Unfortunately the "few weeks' training you get from programming the VGA chips on most display boards is worth less than nothing because it's consuming too much time and effort and using time which could be used in more valuable pursuits. I can assure you that soldering a resistor onto the back of a display adapter is sufficient to verify that the monitor can be used, and no programming of any sort is needed. If the card is capable of 60 Hz non-interlaced 1280x1024x256-color display, programming it won't be necessary, as it will support that format. If it's not, all the programming either of us could do won't help. The sync mixer I have used, and instructed others to use, many times since the mid-to-late '80's is quite simple, uses a current mirror, a dif-amp, and a couple of diodes configured as a negative logic OR, with the aid of a half dozen resistors. It's a circuit any first year EE student should be able to build and fully understand. If the first year EE student can do it, so can anyone else! It was probably designed by a student and then cleaned up by the guys at Brooktree, from one of whose app-notes I pinched the circuit back in days of old. I had to add details about the hookup, but it's essentially their circuit. The benefit is that it will happily tolerate either polarity of one or the other sync signals if you fiddle with it a bit. I'd not consider trying to program this display format in to a board which doesn't normally support it because that normally indicates it isn't capable. You might want to get out your slide rule and figure out how fast the pixels have to fly out of the DAC if you want 1280 of them in the active portion of a 64kHz sweep. Most of them (the boards in question) simply won't do that. Dick -----Original Message----- From: Tony Duell <ard(a)p850ug1.demon.co.uk> To: Discussion re-collecting of classic computers <classiccmp(a)u.washington.edu> Date: Tuesday, July 20, 1999 1:05 PM Subject: Re: Sun Monitor (UK) (2) SUN, only You're right, it is easier, but this circuit is already designed and proven. It simply needs to be built faithfully to the schematic and such that it looks good. So long as there are no excessively long (meaning longer than absolutely necessary) wires, and so long as the soldering is neat and clean, everything should go well. you a to A a at $1(US) per hour you'll save a fortune by buying a good 20" monitor at a computer store. You'd be better off shining shoes for it than trying to program a board which doesn't already do what you want. Don't they say, "penny-wise, pound-foolish" where you live?