8MB Ram Upgrade Card Question

02 February 2012, 20:54

Hi all - long time Amiga user, 1st time modder lol

Ill save the back story for the member introductions section and keep this short and sweet

Recently bought item number 180799139260 off ebay and it was listed as "8MB Ram Upgrade Card FPU Clock Expansion Card Amiga 1200 A1200" Great, perfect.. considering I just put WHDload on a CF card and my 2mb games that used to run now dont, sureley the 8mb would be a wise decision.

Card has come, It's finally in (that trapdoor solution is horrid.. way to small lol) and the Workbench sees the additional Ram, Excellent.

Question is, why does WB only see 4mb? I found what I suspect to be the PDF manual (i dont want to link externally, not to sure if thats allowed) but I have played with the jumpers and got WB to see 8mb - however the games now crash with a nice black screen and an orange error message. The listing clearly said 8mb (i suspect the board can take upto 8mb)

The seller couldnt be nicer, he states its definatley 8mb and will issue a full refund if I am not happy. I've read somewhere changing the jumpers to get WB seeing 8mb does not mean you may have an 8mb simm?

I've paid £80 quid for this and really dont know if I got a deal or not if its just 4mb.

tia
Slyder

fitzsteve · 02 February 2012, 21:08

Hi!

Welcome to EAB.

It sounds like you have a 4mb Simm on your Ram expansion, users do this becuase with 8mb they conflict with the PCMCIA port.

You can of course fit an 8mb Simm and then your games shouldn't crash anymore. You can jumper it back to 4mb for now so that you can at least use it for now, and most games work fine with 4mb Fast Ram.

I strongly advise registering with Amibay for your future Amiga purchases to save paying the over inflated eBay prices.

Anyway, if you need an 8mb Simm, I probably have one here you could have for the cost of postage - I'd just need to check.

You probably want to know a little bit more about the PCMCIA conflct, basicly these Ram cards map ram above 5.5mb in the same zorro space used by the PCMCIA port hence why if you try to use a PCMCIA network card at the same time as 8mb you will get crashes, same applies to the SCSI & Hard Drive expansions you can get for the A600/1200.

If you don't intend to use these then it's nothing to worry about, and I'm sure your crashing now is due to your card trying to use Ram that dosen't exist...

All the best,

Steve.

Peter · 02 February 2012, 21:08

This old thread may be of some use to you re jumper settings...

http://eab.abime.net/showpost.php?p=509087&postcount=14

I think your board is an Amitek - same sort of beast as the old Hawk board I used to have...

02 February 2012, 23:29

Quote:

Originally Posted by fitzsteve

Hi!

Welcome to EAB.

It sounds like you have a 4mb Simm on your Ram expansion, users do this becuase with 8mb they conflict with the PCMCIA port.

You can of course fit an 8mb Simm and then your games shouldn't crash anymore. You can jumper it back to 4mb for now so that you can at least use it for now, and most games work fine with 4mb Fast Ram.

I strongly advise registering with Amibay for your future Amiga purchases to save paying the over inflated eBay prices.

Anyway, if you need an 8mb Simm, I probably have one here you could have for the cost of postage - I'd just need to check.

You probably want to know a little bit more about the PCMCIA conflct, basicly these Ram cards map ram above 5.5mb in the same zorro space used by the PCMCIA port hence why if you try to use a PCMCIA network card at the same time as 8mb you will get crashes, same applies to the SCSI & Hard Drive expansions you can get for the A600/1200.

If you don't intend to use these then it's nothing to worry about, and I'm sure your crashing now is due to your card trying to use Ram that dosen't exist...

All the best,

Steve.

Hi Steve.. many thanks for the offer. May I just say, as long as I can play my WHDload games, I wont be needing the PCMCIA port. The point of getting into this was to consolodate my exisiting collection into a more practicle way of playing my Amiga games. Truth be told, my Amiga was stuck in my loft for god knows how long, I hadnt used it since my teen years and I'm now 31. I got stung on ebay. I bought the CF drive which claimed to work on a stock A1200 (which it did to be fair) but when I tried to load my AGA games, I was quickly presented with memory problems. I had no idea I would need to invest in more ram but I did again on the fact it was stated as 8meg.

