1. snap-dos-3.1.1.exe Driver
2. readme.txt File Contents

readme.txt Driver File Contents (snap-dos-3.1.1.exe)

                  -----------------------------------
                         SciTech SNAP Graphics
                         DOS only Installation
                  -----------------------------------

             Copyright (C) 1991-2005 SciTech Software, Inc.
                          All rights reserved.


CONTENTS.....................................................

INTRODUCTION
  About the DOS only Installation
  About SciTech SNAP Graphics
  Benefits of SciTech SNAP Graphics
  Supported Graphics Chips

ADVANCED OPTIONS
  GAMon Monitor Selection Program
  GAReport Hardware Report Program
  GACtrl Configuration Program
  GAOption Options Selection Program
  GAPerf Performance Profiler
  GAMode Dial-A-Mode Utility

SUPPORT

REGISTERING
  Purchasing the Product
  Registering the Product


INTRODUCTION.................................................


About the DOS only Installation
-------------------------------

This archive contains a DOS only installation of the SciTech SNAP Graphics
package and contains all of the necessary DOS based utilities and drivers to
get you going. If you have Windows 95, Windows 98, Windows Me, Windows NT,
Windows 2000, or Windows XP installed on your machine, please download the
full SciTech SNAP Graphics Package and install it from within Windows.

Because this package is provided as a covenience to our users who do not
have a version of Windows installed on their machines, we have not provided
any documentation in this package. For full documentation on the product
please refer to the full Windows based package.  Please note that we no
longer support the DOS UniVBE 16-bit TSR driver; instead we support the
SciTech SNAP drivers for 32-bit DOS applications.


About SciTech SNAP Graphics
---------------------------

SciTech SNAP Graphics incorporates the SciTech SNAP Graphics Architecture,
which is a cross platform device driver technology enabling the use of
the same device drivers on all supported platforms and architectures. Sharing
the drivers between platforms improves the quality and performance of device
drivers for all supported operating systems.


Benefits of SciTech SNAP Graphics
---------------------------------

*  Plug & Play.  SciTech SNAP Graphics will automatically detect your
   graphics card and monitor. You don't have to try and figure out what kind
   of graphics chip you have and then try to track down your vendor for a
   possible software upgrade. If you ever change your graphics card, SciTech
   SNAP Graphics will automatically detect the change and reconfigure itself
   for your new hardware.

*  Protected Mode/Linear Buffer Support.  You can use a 32-bit protected
   mode interface, giving you as much as 2-3 times the performance of the
   older VESA interface.

*  Display Centering.  SciTech SNAP Graphics allows for centering and sizing
   the display image on your monitor, for all supported graphics modes.

*  Refresh Rate Control.  You can control the refresh rate, so you can set
   your display for the highest possible flicker-free image in each mode.

*  VESA GTF Support.  SciTech SNAP Graphics can use the VESA GTF
   (Generalized Timing Formula) standard to automatically calculate exact
   refresh rates and display sizing. This makes centering graphics modes much
   easier.

*  Performance Profiling.  SciTech SNAP Graphics includes display profiling
   programs that allow you to test raw bandwidth of your graphics subsystem.
   The profiling programs are low-level hardware oriented tests that can tell
   you the baseline performance level of your card.


Supported Graphics Chips
------------------------

This is a complete list of the various graphics chipsets that have been
certified to work correctly with this version of SciTech SNAP Graphics.
These can be used with any applications that use SciTech MGL or SciTech
SNAP technology directly.

