#Disaster continued!
18 messages in this thread
So my old buddy has fallen foul of the BUG… otherwise in scientific
literature called the MegAChip 2000. You seem to have fought the battle and
hope have won at last. The interplay with MegAChips flowing thru' the
postal/UPS services to and fro will at least have done the economy some good.
Did talk with DKB. They say fault is my Rev 6. motherboard and its installed
memory. Just have a wee bit of doubt on that diagnosis – also the PANIC of
laying out more bucks for another full motherboard – just to make the $196.00
(from Grapevine) MegAChip do its advertised duty.
Am presently trying to decide upon my next course of action. Have even dark
thoughts of just dumping the Amiga…. but hate to loose the Toaster and its
stuff.
Think of me. Sitting and getting those wonderful GURU messages. I too am now
blessed with odd screens of obtuse colors at times. Only wish I could record
them on tape and sell to MTV. Make a fortune.
HILARY.
Don't give up the Amiga!
There are definite known problems with Rev 6 MB's. I believe C= was even
swapping them, free of charge, for a while.
You could always go back to the 1M Agnus, and give up the Megachip…
Or, you could get probably get a used 2000 for less than $500, and just
swap out it's motherboard.
Bob Comer — Flying high and fast with my A1200HD'030 on Autopilot!
From Cheyenne, Wyoming U.S.A
Hilary,
DKB is being (as usual for them) most accomodating and eager to work with
me to nail down the problem. That self same DKB board is on the machine I
am currently using (which has been running non stop for about 42 hours now
either with me using it or rendering/singlframing anims). DKB thinks it
is the agnes socket and since the machine acts up without the DKB on board
that could possibly be the case. Both machines have been through the same
termperature cycles (daytime temps of 86 in the studio) but one has a 250
watt supply (DKB works OK and air coming out of machine is slightly warm)
ant t he other has a 300 Watt supply (DKB doesn't work and air coming out
of machine is quite hot).
Now I'm just trying to decide how to get the 6.4 fixed since it was 5 days
old when it broke. I did send in for level II Gold serive, but I know
the reg materials may not have made it, but…
The odd thing is since taking everythig out of the old unreliable 4.1 MB
machine, taking the keyboard apart and popping key caps off to clean it,
blowing all the dust out of the chassis, I am no longer having random
read/write errors to the removable or quarterback crashes on invocation.
Very weird (maybe it felt threatened… :^|
wmc – via Autopilot!
Wayne,
>>The odd thing is since taking everythig out of the old unreliable 4.1 MB
>>machine.
What problems do you know about with the 4.1 rev MB? I have had a 2000
with 4.1 MB for over 3 years, and it pushes a unatural number of
peripherals with no problems, ie GVP combo accel, flickerfixer, 386
bridgboard w/ multi I/O card, GVP series II hard card, syquest 88, DCTV,
HD floppy, 3 different HDs, 14.4 HST, have even used an old Cherry
keyboard with no known problems (lightning did take out serial port
buffers a couple of years ago but have since replaced with socketed
chips). Never even replaced CIA chips. Is there something here I don't
know and have been just plain lucky?
…Steve
====>>> Motorola 68030 Inside <<<====
Steve,
I have had a Ricoh Rmovable that worked fine off a GVP HC/8 and original
rev their Faastprep and 3.5 omni ROM under dos 1.2. Then I added a GVP
030 combo. Still worked ok. Then I added 32 bit mem to the combo card,
upgraded (per thier manuyal) to a later rom rev (4.3) to get the
"extended" memory disk access and accessing the ricoh became a crap shoot.
Changing termination changed the symptoms, but the problem remained. GVP,
for the longest time, hid behind the "oh, 4.1 motherboard – even CBM calls
that non-standard – thats your problem." Then my first Toaster would not
start-up when I attached a BB to input one. It took 3 weeks of convincing
before NewTek issued an RMA to return the board, again stating the the 4.1
MB was the problem. Turned out to be the Toaster as the replacement one
worked fine ever since. So, the reason I wanted to upgrade was so I could
bypass that 4.1 MB blow-off routine when I needed support.
BTW, it turns out that most of the Ricoh problems were due to two things:
a component in the ricoh blew, and the GVP software tries to treat it as a
SYquest ignoring the sectoring info returned by the ricoh drive. They
apparently also handle bernoullies as syquests as well. Consequentley
due to differneces in Low Level command parameters, their software
logically destroyed 7 ricoh removable at $120 a crack. The only way I
found this out was due to the work of a local Ricoh removable OEM/VAR who
packages unix based document imaging systems and had lots of diagnostic
and repair capacity. They got Ricoh to replace 4 of my carts, they
rehabed one and the other two were actually physically damaged and they
are trying to get Ricoh to replace those for me too. GVP denied the
problems with thier software to the point of telling me they didn't even
have the source code to FaastPrep (right, like they are that dumb to toss
it or not to own it even tho a contractor built it for them) or a scsi bus
analyzer to be able to tell me the parameters their LL Format command sent
to the drive. Thier head of tech support was supposed to (after a one
hour haranguing phone conversation – basically a GVP litany of dneial) do
a simple test and call me back to tell if my problem was unique to my
set-up or not. The test was to LL FOrmat a Ricoh cart using FaastPrep
expert mode. Its been several months – I've not heard a peep!
