VIA Technologies and 4Front Technologies announce drivers 
for VIA AC97 audio controller for Linux 

Taipei, Taiwan/Culver City, CA, December 28, 1999 - VIA Technologies and 4Front
controller (VT82C686C) for Linux. These drivers are Open Sound System compliant
and are available for evaluation from 4Front's website at http://www.opensound.com

"There has been a huge demand for these drivers from Linux users. We will also 
support the VIA audio controller under other operating systems such as FreeBSD,i
Solaris x86, UnixWare, OpenServer, VxWorks and LynxRT", said Dev Mazumdar, 
President of 4Front Technologies. "We hope to build on this partnership and i
support future audio products developed by VIA Technologies."

"We are pleased to support the Linux community by working with 4Front 
Technologies on developing Linux drivers for the VIA AC97 audio controller," i
commented Richard Brown, Director of Market of VIA Technologies, Inc. "We look i
forward to further strengthening our cooperation with 4Front Technologies in i
the future so that our audio products can run under a complete range of OS i
environments."

Features:
The Open Sound System sound drivers for the VIA AC97 controller feature:
o Digital audio (wave audio) with full duplex operation.
o AC97 Mixer capability
o MPU401 UART support
o Software based Wave table MIDI synthesizer
o Easy to configure GUI with automatic device detection capability

Price and Availability
The drivers are available from 4Front's website for US $30.00 which includes 
free technical support (via Phone and Email) for a period of 1 year and free 
upgrades for a period of 2 years. OEM enquiries may be addressed to i
sales@opensound.com

About 4Front Technologies
Founded in 1994, 4Front Technologies is a privately held company with 
development facilities in California, Finland and Sweden.  4Front's main focus 
is on developing audio solutions for the UNIX and embedded Systems marketplace.
4Front's Open Sound System has become the "de-facto" audio API that is now 
distributed with Linux and FreeBSD kernel sources under the GNU Public License 
(GPL). Open Sound System has been licensed by companies like SCO, Wind River 
Systems and endorsed by SUN Microsystems. The commercial version of Open Sound 
System is also bundled in Linux distributions from Corel, Caldera, MandrakeSoft
SuSE and TurboLinux.  More information can be obtained at http://www.opensound.com

About Linux 
Linux is a free UNIX-type operating system that was originally created by 
Linus Torvalds with the assistance of developers around the world.  Linux is 
an independent POSIX implementation and includes true multitasking, virtual 
memory, shared libraries, demand loading, proper memory management, TCP/IP 
networking, and other features consistent with UNIX-type systems.  Linux is 
developed under the GNU Public License (GPL), the source code for Linux is 
freely available to everyone.  More information on Linux is available at 
http://www.linux.com


About VIA
Founded in 1987, VIA Technologies, Inc., designs, engineers and manufactures 
cost-effective, highly integrated, high functionality system logic chip sets 
and associated peripherals for manufacturers of desktop and portable PC systems.
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Copyright 1999, 4Front Technologies. All rights reserved
Open Sound System is a trade mark of 4Front Technologies
Linux is a registered trademark of Linus Torvalds