I don't know if it is applicable in this case, but many 286 boards are an OR setup with dip and sipp/simm banks... There are exceptions, but it's usually one or the other - not both.

Is there no means to access the bios to do any setup in there?

AMISETUP is for AMI HiFlex BIOS; this 286 BIOS is too old and I don't think has hidden options anyway.

It's likely that in the 1MB configuration, the chipset is programmed for shadowing on and relocation off. If you can disable all shadowing, hopefully the bios enables relocation giving you 384K of extended memory.

Because this board uses an 8-bit BIOS chip, it was designed to be used with shadowing on, however.

megatron-uk wrote on 2023-10-21, 23:33:

I don't know if it is applicable in this case, but many 286 boards are an OR setup with dip and sipp/simm banks... There are exceptions, but it's usually one or the other - not both.

Is there no means to access the bios to do any setup in there?

DIPs + SIPP works, as 512KB of DIPs + SIPPs gives 640KB.
The DIPs are mine, 70ns like the ram. It was a test. I get the same 512KB if I leave just 2 SIPP sticks.

No options in BIOS, it's the b&w with just basic options.

I'm looking for a BIOS, the ones that come in pink+brown... commonly found on 386s. It's an idea, not a certainty it'll work. 😀

jakethompson1 wrote on 2023-10-21, 23:36:

AMISETUP is for AMI HiFlex BIOS; this 286 BIOS is too old and I don't think has hidden options anyway.

It's likely that in the 1MB configuration, the chipset is programmed for shadowing on and relocation off. If you can disable all shadowing, hopefully the bios enables relocation giving you 384K of extended memory.

Because this board uses an 8-bit BIOS chip, it was designed to be used with shadowing on, however.

Any idea what program I should use to try anything?
There are aonly BIOS and VIDEO shadow, both enabled or disabled does nothing.

Shouldn't ram exceeding 640 appear anyway? IDK, prolly a custom bios to limit machines and avoid "workers" to play? 🤣

There's an EMS driver on the page.
So I assume the board can handle more than 1 MB?

If it was my board, I would remove all RAM and install two SIMMs of 1 MB each (80286 is 16-Bit, 2x 8-Bit SIMMs per RAM bank).

I would just use two slim SIMM sockets and plug them into the corresponding SIPP sockets (as an adapter).

Or I'd just solder pins to a pair of spare SIMMs, pinout is 1:1 identical.

I did this in the past using resistor legs, not pretty but it worked. Though a pin strip would be more elegant, perhaps.

Edit: I forgot to say, I was just thinking out loud. I'm not telling anyone how to do things, of course. Many roads lead to Rome, so to say. 🙂

My old 286 systems required me to manually type in how much ram was installed.

Sometimes I had to set a jumper for “bank 0” to tell it what banks were active.

It’s possible that it’s only “seeing “ the sticks of ram giving you 1mb usable which on old systems was only 640k plus UMBs

Also you don’t get 640k + 384 extended unless your board supports relocation.
Relocation + shadow was rare.

Nexxen wrote on 2023-10-21, 23:44:

Shouldn't ram exceeding 640 appear anyway? IDK, prolly a custom bios to limit machines and avoid "workers" to play? 🤣

For whatever reason, AMI always subtracted unrelocated RAM from 640K-1024K from the displayed memory count, while Award did not.
Thus AMI gives odd counts like 3968 KB, 7808 KB, 16000 KB, etc. while Award would display the "expected" amount.

jakethompson1 wrote on 2023-10-21, 23:58:

Nexxen wrote on 2023-10-21, 23:44:

Shouldn't ram exceeding 640 appear anyway? IDK, prolly a custom bios to limit machines and avoid "workers" to play? 🤣

For whatever reason, AMI always subtracted unrelocated RAM from 640K-1024K from the displayed memory count, while Award did not.
Thus AMI gives odd counts like 3968 KB, 7808 KB, 16000 KB, etc. while Award would display the "expected" amount.

I can't make use of it. I tried drivers for EMS, XMS... nothing. Not even the ones supposed to work 😀
Crazy...

In config and autoexec combos nothing loads beyond 640KB.
I could have made a mistake.

Jo22 wrote on 2023-10-21, 23:51:

There's an EMS driver on the page. So I assume the board can handle more than 1 MB? […]
Show full quote

There's an EMS driver on the page.
So I assume the board can handle more than 1 MB?

If it was my board, I would remove all RAM and install two SIMMs of 1 MB each (80286 is 16-Bit, 2x 8-Bit SIMMs per RAM bank).

I would just use two slim SIMM sockets and plug them into the corresponding SIPP sockets (as an adapter).

