Re: Work on PCI support :-)

[Radosław Kujawa <radoslaw.kujawa%c0ff33.net@localhost>]

Hi.

On Jul 16, 2011, at 9:53 PM, Frank Wille wrote:
>> - You will notice that the are some pixels missing, on the left side of
>> the screen.
> 
> Hm. Seems that the pixels are not shifted, so that they reappear on the
> other edge or leave some space there. It is probably a bad setting of the
> left display window border (or whatever it is called for Permedia2) ?

It's possible, and the same problem is visible in AmigaOS, if the card drivers 
(CGX) are not installed. Firmware boots the card in 640x480x8 mode, but it 
configures the Permedia to emulate PAL modes, so you can install AmigaOS 
without PAL monitor or scandoubler. I had no time to do the additional testing 
with CGX yet, but I assume that it might "just work" once some sane mode is 
configured on AmigaOS. Provided that CGX will not change the framebuffer 
location on the bus :-P. 

Currently both pm2fb and genfb can't change the running graphics mode or "cold 
boot" the Permedia chip, so we have to rely on whatever firmware or AmigaOS 
configures for us. I could probably take a look at Adam's old cvppc driver, 
which implemented mode setting, but first we'd need to get the pm2fb running...

> 
>> I discussed this with macallan. We've reached the
>> conclusion that the firmware sets up such weird mode.
> 
> At which point does the firmware initialize the screen mode?

During CSPPC/BPPC ROM execution.

> Can the early
> startup menu be displayed via the Permedia?

Yes. CVPPC/BVPPC are probably the only RTG cards capable of this. Excluding 
cards with integrated scandoublers, ofcourse.

--
Best regards,
Radoslaw Kujawa