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      DOS 5.0 and Above Boards for Micro Channel (MCA) Computers          
                                                                          
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 DOS 5.0 AND ABS (MICRO CHANNEL)

     DOS 5.0 and Above Boards (Micro Channel)
     The Micro Channel Above Boards are these models:
         Above Board MC
         Above Board MC32
         Above Board 2 Plus
         Above Board 2

     Micro Channel Above Boards work well with DOS 5.0, appearing to have no
     compatibility problems.  There are some issues to be considered
     however:

        Above Board MC32 provides only extended memory in hardware.  The
         issues discussing EMM.SYS do not apply to Above Board MC32.  Above
         Board MC32 owners should seriously consider using the EMM386.EXE
         driver that is provided with DOS 5.0 instead of ILIM386.SYS.  These
         drivers provide essentially the same expanded memory capabilities,
         but EMM386.EXE is also a DOS 5.0 compatible Upper Memory Block
         (UMB) provider.  Note, these two drivers are not mutually
         compatible. A system should use either HIMEM.SYS with EMM386.EXE or
         ILIM386.SYS without HIMEM.SYS.

        If you are using EMM.SYS and HIMEM.SYS, EMM.SYS should come before
         HIMEM.SYS.  Generally EMM.SYS should be the first driver in your
         config.sys file.  If both are present, EMM.SYS must come before
         HIMEM.SYS because of the way that HIMEM.SYS manages INT15.  Also,
         in some systems EMM.SYS is used to initialize the extended memory
         on the Above Board, so that memory will not be available to
         HIMEM.SYS unless EMM.SYS is loaded first.

        Please use the latest version of our software, both the drivers and
         utilities, such as installation software.  This software is
         available on our BBS and Compuserve, or you can call and request
         that a disk be sent to you.

        If EMM.SYS gives you an error indicating that extended memory is
         already in use when it tries to load, and it is the first driver in
         your CONFIG.SYS file, you will need to add the NE parameter to the
         EMM.SYS line.  This will allow EMM to load, but you must be sure
         that EMM.SYS is the first device driver in your CONFIG.SYS file.

        In general, installation programs for hardware and software should
         be run on a "clean" system - that is, one that has been booted from
         a DOS diskette without drivers and TSRs loaded into memory.  Disk
         caches in particular (such as SMARTDRV) can cause the loss of data
         when some installation programs are run.

        If your system is having problems with EXTENDED memory usage, and
         specifically with HIMEM.SYS, check the README file that came with
         DOS. The Above Board is fully compatible with HIMEM.SYS, but some
         system motherboards implement the A20 address gate in non-standard
         fashions and can either require special parameters on the HIMEM.SYS
         line, or be totally incompatible with HIMEM.SYS.

     DOS 5.0 is the first version of DOS to make significant use of EXTENDED
     memory, and to acknowledge Upper Memory Blocks (UMBs).  For that
     reason, both extended and expanded memory become an issue with DOS 5.0.

        If you are trying to use your Above Board to provide UMBs in a 286
         system, you will need to have the latest version of our EMM driver.
         In addition, you will need a UMB manager program such as QRAM or
         MOVE'M. Also, UMBs can not be provided in any address space that is
         either being used by or reserved for other devices.  Micro Channel
         Above Boards can map the range from C000 to DFFF.  On PS/2 systems,
         the E000-FFFF segment is used for the system BIOS.  Above Boards
         will not map RAM into the A000-BFFF address range, as this range
         was reserved by IBM for video buffer.

     Be aware of other add-in boards in your system that might be using the
     UMB address range, such as network adapters, special hard disk
     adapters, etc.  Booting your system from the Reference diskette and
     viewing your system configuration can give you some good indications of
     what might be using these address areas.

     For more information, please refer to our articles on those two topics:
                    Upper Memory Blocks (UMBs)     FaxBACK doc 1158
                    High Memory Area (HMA)         FaxBACK doc 1250



End of file                 Intel FaxBack # 1556          June 24,1992
