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FreeBSD thinks Hercules / CGA combo card is CGA, not Hercules

FreeBSD thinks Hercules / CGA combo card is CGA, not Hercules

Post by Irvine Sho » Sat, 17 Oct 1998 04:00:00



Hi All

I have a FreeBSD box with an old hercules type monitor on it, being driven by
a Taiwanese Hercules / CGA card.

When I boot up, though, I get the first few lines of boot messages and then
it just seems to freeze.

If I telnet in and look at /var/log/messages it seems to be detecting the CGA
part of the card, not the Hercules. I didn't notice this when I was installing
as I used a VGA card. The client has no spare VGA monitor, though.

Is there any easy way to stop it from looking for the CGA side of things?

The machine's BIOS is set for mono.

Regards,
Irvine Short
Tech Support Professional Computer Manufacturers

 
 
 
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FreeBSD thinks Hercules / CGA combo card is CGA, not Hercules

Post by Arve Ronnin » Sat, 17 Oct 1998 04:00:00



> Hi All

> I have a FreeBSD box with an old hercules type monitor on it, being driven by
> a Taiwanese Hercules / CGA card.

> When I boot up, though, I get the first few lines of boot messages and then
> it just seems to freeze.

> If I telnet in and look at /var/log/messages it seems to be detecting the CGA
> part of the card, not the Hercules. I didn't notice this when I was installing
> as I used a VGA card. The client has no spare VGA monitor, though.

> Is there any easy way to stop it from looking for the CGA side of things?

> The machine's BIOS is set for mono.

> Regards,
> Irvine Short
> Tech Support Professional Computer Manufacturers


I solved this a few years back for a machine which had one Hercules and
one VGA installed by modifying the boot-blocks and syscons. As far as I
can remember, the problem is that boot&syscons prefer [CEV]GA over MDA
when both are present (or maybe boot uses the BIOS setting, and
syscons probes for [CEV]GA first, then MDA. I'm not quite sure).

This modification to boot&syscons might not be required on your system
if you can hide the CGA function by configuration options (eg strapping)
on the Hercules/CGA card.

If you _do_ need to modify the code, I could try to find my old patches
for you.

Good luck
  -Arve

 
 
 
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1. Mono, Hercules, or CGA work with linux?

After upgrading my dual cpu NT Server from 166's to 233's, I have 2 old
cpus sitting around not doing anything. Computer City today had
motherboards on sale for $50, so I picked one up. In the old computer
cellar, I found, Adaptec 1542 SCSI controller,
180 MB scsi hard drive, old single speed scsi CDROM, 16 MB ram, an old
case,
1.2 MB and 360 KB floppy drives, but NO VGA stuff. It's up and running, at
least MSDOS.

I did find a mono video controller, a hercules mono video controller, a cga
video controller, and an ega video controller. I also have 2 monochrome
monitors and a cga monitor. I also think I have an ega monitor, but I can't
seem to track it down right now.

Bottom line: For a simple command line interface only version of linux,
will any of the above video card / monitors work? I want to use linux for
personal knowledge, more understanding of unix, and to use it as a gateway
between my LAN and the Internet. I have version 3.3 of Slackware, which I
had previously dual booting with NT Workstation on my notebook computer.

Thanks,

Tom Suzda

2. User/Install question

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8. Enlightenment: how to edit window menu?

9. CGA screen with VGA Card

10. CGA SNOW ... Any Thoughts ?

11. dual-console: will CGA work instead of MDA???

12. 386,2m,CGA,Dosemu can it work?

13. Looking for touch screen monitors with drivers for CGA apps


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