Thanks again Paul. After completing all my legal and medical business
today I returned to search the web. It should be noted that it is best to
find part numbers to distinguish different features. For "ATI Wonder"
here are two:
MPN: 1090005910
100-703271
If I had a complete list it would be long and modify your view. However,
'search and ye shall find'. I found a museum at YorkU:
http://www.cse.yorku.ca/museum/collections/ATI/ATI.htm
Here is a bigger list of 12 ATI cards from that era:
ATI VIP graphics card (1988)
ATI VGA 1024 graphics card, v4-01 (1989)
ATI VGA 1024 graphics card, V60M-1.03 (1990)
ATI VGA WONDER+ graphics card (1990)
ATI 2400etc/e modem (1990)
ATI 28300 SA Graphics Adapter (1991)
ATI ATi Graphics Vantage card (1991)
VGAWonder XL24, ver. 4.1, ATI (1992)
ATI 14.4I/R.1.625 board (1993)
ATI VGAWONDER GT graphics card (1993)
ATI All-in-Wonder prototype, PCI bus, multimedia board (1994?)
ATI PCI MARCH64 video card (1996)
The one species of cards that we had fixated on is not there but WONDER+
(1990) is. I am going to write to the CompSci YorkU Prof for his help.
Merry Christmas
The All-In-Wonder are the ones with TV Tuners onboard.
That stopped in the year 2008 or so.
Yes. I owned an ATI All-In-Wonder. It turned my PC monitor into a TV. In the
Apple era folks turned their TV into a monitor.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/All-in-Wonder
Apparently ATI Wonder is just a flavor of video card marketing.
Their are different flavors of ATI Wonder. You need to distinguish by part
number. This is a general rule. Only with part numbers can with distiguish
specs of similar products. Names like 'ATI Wonder' are just for marketing.
From WBM in late 2008, when my GA-EP45-DR3LR MOBO was found Gigabyte ATI
Wonder was adfvertised by Gigabyte. People resell old parts. ATI Wonder is
no where to be found. Strange, what does that tell you. Gigabyte is not the
only MOBO maker. If hardware specific hardware was the industry norm, that
would tell you someting about resale market in subsequent decades.
ATI Theater chips came after 2008, and were sold as
separate cards. Diamond Multimedia had an ATI Theater
capture card, for example. In this example, you can
just barely see the ATI branding on it. This is a
TV tuner capture card. With a TV and an FM 75 ohm input.
https://images.hothardware.com/stati...em720/card.jpg
ATI stopped this business, because the software development
was costing too much. That's why they made the TV tuner card companies
provide their own capture software (and much of that
capture software sucked). This kinda crushed the business
and made it unattractive.
After that ATI/AMD stuck with video card functions, to make a buck.
They got out of that distracting business and concentrated
on their strengths.
*******
Try to concentrate on the bus compatibility issue here.
I don't think the words "All-In-Wonder" help in that regard.
I don't want to see you wasting money on garbage.
There should at least be a reasonable plan for what
any item like this, hopes to achieve.
The purpose of finding a PCI video card, is just so
you can see the screen. This assumes the rest of the
motherboard/RAM/CPU are working.
This is why I want you do those damn beep tests first!
**** the video card. You need to test that mobo/CPU
work with no RAM and no video in place. Add RAM back,
observe that "missing video" beep happens. These
are basic tests to prevent you from wasting your
time on acquiring a video card.
Thanks. I'll try that. But the beeper is in the MX-330-X chassis. I need to
check that electrically first so as to not get a false diagnosis. When I did
not see the POWER LED, I needed to switch the polarity. The front panel
connectors are tiny. Child size finger would help. I have not yet seen disc
activity LED, since not yet booted. When booted and not seen, I'll need to
switch the polarity. The + / - marks on leads are tiny. The colored LED's on
the MOBO near RAM say RAM is good and recognized.
If the appropriate beeps come out of the computer SPKR,
*then* you can settle in searching for some sort of
magical video card.
If the machine won't beep... a video card will *not* help.
Asus made one motherboard, where due to some BIOS issues,
the SPKR will not beep at all. I'm not aware of any
Gigabyte boards suffering from this sort of issue.
They wouldn't react the way Asus did at the time.
Various "Port 80 POST cards" exist. Some enthusiast motherboards
have this two digit display right on the motherboard, as an
aid to debugging. If you already own one of these, you could
use it. I do not recommend buying these, as the benefits
they product are not great enough to justify the purchase
price. The value in these is "Go/No Go". If the display
shows a value other than 0xFF or 0x00 or the display
goes blank (when the system starts to boot), fine.
The status LEDs that indicate system power rails are
pretty to look at (one poster was able to detect
a power failure by looking at the four LEDs). But
the values on the digits are almost worthless in
figuring out root causes of motherboard failures.
Consequently I don't recommend these for general usage.
The PC SPKR by comparison, is a cheap cheap way to test.
It's a kind of GO/No Go test too. But you don't have to
buy anything (as long as the computer case has the standard
SPKR and two wire cable with the 1x4 connector on the end).
https://www.computerhope.com/jargon/p/postcard.jpg
Paul
Thanks for the fine diagnostic advice. YorkU ComSci/EE has bad telecom. They
are closed to the outside world. I have tried an ATI Rage card. A local has
offered an ATI Radeon VGA card that I have not tried yet. I think I owned
one once. But I recycle on Craigslist and don't have a box of old parts.
From manual, here are the beep codes:
Q: What do the beeps emitted during the POST mean?
A: The following Award BIOS beep code descriptions may help you identify
possible computer problems.
(For reference only.)
1 short: System boots successfully
2 short: CMOS setting error
1 long, 1 short: Memory or motherboard error
1 long, 2 short: Monitor or graphics card error
1 long, 3 short: Keyboard error
1 long, 9 short: BIOS ROM error
Continuous long beeps: Graphics card not inserted properly
Continuous short beeps: Power error
Since I have not heard any beeps when the table says I should, that would
imply a problem with the front panel connecter. I'll be back after Xmas
duties.