[comp.windows.ms] Trident drivers for Windows 3.0

woan@peyote.cactus.org (Ronald S. Woan) (07/03/90)

Here's the latest scoop regarding Trident drivers!

They will be available Friday for the following modes:

	For the 8800 based cards: 800x600x16, 640x480x256
	For the 8900 based cards: all the above + 1024x768x256

They will be sending the out Friday to their OEM manufacturers (i.e.
Logos, Maxxon, etc...). You can also get them directly from Trident
for a $40 software upgrade fee (pretty steep, but I was told they
include other drivers, as well). Anyway, Trident's phone number is
(408)738-3194, if I copied it from work correctly. All in all, I think 
this is a shameful distribution policy considering ATI, Video 7, and
Paradise have uploaded theirs to Compuserve and made theirs available
for free.

						Ron
PS I just traded my Trident for
a Paradise based card after experiencing
interference problems.
-- 
+-----All Views Expressed Are My Own And Are Not Necessarily Shared By------+
+------------------------------My Employer----------------------------------+
+ Ronald S. Woan                                     woan@peyote.cactus.org +
+ If nothing else works                              woan@soda.berkeley.edu +

alee@portia.Stanford.EDU (Andrew Lee) (07/06/90)

In article <1266@peyote.cactus.org> woan@peyote.cactus.org (Ronald S. Woan) writes:
>Here's the latest scoop regarding Trident drivers!
[a few lines deleted]
>They will be sending the out Friday to their OEM manufacturers (i.e.
>Logos, Maxxon, etc...). You can also get them directly from Trident
>for a $40 software upgrade fee (pretty steep, but I was told they
>include other drivers, as well). Anyway, Trident's phone number is
>(408)738-3194, if I copied it from work correctly. All in all, I think 
>this is a shameful distribution policy considering ATI, Video 7, and
>Paradise have uploaded theirs to Compuserve and made theirs available
>for free.

I just called them today (the phone number is right).  The drivers will
be out next week, and the reason they're charging $40 is so that they
DON'T want to deal directly with users.  HOWEVER, when I asked about
redistributing the drivers, the guy said that what I did with them was
my own business, and IT WOULD BE OK TO GIVE THEM AWAY.  So if anyone
gets drivers from one of the OEMs, please see if you can give a copy to
an anonymous FTP site.  My board is manufactured by Zoltrix, and when
I called them up, they said they've stopped making VGA boards.

	Andrew Lee (alee@fizzle.stanford.edu)

ops@ayov27.enet.dec.com (Joseph Early) (07/13/90)

>HOWEVER, when I asked about
>redistributing the drivers, the guy said that what I did with them was
>my own business, and IT WOULD BE OK TO GIVE THEM AWAY.
>	Andrew Lee (alee@fizzle.stanford.edu)

What about putting them to comp.binaries.ibm.pc. You think they would do 
this themselves. Microsoft put up it's generic unsupported SVGA drivers.

Joseph Early - Put my name in subject of mail. Support the short .sig campaign.
...!unido!decum!ayov27.dnet!ops 		...!ukc!wessex!ayov27.enet!ops
			 ops@ayov18.enet.dec.com

alee@portia.Stanford.EDU (Andrew Lee) (07/14/90)

In article <231@uninet.vbo.dec.com> ops@ayov27.enet.dec.com (Joseph Early) writes:
>
>>HOWEVER, when I asked about
>>redistributing the drivers, the guy said that what I did with them was
>>my own business, and IT WOULD BE OK TO GIVE THEM AWAY.
>>	Andrew Lee (alee@fizzle.stanford.edu)
>
>What about putting them to comp.binaries.ibm.pc. You think they would do 
>this themselves. Microsoft put up it's generic unsupported SVGA drivers.
>
>Joseph Early - Put my name in subject of mail. Support the short .sig campaign.
>...!unido!decum!ayov27.dnet!ops 		...!ukc!wessex!ayov27.enet!ops
>			 ops@ayov18.enet.dec.com
Well, I called them again to find out when the drivers would be out.  Now
it's some time next week.  I asked this person about the distribution
policy, and he only said that he wouldn't come after me if I gave away
copies of it.  It seems that what the first person I spoke to told me isn't
the official company policy.  If so, it means that we certainly can't
post the drivers or make them available for anonymous FTP.  The best thing
for most people to do is to contact the OEM who manufactured their board.
(Trident is giving free upgrades to those whose BOARDS were made by Trident.)
Unfortunately for me, the company that made my board, Zoltrix, doesn't
make video boards any more.

