Amiga 4000T not booting

[Kristian95]

I've finally gotten all my bits and pieces together to use my A4000T and it won't boot :boohoo:
When I start the machine I am stuck with a black screen and the caps lock on the keyboard blinking slowly... blink.... blink..... blink.... it blinks like that continuously.
The machine has a Picasso IV card, a CSPPC card and a 2Mb eFlash card in it.
I read somewhere that the continuous one flash on the caps lock indicates a problem with one of the CIA chips... is that true, in if it is, is there anyone in the US capable of fixing my dear Amiga for me ??

[Kristian95]

I have tried taking the e-flash card out, I have disconnected the SCSI cd-rom drive and I have disconnected the IDE->CF adapters (taking the IDE-cable out completely) and still no go. I cannot remove the P-IV card as I have no monitor to connect to a bare Amiga and I cannot remove the CSPPC card as I don't have any other CPU card.
The CPU fan on the PPC as well as the case fan both run when the computer is booted.
Btw, the keyboard has been bought as working from Vesalia.de.

[Kristian95]

I tried a warm reboot, both trying the Ctrl+Amiga+Amiga and the reset button, none worked, still have the caps lock flashing

[Kristian95]

One step closer  actually I have had the Amiga booting. I think the problem was a conflict between my 2 IDE -> CF devices, I think both wanted to be masters... I solved that one, though my preferred device had to be slave.
The computer boots, no caps flashing, but I'm not there quite yet, because I have problems with the video signal from my Picasso IV card:

Most of the time when I boot (using a standard PC CRT monitor) I get a black screen, well I can see that the Amiga image on the screen is slightly less "black" than the surrounding. Once in a while, when I boot, I get a grey screen instead. It even booted and showed me a _very_ blurred WB screen. Also, once, I got a Guru screen which displayed perfectly. I checked with the monitor, when the screen was giving me the blurred wb screen it was at 31 KHz.... does this indicate that the scandoubler/flicker fixer is in trouble ??

Thanks to all of you for your help throughout this ordeal!!

Btw, I do, somewhere, have an Amiga -> Scart cable for the standard video output, but I am in the US and the TV I have access to does not have a scart plug but only the 3 plugs for Y, Pb and Pr.

The SCSI cable has starts at the external plug, then goes to the CSPPC board and ends at the SCSI CD-ROM.

Btw, I have 2 HD floppy drives in the Amiga, one FZ-357A and one FZ-357B drive, I have bought a new floppy cable from Amigakit, but I am unsure how to set the jumpers for drive selection... should both be DS0 or should one of them be DS1 ?? If one should be set to DS1, should it be the one before or after the "twist" on the floppy cable ??

[Kristian95]

Ok, I'm getting closer now
I have switched the P-IV card to the other video-slot and now it works... when I use WHDLoad it keeps working fine, but when I am in Workbench after a few minutes it stops working (giving me a black screen on my LCD)... anyone have any idea what causes this to happen ??

[Kristian95]

I've set my WB to run at 1024 x 768 at 24bit colours. I've not been able to fiddle around with making a custom setup with my P-IV board as I run out of time before the screen goes black. It looks perfectly fine when it boots, and if I start WHDLoad games I don't get the screen going black at all, so I am a bit miffed at this
Hope someone has some good ideas of what to try. Btw, my WB install was made in WinUAE, I tried installing PIV software in WinUAE but it of course has trouble finding the PIV board, any ideas whether I could make a custom screen thingie in WinUAE ??

[Kristian95]

I know I ought to have the capacitors changed... but I am not that good with a soldering iron... I'd have to find someone close by who could help me out (beer, wine or the like could easily be supplied hehehe)

[Kristian95]

I found the cause of my problem but I don't know how to solve it

It seems that the gfx settings from my P-IV card are at a too high refresh rate for my lcd monitor, as when I run it on a crt monitor the image stays there just fine.
I have tried many times to access the early start menu for the P-IV board (both holding down left or right or both shift keys or tapping them) to no avail When I try using PicassoModeTNG I can't seem to be allowed to save settings, I read the guide on the Amiga but was left none the wiser Can someone help me out please ??

[Kristian95]

I am using an Amiga keyboard bought at Vesalia.de.
Is there anyway I can make the CSPPC board not default to 31KHz on the Amiga RGB-port apart from accessing the early boot menu ??

Btw, the only bootmenu I can get to show is the Amiga bootmenu itself (both mouse buttons pressed).

EDIT: I have tried with the esc key, I get a black screen with a white line at the top, pretty strange. This was the result I got on a standard PC crt monitor.
What is the easiest way for me to connect the Amiga to a TV in the US, using the Amiga rgb port ??

I got a bit of help with PicassoModeTNG so I have it working on my lcd screen... I'm still miffed at how come I cannot get to the two early boot menus though!!

[Kristian95]

I think I have found out why I don't have the early boot menu for my CSPPC card... the rom version is 44.60 which is not a rom that has the boot menu.
I wonder whether there is a similar thing with P-IV rom versions??

[Kristian95]

np, thanks for your suggestions and tips

[Kristian95]

ok... can I beat the timing issue by repeatedly hitting a shift key ??
I have tried many times now and never seen the menu.
I've also tried flashing the card with P4Update 7.4 but the flashprg stalls prior to flashing, nearly gave me a heart attack as I feared improper flashing had been done.
I've just flashed my CSPPC card to the newest version so that I can get to a boot menu for that card too... we'll see if that goes any smoother.

[Kristian95]

I just tried accessing both my CSPPC and P4 menus with no luck.... could having an eFlash card installed be the reason ??

EDIT: When I hit the shift key / Esc key (CSPPC) I hit it 4-5 times per second, no luck though

[Kristian95]

hehehe ok, I guess it doesn't make things easier for me that my A4000t takes a loooong time to boot... it hangs for a long time before even beginning the booting sequence, my guess is it waits at least 30 seconds I wonder what I can do to eliminate that.
Currently I use the A4000t IDE for my CF disk, I guess if I used the CSPPC SCSI it would boot faster ??

[Kristian95]

Cool, thanks, I'll give that a try
Btw, do you know how I can get Blizkick modules working in an eFlash card ??