#B1-step hrdware fix
3 messages in this thread
(to those of us with B-step problems),
We had major problems moving into Release 11 because of "B step"
80386 chips in our vintage (1987) Acer Model 1100 16mH machines. All
software fixes/patches were for nought. Got no help from Acer for a long
while – in part because the motherboard on these early machines were of
proprietary design. (I was told they couldn't give me just any Intel chip
– we had to wait until Acer/Intel worked out some agreement.)
Eventually Acer came forward with a $300 offer to replace these
problematic mother boards and chips with newer 20mH models. This would
have been fine but that meant (I believe) I'd have to buy a new
$co-processor$ as well. Add in downtime while units shipped back to
factory….Ugh. I didn't feel like investing too much in this hardware (no
IDE drives, no on-board cache, etc.)
Found a way out – some of you may have noticed that in early
documentation for Release 11/c1 the discussion of the B-step problem
refered to hardware fixes and mentioned a company called Ironwood. The
referenced was deleted from the presumably more up to date readme file, and
is not in 11/c2 documentation.
In my opinion it should not have been. I contacted Ironwood
Electronics, POB 21151, St. Paul, MN 55121 (612-431-7025) and had an item
called FIX-80386 shipped overnight letter for only $164. This chip fits
between the 80386 and the motherboard and has made it possible for me to
run Release 11 on my old machines. Hope this helps others.
Charles – The FIX-80386 insert from Ironwood solves Erratum 21. The FIX
chip does not solve Erratum 17, which is the cause of most of the problems
we see. Only a new CPU will solve that problem. We have ERRAT17.EXP, an
ADS program that works around the INTEL bug, available for R11. To be fair
to Ironwood, our ADS program won't solve Erratum 21, but most manufacturers
have built a fix into the motherboard for that one. If the ADS program
doesn't help, you may also need the FIX chip. A new CPU is the best
answer.
Thanks for your help and comments. I didn't realize the Ironwood FIX386,
which I have, handled only the Errata21 problem. Errata17 is incredibly
erratic :-), obviously — by following instructions for the software patch
(I load the errata17.exp from my ACAD.ADS file) I seem to have solved my
problems. Again, thanks to all who listened to my increasingly paranoid
lament.