Night Owl 9/Night Owl CD-ROM (NOPV9) (Night Owl Publisher) (1993).ISO/038a/iocheck.zip/READ.ME

Text File | 1993-04-01 | 10KB | 211 lines

IOCHECK.EXE - A Communications Port From Drastic Technologies.

   Drastic's Master Distributor:

      Forefront Graphics Corporation
      37 Kodiak Cres, Unit 6
      Downsview, ON, M3J 3E5, CANADA.
      [phone], (FAX) 636 4454


   IOCHECK is a utility which provides as much information as is available
concerning your PC's communications ports.  It was initially developed to
search for the Drastic VCR Controller card.  In the interest of minimizing
technical support and maximizing user awareness, this utility has been
donated as freeware.  This means that Drastic Technologies retains the
copyright and rights to this program, but it may be freely given and
used by whoever you like.  The only restriction is that you may not include
this utility in your product, unless it is public domain, freeware or
shareware (Anyone creating shareware deserves as much support as we can
give them).  No matter how this product is distributed, it CANNOT be include
in a 'commercial' product, nor can any free be charged for it (excluding
its inclusion in a larger shareware product, or those companies who sell
and distribute shareware for a minimal cost).  This readme must also be
included with the file through any distribution channel.  No that we're
through with the stupid legal jargon. . .

---IOCHECK

   To run IOCHECK effectively, it should be run immeadiately afer a COLD
BOOT (e.g. Turn the power off, wait, and turn it back on).  This will give
IOCHECK the oppertunity to check for UARTS before any one else tries to
use them (mouse drivers, ect don't present a problem).  Unlike most system
check programs (SI, PD system checks), IOCHECK doesn't not expect the BIOS
to have any idea what is actually in your system (because it usually
doesn't).  IOCHECK searches for COM ports and Serial UARTS the hard way,
location by location.  Once IOCHECK ID's a UART, is reports its location
and tries to find its interrupt.  The interrupt will then be reported back
as 3 through 7, above 8 or unknown.  It can only accurately find UARTs
with interrupts below 7 (that's most of them).  Once the interrupt is taken
care of, IOCHECK test what generation of 8250 UART you have.  This is
reported at the end of the COM/PORT line.

   Because IOCHECK spends most of its time slamming bytes in and out of
your I/O Space it has the potential of knocking the wrong door.  If this
happens, you system may cease to function (READ:  Screaming down in a
flaming wreck).  This 'crash' will not harm you system in any way!  The
offending card is usually an overly sensitive SCSI or network adapter.    To
remedy this, you must figure out where your non standard cards are placed
in I/O Space.  Once you know this, you can exclude these address in your
search.  To exclude them, simply place them on the command line after
the program name (IOCHECK):

   IOCHECK 2A0 2A8 168

This line will exclude 2A0-2A7, 2A8-2AF and 268-26F from the search,
bypassing any cards that may be using that space.  The value the card
uses should always be brought down to the nearest 0 or 8, because thats
where we always begin or tests.  Each exclusion is good for 8 bytes.

   Because the PC is so standard (HAHAHAHAHAHHAHAHAHA), IOCHECK
automatically ignores some I/O spaces.    The missed spaces are list below
with some lame reason for checking them, when the truth is we are just
too lazy:

   108          - PS/2 Option Select
   1F0, 1F8      - Hard Drive
   200, 208      - Parallel and other stuff
   238          - Bus Mouse, Train Rat
   278          - More of the same
   2B0, 2B8,
   2C0, 2C8,
   2D0, 2D8,      - EGA
   320, 32F,      - XT Hard Disk
   3B0          - Mono card
   3B8          - Even MORE Parallel & O. S.
   3C8, 3D0, 3D8  - Video (look at all the pretty colours)
   3E0          - Still more video
   3F0          - Floppies (why are the lights binking?)

As far as interrupts go (and, considering their latency, that's not far),
IOCHECK 'captures' interrupts 2-7 and then forces the chip to interrupt.
Once a confirmed capture is made, it reports that as the UARTs IRQ value.
This test will only work it the card is using one of the standard methods
for enabling or disabling interrupts (there's about 5, a low number for
PC based 'standards').  If IOCHECK cannot find the interrupt (e.g. reports
UNKNOWN) it means one of three things.    1:  There is an interrupt conflict
in your PC.  To remedy this, check your bus for hordes of moguals running
about, chopping each other's heads off or two cards trying to use the
same interrupt (the hordes are the prettier of the two).  Fix it dear Liza,
by changing the interrupt of one of the cards and trying again.  2:  The
interrupt is set to a value above 7.  IOCHECK will not find any such sillily
configured UARTS.  3:  The card is bust or incorrectly installed.  Just for
reference, here's a list of interrupts and their common abuses:

   IRQ     Use                Comment

    0      Timer/Ram Refresh         Not available on the BUS
    1     Keyboard                    "                    "
    2      Cascade to IRQ 8-15         PCs are sooooooo dumb.
    3      COM2: & COM4:             But not at the same time . . .
    4      COM1: & COM2:             But not at the (dead mouse)
    5      Reserved             Acually not used, a good choice.
    6      Diskette             Not a good choice
    7      Parallel Port             But nobody uses it, a good choice.

