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- ALi AGP Driver Version 1.68
- ------------
- INTRODUCTION
- ------------
- This file contains a variety of information you should read before
- installing ALi AGP drivers. This setup program contains three drivers,
- AgartD.VXD, ALiPCIMP.PCI and ALiAGP.sys. AgartD.VXD is the graphics
- address remapping table(GART) management for ALi chipsets at Windows 95.
- ALiPCIMP.PCI is the PCI miniport driver providing PCI miniport
- services at Windows 98/98SE. ALiAGP.sys is the PCI miniport driver
- providing PCI miniport services for Windows 2000.
-
- -------------------------
- CONTENTS OF THIS DOCUMENT
- -------------------------
- This document contains the following sections:
- 1. System Requirements
- 2. Installation Instructions
- 3. Uninstallation Instructions
- 4. Manual Installation
- 5. Verifying Installation of the Driver
- 6. Verifying Validation of the AGP Functionality
- 7. Identifying the Drivers Version Number
- 8. Change List
- 9. Known issues
-
- ----------------------
- 1. System requirements
- ----------------------
- Windows 95:
- 1. Microsoft Windows 95 OSR2.1 or later version
- 2. ALi AGP Driver (AgartD.VXD)
- 3. AGP VGA Card with Driver
- 4. Direct X5 or above
-
- Windows 98/98SE:
- 1. Microsoft Windows 98/98SE
- 2. ALi AGP Driver (ALiPCIMP.PCI)
- 3. AGP VGA Card with Driver
-
- Windows 2000:
- 1. Microsoft Windows 2000(build 2195) or later version
- 2. ALi AGP Driver (ALiAGP.SYS)
- 3. AGP VGA Card with Driver
-
- ----------------------------
- 2. Installation Instructions
- ----------------------------
- Windows 95:
- 1. Install Windows 95 OSR2 or later version.
- 2. Upgrade Windows 95 to version OSR2.1 by running USBSUPP.EXE.
- We can get this file from Microsoft (www.microsoft.com).
- If you install Windows 95 OSR2.5, you still need to install USBSUPP.EXE.
- 3. Install Microsoft DirectX 5.0 or later version.
- We can get this driver from Microsoft too.
- 4. Install ALi AGP Driver
- - run this install program.
- - this program will detect the Windows version automatically
- and modify the registry to load the proper driver.
- 5. Install VGA driver for Windows 95.
-
- Windows 98/98SE:
- 1. Install Windows 98/98SE.
- 2. Install ALi AGP Driver
- - run this install program.
- - this program will detect the Windows version automatically
- and modify the registry to load the proper driver.
- 3. Install VGA driver.
-
- Windows 2000:
- 1. Install Windows 2000.
- 2. Press "F8" at Windows 2000 booting menu to select
- Safe Mode if Windows 2000 fails to boot into.
- 3. Install ALi AGP Driver
- - run this install program.
- - this program will detect the Windows version automatically
- and modify the registry to load the proper driver.
- 4. Install VGA driver.
-
- Important note:
- Many systems instability are caused by OS drivers internal confliction after
- changing mainboard, graphics card, or even upgrading driver or BIOS. It
- strongly recommends user to format your hard drive and re-install OS again
- after you have ever done system/driver upgrading operation and system is not
- stable.
-
- ------------------------------
- 3. Uninstallation Instructions
- ------------------------------
- Windows 95 and Windows 98/98SE:
- 1. Open "Control Panel" folder
- 2. Invoke "Add\Remove Programs" icon
- 3. Choose "ALi AGP Driver" item
- 4. Click on "Add/Remove" button to remove drivers.
-
- ----------------------
- 4. Manual Installation
- ----------------------
- After installation, the following drivers are stored as listed.
- <Windows 95 directory>\System\AgartD.VXD
- <Windows 95 directory>\System\ALiPCIMP.PCI
-
- We can backup those files and install drivers manually in the future.
-
- Windows 95:
- 1. Copy AgartD.VXD to "<Windows 95 directory>\System\" directory.
- 2. Add a key "AGARTD" in the registry:
- KEY:"HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\System\CurrentControlSet\Services\VxD\AGARTD"
- with:
- NAME:StaticVxD
- DATA:"AgartD.VXD"
-
- Windows 98/98SE (M1541 chipset):
- 1. Copy ALiPCIMP.PCI to "<Windows 98 directory>\System\" directory.
- 2. Add a key "154110b9" in the registry:
- KEY:"HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\System\CurrentControlSet\Services\VxD\PCI\GARTMINIPORT\154110B9"
- with:
- NAME DATA
- ---------------
- Instance 00 00 00 00
- Name "ALi M1541"
- Path "ALiPCIMP.PCI"
-
- Windows 98/98SE (M1621 chipset):
- 1. Copy ALiPCIMP.PCI to "<Windows 98 directory>\System\" directory.
- 2. Add a key "162110b9" in the registry:
- KEY:"HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\System\CurrentControlSet\Services\VxD\PCI\GARTMINIPORT\162110B9"
- with:
- NAME DATA
- ---------------
- Instance 00 00 00 00
- Name "ALi M1621"
- Path "ALiPCIMP.PCI"
-
- -----------------------------------------
- 5. Verifying Installation of the Driver
- -----------------------------------------
- Windows 95:
- To make sure if the ALI AGP driver is properly installed,
- We need run "Regedit" and check whether the key AGARTD exists in
- the following path
- "HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\System\CurrentControlSet\Services\VxD"
- for Windows 95
-
- Windows 98/98SE:
- 1. Run "Regedit" and find the NAME/DATA pair 'Path "ALiPCIMP.PCI" ' existing in
- the following path
- "HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\System\CurrentControlSet\Services\VxD\PCI\GARTMINIPORT\154110B9"
- "HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\System\CurrentControlSet\Services\VxD\PCI\GARTMINIPORT\162110B9"
- 2. Find "System devices" category in "System"'s "Device Manager" tab of "Control Panel".
