+---------------------------------------------+
| Merlin's PCI Hardware Sniffer Version 0.44с |
|                                             |
| The #1 FREEWARE diagnostic tool for modern  |
|  chipsets just got better! now featuring    |
|   full CardBus, AGP and PCI support, PCI    |
| can identify over 4,800 known devices from  |
| over 1800 hardware vendors.                 |
|                                             |
| The #1 tool for resolving resource issues,  |
| detecting modern devices, automating setup  |
| procedures and much much more.              |
|                                             |
|  An essential tool in any Tech's toolbox!   |
|                                             |
|                                             |
|  Includes full Turbo Pascal 7 source code!  |
+---------------------------------------------+
 PCI - The PCI System information & Exploration tool.


The following is a somewhat rambling text, from which you should be
able to extract everything you ever wanted to know about this program!
Please excuse my poor documentation style; I really hate writing the
docs :-) So read everything, the answer's probably there, somewhere.



  General

This code is Written by Craig Hart in 1996-2002 and is under constant
development. It is released as freeware; please use and modify at will.
No guarantees are made or implied. Commercial use is also specifically
permitted, without restriction. It's free, use it!

I'd appreciate credit if you find this code useful.
I'd also be interested to see any code you may develop or modifications
you create to this code...
suggestions & bug fixes are _always_ welcomed.

I can be reached by email: chart@hyperlink.net.au

See my home page for the latest version of all my software releases,
programmers information, updates for PCIDEVS.TXT and much more:

http://members.hyperlink.net.au/~chart

Wherever you see the term PCI in this document, you can substitute AGP
and/or CardBus, if appropriate, instead. AGP is just a new physical
and electrical form of the PCI bus; CardBus is the 32-bit "version"
of PCMCIA; software-wise, they're virtually identical.
This also covers all the 'other' PCI variants,
such as SmallPCI, PCI-X, etc.



   Why create this program, anyhow? What use is it? What does it do?

PCI basically produces a report of the PCI, AGP & CardBus devices
fitted to a PC, including the system chipset. A plethoria of
information is reported on, including system resource useage
(IRQs, Memory ranges, etc), capabilities (busmastering, caching),
setup data (device latencies, general capabilities, features,
subsystem info), and much much more. A text-file PCIDEVS.TXT lists
thousands of known vendors, devices and subsystems, which PCI will
refer to and display the info from. PCI covers all PCI device
derivitives, including PCI 64-bit & 66MHz options, AGP (all speeds),
CompactPCI, CardBus and PCI-X.

PCIDEVS.TXT is a plain text file, so you can update it yourself,
however it is updated regularly (virtually daily) by the author,
and the latest revision is always available as a free download from
the webpage (see general section).

This program was originally written purely for me to learn how to
program the PCI BIOS found in newer PC's. Since then, this program
has proven to be vastly more useful, especially in the hands of a
technician, system builder, and also in the hands of those about to
purchase or upgrade a PC.

To a technician or system builder, PCI can act as a system
information and diagnostic tool. It lists the resources devices have
been assigned (for example, IRQ's, Memory regions, etc)
so it is handy for finding conflicts.
Because PCI also identifies the devices fitted, it is handy in
figuring out _exactly_ what drivers are required when setting up
a system.

PC buyers don't need to open a PC to see exactly what they're getting:
your vendor can't tell you fibs about the chipset, graphic-card,
or whatever, and since the PC doesn't need to be opened to check what
you ordered is what you got fitted, you aren't loosing any warranties.

Second hand parts hoarders can figure out what they have, just by
plugging it in and running PCI - no more scratching your head over
a mystery card you just stumbled across amongst your latest piles
of aquired junk. As above, finding drivers becomes much easier when
you can say *exactly* what brand model, and revision of card you have.

To a programmer, PCI is a learning tool, since it's full source code
is supplied, and the dump configuration-space feature will help a
programmer discover how a driver alters the hardware to activate
special features or generally work with a given device.




   Using PCI

Just run it. Read the output. Be happy!

You must place PCI.EXE and PCIDEVS.TXT together in the same directory.
You must be "in" that directory before running PCI; in other words,
do NOT run PCI from a path. This is because PCI only looks in the
CURRENT directory for it's data file.

PCI as of version 0.41с will pause at the end of each screenfull to
allow you to read the report; press any key for the next page.
Pausing is disabled if you are using I/O redirection.

PCI's output can be redirected (using MS-DOS pipes), for example to
a text file on disk or a printer. IE "C:\>PCI > LOG.TXT" will generate
a file on disk called LOG.TXT  This is handy if you want to keep a
perminant record of the system under test, print it out, e-mail it to
me, or whatever.

PCI will be slow to generate it's report if run from a plain DOS
computer from a floppy disk drive. For best speed run from within
windows and/or from a hard disk drive. This is because the data file
is more than 200k in size and is therefore not cached in memory.
To improve speed under DOS a little, put buffers=20 in your config.sys
file and reboot.

PCI does not function under Windows 2000 or NT or XP. 3.x/95/98/ME work
OK, as does OS/2 Warp.  See the bugs and OS/2 sections for more info.



Syntax: PCI [/H] [/D] [/S] [/T] [/B] [/P] [/I] [/?]

      ([] = optional, see the docs!)


  And to the PCI SIG:

Official PCI Programming information is not freely available.
The controlling body the "PCI Special Interest Group" has determined
that documentation will be made available only to those willing to pay
for it. And it's not cheap, or easily obtainable outside the USA.
I have the following to say to the PCI SIG:

Charging money for your documentation not only restricts programmers
and end users from adopting the PCI standard, but makes a mockery of
the concept of open information sharing that the Internet has always
stood for. Rather than take such a petty attitude towards Joe Average
programmer, why not release your documentation freely in electronic
format? It can only help establish your standards further.

Freely releasing formal documentation would also mean that programmers
such as myself can stop guessing about PCI, and stop writing up
alternative documentation that may, ultimately, be incorrect.
I'm sure that the current host of "third party" documentation
(along with it's errors) can only make PCI look BAD, not good.

Remember MCA? In 1987 we already had what PCI now offers..
please don't kill PCI the same way IBM killed MCA.