#Bridgecard and VGA
15 messages in this thread
Hello everyone. I have a Bridgecard question I hope someone can help me
with. I have a 286 bridgecard, I recently purchased a Super VGA card made
by BOCA. I'm trying to get it to work right with my Bridgecard but I'm
having no luck at all. I also purchased the new version of the Janus
software. Anyone have any experience in this? I'm desperate!
John
John,
What monitor are you using? If you are using the standard Amiga Monitor,
it won't work. You will need a VGA or a multisynch monitor. If you bought
a multisynch monitor that would synch all the way down to 15kHz (needed
buy the Amiga if you do not have a flixer fixer) you could get a switchbox
and use one monitor for both the Amgia and the VGA card. I am thinking
about doing this RSN.
I just bought a Commodore 1960. It's a multisync type monitor, I thought
about the switchbox thing also, haven't tried it yet though. It supports
VGA modes, but I can't seem to get it working correctly. I dunno if I have
to have and IBM hard drive controller in there or what, my thought is that
it may be interferring with the ram location of my Janus stuff. WHen I
boot my machine it doesn't even look for my bridgfecard when I have the
SuperVGA plugged into the slot.
John,
I am not sure what could be causing your trouble, but you should not need
a IBM harddrive controller to get your VGA to work. Post a message in the
AmigaUser Bridgboard section.
John,
I've heard that there have been compatibility problems with some BOCA
boards. You might try asking your question in the Bridgeboard section of
the AmigaUser forum.
Can you describe what problem you're having in greater detail? You should
have the BB's monitor jumper to 'none'.
David
How do I set it to none? I know how to set it to color or mono.
John,
Get out your BB manual. IN the back is a diagram showing the board
layout and location of various jumpers. Locate the jumpers for setting the
default video mode and set those jumpers to disable both color and mono.
Unless they are both disabled the BB will try to operate in one of its
standard CGA or MDA modes, which is incompatible with the VGA boards.
Simply disabling through Janus software isn't enough. Hope this helps.
Thanks Steven, I will give it a try and let ya know how it works out!
At various times in the past I have considered purchasing a bridge board,
but have always backed off. One question that I always had was whether or
not there was any way to get VGA output into a window on the WB screen.
It seems like output to a window on the WB was limited to the BBs built in
CGA, which seemed reasonable given the differences in resolution, but now
with new video modes can this be done?
Bill
Bill,
I don't doubt it could be done, but CBM, as well as the other
competitors have chosen not to include the added circuitry (and expense) of
supporting VGA color. I think the logic was that with the additional slots
available it was easier to let the user decide whether to add VGA with a
third-party card. Of course that logic falls apart with the A3000 which
only has two available BB slots. It is also a problem, although less of
one, with the A2000 which only have two 16-bit BB slots. If you include a
BB and VGA card then you have no 16-bit slots left for disk controllers,
etc. Oh well, that's the way it is. You can't wholly flame CBM for this
oversight, because Vortex, Supra, etc also don't support VGA color. At
least with the CBM product you can add VGA with another card. With the
Vortex and other products which don't recognize the BB slots you cannot.
The new Goldengate card from Vortex does work as a BB card and I do think
you can add cards in the other slots which the Goldengate will recognize,
but I'm not positive this is true.
But even with a BB and a VGA card from another vendor, don't you end up
with two separate video outputs? So there goes putting the IBM output
into a window on the WB screen.
Bill
Bill,
Yes, that's right. I have a switchbox I got from JDR Micro along
with some cables and just switch over the monitor when I run the BB. Until
CBM or someone else makes a BB for the Amiga which supports VGA through the
Amiga, this is about the only solution I know of unless you're willing to
live with CGA. I guess if you don't run windows you can live with CGA and
DOS, but I chose to go the other route. The switchbox wasn't all that
expensive even with the two cables. I use one monitor, a CBM 1950
multisync and just use the switchbox to connect either to the VGA card or
to the flickerfixer. Works well, but of course I had to use the only other
16 bit slot available. Consequently, my hard drive controller had to be
limited to an 8 bit controller. I didn't know much aabout the performance
characteristics of an 8 bit IDE controller, so I use an 8 bit SCSI
controller, a Seagate ST02. It cost a whopping $34.00 and delivers good
performance for an 8 bit SCSI. All in all it makes for a quite usable
windows system even though the 386 BB only runs at 20 Mhz. I run Hyperdisk
for disk caching on the PC side to help improve disk transfers. If you
didn't want to go the same route you can buy a multifunction card which has
VGA, serial and parallel ports, and an IDE controller all on one card for
about $275. The switchbox and cables will run another $40 or so.
I guess I'll just have to wait. Being able to put the output into a
window on the WB is, to me, the only real benefit of a BB. Maybe a better
(certainly more cost effective) solution for my own needs is to buy an
MSDOS box, minus monitor, and get the switch for my monitor. Two
keyboards will kindof be a pain, but otherwise everything looks like a
plus.
Thanks,
Bill
John,
Leave the color/mono jumper off. That'll set it to none.
David
Thanks.