Peter's Tower Project

Peter · 16 June 2007, 14:35

I thought I would start a new thread for my Z4 Tower Project... See Picture 1...

Mainly because I think I am going to have lots of questions to ask...

At the Moment it is very early days in the project, I have the Z4 Tower, a 1D.1 A1200 Motherboard, Fast ATA MKIII Controller, 3.1 Rom Chips, Right Angle PCMCIA Adaptor, Lyra Keyboard Adaptor, Mediator SX version, various PCI cards to be fitted (when I get a decent Accelerator for this project...) a CD Rom and 3.5 Hard drive...

I got nearly all the bits and pieces from Amigakit and once again I was really impressed by their service and friendly advice - thanks Amigakit.

The first problem I had was with the Fast ATA Mark III Controller - because I am using a 1D.1 Motherboard the clockpins are on the side that meant that the controller would not sit flush - I have solved this by sitting two additional rom chip risers... see picture 2 ...

I am still waiting to receive an LED adaptor from Amigakit but in the meantime I do have a couple of questions about the Z4 Power connections to the Mediator...

1. I have the SX Mediator and there are two power inputs - the Z4 tower has an ATX power supply so plugging in the top power supply on the Mediator seems straight forward enough however there is an additional power cable coming from the towers power supply that looks as if it should be plugged into either P8 or P9 on the lower Mediator power input... what should I do here? See Picture 3...

2. I need to plug the Power SW small pink and white cable into the Mediator Power SW input - but which way up does it go... pink to the top, white to the bottom or the other way round?

As you can imagine this is going to be a challenge for me but it has been fun so far - going to post a few pics along the way and I will keep picking your brains out there if that is ok...

Picture 1.

Picture 2.

Picture 3.

Zetr0 · 16 June 2007, 14:48

@peter

its shaping up to be a fine looking build my friend, and i await with much anticipation !!!!

The psu connector is a p8 connector, wich if memory serves me correctly is nothing more than
P8 Connector

red +5v
orange +3.3v
orange +3.3v
black COM
black COM
black COM

I am not to sure so please check your manual, but I believe you only need one OR the other (ATX or AT)

hope it helps

Peter · 16 June 2007, 14:58

I have asked Amigakit to confirm as there is not much in the Mediator manual to suggest what to do - also the Z4 Tower did not come with any documentation so I will sit tight until I hear as I dont want to damage anything so early on in the project!!

Peter · 16 June 2007, 16:28

Zetr0 - you are right - only one connection required - it is important here not to connect the P8/P9!

The power cable can go either way.

Thanks Amigakit.

amigakit.com · 16 June 2007, 16:28

The two pin power switch plug goes over the two prong header on the right side of the Mediator any orientation - it does not matter- it simply makes a connection to tell the Mediator to power on the computer.

Do not connect to P8 and P9- Only connect the ATX connector.

Hope this helps.

BTW: If anyone else wants a Z4 tower - we have built 10 more this week (brand new)

amigakit.com · 16 June 2007, 16:35

Before you cable tie the FastATA into place, it may be good to put a few blobs from a hot-glue gun to stabalise it to the ROM socket extenders. Finally test it independently out of the tower to ensure it works before adding the Mediator.

Zetr0 · 16 June 2007, 16:47

you know guys, i am begining to see the real future of Amiga...

Powered by AmigaKit!

well done AK

twizzle · 16 June 2007, 22:16

you will also need to put installer v 43.3 in your C: drawer first
before you can install the fast ata111 software
also when you fit your PC1 cards in the mediator
1st slot ethernet card as this uses the main chips from the mediator
2nd slot sound card
5th slot graphics card
i got amigakit to make me up some custom cables to go from the fast ata to my 2x cdrw & dvdrw drives, as the std cables are rather tight

and if you brake my arms and legs i might sell you my BL060/50mhz +32 meg ram in mint cond 100% working its in a BLPPC 603e 060 box though.
have you strained enough money yet

Peter · 16 June 2007, 23:01

PM me the details of the card please twizzle - I am considering a few options accelerator wise at the moment and I would be interested in seeing some pictures and finding out some more details of what you have there...

