Amiga 3000, Deneb and the different Busters

[save2600]

Okay - in trying to decipher Deneb's manual, am I reading this right?

1) Buster 11 is only capable of ONE active busmaster and that is being used solely for the built in SCSI. No workarounds.

2) Buster 9 allows several simultaneous busmasters, as long as all use a "special" workaround.

...since there's a Buster 11 in my machine and the only way I can get Deneb to work in my A3000 is if I force Zorro II mode, will putting a Buster 9 in the machine allow Deneb to use Zorro III/DMA?

If so and in this case, wouldn't that make the Buster 9 chip superior? A little confusing since one would think a later revision would be the better. In any case, if a Buster 9 is what I need in order to be able to use the Zorro III mode, I'm gonna need one...

[save2600]

Matt_H: I'll throw my A3000 back together here and investigate further, but the only way I could get this card to work is by setting that jumper to Zorro II mode. I don't remember off hand what .device is being used, but I do remember that I couldn't seem to add another easily.

What's the quick scoop on this and how do I enable that mode you're talking about? There are two other modes, dma.device is one and they're both ghosted and say 'offline'...

[save2600]

If I fit the Deneb in my A3000D the Deneb works fine in PIOMode.

Weed

I have yet to try this because I'd rather not dilly-dally around and mess something up experimenting this time. Are you guys saying that you can remove the Zorro II jumper IF you use PIO Mode? Is PIO mode faster than forcing Zorro II mode?

[save2600]

Hmm, I thought the built-in SCSI was a DMA configuration. Why else does that thing scream? lol  

Yeah, I tried deleting the other devices in Trident and removed the Zorro II jumper on Deneb to no avail. Guess I need to upgrade the firmware, huh? I've updated the software to 4.3 (I think that's it) from 4.0, but that's not the same thing.

[save2600]

Okay... well, so you're saying that irregardless of which Firmware I have in the machine (there are no other Zorro III cards installed), Deneb should automatically default to Zorro III? In my case, it does not.

IS there a way to ask Deneb which version of Firmware I have installed before I dismantle the machine again?

[save2600]

Just updated the Firmware to V9 and still cannot get DMA to work.

denebdmausb and the other two devices are in the FlashROM of Deneb.

I have deleted the other two and only kept denebdmausb.device in Trident.

System will boot with the card in ZIII mode, but as soon as I insert a flashdrive, it's icon will pop up and if I attempt to double-click on my HD OR the flashdrive - the machine freezes...

[save2600]

If I can't get this resolved here, I'll track down Mr. Boehmer on that board per your suggestion.

I do believe there is a conflict of some kind though with my HD. Is there a jumper on the mobo that could be to blame?

Deneb simply will not work in PIO or DMA mode on my A3000. Zorro II is really frickin' fast though, but as would be the norm in Amiga hardwareland, just wondering why these other modes don't work?!?

Looking at a data sheet of the pinouts, nothing says 'DMA' burst mode or anything...  lol

[save2600]

I did that as per a hint from the German site where I got the Firmware update.

I didn't disable Flash though... just emptied it.

PSDstackloader is in my User-Startup. There's a couple of things I am unclear of:

When the machine asks "clear all vectors", I always say yes - even though I have no idea what the hell a vector is - but it sounds good to flush anything...  lol

Do I need to run the PSDROMTag at anytime? Not even entirely sure what installing or uninstalling them really does...

-edit-

It's so weird... in ZII jumpered mode, I can start Trident, hit the restart button on the bottom and it'll default to ZII and work fine. If I do not have ZII jumpered and hit restart, it'll find the PIO.device and then crash the machine. Same with dma...

To be clear, so you think there's nothing wrong with a setting my A3000's mobo?

Do I need to update V8 of the Firmware and then V9? I skipped directly to 9...

Would the way the mobo or the HD is terminated be a problem?

[save2600]

USB on the Miggy rocks when it works and it DOES work in ZII mode all_day_long. Not just this purported super-high-speed mode. lol  

Screw SCSI drives and the HD limitations of OS3.1. With USB, you can have as large a flashdrive as you want! The setup on my A3000 is an old 40mb Quantum HD with OS3.1 on it and the Deneb software. System boots uber-quick and I read/write all extraneous stuff via the flashdrive. Works extremely well and will be happy with ZII mode if I am forced to for whatever reason.

Tone, I assume that's you in your avatar? Always good to place a face with a name. We should all do that, but I've noticed on these kinds of forums, more choose not to than do.

[save2600]

Okay... Got her working in DMA mode finally!  Seems I had to completely erase the Flash part of Deneb a few times and then made sure ONLY denebdmausb.device was flashed to it (not the other two). I was trying 2-3 different things at the time (alternating between flashing the ROM and deleting the devices in Trident), so can only conclude something was funky residing in envarc or the Flash of Deneb.



Other "new" artifact I am experiencing is a green screen (maybe 2 flashes of green) before the computer starts up. IS that Deneb saying she's okay finally? lol

Okay... the system has been off for a while now. Going to re-boot and see if the damn thing still works...  lol

-edit-

Yep, spoke too soon. Seems dma only wants to work with a small 124mb card. Stuck a 4gb thumbdrive and she either crashes or pops an icon and then crashes  

[save2600]

So yeah, tried every Flash combo & Deneb jumper combo to no avail. I must have the only A3000 in the world where Deneb doesn't work in PIO or DMA mode. lol  

Zorro II or bust for this Amiga spud I guess!  

-edit-

A thought just occurred... because the ZIII DMA mode was flaky (big time) and caused computer freezes, might it have been because my 4GB HP thumbdrive needed to be hooked to a self-powered hub??

[save2600]

Thanks Alex, Chris and Matt - but PIO or DMA does not want to work in my A3000. I've double checked all my mobo jumpers and everything seems to be in order. I tried all the good suggestions from Matt to no avail. System locks up every time I go to double click on either a HD partition OR the thumbdrive. Only way it seems to work is in ZII mode.

Really does seem as if there is a "conflict" of some kind between SCSI and the ZIII modes.

I'm running out of ideas here, 'cept for maybe that MMU.library program - which I'm looking at right now.

[save2600]

SnoopDOS reveals that it seems to hang at the L:Fat95 stage, so I installed the latest handler from Chris's V4.4 of Poseidon. Same result. System crashes and the thumbdrive blinks rapidly.

-update-

Okay, after installing the MMULibs goodies, it appears PIO mode now works! I had to change the startup delay to 2000ms though. System still crashes however when Deneb is used in DMA mode. Almost there!

[save2600]

We have a beta firmware ready which cures this problem, which is - to stress this - not a bug inside DENEB, but Buster 11. Apparently up to now nobody ever stressed Zorro III DMA on Buster 11 in the way DENEB does.

Michael

Thanks for taking the time to write Michael. Kind of surprising more people haven't noticed the ZIII/Buster 11 DMA issue with Deneb.

Regarding this firmware update... you're talking about within the Deneb card right? So there's now or soon to be a workaround for our "defective" Buster 11's in using Deneb in DMA mode? Nice we have the option of flashing firmware than waiting forever for a new Buster chip  

Love to give that a try when it's ready...

[save2600]

Hang on, is the ZorRAM board affected by the same only-one-busmaster bug that's preventing me from using Deneb DMA on my SCSI'ed 4000T?

Shoot. If that's the case, might just as well put off the purchase of the ZorRAM until a definite workaround and mod are offered to "fix" our Deneb's.

Or would ZorRAM be fine with Deneb under PIO mode? At least that way, modding the Deneb would be more of an option for some of us than a forced and necessary upgrade.