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Amiga computer related discussion => Amiga Hardware Issues and discussion => Topic started by: TCMSLP on June 01, 2015, 12:00:04 PM
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Hi All,
I recently rescued an A600 from a friend. It had been sat in a garage for 10+ years, unused and unloved.
When first powering it on, all seemed well. It read disks, ran demos, keyboard seemed good.
However, on opening it up it became obvious something had been split down the rear grill. I cleaned this up best I could and noticed some minor corrosion on a few tracks. Nothing particularly bad though and conductivity on the traces I checked seemed good.
I then ordered an A604n memory expansion from AmigaKit, an IDE-CF adapter and a 3.1 ROM (the A600 had the original non-IDE support ROM).
This is where things have rapidly gone downhill.
First, removing and refitting the keyboard - the ribbon connector has lost all its black conductive coating. The keyboard matrix itself seems ok, but keys randomly stop working until the ribbon cable is wiggled. It's now practically unusable.
Secondly, the A604n refuses to work. I've cleaned the edge connector several times, refitted the card - pushed it all the way in, left it slightly out - no difference. I'm guessing there's perhaps more corrosion than I thought :(
So, I now have an A600 which can correctly talk to the IDE interface, but a broken keyboard and no way to add more RAM. I had an accelerator and Indivision ECS planned for this too.
I can't see any new keyboard membranes available and without additional memory this will mostly be pointless anyway.
Worst case scenario, find an old keyboard, replace original ROM, sell as a gaming machine. I'm just sad I had so much planned for this machine :(
If anyone has a spare keyboard/membrane or any other suggestions regarding the memory issue - I'd be interested in hearing from you!
Steve
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Images attached.
0001 - Some remaining surface crap, corrosion on resistors visible.
0002 - The worst part of the damage - tracks started to dissolve :(
0003 - The overall board, not too bad from a distance.
I guess really, considering the unknown liquid that had covered the majority of the board, I'm lucky it even boots. Poor miggy :(
Edit: High res images here:-
http://www.track3.org.uk/~steve/A600/img_0001.jpg
http://www.track3.org.uk/~steve/A600/img_0002.jpg
http://www.track3.org.uk/~steve/A600/img_0003.jpg
Update: Just tried trimming the keyboard connector but the black (carbon?) is just flaking off. I remember the mystery liquid had also covered this so no surprises really...
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no way to add more RAM
How about one of the memory expansions that pops on top of the processor? Or a PCMCIA RAM card? There's always ways of adding more ram, they just may not be as ideal. ;)
http://kipper2k.com/a600fastmem.html
Agreed, better to fix the problems than to find work-arounds, however. :)
(http://kipper2k.com/a600fastmem.html)
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I've now found and ordered a replacement keyboard membrane :D
Oldsmobile_Mike: Great idea, I did almost order a Vampire board from Kipper2K. Maybe this is now not such a daft idea, an accelerator plus 64Mb RAM on a board which doesn't touch the expansion connector.
The only problem being, I'd still be limited to only 1Mb chip RAM. I wonder how this would work in practice...
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I see you are living in England. You could send your A600 mainboard to Amigakit to check your problem.
You could also try to clean the connectors of your mainboard with a pencil eraser. Maybe it works.
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Are you sure the memory expansion card is not defective?
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Definitely have the board cleaned, capacitors replaced and broken tracks fixed if you want to be able to keep using this 600 :)
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There is currently an A600 on Ebay for £12 with a busted key. Takes just a few minutes to work two sad A600s into a new one. If that was my motherboard I wouldn't be struggling with it. Even if the one off Ebay doesn't work you will have gained some valuable bits and pieces. I couldn't rest until I got the 600 back up and running.
Check out the A600 I won for £1 off Ebay. Always fun.
http://www.commodore-amiga-retro.com/amiga/amiga_scuzz93.htm
To be honest if I had more space I would buy those busted Amigas every day of the week. Great fun.