General Stuff(tm)

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stephen_usher
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Re: General Stuff(tm)

Post by stephen_usher »

Well, I got the Apricot F Series Portable.

The two hour trip to/from Leigh Delamere services took 4 in the end due to the M4 being closed around Swindon. Looks like a major crash on the Westbound carriageway.

Anyway, I've just got back and had a quick look.

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This is portable computing 1985 style!

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Everything except the floppy disks and the power cord is there, including the "mouse" and light pipes!

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An interesting steel protective clip for the trackball!

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Even the floppy protection insert is there.

Unfortunately...

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Error 23 is peripheral chip test failure. Given that the speaker is sounding constantly I'm wondering if there's a bad connection between the main circuit board and the peripheral board, which is quite possible. I need to look at the PSU as well as I know there should be at least one RIFA smoke generator in there.

One bonus, it's a later 512K model and unusually not dark grey coloured plastic.
Intro retro computers since before they were retro...
ZX81->Spectrum->Memotech MTX->Sinclair QL->520STM->BBC Micro->TT030->PCs & Sun Workstations.
Added code to the MiNT kernel (still there the last time I checked) + put together MiNTOS.
Collection now with added Macs, Amigas, Suns and Acorns.
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stephen_usher
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Re: General Stuff(tm)

Post by stephen_usher »

Looks like this may be another repair thread.

Actually no RIFAs in the PSU and all the voltages are good and stable.

The I/O board isn't being initialised and there are some suspiciously floating voltages on some chip pins.
Intro retro computers since before they were retro...
ZX81->Spectrum->Memotech MTX->Sinclair QL->520STM->BBC Micro->TT030->PCs & Sun Workstations.
Added code to the MiNT kernel (still there the last time I checked) + put together MiNTOS.
Collection now with added Macs, Amigas, Suns and Acorns.
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rubber_jonnie
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Re: General Stuff(tm)

Post by rubber_jonnie »

Wow, that's a seriously funky machine!!

I can sympathise with the journey problems, I had a 1 hour trip to collect a Mega ST take 3 due to an accident on the M25. At least you got there and back again in the end.
Collector of many retro things!
800XL and 65XE both with Ultimate1MB,VBXL/XE & PokeyMax, SIDE3, SDrive Max, 2x 1010 cassette, 2x 1050 one with Happy mod, 3x 2600 Jr, 7800 and Lynx II
Approx 20 STs, including a 520 STM, 520 STFMs, 3x Mega ST, MSTE & 2x 32 Mhz boosted STEs
Plus the rest, totalling around 50 machines including a QL, 3x BBC Model B, Electron, Spectrums, ZX81 etc...
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stephen_usher
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Re: General Stuff(tm)

Post by stephen_usher »

IC74, a 74LS74, which controls the I/O read/write enable for the 6845 is looking suspicious. The inputs (clock and data) are doing stuff but there's no output.

Unfortunately, as with most of the chips, the 74LS74 is not socketed. I don't know if I have one in stock I can piggy-back.
Intro retro computers since before they were retro...
ZX81->Spectrum->Memotech MTX->Sinclair QL->520STM->BBC Micro->TT030->PCs & Sun Workstations.
Added code to the MiNT kernel (still there the last time I checked) + put together MiNTOS.
Collection now with added Macs, Amigas, Suns and Acorns.
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stephen_usher
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Re: General Stuff(tm)

Post by stephen_usher »

Found a 74LS74, piggy-backed and... happy computer.

That was quick. :-)

P.S. I was suprised how quickly I found this fault as i'd never looked at the F Portable schematics before and they're a bit more complex than the F1/F2/F10.
Intro retro computers since before they were retro...
ZX81->Spectrum->Memotech MTX->Sinclair QL->520STM->BBC Micro->TT030->PCs & Sun Workstations.
Added code to the MiNT kernel (still there the last time I checked) + put together MiNTOS.
Collection now with added Macs, Amigas, Suns and Acorns.
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rubber_jonnie
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Re: General Stuff(tm)

Post by rubber_jonnie »

stephen_usher wrote: Sun Dec 05, 2021 8:10 pm Found a 74LS74, piggy-backed and... happy computer.

That was quick. :-)

P.S. I was suprised how quickly I found this fault as i'd never looked at the F Portable schematics before and they're a bit more complex than the F1/F2/F10.
Nice quick find 😁
Collector of many retro things!
800XL and 65XE both with Ultimate1MB,VBXL/XE & PokeyMax, SIDE3, SDrive Max, 2x 1010 cassette, 2x 1050 one with Happy mod, 3x 2600 Jr, 7800 and Lynx II
Approx 20 STs, including a 520 STM, 520 STFMs, 3x Mega ST, MSTE & 2x 32 Mhz boosted STEs
Plus the rest, totalling around 50 machines including a QL, 3x BBC Model B, Electron, Spectrums, ZX81 etc...
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stephen_usher
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Re: General Stuff(tm)

Post by stephen_usher »

OK, now it can't read floppies. (Error 8, sector not found)

Everything else seems to be working fine though.

IMG_2490.jpg
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Intro retro computers since before they were retro...
ZX81->Spectrum->Memotech MTX->Sinclair QL->520STM->BBC Micro->TT030->PCs & Sun Workstations.
Added code to the MiNT kernel (still there the last time I checked) + put together MiNTOS.
Collection now with added Macs, Amigas, Suns and Acorns.
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stephen_usher
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Joined: Mon Nov 13, 2017 7:19 pm
Location: Oxford, UK.
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Re: General Stuff(tm)

Post by stephen_usher »

Looks like it was probably the dodgy Argos 'Select' branded floppy which was at fault. They were unreliable from new. Other (non) Apricot disks are rightly seen as that and give Error 99.

Anyway, I couldn't sleep due to thinking about this so I got up at about 3:30 and thought I'd use dd on my Linux server to write a floppy image...

Had to reboot the machine as an update had fubared the console...

Grub2 fails! It seems that a recent update of Grub2 broke booting from XFS partitions and guess what my root partition is formatted as...

3 hours later I manage to boot using the installation DVD's Grub via a USB drive, and I'm still no nearer writing that floppy image. Blurgh!

Bug report to the distro done this morning with a link to the bug on the Redhat bug reporting system showing the problem.
Intro retro computers since before they were retro...
ZX81->Spectrum->Memotech MTX->Sinclair QL->520STM->BBC Micro->TT030->PCs & Sun Workstations.
Added code to the MiNT kernel (still there the last time I checked) + put together MiNTOS.
Collection now with added Macs, Amigas, Suns and Acorns.
User avatar
stephen_usher
Posts: 5580
Joined: Mon Nov 13, 2017 7:19 pm
Location: Oxford, UK.
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Re: General Stuff(tm)

Post by stephen_usher »

OK, written known good images to known good floppies using a known good drive.

The Field Test floppy image, which is definitely FP compatible, gives Error 08 (sector/track not found).
My clean boot image, which probably couldn't boot on the FP, gives the correct Error 99 (invalid disk type).

I'm wondering if the drive is out of alignment.
Intro retro computers since before they were retro...
ZX81->Spectrum->Memotech MTX->Sinclair QL->520STM->BBC Micro->TT030->PCs & Sun Workstations.
Added code to the MiNT kernel (still there the last time I checked) + put together MiNTOS.
Collection now with added Macs, Amigas, Suns and Acorns.
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Icky
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Re: General Stuff(tm)

Post by Icky »

Apricots were definitely ahead of their time. That’s one really neat setup. Apricot the UK Apple. :)
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