VOGONS


First post, by smevans526

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My system came with an integrated Cirrus Logic CL-GD5428, 1MB VLB. Not bad, but needs a driver randomly. Crusader No Remorse, Seventh Guest, and Gabriel Knight load w/o driver (probably UNIVBE). Simlife gives waves, and tie fighter tires to load UNIVBE, but crashes.

All work fine when the 'CL Mode' VESA driver is active. Aside from consuming memory, is there any consequence to putting CL Mode in autoexec, and always running the system in VESA? I thought that VESA could slow down VGA performance...

Reply 1 of 5, by clueless1

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It looks like CLMODE is a refresh rate utility, not VESA driver:
http://nerdlypleasures.blogspot.com/2014/01/
Try UniVBE: http://www.vogonsdrivers.com/getfile.php?fileid=346

VESA drivers basically add resolution support and in some cases improve performance. It's rare to see VGA performance go down while a VESA driver is loaded.

You don't have to put it in autoexec.bat, you can put it in a batch file that launches your games. Use it for games that need it, don't use it for games that don't.

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Reply 2 of 5, by smevans526

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Interesting...

There's a previous post on me trying to load UnIvbe, and meeting failure with this chip. My initial conjecture was the fact that the chip was integrated. Univbe does load for some games, without clmode, again crusader and Gabriel knight. Seventh guest does, calling it SVGA. Yes, I know, super vga, but, I thought svga and vesa were technically different, but vesa can load modes equivalent to svga.

My point is that i figured seventh guest was using svga, not vesa.

The big game of interest is the borefest that is Simlife. It supports 800x600 16 color svga. It will not load without clmode. Again, tie fighter cd will not load without clmode.

I only did only a quick search for refresh utility, but I'm gathering it has to with optimizing Dos relative to your monitor's refresh rate.

So, simlife has nothing to do with vesa. But why would tiefighter not work in univbe without clmode? The cl-gd5428 asks for my monitor refresh rate in the bios, could supplying one possible resolve the issue without clmode?

Reply 3 of 5, by fitzpatr

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Have you isolated for your monitor? Some are not able to handle over 60Hz.

MT-32 Old, CM-32L, CM-500, SC-55mkII, SC-88Pro, SC-D70, FB-01, MU2000EX
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Reply 5 of 5, by Jo22

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UniVBE never worked for me (too buggy).
I would stick to the official VBE BIOSes, if possible. 😀

Attachments

  • Filename
    cirrus_vbe.zip
    File size
    40.93 KiB
    Downloads
    200 downloads
    File comment
    Old VBE drivers - Cirrus Logic GD540x/542x
    File license
    Fair use/fair dealing exception

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