avp igt operating system

[Wackyracer]

I have a tested E4690 video card . PM for a price, it will be considerably less than ebay and I will include shipping.

[Mikey4026]

Scott
One of my G20s had a 625 box with onboard video running Family 20 without issues.
I have since upgraded to a 660 and an E4690 video card, it operates a little better.
I have had no trouble running non-MLD games on my SAVP and MLD games on non-MLD equipped machines.
Is that something I should not be doing?
Cheers
Mike

[sccarlso]

If it works, eh, go with it.

I've never loaded fam20 on a machine that didn't have a 660 box in it.  So I can't be certain.  But if the machine errors out running fam20 when it initially boots saying it can't find a GPU and will reboot in 30 sec.  It's something with the video card.  While on-board video technically is a GPU, in this case the software wasn't seeing anything and was getting a null value returned for the GPU.

There is an option in the fam20 diag in the deployment utility on the page where you install the OS/AI files to "validate the GPU".  With the E4690 card installed it passes.  But again, I’ve never done that test myself when the E4690 wasn't installed.  I suspect it might fail if it's not installed.

In many games for fam14 the PSR's clearly state the E4690 card is required. But I've not tried running it without the card either.  Can't since all my machines have 660's   lol

Fam20 AVP 4.0 software running on an AVP 3.0 box was "supported" during the transition from 3.0 > 4.0 hardware and moving to the Crystal Core/Curve cabinets. 
But at a certain point it would seem they just quit testing games on 3.0 boxes as games were too GPU intensive and just put in the PSR that 4.0 hardware is required (or they list the bios number that can only be installed on AVP 4.0 boxes as required).
 
You can still load many of them, like Dragons vs Pandas on a 3.0 box running fam20 4.0 software and it does run.  But it lags so much that it's not even worth playing.   

There's a lot fewer fam 20 PSR's out there that I've been able to find, so I don't have PSR's for the majority of the later OS/AI files and the fam20 games out there to validate this.  If I had the PSR for Dragons vs Pandas, I'd be interested to see if it said anything about requiring AVP 4.0 bios, or list the newer model video cards in AVP 4.0 boxes as required.
 
But it might just state it won't run on 3.0 hardware by listing a 4.0 bios number as required.  Or the PSR for the larger OS/AI packages states it requires a 4.0 bios number to run.  It's a guess, but I "think" the change where 4.0 boxes were required can be identified somewhat by the OS size.  When the OS versions went from about 2-3GB in size to 5GB+ is where they only run on 4.0 boxes.  And I believe the fam20 OS 508 was the last fam20 4.0 OS released that runs on 3.0 boxes before it jumped in size to 5GB or larger which won’t work right on AVP 3.0 boxes, and require the 4.0 bios number to run.

The exact cutoff when an AVP 4.0 box was required for a fam20 game isn't well defined and hard to tell unless you have the PSRs. 

But from my experience, most fam20 games that were under 1GB in size would work.  The only ones that wouldn't run was because they required a DPP button panel, so it tilts when it doesn't detect a DPP panel installed on the machine.
 
And most of the time if a fam20 game exceeds like 1.8GB in size but would still load without tilting.  But even with that as the only game installed/enabled, it's just too much for the E4690 video card to handle in 3.0 boxes and lags so badly it's unplayable.
 
I had another fam20 game that would load/run.  But it would put the machine in a reboot loop every time you hit the bonus.  I assume this was because the video in the bonus was too much for the video card and crashed the box.  Then it rebooted, and by design it goes back to complete the bonus after it reboots and just crashes again.  I had to clear it with the fam20 diag to get the machine out of the reboot loop.  Also fam20 games with a type of 009 that was added, clearly won't run on 3.0 boxes as the 009 games are like 8GB or more in size.   

So if you have a 3.0 box with the E4690, preferably with 8GB of RAM.  Can't really upgrade any further.  If a fam20 game works and plays without lagging, great!    But without PSR’s it’s a lot of trial and error for what games run acceptably with a 3.0 box.

I also found from experimenting that IGT did some "sneaky" checks to intentionally make it so many later fam20 games wouldn't run on 3.0 boxes that likely could if the OS loaded can run on both 3.0 and 4.0 boxes by setting it to require the AVP 4.0 hardware be present in order to run.  But they did it in a strange but effective way.  They wanted to get casinos off the AVP 3.0 hardware and buy new AVP 4.0 Crystal cabinets.

Since I like to see if I can "make things work".  heh    I looked up the model video card in AVP 4.0 boxes (I think I found the model number in a PSR somewhere).  I don't recall the exact model, like an E6790 or something that has 5 "mini DP" ports on it...     

I was able to get an E6790 PCIe card or whatever the standard video card is in AVP 4.0 boxes (it even had the green IGT sticker on it and everything) for like $70.  And I put it in a 660 box to see if I could get those lagging games to run well with a much faster video card since the fam20 OS would have to have video drivers in it for the E4690 and the new one for that card since it's in AVP 4.0 boxes.