80 quid for the ram and 35 quid for the cf drive later, I have it working relativley well. As you have suggested Steve, I had already jumpered it back to 4mb so thats not a problem. As for your 8mb simm, I wouldnt feel right just paying postage, are you sure you wouldnt want anything for it, I dont even know if my simm is 8mb. It has 8 chips on it, but I just assumed they were 1mb each.. now I'm thinking they are 512k each.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Peter

This old thread may be of some use to you re jumper settings...

http://eab.abime.net/showpost.php?p=509087&postcount=14

I think your board is an Amitek - same sort of beast as the old Hawk board I used to have...

Sorry Pete.. didnt see your reply. Yes your right, I have an Amitek. If you want to see a picture, feel free to go on the ebay site and look up the item number 180799139260. I got the hang of the jumpers as one of my hobbies is PC repairs, so I know a little about jumpers and ram

fitzsteve · 02 February 2012, 23:41

Hi Mate,

Honestly, it's not a problem I have a box full of Memory here

PM me your address and I will pop one in the post tomorrow for you, I have a couple of bits to post tomorrow so I'll be at the post office

Like you I pulled my A1200 out of the lofe recently, well about 2 years ago... Since then I've gone a bit over the top with upgrades but an 8mb A1200 is ideal and will serve you well.

You may have overpaid a bit for the items, but you have a great setup now so sit back and enjoy it.

As I said, it's my pleasure to help out.

Welcome back to the community

Steve.

02 February 2012, 23:48

If your ever in Coventry, drop by.. I owe you a beer.

PM being sent

as I say.. my simm has 8 chips on it.. but Im out of practice with pc repairs.. I assumed they were 1 meg each. The seller is sure its an 8meg simm.. but when I jumper it to 8mb, it WB crashes... alot.. lol..

anyways... best make my introduction.. Steve.. thanks again mate.. ill let u know how i get on mate...

Peter · 02 February 2012, 23:51

If you are sure that you wont use the PCMCIA slot then you may as well get the 8MB up and running...

You might want to think about how you are going to transfer files to your Amiga though first as a lot of people use the PCMCIA slot for this purpose...

Don't worry about the money - best thing is your Amiga is back up and running... also those 8MB Amitek cards are always very easy to sell back into the Amiga market.

As Steve says... enjoy it!!

fitzsteve · 03 February 2012, 00:03

If you google the numbers on the chip you will find out if they are 512k chips or 1024's, I've just sorted through a load of Ram and found a whole bunch of 32mb Simms I thought were 8mb

So you've actually done me a favour as I can now load up my spare DKB3128 full of 128mb Ram

Also, you can always setup a switch on the 4mb jumper and jumper it off to 4mb when you want to use PCMCIA

Let us know how you get on with the Simms, I hope they solve th issues.

Steve.

02 February 2012, 20:54	#1
Slyder1980 Posts: n/a	8MB Ram Upgrade Card Question Hi all - long time Amiga user, 1st time modder lol Ill save the back story for the member introductions section and keep this short and sweet Recently bought item number 180799139260 off ebay and it was listed as "8MB Ram Upgrade Card FPU Clock Expansion Card Amiga 1200 A1200" Great, perfect.. considering I just put WHDload on a CF card and my 2mb games that used to run now dont, sureley the 8mb would be a wise decision. Card has come, It's finally in (that trapdoor solution is horrid.. way to small lol) and the Workbench sees the additional Ram, Excellent. Question is, why does WB only see 4mb? I found what I suspect to be the PDF manual (i dont want to link externally, not to sure if thats allowed) but I have played with the jumpers and got WB to see 8mb - however the games now crash with a nice black screen and an orange error message. The listing clearly said 8mb (i suspect the board can take upto 8mb) The seller couldnt be nicer, he states its definatley 8mb and will issue a full refund if I am not happy. I've read somewhere changing the jumpers to get WB seeing 8mb does not mean you may have an 8mb simm? I've paid £80 quid for this and really dont know if I got a deal or not if its just 4mb. tia Slyder

