We are having a compotion to see who can fit the best OS/program in the boot sector of a floppy (512bytes) read about it here: http://512.decard.net/?body=intro
and here: http://board.flatassembler.net/topic.php?t=1973
May be you could enter your Interpreter ?.

\\\\||////
(@@)
ASHLEY4.

XBIOC needs massive rewrite of the code to participate to the contest....
It was optimised mainly for speed.
Now it needs to be optimised for size....
I will try to make a 512 bytes version with minimal functionality....

And on the question



my answer still remains NO !!!

Too much to list here

Just two links with lists (but there are more):

http://www.ctyme.com/intr/rb-0069.htm (Int10h/AH=00h)
http://www.ctyme.com/intr/rb-0275.htm (Int10h/AX=4F02h)

I meant standard video mode that apply to every video card that exists....

The list containes only Tseng,Hercules,ATI....
Not everybody has those video cards.....

I am writing an operating system that should work on 99% of computers so the Raplh Brown interrupt list can't help me with video modes

There isn't any modes that apply to every video card that exists!

MDA cards just supports 80x25 monochrome text (with underline, bold and reverse effects).

Hercules Monochrome have MDA text mode and 720x348x2 graphics.

CGA and compatibles (including EGA/VGA/SVGA) have 40x25 and 80x25 text (both color and black&white [not same as MDA monochrome]), 320x200x4 and 640x200x2 graphics.

MCGA have all CGA modes plus 320x200x256 and 640x480x2.

Color EGAs with 64 KB video RAM have 80x43 text, 320x200x16, 640x200x16 and 640x350x4 graphics.

Color EGAs with 256 KB video RAM and compatibles (including VGA/SVGA) have 80x43 text, 320x200x16, 640x200x16 and 640x350x16.

Monochrome EGAs have 640x350x2 (not supported by color EGAs).

There was PC Junior / Tandy with 320x200x16 and 640x200x4 modes, but they aren't EGA compatible (have different mode numbers).

VGA and compatibles (including most today's adapters) have all 256K color EGA modes, all MCGA modes, + 640x480x16.

Non-VESA SuperVGA adapters have 800x600x16, 640x400x256, 640x480x256 and other modes but they have different mode numbers.

VESA SuperVGA adapters have VESA modes.

But practically speaking, every 386 will have EGA/VGA or compatible adapter (at least I haven't seen 386s with CGAs or Hercules).

For more info on mode numbers, check out the links I give in previous post.

That's easy

80x25 and 40x25 are supported on 99% of them.

Beyond that go to Ralph Brown's list or use the vesa calls to determine which extra text modes.

There is no such thing as a non-standard mode that is universally supported(otherwise it isn't non-standard). You can't have your cake and eat it. You can't say I want to do some really weird text modes, but I want them to work on every video card.

The only way to do that is creating video drivers for cards. Not too sure why anybody would want to do that for text modes though. Can just go graphics modes and set whatever character size you want(that's how the video card does it).

You fascination with text modes does interest me though, can't figure out why so interested.

I made a mistake.

Standard modes supported on all card that i tested:

Screen Char Video Mode Colors Nr of Memmory System
Res Res Res Pages Adress
1. 40x25 9x16 360x400 16 8 B800 EGA/VGA
2. 80x25 9x16 720x400 16 8 B800 EGA/VGA
3. 80x43 8x8 640x350 16 4 B800 EGA/VGA
4. 80x50 8x8 640x400 16 4 B800 EGA/VGA

Standard modes supported on all card with VESA that i tested:

1. 80x60 VESA
2. 132x25 VESA
3. 132x43 VESA
4. 132x50 VESA
5. 132x60 VESA

Non-Standard mode supported on all video cards that i tested:

1. 90x40 Reprogrammed CRT

And if i am right i can Reprogramm CRT to create more non-standard text modes that behaves like a standard one.



You heard of GUI ( Graphic User Interface ) ?
So i am developing TUI ( Text User Interface )

All the best to you in your endeavors.

I like text mode, keeps things simple and easy programming interface.
I found it kind of limiting though. DOS' edit is nice, but I like notepad better for editing docs.

Look forward to see what you accomplish.