I will be back on line later...

Peter · 18 June 2007, 02:14

The rom risers did not turn out quite as I expected as once the mediator was installed the new height of the Fast ATA Controller made it sit too tightly to the back of the mediator... out with the rom risers...in with the old problem - that is the fact that the 1D.1 motherboard I have has the clockport pins on the left hand side... and they were not allowing the Fast ATA Controller to sit comfortably flush.

The clockport pins had to go, I have only ever used a clockport for a silver surfer for dial up and now it is easy enough to get Amigas networked onto broadband I dont think I would have used the clockport here... They were a bit stubborn to remove and needed a bit of heat from the soldering iron and a bit of Dremmel work to get them out - I can always re-seat a new set on the right if there should ever be a need I guess...

See Picture 1... Offending pins on the left removed...

The Rom Risers and clockport pins removed allowed the Fast ATA to sit almost flush but because it is now sitting at it's correct height it won't allow the Lyra keyboard adaptor to sit in place - the two clash for space - that will have to go back in exchange for an alternative - it's a shame as the Lyra is a nice item.

See picture 2 ... Lyra Adaptor and Fast ATA Controller clash for space...

The ATA Fast Controller is back in place and the motherboard booted up fine which was a relief as removing the Clockport pins was a bit of a challenge!

See Picure 3... ATA Controller...

There is a fair bit of trial and error here as I go along and I dont seem to have made much progress TBH but it is coming together slowly - it's great to have a spare room where you can just shut the door on this lot though!

See Picture 4... !

Thanks AmigaKit for advice this week and Zetr0!
Twizzle - Must talk to you about the cable situation this week...

Peter · 30 June 2007, 01:30

Just a quick update...

Made some progess this week - added a Blizzard 060 so that has made all the re-installs I have had to do a bit quicker - started configuring this Tower with only an old 8 Meg Ram expansion...

Really pleased with the look of the Z4 - it is a smart Tower IMO.

The 3.5 IDE 80 GIG HD was a real pain to install as a single disk so I have installed a 3.5 IDE 4 GIG HD to accomodate the boot partition - I may add the 80 GIG as at a later date - but dont know if it really warrants all the space.

I have found that dealing with large HD's a real nightmare - very unstable and a pig to configure - probably just my inexperience however I think something 4 GIG or under for a "System" Disk makes life so much easier.

OS3.9 installed with BB 1+2 - no errors so far... Mediator installed and Voodoo 3 card is producing a nice picture via an HP1520 Flat Screen monitor.
I have to be honest - I made so many school boy errors while trying to set this card up but I guess it is trial and error... my best mistake was having the Mediator memory jumper incorrectly set thus disabling the card!! - I must have smoked about five fags while scratching my head before I realised!

Going to configure the sound and network cards next - then start to slowly build up the application and software installs.

It has taken me hours so far and I have got a bit p*ssed off with it along the way - the clockport Pins saga and the Fast ATA settings were a bit frustrating - (Thanks Zetr0, Twizzle and Amigakit for the help along the way!)

Here are a couple of pictures...

Pic 1.

Pic 2.

Peter

Zetr0 · 30 June 2007, 02:33

Its looking great peter!

keep up the good work

jimbob005 · 30 June 2007, 09:54

looking good mate

Peter · 11 July 2007, 00:31

I haven't had much time to update this thread lately but the Tower is nearly finished.
I have added the Blizzard SCSI module and the Tower now has 256 MB of memory.
I opted for a 4 GB Maxtor 3.5 IDE Hard Drive for the System partition and have installed the 80 GB 3.5 IDE HD as a slave - I intend to build up a serious collection of MODs on it - it has the room!

Got a couple of fans doing their thing in there - didn't realise the Voodoo got quite so hot...