02 February 2012, 21:08	#2
fitzsteve Professional slacker! Join Date: Jul 2009 Location: Kent, UK Age: 44 Posts: 6,685	Hi! Welcome to EAB. It sounds like you have a 4mb Simm on your Ram expansion, users do this becuase with 8mb they conflict with the PCMCIA port. You can of course fit an 8mb Simm and then your games shouldn't crash anymore. You can jumper it back to 4mb for now so that you can at least use it for now, and most games work fine with 4mb Fast Ram. I strongly advise registering with Amibay for your future Amiga purchases to save paying the over inflated eBay prices. Anyway, if you need an 8mb Simm, I probably have one here you could have for the cost of postage - I'd just need to check. You probably want to know a little bit more about the PCMCIA conflct, basicly these Ram cards map ram above 5.5mb in the same zorro space used by the PCMCIA port hence why if you try to use a PCMCIA network card at the same time as 8mb you will get crashes, same applies to the SCSI & Hard Drive expansions you can get for the A600/1200. If you don't intend to use these then it's nothing to worry about, and I'm sure your crashing now is due to your card trying to use Ram that dosen't exist... All the best, Steve. Last edited by fitzsteve; 02 February 2012 at 21:13.

02 February 2012, 23:48	#6
Slyder1980 Posts: n/a	If your ever in Coventry, drop by.. I owe you a beer. PM being sent as I say.. my simm has 8 chips on it.. but Im out of practice with pc repairs.. I assumed they were 1 meg each. The seller is sure its an 8meg simm.. but when I jumper it to 8mb, it WB crashes... alot.. lol.. anyways... best make my introduction.. Steve.. thanks again mate.. ill let u know how i get on mate... Last edited by Slyder1980; 02 February 2012 at 23:55.

02 February 2012, 23:51	#7
Peter Still an Amiga user Join Date: Nov 2006 Location: Kent Age: 55 Posts: 2,715	If you are sure that you wont use the PCMCIA slot then you may as well get the 8MB up and running... You might want to think about how you are going to transfer files to your Amiga though first as a lot of people use the PCMCIA slot for this purpose... Don't worry about the money - best thing is your Amiga is back up and running... also those 8MB Amitek cards are always very easy to sell back into the Amiga market. As Steve says... enjoy it!! Last edited by Peter; 02 February 2012 at 23:56.

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02 February 2012, 23:41	#5
fitzsteve Professional slacker! Join Date: Jul 2009 Location: Kent, UK Age: 44 Posts: 6,685	Hi Mate, Honestly, it's not a problem I have a box full of Memory here PM me your address and I will pop one in the post tomorrow for you, I have a couple of bits to post tomorrow so I'll be at the post office Like you I pulled my A1200 out of the lofe recently, well about 2 years ago... Since then I've gone a bit over the top with upgrades but an 8mb A1200 is ideal and will serve you well. You may have overpaid a bit for the items, but you have a great setup now so sit back and enjoy it. As I said, it's my pleasure to help out. Welcome back to the community Steve.

03 February 2012, 00:03	#8
fitzsteve Professional slacker! Join Date: Jul 2009 Location: Kent, UK Age: 44 Posts: 6,685	If you google the numbers on the chip you will find out if they are 512k chips or 1024's, I've just sorted through a load of Ram and found a whole bunch of 32mb Simms I thought were 8mb So you've actually done me a favour as I can now load up my spare DKB3128 full of 128mb Ram Also, you can always setup a switch on the 4mb jumper and jumper it off to 4mb when you want to use PCMCIA Let us know how you get on with the Simms, I hope they solve th issues. Steve.

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