Date: Sun, 08 Sep 1996 15:08:34 -0700 From: Arve Ronning <arver@sn.no> To: Bruce Evans <bde@zeta.org.au> Cc: sos@FreeBSD.ORG, Arve.Ronning@alcatel.no, durham@w2xo.pgh.pa.us, freebsd-hackers@FreeBSD.ORG, j@uriah.heep.sax.de Subject: Re: Support for fixed-scan monitors Message-ID: <323343E2.297D@sn.no> References: <199609080131.LAA27126@godzilla.zeta.org.au>
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Bruce Evans wrote: > > >> If I remember right you can set the PC to boot into whichever you > >> want by setting the BIOS to either monochrome og vga. Syscons could > >> then take over the device that the BIOS used as default. As I see > >> it there is no need to muck with the bootblocks.... > > > >With MDA *and* VGA present...Hmm... > >Some BIOSes may be able to do that, but the ones I've tried have failed either > >by silently resetting the primary to VGA or by not initializing the MDA correctly > >on the next power-on boot (I thought my MDA monitor had departed for good, but it > > Syscons (and pcvt) should start the same device as the BIOS, anyway. Given the quirks of BIOSes, that would have to be the [CEV]GA. I don't think syscons knows which device is being used by BIOS (please correct me if I'm wrong here). I haven't checked pcvt. So, I believe this is mostly a matter of choice (and not of using what BIOS uses). > The new option(s) could reverse the default, or force MDA (fail the probe > if none), or force [CEV]GA. Then it should be possible to switch to > the other screen, or use both (syscons on one and pcvt on the other :-). > That sounds nifty :). (using syscons *and* pcvt I mean:). However, what if the screen used by BIOS is on a monitor which doesn't accept the default scan rates (my situation) ? During boot, we would not see : a) the BIOS messages b) the '>> FreeBSD....Boot:' prompt In this case, there is little we can do about a) (except perhaps hack the BIOS :(. But we *can* do something about b) by hacking the bootblocks (which is what I did:). BTW, I forgot to say (yesterday) that my patches are for *2.1.5R* ! - Arve
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