OS3.9 is running very well and I have connected into my ADSL - the PCI network card goes into my ADSL router and Genesis seems prettty quick together with IBrowse and Yam...

Great picture from the Voodoo - but of course there is always the temptation to run a program that just wont display and of course games are very limited with this screen mode... anyone for slow Quake?
Does anyone know any Games, Demo's that will run in this screen mode??

I need to get some sound from the DVD Rom - I have the SB128 but haven't configured AHI as yet - bit puzzled about this.... may have to start another thread with some questions about setting this up becuase I want to get sound from both the Amiga and the DVD Rom...

Never got the time save option sorted but hey it's not a perfect Amiga World.
I have a neat program that pops up on bootup and asks me very politely if I want to set the time - if not I just cancel...

The Tower has been fun to build and configure - it has given me some headaches but I am pleased with the end result... I will add some final pictures when it is all in place...

I cant make up my mind whether it is more fun doing a tower or butchering up a desktop case and cramming as many things as possible inside - both fun I guess...

I'm just waiting on an LED adaptor from Amigakit and the sides can go on... then... another project, of course.

Amigakit have been very helpful throughout this little project of mine as indeed have been a number of EAB members, Cheers All...

Zetr0 · 11 July 2007, 00:48

@Peter

my friend, that indeed is a fantastic build, and i am glad that you have persisted to where you are now! its indeed great.

~Quake060

Ahhh even at 320*200 on my cybervision643dMk2 ..... poor..... 12-18 fps max lol... still managed to game across the internet via dialup with my m8 LidlessEyE in France... ahhh good times....

~Audio Mixer
I have built a simple stereo mixer for my A600 and DVDRom it works quite well, if you want i can postie the mixer

. on the other hand I do believe that Amigakit also sell CD and amiga Audio mixers.

~AHI
I had some issues and a bit of lag with this using my prelude *clockport* (but this was in the very early days of AHI btw) I noticed this mainly when using MedSS / Rombler or tracker. strange i never got round to testing with bars and pipes.

I am actualy building a midi synthesizer that uses the serial port and a Korg 4MB card (should be quite nice building a full mixer with a front pannel for the amiga when i get round to it LOL)

anyways imma rambling... great work m8, please posty more and more pics

Zetr0 · 11 July 2007, 00:48

@Peter

my friend, that indeed is a fantastic build, and i am glad that you have persisted to where you are now! its indeed great.

~Quake060

Ahhh even at 320*200 on my cybervision643dMk2 ..... poor..... 12-18 fps max lol... still managed to game across the internet via dialup with my m8 LidlessEyE in France... ahhh good times....

~Audio Mixer
I have built a simple stereo mixer for my A600 and DVDRom it works quite well, if you want i can postie the mixer

. on the other hand I do believe that Amigakit also sell CD and amiga Audio mixers.

~AHI
I had some issues and a bit of lag with this using my prelude *clockport* (but this was in the very early days of AHI btw) I noticed this mainly when using MedSS / Rombler or tracker. strange i never got round to testing with bars and pipes.

I am actualy building a midi synthesizer that uses the serial port and a Korg 4MB card (should be quite nice building a full mixer with a front pannel for the amiga when i get round to it LOL)

anyways imma rambling... great work m8, please posty more and more pics

Zetr0 · 11 July 2007, 00:48

eh!? how the hell did i post twice?!

Retro-Nerd · 11 July 2007, 01:01

Quote:

Originally Posted by Zetr0

eh!? how the hell did i post twice?!

Delete one, Zetr0.

Zetr0 · 11 July 2007, 01:04

I can only edit or quote, and as i said it twice hardly need quote it again LOL

Retro-Nerd · 11 July 2007, 01:07

Really? Very strange, matey. Edit --> Delete ---> Delete Message works fine here.

