SVGATextMode and SiS6326 video cards
AFAIK SVGATextMode hasn't been touched since 1999, apparently because
newer kernels "make it redundant" by sending bitmaps of characters to a
graphics-mode screen. YEUCCHH!!! That's the sort of thing I'd expect
Windows to do.
I got myself a SiS6326 video card because it is capable of stonking scan
rates in text mode. Unfortunately the SiS chipset defined in
SVGATextMode is older than, and incompatible with, the 6326. So I
downloaded the 6326 data sheet (4 years out of date) from SiS's website,
wrote a program in DOS to program its clock rate (because it's much
easier to recover in DOS when you screw the whole machine up doing this
sort of thing!) and once it worked ported it to Linux to use as an
SVGATextMode ClockProg.
It works! although it has a slight problem the first time it is invoked
it doesn't work properly. Dunno why - it didn't happen under DOS, and
the easiest way round it is to make my /etc/rc2.d/S9SVGATextMode do:
# set 100 x 37 @ 85Hz
stm
# it didn't work, so reset to normal...
stm 80x25
# then set 100 x 37 again
stm
# and we're off!
Dunno WHY this works, but it does. After this everything works fine, and
I can cope with this one-off horribleness.
If anyone happens to be interested in this prog I have a 9k zip file of
the DOS and Linux source code. Don't expect to understand it very easily
cos I was more concerned with getting my new video card working than
writing beautiful code.
I assume I can't/mayn't upload it to the list as an attachment, so it's
by email if you want it tell me!
Pigeon
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