xref: /dragonfly/share/man/man4/vga.4 (revision 9c600e7d)
1.\"
2.\" Copyright (c) 1999
3.\" Kazutaka YOKOTA <yokota@zodiac.mech.utsunomiya-u.ac.jp>
4.\" All rights reserved.
5.\"
6.\" Redistribution and use in source and binary forms, with or without
7.\" modification, are permitted provided that the following conditions
8.\" are met:
9.\" 1. Redistributions of source code must retain the above copyright
10.\"    notice, this list of conditions and the following disclaimer as
11.\"    the first lines of this file unmodified.
12.\" 2. Redistributions in binary form must reproduce the above copyright
13.\"    notice, this list of conditions and the following disclaimer in the
14.\"    documentation and/or other materials provided with the distribution.
15.\"
16.\" THIS SOFTWARE IS PROVIDED BY THE AUTHOR ``AS IS'' AND ANY EXPRESS OR
17.\" IMPLIED WARRANTIES, INCLUDING, BUT NOT LIMITED TO, THE IMPLIED WARRANTIES
18.\" OF MERCHANTABILITY AND FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE ARE DISCLAIMED.
19.\" IN NO EVENT SHALL THE AUTHOR BE LIABLE FOR ANY DIRECT, INDIRECT,
20.\" INCIDENTAL, SPECIAL, EXEMPLARY, OR CONSEQUENTIAL DAMAGES (INCLUDING, BUT
21.\" NOT LIMITED TO, PROCUREMENT OF SUBSTITUTE GOODS OR SERVICES; LOSS OF USE,
22.\" DATA, OR PROFITS; OR BUSINESS INTERRUPTION) HOWEVER CAUSED AND ON ANY
23.\" THEORY OF LIABILITY, WHETHER IN CONTRACT, STRICT LIABILITY, OR TORT
24.\" (INCLUDING NEGLIGENCE OR OTHERWISE) ARISING IN ANY WAY OUT OF THE USE OF
25.\" THIS SOFTWARE, EVEN IF ADVISED OF THE POSSIBILITY OF SUCH DAMAGE.
26.\"
27.\" $FreeBSD: src/share/man/man4/vga.4,v 1.7.2.10 2002/12/20 18:03:05 trhodes Exp $
28.\" $DragonFly: src/share/man/man4/vga.4,v 1.2 2003/06/17 04:36:59 dillon Exp $
29.\"
30.Dd June 30, 1999
31.Dt VGA 4
32.Os
33.Sh NAME
34.Nm vga
35.Nd generic video card interface
36.Sh SYNOPSIS
37.Cd "options VESA"
38.Cd "options VESA_DEBUG=N"
39.Cd "options VGA_ALT_SEQACCESS"
40.Cd "options VGA_NO_FONT_LOADING"
41.Cd "options VGA_NO_MODE_CHANGE"
42.Cd "options VGA_SLOW_IOACCESS"
43.Cd "options VGA_WIDTH90"
44.Cd "device vga0 at isa? port ?
45.Sh DESCRIPTION
46The
47.Nm
48driver is a generic video card driver which provides access to
49video cards.  This driver is required for the console driver
50.Xr syscons 4 .
51The console driver will call the
52.Nm
53driver to manipulate video hardware (changing video modes, loading font, etc).
54.Pp
55The
56.Nm
57driver supports the standard video cards: MDA, CGA, EGA and VGA.
58In
59addition, the driver can utilize VESA BIOS extensions if the video card
60supports them.
61VESA support can either be statically included in the kernel
62or can be loaded as a separate module.
63.Pp
64In order to statically link the VESA support to the kernel, the
65.Dv VESA
66option (see below) must be defined in the kernel configuration file.
67.Pp
68The
69.Nm vesa
70module can be dynamically loaded into the kernel using
71.Xr kldload 8 .
72.Sh DRIVER CONFIGURATION
73.Ss Kernel Configuration Options
74The following kernel configuration options
75(see
76.Xr config 8 )
77can be used to control the
78.Nm
79driver.
80These options provide compatibility with certain VGA cards.
81.Bl -tag -width MOUSE
82.It Dv VGA_ALT_SEQACCESS
83You may want to try this option if the mouse pointer is not drawn correctly
84or the font does not seem to be loaded properly on the VGA card.
85However, it may cause flicker on some systems.
86.It Dv VGA_SLOW_IOACCESS
87Older VGA cards may require this option for proper operation.
88It makes the driver perform byte-wide I/O to VGA registers and
89slow down a little.
90.It Dv VGA_WIDTH90
91This option enables 90 column modes: 90x25, 90x30, 90x43, 90x50, 90x60.
92These modes are not always supported by the video card and the display.
93It is highly likely that LCD display cannot work with these modes.
94.El
95.Pp
96The following options add optional features to the driver.
97.Bl -tag -width MOUSE
98.It Dv VESA
99Add VESA BIOS support to the driver.
100If the VGA card has the VESA BIOS extension 1.2 or later,
101this option will utilize the VESA BIOS service to switch to high
102resolution modes.
103.It Dv VESA_DEBUG=N
104Set the VESA support debug level to
105.Fa N .
106The default value is zero, which suppresses all debugging output.
107.El
108.Pp
109The following options will remove some features from the
110.Nm
111driver and save kernel memory.
112.Bl -tag -width MOUSE
113.It Dv VGA_NO_FONT_LOADING
114The
115.Nm
116driver can load software font to EGA and VGA cards.
117This option removes this feature.
118Note that if you use this option and
119still wish to use the mouse on the console then you must also use the
120.Dv SC_ALT_MOUSE_IMAGE
121option.  See
122.Xr syscons 4 .
123.It Dv VGA_NO_MODE_CHANGE
124This option prevents the driver from changing video modes.
125.El
126.\".Sh FILES
127.Sh EXAMPLES
128Your kernel configuration should normally have:
129.Pp
130.Dl "device vga0 at isa? port ?
131.Pp
132The following lines should be included in the kernel configuration file
133in order to enable the VESA BIOS Extension support.
134.Pp
135.Dl "options VESA"
136.Dl "device vga0 at isa? port ?
137.Pp
138If you do not want VESA support included in the kernel, but
139want to use occasionally, do not add the
140.Dv VESA
141option.  And load the
142.Nm vesa
143module as desired:
144.Pp
145.Dl kldload vesa
146.Pp
147.\".Sh DIAGNOSTICS
148.\".Sh CAVEATS
149.\".Sh BUGS
150.Sh SEE ALSO
151.Xr vgl 3 ,
152.Xr syscons 4 ,
153.Xr config 8 ,
154.Xr kldload 8 ,
155.Xr kldunload 8
156.Sh STANDARDS
157.Rs
158.%T "VESA BIOS Extension (VBE)"
159.%A Video Electronics Standards Association
160.Re
161.Sh HISTORY
162The
163.Nm
164driver first appeared in
165.Fx 3.1 .
166.Sh AUTHORS
167.An -nosplit
168The
169.Nm
170driver was written by
171.An S\(/oren Schmidt Aq sos@FreeBSD.org
172and
173.An Kazutaka Yokota Aq yokota@FreeBSD.org .
174This manual page was written by
175.An Kazutaka Yokota .
176