Blizzard 603e + BVision Power Problems?

[badgerme]

Hi There

Really hope that someone can point me in the right direction here - I did have a working Amiga 1200 running OS4 with the Blizzard PPC 603e+ card with BVision attached. I'd recently added 256mb ram (two 128mb edo simms) to the card and it was working beautifully and registering all of the ram for at least 20 minutes or so, and then it just crashed and hung. I went to reset the Amiga and now it wont power up. The green light stays dim and I get a dark grey screen. If I remove the blizzard cards, the amiga turns on and goes through the dim/bright green power led stage and comes on as normal.
I'm running this setup using a really old AT power supply with the 5 pin plug attached to the normal amiga power socket, along with an additional floppy power connector plugged in at the floppy power socket on the motherboard (split to go to the floppy drive also)
I had to have 2 power points from the PSU as it wouldn't boot without it. I use to (on several occasions) have to soft reset it in order for it to get past the dim green light stage of booting.

Im wondering if this is an issue with my crappy AT power supply? I've read reports online that if the voltage of the 5v rail drops below 4.75 then wierd things happen - well - mine reads 4.70 at the motherboard connector by the floppy. Could this be the reason its not booting because theres not enough power?
The AT PSU 5v rail reads 5.05 volts off load when switched on, then it reads 4.7 on load when the amiga is attached to it. What should it be at best? The AT PSU is rated at 200Watts

Also - Would purchasing the 250W PSU with just the single 5pin connector for £24.99 from http://www.amigakit.com work with my setup or do I still need to connect a spur off the power supply directly to the amiga motherboard? Is it possible to power both blizzard cards and the amiga all through the main 5 pin traditional amiga power connector??

Please if anyone can shed some light on this It would really make my day. I miss my miggy being down and I'd really like to get it back up and running again! Im sure its just a PSU issue....

[badgerme]

The ppc card is a 210mhz with a 25mhz 040. Has anyone managed to get this setup running with just the standard amiga 5 pin power connector and a at/atx psu without having to run a seperate power connector going to the floppy power connector on the main board? Or is this a necessity to get enough power over to the ppc card?
I've got my setup inside the original a1200 case you see and would really like to have just one power lead instead of 2 as I did previously.

Also I'm measuring the 5v rail onload at the a1200's motherboards floppy power connector as being 4.7v - is this the correct place to check the 5v rail? Can someone post their 5v Reading at this point here also please so I can compare?

Cheers guys! Really appreciate any light on this one!

[badgerme]

Thank you all for your suggestions! I've tried different simm combinations (including the RAM i had in there before I upgraded to the 2x128mb) and I still get a black screen and a dimm green light. Oddly I also get the same black screen and dim green light even when the BVision isn't connected? I would have thought at least this would have required enough less power to make it fire up...?

To add more power over to the motherboard floppy connector: can I simply just take a +5v over from the 5pin socket over to it from the main amiga power connector or does it need its own molex connector from the psu? Main reason for asking is that I've just bought one of these and amigakit.com claim it will work:

http://amigakit.leamancomputing.com/catalog/product_info.php?cPath=39&products_id=866

I really don't want to stick the whole thing in a tower spoils the original amiga feel i think...

Here a question: How many power do I need to run a Blizzard 603e+ with 256mb ram, a BVision - a couple of small fans and a 2gb Compact Flash card? Surely its not coming close to 200Watts (the old AT PSU that I have.....) - I'm really hoping that the Old AT PSU is failing to give out a reliable 5v rail on load.... how can i test the old AT PSU to see what load it takes before dropping the voltage?

Any suggestions would be greatly received - cant wait to get back up and running again..

[badgerme]

Ok guys I've just tried the new power supply and the floppy connector on the motherboard now reads 4.97v! (a big improvement on 4.7v)

Only problem is that it still doesn't get past the dim green light and the black screen.

if I take the card out the Amiga boots and works fine.

I've different RAM chips and still the same. I really don't think it's the ram.

Is it knackered? Does anyone still know if Jean Jaques is still repairing Amiga hardware in France? (http://www.amigacenter.com) ??

Any tips/advice to get me back up and running will be really appreciated!

Cheers

[badgerme]

I have 2x128mb simms and they pretty big (double sided)

As I've said before the card worked with ram in for about 10-20 mind before freezing. If they had touched surely it would have blown up/stopped working almost immediately?

I'm wondering if the card has suffered any damage after having the 5v rail @ 4.7 with the old power supply?

Has anyone had anything repaired recently by The Amiga Center? Still waiting for a reply from Jean (JJ)

[badgerme]

Delshey: Have tried the on/off approach as well as moving the card in/out at a fraction at a time and still the same situation - dim green light - no boot
When it did use to work - I would normally have to soft reboot (CTRL + 2A keys) in order to reset it and get the dim green light to go bright green - is this normal or does it sound like the card was either on its way out - or simply reinforces the original PSU issue by way of the 5v rail not being 'strong' enough at 4.7v.

I think I'll skip the upgrade..... I wont how much a repair will be. If I have shorted the ram on the 68k processor - does that basically mean - game over?

I cant see that I have as the card worked with the RAM in for some time....

I do hope Mr JJ can help me out

[badgerme]

Have tried holding ESC for the menu whilst turning on and nothing..... I've tried soft resetting it and holding ESC and nothing......

Does this card boot without any RAM in? I just wondered because I could take the ram out to eliminate it as being a suspect in this debugging process.....