Magnum One/Magnum One (Mid-American Digital) (Disc Manufacturing).iso/d21/qram101.arc/READ.ME

Text File | 1991-06-16 | 12KB | 329 lines

QRAM Version 1
Additional Information

This file contains information which does not
appear in the current manual.

**** If you would like to print this file,
     simply type

     COPY READ.ME PRN: ─┘

at the DOS prompt.


**** Order of loading programs

Normally the INSTALL procedure will place
QRAM.SYS into its correct place in your
CONFIG.SYS file.  Simply stated, there should
not be any other drivers between your expanded
memory manager and QRAM.SYS, and QRAM.SYS
should follow the expanded memory manager.

Also, if you use the QEXT.SYS driver for XMS
support or for DESQview, it should now be AFTER
the QRAM.SYS driver.  This is because it is
possible to have QEXT.SYS loaded into high RAM,
but only after the high RAM is created by
QRAM.SYS.  As mentioned in the DESQview manual,
QEXT.SYS should be the first program which uses
exTENDed memory.  If you have a driver which
controls both extended and expanded memory,
such as QEMM-50/60 or ALLEMM4, then be sure to
reserve at least 64K for QEXT's use.  For
example, when using QEMM-50/60 you would add
the parameter EXTMEM=64.


**** Lotus 1-2-3 reports that "123 cannot start
     because the driver set is invalid."

If you get this message you are probably using
VIDRAM.  1-2-3 is trying to check on the
graphics card's capabilities and VIDRAM is
telling it that no graphics are allowed.

If you run the 1-2-3 INSTALL program and delete
the graphics entry, then 1-2-3 will work.  The
best way is to use 1-2-3 INSTALL's "Advanced
Options" and "Modify Current Driver Set"
selections.  Then select the "Graph Display"
item.  Using the "Del" key on the driver which
is selected.  After doing this, press the "Esc"
key and use "Save Changes" to save the driver
set with a different name (we suggest 123VID).
Then when you use 1-2-3 with VIDRAM simply
enter

   123 123VID

and the right driver will be used.

DESQview users may want to install a second
version of 1-2-3 which passes 123VID as another
parameter.


**** Extra messages from OPTIMIZE

The OPTIMIZE program may report things which
are not mentioned in the documentation:

  1) The number of combinations OPTIMIZE uses
     to figure out the best possible locations
     for your programs.  This number depends on
     the number of programs which need to be
     loaded high, and the number of High RAM
     areas.  If you have few High RAM areas,
     then the number will be smaller than if
     you have many.

  2) The amount of memory you gain or lose by
     using OPTIMIZE is reported.  OPTIMIZE will
     save the current memory size when it is
     run and then calculates the difference
     when it has finished its 2nd reboot.  If
     you have previously run OPTIMIZE (i.e. you
     already have some programs loaded high),
     then the memory savings or loss is
     reflected in the new memory values.

  3) Unable to optimize a line in AUTOEXEC.BAT
     because it is too long.  Since OPTIMIZE
     needs to add some extra parameters to each
     LOADHI, it is possible that the line will
     end up longer than 128 characters. Lines
     in AUTOEXEC are limited to 128 characters,
     so OPTIMIZE can't test if LOADHI will work
     for that line so, you might try OPTIMIZE
     /PATH which will avoid adding the path to
     each LOADHI (instead, it adds the QRAM
     subdirectory to your PATH).

You may have to watch carefully for these
items, since they may happen in the middle of
your AUTOEXEC file.


**** Additional switches for OPTIMIZE

Several switches have been added to OPTIMIZE
since the manual was printed.  Some of these
switches are for its own use while others may
be useful to you.  You can see the switches
yourself by typing:

    OPTIMIZE /HELP

The /PATH switch tells OPTIMIZE to add the path
to OPTIMIZE to your PATH= statement in the
AUTOEXEC.BAT file.

The /EMM:fname switch tells OPTIMIZE the name
of your expanded memory manager.  Most expanded
memory managers have "EMM" somewhere in their
name, but if yours does not, then you may have
to use this switch so the OPTIMIZE will know
which line in your CONFIG.SYS is the expanded
memory manager.

The /LOADHIONLY switch tells OPTIMZE to only
modify lines which alread have LOADHI in them.
This will keep OPTIMIZE from trying to add
LOADHI to lines which you may not want loaded
high.


**** What are those numbers in the LOADHI.OPT
     file that OPTIMIZE creates?

When OPTIMIZE is gathering statistics on your
programs, it uses the "GS" parameter with the
output sent to a file.  The file name is
LOADHI.OPT and will usually be found in the
QRAM directory.  You can see the same numbers
if you use the "/GS" parameter yourself.

The first item on each line is the name of the
program.  The second item is a number which is
the amount of memory the program needs to load
in.  The third item is the amount of memory the
program leaves resident in memory (a 0
indicates a program which leaves nothing
resident, no reason to load that one high).
The two letters are something OPTIMIZE uses to
keep track of which programs and device drivers
are where.

By the way, if you use DESQview and are
wondering how to figure out how much memory a
program needs, you can use LOADHI/GS progname
for any program.  The first number you get
(when you exit the program) is that program's
minimum memory usage to load.


**** There should be enough room to LOADHI a
     program, but it won't load into high RAM

First, see the item 'Attempting to LOADHI a
program reports "Not enough room to load High"'
in Appendix A.

