SIXTH REVISION (01/27/94): From all that I've learned, the choices for a good OS/2 2.1 video card as I see them (in increasing order of performance and to some degree cost) are: * XGA-2 (CatsEye/X and Radius): ISA cards using the IBM chipset that have excellent driver support under OS/2 2.1. Speed is reportedly good, but not as fast as the latest S3, Weitek and IIT accelerators. Color depth is limited to 16 bits (static 64K color pallette). However, further development of the XGA architecture has reportedly been abandoned (and the CatsEye/X discontinued) as IBM has adopted S3 for future products. * ATI Graphics Ultra Pro [VRAM] and Plus [DRAM]: Able to use generic 8514/A drivers in many environments, which makes them a good choice for OS/2. ATI native OS/2 drivers have been released, but they aren't much faster than the 8514/A (i.e., significantly slower than ATI Windows drivers) -- essentially they are 8514/A drivers hacked to support more resolutions, and have proved to be a bit buggy. Thanks to lukewarm support for OS/2, ATI drivers won't be getting hardware support for Ultimotion video. These cards used to be quite pricey, but have now come down to a somewhat more reasonable level. ISA, VLB and EISA versions are available. (The reincarnation of the old 8-bit Graphics Ultra is unimpressive. The newer XLR is claimed to be up to twice as fast as the Ultra Pro, but real-world results seem to be more in the range of 10-20%. Caveat emptor in both cases) * Tseng ET4000W32-series [DRAM] (Hercules Dynamite, Diamond Stealth 32, and a number of smalled suppliers): Fastest DOS and dumb frame buffer performance. The best non-accelerated driver support of any card. A dumb frame buffer ET4000 performs much faster on VLB than on the ISA bus, giving perhaps 1/2 the speed boost of an ISA bus S3 accelerator (though much less than a VLB accelerator), so a VLB Tseng ET4000W32 should give at least respectable performance even without accelerated drivers. Very good accelerated Windows performance. Accelerated drivers for OS/2 are just becoming available. A good value, with prices about the same as the S3 801/805. However, VESA 70+ Hz refresh rates are only supported at up to 8-bit (256) colors; 16-bit (64K) and 24-bit (16M) color are limited to 60 Hz. A faster version, the ET4000W32i ("i" as in interleaved memory access), has performance that is closer to S3. An even faster version (thanks to a drawing engine at last), the ET4000W32p, which is just becoming available, finally has performance comparable to the S3 805-series; one of the first is the Diamond Stealth 32 (which, despite the confusing "Stealth" name is *not* an S3-based card -- OS/2 drivers due to be released "soon"). * S3 801/805 [DRAM] (Diamond Stealth 24, Orchid F1280+, Actix, STB): S3 is well-supported by drivers in most environments. IBM has commited full 32-bit seamless driver support for certain S3 cards, and excellent 16M-color drivers have been released (on CompuServe GO OS2SUPPORT and look for S3_16M.DSK); a driver update is due sometime soon. The 801/805 cards are a good deal faster than the old fast S3 911/924 cards (even unaccelerated and especially in DOS text mode), and are a real bargain thanks to the use of lower cost DRAM (about $160 on the street with 1 Mb). 24-bit color in 640x480, 16-bit (64K) color at 800x600, and 8-bit (256) color at 1024x768. Greater color depth and up to 1280x1024 resolution (depending on the video card) with 2 Mb of DRAM. VESA-standard refresh rates possible at all resolutions (again depending on the video card). Both ISA and VLB versions. A faster version of the 805, the 805i ("i" as in interleaved memory access), is just becoming available. (Note that the Diamond Stealth 32 is *not* an S3-based card.) * S3 928 [VRAM] (Diamond Stealth Pro, Actix, Metheus, Number Nine, STB): Faster than the S3 801/805, but significantly more expensive (about $220 on the street with 1 Mb) due to the use of VRAM; the speed difference only really shows up at the higher color depths, resolutions (up to 1280x1024 with 1 Mb) and/or refresh rates (VESA-standard at all resolutions). Upgrade to 2 Mb ($80-100) allows (unaccelerated) 24-bit color in 800x600, 16-bit (64K) color at 1024x768, and 8-bit (256) color at 1280x1024. Driver support is the same as the S3 801/805; i.e., excellent (see above). Some cards (e.g., Metheus and STB) support up to 4 Mb of DRAM, which gives 24-bit color at 1024x768 and resolutions as high as 1600x1200, although OS/2 drivers for these resolutions do not yet exist. (Note that the Diamond Stealth 32 is *not* an S3-based card.) * P9000 [VRAM/DRAM] (Diamond Viper, Orchid P9000): The P9000 is very fast, faster than the S3 928 as measured by WinBench 3.11, although the real world performance difference is small. However, performance in DOS text mode is normally poor due to the need for a separate VGA chip that typically is slow. (An improved version due in 1994, the P9100, will have fast integrated VGA.) Thanks to top accelerated performance, separate VGA and pricey VRAM (resolutions up to 1280x1024x256, all at VESA-standard refresh rates), at the moment it's about $300-400 on the street. OS/2 drivers are thus far slower and more limited than Windows drivers. Early cards were a bit buggy, so be sure to get the latest rev (chipset and BIOS). * IIT X-15 (Hercules Graphite and Orchid Celcius): The X-15 (an improved version of the X-14) is claimed by IIT to be the fastest current accelerator; it probably is for drawing (CAD), but is otherwise only comparable to the S3 928 and Weitek P9000. (Orchid thinks the X-15 is a bit faster than the P9000, which Orchid also sells.) OS/2 driver support is still problematic. The X-14 and X-15 are *not* fully XGA-compatible, so XGA drivers won't work. Watch out for cards that are FCC Class A rather than FCC Class B. * Matrox MGA and MGA-II [VRAM]: Probably has the greatest hardware potential (including support for 3D) of any current single chip solution, but I have not yet had a chance to test it. High pricing to match the high performance, but the new MGA-II is a bit less expensive than the original MGA (due to the ommission of 3D features that aren't used for OS/2). Windows drivers are reported to be faster than other accelerators. 8-bit drivers for OS/2 are reported to be buggy and slower than the Windows drivers. Drivers are also claimed to be available for Windows NT and X-Window. At 1993 Fall COMDEX I saw MediaVision's new color video card, which is claimed to be very fast in 24-bit (16M true color) mode and looked very impressive. Full 32-bit seamless OS/2 drivers are claimed to be in development and are supposed to be released sometime soon. This is a card to watch. Other interesting developments at 1993 Fall COMDEX included new, ultra fast 64-bit chips from S3, together with a motion video accelerator chip. However, boards with these chips won't be available before min-1994, and OS/2 drivers are anybody's guess. (BTW, my research has convinced me that WinBench is NOT an accurate predictor of real-world performance. The tests are poorly designed and not typical of real-world usage. This goes not only for version 3.11, but also for the new version 4.0 introduced at 1993 Fall COMDEX. Certain chips and/or drivers have been optimized to win the WinBench contest without providing as much real-world performance as the numbers would suggest; some are even slower in real-world performance than chips and/or drivers with lower WinBench ratings. Caveat Emptor.) The bottom line is that *any* of these cards are reasonable choices, depending on what you want and what you can afford. If I wanted to run *anything*, I'd go with the Tseng ET4000W32p. If I wanted the best OS/2 support and bang for the buck I'd go with the S3 801/805i. If I wanted top performance (and could afford it), I'd go with the S3 928, IIT X-15 or Weitek P9000, but for all but S3 only after actually testing the drivers I needed (especially with the Matrox MGA). ----- Another possible option is the Lava, a Canadian 24-bit board based on three 8514/A chips that is claimed to have OS/2 support. Because of the very high price (US$1300) and uncertain support I have not pursued it. ----- I did not find that current Western Digital (Paradise) or Cirrus Logic chipsets made sense for OS/2 users due to poor support and performance. (Although accelerated Cirrus Logic drivers are now available, current performance does not measure up to other GUI accelerators.) ----- My personal choice was the Diamond Stealth Pro VLB, which was faster and higher quality than most of the other S3 928 cards I tested. (I also liked the ability to save monitor settings in EEPROM. The one weakness is that 1024x768x64K is limited to 60 Hz refresh, but that's a mode I do not use.) The decisive factor for me on choosing the S3 928 over other chips was the excellent IBM 32-bit seamless S3 driver support and the desire for top performance at an affordable price. -John Navas CompuServe: 70244,2046 Internet: john.navas@uttsbbs.uucp 70244.2046@compuserve.com ----- GO GRAPHVEN on CompuServe for information on STB and ATI. GO GRAPHBVEN on CompuServe for information on Tseng, Diamond, Hercules and Genoa. ----- Internet mail to video card companies can be addressed through CompuServe as follows: STB Systems Eric Lofland 75300.1664@compuserve.com ATI Technologies Corilee Fox 76004.3656@compuserve.com Tseng Laboratories Joe Curley 71333.430@compuserve.com Diamond Computer Systems Lance Tom 75300.3673@compuserve.com Hercules Computer Tech. Dylan Rhodes 71333.2532@compuserve.com Genoa Systems Neil Roehm 71333.3543@compuserve.com ----- Additional contact information for high-end S3 928 suppliers: ARTIST Graphics Co. 2675 Patton Rd. St. Paul, MN 55113 800-627-8478; 612-631-7800 FAX: 612-631-7802 Tech support: Use toll-free no. ELSA America, Inc. 400 Oyster Point Blvd., Ste. 109 South San Francisco, CA 94080 800-272-3572; 415-615-7799 FAX: 415-588-0113 Tech support: Use toll-free no. Metheus Corp. 1600 N.W. Compton Dr. Beaverton, OR 97006-6905 800-638-4387; 503-690-1550 FAX: 503-690-1525 Tech support: Use main no. National Design, Inc. 1515 Capital of Texas Hwy., S, 5th Fl. Austin, TX 78746 800-253-8831; 512-329-5055 FAX: 512-329-6326 Tech support: Use main no. Number