[comp.sys.ibm.pc] Video 7 / AWARD BIOS incompatability?

tims@starfish.Convergent.COM (Tim Simmons) (06/07/89)

 I recently installed a VIDEO 7 FASTWRITE VGA card (rev 1.10) into
 a 286-20mhz system with AWARD BIOS ver N3.03

 There seems to be a BIOS incompatability problem. Symptom is: when
 booted up, 3 out of 5 times the system hangs, and it will not warm
 boot at all.  We replaced the Award BIOS with AMI and the system
 worked beautifully!

 Has anyone run into this type of problem and found a solution to
 it?  We called Video 7, they were no help.... said there should be
 no problem with Award BIOS ver N3.03.

 I will post a summary if anything interesting comes up.

 Thanks in advance!

 Tim Simmons (408)434-2843
 tims@starfish.convergent.com

keithe@tekgvs.LABS.TEK.COM (Keith Ericson) (06/09/89)

In article <1060@starfish.Convergent.COM< tims@starfish.Convergent.COM (Tim Simmons) writes:
<
< I recently installed a VIDEO 7 FASTWRITE VGA card (rev 1.10) into
< a 286-20mhz system with AWARD BIOS ver N3.03
<
< There seems to be a BIOS incompatability problem. Symptom is: when
< booted up, 3 out of 5 times the system hangs, and it will not warm
< boot at all.  We replaced the Award BIOS with AMI and the system
< worked beautifully!
<
< Has anyone run into this type of problem and found a solution to
< it?  We called Video 7, they were no help.... said there should be
< no problem with Award BIOS ver N3.03.
<

The FastWrite has ab 8-position DIP switch.  Switch 4 is specified
as "factory-set to 'OFF': do not change" (or something to that
effect).  When installing one in an Acer 386 box we found that
changing this switch to 'ON' was necessary or the machine wouldn't
boot.  We have no idea as to why; all we know is that it works.

kEITHe