   The last thing IOCHECK does, is figure out what kind of UART you
have.  Below is a list of the responses and a small quip.

INS8250/8250B  - Original UART.  Get rid of it

INS8250A/16550 - Fixed up original.  Not a bad mouse port

INS16550       - 1st real UART.  Fifos but a little buggy

INS16550       - They finally got it right.  Best option.

   That's all folks.  The rest of this file is a glossary and blatant
advertising.  Sensible people may skip it . . .

---Drastic Technologies

   Essentially, Mad Hackers desperately looking for something else
to do.  Started in '92 with 1 weekends beer money (about $124.25 all
told) which has grown into a hardware/software tool house, mostly selling
to OEMs (guy's who pay you good scotch money to take your program and
call it their's).  Latest OEMs include Matrox Electronics, Selectra
Corporation, Vivid Group, Interactor, Glaxo Canada ect.  Between messing
with these people, Drastic has created a few products of our own:

   Animation Commander:

      A single frame animation controller used to dump animations to
      tape from rendering programs.  Includes an AutoDesk 3D Studio/
      Animator Pro ADI (read Internal) driver, DOS Command Line
      control software for up to 3 deck rotoscoping, A GSL Topas overlay
      driver, Windows 3.1 MCI drivers and a TSR controller.
      It also includes a DiaQuest emulation mode for packages not
      directly supported and a stand alone Windows application to
      record animations to tape for packages that don't allow controllers
      at all.  Supports a large range of VCRs and includes all the
      hardware software you need.  Ver 2.0

   Virtual VCR:

      A black box that acts like a Industrial VCR.  Hook it up to an
      edit controller, computer editor or run it from the keypad. The
      main difference between this and a regular VCR is that the Virtual
      VCR record and plays back video and audio directly from Hard Drive.
      Using LSI's JPEG chipset, the VVCR records and plays back Industrial
      level, non linear video and DAT quality audio for your standard
      edit suite/animation system.  Uses Sony 422 protocol or LaserDisc
      emulation.  Various lengths (10min to 8hour) available.

   Animation Stand:

      A Virtual VCR, except entirely RAM based.  Broadcast quality
      video for 30 to 180 seconds.  Removable backup media and GPI/422/232
      interfaces make it a perfect animation or broadcast cart system.
      No headache animation recording and insertion.

   Animation Commander NL:

      A Virtual VCR in your PC.  Connects directly to AutoDesk 3D Studio
      to compress animations and then play them back to any videotape
      recorder.  Cheaper and higher quality then frame accurate decks,
      while being far more flexible.  Currently only supports 3D Studio
      but we're hoping to generate interest from other animation companies
      for this solution (READ:    Call us if you have an app. we can connect
      to).  Length of recording depends on the size of your hard drive.

   Windows 3.1 MCI Kit:

      A series of VCR control drivers for 422 and 232 based VCRs.  For
      computer based editting and multimedia apps.  Simple 'string' inferface
      as well as low level 'C' interface.  Standard windows compatible,
      with full documentation  for interfacing to MS C, Borland C, Watcom
      C, most other 'C's, ToolBox, Visual Basic, Icon Author and most
      multimedia apps.    Supports:  Selectra VuPort, Sony VISCA/V-Box,
      JVC 605, Pansonic 5700, 7150, 7350, Sony 2600, 2650, 2800, 9800,
      9850, Panasonuc 7650, 7750, JVC 622/822 . . . to name a few.

---Glossary

Drastic Technologies
      - A funky software/hardware design house populated entirely by
      musicians, audio guys, video guys and drunks that produces
      products that we need for our other, more interesting pursuits.
      Not to be messed with, we'll piddle on your ankle!!!

Hexidecimal
      - A counting system based on 16 (0-9, A-F) used by masochistic
      programmer types and PC sales guys who are trying to prove
      that they have some idea of what their doing.  Don't bother
      understanding it, all your other manuals use it too.  Just
      copy the strange number/letters and impress your friends with
      this six sylabel word, as they probably don't know what it
      means either.

I/O Space
      - That never-never land of memory that the 80x86 accesses in
      a completely different way then normal memory.  A favorite
      for PC Adapter (read CARD) designer because it requires only
      a brain dead implementation of interface circuitry.

UART
      - Universal Asychronous Reciever Transmitter (or something like
      that).  In our case 8250, 16450 and 16550 (plus some letters) for
      National Semiconductor.  These are the standard UARTs used in
      PC Compatibles.