Paradise PVGA1A JK

Great little card. Despite it's age and simplicity it works very well in early systems (XT, 286). I used to have this card in my ARC ProTurbo 88 until I switched over to a CGA-card + monitor to obtain true CGA-graphics.

If you're looking for the dip-switch configuration:

Switch 1 Monitor Type. ON: Multi frequency, OFF: Standard VGA
Switch 2 VGA Mode Switching Style. ON: PS/2 Style - All modes available on all monitors, OFF: PC/AT Style - color on color, mono on mono
Switch 3 Not used - Set to OFF
Switch 4 (Not VGA Plus) 8bit vs 16bit AutoSense. ON: Auto sense 8/16bitBIOS access, OFF: Force 8bit BIOS access

There is also a 16-bit ISA version of this card.

I have benchmarked this card (read here) in a Pentium 100 and I think it's performance isn't that bad considering it's age. Of course there are many cards that are faster (and newer) but all in all you can have worse. Because I used a (relatively fast) Pentium 100 the PVGA1A is stretched to it's limits. If you use this card in an XT-class system it will run just fine and there would be no point in getting a faster VGA-card since the XT is the bottleneck anyway.

Specifications

Chipset

PVGA1A JK

PCB date

0000

Chip date

9022

RAM

256KB ? (?)

Interface

ISA

Condition

Card only

TV functions?

No

Engineering sample?

No

RAMDAC

?

Board revision

C

Benchmarks

A similar card has been benchmarked! Click here to see this card and the benchmarks.

Found an unboxing video for a similar card, contains some the DIP settings on the card.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ws6Sa7U6qTc

Typed out the text of the Quick Setup card below

QUICK SETUP
CAUTION!
Please read prior to installing the Paradise Basic VGA Card.

Your Paradise Basic VGA Card has two modifcations for better reliability and ease of manufacture. DIP Switches and Feature Clock Jumper. Instructions for operating this video adapter card with these changes are not addressed in the enclosed User's Guide.

DIP Switches are used to tell the Paradise Basic VGA card what features to use. The first switch (lever 1) tells the Paradise Basic VGA card to use special timing for a multi-frequency monitor, or to use standard VGA timing for first frequency PS/2 monitors and some newer multi-frequency displays. The multi-frequency monitor setting will allow most video modes to be displayed on some brands of multi-frequnecy monitors using a larger screen area than standard PS/2 timing will allow. Some newer multi-frequency monitors will work better using the PS/2 monitor timings. You may want to experiment with the two settings to determine the best results for your particular brand of multi frequency display.

NOTE: If you are using an IBM PS/2 display or equivalent fixed frequency display, you must select PS/2 compatible display timing by setting lever 1 to the OFF Position

----END PAGE 1----

DIP SWITCH SETTINGS:

Lever 1 - Monitor Type
ON - Special Multi-Frequency display timing.
OFF - Standard PS/2 compatible fixed frequency display timing. (Standard VGA)

Lever 2 - VGA Implementation Type
ON - PS/2 Style - All VGA modes available on any monitor (recommended setting).
OFF - PC/AT Style - color modes on color monitors, mono modes on monochrome monitors.

Lever 3 and Lever 4 are not used and should be set to the OFF Position

Feature Connector Clock Jumper - (P2)
Please make sure the feature connector clock jumper (marked "P2" on the board) is set to pins 2 and 3.

----END PAGE 2----

Nice! Thanks for typing over the additional information .

Thank you very much for the information! The switch config information worked wonderfully for the 16 bit version aswell. Needed to configure it to pure 8 bit PC/AT so it would have a chance to work on a 5150... and it did!

Hi! The PVGA1A can support 256KB, 512KB and 1024KB.
With 8 chips it can have either 256KB or 1024KB (I think).
There's also a Windows 2.03 driver for 800x600 16c and 640x400 256c.
Both video modes work with as little as 256KB of video RAM.
Same goes for VBE modes 102h (6Ah) and 100h, once a VBE TSR was loaded.
Windows 3.1 and GeoWorks Ensemble 2 support Paradise 800x600 16c out-of-box.
A memory upgrade might seem like a waste at first glance,
but might be useful to certain DOS web browsers or
other applications which have GIF picture support
and do support SVGA from 640x480 256c onwards.

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