New Minimig cores available

[odin22]

Hi Everyone.

I've been lurking here for quite some time and been the proud owner of a MiniMig since ACube released their first shipment. Unfortunately, being an early adopter, I got one directly from ACube themselves (this was before Vesalia and AmigaKit had them in stock) and as some of you know they were shipped with a PIC sans bootloader.

Truth be told, I had no idea this was the case until the recent release by Jakub and Dennis came out (FANtastic job, by the way), and I've been crying salty tears ever since as I have had no way of trying it out for myself. Contacting ACube directly yielded nothing and thinking back on how messy the shipment process was the last time I dealt with them, I'm not sure I would have liked to go trough it again. So, hearing nothing but good from those of you who ordered from AmigaKit, I thought I might give it a shot, and lo and behold: Not only did they not mind updating my PIC even though I hadn't bought my MiniMig from them in the first place - they insisted to do it free of charge! What a great place. So I sent away my PIC to England, and today I received a padded envelope from them with a new one.

But here is where it gets weird: The PIC I received was not the one I sent over. Of course this is of absolutely no importance, had it not been for the fact that this new PIC came shrinkwrapped in a hermetically sealed anti-static bag (the kind that needs to be ripped open). I found this a bit unsettling as I assume this is how AmigaKit themselves receive the PICs and that they take them out of those bags to update them with a bootloader. Trying out the new PIC in my MiniMig and loading up Tiny Bootloader only added to my suspicion, as I am still not able to connect to it. I get the exact same "Searching for PIC ...Not found, ERROR!" as I did with the other one.

So before I contact AmigaKit, I would just like to hear from you guys: Did all of you who got your PICs updated through AmigaKit's warranty receive them in hermetically sealed bags, or has someone at AmigaKit sent me an empty, factory-new PIC?

I really hope someone can shed some light on this.

Kind regards,

Odin / Anders Petersen

[odin22]

Thanks, Straycat. That makes me less worried.

Yeah, it seems to be seated just fine. I also double checked that I inserted it the right way, and the "groove" matches the outline beneath the socket like it should.

Then I wonder what is wrong? Why can't I update? When I press the "CheckPIC" button, the TinyBootloader application doesn't even give me half a second before declaring the "PIC not found" error. I can barely make it to press the PGM reset button. To make sure it wasn't the cable, I even spent an hour today making a new cable (using this diagram: http://www.loop-back.com/null-mod.html, if anyone is asking) but still nothing.

Is there any way of getting a readout of information on the contents of the PIC using the MiniMig itself - just to make sure that there is something there?
I have tried pressing the PGM/Reset button countless times both with and without an SD card (not that it should make a difference, but I'm getting desperate in my troubleshooting). When I power up the board without an SD card, the drive light starts blinking and there is (naturally) no video output. When I power up with an SD card (containing the newest minimig1.bin) inserted, I get a blue screen with version information (just beneath the names of Jakub and Dennis) that turns red after a few seconds and tells me that my PIC firmware is incompatible.

[odin22]

Well, I've now received an email back from AmigaKit who tells me that they indeed ship out the new PICs in those bags as they receive them preprogrammed from Acube. In the meantime I have spent the past many hours trying everything under the sun to get some usable information out of that damned PIC.

All I keep getting now is the same message:

"Connected to \\.\COM1 at 115200
  Searching for PIC ...
  pic sending unknown data:  "K" <> 6Bh=k
Check baudrate & Start Write while PIC is not sending serial data (e.g. in reset)
  ERROR!"

...with the "6Bh=k" bit of the string ending with a different character depending on the number of milliseconds I wait between pressing CheckPIC and hitting the PGM/reset switch.

I now have an additional 200+ unsuccesful CheckPIC attempts under my belt and I'm on the verge of just breaking the board in half and be done with this thing entirely. Life is just too short.

[odin22]

Hey Straycat.

Yep, as mentioned two posts above this, I checked it twice and made sure that the PIC is seated correctly. There is even an outline on the board beneath the socket that shows which way it goes, and I'm reading the text printed on the PIC relative to the joystick ports as you mention.

I have checked everything else as well; the jumper has been moved from FPGA to MCU, the 31Khz jumper is the only other jumper left on the board, and the spare jumper pins are free. As mentioned I have tried two different cables - the second one hand-built to make sure the wiring was right. So what am I missing? I am so frustrated with this thing.

UPDATE: I have just borrowed two extra null-modem cables from work that I will try on when I get home. If it doesn't work with those either (which I am pretty certain it won't) I am all out of ideas.

[odin22]

Got back and tried both cables, and exactly as predicted, it didn't work. I get the exact same results as before. Meanwhile I have been searching other threads, and what I am experiencing is outlined perfectly in the posts made by boing4000 in this thread: http://www.amiga.org/forums/showthread.php?t=36311

This thread also concludes that what I am experiencing is caused by a PIC with no bootloader. So my guess is that either Acube sent AmigaKit an empty PIC or AmigaKit mistook an empty PIC for a pre-programmed one when they sent it to me.

[odin22]

Unfortunately no. Are you having problems with the replacement PIC from ACube/AmigaKit as well, or are you dealing with the one that came on the board when you bought it?

[odin22]

If you have a board from one of the early batches that came with an empty PIC, you just send AmigaKit an email and they'll swap it for one preprogrammed with a bootloader within warranty.