A2000 Freezing?

[Picklepie]

This 2K gives me an orange screen on initial cold boot but not always. Once its up and running, it will function for a while, then it will display a weird? screen of striped blue lines and after that the screen goes black and will not function any longer but will not turn off. If I turn it off for 30 to a minute it will boot but it will happen again.

It's been working ok, I added a Gonbes 8200 since my 1084 will not work, a Buddha 20th, 40GB 2.5 drive because I could not get the CF to work, and removed battery and replaced with the coin battery but not before it leaked on the motherboard. Battery was replaced several months ago.

Any Ideas? this issue just started happening and I already re-seated all the chips I could.

[Picklepie]

Not sure if this helps but here is a screenshot of the event.
Also I just updated to (WB 3.1.4). WB 3.1 was working just fine.

[Picklepie]

Update.
So I found the Blink codes and for the 2000, 9 short blinks +1 long (with a red screen) continuously means bad ram. I"m getting an orange screen which does not exist in the list but the RGB to VGA converter could be off in the colors.

So I figure what the heck, power down the computer and pull the memory, it's an A2058 with 8meg on board. Inspect the solder side and find several places where the traces have started to corrode. Start to clean the traces as best I can and in the meantime the computer still has 4 meg on the accelerator so I apply power to see if the issue is still happening.

Well, its been running for several hours on the 4 meg and not a hiccup has occurred, I'm going to let it run overnight and check in the morning to see if it's still running or crashes.
Uploaded a picture of the back of the board, to show what I found.

[Picklepie]

Back to the drawing board.
Just went to check on the 2000 and found it with a green (light green, green bluish?) screen and a solid power and hard drive activity LED lit solid. Attempt to cntr-A-A would not restart it, had to do a power down then power up to make it work again.

The chips or the sockets? Not sure where to turn now...

Ideas?

[r.cade]

You put the original working 3.1 ROM in? I've seen the newer 3.1.4 AMD EPROMs not work properly in some Amigas.

I bought a set that is on AMD EPROMs and it worked in one A3000 and not at all in the other. Sometimes red screen, yellow, orange, crashing lockups, etc.

[Picklepie]

Thank you for the reply and the idea.
Will install 3.1 back in and see what happens. Will even install WB3.1 in another drive and run that to see what happens and will post the results but won't be able to do so until tomorrow.

About the memory board, you think some kind of coating to protect the traces from further damage, or would it be fine as is?

[hooverphonique]

Originally Posted by Picklepie

About the memory board, you think some kind of coating to protect the traces from further damage, or would it be fine as is?

Use clear nail varnish if nothing else.

[TjLaZer]

Always revert back after doing mods if you have an issue.

[Picklepie]

I was thinking of spraying the back area with a spray can of varnish but the nail polish idea sounds much better and more control.

After work, I mostly pulled mostly everything from the computer except the CD, Zip and Buddha (oh and floppy). Installed the 3.1 rom and also have a Derringer 030 left in the system.

Was booting from the WB3.1 floppy but decided to make a bootable zip, install 3.1, and run it that way for now until i'm sure. Just checked and it's still running. Will let it run overnight and report the findings later. If it does not freeze, then will work on the ram board and install, see what happens.

[dalek]

Google 'conformal coating' and use the right product for the job

[Picklepie]

DARN! Sorry Dalek, i missed your post and already used the nail polish. At least it will protect it, (i Hope).

Computer ran all night without a hickup, at least it was not frozen or locked up So installed the A2058 board an turned it on again to see what hapens.

When I bought this way back when, it also had a bridgeboard with a 2mb board labeld "MICRON TECH., INC>." with a bunch of dip switches on it. No longer have the bridgeboard as when I pulled the 2k out of storage i found it out of the slot with a battery that leaked all over the place. Cut the edge connector for another project and chucked the board as i thought it was un-salvageable.
Since this memory goes on the ISA slot I guess it's useless to me but it's in pristine condition.

Sorry for the rant.

What TjLaZer said got me thinking...
When I installed the 3.1.4 rom I also installed a modified version of ClassicWB that had been modified to work with the new WB.
(There is a thread on it somewhere.)
Lots of thing were changed so could be a combination.; new rom, new software, etc. Will have to revisit that.....

[Picklepie]

Well it's been running with none of the initial issues, no crashes, freezing, or lockups since i installed the cleaned up memory board. So powered down again and removed 3.1, in goes 3.1.4. Booted with no weird screen colors or anything, hopefully it was the corrosion shorted traces on the mem board.

Funny though how since removing the new rom everything has been running smoothly, except the Buddha will no longer recognize the install Dom.

[Picklepie]

Hi Gang,.
The Buddha issue will have to be fixed another day since I have the floppies for 1.3 (with manuals), 3.1 and 3.1.4.

So the issue looks like it's completely gone. Might have been re-swapping the roms and ensuring a good connection that might have cleared some tarnish from the socket pins. That and the issue with the memory board, but after re-installing the 3.3.4 i also returned the 2.5 40gb hard drive to the 2000 and let it run all night and almost all day with no problems.

One thing naggs me though; at one time checking some things with the case open I moved the harness on the power supply and I think a similar thing happened. Could be a flaky cable or might need the PSU updated. Might have to investigate that further but at another time since it seems 100% operational, im putting the top case back on and leave thing be.

Thank you all for the valuable inputs and help with this issue.

[Picklepie]

Well, that orange screen was back. Tracked it down to the accelerator. Goes plugged into the 68000 socket then the proc goes plugged on that. Removed and re-inserted several times and after that worked fine so probably some old corrosion on the contacts or something. Afraid of doing anything on the sockets for fear of making it worse.