Second, If you think a program should be able
to LOADHI but it won't, check the LOADHI.OPT
file for its size.  Perhaps if you load the
items in your CONFIG or AUTOEXEC files in a
different order it may be able to fit.  This is
especially true of programs which start out
using large amounts of memory to load in and
then leave small amounts resident.  In general,
if you can load the programs which use the most
amount of RESIDENT memory first, you'll be able
to fit more programs into memory.

Third, maybe you have "too many" high RAM
areas.  This means that you have some devices
using memory between 640K and 1024K (A000-FFFF)
which fragment the high RAM.  This is
especially true on PS/2 computers.  Devices
such as network cards, hard disks, and 3270
cards can put ROM and RAM in this area.
"Fragmenting" the area above 640K, means that
these ROMs and RAMs are leaving empty places
between them.  The best thing to do is to move
each of the ROM and/or RAM pieces to the
beginning or end of your usuable area.  This
means to move them as close to C000 (the lowest
possible) or E000 (the highest possible) as you
can.  Try to get the end of one device and the
start of the next device to be right next to
each other.  Then you'll have fewer high RAM
areas, but they will be larger in size (the
same amount of memory is available, it's just
in bigger pieces).


**** New Parameter NOVIDEORAM prevents high RAM
     in the video area

When using Monochrome, Hercules, or CGA video
adapters, QRAM normally fills the unused
memory areas between 640K and 736K with memory
and raises the DOS upper memory limit to 704K
or 736K.  This process is call "video filling".
If you do not want the DOS memory limit
increased, then you must specify NOVIDEOFILL.
The video areas will be treated as High RAM if
NOVIDEOFILL and RAM are specified.  If you do
not want the area treated as High RAM, then you
may specify NOVIDEORAM which will prevent any
area below C000 not explicitly specified as
high RAM from becoming high RAM.  Most people
won't need to use this parameter; it is
intended to make VIDRAMEGA and VIDRAMEMS easier
to understand.


**** New Parameters for use along with VIDRAM

If you wish to use the VIDRAM program, you may
find two new parameters to be of some use.
These parameters are VIDRAMEGA and VIDRAMEMS.
These parameters affect how QRAM treats the
memory area between A000 to BFFF, commonly
called "the video area".

VIDRAMEGA tells QRAM that the video area is not
to be mappable.  This is equivalent to having
the following parameters on the QRAM line:

   X=A000-BFFF

VIDRAMEMS tell QRAM that the video area is
mappable but it is not a part of conventional
memory nor will be converted to high RAM.  This
is equivalent to the following parameters on
the QRAM line:

   NOVIDEOFILL NOVIDEORAM I=A000-AFFF

These two new parameters are meant to be used
along with the VIDRAM program.  VIDRAM will
allow you to use the EGA/VGA video area as
conventional memory as long as you don't use a
graphics program.

With VIDRAMEGA, the memory used to fill in the
video area by the VIDRAM program comes from the
EGA or VGA card's memory.  While this will
conserve your extended memory for use as
expanded memory, the memory provided is usually
very slow, often less than half the speed of
your other memory.

With VIDRAMEMS, the memory used to fill in the
video area by the VIDRAM program comes from
expanded memory (EMS).  This memory is usually
just as fast as your other memory, and since it
is mappable, the size of background programs
inside DESQview will increase as well.

The VIDRAMEMS option will confuse versions of
DESQview prior to 2.26.  You should NOT use
VIDRAMEMS with DESQview unless you have version
2.26 or higher.


**** New parameters to allow the Page Frame to
     be smaller than 64K

FORCEEMS, (FEMS), instructs QRAM to allow EMS
memory requests to be honored. Use this
parameter only if you have used the FRAMELENGTH
parameter (see below) with a value less than
four. This will allow programs limited access
to expanded memory even without a full page
frame. Be aware that some programs which use
expanded memory may not work with a partial or
missing page frame if you use this option.

FRAMELENGTH=x, (FL), instructs QRAM to assume a
page frame containing "x" pages, where "x" is a
number from 0 to 4. Setting "x" to zero is
equivalent to not having a page frame at all.
See also FRAME=NONE. Setting "x" to four is
equivalent to the EMS standard. Normally a page
frame is established by the expanded memory
manager and consists of four 16K pages. With
this parameter, QRAM allows you to free up one
or more of these pages for use as high RAM. Or,
you can use this option with FORCEEMS if you
have programs which can make use of expanded
memory in the absence of a page frame, or with
a partial page frame. This can be important if
none of your high memory areas is large enough
for a standard size page frame. See also
FORCEEMS and NOEMS.


**** Using Super PC-Kwik with LOADHI

The Super PC-Kwik disk cache may cause OPTIMIZE
some confusion when it is loaded high.  While
it is possible to load this program hign, the
amount of memory it may take when loaded high
can be different than when the program is
loaded low.  Since OPTIMZE loads all programs
in low memory to calculate its size, you may
find that programs loaded after the disk cache
may not be able to load high.  One possible way
to avoid this problem is to use /t:8 with
SUPERPCK.  This parameter limits the amount of
"look ahead" the cache uses to less than a full
track.  Refer to the Super PC-Kwik manual for
mor information about the "/t" switch.