Or I'd just solder pins to a pair of spare SIMMs, pinout is 1:1 identical.

I did this in the past using resistor legs, not pretty but it worked. Though a pin strip would be more elegant, perhaps.

Edit: I forgot to say, I was just thinking out loud. I'm not telling anyone how to do things, of course. Many roads lead to Rome, so to say. 🙂

I thought of that. I'd like to solder simm sockets to use above 1MB...
No offense taken, we are here to team up and solve stuff.

Guess hte driver isn't working correctly anyway:
see readme.

Edit, maybe broken traces? Again continuity tests... I am a masochist.

Nexxen wrote on 2023-10-22, 00:05:

jakethompson1 wrote on 2023-10-21, 23:58:

Nexxen wrote on 2023-10-21, 23:44:

Shouldn't ram exceeding 640 appear anyway? IDK, prolly a custom bios to limit machines and avoid "workers" to play? 🤣

For whatever reason, AMI always subtracted unrelocated RAM from 640K-1024K from the displayed memory count, while Award did not.
Thus AMI gives odd counts like 3968 KB, 7808 KB, 16000 KB, etc. while Award would display the "expected" amount.

I can't make use of it. I tried drivers for EMS, XMS... nothing. Not even the ones supposed to work 😀
Crazy...

Your chipset supports more memory maps than what your BIOS allows, it seems:

It appears you're stuck in mode 1 with shadowing on, which means no EMS and no extended memory.
Alternatives would be mode 1 with shadowing off, no XMS, and with EMS, or mode 1F, with shadowing off, no EMS, and with XMS.
It's possible you could try and poke at the chipset registers with DEBUG after boot, or patch the BIOS to try and use one of these other modes.
I suspect if you turn both forms of shadowing off and then try the EMS driver again, it may work...

jakethompson1 wrote on 2023-10-22, 00:18:

Your chipset supports more memory maps than what your BIOS allows, it seems: […]
Show full quote

Nexxen wrote on 2023-10-22, 00:05:

jakethompson1 wrote on 2023-10-21, 23:58:

For whatever reason, AMI always subtracted unrelocated RAM from 640K-1024K from the displayed memory count, while Award did not.
Thus AMI gives odd counts like 3968 KB, 7808 KB, 16000 KB, etc. while Award would display the "expected" amount.

I can't make use of it. I tried drivers for EMS, XMS... nothing. Not even the ones supposed to work 😀
Crazy...

Your chipset supports more memory maps than what your BIOS allows, it seems:

VL82C320_DRAM.png

It appears you're stuck in mode 1 with shadowing on, which means no EMS and no extended memory.
Alternatives would be mode 1 with shadowing off, no XMS, and with EMS, or mode 1F, with shadowing off, no EMS, and with XMS.
It's possible you could try and poke at the chipset registers with DEBUG after boot, or patch the BIOS to try and use one of these other modes.
I suspect if you turn both forms of shadowing off and then try the EMS driver again, it may work...

This is interesting but, alas, non clue how. This is the point I am in the dark.
I'll take pics of the BIOS menu. Wait a wee bit 😉

I need a new BIOS.
No idea of compatibles. I can merge odd and evens but don't know how.

Nothing is simple here... 🤣 🤣

bios
not much choice...

Ok, I was thinking bios is stuck at mode 3 with shadow since he said he could get 640k (4x256k -384k)... just thinking out loud 🤣
Odd I have a similar bios but has a page 2 where you have to set other RAM items. I noted the bios at Retro is dated 7/1990 and your is dated 1990...

Horun wrote on 2023-10-22, 01:19:

Ok, I was thinking bios is stuck at mode 3 with shadow since he said he could get 640k (4x256k -384k)... just thinking out loud 🤣
Odd I have a similar bios but has a page 2 where you have to set other RAM items. I noted the bios at Retro is dated 7/1990 and your is dated 1990...

If it is in 64KB attach it and I'll test it. THanks!!

It is 64k and appears from a hex edit to be near identical screens as yours but here it is: https://theretroweb.com/motherboards/s/abc-co … 1-v3-#downloads

That is very primitive bios type. And motherboard and the bios has to be set up to use more than 1MB.

Cheers,

Horun wrote on 2023-10-22, 01:25:

It is 64k and appears from a hex edit to be near identical screens as yours but here it is: https://theretroweb.com/motherboards/s/abc-co … 1-v3-#downloads

That one is mine, I uploaded the image. Better than nothing if there isn't one around 😀

pentiumspeed wrote on 2023-10-22, 01:26:

That is very primitive bios type. And motherboard and the bios has to be set up to use more than 1MB.

Cheers,

We aren't even getting to 1MB... just 640KB.
🤣