[comp.sys.ibm.pc.hardware] VGA card from OAK for $59??

merx@vax5.cit.cornell.edu (12/03/90)

Hi,
  I have seen VGA boards from OAK for $59. Does anyone have one. I am looking
for an 8bit board for an XT.
Thanks,
Mike Ray

raster@pawl.rpi.edu (Jerry D Bain) (12/04/90)

merx@vax5.cit.cornell.edu writes:
>  I have seen VGA boards from OAK for $59. Does anyone have one. I am looking
>for an 8bit board for an XT.

I computer company I work with recently ordered 30 of these boards (price
considerations)... To sum it up: they lost money on the deal.

The boards all went out on 12mhz 286's and 20mhz 386SX's.  Eight were dead
out of the box.  Four died during burn-in.  Three died after a couple days
after installation.  All were recalled after a week and replace with
ATI Wonders.

I am not associated with any of these companies, and do not intend to pass
any judgement upon them.  The computer company in question really felt they
got burned on the whole deal and has decided not to purchase any more of
these boards due to apparent Quality Control problems.

ergo@netcom.UUCP (Isaac Rabinovitch) (12/04/90)

In <1990Dec3.082101.1315@vax5.cit.cornell.edu> merx@vax5.cit.cornell.edu writes:

>Hi,
>  I have seen VGA boards from OAK for $59. Does anyone have one. I am looking
>for an 8bit board for an XT.
>Thanks,
>Mike Ray

If that's the same one I got, that's a reasonable price.  The manual
is sort of misleading in places, and you'll need to reset the switches
to run it in an 8-bit slot, but that's just about the worst things I
can say about it.  I rather think it'll drive just about any analog
monitor, if you can figure out the right switch setting.

Stuff that's not in the manual:  the board seems to handle
well-behaved hercules, cga, and ega software automatically, but if the
software *isn't* well behaved, you have to tell the board what mode it
should be in.  The correct command for this is usually obvious, but
for hercules software you want "mono" mode.
-- 

	ergo@netcom.uucp			Isaac Rabinovitch
	netcom!ergo@apple.com			Silicon Valley, CA
	{apple,amdahl,claris}!netcom!ergo

		THIS STATEMENT IS VERIFIABLY, IRREFUTABLY TRUE!

ergo@netcom.UUCP (Isaac Rabinovitch) (12/04/90)

In <Y_?^!Z%@rpi.edu> raster@pawl.rpi.edu (Jerry D Bain) writes:

>merx@vax5.cit.cornell.edu writes:
>>  I have seen VGA boards from OAK for $59. Does anyone have one. I am looking
>>for an 8bit board for an XT.

>I computer company I work with recently ordered 30 of these boards (price
>considerations)... To sum it up: they lost money on the deal.

>The boards all went out on 12mhz 286's and 20mhz 386SX's.  Eight were dead
>out of the box.  Four died during burn-in.  Three died after a couple days
>after installation.  All were recalled after a week and replace with
>ATI Wonders.

Obviously you got stung, but why couldn't you force the vendor to
repair or replace?  Sounds like somebody tried to save money by buying
"as-is".

My own Oak has yet to show signs of trouble.  But then, the people
that sold it to me burned it in (and the system it was in) for two days
before shipping it to me.  Smart of them, since the system was sold
with this weird sort of agreement called a warrantee.

Hey, this reminds me of the time I had to return *four* winchesters
before I finally got one that wasn't DOA....
-- 

	ergo@netcom.uucp			Isaac Rabinovitch
	netcom!ergo@apple.com			Silicon Valley, CA
	{apple,amdahl,claris}!netcom!ergo

		THIS STATEMENT IS VERIFIABLY, IRREFUTABLY TRUE!

sunyat@pawl.rpi.edu (Eric Hsiao) (12/04/90)

I've got a true IBM VGA card I want to get rid of.  It's 8 Bit and it never had any
problems.  If you're interested, E-mail me.  Probably around $79 + COD shipping.  I
paid $215 originally last year for it.

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berger@anomaly (Mike Berger) (12/07/90)

>In <1990Dec3.082101.1315@vax5.cit.cornell.edu> merx@vax5.cit.cornell.edu writes:

>>  I have seen VGA boards from OAK for $59. Does anyone have one. I am looking
>>for an 8bit board for an XT.
*----

I saw a lot of these go at the Dayton Hamfest for $ 49.  I wondered if
they were early runs, rejects, or plain junk.  It sounds more like the
early production run theory is correct.  At that price, it might be
worth keeping one as a spare for emergencies.
--
	Mike Berger
	Department of Statistics, University of Illinois
	AT&TNET     217-244-6067
	Internet    berger@atropa.stat.uiuc.edu