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README.WIN                 MATROX GRAPHICS INC               December 12, 1994


                    The MGA Windows Drivers and PowerDesk
                              Revision 2.11 

This diskette contains the MGA Windows Drivers and the following PowerDesk 
utilities: 

   MGA Control Panel and Quick Access Panel 
   MGA Board Info and Monitor Selection Program 

Other Matrox Windows Drivers and Utilities are included on the Supplemental
Disk:

   MGA DCI Driver
   MGA 3D Screen Saver
   MGA AutoCAD for Windows Driver
   MGA DynaView/3D for Windows application

This version is intended for the MGA Impression-Plus and Impression-Lite
boards. This readme file is copied to your hard disk, in the \mga\cpanel
directory.

Installation:
-------------

The installation works from VGA Windows (first-time installation) or
MGA Windows (upgrading from older version):

- Run Windows. 
- Select "File", "Run", then type "A:SETUP".
- Follow the instructions. For first-time installation, the monitor program
  will be automatically invoked. Selecting a monitor is highly recommended.
- For a first-time installation (from VGA), the program will reboot your 
  system at the end, and you must then re-enter Windows manually.
  For an upgrade (from MGA 2.0x), the program will restart Windows 
  automatically in the selected mode.
- The installation creates a new Group called "MGA PowerDesk". Run the MGA
  Control Panel to see the additional features that are at your disposal. 
  The monitor program is also available for further monitor tuning. The 
  Quick Access panel is a handy replacement for many of the PowerDesk 
  hotkeys.

Note: The installation may be started from DOS by changing to the floppy 
drive and typing "SETUP".

The Supplemental Disk should be installed AFTER the PowerDesk Driver disk.

Modifications to the Windows .INI files:
----------------------------------------

The MGA Windows Driver installation program makes some changes to 
various .INI files. The changes for the default installation (1024 X 768,
8-bit) are listed below:

  PROGMAN.INI
  ===========
  [Groups]
  Group1=C:\WINDOWS\MGA.GRP

  WIN.INI
  =======
  [windows]
  load=C:\MGA\CPANEL\MGACTRL.EXE

  [fonts] 
  Small Fonts (8514/a res)=SMALLF.FON
  Symbol 8,10,12,14,18,24 (8514/a res)=SYMBOLF.FON
  MS Serif 8,10,12,14,18,24 (8514/a res)=SERIFF.FON
  Courier 10,12,15 (8514/a res)=COURF.FON
  MS Sans Serif 8,10,12,14,18,24 (8514/a res)=SSERIFF.FON

  [Quick Access]
  ShowVertical=ON

  SYSTEM.INI
  ==========
  [boot]           
  386grabber=mgavga.3gr
  286grabber=mgavga.2gr
  display.drv=mga8.drv
  oemfonts.fon=8514oem.fon
  fixedfon.fon=8514fix.fon
  fonts.fon=8514sys.fon
  
  [boot.description]
  displayinf=oemmga.inf
  display.drv=Matrox 8-bit MGA 256 colors
  
  [386Enh]
  display=vddmga.386
  
  [mga.drv]
  dpi=120
  Mode1Display=1024x768x8,1024x768,LARGE
  Mode1Key=
  Mode2Display=1024x768x8,1024x768,LARGE
  Mode2Key=
  Mode3Display=1024x768x8,1024x768,LARGE
  Mode3Key=
  Mode4Display=1024x768x8,1024x768,LARGE
  Mode4Key=
  ModeUsed=Mode1
  ActFeatures=
  UseKeys=

DCI Driver:
-----------

The MGA DCI driver can be used to accelerate significantly the playback
performance of AVI files.

The DCI driver will however not be called unless updated codecs and Media
Player are also installed. A Video for Windows 1.1D Run-time upgrade is
available from Microsoft, but you can also get it from Matrox. Contact our 
technical support department if you need the upgrade.

Known bugs, limitations and misc. notes:
----------------------------------------

- PowerDesk Hotkeys limitations:

  The hotkeys (for ModeSWITCH, PixelTOUCH, etc...) MUST NOT BE USED
  when running the following programs: Monitor Selection (Test & Adjust),
  3D Screen Saver, or DynaView/3D for Windows (3D Viewer).

- Monitor Selection program:

  The Monitor Selection program is normally aimed at selecting and testing
  a monitor from our list of monitor. However an Advanced feature allows
  you to interactively adjust the timings and save your changes. To use
  this Advanced feature, change the "property" of the Monitor Selection
  icon to start MGASET.EXE with the /A argument.

  The /A (Advanced) feature of the Monitor program should not be used while
  Windows is running at 1280 X 1024 X 24 resolution (which is available on 
  Impression-Plus boards with 4Mb of VRAM).

  Moving the test screen to the extreme right or left while using 
  /A (Advanced) feature may result in the test screen's background color 
  changing to black. Pressing "U" to undo should restore the color.

  Selecting Test after changing the resolution from 1024 x 768 to 
  800 x 600 or from 640 x 480 to 800 x 600 while in 24 bit mode will cause
  the test screen to appear jittery. Changing the size, position or pixel 
  clock will stabilize the screen.

- Cursor problem:

  The Impression-Plus currently has a cursor problem that shows a small 
  vertical line when the cursor is brought near the right edge of the 
  screen. There is no work-around for this problem.

  The Impression-Plus also exhibits noise around the cursor when running
  applications which are programming the color palette in a continuous
  manner. This includes the Kaleidoscope option of the AfterDark screen-
  saver. A patch is available to alleviate this problem. To enable the
  patch, edit your SYSTEM.INI, search for the [MGA.DRV] section, and
  add the following line:

  DacSync = ON

  Note that this problem applies only to the 256 color driver.

- DOS Window:

  When switching from DOS full-screen to DOS Window, the previous position
  of the DOS Window is not retained; the DOS Window is brought back to the 
  upper left portion of the screen. This happens only when the DOS Window
  is at its maximum size. 

- Device Bitmaps:

  The MGA POWER Drivers support a feature of Windows 3.1 and 3.11 that 
  allows device bitmaps to be stored in MGA memory instead of in system
  memory. Device bitmaps can increase the performance of MGA drivers if 
  there is sufficient on-board memory available. However when this feature 
  is activated, Windows is not 100% reliable and could cause some applica-
  tions to crash.  You can disable the device bitmaps feature by adding the
  following line in the MGA.DRV section of your SYSTEM.INI file.

        [MGA.DRV]
        .
        DevBits=OFF 
 
- MGA with a monochrome card:

  The MGA Windows drivers do not work when a monochrome card is installed 
  in the system and the MGA card has its VGA disabled. 
  
  (PCI boards only) A monochrome card will not be recognized if the MGA
  has its VGA enabled. The system will boot, but the monochrome card will be
  unusable (i.e. "mode mono" will do nothing).

- VESA support:

  The MGAVESA driver supports VESA Super VGA Extensions version 1.2 and VESA
  Display Power Management Signaling (DPMS) version 1.0. This driver is
  installed in \MGA\SETUP, and can be added to your AUTOEXEC.BAT. 

  See the README.UTL file in \MGA\SETUP for more details about VESA support.


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