Hello Steve,
zondag 05 september 1999 07.59, Steve McCrystal wrote to Kris Steenhaut:

 SM> ;
 SM> In a msg of , Kris Steenhaut writes to
 SM> Andy Roberts: ; Kris,

 KS>> I tried already the beta 2.30 & 2.31 drivers. The beta 2.30 are
 KS>> even worser than the 2.22, the 2.31 gives an amelioration, but it
 KS>> is still bad, bad enough to be not acceptable at all.

 SM> Just curious... have you looked to see just what was change in the
 SM> 2.30/2.31 Matrox drivers vs the 2.23 release?

Yep.

I even did compare with te different biosses.

My experiences once bios 2.6 had been installed:

2.21: screen mess immediatly right after boot . The mess wasn't there with
earlier biosses.

2.22: Partial screen mess accidently, lock up on tranfers of huges files
[files greater than 10 Mb]

2.23: same picture + much NS crashes.

2.30beta: at boot, I saw the desktop cluttered with the desktop with the
desktop as it was before the latest shutdown. No lock-ups at file transfers
anymore, but an immediat lock-up when starting two different programs at the
same time, for instance a Winos2 session and GOLDED/2. Only occasional NS
crashes.

2.31beta: Desktop at boot is fine now. Still lock ups  when 2 programs are
starting at the same time. But is is controllable now, as it must be about
heavy task: starting  Golded/2, FM/2 & once again FM/2 or something like that. 
At least I am able to avoid this lock-ups most of the time. No NS crases at
all, talking about NS404.

So the 2.31beta  appear to be the most stable, or better, less unstable.

I'm still persuaded the SDD wil be our best bet. Too bad the SDD team has to
rely on Big Blue for fixing the Gradd memory leak matter. So, I presume we
will have to wait a bit longer than we could expect initially..

You know: if you want have it at his best, you'll have to wait. :-))

 SM> Here's a hint... do you have a G-400 AGP card, for which both the
 SM> 2.30
 SM> and 2.31 betas were released?

 SM> In short, Matrox never claimed (to my knowledge) that the leatest
 SM> *BETA* drivers would do anything for your hardware (or my G-200, for
 SM> that matter)! And, they specifically asked that at least the 2.31
 SM> version *NOT BE DISTRIBUTED* by the guy who uploaded them to Hobbes
 SM> (and by everyone else to whom the sent them, I assume).

Sadly, the 2.21 @ 2.23 do suck all the time, and as far as I know the 2.21,
2.22 and 2.23 are genuine official GA. I wrote Matrox  2 emails  about the
2.23, and I even didn't get a reply from one of their answering machines. Wich 
indicates clearly they are refusing any reply.
If they don't want to talk about beta, that's fine for me. But they provided
us with sucking GA drivers, and no, I don't by that.


 SM> I mentioned it earlier in the hardwaree list, but I'll say it again
 SM> here.  I sincerely hope that some day EVERYONE will understand what
 SM> "BETA" means, but I'm not optimistic.  This is one thing that makes me
 SM> a big fan of closed btas, even if it does somewhat limit the user
 SM> population.


Steve, sorry, maybe it's your age, but I'm afraid you aren't capable anymore
of remembering all those mail you are reading. I wrote already  in february
'99 here and else there are problems with the Matrox 2.21 - 2.22 - 2.23. These 
are GA drivers, and you do now.

Ofcoz, seven months ago, I was slammed by you and kind alike for blashfeming
the  Holy Institution.
It turned out now since two months  about everybody has problems with this
Holy Institution drivers. A guru even did confess here he backed  up to the
2.20.8 drivers, in order to get rid of the problems. I did too, btw, but
apparently, the 2.60 bios isn't compatible anymore with these old drivers.
Even on your continent problems do popup from everywhere. Not about the beta,
but about the GA 2.21 - 2.22 - 2.23. And I am persuaded now some of the
Netscape 4.04 problems are bound to Matrox, and have few but nothing to do
with Netscape itself.

So, pardon me, but imho Matrox attitude is ridiculous: they refuse to give any 
support on sucking GA drivers, and they say it's forbidden to use the beta
drivers. Wich implies: or we go on with sucking drivers, or we do by something 
new, or we try to safe bucks by installing the beta.

BTW: You are saying the 2.31 are only there for the G-200. That isn't correct
eighter:


++++ Knip.....Begin van het bestand README.os2 .....++++
README.OS2                   MATROX GRAPHICS INC.                20-July-1999


                        Matrox OS/2 PM Display Driver

                             Version 2.31.095

                                 for the
                               Matrox G400
                         MGA Millennium/Mystique
                            MGA-G100/MGA-G200




Product Description
-+-----------------

This OS/2 PM driver for the Matrox G400, MGA Millenium, MGA Mystique, MGA-G100
and MGA-G200 video accellerator chips supports 8-bit (256 colors),
16-bit (64K colors), and 24- and 32-bit (16M colors) display modes under
OS/2 2.11 and later, in resolutions ranging from 640 x 480 to
2048 x 1536.


Driver Installation
-+-----------------

To install the software, follow the procedure below:

   1. If you have previously configured OS/2 for another graphics card, then
      you should uninstall the drivers for that card.  Be sure that OS/2 will
      start up in VGA mode before installing the Matrox Drivers.

   2. Using the Command Prompts folder of OS/2, open an OS/2 Window or Full
      Screen session.

   3. Insert the driver disk in a floppy drive (if you are installing from
      the floppy disk) or insert the CD-ROM in its drive bay.

   4. Make the CD-ROM or floppy disk the active drive and type:

      "SRCPATH\INSTALL",

      where SRCPATH is the path which contains the Matrox OS/2 drivers.

      Examples:
++++ Knip.....Einde van het bestand README.os2 .....++++


As a last ressource ofcoz,  you can suggest I wrote the readme myself. It's
eighter that, or I do have an option to question your credebility.





    Groeten uit Gent,
    Regards/2

      Kris

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