Tony Duell wrote:
Hi,
I recently picked up a model 4 ver 1 with a problem. The system originally
worked and booted, after moving the system it started to display random
characters
on power up and failed to boot.. I removed socketed ICs and cleaned
the connectors.
The system now displays a blank screen on power up ( although the drives
spin, and
it could be booting ). If I disconnect the FD controller from the main
board, the
system jumps into basic ( with video ) and seems to operate. Print
fre(0) returns
somthing over 48K with the fd disconnected. Any hints?
It sounds like the CPU board is basically (!) OK -- the ROM BASIC only
uses 48K of the RAM (no matter how much you actually have fitted).
When you reseated socketed chips, did you also do the ones on the FDC
board? Have you checked -- carefully -- the ribbon cable between the CPU
and FDC boards? I've had a lot of problems with those cables in M3s and M4s.
-tony
The floppy cable is indeed fragile, Having been forced to use the same type
on a project 20 some years ago. When I had it disassembled, I pulled the fdc
controller, burnished the leads, cleaned the socket and the fdc I/F
connector
on the cpu board with 90% isoprop. I'll check cable continuity and fdc lead
to controller trace.
Thanks,
Jim.