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re: macivory



    Date: Thu, 2 Feb 89 15:27 EST
    From: Robert W. Kerns <RWK@FUJI.ILA.Dialnet.Symbolics.COM>

	Date: Tue, 24 Jan 89 09:44 EST
	From: JR@YUKON.SCRC.Symbolics.COM (Johanna Rothman)
	    Another problem we had was that the Macivory would not work with
	    a 19 inch color monitor (it's a Sony trinitron monitor).  Symbolics
	    told me that they only support Apple video boards.  This means that
	    color work is restricted to 640x480 resolution, whether on a 13 inch
	    Apple monitor or some of the large screen monitors that use the
	    Apple video board.

	This is not true, but our approved vendor list is very short.  Please
	send information about the video card you used with the Sony monitor-
	its manufacturer, the number of pixels, the bits per pixel.  Then, please
	tell us what "didn't work".  We've had some interesting experiences with
	other vendors interfering with Nubus memory, etc.  At this point, we support
	a Radius 18" greyscale monitor.  E-machines seems to have fixed their
	video cards, so E-machines may be a supported vendor soon.  We are still
	evaluating other color monitors.

    Gack!  Could you please forward to this mailng-list the complete list of color
    monitors you have had success with?  Also, could you please be more specific
    about the nature of these nubus problems?  Exactly what are these video boards
    doing wrong?

Most Mac add-ins are "passive" and can get by with "loose" interpretations
of the NuBus spec.  A co-processor like MacIvory is an "active" bus master 
and must pass ownership of the bus between itself and the Mac's 68000.  In 
the presence of other boards with "loose" NuBus implementations, this bus 
passing can break down, or cause the other boards to misbehave.

At this point, we have no approved vendor list for a color monitor, but we
are actively looking into different vendors.

    I find this all rather supprising, since video boards generally don't do
    much of anything except act like memory & generate retrace interrupts.