Now..help getting X-Surf 100 & Rapid Road to work

[WeiXing3D]

After talking with you on the phone and discovering you have an A3640 in your A3000 you NEED to change the Xsurf-100 into ZII mode. The jumper is easy to spot on the board.

The RapidRoad has issues with an A3640. Here is the thread where it was discovered. I'm glad I was ale to get the Ethernet portion working for you at least over the phone!

http://eab.abime.net/showthread.php?t=75396&highlight=rapidroad

Thank you Acill. This is my first post from my A3000 using IBrowse, and yes, it directly downloaded IBrowse in my 3000.

Thank you all of you who have been helping me in my journey with a "real" Amiga.

Now, if someone can give a little bit of help in modifying the jumper(s). I have never touch jumpers in a computer board or card.

[WeiXing3D]

Just one jumper, clearly marked.  See the pic I added to my post right above yours.  

Cool :roflmao:

[WeiXing3D]

What buster version do you have?
Did you try the zorro2 jumper?
Are you going to use ad power via a 4 pin  cable?

What is that memory card below the xsurf?

In Poseidon prefs... Scroll down the messages as what is the newest?

Now I have the answers to your questions. This is what the previous owner wrote to me:
You got Buster 11 and the 7.1 Daughter Board. No need for jumper. That is a 2 MB 24 bit Fast RAM Board. You have the full 16 MB of 32 bit Fast RAM. (Zips). The 2 MB RAM board is not necessary. You may be able to overcome some issues you are having by taking it out as well and just sticking to the 16 MB Expansion Ram (32 Bit). I know you are working at it but remember I told you that I had to upgrade all chip revisions including the Daughter Board to get the A3640 to work properly. Your WD SCSI chips are upgraded revisions too. The chips on the A3640 are version 3.2. You're getting there it seems.

And UPDATE: As you all kn ow by now, thanks to Acill, I have Internet up and running. He also shared with me a link to a whole thread about Rapid Road used in A3000's and issues with the 3640. I read all 22 pages of it. So I 'm now aware that I have the same issue (also by reading the log in Trident).

So this is what I will do:
1. Add power to the RR
2. Change jumper to Z2 position

I'm not sure if I have another floppy power connection available inside, if not I will have to buy one, and also the ground cable.

I will report later.

[WeiXing3D]

Nice one, guys! It's stuff like this that really makes me miss user groups. I'm sure if you locked all of us into a room together we could have figured this out about 20 comments ago, lol. :lol:

@Oldsmobile_Mike Do you have a larger picture of the jumper settings?

[WeiXing3D]

Thank you guys.

Believe it or not I have never dealt with jumpers before; all plug and play

I know that this may be is not relevant, but why is it that the LED icon in Trident showing the device status under Controller, is at times greyed out and some other times is green; under both circumstances it reads On Line, and it works. In fact this been posted from my A3000.

Just curious.

[WeiXing3D]

Mine is green all the time, not sure why yours does that. I have to assume it has something to do with the known issues the A3640 has. I'm also using a Radeon and sometimes a Voodoo 5 card to display 32 bit full color screen modes on a 27" monitor and not native A3000 modes through an Amber card like you are. It could be Mike and I are on RTG graphics and cn show more colors.

I see what it is: Changing the ScreenMode to a lower res but 32 colors shows the light in green. I'm using NTSC Hire Res Laced but that only goes up to 16 colors.

Using PAL shows a picture a bit sharper (my monitor LG HD multi port) handles both PAL & NTSC, but still I can only use PAL High Res Laced to get a decent picture quality.

Is there any option that I could try? I don't remember how it is that one can populate the list of monitors available under SYS:Prefs/ScreenModes.

I know it's something between DEVS & Storage, but I can't remember.

[WeiXing3D]

Aaah, ya killing me now, man.    I just googled that picture, but seriously, there's only one jumper, just put it on.  

Here ya go, a bigger picture I found.  Granted, it's upside-down, but still.  

http://www.kinhell.amibay.com/Kin/Pics/Amiga%20Sale/X-Surf100/X-Surf100-02.JPG

Thanks a lot for your patience with me bro.

[WeiXing3D]

Thanks a lot for those links. Sounds quite interesting. I will read them in detail.

Man, I know...I need a gfx card, but my wife is going to ask me for either a new diamond ring or divorce before she lets me spend more money. Btwn the A3000, the X-Surf 100, RR, a new or NOS mouse, 2 x SCS2SD adapters, my wife is giving me the look :hammer:

But anyways, are there any gfx cards still available? Used preferably.

No graphics card?  You're going to be stuck with a maximum of 16 colors if you want to run your Workbench at 640x400 / 640x512.  No greens left in your palette?  Now is the time you want to research the FullPalette program and the Rebel palette.

I'll just leave this excellent blog entry here for you to read and study at your leasure:

http://www.mfilos.com/2012/01/guide-making-workbench-prettier-using.html

Also you're going to want the Peter K. icon library:  http://aminet.net/package/util/libs/IconLib_46.4

(more info on that, as well as later test versions, here:  http://eab.abime.net/showthread.php?t=64079)


...now be prepared to spend the next 904857945687 hours customizing your Workbench.  I've been doing mine for over 25 years and it still ain't perfect, yet.  