. 3dfx Voodoo Banshee, Voodoo3, Voodoo4, Voodoo5
. 3DLabs Permedia, Permedia 2, Permedia 2V, Permedia 3
. Alliance ProMotion 6422, ProMotion AT24, ProMotion AT3D
. AMD Geode GX2
. ARK 2000PV, 2000MT, 2000MI (Quadro64), 2000MI+ (Quadro64)
. ATI Mach64 GX, Mach64 CX, Mach64 CT, Mach64 VT, 3D Rage, Mach64 VTB
. ATI 3D Rage II, 3D Rage II+, Mach64 VT4, 3D Rage IIC, 3D Rage Pro
. ATI 3D Rage LT Pro, Rage Mobility, Rage XL, Rage 128, Rage 128 Pro
. ATI Rage 128 Ultra, Rage Mobility 128, Rage Mobility 128-D4x, ES1000
. ATI Radeon 7200, Radeon 7000, Radeon IGP 320M / 340M
. ATI Mobility Radeon, Mobility Radeon 7000 IGP, Radeon 7500
. ATI Mobility Radeon 7500, Radeon 8500, Radeon 8500DV
. ATI Mobility Radeon 9000, Mobility Radeon 9000 IGP
. ATI Radeon 9000 Series, Radeon 9100 Pro IGP, Radeon 9100
. ATI Mobility Radeon 9200, Radeon 9200 Series, Radeon 9500
. ATI Radeon 9500 Pro, Radeon 9550, Mobility Radeon 9600
. ATI Radeon 9600 Series, Radeon 9600 XT, Radeon 9700 Pro
. ATI Mobility Radeon 9800, Radeon 9800, Radeon 9800 Pro
. ATI Radeon 9800 XT, Mobility Radeon X300, Mobility Radeon X600
. ATI Radeon X300 Series, Radeon X600 Series, Mobility Radeon X800
. ATI Radeon XPress 200, Mobility Radeon 9550, FireMV 2200
. ATI Radeon X550
. Chips & Technologies 65548, 65550, 65554, 65555, 69000
. Cirrus Logic CL-GD7543 LCD, CL-GD5434, CL-GD5440, CL-GD5436
. Cirrus Logic CL-GD5446, CL-GD7555 LCD, Laguna 5462, Laguna 5464
. Cirrus Logic Laguna 5465
. Cyrix MediaGX
. IBM VGA Compatible
. InteGraphics CyberPro 2000, CyberPro 2010
. Intel i740, i740 PCI, i810, i810/DC100, i810e, i815, i845G/GL/GV
. Intel i852/i855 GM/GME, i865G/GL/GV, i915G/GV, i915GM/GMS, i945G
. Matrox MGA Millennium, MGA Millennium II, MGA Mystique
. Matrox MGA Mystique 220, MGA-G100, MGA-G200, MGA-G400, MGA-G450
. Matrox MGA-G550, Parhelia, MGA-P750, MGA-P650
. NeoMagic MagicGraph 128, MagicGraph 128ZV, MagicGraph 128XD
. NeoMagic MagicGraph 256AV, MagicMedia 256AV+, MagicMedia 256ZX
. NeoMagic MagicMedia 256XL+
. Number Nine Imagine 128, Imagine 128 II, Imagine 128 II VRAM
. Number Nine Imagine 128 II DRAM, Ticket 2 Ride WRAM
. Number Nine Ticket 2 Ride SGRAM, Ticket 2 Ride IV
. NVIDIA RIVA-128, RIVA-128ZX, RIVA-TNT, RIVA-TNT2, RIVA-TNT2 M64
. NVIDIA RIVA-TNT2 Vanta, RIVA-TNT2 Ultra, GeForce 256, GeForce DDR
. NVIDIA Quadro, GeForce2 Integrated GPU, GeForce2 Ti, GeForce2 GTS
. NVIDIA GeForce2 MX 100/200, GeForce2 MX/MX 400, GeForce2 Ultra
. NVIDIA GeForce4 MX 420, GeForce3, Quadro2, GeForce4 MX 440
. NVIDIA GeForce4 MX 440 8X, GeForce4 MX 460, GeForce4 MX 4000
. NVIDIA GeForce4 Integrated GPU, Quadro4 NVS, GeForce4 Ti 4200
. NVIDIA GeForce4 Ti 4200 8X, GeForce4 Ti 4400, GeForce4 Ti 4600
. NVIDIA GeForce4 Ti 4800, Quadro4 XGL, GeForce FX 5200
. NVIDIA GeForce FX 5500, GeForce FX 5600 Series
. NVIDIA GeForce FX 5700 Series, GeForce PCX 5300, GeForce PCX 5750
. NVIDIA Quadro FX, GeForce 6600 Series
. OAK Spitfire 64107, Spitfire 64111, Eon 64017, Eon 64217, Warp 5
. Philips 9710
. Rendition Verite V1000, Verite V2200
. S3 Vision 864, Vision 964, Vision 868, Vision 968, Trio32, Trio64
. S3 Trio64V+, Trio64UV+, Trio64V2/DX, Virge, Virge/DX/GX, Virge/VX
. S3 Virge/GX2, Virge/MX, Trio3D, Trio3D/2X, Savage3D, Savage4
. S3 ProSavage (VIA PM133), ProSavage (VIA KM133)
. S3 ProSavage (VIA PN133), ProSavageDDR (VIA PM266)
. S3 ProSavageDDR (VIA KM266), Savage/MX/IX, SuperSavage/IXC
. S3 Savage2000
. Sigma Designs RealMagic 64 GX
. Silicon Motion LynxEM, Lynx3DM
. SiS 6202, 6205, 6215, 5597/5598, 6326, 300, 305, 630, 315, 730
. SiS 5595/530, 5595/620
. Trident TGUI9440, TGUI9440-R2, TGUI9680, ProVidia 9682
. Trident Cyber9385 LCD, ProVidia 9685, 3DImage 975, Cyber9397 LCD
. Trident 3DImage 985, Blade 3D, Blade 3D (VIA VT8501)
. Trident Blade 3D (VIA VT8601)
. Tseng Labs ET4000/W32p, ET6000, ET6100
. Weitek P9000, P9100
. VESA VBE 1.2, VBE 2.0, VBE 3.0


