nghiem@walt.cc.utexas.edu (Alex Nghiem) (09/21/89)
Received: by vondrake.cc.utexas.edu (5.61/1.34) id AA23966; Tue, 19 Sep 89 02:18:54 -0500 Date: Tue, 19 Sep 89 02:18:54 -0500 From: nghiem (Alex Nghiem) Message-Id: <8909190718.AA23966@vondrake.cc.utexas.edu> To: catone@dsl.cis.upenn.edu Subject: Re: Gateway 2000 386 20mhz Windows 386 BIOS Cc: nghiem Status: R Here's an UPDATED brief summary. Please feel free to repost it for me. (Send me a copy when you do.) 1. AMI BIOS (American Megatrends International)--Most of the 386 machines that PC Magazine has given editor's choice had this bios. Everex systems bios is derived from the AMI bios as well (Everex markets ENIX.) Seems that AMI bios works for most everybody. HOWEVER, I received one bug report of the Western Digital WA2 controller sending the ABORT, RETRY, IGNORE message to DOS when running Windows with this bios. Retry resumes normal operation. There has been no specific report of bios shadowing problems with this bios. However, it is known that some video cards do not work with bios shadowing. Also, with many boards that have AMI bios, disabling the shadow bios does not free up extended memory for use with VDISK.SYS or any other Lotus, Intel, Microsoft extended memory application. This seems to be a flaw in a version of the CHIPS and TECHNOLOGIES NEW EXTENDED AT (NEAT) chip set rather that a flaw in the AMI BIOS. Very few people who use Xenix/Unix indicated that they use this BIOS. Boards with AMI BIOS tend to sell for much less that boards with Phoenix BIOS. 2. Phoenix BIOS-- Most of the reports I got said that this bios could run everything: Windows, Os/2, Unix, Xenix, etc. The favorite board of the Unix users who responded are Micronics 386 Boards with Phoenix BIOS. However, got reports of problems with shadow bios and networking. Two boards with Phoenix bios had known problems: Early revisons of the Mylex 25Mhz 386 would not run Xenix and apparently ENIX (Everex's SCO?) would not run on Micronics 25Mhz. PC Magazine gave editors choice to a Tandy machine with a customized Phoenix BIOS. Dell computers uses a customized Phoenix BIOS also. Wholesale Direct (See Computer Shopper) advertises that Phoenix has full Novell Netware compatibility. [Saw a report on CNN that Micronics, a company that manufactures switches for the Air Force was going out of business because of investigations into supplying substandard switches to USAF. Any relation? Anybody know?] 3. Award BIOS (Related to Quadtel BIOS) Got one report that installing Award or Quadtel Bioses solves networking problems. However, Award version 2 does not run Windows. Award version 3 does run windows, but it seems some people do not trust it. Compuadd machines use Award BIOS, but have mediocre test scores. Hauppage Computer Works also uses Award BIOS. Their boards are considered expensive, but are also considered real reliable. None of the 80386 machines that PC-Magazine gave editor's choice to had an Award BIOS. Note that all these manufacturers advertise complete compatiblity. What they claim and what actually happens are two different things. Send Comments to nghiem@walt.cc.utexas.edu !cs.utexas.edu!ut-emx!walt!nghiem. The original posting was sent several months ago. But it seems that messages tend to bounce around a lot. This message was posted September 19, 1989. Thanks to all who responded. Alex Nghiem University of Texas. nghiem@walt.cc.utexas.edu !cs.utexas.edu!ut-emx!walt!nghiem
slin@cory.Berkeley.EDU (Steven Philip Lin) (09/23/89)
In article <18672@ut-emx.UUCP> nghiem@walt.cc.utexas.edu (Alex Nghiem) writes: >[Saw a report on >CNN that Micronics, a company that manufactures switches for the Air Force >was going out of business because of investigations into supplying substandard >switches to USAF. Any relation? Anybody know?] Not true. Micronics manufactures only 386 based motherboards and memory cards. It is possible, however, that there may be another company by the same name that is going out of business. But I know for a fact that Sunnyvale based Micronics is alive and doing very well. When I last checked, I heard that Micronics had moved up to become one of the top 5 or 6 OEM manufacturers of 386 boards. The other top 3 or so were Compaq, IBM, and Zenith. I can't remember the fourth one, but the other biggies like Tandy were further down.