They are going to be SOOOOoooo unhappy to see me at WOCA Pasedena this
year when I walk in with my Ricoh drive and tell them to demonstrate to
the nice folks how to LL format a removable following the steps in their
docs…. :^}
wmc – via Autopilot!
I don't know how your deity is but… YOU OWE 'EM! You say you never have
even had to replace 8520 AND have had a lighting hit!
hummm, I think that you are the guy that I want to have around next time
we try something really risky <g>
-bill
Steve isn't the only one with virtually no problems. I have a 4.5 rev
board. I have a GVP3001 w/80meg Quantum & 8megs ram, a FC24, AMaxII+,
Trumpcard Pro w/ 210meg Quantum (that runs REALLY hot). My only problems
are: All these cards sucked up the juice, so I got a 300 watt PS. Had a
capacitor fail (very difficult to isolate). Occasionally the SCSI drive
fails to spin up, so I shut the system down, give the machine a good
whallop on the side and then turn it back on. Been doing this for about a
year with no secondary problems. I have not replaced any chips and have
not been too careful about plugging and unplugging things with power on.
It has been (and continues to be the most reliable piece of machinery I've
ever owned).
OTOH, I also work with a Quadra 950, which I can crash with a blink of my
eye. Even with out blinking, I find it to be a cantankerous (sp?) lug that
is not fast (due to constant crashing and shutting down after resetting
control panel stuff like mode32, Appletalk, etc so that various software
will work properly) It is truly a PITA!
-Steve
Steve,
The word on the inside is that the 4.5 rev was one of the best, much
preferred over the later revs.
Pete Jones. flying on AutoPilot from Brussels, Belgium
Just jumping in after reading all this *disaster* talk. I just upgraded
my A-500 with a GVP A530 Turbo w/ 40mg HD. Anybody got any history on
this baby? So far it's a DREAM!!
Rich – Flying the AP skys…..finally!!
(and loving every minute of it)
Steve;
Overall, my Amiga's have been pretty reliable. I have lost a bunch of CIA
chips. All but one or two have been mainly my own fault however.
Trouble is that when I think about the most reliable machine that I have
ever used… An old HP-1000M, a real tank that one! 'Course I sure would
not want to still be using RTE-3!
-bill
My brother is still using the _original_ IBM PC, not the XT but the PC! He
refuses to upgrade because Charlie Chaplin said it's the last computer
you'll ever need! IBM said that with the PC's open architecture you'll be
able to expand and never be outdated. He doesn't mind how slow it is, it
allows him to pop open another beer!
-Steve
>…slow… allows him to pop open another beer!
Probably allows him to drink it too. In fact, if he does that often
enough, it is no wonder that the machine's speed doesn't bother him <g>
-bill
>>I don't know how your deity is but… YOU OWE 'EM! You say you never
>>have even had to replace 8520 AND have had a lighting hit!
>>hummm, I think that you are the guy that I want to have around next time
>>we try something really risky <g>
Actually Bill, I am one of those people who wish luck would just leave me
alone! Oh I have had my share of problems with the Amy but nothing to do
with the motherboard or the basic stock machine. I pulled my hair out for
3 weeks trying to get 2 hd on the 030 board, terminationa and id where all
correct (turned out the mask values were bad, but it was what was in the
GVP manual).
Just remebered than when I originally got the 2000 in 1988 (with 2090
controller!), I had a problem with the agnis (512k) seating. Everyone one
told me it was unheard of in the 2000, only the 500 had that problem!
While my sons 500 agnus stayed seated, the cpu had to be reseated every
couple of weeks.
…Steve
====>>> Motorola 68030 Inside <<<====
OK, you had me worried there for a bit. I am sure that there are those
that never have problems with their machines (of any kind) but I tend to
believe that these same people must not use them, of at least they
certainly don't change anything!
-bill
Hilary,
Don't give up just yet. We are working on resolving your problem the
best we can. The first thing we will do if you are willing is to swap the
MegAChip out with another one. I do feel that it is very unlikely the swap
will do any good, since I don't believe the problem lies with the
MegAChip. I am more than willing to test that premise though.
I am working on seeing if we can resolve your motherboard problem, but
haven't gotten any response yet.
Dean
DKB Software
Hilary;
Dominick is right. I did not remember but vaguely. It seemed that I
remembered a version of the Ami 2K motherboard that was so bad that C= did
free replacements. Of course that was a number of years ago now so it is
doubtful that they will still replace it. OTOH, it sure doesn't hurt to
try!
-bill
Hilary,
The problem is that whoever sold you the Rev 6.0 motherboard in the first place
(I got the impression you bought it as a replacement motherboard) did you a
great disservice. Commodore replaced 6.0 motherboards with 6.1/6.2 boards for
anyone who had a problem for quite a while — the 6.0 was a real troublemaker.
If someone sold you a 6.0, I wonder if it wasn't a board pulled from a system
that had had its board replaced…
One thing I've seen cure some 6.0 problems is replacing the plastic 68000 chip
with a ceramic 16MHz version. (Cheap) Don't know why it helps though.
Denny,
There was a C= tech bulletin about swapping the 68000 on the rev 6 boards.
Something about a bad batch with a certain date code. I don't recall the
specifics without looking it up. But I do recall it fixing a couple
problems.
-Jim