ADVANCED OPTIONS..............................................

GAMon monitor selection program
-------------------------------

If you have a plug and play (DDC) monitor, SciTech SNAP Graphics will
automatically detect its capabilities. If your monitor is not detected, you
can configure it using the command-line GAMON utility.  GAMon is a simple
program to allow you to select a monitor that is attached to your graphics
card.  Selecting a monitor will filter the available display modes and
refresh rates depending on the capabilities of your attached monitor.

To display the current monitor configuration, use the following command:

  gamon show

To select a monitor you must know the manufacturer and model name for your
monitor. To list all available manufacturers, use the following command:

  gamon mfr

This will produce a rather long list, so you can narrow the list by entering
the start of the manufacturer name as below, and list all monitors that
manufacturer makes:

  gamon model nec

which will list all 'NEC Technologies' monitors. Once you have found your
monitor, you can select it by entering the partial manufacturer name and
a partial model name like so:

  gamon select nec xp21

which will select the 'NEC Technologies' 'NEC XP21' monitor.  If you need
to make a selection with spaces in the name, use the quoting characters:

  gamon select "NEC Technologies" "NEC XP21"

If your monitor is not listed, you can add it to the database.  The
majority of monitor manufacturers include INF files for Windows 9x with
their monitors, and/or provide them on their web sites.  You can import
these files using:

  gamon import <filename.inf>

where <filename.inf> is the name of the INF file.


GAReport Hardware Report Program
--------------------------------

This is a simple program which will load the SciTech SNAP display driver
for your hardware, and report the graphics hardware configuration.


GACtrl configuration program
----------------------------

This program allows you to perform compatibility testing on the SNAP
device drivers, including testing the graphics modes, stereo modes,
DPMS Power Management, and DDC communications.

One of the other useful things that this program can do is allow you to
adjust the centering and refresh rate control for all available display
modes. Use the 'Centering and Refresh' menu item to change the refresh rate
and centering values for individual display modes, or the 'Global Refresh
Rate' menu item to set all display modes to a preferred refresh rate.


GAOption options selection program
----------------------------------

This is a simple command line program to allow you to override some of
the useful options for the SciTech SNAP drivers.

To see the current list of options and settings, use the following command:

  gaoption show

This will show all the options for the current device. Some of the more
useful options are explained below:

  gaoption accel [none | basic | most | full]

This option controls what hardware acceleration features are used by the
drivers. By default full hardware accleration is enabled. If you have
problems with the mouse cursor, try 'most', which will disable hardware
acceleration of the mouse cursor. The 'basic' setting will allow for
basic acceleration features and is useful if you have problems with
line drawing or text. The 'none' option turns off all hardware
acceleration in the driver.

  gaoption vbe [on | off]
  gaoption vga [on | off]

These options control whether the VBE/Core or VGA fallback drivers are
used by default, or whether the native hardware accelerated drivers are
used.  By default these options are off, but you may want to enable one
of them if the native driver has problems on your system.

  gaoption prefer32 [on | off]
  gaoption prefer16 [on | off]

The prefer32 option controls whether you would prefer 32-bit display modes
over 24-bit display modes.  The default is to choose 32-bit modes in
preference to 24-bit modes if the mode exists at both color depths, and both
color depths are fully accelerated. Otherwise the highest performance mode
is always chosen.  Similarly, the prefer16 option controls whether you would
prefer 16-bit display modes over 15-bit display modes.

  gaoption noncert [on | off]

This option controls whether non-certified SNAP drivers will be used.
If this is turned off when there is no certified driver for your card, the
VBE fallback driver will automatically be used.

  gaoption nowcomb [on | off]

