IBM OS/2 video corruption in text mode using VGA driver - Servers

Resolving The Problem

Source
RETAIN tip: H165581

Symptom
Part of the text screen is illegible in full-screen text mode in OS/2. (There is no problem in GUI mode). The user has not installed S3 video driver or has disabled the S3 driver with ALT-F1 or a boot diskette.

Affected configurations
The system is one of the following Netfinity servers:

• Netfinity 7000-M10 server, Type 8680, any Model.
• Netfinity 5500-M20 server, Type 8662, any Model.
• Netfinity 5500-M10 server, Type 8661, any Model.
• Netfinity 5500 server, Type 8660, any Model.
• Netfinity 5000 server, Type 8659, any Model.

The system is configured with OS/2 Warp Server 4 SMP. OS/2 is configured with the Standard OS/2 VGA Video Device Driver for the S3 adapter. OS/2 is not using the SVGA driver and does not have FixPack 35 or later installed.

Solution
If you install the S3 video driver, you will eliminate this problem in normal operation. The driver ( 24L8036.exe ) and its corresponding text file (24L8036.txt) can be obtained by following this link: Netfinity 5000 / 5500 / 5500 M10 / 5500 M20 / 7000M10 S3 Trio V2/GX device driver diskette for OS/2

If the standard OS/2 VGA driver is still desired over the S3 video driver, eliminate the problem by using either of the following two methods:

Method 1. Install FixPack 35 or later for Warp Server.
- Copy the BVHSVGA.DLL from the S3 diskette mentioned above to the \OS2\DLL directory.
- Edit OS/2's CONFIG.SYS and add the text ",BVHSVGA" to the "SET VIO_VGA" statement (if not already present) as shown in the line below:

"SET VIO_VGA = DEVICE(BVHVGA,BVHSVGA)"

Note: The file BVHSVGA.DLL is on the diskette in a packet file. Copy the file OS2DRV.PK2, open it with UNPACK.EXE and then copy the file BVHSVGA.DLL to the C:\OS2\BOOT directory. Copying this file to this directory will only be possible if you boot the server from installation disks; if you do not, you will get a "file in use" error.

Method 2. Install the VIDFIX.EXE executable (per the README2.TXT file located on the above mentioned diskette).

If video corruption occurs when you use the ALT-F1 command prompt option, one of the above methods must be used to update the CONFIG.X file in the \OS2\BOOT directory (as in the config.sys installation). Please refer to the README2.TXT on the S3 driver diskette for information about using VIDFIX.EXE.

Note: The file CONFIG.X is a read only file. After updating it, you need to use the ATTRIB command before you can save it.