me the photo's in full size so I can archive them with the other information I have?

If it's O.K. I can send you my e-mail address via a PM.
 
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