Found a ISA Video Card Cardinal 16bit What year was it made?

R

Rustedimpala

Limp Gawd
Joined
Jan 31, 2005
Messages
397
I remember buying this card forever ago and my mom wouldnt let me put it in here pc. So there it sat on the shelf in my folks office, until now. I was looking for something else and came across it. I remember buying the card but I cant remember how long ago. I cant find a date anywhere on the card, box, or instructions. Anybody know about what year this was made? i googled it but didnt come up with much. Its a Cardinal 16 Bit 512K VGA Card, ISA interface. It was 59.99 new, and I remember paying that much. Wish I could find the receipt.

I may have to dig out my old 75mhz AMD rig!

isacard.JPG




 
What the fuck are them big black things at the bottom of the picture? Hehe. And they shipped that stuff in styrofoam?

EDIT: DUH!!! I see where it says antistatic material.
 
I can't give an exact year... but the original IBM VGA is from 1987, so it must be post-1987. Probably post-1988 even, since it's a clone, and it took a while for clones to appear.
My guess is that it is from somewhere around 1989-1992.
 
Scali said:
I can't give an exact year... but the original IBM VGA is from 1987, so it must be post-1987. Probably post-1988 even, since it's a clone, and it took a while for clones to appear.
My guess is that it is from somewhere around 1989-1992.
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I was thinking somewhere around 1990, but for some reason that didnt seem right..??


AntiStatic foam rules!
 
If the video chip is ET4000, it's vintage 1991-1995 or so. The single ROM, soldered crystal and 4 memory chips (vs 8 on older 512KB video cards) make me think it's a later 16-bit card.

Look at the memory chips... most likely those will have the latest date codes (e.g. 9342 or some other 4 digit number).
 
My crystalball shines with light and glows with musky mist...























No on knows the exact date.. noob :p <3 (jk)

~Adam
 
CleanSlate said:
My crystalball shines with light and glows with musky mist...
No on knows the exact date.. noob :p <3 (jk)

~Adam
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Wow you were helpful.

I think it's from the late 80's, early 90's, 1988-1991.
 
Damn, that thing has a brother somewhere around here (MONOCHROME VGA, no less)...

I'm going to say circa 1988. That's about the time I bought my Cardinal card. To narrow it down, what is on the sticker on the lower socketed EPROM? The date is usually on there, or on the flip side of the PCB.

Cardinal has been out of business since about 1998, so I wouldn't expect to see drivers for this beast anywhere useful.


 
Strikemaster said:
Damn, that thing has a brother somewhere around here (MONOCHROME VGA, no less)...
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grayscale vga monitors rocked. i had one a long time ago.
 
Strikemaster said:
Damn, that thing has a brother somewhere around here (MONOCHROME VGA, no less)...

I'm going to say circa 1988. That's about the time I bought my Cardinal card. To narrow it down, what is on the sticker on the lower socketed EPROM? The date is usually on there, or on the flip side of the PCB.

Cardinal has been out of business since about 1998, so I wouldn't expect to see drivers for this beast anywhere useful.
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The only thing on the back is a stamp that says "FEB-023".
 
Rustedimpala said:
The only thing on the back is a stamp that says "FEB-023".
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Post the 4 digit date code on the memory chips.
 
pxc said:
Post the 4 digit date code on the memory chips.
Click to expand...

Ok, Im guessing the memory are the 4 small ones at the end of the card, numbers on them are:

HY534256J-70
9249A KOREA
 
pxc said:
grayscale vga monitors rocked. i had one a long time ago.
Click to expand...

I've still got the silly thing, a Magnavox 7BM749.

<ponder>

Man, I've GOT to start throwing stuff out. Back amongst the Folders, there's a NEC Multisync 3D that still works, but at refresh rates that'll kill your retinas (800x600@56Hz noninterlaced, 1024x768@ :eek: interlaced).

Heh. Tried Googling the rates for the 3D, ran across this bit of profound wisdom. Love this paragraph:

"The second problem arises when you try to do anything with the Super VGA mode. You need a driver program for each of your applications to exploit Super VGA--a driver for 1-2-3, one for WordPerfect, and so on. How do you know that the VGA vendor will be around to continue to support his board? On the other hand, this won't be a problem if you buy your boards from a big-name vendor like Paradise, Orchid, Headlands Technology, Sigma, or ATI--they'll probably all be around for years to come."

:D
 
Strikemaster said:
"The second problem arises when you try to do anything with the Super VGA mode. You need a driver program for each of your applications to exploit Super VGA--a driver for 1-2-3, one for WordPerfect, and so on. How do you know that the VGA vendor will be around to continue to support his board? On the other hand, this won't be a problem if you buy your boards from a big-name vendor like Paradise, Orchid, Headlands Technology, Sigma, or ATI--they'll probably all be around for years to come."
Click to expand...

heh i think out of all of them only ATi is still around too
 
Elios said:
heh i think out of all of them only ATi is still around too
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Paradise was Western Digital's video card brand. I still have their first 3D accelerator. Sigma is still around... they make MPEG-2/4 chips and capture boards. But yeah, the rest are gone.
 
It was all about Trident...thier vesa local bus cards made games like "Rise of the Triad" and Lemmings fly like no other!
 
Trident was about as horrible back then as onboard VIA or SiS is now :)

In those days, the good stuff came from brands like Paradise, VideoSeven, TsengLabs and every now and then guys like S3 or Cirrus Logic would strike gold. And ofcourse Matrox... damn expensive, but their cards were always damn fast too :)
 
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