I had also figured out that if you load a single tall screen game in fam20 on a 3.0 box (there's a few of them that will run, that even if you don't enable it and just load it on the machine.  It switches the entire machine to display video on the top screen vertically on all games, even games that run with a normal horizontal top screen.  It actually looks good with a normal top display for Dark and Stormy.  But others were skewed/stretched.   Removed the tall screen game and rebooted, then it returned to the normal horizontal top display format for all games.

With that AVP 4.0 supported video card plugged into my 3.0 660 box, I used two mini-DP to DVI cables to connect my dispays.  To my surprise.  It booted just fine and video on both displays came up with the fam20 diag!  I installed the fam20 OS/AI no problem.   Since that larger video card worked fine to boot with the fam20 diag key I thought it was good to go.

Nope, the IGT weasels put a check in the OS!  Dangit!  I installed one known working fam20 game and rebooted.  All seemed fine as it initially booted up and displayed normally.  Yes, the drivers for that card are in the OS!

Alas, right before it would normally display the Configuration Required screen.   It hit me with a dialog that the card wasn’t supported.  Why?  The drivers are there and they work?
Because it checks for AVP 4.0 bios!  Which is like 4 times as large as the AVP 3.0 bios.  Booooo!

No way to get AVP 4.0 bios on a 3.0 box.   So stopped cold.  Just like their switch from the ribbon cable PCI card in 3.0 boxes to the small PCIe cable used in 4.0 boxes that blocked us from upgrading AVP 3.0 cabinets with AVP 4.0 boxes.  No way to connect them to the backplane.  Again.   Boooo!  If it still had a PCI card with a ribbon cable, you could.

For whatever reason, IGT apparently did make a small number of PCI cards that do have a ribbon cable and have AVP 4.0 bios in them.  So that allows you to put a 4.0 box in an AVP 3.0 machine.  I’ve seen a few listed for sale but never seen one close up.  They’re extremely rare.  Perhaps they started making those in development, and then decided, nah, let’s not do this so casinos have to get new Crystal cabinets, and some of the dev cards got out.  Who knows.

It sure would be great if someone had a complete library of all AVP 3.0 and 4.0 tech bulletins, PSR’s for all OS/AI versions, and all game PSRs for fam14 and 20 somewhere.
 
Someone probably does, all they would have needed was a legit IGT account to login to IGT's portal and download everything.   But if anyone does, they’re keeping those docs close to the vest.  lol    But it would open a lot of knowledge for what they did in the transition from AVP 3.0 to 4.0, and make it a lot easier to identify exactly what fam20 games will run on a 3.0 box without having to just load them and see what happens.  Or maybe explain this PCI card for AVP 4.0 boxes that had a ribbon cable on it.   Maybe someday. 

[sccarlso]

Also, I've posted this before.  I put 660 boxes in all four of my AVP machines by getting refurb brainboxes from GET-T.

They used to be only $150.  They raised the price by $45 now.  But it's still worth it if you need the E4690 video card.

They usually have 4GB even though it says 2GB.  The ones I got all came with 4GB.   

So don't pay $399 on ebay or something for just the E4690 video card!   Just get this 660 from GET-T, you can simply pull the video card (and the RAM if you only have 2GB in your current brainbox).  And just put the card and RAM in your existing brainbox.  No OS reload, no swapping bios chips, needing a different power cable or anything else needed.  Remove your existing brainbox, plug in the card/RAM if necessary, and plug it back in.  Personally, I used the actual 660's and swapped the bios because I had the 660 power cables around.

Just by plugging the video card in, and ensuring you have both DIMM slots populated with 2GB sticks in each slot, your brainbox now has the same "guts" as a 660.   Except yours has both on-board video, and the add on card (The on-board video is just disabled when you have the E4690 plugged in).  The 660 has no on-board video so it can't run without the E4690 card installed.  But put the rest of the 660 box on a shelf as you may need it down the road. 

https://get-t.net/product/cpu168/

Just be sure to also get this DVI>VGA adapter below as well if you don't have one already  This specific adapter is the best as it's DVI-I > VGA and not DVI-D > VGA as most others are.  Also better than just a plug adapter as they stick out too far when plugged into the video card.

https://www.amazon.com/dp/B009JXH8TU

The E4690 only has two DVi ports, and you MUST connect the lower DVI port on the add on card to the VGA cable going to your lower touchscreen or it won't work right, even if your lower touchscreen has a DVI port on it.   Trust me, I tried.  Does crazy things like display the lower touchscreen image on the top display.   lol

But that's actually good, as you don't have to run a new DVI cable from the brainbox, to the door, and to the lower touchscreen (real pain).  You just use your existing VGA cable to connect your lower touchscreen to the E4690's DVI port.

And make sure all video cables are screwed in tight on the card and displays!  Loose video cables are probably the most common reason for color flickering/display oddities. 

[Mikey4026]

Thanks Scott
I will have to spend some time soaking in all this information.
And here I thought I was getting a good understanding of the AVP.
Cheers
Mike