Path: utzoo!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!mailrus!tut.cis.ohio-state.edu!cs.utexas.edu!uunet!tektronix!tekcrl!tekgvs!toma
From: toma@tekgvs.LABS.TEK.COM (Tom Almy)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.ibm.pc
Subject: Re: VGA Card query: Video 7's V-RAM card
Keywords: VGA V-RAM
Message-ID: <5064@tekgvs.LABS.TEK.COM>
Date: 4 May 89 14:36:59 GMT
References: <12361@hodge.UUCP> <5032@tekgvs.LABS.TEK.COM> <12536@hodge.UUCP>
Reply-To: toma@tekgvs.LABS.TEK.COM (Tom Almy)
Organization: Tektronix, Inc., Beaverton,  OR.
Lines: 47

In article <12536@hodge.UUCP> jdm@hodge.UUCP (jdm) writes:
>
>I've talked with a number of people who have owned Video-7 cards
>(V-RAM and others) and they all agree that the lack of documentation,
>poor technical support on the part of Video-7, poor quality of the
>board itself, and the high failure rate of boards right out of the box
>has them skipping over any Video-7 product purchases in the future.
>

Do we buy from a different Video-7?  

1. (lack of documentation) The fastwrite and vram documentation is among the
   best we've got.  It even tells you how to change the display modes with
   BIOS calls rather than the supplied canned program.  I've had to reverse
   engineer some Genoa and Everex mode changing programs to get this vital
   information.  And if you want complete specs (register level programming)
   they will sell (at a reasonable cost) it.

2. (Poor technical support). When I called about getting a Windows 386 driver 
   for the latest Windows revision, they said they were nearing shipment and
   that it would be a couple of weeks.  I got it within a week, no charge.
   When other engineers here have called about technical information, they
   have had no trouble talking to engineers at Video-7.

3. (Poor board quality and failures)  The board has no jumpers (although there
   is one resistor mounted on the back).  Almost entirely SMDs.  We have never
   had a failure.

These boards are not only the fastest we have tested, but also the only
boards that seem to work flawlessly with all software (WordPerfect 5.0 seems
to be the definitive test -- can you set a 132 column mode, run WP, do a
page preview, and then return back to 132 column text?  These are the only
cards we have tested that do it.)

>So far the best VGA for under $500 that I've seen is the Orchid
>ProDesigner+ (512K).  800x600x256 and 1024x768x16 modes, 4 year
>warrenty, hardware pan and zoom, and font editor.  That and the
>STB EM/Extra (512K) seem to be the most stable boards.

Haven't tried these, but we will try to get them for evaluation.

Does anybody know of a 16 bit VGA card that will work on a 12.5 MHz bus?


Tom Almy
toma@tekgvs.labs.tek.com
Standard Disclaimers Apply