Nine Computer Corp. 18 Hartwell Ave. Lexington, MA 02173 800-GET-NINE; 617-674-0009 FAX: 617-674-2919 Tech support: Use main no. STB Systems, Inc. 1651 N. Glenville, Ste. 210 Richardson, TX 75081 800-234-4334; 214-234-8750 FAX: 214-234-1306 Tech support: Use main no. ----- FOOTNOTES: ----- > In one of your posts in OS2DF1 you mentioned that some video cards > need a memory aperature on ISA machines and that this was a problem > if the machine had 16 Mb or more of RAM. Well, I'm in the market > for a video card too and have an ISA machine with 20Mb of RAM and > was wondering what a memory aperature was and what problems the > high memory caused. The problem seems to be most commonly associated with the ATI Ultra Pro (VRAM) and Ultra Plus (DRAM) on the ISA bus. For best performance they need a linear memory aperature of at least 2Mb that is 2 Mb above all physical RAM (which must be contiguous). On an ISA bus that aperature must be below the 16Mb line because of addressing limits on the ISA bus. That means the memory aperature can't be used with more than 12 Mb of RAM. A VLB or (expensive) EISA card solves the problem. (Putting an ISA card in an EISA slot doesn't help.) BTW, I don't think the memory aperature affects the performance using IBM's 8514/A drivers, only ATI (Windows and presumably Windows NT beta) drivers. However, the Ultras are slower and more limited in 8514/A mode than they are with native ATI drivers, and ATI has yet to release drivers for OS/2 (they're in beta). Note also that ATI is known for buggy drivers. ATI claims only a 5% slowdown when the memory aperature is disabled, but there have been several reports of big performance losses and an inability to use 24-bit color; ATI's response is that it is still working on optimizing its Mach32 drivers. I received a report that the Radius XGA-2 card has the same video aperture problem as the ATI card; i.e., it won't enable the 1MB aperture in ISA machines with 16 Mb or more of RAM. I therefore assume that the CatsEye card has the same problem. Note also that, while current S3 drivers generally do not use a memory aperture, the newer S3 chips (801/805/928) do support it, and it's likely that future driver performance increases will require it. In fact, as more and more video cards require a memory aperature for best performance, it becomes even more important to have a motherboard that supports EISA, VLB or PCI, any of which solves the problem. ----- > Do you know how EISA figures in to the video board choice problem? > I have heard that EISA is much faster for DOS applications > (non-Windows, non-OS/2). Since much of what I do is DOS apps, I > would like good performance there as well as any Windows or OS/2 > graphics apps I later add. The best chips for DOS applications (that do not have accelerated drivers) are the Tseng ET4000 (unaccelerated) and ET4000W32 (accelerated), because they have the highest memory to screen bandwidth and the fewest wait states (despite using cheaper DRAM) of any VGA-type cards. (Note, however, that the S3 805/928 on local bus as fast or faster than the fast ET4000 on ISA bus.) Graphic speed is, however, limited by the slow (usually) 8 MHz 16-bit ISA bus. One way to boost graphic (and other I/O) speed is to run the ISA bus at 10 or even 12 MHz, assuming that your motherboard can do it and that *all* your peripheral cards can handle it. The second step up is 32-bit EISA, which has two or more times the throughput of the 16-bit ISA bus. However, you'll only really get that speed boost with drivers or applications that are smart enough to take advantage of the wider EISA bus; i.e., if the application only writes graphics data 8 or 16 bits at a time (which most do), the EISA bus probably won't be that much faster than the ISA bus (the only difference being bus wait states). EISA also has the disadvantage of being quite a bit more expensive than ISA. The third step up is VESA Local Bus (VLB). Since VLB runs 32-bit transfers at processor speed (up to a practical max. of 40 MHz), it has up to 10 times the speed of the ISA bus, and is much faster even for 8- or 16-bit transfers; i.e., no special driver or application support is needed to get the benefit. The good news is that VESA costs only slightly more than ISA, which is why it's taking the market by storm. The fourth step up is Peripheral Component Interconnect (PCI), a new standard in the making. PCI is not widely available yet and it's probably going to be more expensive than VLB. In the real world there probably won't be a noticeable speed difference between PCI and VLB graphics cards on the 486. It appears that VLB will continue to be dominant on the 486, with PCI taking over on the Pentium. The bottom line? For about the same money that you'd pay for an EISA graphics card you can get a VLB graphics card and a new naked VLB motherboard, and transfer over your processor, RAM and peripheral cards. The result will be significantly faster in most applications. This is why I *don't* recommend EISA for graphics cards. BTW, real performance freaks can get an EISA/VLB motherboard and have the best of both worlds. <>