This option controls whether the SNAP drivers will attempt to enable
write combining on your system for faster system memory to video memory
transfers. By default write combining will always be used where possible,
but if this is causing problems you may wish to try using this option to
disable write combining support. The most likely scenario would be for
a new processor that has not yet been fully QA tested.

  gaoption noddc [on | off]

This option controls whether SNAP will attempt to read DDC information from
your monitor.  By default, this option is off (DDC detection is used), but
if you think this is causing problems you may wish to try turning this on.

  gaoption agpfwrite [on | off]

This option controls whether the SNAP drivers will attempt to enable
AGP FastWrite for your video card.  This feature is not available on all
motherboards and video chipsets, but can significantly improve performance
when enabled.  By default, this option is on, but if you think this is
causing problems you may wish to try turning this off.

  gaoption lcdusebios [auto | on | off]

This option controls whether the LCD BIOS is used on laptops.  This option
defaults to auto, which means that the BIOS will be used when the laptop is
booted on the LCD panel, and will not be used when it is booted on an
external CRT monitor.  If you frequently switch between LCD and CRT screens,
you may wish to set this option to on, so that the graphics modes will be
limited to those that can be properly displayed on the LCD panel.

  gaoption agpmem [memsize]

This option controls how much system memory to allocate to video.  It only
has an effect on video chipsets that use AGP memory; currently the Intel
i810 and i815 chipsets are the only ones that do so.  The memory size
defaults to 4096 Kb, but can be changed as desired.

  gaoption usesysmem [memsize | off]

This option controls whether the system memory driver is used.  It is only
useful if you have no video card, as there will be no graphics displayed on
any attached video cards; remote control software must be used.  This option
defaults to off, to enable it you must use a minimum of 512 Kb.


GAPerf Performance Profiler
---------------------------

This program allows you to run some performance profiling on the SNAP
device drivers, which will allow you to see what sort of raw hardware
performance your graphics card posseses. Try it out, you may find the
results rather interesting...


GAMode Dial-A-Mode Utility
--------------------------

When SciTech SNAP Graphics is installed, it comes pre-configured with a
set of useful display modes that most users will find useful. The GAMode
program allows the user to tailor the list of display modes to suit their
tastes, allowing modes to be removed from the list, custom modes to be
added, and custom refresh rates to be added for a particular mode.

To show the list of currently configured modes and refresh rates, use:

  gamode show

To add a new custom resolution to the list of modes, use:

  gamode add <xres> <yres> <bits>

where <xres> is the desired X resolution, <yres> is the desired Y resolution
and <bits> is the desired color depth (0,4,8,15,16,24 or 32, where 0 is for
text modes). When a new mode is added, all refresh rates from 60 Hz to 100Hz
will be added in 5 Hz increments.

To add a new custom refresh rate for a particular resolution, use:

  gamode addref <xres> <yres> <refresh>

where <xres> is the desired X resolution, <yres> is the desired Y resolution
and <refresh> is the desired refresh rate in Hz. To specify an interlaced
refresh rate, use a negative value (ie: -87 for 87 Hz interlaced).

To remove a mode from the list of supported modes, use:

  gamode del <xres> <yres> <bits>

where <xres> is the desired X resolution, <yres> is the desired Y resolution
and <bits> is the desired color depth (0,4,8,15,16,24 or 32, where 0 is for
text modes).

To set the default refresh rate for a specific resolution, use:

  gamode set <xres> <yres> <bits> <refresh>

where <xres> is the desired X resolution, <yres> is the desired Y resolution,
<bits> is the desired color depth (0,4,8,15,16,24 or 32, where 0 is for text
modes), and <refresh> is the desired refresh rate in Hz.



SUPPORT......................................................

The most effective method of contacting support for SciTech SNAP Graphics
for DOS is using the SciTech newsgroups. You can access the newsgroups via:

news://news.scitechsoft.com/



REGISTERING..................................................

Purchasing the Product
----------------------

You can purchase SciTech SNAP Graphics online at:
http://www.scitechsoft.com/


Registering the Product
-----------------------

Once you have purchased the product, you will receive a personal registration
code.  To register the software, run the included register.exe program.
When prompted, enter the exact user name EXACTLY AS SHOWN, INCLUDING CASE!
Hit enter and enter the registration code, and the product should then be
registered.


SciTech Software, Inc.
180 East 4th Street, Suite 300
Chico, CA 95928
(530) 894-8400
(530) 894-9069 FAX

Web: http://www.scitechsoft.com/
Email: support@scitechsoft.com