	Andrew Lee
	alee@fizzle.stanford.edu	alee@slacvm.bitnet

alee@amy1.stanford.edu (Andrew Lee) (07/21/90)

Last week, after I found out that Trident wanted $40 for Windows 3.0 drivers
for people who had boards from OEM's, rather than Trident itself, I faxed a
massive flame to them.  (From here to there, my fax modem is cheaper than
snail mail.)  Anyway, they called me back, but they hadn't changed their
policy.  They were going to set up a BBS, but only for people whose boards
were actually made by Trident; it would require the serial no.

I talked to the guy again today, and they're going to make the BBS free to
everyone now, partly because of my comments.  Supposedly, it will be up in
2-3 weeks.  I also found out that their OEM's get the drivers for free.  I
figure that if enough people talk to Trident, they can be convinced to
allow redistribution of the drivers (by anon. FTP, over Usenet, etc.)
Right now, they don't allow it, even though they don't really plan to
enforce it.

If anybody wants to contact Trident, here's their address and phone nos. again:
	Trident Microsystems, Inc.
	321 Soquel Way
	Sunnyvale, CA 94086
	Tel.: (408) 738-3194
	Fax:  (408) 738-0905


	Andrew Lee
	alee@fizzle.stanford.edu	alee@slacvm.bitnet

hv@uwasa.fi (Harri Valkama LAKE) (07/21/90)

In article <1990Jul20.205241.24996@portia.Stanford.EDU> alee@amy1.stanford.edu (Andrew Lee) writes:
>
>I talked to the guy again today, and they're going to make the BBS free to
>everyone now, partly because of my comments.  Supposedly, it will be up in
>2-3 weeks.  I also found out that their OEM's get the drivers for free.  I
>figure that if enough people talk to Trident, they can be convinced to
>allow redistribution of the drivers (by anon. FTP, over Usenet, etc.)
>Right now, they don't allow it, even though they don't really plan to
>enforce it.

So, the Trident drivers for Windows v3.0 is out now, or is it?
-- 
== Harri Valkama ==============================================================
| harri.valkama@wmac00.uwasa.fi hv@uwasa.fi hv@flame.uwasa.fi hv@nic.funet.fi |
| University of Vaasa, PO BOX 700, 65101 VAASA, Finland (fax: +358 61 248465) |
= Moderating at chyde.uwasa.fi (128.214.12.3) & nic.funet.fi (128.214.6.100) ==

alee@portia.Stanford.EDU (Andrew Lee) (07/22/90)

In article <1990Jul21.064256.19278@uwasa.fi> hv@uwasa.fi (Harri Valkama LAKE) writes:
>In article <1990Jul20.205241.24996@portia.Stanford.EDU> alee@amy1.stanford.edu (Andrew Lee) writes:
[some stuff by me]
>
>So, the Trident drivers for Windows v3.0 is out now, or is it?
>-- 
>== Harri Valkama ==============================================================
>| harri.valkama@wmac00.uwasa.fi hv@uwasa.fi hv@flame.uwasa.fi hv@nic.funet.fi |
>| University of Vaasa, PO BOX 700, 65101 VAASA, Finland (fax: +358 61 248465) |
>= Moderating at chyde.uwasa.fi (128.214.12.3) & nic.funet.fi (128.214.6.100) ==

I forgot to mention this.  The drivers for the 8900 chipset are out, but those
for the 8800 chipset won't be ready for "a few days".  The 8800 chip is no
longer being made, and the 8900 chip only came out in March.  The number should
be on the chip.

	Andrew Lee
	alee@fizzle.stanford.edu	alee@slacvm.bitnet

alee@portia.Stanford.EDU (Andrew Lee) (08/10/90)

I just got the Trident Windows 3.0 drivers for the 8800 chip boards
today, along with all of their other drivers (Presentation Manager,
etc.).  (Drivers for the 8900 chip boards have been out for about 2
weeks.)  I got drivers for 640x480x256, 800x600x16, and 1024x768x16
modes.  Unfortunately, it seems that their official policy is still
that we can't give copies away, even though they're going to make them
publicly available on their own BBS.  I think that they're still
charging $40 for the driver disks if you have an OEM board rather than
one of theirs.

If anybody wants to contact them, their address and phone numbers are:
	Trident Microsystems, Inc.
	321 Soquel Way
	Sunnyvale, CA 94086
	Tel. (408) 738-3194
	Fax  (408) 738-0905
	BBS  (408) 736-5483
Don't try calling their BBS yet.  It won't be up for 2-3 weeks, because
they had to send back the hardware yesterday.

	Andrew Lee
	alee@fizzle.stanford.edu        alee@slacvm.bitnet