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Oak OTI067 - ROM initialization screen missing?

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First post, by scruit

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tl;dr ... Question: Does the Oak OTI067 have a splash screen / initialization message at bootup?

More detail:

Working on "Uncle Sherman", my Mitsubishi MP-3200 386 from 1988. Before I start up old computers I have a process where I disassemble, test for shorts, visually inspect, capture EPROM images etc.

My T866II+ give me a "pins not detected" error on the EPROM from the Oak-based (OTI067 GPU but apparently a no-name card??) I assumed the EPROM was bad, ordered a replacement and figured I'd program a downloaded ROM image to it.

When it got time to try to fire up the PC for the first time I used a Trident TVGA8900D, which gave me the ROM splash screen / initialization message. Then RAM test, KBD error and FD error (those aren't plugged in yet) All looked good.

For poop and giggles... I mean "completeness and due diligence"... I put the Oak card in. It also fired up and POSTed, but I don't get any splash screen / initialization message from the card. First thing I see is RAM test, etc.

So either the card supposed to have an initialization message, and its absence is a symptom of the bad EPROM... (doubtful, tbh) Or there is no splash screen, the card is fine, and my EPROM reader and that particular EPROM are just having "personality clash". (my theory)

Thoughts?

Reply 1 of 5, by Tiido

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There just isn't any on that particular video BIOS version. Not all cards have such screens and some BIOSes manage to supress them even.

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Reply 2 of 5, by scruit

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Tiido wrote on 2022-04-17, 12:38:

There just isn't any on that particular video BIOS version. Not all cards have such screens and some BIOSes manage to supress them even.

Thank you for your response.

Well, then I will stop worrying about the initialization message and just use the card. 😀

Thanks!

Reply 3 of 5, by Jo22

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I agree with the others. My Schneider Tower AT 286 had an OTI 037c with a VGA BIOS that showed a rainbow colour effect,
for example, but the OTI 067 I installed afterwards hasn't such an effect.
It just prints a simple text string.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zc2fVXozxwU

Edit: I can make a photo of my OTI 067's initialization and also dump the VGA BIOS if it's helpful. :)

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Reply 4 of 5, by scruit

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I appreciate the offer, but I don't think that is necessary right now. 😀

The BIOS appears to be good. It has been suggested that it might be a MASK ROM rather than an eprom, so I may be able to read it using AM27C256 settings and skipping the pin detect... However as the card clearly works as I can follow POST. I think I am assuming my inability to read "the eprom" is a problem ... but there is no real problem.

Reply 5 of 5, by mkarcher

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Tiido wrote on 2022-04-17, 12:38:

There just isn't any on that particular video BIOS version. Not all cards have such screens and some BIOSes manage to supress them even.

There are basically two kinds of VGA initialization messages. Old VGA cards just printed some lines on the screen when they were initialized. The early PC/XT/AT BIOSes didn't clear the screen afterwards and just continued printing the memory test below the VGA initialization message. At some point in time, mainboard BIOSes started to clear the screen and draw the POST screen fully under BIOS control. Any VGA copyright message will be erased by that.

VGA vendors responded to the BIOSes clearing "their" screen by adding a delay to the VGA BIOS after printing the VGA copyright message, so the message is still readable, even if the mainboard BIOS clears the screen after VGA initialization is finished. An early VGA BIOS, or a VGA BIOS with the delay disabled, combined with a late mainboard BIOS causes the screen to be missing / suppressed.

Disabling the delay is an OEM option that may be enabled or disabled by the card manufacturer on some VGA cards. The manufacturer uses a BIOS customization process provided by the VGA BIOS vendor and can create images with and without that delay at their discretion.

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