*** Rendition V2x00 Reference Drivers ***

Version: 3.0 beta5, build 5176 - June 2, 1999

This archive features ‘beta’ reference drivers for the Rendition V2x00
family of graphics accelerators. These drivers are not supported by
Rendition, Micron Technology Inc, or by your board manufacturer. They are
provided as a courtesy to users of Rendition based products on an "as is"
basis, without warranty. They may not be disassembled, reverse-engineered,
or used on anything other than Rendition chipsets. Use these drivers at
your own risk.

What are reference drivers?

Reference drivers are provided by Rendition to our chip customers; who then
use these drivers as a starting point in creating their own supported
release drivers. In the process of creating these supported drivers, a
board maker typically debugs and optimizes the reference drivers to suite
the exact configuration of the boards they have sold. It is important to
remember that Rendition manufactures chips, not board. We have no way to
guarantee that these reference drivers will run on your exact board
configuration. If you have difficulty, you may need to consult with your
original board maker.

Why would I want reference drivers?

You are often better off with the supported drivers provided by your board
manufacturer. These drivers have been thoroughly tested and optimized on
your specific hardware configuration, and are backed by a dedicated support
staff. But occasionally new release drivers lag the reference drivers by
several months. If an application or game you wish to run requires certain
features or bug fixes that have not been incorporated into the release
drivers yet, your only solution may be to use these reference drivers.

You should switch back to the supported release drivers from your board
manufacturer as soon as they have been brought up to date. These reference
drivers may not work on your system, and by using them you may lose
‘enhanced’ functionality provided by your board manufacturer's drivers.
Make sure you retain a copy of your existing drivers before installing
these drivers.

Check with your board manufacturer frequently to get updated supported
drivers. The ‘Links’ subdirectory of this archive contains pointers to many
board maker’s driver download areas.

Installation Instructions

To install these reference drivers:

   * You MUST read and agree to the license.txt file included in this
     archive before installing these drivers.
   * IMPORTANT! Make sure that you are using the most recent BIOS released
     by your board manufacturer! These drivers may not function properly
     with older BIOS versions. Check with your board manufacturer (see the
     ‘Links’ directory) and bring your BIOS up to date before attempting to
     install these drivers.

     WARNING: Attempting to install a BIOS not intended for your specific
     board may render your graphics board permanently unusable. Experiment
     with your BIOS at your own risk. The BIOS must be matched to your very
     specific board configuration, and only a board manufacturer can do
     this. For this reason, Rendition does not make a reference BIOS
     available at this time.
   * ALSO IMPORTANT! Completely remove your current driver and make sure
     that Windows is running with the generic VGA driver before attempting
     to install this driver release. Attempting to install this driver on
     top of a prior release may cause compatibility and stability problems.
   * Open the "Display Properties" control panel, choose the "Settings"
     tab, and click the "Advanced Properties" button.
   * On the "Adapter" tab click the "Change" button.
   * Click "Have Disk".
   * Browse to the ‘Driver’ subdirectory of this archive.
   * Click "OK" several times to restart with the new driver.

Troubleshooting

Again, these drivers are unsupported by Rendition.

End-users are recommended to use drivers provided by their board
manufacturer to ensure that they can obtain full support.

Please post bug reports on Rendition's discussion server at
http://www.rendition.com/forums.html, or go directly to
news://news.rendition.com/rendition.support to see what experiences other
users have been having.

Also, please be sure and read the ‘ReleaseNotes’ for specific hints and
tips about using this driver.