16 June 2007, 14:35	#1
Peter Still an Amiga user Join Date: Nov 2006 Location: Kent Age: 55 Posts: 2,715	Peter's Tower Project I thought I would start a new thread for my Z4 Tower Project... See Picture 1... Mainly because I think I am going to have lots of questions to ask... At the Moment it is very early days in the project, I have the Z4 Tower, a 1D.1 A1200 Motherboard, Fast ATA MKIII Controller, 3.1 Rom Chips, Right Angle PCMCIA Adaptor, Lyra Keyboard Adaptor, Mediator SX version, various PCI cards to be fitted (when I get a decent Accelerator for this project...) a CD Rom and 3.5 Hard drive... I got nearly all the bits and pieces from Amigakit and once again I was really impressed by their service and friendly advice - thanks Amigakit. The first problem I had was with the Fast ATA Mark III Controller - because I am using a 1D.1 Motherboard the clockpins are on the side that meant that the controller would not sit flush - I have solved this by sitting two additional rom chip risers... see picture 2 ... I am still waiting to receive an LED adaptor from Amigakit but in the meantime I do have a couple of questions about the Z4 Power connections to the Mediator... 1. I have the SX Mediator and there are two power inputs - the Z4 tower has an ATX power supply so plugging in the top power supply on the Mediator seems straight forward enough however there is an additional power cable coming from the towers power supply that looks as if it should be plugged into either P8 or P9 on the lower Mediator power input... what should I do here? See Picture 3... 2. I need to plug the Power SW small pink and white cable into the Mediator Power SW input - but which way up does it go... pink to the top, white to the bottom or the other way round? As you can imagine this is going to be a challenge for me but it has been fun so far - going to post a few pics along the way and I will keep picking your brains out there if that is ok... Picture 1. Picture 2. Picture 3.

16 June 2007, 14:48	#2
Zetr0 Ya' like it Retr0? Join Date: Jul 2005 Location: United Kingdom Age: 49 Posts: 9,768	@peter its shaping up to be a fine looking build my friend, and i await with much anticipation !!!! The psu connector is a p8 connector, wich if memory serves me correctly is nothing more than P8 Connector red +5v orange +3.3v orange +3.3v black COM black COM black COM I am not to sure so please check your manual, but I believe you only need one OR the other (ATX or AT) hope it helps

30 June 2007, 01:30	#11
Peter Still an Amiga user Join Date: Nov 2006 Location: Kent Age: 55 Posts: 2,715	Peter's Tower Update Just a quick update... Made some progess this week - added a Blizzard 060 so that has made all the re-installs I have had to do a bit quicker - started configuring this Tower with only an old 8 Meg Ram expansion... Really pleased with the look of the Z4 - it is a smart Tower IMO. The 3.5 IDE 80 GIG HD was a real pain to install as a single disk so I have installed a 3.5 IDE 4 GIG HD to accomodate the boot partition - I may add the 80 GIG as at a later date - but dont know if it really warrants all the space. I have found that dealing with large HD's a real nightmare - very unstable and a pig to configure - probably just my inexperience however I think something 4 GIG or under for a "System" Disk makes life so much easier. OS3.9 installed with BB 1+2 - no errors so far... Mediator installed and Voodoo 3 card is producing a nice picture via an HP1520 Flat Screen monitor. I have to be honest - I made so many school boy errors while trying to set this card up but I guess it is trial and error... my best mistake was having the Mediator memory jumper incorrectly set thus disabling the card!! - I must have smoked about five fags while scratching my head before I realised! Going to configure the sound and network cards next - then start to slowly build up the application and software installs. It has taken me hours so far and I have got a bit p*ssed off with it along the way - the clockport Pins saga and the Fast ATA settings were a bit frustrating - (Thanks Zetr0, Twizzle and Amigakit for the help along the way!) Here are a couple of pictures... Pic 1. Pic 2. Peter

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16 June 2007, 14:58	#3
Peter Still an Amiga user Join Date: Nov 2006 Location: Kent Age: 55 Posts: 2,715	I have asked Amigakit to confirm as there is not much in the Mediator manual to suggest what to do - also the Z4 Tower did not come with any documentation so I will sit tight until I hear as I dont want to damage anything so early on in the project!!

