M7264 Troubleshooting

[Josh Dersch]

On Tue, May 28, 2019 at 6:23 PM Noel Chiappa via cctalk <
cctalk at classiccmp.org> wrote:

> Hi, sorry about the delayed reply; been dealing with this:
>
>   http://ana-3.lcs.mit.edu/~jnc/jpg/backoak/WholeTreeS.jpg
>
> The cranes arrive tomorrow...
>
>
>     > I took a look at all the lines you mentioned. BDAL3-13, BDIN, BSYNC,
> and
>     > BBS7 are all active and jump around in some manner.
>
> Hmm. Well, that shoots down the simplest theory; that a CPU BDAL (or
> perhaps
> BDIN) driver (technically, a transceiver) chip is bad; if you're seeing any
> activity at all on a line, the driver must be working. So, either both
> console
> cards have an issue, or something more complex is going on.
>
> Here are some pictures to show you what you should be seeing, and what I'm
> seeing with an LSI-11 with no console card. First, normal operation:
>
>   http://ana-3.lcs.mit.edu/~jnc/tech/pdp11/jpg/BSYN-BDAL_OK.jpg
>
> The top trace is BSYNC, the bottom BDAL10 (which should be asserted for
> 0177560, the console CSR's address; it's the 02000 bit). The timebase on
> this
> one is 1 usec per division. As you can see, it's in a tight loop reading
> that
> register.
>
> The QBUS spec shows that for a DATI cycle, the DAL lines are set up before
> BSYNC is asserted (falling edge here, since the bus lines are inverted).
> BDA10 is indeed asserted (low) when that happens; shortly after it goes
> back
> to 0 (high) so that device can put its data out on those lines. It stays
> high,
> so that bit in the CSR must be 0.
>
> OK, now a picture of the bus with no console card:
>
>   http://ana-3.lcs.mit.edu/~jnc/tech/pdp11/jpg/BSYN-BDAL_NoCon.jpg
>
> It's a bit hard to interpret what's going on here (note that the timebase
> is
> much larger - 5 usec). The long assertion of BSYNC is undoubtly the CPU
> trying
> to get the console CSR to respond, and eventually timing out.  Not sure
> what
> the short assertion following it is - without looking at the ucode for the
> ODT, there's no way to know what the CPU's doing.
>
> Even harder to understand is what the BDAL line is doing. It looks like
> it's
> un-asserted (0, i.e. +3V) on the falling (electrically - rising, logically)
> edge of BSYN (which would be incorrect - see above). And then it hops
> around
> while BSYNC is asserted, which makes no sense at all to me.
>
>
> At this point, my best guess at the most likely cause of your problem
> (given
> the 'all the lines are doing stuff') is that both console cards have
> issues. Tomorrow, when I'm not outside, I'll try and look at some other
> BDAL
> lines and see if they are doing the same thing with no console card in.
>
>       Noel
>

Dumb question -- this is a long thread, so maybe this has been covered and
I missed it -- but how is the backplane in the H11 currently configured?
(i.e. what boards are in what slots?)  Could the issue here be something as
simple as a break in the qbus due to a misplaced board?

- Josh