- You can find "ALi M1541 AGP System Controller" or "ALi M1621 AGP System Controller"
- device, depend on the ALi chipset you use. Click on the "Properties" button, select
- "Driver" tab, and click on the "Driver File Details" button, you can find the driver
- provider and driver file version.
- 3. Run "drwatson" from Start menu. Select "Advanced View" from "View" menu and click
- on "Kernel Drivers" tab. You can find "ALiPCIMP" in the Driver list and associated
- version. If you can't find "ALiPCIMP" in the Driver list, ALi AGP driver is not loaded
- in this system.
-
- We recommend Method 3 to check whether ALi AGP driver is actually loaded for Windows 98/
- 98SE.
-
- ------------------------------------------------
- 6. Verifying Validation of the AGP Functionality
- ------------------------------------------------
- To check whether the AGP mechanism is able to activate, we can try the
- following steps:
- 1. Install DirectX 7.0.
- 2. Double click Dxdiag.exe under C:\WINDOWS\SYSTEM\.
- 3. Click the "Display" tab.
- 4. Check "AGP Support" of DirectX features is enabled or not.
-
- -----------------------------------------
- 7. Identifying the Drivers Version Number
- -----------------------------------------
- Windows 95 & 98/98SE:
- The version of the drivers can be obtained by querying the driver file's
- properties under File Manager.
-
- After installation, the following driver are stored as listed.
- <Windows directory>\System\AgartD.VXD
- <Windows directory>\System\ALiPCIMP.PCI
-
- 1. Invoke the "Explorer" application.
- 2. Select the driver file.
- 3. Open the "File" menu.
- 4. Click on the "Properties" item.
- 5. Click on the "Version" tab.
- 6. The driver's version should be listed in the "File version" or "Product
- Version".
-
- Windows 98/98SE only:
- See Windows 98/98SE method 2 & 3 at Section 5.
-
- --------------
- 8. Change List
- --------------
- V1.68
- 1. Add Windows 2000 AGP driver.
-
- V1.67
- 1. Correct frame buffer starting address to improve system stability
- with some 1541 mainboards.
- 2. Improve 3D stability for Matrox Millennium II.
- 3. Improve system stability in PCI mode.
- 4. Enable K6-2/K6-3 Write-Allocate with TNT/TNT2/Geforce/G400 cards.
- 5. Improve system stability with Permedia3 cards.
- 6. Improve DVD playback issue on M1541 and ATI Rage 128.
- 7. Improve system stability with AGP cards without Side Band Address
- on M1621.
-
- V1.66
- 1. Add AMD K6 Write-Allocate feature
-
- V1.64
- 1. Add support for Matrox G400.
- 2. Add support for 3DLabs Permedia3.
- 3. Fix some texture corruption syndrome seen on M1541 and TNT2 Model 64 based system.
- 4. Fix M1541 system instability after resuming from suspend in Windows 98SE ACPI mode.
- 5. Improve system stability with some TNT2 cards.
- 6. Improve system stability with some Savage4 cards.
-
- V1.60
- 1. Fix nVidia TNT playing DVD frame drop.
- 2. Fix Window 95 system auto resets when using a PCI card and driver v1.53.
-
- V1.54
- 1. Add support for ATI Rage Mobility AGP/Rage Pro XL AGP/Rage Pro XC AGP.
- 2. Add support for nVidia TNT2/Vanta.
- 3. Add support for 3Dfx Voodoo3.
- 4. Fix 3Dfx Banshee/Voodoo3 performance drop using ALi AGP driver v1.53.
-
- V1.53
- 1. Support Windows 95(OSR2.1)/Windows 98/Windows 98SE.
- 2. ALi AGP Driver 1.53 add registry key to help Windows98 Device Manager to display proper
- chipset driver properties, like Provider, Date, Version.
- 3. Support AMD K6-2 CXT core/K6-III MTRR feature. When ALi AGP Driver 1.53 detects a AMD CXT
- core CPU, it sets up MTRR to enable this feature.
- 4. S3 Savage3D is not stable on M1621 system, ALi AGP Driver 1.53 has solved this problem.
- 5. ALi AGP Driver 1.50 does not work well in Win98 with the Savage4. System may turn into
- BSOD(Blue Screen Of Death). ALi AGP Driver 1.53 has solved this problem.
- 6. System may turn into BSOD when executing Turok on Intel i740 and M1621 based system. ALi
- AGP Driver 1.53 has solved this problem.
- 7. Solve system poor performance for Intel i740 in Windows 95. Need Intel i740 driver version
- v3.2.
- 8. Asus P5A bios 1005 sets up M1541 GAT mode and this will cause problem in ATI Rage 128.
- ALi AGP Driver 1.53 has solved this problem.
-
- ---------------
- 9. Known issues
- ---------------
- Windows 95 & 98/98SE:
- 1. Fix DVD playback issue of Rage 128GL and Rage 128VR on M1541 by setting
- AGP data rate to 1X.
- 2. Fix some texture corruption syndrome of TNT2 M64 and TNT2 Vanta on M1541
- by setting AGP data rate to 1X.
-
- Windows 2000:
- 1. End users should download Windows 2000 VGA drivers from
- VGA vendor web site to upgrade default VGA drivers if
- available.
-
- Note: If you do not want to set AGP data rate to 1X, you can use ALi AGP
- utility to set AGP data rate to 2X but you may encounter some system instability
- issues.
-
-
- Acer Laboratories Inc. (ALi) web sites:
- http://www.ali.com.tw/ (Taiwan)
- http://www.acerlabs.com/ (America)