Snover wrote:

Seriously, though. Are there any cards that support VESA but not SVGA and vice-versa?

Probably not (VESA, but not SVGA), but manufacturers seemed to declare just about anything beyond VGA as SVGA or VESA interchangeably.

As I said; I'm sure there were resolutions that were considered SVGA, but not VESA; but I know of no VESA standard that would not be legitamitely called SVGA.

I think I'll bail at this point. Now all you need is people to debate whether 15-Bit displays could be called "Hi-Color" (versus 16-bit).

I think I'll bail at this point. Now all you need is people to debate whether 15-Bit displays could be called "Hi-Color" (versus 16-bit).

Heh...why WAS there ever a 15-bit? I don't understand it. 61439 colours? Makes no sense to me.

Snover wrote:

Heh...why WAS there ever a 15-bit? I don't understand it. 61439 colours? Makes no sense to me.

I still remember when PC people told me there was no need to go beyond 16 colors. Even back then I found HAM mode (4096 12-bit color) too limiting. Of course, VGA caught on and all those game companies that thought 16 colors was plenty suddenly found that couldn't possibly make titles using less than 256 *grumble*.

I'm certain SEGA made the NV1 a 15/30 Bit card simply because that's the way it came out when they developed it (and also because the basic layout of the chipset came from the Sega Saturn, which meant VGA/SVGA/VESA standards were not a concern when it was originally designed).

But where are the extra 1/2 bits going?

I mean, 32-bit colour is 2^32 power, or 4294967296 (that's 4.294M) colours. 16-bit colour is 2^16 power, or 65536 colours. 15-bit colour is 32768 colours (half of 16-bit). 30-bit colour is 1073741824 (that's 1.073M) colours (one-quarter of 32-bit).

8-bit is RRGGBB, 0-31 [inc];
16-bit is RRGGBB, 0-127 [inc],
24-bit is RRGGBB, 0-255 [inc],
32-bit is RRGGBBAA, 0-255 [inc].

I dunno, it just doesn't seem very logical to me.

Nicht Sehr Gut wrote:

I'm certain SEGA made the NV1 a 15/30 Bit card simply because that's the way it came out when they developed it (and also because the basic layout of the chipset came from the Sega Saturn, which meant VGA/SVGA/VESA standards were not a concern when it was originally designed).

A Side Note to Nicht:
That guy you said was not very credible claimed that SEGA "had nothing to do with" the NV-1, other than supporting it in a few games. I personally think that's bullshit. 😀

Well, yeah, NV-1 was the chipset used in the Saturn, so I'd say he was full of shit too.

Actually, the software engineer may be right:
This page: http://firingsquad.gamers.com/features/nv2
(and I trust FiringSquad) says that the Sega Saturn's video DSP and NVIDIA's NV-1 were based on the same underlying technology (quad acceleration), but were in fact different chips and designed by different groups of people. The fact that they had similar technology made it easier for them to port their Saturn console games over to it.

Interesting story, that.

I gave a little too much credit to SEGA when I said "I'm certain SEGA made the NV1 a 15/30 Bit card ...". Obviously NVidia was involved, it's just that AFAIK it started life at SEGA.

Also AFAIK, this was a major source of problems as the chip design didn't seem to take existing standards (using 15/30 Bit video instead of 16/24or32Bit) or incoming standards (Direct3D) into account. That translated into numerous compatibility headaches for me. At least it allowed me to play a 3D-accellerated "Panzer Dragoon" on a 486DX4-100.

Stiletto wrote:

Actually, the software engineer may be right:
This page: http://firingsquad.gamers.com/features/nv2
(and I trust FiringSquad) says that the Sega Saturn's video DSP and NVIDIA's NV-1 were based on the same underlying technology (quad acceleration), but were in fact different chips and designed by different groups of people. The fact that they had similar technology made it easier for them to port their Saturn console games over to it.

That's bizarre. I'm not doubting the Firing Squad, but this still doesn't sound quite right. If find it kind of hard to believe that the NV1 was a whole 'nother chipset that just happened to be really close in compatibility with a separate Sega chipset.

Stranger things have happened...

...I'm not sure what, but dammit, they have.

Snover wrote:

Stranger things have happened...
...I'm not sure what, but dammit, they have.

But don't those stories usually end with "..and there...draped across the gravestone...was her SWEATER!" *cue tacky horror music*

BTW, Have we gotten far enough off-topic yet. I fear if this keeps going that somehow Beverly Hills:90210 will be discussed.

Snover wrote:

Yeah, without him there'd be no bugs to bitch about 😉

Seriously, though. Are there any cards that support VESA but not SVGA and vice-versa?

Some old cards (Paradise?) may support "proprietary" SVGA modes (i.e. achieved by going into some undocumented video mode). New cards will not support these proprietary modes, but will support equivalent modes via VESA.

V.

Isn't it that SVGA is something a video card supports, whereas VESA is the software interface the software driver supports?

SVGA is about being able to support resolutions and color depths of cretain size, whereas VESA is a software interface via which a program can find out what resolutions a video card can do, and how it presents video memory to a program.

It would be quite reasonable for a VGA card to provide a VESA software interface, but it is unlikely you would find one that did because, as far as I know, the VESA interface was developed just after SVGA cards came around, and hence at a time when VGA cards were dying out.

I think when SVGA first came out, programmers had to write special code for each make of card. The VESA interface was developed so that programmers had a single way to drive all SVGA cards.

I thought that's what UNIVBE was...

UNIVBE is a piece of software, isn't it, rather than a type of interface that many pieces of software can support.

I thought UNIVBE was a sort of universal driver that gave a cleaner VESA interface than the large variety of drivers that
card manufactures supplied.

Yeah, it is/was a universal driver. It totally blows/blew, but... I dunno. As far as the software was concerned, it WAS the interface. It is/was basically a VESA wrapper. (A really shitty VESA wrapper.)

Not to dig up the dead, but while I was perusing the same old site I made, I found this:

Q: I get an error message that I need a VESA-compatible video card or VESA-compatible drivers. What is VESA, and where can I get it?
VESA is the Video Electronics Standards Association's video mode standard, used by almost every post-1993 graphical DOS game as a way of allowing for maximum compatibility with a wide range of consumer video boards. All modern video cards support VESA, however, old games do not properly detect our new chipsets and often decide that, because it is not on ITS list of supported cards, it is not a VESA-compatible video card and will not allow you to run the game. Most of these games use UniVBE, an adopted universal VESA driver. However, like the old games, UniVBE does not detect newer chipsets and has problems working properly. I scoured the net and found this list of VESA TSR drivers which may help resolve any issues regarding VESA.

Nice site. Thanks! That will help a project of mine a lot.

And you know who made UNIVBE (as mentioned earlier) and UVESA (mentioned at that site)? That would be the guys at...
SciTech Software!!!

Mabye this should go in Deep Thought?....just a Thought..

eh..Thought....Deep Though....ahahahahahahhaha!

I know. SciTech sucks, so I don't recommend the shit. But, y'know, just read the site. It has other recommendations and information, too.