16 June 2007, 16:28	#4
Peter Still an Amiga user Join Date: Nov 2006 Location: Kent Age: 55 Posts: 2,715	Zetr0 - you are right - only one connection required - it is important here not to connect the P8/P9! The power cable can go either way. Thanks Amigakit.

16 June 2007, 16:28	#5
amigakit.com Registered User Join Date: Aug 2004 Location: www.amigakit.com Posts: 2,032	The two pin power switch plug goes over the two prong header on the right side of the Mediator any orientation - it does not matter- it simply makes a connection to tell the Mediator to power on the computer. Do not connect to P8 and P9- Only connect the ATX connector. Hope this helps. BTW: If anyone else wants a Z4 tower - we have built 10 more this week (brand new)

16 June 2007, 16:35	#6
amigakit.com Registered User Join Date: Aug 2004 Location: www.amigakit.com Posts: 2,032	Before you cable tie the FastATA into place, it may be good to put a few blobs from a hot-glue gun to stabalise it to the ROM socket extenders. Finally test it independently out of the tower to ensure it works before adding the Mediator.

16 June 2007, 16:47	#7
Zetr0 Ya' like it Retr0? Join Date: Jul 2005 Location: United Kingdom Age: 49 Posts: 9,768	you know guys, i am begining to see the real future of Amiga... Powered by AmigaKit! well done AK

16 June 2007, 22:16	#8
twizzle Registered User Join Date: Sep 2005 Location: taunton.som.uk Age: 73 Posts: 681	you will also need to put installer v 43.3 in your C: drawer first before you can install the fast ata111 software also when you fit your PC1 cards in the mediator 1st slot ethernet card as this uses the main chips from the mediator 2nd slot sound card 5th slot graphics card i got amigakit to make me up some custom cables to go from the fast ata to my 2x cdrw & dvdrw drives, as the std cables are rather tight and if you brake my arms and legs i might sell you my BL060/50mhz +32 meg ram in mint cond 100% working its in a BLPPC 603e 060 box though. have you strained enough money yet

16 June 2007, 23:01	#9
Peter Still an Amiga user Join Date: Nov 2006 Location: Kent Age: 55 Posts: 2,715	PM me the details of the card please twizzle - I am considering a few options accelerator wise at the moment and I would be interested in seeing some pictures and finding out some more details of what you have there... I will be back on line later...

18 June 2007, 02:14	#10
Peter Still an Amiga user Join Date: Nov 2006 Location: Kent Age: 55 Posts: 2,715	The rom risers did not turn out quite as I expected as once the mediator was installed the new height of the Fast ATA Controller made it sit too tightly to the back of the mediator... out with the rom risers...in with the old problem - that is the fact that the 1D.1 motherboard I have has the clockport pins on the left hand side... and they were not allowing the Fast ATA Controller to sit comfortably flush. The clockport pins had to go, I have only ever used a clockport for a silver surfer for dial up and now it is easy enough to get Amigas networked onto broadband I dont think I would have used the clockport here... They were a bit stubborn to remove and needed a bit of heat from the soldering iron and a bit of Dremmel work to get them out - I can always re-seat a new set on the right if there should ever be a need I guess... See Picture 1... Offending pins on the left removed... The Rom Risers and clockport pins removed allowed the Fast ATA to sit almost flush but because it is now sitting at it's correct height it won't allow the Lyra keyboard adaptor to sit in place - the two clash for space - that will have to go back in exchange for an alternative - it's a shame as the Lyra is a nice item. See picture 2 ... Lyra Adaptor and Fast ATA Controller clash for space... The ATA Fast Controller is back in place and the motherboard booted up fine which was a relief as removing the Clockport pins was a bit of a challenge! See Picure 3... ATA Controller... There is a fair bit of trial and error here as I go along and I dont seem to have made much progress TBH but it is coming together slowly - it's great to have a spare room where you can just shut the door on this lot though! See Picture 4... ! Thanks AmigaKit for advice this week and Zetr0! Twizzle - Must talk to you about the cable situation this week...