[WeiXing3D]

Glad to see you got her going! Good work! You took her to the next level where I left off years ago. I got "the look" from my wife as well about spending money on the Sam. If you type in "Amiga One" in ebay and "Amiga Graphics Cards" you occasionally run into one, just watch the bidding - gets outta control sometimes.    :hammer:  
Glad it's working out for both of us. Cheers!!

To me this is being a very humbling experience. When I had my first Amiga, a 500, I was fresh out college and didn't have money to buy all I could only dream of having, so I basically use my A500 to play games.

Now that I am mature (old is a better word though :laughing: I have the time occasionally, but more importantly, the resources, to buy and configure the computer I always wanted to have.

So, I'm using training wheels, but I have a big appetite to learn. The joy for me is in experimenting and learning something new about the amazing Amiga everyday.

Thank you to all of you who are helping me to make my journey easier and more enjoyable.

[WeiXing3D]

@all who helped me with this project BIG thanks.

Eureka...The Rapid Road USB module is working. Just as predicted...it was just a matter of connecting to power and switching to ZII.

I just formatted my first 4GB card in my Amiga 3000.



I will create a new thread to see if anyone maybe interested in swapping a Commodore 2065 network card with and Allied Telesyn Centrecom 210TS Twisted Pair Micro Transceiver with 4 LEDs for a graphic card...

[WeiXing3D]

Glad to hear you got it working! Your best bet is to just sell the card and spend a bit more for a Mediator and use a Radeon 9200. You will get more RAM and the fastest RTG for classics for only a few hundred dollars. I dont see anyone trading an Amiga video card for a network card. I only got $100 each for two older network cards on ebay, and the X-surf 100 is only a bit more than that now. I see a Picasso IV for near $500 on Amibay currently.

I don't see myself spending 500 bucks in a graphic card; definitely not for a while.:laugh1:

Please tell me more about that Mediator and Radeon card solution.

[WeiXing3D]

Personally I'd ditch that '040 card like a hot potato and get a model that's compatible with Zorro 3 - either a different '040, or an '060.  But that's just me, I don't know OP's budget.  

I had two Picasso 2's and didn't like them much, but that was only because I couldn't get their pass-through to work with an Indivision.  AFAIK it should work fine with the A3K's build-in HD15 output.

Never could find a PII+, GVP Spectrum is the bee's knees, however.  Does Z 2 and Z 3, so if he could find one of those he could run it in 2 now, and flip it to 3 when he gets a real accelerator.  Sorry OP, that's another jumper you're going to have to flip, though!  :lol:

Guys, thank you for all the advice about a gfx card for my A3000. I think I will just keep my eyes open for a PII + GVP Spectrum. No rush, since I need to recup.

I will move on to my next project in a new thread coming a forum near you...

[WeiXing3D]

IMHO and being and Amiga 3000 owner since 1991 and having tried about every possible combinations of graphics cards and setups.  I would stay away from the picasso II and the spectrum cards, they are both fine cards but the Cybervision 64 is the best plug and play zorro 3 card for the 3000D.  In normal use it is much faster than lower end cards and is has a path through.  The Retina BLT Z3 fills the space between the picasso II and the cybervision 64.  It is a real fast card, not as fast as the cybervision and it lacks a paththrough.  If your going to spend real money get the CV64, it makes a much better improvement in useability and speed than an 040  card does.

The only reason I would install a Mediator Board is to get DVI out and higher resolutions, other than that I haven't found any other real advantage to owning one.  The speed difference between a radeon and the cv64 is not that great really, running my 3000D on the CV64 in 1024x768 and the radeon in HD (granted it is a much higher screen) is pretty close in performance.

Again this is my experience with the 3000D.  Good luck.

Thank you for sharing your experience; your comments are appreciated.

Right now, I need to recup from my recent spending spree.

Honestly, I feel more attracted to the Mediator PCI solution,but I'm still open to the Picasso II alternative. I'm not building a high performance machine, but rather something functional and practical to use.

Unfortunately, either solution is a long shot due to the scarcity of those cards in the market, and when they pop up, the asking price is higher than the price of your machine :furious:

[WeiXing3D]

@Oldsmobile_Mike
I'm trying to install these WB enhancing tools, but I found that these 2 links are not longer working:

FullPalette.prefs:  http://home.exetel.com.au/amiga/FullPalette.prefs
Rebel’s optimized 16 colors palette for FullPalette.

SilverSkin:  http://home.exetel.com.au/amiga/Skins.lha
2 beautiful Skins made by Rebel (Green-Blue) for Windows, Titlebar etc (for use with VisualPrefs).

Do you happen to know if they can be found somewhere else? Google is not helping me.

No graphics card?  You're going to be stuck with a maximum of 16 colors if you want to run your Workbench at 640x400 / 640x512.  No greens left in your palette?  Now is the time you want to research the FullPalette program and the Rebel palette.

I'll just leave this excellent blog entry here for you to read and study at your leisure:

http://www.mfilos.com/2012/01/guide-making-workbench-prettier-using.html

Also you're going to want the Peter K. icon library:  http://aminet.net/package/util/libs/IconLib_46.4

(more info on that, as well as later test versions, here:  http://eab.abime.net/showthread.php?t=64079)


...now be prepared to spend the next 904857945687 hours customizing your Workbench.  I've been doing mine for over 25 years and it still ain't perfect, yet.