30 June 2007, 02:33	#12
Zetr0 Ya' like it Retr0? Join Date: Jul 2005 Location: United Kingdom Age: 49 Posts: 9,768	Its looking great peter! keep up the good work

30 June 2007, 09:54	#13
jimbob005 Registered User Join Date: May 2007 Location: swadlincote, uk Age: 43 Posts: 226	looking good mate

11 July 2007, 00:31	#14
Peter Still an Amiga user Join Date: Nov 2006 Location: Kent Age: 55 Posts: 2,715	I haven't had much time to update this thread lately but the Tower is nearly finished. I have added the Blizzard SCSI module and the Tower now has 256 MB of memory. I opted for a 4 GB Maxtor 3.5 IDE Hard Drive for the System partition and have installed the 80 GB 3.5 IDE HD as a slave - I intend to build up a serious collection of MODs on it - it has the room! Got a couple of fans doing their thing in there - didn't realise the Voodoo got quite so hot... OS3.9 is running very well and I have connected into my ADSL - the PCI network card goes into my ADSL router and Genesis seems prettty quick together with IBrowse and Yam... Great picture from the Voodoo - but of course there is always the temptation to run a program that just wont display and of course games are very limited with this screen mode... anyone for slow Quake? Does anyone know any Games, Demo's that will run in this screen mode?? I need to get some sound from the DVD Rom - I have the SB128 but haven't configured AHI as yet - bit puzzled about this.... may have to start another thread with some questions about setting this up becuase I want to get sound from both the Amiga and the DVD Rom... Never got the time save option sorted but hey it's not a perfect Amiga World. I have a neat program that pops up on bootup and asks me very politely if I want to set the time - if not I just cancel... The Tower has been fun to build and configure - it has given me some headaches but I am pleased with the end result... I will add some final pictures when it is all in place... I cant make up my mind whether it is more fun doing a tower or butchering up a desktop case and cramming as many things as possible inside - both fun I guess... I'm just waiting on an LED adaptor from Amigakit and the sides can go on... then... another project, of course. Amigakit have been very helpful throughout this little project of mine as indeed have been a number of EAB members, Cheers All...

11 July 2007, 00:48	#15
Zetr0 Ya' like it Retr0? Join Date: Jul 2005 Location: United Kingdom Age: 49 Posts: 9,768	@Peter my friend, that indeed is a fantastic build, and i am glad that you have persisted to where you are now! its indeed great. ~Quake060 Ahhh even at 320200 on my cybervision643dMk2 ..... poor..... 12-18 fps max lol... still managed to game across the internet via dialup with my m8 LidlessEyE in France... ahhh good times.... ~Audio Mixer I have built a simple stereo mixer for my A600 and DVDRom it works quite well, if you want i can postie the mixer . on the other hand I do believe that Amigakit also sell CD and amiga Audio mixers. ~AHI I had some issues and a bit of lag with this using my prelude clockport* (but this was in the very early days of AHI btw) I noticed this mainly when using MedSS / Rombler or tracker. strange i never got round to testing with bars and pipes. I am actualy building a midi synthesizer that uses the serial port and a Korg 4MB card (should be quite nice building a full mixer with a front pannel for the amiga when i get round to it LOL) anyways imma rambling... great work m8, please posty more and more pics

11 July 2007, 01:04	#19
Zetr0 Ya' like it Retr0? Join Date: Jul 2005 Location: United Kingdom Age: 49 Posts: 9,768	I can only edit or quote, and as i said it twice hardly need quote it again LOL

11 July 2007, 01:07	#20
Retro-Nerd Missile Command Champion Join Date: Aug 2005 Location: Germany Age: 52 Posts: 12,453	Really? Very strange, matey. Edit --> Delete ---> Delete Message works fine here.

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